Ultimate Level 1

“You met her?!”

Tanila’s eyes had never been as wide as they were now.

Max noticed she wasn’t the only one with an open mouth; Fowl and Batrire had the same expression.

“I mean, I think it could have been one of the gods. I was in a temple of Phaius and giving an offering when an older woman showed up. A minute later, I couldn’t move. She had grown and then was gone. She warned me I needed to grow stronger and that I would be hunted.” Max paused and shivered as if someone had walked across his grave. “That man I killed proves she was right.”

The only sound for a minute was the wind blowing across the rocks in the dungeon.

“How strong do you think you need to be?”

Looking at Tanila, Max smiled and shrugged. “I have no idea, but we all know how weak I am.”

“What do you mean weak? You have a skill that takes most one hundred levels to acquire!” Fowl exclaimed. “Do you really not understand how powerful that skill is?”

Max realized he didn’t.

[Skill Description - Melee Weapon Mastery]

*****

Melee Weapon Mastery - Uncommon Skill: This skill provides mastery of all melee weapons, even ones not previously learned. Every attack will be more likely to successfully hit the location they aim at. Attacks will have a higher chance of critically striking and doing increased damage. Mastery grants an improved understanding of combination attacks.

*****

“I can use every melee weapon…”

Snorting, Fowl nodded and tapped the hammer on his hip. “You are a walking source of melee damage. With that skill, imagine what you could have done against the undead. Two hammers? A tree trunk? Even those two swords you mentioned getting from that guy you defended yourself against.”

Slowly nodding his head, Max realized exactly what Fowl was talking about.

“You two done comparing skill sizes? If so, we can see what difference this will make in our ability to progress.” Batrire said as she began casting her buff. “I’m ready to enjoy some easy experience courtesy of Seth.”

Max smiled, activated his storage, and pulled out both the swords he had gotten off James.

“I guess now is better than never to try these out.”

[ Inspect Weapons ]

*****

Sharp Silver Sword (Right)

+2 Strength

Sharp - 10% increased damage when slashing

Sharp Silver Sword (Left)

+2 Strength

Sharp - 10% increased damage when slashing

*****

[Simple Stat Check]

*****

HP: 360/360

MP: 60/60

Stamina: 180/180

STR: 27+13

DEX: 18+3

CON: 28+8

INT: 12

WIS: 9

*****

“This is going to be fun,” Max said with a massive grin.

They found another group of three ogres, two with axes and one with a tree trunk.

“Can you root one with an axe, and I’ll manage the other?” Max asked.

Tanila nodded, and Fowl rotated his shoulders, smiling as he saw Max spinning his swords in little circles.

“You scare me sometimes,” Fowl said, watching Max cast a fire and ice enchantment on his swords. “What were the gods thinking, giving someone so much power?”

Batrire grunted but said nothing, and Max was glad no one seemed to want him to answer that question. He had struggled with it himself more than once.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

“Engage, and then I’ll ensnare the one in the middle,” Tanila said.

Max entered stealth as Fowl began to move toward the ogres, sizing up the beast he was about to face. His mind told him different ways to parry that massive axe with his swords.

The ogres started to run toward Fowl as he shouted, gaining their attention.

“Resisted!”

Fowl slowed his charge when they heard Tanila tell them her ensnare had failed. Max had seen the roots reach up, but the ogre had taken two steps, ripping them from the ground and falling behind the other two by just a few steps.

“Seth!”

Max wanted to respond, but he couldn’t. Doing so would break stealth, and he knew what he needed to do. Moving as fast as possible, he put himself in the path of the ogre on the left with an axe and prepared to attack with two weapons for the first time.

Max could see how the ogre ran, its legs and arms moving forward and backward. The axe was in its left hand and his mind saw what he needed to do to turn this fight around.

The ogre came right at him, unaware of Max, who started his strike as its right leg planted on the ground a foot in front of him. The two swords sliced as one, catching it right on the knee and cutting its lower leg off.

The ogre stumbled, plunging face-first to the ground as its momentum sent it skidding, its axe flying from its left hand.

Spinning the moment he sliced the ogre's leg off, Max ran to catch up with the floundering beast.

Fowl had moved, engaging the ogre with the trunk as Max reached the ogre face-first on the rocks, jumping up into the air and driving both swords into the back of its neck. It barely shuddered as his blades punctured its neck and sliced the spinal cord all the way through.

He felt the second ogre with an axe enter his sphere of detection and spun in time, both swords coming up to deflect its overhead chop, sending the blade to the side where it slashed into its fallen partner's shoulder.

Max became a whirlwind of blades, spinning, slashing, and slicing the ogre before it could begin to lift its axe out of the corpse it had struck.

Massive pieces of flesh and chunks of muscle flew as Max ran between its legs, planting his feet and slicing both achilles simultaneously.

The creature started to fall backward, its legs giving out as its ankles folded under its weight. Prepared for that, Max dashed a few steps forward and held both swords up.

Its roar was cut off as both swords pierced its back and heart.

The weight of the ogre crashed down on Max, but he bent his legs, absorbing the impact. With a grunt, he pushed up and to the right, rolling the ogre off him as he pulled his swords free.

It took a few seconds to get out from under the corpse and see Fowl dealing with the other ogre, deflecting and absorbing blows from the tree trunk that kept coming at him.

The axe from the ogre he had just killed was a few steps away, and Max took the opportunity to try something new. Storing both swords, he picked up the massive axe, taller than him, and held it in both hands.

“Any time!” Fowl called out, getting pelted by rocks and wood shards as the tree trunk slammed into the ground next to his feet.

Grinning, Max ran forward, taking a few steps, skipping once toward the ogre's back before planting his feet and twisting his hips and then his arms. The massive axe swung with every ounce of strength he had, cutting into the ogre's waist and cleaving its body in half.

Its top half fell to the left, losing its grip on its weapon as blood flowed like a stream from both halves of its body.

“Holy elf tits! What the hell was that, Seth?”

Holding the axe in one hand, Max spun it around like a top before dropping it to the rocks with a clatter.

“Sorry, Fowl, I just wanted to see what I could do.”

“By the gods, that is not even fair! You cleaved an ogre in half with one strike! One strike!”

Shrugging, Max moved a few feet from the blood that was pooling around the corpse and activated his storage, pulling out a backpack and setting it down on the ground.

“Just wait till we fight the lizards in the level twenty-five dungeon. Those things are nasty.”

Fowl looked at the two women who had moved up to the corpses. “Tell me he isn’t already talking about the next dungeon. I mean, seriously?”

Tanila chuckled as she pulled out her knife and moved to cut off the ogre’s ears. “I have no doubt we will be there soon enough.”

Grunting, Fowl smirked and moved to help with the trophy gathering.

They cleared the rest of the second level with ease. Max demonstrated the power of a skill most could never imagine acquiring. Each attack he delivered was done with precision, killing or disabling every ogre they faced.

After they finished the dungeon, stopping outside the boss portal and returning to the adventurers’ hall, Max bid them farewell and headed off to bring Aimee for their daily grind.

It took no time as Max kept one of the large axes, cleaving an orc in half with almost every strike.

Aimee had been excited, hitting level nine after the goblin and orc dungeon, promising to bake something special for Max later.

With only about four hours of sunlight left, Max entered the first alchemist shop he had spotted while traveling to get Aimee. Puffing the Dragon seemed like an exciting name, but the magical sign outside that had a red dragon blowing smoke out of its nose had been what caught his attention.

Entering the shop, Max’s nose was assaulted by a pungent smell that made his eyes water.

“Sorry! Forgive the smell!”

Looking around, Max found a dwarf on the ground behind a counter where glass was scattered on the stone floor, and purple liquid bubbled as the man wiped it up with a weird cloth.

“Need any help?” Max asked as he pinched his nose, breathing in through his mouth and immediately wondering if that was the wrong decision. A weird sour taste now coated his tongue. He smacked his tongue to the roof of his mouth a few times, finding out it didn’t help.

The dwarf sighed as he tried to push the purple liquid into a flat glass container. “Some child was in here with their parent and knocked this over. Of course, they didn’t want to pay and… sorry, you don’t want to know all this.” He sat back onto his heels, his leather apron dripping the purple ooze onto the floor. “If you can stand the smell, I will do what I can to help you find what you are looking for.”

“I’ve smelled some pretty bad stuff in the dungeons. The taste…” Max chuckled and ran the top of his tongue against his teeth. “That’s something new. Take your time. I’ll look around.”

“Thank you!” the dwarf exclaimed, quickly returning to the task.

Max walked through the shop, looking at various jars holding different parts of monsters, liquids, flowers, and so many other things that he had no idea what they were.

“Alright! Thanks for waiting! I’m Bardunac, and what can I help you with?”

Max turned around from the jar he was tapping with massive eyeballs floating in a clear liquid and saw that the dwarf had changed his apron. The most alarming feature was that he had no beard.

“You don’t have a beard…”

Bardunac grimaced but nodded. “Yes. I lost it last week when a mishap took place with my ex-assistant. Nearly lost my eyebrows as well.”

Chuckling, Max noticed they seemed less bushy than most dwarf eyebrows.

“So, besides my lack of facial hair, what can I do for you…”

“Seth. Seth Pendal.”

Cocking his thinned eyebrows, Bardunac looked at Max and took him in. “The shade slayer!”

Shaking his head, Max smiled. “No, I just held it off till a higher-level adventurer could come and kill it. All I did was piss it off and somehow manage to stay alive.”

“Well, adventurer Seth, what can I do for you?”

Taking the two paws out of storage, Max held the grey-scaled paw and the red one out before Bardunac. “I’m interested in seeing what I could get for these.”

The dwarf began to choke for a few seconds, his eyes locked on the red-scaled paw.

“I’ll buy it!” he said without hesitation. “Tell me what you want for it!”

Looking down at the red paw, Max looked at Bardunac and saw the dwarf had yet to blink.

“Uh… tell me what you might offer. I was actually looking at comparing prices between a few shops.”

The dwarf struggled to tear his eyes off the paw, forcing himself to look at Max as he scratched his beardless chin.

“You really don’t know what that is worth, do you?”