"I don't like the way that thing's looking at us," Keith pulled the curtain closed, looking at Nathan, then to their sleeping comrades. "It hasn't exactly gathered an army, but-"

"I know," Nathan stepped over and pushed the curtain open enough for him to look across the dome, to the Seven-Pointer staring at them.

Three days had passed since Nathan had woken up and the others had their magic awakened. None of them had a major boost – Michael received a triple, while the other two received a doubling, and they were still adjusting to their greater senses.

Nathan enjoyed watching them fidget because their clothes itched like hell to wear. His did, too, but he'd learned to ignore it already, since most of his adjustment had happened while he had been unconscious.

Over the three days since the others had woken, the sleeping three had taken shifts going through the school and outside and clearing out monsters, retreating once they started getting tired and reporting where the stronger ones were. Nathan and Keith then dealt with the stronger ones.

They wanted to avoid another attack like the one Nathan woke up on.

"How many monsters are here?" Nathan asked.

Keith pulled out his crystal orb and gripped it firmly with both hands, his irises glowing.

"One thousand forty-seven," Keith answered after a few seconds, his eyes returning to normal. "Looks like they built back up after we took the ones out on the football field earlier. What do you think we should do about this one?"

"Kill it," Nathan answered as Keith rejoined him. "Though it seems stronger than the rest of the Seven-Pointers so far."

Keith returned the crystal orb to his Item Box, then glanced at their companions. They hadn't revealed it to the others yet, mostly because Nathan didn't want them to know. He only let Keith use it when the others weren't around or were sleeping. They used it to confirm Nathan's theory, and the others did, indeed, have their Seven-Pointers spawn on the eighth day, meaning that the tougher instance would be there for at least twelve days.

"It has probably thirty monsters guarding it," Keith said. "This one's intelligent."

Nathan nodded, flicking his gaze to the thirty-two monsters standing to the sides and behind the Seven-Pointer. They were definitely guards, and all were either Three-Pointers or Five-Pointers – not a Two-Pointer present.

"And you can't use force magic to just kill them?"

"Right," Keith nodded. "These things are resilient to it. I've tried it before, and all of the monsters seem to have magical defenses, even if they didn't have magic before."

Nathan frowned at that comment, even though it wasn't the first time Keith had told him about it. Magical defenses weren't something someone could just have – they required magic to create and sustain, even if the mana drain was very small. Keith stated that despite having a stronger defense up at all times, he still generated more mana than he used for it.

Yet the monsters – with their magic locked – seemed to have one, regardless of rank. It was something likely done by whoever designed the System to prevent magicians like Keith and Madeline from just one-shotting every monster they came up against.

If an exploit like that existed, those magicians like them would easily beat-out everyone else in the game.

"By the way," Nathan said, and Keith looked at him. "You made it sound like magicians weren't very common and that it wasn't a well-known thing, even among the governments. Three hundred billion a year is pretty different from that."

"Erm," Keith said. "Sorry? Wasn't meant to sound that way. I meant in general. There are probably around two hundred magicians in our county, though across the river has probably three or four thousand. But there are also around a million people living in the city and its surrounding areas."

Nathan shrugged.

"Aim a wave of force directly at the Seven-Pointer," Nathan told him. "I'm going to bounce around. Draw its attention, get it to start heading this way. I'm going to throw it down."

"Alright," Keith said, and Nathan stepped out from behind the curtain, immediately jumping to the side.

As Nathan ran and jumped around the track and walls, Keith created several force pushes aimed at the Seven-Pointer, striking it in the face and torso. The monster snarled and grew out its wings, blood spraying out of its back onto the floor and monsters behind it, then it flew up into the air.

While the monster was preoccupied with taking on the sudden assault from the magician, it sensed something moving towards it, then fell toward the ground with a sudden impact.

"He… meant literally throw it down!" Keith blurt out in shock.

Nathan landed on the Seven-Pointer's chest and began striking it repeatedly, hollering for Keith to deal with the others before they got to the bottom of the bleachers, and Keith began firing slashes of air at the monsters.

The Seven-Pointer struggled under Nathan, eventually throwing him off, immune to the stunning effects of his Burst Knuckle's mod. Nathan landed in a crouch, then launched himself at the Seven-Pointer.

He wrestled with the Seven-Pointer, which was, indeed, a lot stronger than the others of its type. He guessed that it was at least half as much stronger. He'd come across others like it, but not for in its letter ranking.

The Seven-Pointer threw Nathan off, who landed on a pair of Three-Pointers. The warrior quickly killed them, pausing when a message formed in his vision.

5,000 Points held at one time. New Points Shop items are available; Stat Points and Skill Points are permanently 20% cheaper.

That interested Nathan greatly. He hadn't opened his Points Shop even though he was able to again, as they wanted to save his purchases for if they got into another pinch. Having the most Points out of everyone there made it better for him to conserve. If they got to the point where they absolutely needed to access a Points Shop, then Nathan's vast amount of Points would be beneficial to them.

Whether or not the bonus he received for doing it was a blessing in their current situation would be something to investigate later. For the moment, he needed to focus on the fight against the Seven-Pointer, which had begun to charge towards him.

Nathan caught its fist in his hand, stepping to the side and throwing the humanoid beast, using its own momentum against it.

The creature slammed into the bleachers, then stood up and flew towards Nathan, hurling fireballs as it drew closer. The warrior lifted up his hands, taking the brunt of the spell with his palms, allowing the flames to splash over his arms. The spell itself wasn't powerful enough to power through his resistance the moment he triggered Stoneskin.

The flames tried to ignite his sleeves, but were too weak by then to damage them, and Nathan surged forward, meeting the monster with a series of swift strikes. The creature attempted to burn him with more fireballs and claw at him, but Nathan met that challenge with an Impact-enhanced kick to the groin.

The monster froze up, then let out a loud, piercing howl. Nathan swiftly kicked up, slamming its jaw shut, noting a satisfying leakage of blood indicating it had bitten its own tongue.

From that point, Nathan easily overpowered the monster, successfully striking it in several locations. While the Health was useful, there were some things it just didn't defend against. He'd learned that easily.

The impact from a fall was neutralized by Health, if available, but biting one's tongue wasn't. And, it seemed, nor was having one's balls crushed by a kick powered with hundreds of Strength, even with the beast's Endurance protecting it.

Even after Nathan stopped receiving damage notifications, indicating that he'd broken through its Health, the beast still resisted the attacks, showing off its massive resistance as it continued to struggle against him through the pain.

Nathan didn't let up his assault, striking every weak spot and critical point he could as quickly as he could, not letting the opportunity he'd created with the crotch-shot go to waste. At one point, he grabs the beast's balls and rips them off, causing it to howl once more, and he shoved them into its mouth, before delivering an uppercut to its jaw.

Before the thing could react, Nathan whipped out his knife and plunged it deep into its chest, now that its arms were no longer protecting it. He twisted for good measure and sliced the blade up and over, carving a deep, curved gash into the beast's chest before pulling it out and flicking the blade a few times, letting the blood splatter onto the floor.

He cleaned off the last of the blood with his sleeve, then inspected it and returned it to its sheath before looking at the audience. The monster's howls had woken the others, and they came out to investigate the source of the fight. Most of the other monsters had already been slain by Keith, but a few were left.

Fixing his gaze on a Five-Pointer, Nathan decided to test a theory and jumped up to the bleachers, striking it the moment he was close. It put up a fair fight, and took him two minutes to kill, but once he succeeded, he had the confirmation he was seeking.

5,000 Points earned in 1 Challenge. All Points, Stat Points, and Skill Points rewards are doubled; you can purchase up to 50 Skill Points' worth of Skills for free (1 use).

As soon as he closed that message, he pulled up his Skills Shop, where it displayed a 50 Skill Point Credit. There were two Skills from the Level 60 batch that he wanted – the only ones he'd unlocked for Level 60 as he hadn't unlocked all three for that or the prior batch – but they cost 30 Skill Points each.

One was more important than the other, so he purchased it with the credit. It didn't confirm yet, as he had to either fully confirm or add more to the Credit Purchase. He couldn't buy Skills with his Skill Points until he used the Credit, meaning he couldn't save them up in case there was a bonus at 10,000 Points, too.

The only Skill from the Level 50 batch looked interesting, but since it cost 25 Skill Points, he knew he'd have to save it up. That left him with just the Level 20's, which he hadn't touched other than Stoneskin, and his remaining Level 10, Scan.

Deciding Scan could just be bought, he added Iron Grip and Meditation, to use up the full 50 Skill Points Credit he'd earned.

As soon as he'd filled up his purchase, he confirmed it and promptly pulled up his Skills Menu, adding all 9 Skill Points he had to max out Piercing Strikes without even reading its description. Only then did he pull it up.

Piercing Strikes Level 10 Ignores 10% Endurance per Level Level 10 Max

The bonus was better than he'd expected – he thought it was only penetrate 5% Endurance per Level. Because of that, he had twice the bonus and had already maxed it out. It also meant that he would do full damage to everything on good hits.

He checked out his other Skills. Iron Grip increased his grip strength by 5% per Level, and Meditation increased his regenerations by 5% per Level, as well as gave a slight boost to physical recovery. Both of them had a Level 20 Maximum. Unlike Meditation, which had no set duration nor a Mana Cost, Iron Grip cost 25 Mana to use and lasted for five seconds per Level of the Skill.

Not a bad haul, in his opinion.

"Why did you go after that other one?" Samantha asked when Nathan returned to them.

"Theory."

"And?"

"I was right."

"Remind me," Michael said to William. "Not to touch any girl he claims as his. Having my balls is preferable."

"I'd already made a note to ask first," William told Michael. "Though now I'm having second thoughts about dating Samantha while he is."

"No sex and you're fine," Nathan grunted, then walked to where he normally slept. "Since you're up instead of sleeping, I'm going back to sleep."

Without letting anyone protest, Nathan sat down and wedged himself into the corner, promptly falling asleep.

"How he does that amazes me," Samantha told the others as they all returned behind the curtain and closed it. "Just falls asleep without issue, on-thought. And he always wakes so easily, yet nothing really wakes him unless we're trying."

"It's almost like magic," Keith shrugged. "I know some spells that can put me to sleep easily, though of course, he doesn't have those. But they also tend to not let me just wake when someone says my name trying to wake me. That part amazes me, since we can have a loud conversation right beside him and not bother him."

"Or we do bother him," William said. "And he just doesn't let us know."

"If he were a light sleeper," Michael snorted. "I'm pretty sure us handling monsters during our shifts would result in disturbing his sleep. And knowing Nathan, he wouldn't like having his sleep disturbed, and so just go on a rampage, fighting every monster in the Dome until they were all dead."

The four of them looked at Nathan, silently agreed that was true, then all took up watch. The howling of the monster had been unbearable to their ears and had shaken them awake. None of them would be sleeping soon, not even Keith, who had long-since adjusted to his heightened senses.

Which brought them to the question of how Nathan managed to tolerate it from directly in front of the creature. A question they knew they would likely never hear the answer to.