The Forgotten Legacy

The giants, although large, strong and durable were also slow. Shaun moved quickly between the attacking giants, none were able to pin him down or harm him with their hammers. Due to their size they couldn’t even rush him at once which made it just that much easier to move between them. Even with it being a 50 against 1 fight he held the advantage against them, the only annoying thing about them was that they took a while to actually take down.

His attacks, both with his mirrored ice blade and his own blade powered with elemental strikes were doing damage to the giants, but he wasn’t blitzing through them like he had wanted to. He took that as a challenge rather than being disheartened though, he just needed to up the power he was using and truly push his advantage. Pushing his body to the limit in both strength and dexterity he moved even faster, pushing his attacks to do more damage by increasing the power behind both his swings and his strikes.

Changing up his approach he also decided to use his mirrored blade on the same giants he himself was attacking rather than splitting his attention, while he would attack from the ground, forcing the giant’s attention on him, he moved the other blade with his mind to attack at the head. Although he was taking the fight seriously, there was a large part of him that was truly enjoying this fight, he was under pressure of a time limit and he wasn’t needing to focus on protecting anyone, he could just stay in the moment and just give himself over to the fight at hand.

The giants had some ability over earth, they made the very ground that he was moving on move and rumble, some even attempted to create projectiles out of the earth and launch them at him. For the most part this had absolutely no impact on him, he had the element of earth, he could control it and use it in much the same way, just with more power than the giants could.

When the first giant had fallen another took its place, and when the second fell so too did another move in. They did everything they could to kill him and as more fell to his swords the fever of the battle increased. It was only when he got halfway through slaughtering the giant’s that he got the feeling from his magma slime that the wall was ready to be taken down. For a moment he considered going back and being the one to take down the wall himself, but leaving the giants to join the attack would have consequences on his own army if he didn’t take care of them. Although he didn’t really need his army to help him take down the earthen forces, he didn’t see the harm in them killing off the lower levelled soldiers as they would offer next to no experience or challenge for him.

Rather than waste time, he sent the order for his eagles to loop back to his army and then blast through the wall from the opposite side, allowing his army through. It would take a minute or so before they accomplished the task and he didn’t let that distract him form his own fight against the giant’s.

The more he fought with his mirrored blade the easier it was to split is focus and the quicker he was able to move the blade. He was close to hitting level 10 in the skill, and as soon as he finished this dungeon he imagined that he would be able to add another blade into the mix.

By the time he heard the wall explode he had taken out most of the remaining giants, only having 10 more to kill before he could move on. His eagles had rejoined the fight after destroying a very large portion of the wall and even his slime was now in on the fight. Shaun couldn’t help the smile that spread across his face, he had not had this much fun in a dungeon, ever.

It wasn’t just the fighting that he enjoyed, but it was being able to come up with large scale plans in a war and seeing those plans carried out with precision. He was surprised at just how much he was enjoying it, and he knew, that when he had the time, he would be coming back and doing this dungeon at least a few times over.

When the final giant fell to his sword he looked around him and saw the bodies of all of those he had slain, he took in the sight for a few moments, feeling proud of just how much he had grown in the last few weeks. His skill with the blade had grown by leaps and bounds which was reflected in what he had accomplished here. He wasn’t relying on his affinity like he had been but instead utilising the skills that the system gave him in a way that he should have been doing the entire time.

After he was done with reviewing his work, he moved up into the air to get a better look at the actual fight between the two armies. As he had expected, his own army had taken them unprepared, his eagles having done their job of causing mayhem and ruining their opponents’ defences. He diligently looked to see if he could locate any higher levelled opponents in the mix but with the giants taken out of play, he had single handily removed the biggest threat to him winning the dungeon. All that was left was finding the level 124 commander and dealing with it along with any others who were with it.

Sending his echo throughout the armies, he wasn’t able to locate anything at the level he wanted, that meant that the only other place that the opposing commander could be was at their outpost. Taking one final look over the battlefield he knew his army would be fine without any further contribution from him.

Just as he was about to make his exit to move towards the outpost he felt something enter his echo from that same direction. Not long after he felt several more living beings join it until he realised that rather than having to make his way to them, they would be coming to him, and by the feel of it, the commander included.

He had about two minutes to prepare for the new incoming force, and he planned on using that time wisely. Still in the air he started pulling together the water from his surrounding and condensing it down like he had been practicing before. The biggest difference was that he didn’t leave the water in its liquid form once he managed to condense it enough, instead he shaped it into a spear and froze it with his ice element. Shaun repeated the process again and again, working as quickly as he could to form up as many spears as possible. By the time the force was only seconds out from his own army he had managed to create just over 2 dozen of his frozen spears.

Then he waited. Each second that passed felt like an eternity but he was patient, he would get one shot at pulling off his attack and he needed to wait for the perfect moment, so he waited. When he got his first look at one of the creatures he was surprised by what he saw. They were not overly large, if anything they were slightly shorter than he was, they looked fairly human, if it wasn’t for the fact that they looked like they were coated in a layer of stone mixed with metal. They also carried a double-bladed axe, one that looked sharp enough to cut through hardened metal and bone.

After the first appeared another followed, and quickly about 40 of the creatures came into view, behind them was a being similar to the first just taller, more muscular and carrying two axes instead of one. Shaun didn’t attack immediately, waiting for his moment when they came further towards the battle before joining the fight again.

These new creatures stopped a moment and took in the fight, it only lasted a second or two but in that time they had assessed the situation and formed up their own plan of attack. As one they all took off to meet the water forces in battle, he knew that if he did nothing they would end up turning the tide of the war, but he wasn’t having that.

Using his willpower he sent down every single on of his spears in a shower of death, it took only a second for them to impale both the creatures and ground around them. If that had been all he had done then it would have been a devastating attack, but he didn’t use half measures in this initial strike. He had powered each and every one of his spears with an ice strike, it had strained him to do so, and they weren’t the most powerful strikes he could manage, but given the sheer number of spears he had managed to turn the entire area around these new creatures into a frozen wasteland. From what he could see and feel, he had managed to kill off half of the supports and those that were still alive were barely able to move. The only one that was left of the force that seemed to be in a semi okay state was the commander, but with ice now coating the ground, forming a barrier between it and the earth, it was severely disadvantaged.

Not letting this opportunity pass him by, Shaun flew down to the group and as soon as he landed started cutting through the remaining supports as quickly as he could, they had no time to form any counter measures against him, having barely survived his initial attack and fighting back the ice that was freezing them to the spot they stood.

**Earthen Maude Commander – Level 124**

He had no idea what an Earthen Maude was, but truly it didn’t matter, the commander was going to go down with its brethren, he would make sure of it. While he moved closer to the commander, as did the commander come at him. The biggest difference between the two was that while Shaun was able to walk on the ice as if it was nothing but solid ground the commander was slipping all over the place and looked like a baby goat trying to stand for the first time.

As soon as they got within striking distance of each other the commander empowered its axes and attempted to bisect him, but the attacks were clumsy and he was able to move out of the way with ease. Following up with his own attacks, he summoned his mirror blade, this time as a magma blade and met one of the commanders axes with his own. For a moment the two colliding weapons were in stalemate, earth and magma vying to win the fight. It took only that moment though before the magic that the commander was using in his axe waivered and the power of his own magma blade cut through the axe as if it was butter.

There was no hesitation form the commander though, it seemed unbothered by one of its axes being destroyed, instead it tried to move out of the way of the blade and in the process slipped on the ice. Giving his opponent no mercy, Shaun moved in with his own blade and using a good amount of mana in his own attack, he slammed his sword down with a magma strike. The commander moved his remaining axe to intercede in his strike but the moment the 2 blades met his own sword cut through the axe and then through the commander. He waited a moment to see if the commander would be able to recover from the attack with some kind of earth skill but after a few seconds of just staring at its body he concluded that he had won. How disappointing. Even the giants fought harder than this.

He had expected that once he killed the commander that the dungeon would finish, he waited for the message to appear, but nothing did. Great now I have to fight the fodder.

Knowing that there was nothing left to challenge him in the dungeon he simply moved through the fighting of the lower levelled creatures and killed every remaining earth solider that he saw. It didn’t take that long, his own army and summons having done most of the work, but he didn’t gain anything form it either. Once the final soldier was slain a cheer of victory came from the water forces, and with it the message he had been waiting for.

**You have defeated a (Earthen Soldier – Level 84). Experience gained.

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**You have defeated a (Earthen Giant – Level 112). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained.**

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**You have defeated a (Earthen Maude Guard – Level 118). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained.**

**You have defeated a (Earthen Maude Commander – Level 124). Bonus experience for killing an opponent above your level gained.**

**Class: Elemental Blade Slinger has levelled up by +5 levels. [Advanced] Elemental Blade Slinger has reached Level 115. +15 Str, +10 Dex, +15 End, +15 Vit, +20 Soul gained**

**Race: Human has levelled up by +2 levels. Human (E) has reached Level 86. +32 Ap gained**

** Win the War Dungeon Completed. Dungeon will automatically eject successful participants in 1 minutes.**

5 levels for the entire dungeon wasn’t bad, especially considering he hadn’t spent that long inside. He imagined that if he didn’t have such an overwhelming advantage with this dungeon set up that it would have taken a lot longer. What didn’t disappoint him though has his skill levels, both his summons skill and his blade mirror skill had made it over the next hurdle. Now he could summon 4 creatures and 2 blades, he would need to practice both but once he adjusted he would have even more of an advantage.

He didn’t converse with anyone while he waited for the minute to finish, he did say goodbye to his summons though, thanking them for their great work. When the timer hit 0 he appeared back outside of the dungeon, he followed all of the prompts for claiming the dungeon and terraforming the area with no issues and then immediately went back to the screen which would let him enter the dungeon again. As usual he could choose a difficulty but now instead of having a random option he could choose the elements for both sides. The elements were all basic but that may just be exactly what others need to start seeing if they could bond an affinity, something he would raise with Viv and the others.