A barrage of 6 spells quickly flew through the air, each being of a different element, and each striking and killing a whole group of goblins. “I’m at 450 already!” Faust shouted to Dream who was fighting a fair distance away. “If you give up now and admit that I’m the winner, I’ll let you call off the bet!”

“497, 98, 99, 500!” Dream shouted back, counting the kills from 2 dominated goblin warriors, a dominated goblin archer, and Neon. “Wanna give me the gold now or later?”

“Hey I told you those kills shouldn’t count!” Faust argued, sending some more spells at charging goblins. “I mean all you’ve done is stand there and heal, and somehow you think I should let you count those as your kills?”

“Yes!” Dream replied, sending a Healing Bolt to Neon. “If you get to count your Shifter kills, why can’t I count my Tamer ones?”

“Cause I’m actually doing the killing!?” A sudden fireball came flying towards Faust’s turned back.

“Faust look out!” Dream shouted out of concern.

Turning his head in time, Faust saw the fireball and just smiled as the floating crystal moved with a quickened speed in front of him. The fireball directly hit the crystal, but as its explosion went off, all of the flames were quickly absorbed into the crystal and it became slightly less dull in colour. “Was that concern I heard?” Faust teased.

Quickly turning away, Dream shouted “501, 502, 503!”

“Hey, come on! At least only count Neon’s kills!” But seeing her now ignoring him, Faust said to himself “She really leaves me no choice but to go all out.” And he began tossing Fireball after Fireball at the waves of endless goblins.

Tobias observed from a distance as Lavie fought completely surrounded by hundreds of goblins already, and with the red marks—under her clothing—glowing even brighter and more visible. Using the chain whip, Lavie swung it around in a huge circle with such force it cut and sliced through 50 goblins around her, but stopped when it got stuck in a hobgoblin’s old armour. Letting the whip go, she grabbed the greatsword from her back, and with an unnatural strength she leaped forward and bisected the hobgoblin with a clean diagonal cut. Doing a 180 degree turn, Lavie hurled the greatsword horizontally and it rapidly spun towards the goblins charging behind her—cleaving through 50 goblins before stopping.

Blocking the incoming arrows with her shield, Lavie quickly moved to line up as many archers she could see, and with just as much strength as the greatsword, she threw the spear. Piercing through countless goblins, the spear disappeared into the crowd. Seeing an archer aim at her still, Lavie threw her the dagger on her thigh, digging it into the archer’s skull and killing it. Holding her right hand out, the horns protruding from her hair glowed red, and the dagger came flying back to her hand. Drawing her rapier with her left hand, Lavie dual wielded both the weapons as she continued slaying all the goblins around her.

“Just like at the mansion, her moves are sloppy and basic. It’s almost as if she’s never used those weapons before.” Tobias said to himself, “But that said, her fighting instincts are unreal, she’s like a person born knowing how to fight.” Adding, “And what makes her even scarier, is that I don’t think she’s even used a single skill yet, and she’s still taken out over 500 goblins while being completely surrounded.” Tobias then got another notification.

Congratulations you have Leveled Up! All Stats have increased by 1, and you have gained 10 Available Points.

“That's my third one, I guess those children are also doing their share of work.” Feeling his body rejuvenated, “I guess I should move on after taking care of these guys.” Turning back to the multiple different groups of goblins chained up together.

After a few more minutes of fighting, the whole Party got the same message.

Your Party has killed the Dungeon Boss, and are now able to leave the Close Dungeon.

Motivated by the message, they all began to fight even harder, losing each other in the battles, but still heading towards the mountains. All of them separated, they each heard a loud shouting coming from a huge goblin in the back. All the goblins suddenly retreated a little and kept their distance from each of the Party members, as they were left alone to a Goblin Chieftain. Then to their surprise, they all got another notification and a message in the chat.

As a follower of Eyes Thalion, you now gain the bonus effect of ‘The Cursed Crown Of Royalty’. +25% of Base Stats, and +10% to Base Regenerations. Party

Eyes- Heads up, the four Goblin Chieftains are not in the castle. And be careful if you run into one, they are all Lv.20s.

Reading the message, they all put on a serious face—readying their weapons and magics, and the Chieftains doing the same.

***

A few minutes earlier...

You have gained the Title: [A Kingslayer]. The Kingslayer: Having killed a King, you now gain the natural dislike of all Royalty and Nobility, but gain the natural liking of all common people. You have gained the Title: [Betrayer of Goblinkind]. Betrayer of Goblinkind: With the blood of a Goblin King on your hands, all of Goblinkind will have an instinctual hatred towards you, and become extremely hostile on sight.

“These titles seem pretty terrible, and I thought you could only get good effects from them.” Also thinking, “And I didn’t lose the Royal Guard title for some reason, even though it’s completely useless now.” Staring at the Goblin King’s body. Seeing the women in the cell trembling at the sight of the body and me, I said to them “It’s okay, everything will be over soon.” Dragging the King’s body outside of their cell. “Just wait here and stay safe, we’ll come get you when it’s clear.”

Quickly collecting the eyes, I noticed that the crown on the King’s head had changed completely. Before it was a spiked black and gold crown, but now it was just a simple black round band. Grabbing it, I read the Stats.

The Cursed Crown Of Royalty

Legendary

A crown cursed with the incredible power to make one truly Royal in exchange for life.

Curse Effect: Sacrificing half of your remaining lifespan, an everlasting bond will be created, and you will be recognized as Royalty of your Race.

Bonus Effect: Gain +25% of Base Stats, and +10% to Base Regenerations, for yourself and those who follow you.

“Wow, if I wasn’t an Elf I probably wouldn’t use this, but since I am...”

Bringing the crown up and resting it on my head, a sudden red glow came from it, and surges of pain immediately struck my head. Collapsing to the ground, the pain was a hundred times worse than the pain from the Race change, and I could feel my body starting to seize up. Unable to even scream, the red glow drifted down my whole body with the pain following right behind it. Barely keeping my eyes open, the pain was relentless, and I blacked out...but then regained consciousness a second later. The pain and the black outs repeated for what felt like hours, but was probably only about 5 minutes, until it just ended. Breathing heavily and sweating profusely, I read the new message.

You have sacrificed 240 years of your remaining lifespan to ‘The Cursed Crown of Royalty’, creating an everlasting and ever-growing bond with each other until the day that you die.

Picking myself up from the ground and still breathing hard, I said smiling “240 more years to live, was it even a sacrifice? Elves really aren't fair.” Limping out of the underground chamber, and sending a message to the Party.

***

Dodging the incoming crossbow bolts, Tobias drew his own crossbow and stood his ground. Aiming with the bolt, Tobias carefully returned fire at the Goblin Ranger Chieftain; but reacting in time, the Chieftain turned his shoulder and blocked the bolt with his spiked shoulder armour. Laughing, the Chieftain fired a bolt back, but Tobias just stood there unflinching and loaded another bolt. As the Chieftain’s bolt struck Tobias in the chest, it suddenly went through, leaving an ethereal hole that filled itself back up and returned to the normal body of Tobias. With the Chieftain confused at what happened to his bolt, Tobias took that time to fire, reload, and then fire again; this time hitting both bolts in the gap between the gauntlet and shoulder armour. The range standoff continued, with the Chieftain shooting and reloading faster—and having more bolts—but Tobias didn’t seem to get hurt by any of his shots, and just carefully aimed and hit all of his shots. It ended when they both ran out of crossbow bolts.

Tobias stood seemingly unharmed, while the Chieftain had 20 bolts stuck in the gaps of his armour—bleeding a little all over. Tobias smiled, saying “Unlucky, want to try your luck with your daggers?” Drawing his short sword and his dagger. The Chieftain roared, charging at Tobias with daggers drawn. Using Backstab, Tobias quickly appeared behind the Chieftain stabbing him in the back and piercing through his armour, but the blades broke off as he tried to take them out. Looking at the broken weapons, Tobias said “Aww shit, I knew I should’ve stolen some new ones.” The Chieftain then turned around and stabbed Tobias right through the chest with both daggers, and lifted him into the air. Raised in front of the Chieftain’s face, Tobias struggled to throw a group of circled chains on the head of the Chieftain—slowly sliding down to his neck. The Chieftain smiled exposing his sharp teeth as Tobias’ body fell limp in the air.

The Chieftain dropped the body from the daggers, spitting and stepping on it as he headed back towards the mountain—unbothered by the chains. “Spitting and stepping on the dead isn’t very nice you know.” Freaking out at the sudden voice, the Chieftain turned to see Tobias holding the still attached chain. “Why don’t you say hello to my Chain of Binding.” Pulling on the chain, it began to slowly tighten around the Chieftain’s neck. Grabbing some, the Chieftain was able to rip off some of the chains, but there were too many around his neck as the other chains just kept tightening and tightening. Tobias walked towards the Chieftain, and stood over him as he fell over gasping for air. And with one more pull on the chains, an audible crack came from the Chieftain's neck.

Congratulations you have Leveled Up! All Stats have increased by 1, and you have gained 10 Available Points.

“I’ll be taking these.” Grabbing the crossbow, and the two daggers.

Chieftain’s Crossbow

Rare

Attack: 250

+10 Strength

+5 Agility

Effect: Increase Attack Speed and Reload Speed by 15%.

Requirements: Lv.20, Str 80

Left Fang Right Fang

Rare

Attack: 188

+3 Agility

+2 Strength

Requirement: Lv.15, Agi 80

Rare

Attack: 188

+3 Agility

+2 Strength

Requirement: Lv.15, Agi 80

“Only 6 more levels until I can use the daggers.” Tobias thought to himself, “And it is a good thing I only take half damage on physical attacks, or I would’ve had to work a lot harder to kill that Chieftain.” Then seeing the goblins who were watching run towards the mountain, Tobias said “I guess it’s time to clean up the rest of them.” Chasing after the goblins.

***

Watching Neon and 3 dominated hobgoblin warriors fighting a Goblin Rider Chieftain riding a Dire Wolf, Dream thought to herself “Looks like I’ll have to join in, the dominated goblins just aren’t good enough.” Moving towards the battle, she shouted out her commands. “You 3 tackle the rider off, and Neon take care of the wolf, but don’t kill it okay?”

“As you command, Mistress.” Neon waited as the Chieftain came charging on the dire wolf, but was clotheslined by the 3 hobgoblin warriors—knocking him off. The wolf running forward was lunged at by Neon, digging his long sharp claws into the side of the wolf and climbed onto its back. Whimpering at the pain, the wolf tried to bite Neon off but couldn’t turn his head enough to reach his back, and instead started running around trying to whip Neon off. Holding steady, Neon smiled with a wicked smile, biting into the back of the wolf’s neck, but remembering his Mistress's orders, he didn’t rip a chunk out and just released his bite. The pain from a direct bite on neck however was enough to cause even the large wolf to collapse. Pinning the wolf by the neck with his foot, Neon held a claw to its eye—keeping the wolf still out of fear.

The Chieftain easily overpowered the hobgoblin warriors, throwing them off and finishing them with his spear—only using a single stab to each of their chests. “Just to let you know, I’m taking that wolf of yours.” Dream smiled, sending a Decaying Bolt from her right hand and a Poison Bolt from her left. Both barely hitting the Chieftain’s neck, one side became affected by poison, and the other partially blackened. Angered, the Chieftain rushed towards Dream holding his shield up to block any other of her attacks. “You’re gonna hurt yourself if you do that.” The Chieftain thrusted his spear forward aiming for Dream’s body. Smiling, Dream raised her own shield, and half of the spear disappeared into it and then came out spearhead first, piercing deep into the spiked chestplate of the Chieftain. Confused, the Chieftain quickly moved back and looked at his spear. “I told you so.” Dream shrugged.

With the distance, Dream sent more bolts of poison and decay, slowly damaging the Chieftain who wasn’t able to block all of the bolts. The Chieftain tried to charge again but was still blocked by Dream’s strange shield, and just like before the attack reflected back at him—hurting himself. Stupidly the Chieftain repeated the cycle 4 more times, until his body collapsed from the decay, poison, and his own spear attacks.

Congratulations you have Leveled Up! All Stats have increased by 1, and you have gained 10 Available Points. Neon has Leveled Up!

“I kind of feel sorry for the guy, he was so dumb killing himself like that.” Dream said, looking over his dead body, and then picking up the spear and shield.

Chieftain’s Spear Shield of Vitality

Rare

Attack: 275

+15 Strength

Effect: Increase damage by 15% against armour.

Requirement: Lv.20, Str 90

Rare

+15 Vitality

+3% Physical Damage Reduction

Requirement: Lv.20, Str 80, Vit 80

“I don’t need the spear, but Reflection could use the Stats for the shield.” Storing the spear in her Inventory and absorbing the shield into her own. Then walking to Neon, Dream said “Really good job with handling the wolf Neon, but you can let him go now.”

“As you wish, Mistress.” Neon replied, releasing the wolf from under his foot.

The dire wolf cautiously rose, still bleeding from the wound on its neck and side, and staring at its dead master’s body. “I’m sorry about your master, but how about you come with me instead, boy?” Caressing the wolf’s wounds and casting Healing Touch on them.

***

Faust casted another Ice Bolt at the Goblin Shaman Chieftain, but it was still blocked by a continuous magical barrier. “Interesting, I wonder if he can show me more new magic I could try to learn.” Faust thought to himself. “But let’s see if his barrier can handle this.” Rapidly firing alternating bolts of elements and mana.

The Shaman held his staff in front and tried to keep the magic barrier up, but the unending barrage slowly caused the barrier to crack in different areas, and with a few more spells the barrier broke. Running out of the way from the rest of the incoming spells, the Shaman lifted his hands up and fire emitted from them, as he then slammed them to the ground. Feeling a sudden rumble under his feet, Faust looked down to see that he was inside a fiery circle.

Instinctually he shifted into a wolf trying to dive out of the circle, but only getting half way out, Faust’s whole lower wolf body got caught as a pillar of fire bursted from the circle on the ground. With his lower body burnt black, Faust shifted into his bear form, and his body was completely unburnt again. “That was a close one, that pillar of fire seemed strong, and Absorption couldn't detect where the magic was coming from till it was too late. Good thing my Shifts each have their own Hp, I'm practically unkillable, but I better not play around.” Faust then recovered all his Stats, getting a notification.

Congratulations you have Leveled Up! All Stats have increased by 1, and you have gained 10 Available Points.

Invigorated by the level up, Faust charged towards the Shaman. Panicking at the sight of a charging bear, the Shaman held his palms out and sent out a continuous hose of fire, but moving and floating in front of the bear, the crystal absorbed all of the magic. The Shaman roared in frustration, casting a spell on his staff and swinging the magic imbued staff at the bear. Easily reacting to the slow swings, Faust ducked underneath and struck the Shaman’s hand—knocking the staff away. Panicking again, the Shaman was about to send out the same fire spell, but interrupting him, Faust overpowered the physically weaker Shaman—using his much heavier body weight to pin the Shaman down, and mauling its face until its body fell limp.

“Most mages' weakness is close combat, but it’s not mine.” Shifting back to his human form, and walking over to pick up the dropped staff.

Chieftain’s Staff

Rare

Attack: 100

+15 Magic

+10 Intelligence

Effect: Increase Aoe damage by 15%.

Requirement: Lv.20, Mag 80, Int 80

Putting the staff in his inventory, Faust stood over the mauled body and said, “Now let’s see what your body can do.” Placing his hands on the body.

***

Congratulations you have Leveled Up! All Stats have increased by 1, and you have gained 10 Available Points.

Reading the notification and ripping her stuck greatsword out of the dead Goblin Warrior Chieftain’s chest, Lavie thought to herself “Was that really a Lv.20 monster?” Cleaning the blood off the greatsword, “At least the other one the other night put up a fight, but I guess I was a lower level then.” Lavie then lifted her arms and her four other weapons and her shield slowly floated to her. “Well looks like the practice is paying off. I can control more things now, even if they are slow to come to me.” Sheathing all the weapons floating around her, and picking up the Chieftain’s double-sided axe.

Chieftain’s Battleaxe

Rare

Attack: 280

+15 Strength

Effect: Increase damage by 15% against flesh.

Requirement: Lv.20, Str 100

Seeing the requirement, Lavie stored the axe away into her inventory for now and headed towards the mountains.

Running for a bit, Lavie met up with Tobias, and shortly after they heard a sudden shout. “Hey! Looks like you guys are okay!” Turning to see Dream riding a huge wolf, and Faust following close behind.

“So I see you children made it out alive.” Tobias smirked.

“Just cause we’re young, doesn’t mean we’re pushovers.” Faust replied. “I assume you guys took out a Chieftain too?

Tobias chuckled, “As simple as pulling a chain.”

“Have you guys seen any other goblins on your way here?” Lavie asked.

“No, they all retreated after I killed my Chieftain.” Dream answered.

“Me neither.” Faust added.

“They probably all fled to the castle.” Tobias suggested.

“Oh no, Eyes’ gonna be surrounded.” Dream said, concerned.

“Forget Eyes, I’m more worried he’s gonna take all the kills and I won’t be able to win our bet.” Faust said, enthusiastically climbing up onto the dire wolf.

“I’m gonna win either way, but Lavie and Tobias get on already.” Listening to her insistence, the whole Party got on the dire wolf and they rode off together.

The Party rapidly approached the long and narrow bridge that led to the castle in the middle of the lake. Running across it and getting closer to the entrance, they all spotted the familiar Eyes running along the wall being chased by thousands of goblins.