Once everyone had filed in and the doors were shut, a few attendants helped get everyone who was going inside the room’s middle center crystal square.

“Sometimes they don’t need to send as many, and sometimes the entire room is full,” Tanila whispered. “Each transport requires a different amount of power.”

Max nodded, taking in everything he could, but being as short as he was made seeing anything difficult.

Three bells rang out, and Max felt Tanila grab his hand. Looking at her, she smiled and gave it a squeeze.

“Clench your stomach once it starts… trust me, it's better that way,” she told him. “And before you ask, you’ll know when it starts.”

Sure enough, a bell rang again, and a bright light began to pulse from the shard. The lines on the floor surged with the same light, and Max turned to see Tanila nod her head. Then, her whole face went rigid as she closed her eyes.

Max did the same, trying not to squeeze her hand hard enough to break it while flexing every muscle he could think of while waiting for whatever would happen.

A hum came first, and a warm wash of power went through him a few seconds later. It felt like he was soaking in a warm tub of water, and then, suddenly, it was over.

He felt a squeeze on his hand and realized it was Tanila. Opening his eyes, Max found himself a half mile outside the city, slightly north of the eastern road, in an area that had been roped off.

“EVERYONE OUT! SPREAD OUT! THEY ARE ONLY A MILE FROM THE OUTER EDGES OF THE FARMLANDS!”

Adventures began to jog toward the road, and the four fell in with the crowd, not running, yet still moving briskly.

People outside the wall were hurrying toward the city, staying to the side of the road, and a few even cheering as the progression of adventurers ran toward danger.

“What do we plan to do?” Max asked as they jogged.

“Not die,” joked Fowl, who ignored the look Batrire gave him. “Seriously though, we need to find another group and work together. Once we reach the fields, people will spread out. Follow my lead.”

Nodding, Max didn’t say anything else, not sure what the day would bring.

Quickly glancing up, he was grateful that the sun was still high in the sky. They had at least four hours till sunset, and if the woman in the guild hall was correct, someone should defeat the boss soon, ending this break.

“We’ll join you four!”

Fowl nodded and motioned to the group standing slightly apart, as were all the groups, trying to form quickly and get moving.

“Good!” Fowl shouted as the three elves and two humans ran toward them. “Two warriors, I’m the tank. He’s the DPS but can off-tank, and this is our healer and mage. You?”

The female elf who had shouted they would join quickly pointed at the other four in her group.

“The one in plate armor, Nuala, is a warrior like you. The green-haired elf with the bow is Osonia. I’m Huethae, and as you can see, I am also an archer. Owen, in the plain gray robes, is our healer, and Asher is an off-tank warrior like yours.”

Everyone shook hands and exchanged names before Fowl and Huethae started to plan.

“Four warrior formation, alternating damage dealers, and a healer in the back?” Fowl asked.

“Sounds good to us,” Huethae replied, motioning to the others. “Call out for heals?”

“That works. Let’s go.”

Fowl led the way as Max chatted with Asher, both sharing their woes of having to off-tank for a plate-wearing warrior.

“FOCUS on the ogre on the right!”

Max moved to the ogre on the right as it lumbered toward him.

Each of the ogres was eleven feet tall, almost double his size, and every one wore at least chain armor except the casters.

The party had managed the initial rush of ogres since, during the first wave, the most ogres that had come at once were packs of four. The longer they fought, the denser the packs became, and now they faced a group of seven.

Nuala and Fowl were doing a fantastic job of tanking and handling aggro. Max tried to ignore the itch in the back of his mind that everything seemed to be working out too easily, even in the face of these enemies.

He was taking two or three hits to kill the ogres, not because he couldn’t do it in one or two, but because Tanila had warned him to keep things discrete and see how the others were managing.

Fowl’s new ring was helping a ton as they fought. It only had a thirty-minute cooldown and had already proven its worth when a pair of ogres ignored everyone else to charge the archers in the back who were raining down death.This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

The two elves were fantastic to watch when he could. Their accuracy was insane, and he had already winced more than once as their arrows pierced an ogre in the eye.

Reminder when fighting an archer… protect the eyes…

Fowl already had two ogres on him, and coming from the right was a slightly larger-than-usual ogre with a shield and a massive six-foot sword.

Most of the shots the archers fired off were blocked, and any that got past the shield, the armor it wore stopped them from penetrating.

Charging, Max closed the distance with the ogre, ignoring the shaman on the left side.

Swinging his halberd, he watched as the ogre deftly blocked it, its sword coming at him the moment it stopped his strike with its shield. Jumping back a few feet, the sword strike whipped infront of Max, and he dashed forward, using his speed and dexterity to close the distance again. As he went to counterattack, he saw its leg coming up at him and dodged to the side, not landing his blow but also avoiding the ogre’s kick.

“Come at me, you ugly goblin!” Max shouted, surprised when the ogre roared at him, apparently upset at being called ugly or a goblin.

He tried to pull his shield from storage, feeling it was finally time to use it when he noticed the empty slot in his dimensional space.

Goblin nuts! I forgo–

A combo attack came at him, and Max backed up using his halberd to parry the attacks from a sword that moved faster than expected.

No kill had yet gained him stats or skills, but now, Max felt there might be a chance at one for the first time since the break started.

The two of them danced, blades colliding with each other. Max always had to dodge and dance around, keeping away from the kicks and shield bashes thrown his way.

Time was lost as he found himself in a rhythm, reading the ogre’s movements, seeing how it attacked and parried.

This thing must have a rare weapon skill…

As they clashed again, he could see the rage on the ogre’s face, those massive tusks chomping at nothing as it occasionally roared at him.

Parrying a three-swing combo from the ogre, Max was about to go on the offensive when he saw ice forming up the creature's legs.

It roared as the ice raced up its midsection and encased its chest and arms.

“Sorry, I’ve got a team,” Max said, and he didn’t waste a second, moving behind the ogre and then driving his halberd’s pointed tip into its lower back, piercing its armor and shattering the spine.

Knowing the ice would break when he attacked, Max lined up one more big strike and slammed the head of the halberd from maximum range into the upper part of the ogre’s back, hearing a crunch as it shattered the spine higher up.

“I got it!” Max shouted as he saw the others coming to help him, and they slowed down, watching as Max hacked at a leg and cut halfway through. The ice was falling, but so was the ogre as Max delivered one more blow, cutting its right leg off and causing it to fall.

It roared, unable to move its arms and catch itself as it fell face-first into the dirt.

Smiling, Max moved next to where it flailed, trying to roll over, and drove his halberd’s tip into the back of the ogre’s head, piercing through the skull and deep into its brain.

It shuddered, and a cold sensation filled Max.

[Consume has successfully Consumed a skill]

[ Skill Consumed is Higher Rank of Current Skill ]

[ Upgrading Shield to Rare ]

Smiling, Max looked at the others, who nodded and began to get back into position. It was then that he realized they had cleared out the other ogres while he held this one off.

Glancing down at the shield the ogre had used, Max frowned but knew it was better than nothing. He stored his weapon and used both hands to wrench the shield almost as tall as he was from the corpse.

“Are you sure you can use that?” Fowl shouted. “It’s taller than you are!”

Holding the shield wasn’t challenging, as his strength easily allowed it, but Max knew Fowl was right. This thing might serve a purpose at some point, but he couldn’t use it right now with his halberd. Pulling out a sword was also out of the question right now.

He stored it, pulled his weapon back out, and ran to join Fowl and the others.

“I forgot I broke my shield in that last dungeon before the break… so…”

Fowl groaned and leaned his current shield against himself. A moment later, he had a slightly smaller shield in his hand and tossed it to Max.

“Don’t break that one, please!”

Catching it, Max nodded. It felt natural, even more than he could ever remember his old shield feeling. Now he realized why that ogre had been so hard to hit.

“Anything good?” Fowl asked quietly.

“Just enjoying my rare shield skill,” Max replied, winking at his friend.

Under Fowl’s plate helmet, Max could hear him cursing softly. “Someday… someday, the gods will love me more for putting up with you.”

Huethea ran up from behind. “We need to move and fast! The group on our left is down! Look!”

Max and Fowl both turned to see where the elf was pointing. Sure enough, there was a group running away from a pack like the one they had just faced. The ogres appeared to be about to kill what looked like a third warrior.

“Let’s go!”

The battle was at least seventy-five yards from them, and Max easily beat the rest of his group to it. He didn’t have many good options. He needed to try and save the warrior in plate that was getting smashed by multiple blows from three ogres.

[ Power Strike ]

Max came from behind, attacking an ogre that looked exactly like the one he had just faced.

His axe cut through the creature's body, slicing it in half so the ogre fell in two parts.

Without waiting, Max ran forward, his halberd spinning in his hands as he prepared for a second attack. Right as his halberd cut through the leg of a second ogre, a fireball blasted him from the side.

Knowing he had just been hit, Max risked a quick glance and saw a shaman twenty yards away, preparing to cast again.

“Go!”

With two ogres down and one left, Max heard Asher’s call and took off like an arrow toward the shaman. It snarled and unleashed another fireball that washed over him. The pain of the fire hurt, but Max wanted to laugh. Actually, he wanted to scream.

“Whoever you are up there that is making all this happen, you’re a bastard, but I’ll trust you!”

Max’s shout didn’t seem to matter as no one except the ogre shaman heard it.

Surprise filled the shaman as Max had just taken two spells directly to the face and was fine.

The shaman, however, did not do as well when Max swung his halberd from its nuts to the throat, slicing partially through it. His halberd got stuck halfway through the ogre’s chest, requiring him to rip it out before moving from the falling body of the monster.

One quick chop to its neck removed its head, and Max felt a trickle of cold wash over him.

[ 187 Hit Points Consumed ]

Smiling, Max ran toward the others, grateful that only his party could see his health.