The Shapeshifter - Chapter 33 Experience 4

Ah, that felt good.Though I didn’t get the kill, so what? At least we won, a fast one at that.

“We did good!” Glasses said while walker over to us. He was our archer so he was quite a distance away from us. It was silent in the room so his voice was heard without any problem.

“No, we did not.” a cold voice resounded in the room. It was the Shield Bearer’s voice.

What is wrong with this guy? Have we not killed the guardian without any deaths? Hmmm. He must be discontented with Daggers.

“What?” it seems like Shield Bearer hit the mark, as Daggers quickly responded seemingly angry with his question.

This should be entertaining.

“What, what? Are you really that dumb? You could’ve died there, you know?” he said.

“Then what’s your role then? You, bearing a shield should be blocking their attacks! You actually did good! Yet you’re dissatisfied with me!?” the girl yelled at him.

“Yes indeed. I block attacks. But I cannot be blocking their attacks for you every time. You’re lucky that guy was fast enough to chop off its arm or you could be saying goodbye to your dear life right now.”

“A team should be helping each other right? Then it’s normal for him to help me.”

“Yes, but don’t expect us to save your little arse all the time. You were given a job, you do it!You’re going to get us killed.” the Shield Bearer said. He turned around and started for something valuable from the pig-man’s body.

“She’ll do better next time.” Spear Guy quickly added, while looking sternly at Daggers.

Well that didn’t end the way I expected it to be. I thought it would be a fiery verbal exchange between the two. I guessed wrong.

After checking the body of the pig-man, there weren’t any valuables in him. There were only his big blade and his two tusks. The blade’s actual value couldn’t be determined by Glasses, so they had to bring it back to their clan and let someone appraise it for them.

As for the tusks, it could be sold to alchemists or blacksmiths. It could be either crafted as a dagger or be ground into powder.

The Shield Bearer then cut off the pig-man’s head using his shortsword to let their elders know that they have finished their mission.

Glasses decided to end the dungeon exploring for now, so that two of our team members would calm down. He then told us that the exploration will continue in the morn. So we headed towards the exit and I bade them farewell for now.

I headed towards the opposite direction that my team took, because I haven’t really seen the old man.

The sun was about to set and I arrived at a river. I felt solemness and calmness watching the river become orange due to the sunlight. So I sat beneath a tree and enjoyed the serenity.

I closed my eyes and imagined happy things, but what enters my mind was killing; endless killing.

What the hell?

I tried closing my eyes again, but that was the only thing I was seeing. What else can I do? I watched it and let it finish on its own, but it didn’t. It kept on replaying, like the scene was stuck on replay.

I lamented on the fact that I could do nothing about it. Then the old man’s voice whispered in my ears.

“Only through real battles can you learn your own Sword Art!” the voice was carried away by the passing wind and quickly vanished.

I opened my eyes to search for the old man and I knew it already; he wasn’t there. So I closed my eyes again, but the old man’s voice still kept echoing in my ears.

I looked intently on my battles and one thing that I noticed was that, I can’t recall most of the things that happened. Even though I just watched the scenes for more than ten times now, everything was unfamiliar.

It was like, I wasn’t the one doing those cruel things. It was as if I was mad!

Okay, enough of this!

I opened my eyes and found that the sun was already rising.

I tried standing up but my legs quickly gave out and I collapsed to the ground. Ah! My leg is numb! Even my butt is numb! Hahaha!

I stayed on the ground for a couple of minutes to let my blood circulate once more. I did a couple of stretches then I jumped on the cold river.

It was the best feeling. I swam for a bit as a morning exercise. After that I got out and look for some food to eat. My stomach was growling, but there’s no food that I can see. The fishes could be eaten, but I didn’t know how to light a fire.

Ah! I’m incompetent!

The sun was already above the horizon, so it should probably be 8 already. There was nothing on me aside from my sword, so I quickly set off towards the dungeon entrance.

When I almost reach the entrance, I already saw my team walking towards me. They came early, hmmm, they should be thinking of reaching the last floor today. Since this was a low leveled dungeon, it only has three floors.

Everything could be finished today if we are fast.

We quickly greeted each other and went in.

Today, it was those goblins again. Blocking our way towards the floor’s guardian.

As I was killing the goblins, I was struck by a sudden flash of inspiration. What if I let a bit of madness in me when I’m killing these goblins?

I smirked at the idea and retreated behind my team. I told everyone that I’m going to try something and they agreed as long as I do it quickly.

When I got to the back of the group, I imagined the feeling of anger that I felt on the bandit’s lair. Every single emotion, from helplessness, to guilt then into anger! I let it all out.

Once I opened my eyes, I could feel my left eye’s lower eyelid twitching, as my eyes was getting clouded by anger.

I immediately rushed back towards the goblin and swung my sword. I was just casually swinging my sword, left and right, with no finesse at all like some kind of brute.

What should’ve been a tedious task was done in minutes because of me.

“You didn’t have to kill them all. You should’ve left some for us. Now we’re going to face the guardian without any proper warmup. Ah” the Spear Guy said during our rest.

I admitted that it was kind of selfish of me earlier, so I apologized to them. It won’t hurt me apologizing, so why not.

I actually got a bit of benefit earlier. When I was killing the goblins, I tried thinking rationally and controlled my body a few times and it ended up as a success.

One thing that I noticed was, I wasn’t that tired killing the goblins than I killed the bandits.

Maybe it was me controlling the madness within me or maybe I just learned some tricks in using a sword. Plus I’m not thinking twice when killing creatures. Maybe that’s a good thing, maybe not; who knows?

We moved out and arrived at the room beyond the tunnel. We immediately noticed that, the floor guardian, was the same as yesterday! Though this one’s skin was a bit darker than yesterday’s, so I told my team to be careful.

The team quickly slayed the pig-man just like what we did yesterday, but without any frontal assault from Daggers and we killed it by numbers.

This floor’s guardian wasn’t really a challenge, so the team walked straight ahead towards the stairs.

We now have to kill skeletons! As if we could kill Skeletons. Maybe separating their body parts would do.

Human skeletons, dressed with worn-out cloth armor, bucklers, swords and even bow and arrows was what blocks our path.

This should be easy.

Since this was my first time fighting them, of course I underestimated them. No, not just me. We all did.

The melees in our team rushed in, we swung our weapons and was met with white hard bones.

That was stupid of me actually, to aim on the middle of their bones. I swung my sword, hoping that it would decapitate its head, but damn it, it got stucked.

I tried retrieving my sword, but the skeleton’s sword was already raised up high intending to chop me, so I dodged right away.

After I dodged, I grasped the sword’s hilt then made a quick pull and kick. It worked!

I sent the skeleton flying towards another one and I got by sword back! As the skeleton crashed to another skeleton. I noticed something.

I sheathed my sword and went to pick up a bone. The bone was long enough to be considered as a shortsword.

Again, I did my thing, which was swinging the weapon in my hand. Maybe if the opponent was somewhat bigger then I would attempt to thrust or pierce them, but for now, swinging it is.

When my team saw that I was ‘slaughtering’ skeletons with my bone club, they learned from me and took one for themselves.

It was much easier than the goblins, to be honest. But if it wasn’t for the bone clubs, this would’ve been a real headache.

My team cleared some space to rest. Then Glasses took out some food from his backpack. It was food!

The food was great, like it was made by their mom. Yeah, that’s how it tasted. Felt like I was home.

Oh how I miss mom’s cooking.

Come to think of it. I can’t remember anyone from Earth! I frowned and started thinking.

Hmmm. I thought hard, trying to remember their faces. I could feel the veins in my forehead bulging, as my face was starting to get hot.

No! No! No! No! No! This can’t be happening! No! I know their faces. I think I’m still hungry. Yeah, I should be hungry. I definitely know what they look like. I just need some food to eat.

I searched for food to satisfy my ‘hunger’. I found nothing. I looked at my teammates.

Wait, what!? I’m not that kind of guy. Pfff. Who would do that kind of thing? I quickly looked away and my eyes landed on the entrance to the room. Maybe there’s something I could eat inside the room.

I crept towards the entrance when I felt someone poking my back. I turned around and saw that it was Shield Bearer.

“What are you doing?” he coldly said.

Man, does this guy have any friends at all? The way he speaks is so irritating, it was filled with arrogance. Or at least that was how I perceived it to be, and I didn’t like it.

“What does it have to do with you?” I snapped. I said it so loud, that everyone heard me and looked at us as if there was a fight brewing between us.

“Oh sh*t. I’m sorry I lost my cool.We should be going now, let’s go.” I hastily apologized to Shield Bearer and beckoned everyone that we should be moving towards the room.

Glasses then said, “Okay, everyone do their roles and this one will be a piece of cake.”