Lewis found himself standing before five very angry orcs. All shouting some guttural cries of rage and hatred as they came to avenge their fallen kin, momentarily taking Lewis aback by their intensity. But a look at the dead orc before him kept his feet grounded. He knew he couldn't afford to overclock his skill to that degree again. Not only due to the mana cost, but also the backlash to his body, making him feel far more tired and worn down than using such an amount of mana should warrant. It was the same feeling as when he had pushed out all his mana back in the goblin cave, a feeling of squeezing too much out too fast, threatening to make him collapse.
It wasn't as bad in this case, but it still made him feel far too weak to be able to use the skill again in quick succession, a death sentence when entering a fight like this. Besides, he could only repeat such a devastating attack a few times before he was out of mana and utterly defenseless. But nor did he need to cause such massive damage to the orcs. He wasn't exactly trying to obliterate them like that, so simply using the skill with the intended amount of mana would be good enough.
Besides, he couldn't be sure, but he felt like the skill was already stronger than before. Not in the amount of mana that was used, but rather in the sheer punch it packed, likely a result of his higher intelligence. The same thing had happened to his anti-magic mantle before; the more he increased his intelligence, the more potent the mana seemed to become. And with his new class automatically raising the stat with every level, he felt confident that the skill would work perfectly fine without overclocking it, even if these are higher-level foes.
The five rushing orcs were quickly closing the distance, unfortunately seeming to want to attack him all at once instead of lining up in an orderly fashion to receive their appointed thrashing like Lewis would have preferred. Still, they had accounted for such a situation, not relying on the orcs to play fair to begin with.
An arrow shot out from the darkness, cutting through the air before slamming into the thigh of one of the orcs, the creature grunting in surprise as his feet came down at an angle, tripping himself up and falling flat on his face, eating a mouthful of dirt as his surprised cry was muffled.
Two of the orcs slowed down at the sight, scanning the surroundings for further attacks, but another two simply ignored everything and kept charging. They were already the fastest of them and reached him first. Neither possessed any weapons, either because they didn't bother grabbing them to confront the human right outside their base, or they simply used their fists; Lewis didn't know. What he did know was that he shouldn't underestimate them. He no longer had the advantage of surprise, so he backed away as soon as the first orc lunged, avoiding a meaty fist to the face as he backed up and moved to the side in order to avoid backing away too far from the base, making sure the orcs attention was squarely on him as he kept moving, refusing to let them get too close as he weaved around their lunges.
After a few seconds, the opening he was waiting for finally appeared as a second arrow shot from the tree line and impacted the first orc in the side, the shock of the surprise attack redirecting his attention for a critical moment as he glanced down at the arrow embedded in his side. It hadn't reached deep, only piercing a few centimeters, hardly enough to do any serious damage; the orcs' bodies were even tougher than most beasts of a similar level.
Still, that brief distraction allowed Lewis to leap into action, his fist shooting out with lightning speed, his level up having given him a noticeable boost in speed as he jabbed at the orcs chest, not wanting to risk aiming higher in fear that the creature might spot his attack if he aimed for the head since the orc was taller than him and would require him to swing upwards.
In a repeat of a few seconds ago, [Unravelling strike] slammed into the creatures chest, right were the heart was located as the destructive energy shredded it and extinguished it's life in a moment, the orc's mouth opening in a silent scream, blood in it's throat as it's now destroyed arteries hemorrhage blood inside of it as it fell to the ground.
Lewis was surprised that the skill was strong enough to kill it with a single hit, realizing that overclocking the skill might have never been necessary, as he forced his mind to focus on the second orc right before him.
As the first orc suddenly collapsed without Lewis having done any visible damage, no fiery explosion, no slashing blade or spray of blood, just a simple tap, and the orc collapsed. For a human, receiving Lewis's strike would have broken bones, his strength now at 12, far from an ordinary punch, but for these large muscly guys, such force would be fairly minor, maybe only leaving a bruise, which must have greatly confused the second orc as he froze in place, his eyes uncomprehending of it's kin's sudden collapse, perhaps believing it had tripped or was otherwise only inconvenienced, not outright dead.
Its hesitation became its downfall as Lewis lunged for the creature, his fist crashing into its side, causing the orc to gasp in shock before a follow-up attack crushed its brain with destructive energy, the skill able to be instantly reactivated, making the creature collapse to the ground a moment later.
Lewis felt like things had gone better than expected, having managed to isolate at least two of the orcs from the pack with Fiona's help and having taken them out in seconds. But right as he was about to go confront the other three, he was blown back by a blast of force, like a bomb going off, only there was no fire or explosion, simply a powerful invisible force that slammed into his chest and knocked the wind out of him.
He was flung backwards on the ground, rolling head over heels before he came to a stop, gasping for breath and disoriented. But with adrenaline rushing through his body, he was able to shake off the worst of it and scrambled back to his feet, only to find the three final orcs had seemingly doubled in number, six large orcs now rushing towards him at surprising speed.
His eyes widened, and his heart began racing even faster at the sight, but he didn't even have time to understand what had hit him before one of the orcs suddenly exploded with lightning, a white hot arc lashing out towards Lewis, too fast to dodge as it slammed into him, causing his muscles to freeze up as his entire body went rigid.
Not having expected such an attack after all the previous orc had simply throw brute strength at him, he was slow to react and only when he found the shock to be far less powerful than the large lightning beam would subject did he realize his arcane nullfield was greatly weakening the attack, deluding its power before it reached him, but it wasn't strong enough to entirely cancel it out.
With a speed born from desperation, Lewis grabbed for the mana within his body and pushed it out into the nullfield around him, the electric shock suddenly diminishing until it stopped, the white beam disappearing a moment later, revealing an orc barely a few steps away, having closed the distance while Lewis was incapacitated.
The orc seemed surprised Lewis was still standing, but didn't hesitate to attack as its arm swung in a backhand directed at his head with enough force to turn it into a spray of mist. But with the feeling of that lightning still coursing through his veins, he was able to duck down fast enough that he avoided the backhand, a strong gust of wind rustling his hair from its passage.
Lewis then chopped out, karate slapping the orc's thick leg, unravelling strike activating even from such a comparably feeble strike as the orc's thigh bone audibly snapped, the flesh imploding and causing the orc to buckle and collapse to one knee.
Lewis was surprised at the result; his crouched position meant his ability to hit back was limited, but it seemed his skill only needed physical contact to unleash its full might, irrespective of how hard Lewis hit with his body. After all, it was never his physical might that was dealing such devastating damage, but his mana-fueled skill. As long as he used the skill properly, it didn't matter what punch, kick, or slap he performed; as long as his control over the skill was good, he was able to unleash its full potential.
With this new discovery, he decided to stop trying to throw punches at these orcs, instead relying on the fact that he could spam his most powerful skill without any cooldown as his hand shot out tapped the orcs chest, delivering a second blast of destructive energy into its body as Lewis got back to his feet, his other hand moving to tap it again on the neck as the orc cried out in pain from his internal organs being liquified, the final touch on its neck causing a geyser of blood to spray out as its eyes rolled back inside its head and it slumped over.
Skill: Unravelling strike has reached level 4
Skill: Unravelling strike has reached level 5
Compared to the other orcs he had killed, only using quick taps instead of strong punches seemed to make the achievement far more impressive, as if his mere touch could bring death. Still, he was also aware that the skill seemed a lot weaker as he did so, the effected area shrinking visibly but still more than enough to drill a lethal chunk out of the orcs neck.
Looks like I'm finally starting to get the hang of controlling the skill's strength. He thought to himself, glad that the skill was leveling up after he had struggled to do so at first. But his small breakthrough was dampened as another powerful blast slammed into him just like before. Except this time, he resisted the pressure, his feet digging into the ground slightly as a burst of power tried to push him back, only his arcane nullfield was still strengthened with mana and dismantled the magical force before it could reach him.
Looking up, he found one of the orcs with its hand outstretched, a look of surprise on its face as the force dissipated, leaving Lewis virtually unmoved. With his mana detection, Lewis identified the unleashed mana as some form of kinetic attack that was likely powerful enough to send him flying, his nullfield the only reason he wasn't blasted away the first time around.
Lewis had kept the nullfield close around himself, acting as a condensed shield of anti-magic a few centimeters off of his skin instead of having it spread out and weakened, so the potency of his skill was at it's peak. Still, the fact that some of the attacks' power still made it through meant that the orc's skill must be truly terrifying. Out of curiosity, he scanned the orc to see what level it was.
[Orc - lvl 17]
What the fuck? How is it so high level? Is it the boss?
After he had withstood the lightning blast and the bare-fisted orcs' follow-up attack, the other orcs had stayed back, likely assuming the fight was over, except Lewis had not only survived but also slain the bare-fisted orc, so the creatures seemed weary of him and had stopped mindlessly charging, deciding to deploy their magic-capable orcs to blast him again. Seeing Lewis barely fazed by such a strong kinetic attack, all of them were frozen, unsure what to do as they looked to one another, indecision clear in their postures, yet anger burning in their hearts. They clearly didn't plan to back down, but instead were contemplating a new strategy to defeat this human, so Lewis took the offered breather to scan the other orcs and see what he was working with.
[Orc - lvl 15]
[Orc - lvl 9]
[...]
[Orc - lvl 18]
His mouth opened in shock as he saw the average level of these orcs at around 10, far higher than he would have expected. Some even closing in on the 20s, the limit for this stage of the tutorial.
Looks like I might have underestimated these guys a bit. And do there seem to be even more of them now?
The shouts and growls of the orcs had masked the arrival of something else, the shape of a four legged beast walking towards him as the orcs stepped aside, making way for a large furred creature taller than the orcs, with matted brown fur and large sections of its pelt missing, revealing nasty scars on its body.
But what caught his attention was the figure riding atop it, the orc larger and more muscular than the rest, though it's skin was a dull grey color and it had white markings all over it's body and bones strapped around its arms and chest like some sort of cannibal African witch doctor. The large bear-like creature it rode walked towards Lewis, stopping a safe distance away, where Lewis could spot the dark color of the bears eyes, matched with it's decrepit form making it look like a reanimated corpse. But his eyes widened when the grey orc spoke.
"A human dares attack us? I will drain the life from your body and bind your soul to my service. Your life's greatest mistake was thinking yourself worthy to defy the great skull taker shaman." The figure declared, the large decrepit bear letting out a deep unnatural roar as if to accentuate the orcs words.