Life, Death, and Strength

The monsters attacked again. Not only were there just as many monsters as before; they were even stronger than the first wave.

Kyle took in a deep breath and let it out. He focused on the battle to come and ignored everything else.

Riley was almost in tears. He was also prepared to fight to his last breath. Kyle rushed forward and did a slide tackle.

A slide tackle is where he ran and slid with his right foot out as he knocked the feet of the monsters out from under them, sending them into the air.

This was a new move he and Riley came up toward the end fo their last battle. It used much less spirit energy and accomplished the same job as the AOE Monkey King Rocks.

It was the first time he realized that skills that cost a lot of spirit energy weren't always the best techniques. It depended on the situation. The sliding tackle was great for monsters.

If he were fighting intelligent creatures it might not be as useful and he would probably need to use his AOE attack.

He was also able to identify weak spots faster. Even though he hadn't fought these creatures before; he realized similar anatomy had similar weaknesses.

If a monster hand an arm like a human then nerve strikes that worked on human arms usually worked on the monsters as well.

He used more precise low energy punches to increase his damage to the creatures he was facing.

Kyle was also more efficient in his attacks. He didn't dodge as wildly, he used a minimum of movement to avoid attacks. Similarly, he used a minimum of movement to attack.

His heightened senses gave him a perspective on the battlefield he was never aware of before.

He could often tell where an attack was coming from, the size of the attacker, the strength of the attack, and which limb of the body the attack was being made with.

With all of these lessons learned one would think winning would be easier. If they had attacked like this, to begin with; then perhaps they would be able to overcome the second wave easily.

The fatigue and injuries built up as they continued to push their bodies beyond their limits. Kyle was so tired he didn't think he would be able to stand.

"Are you going to give up? Will you leave your mother and siblings? What about Sif and Samira? Is this all there is to you?

Didn't you want to be a hero? How is dying just because you're tired heroic?" Gramps whispered disdainfully in his ear.

"I'm so tired. I don't have anything left," Kyle said.

"If that's what you think then go and die. No one will miss you much. Your family will forget about you eventually. I'll give them some money to make things easier for them," Gramps laughed evilly.

"Oh, wasn't there that boy Red Ace or something who used you since you were a kid. Weren't you going to show him he made a mistake? You are so weak!" Gramps yelled.

His eyes began to shine a little. He was weak but he wasn't weak enough to just give up without a fight. He had a lot of things to do and people to protect. He couldn't die here!

Kyle released a primal roar as he attacked with explosive vigor! He felt new energy flowing from a place he didn't know of.

Every cell in his body seemed to explode with power. "Now, use your little hack your teachers came up with!" Gramps said.

The teachers that Kyle learned with, taught him that instead of using the system's level up to advance; he should train and earn everything with hard work.

When he felt himself about to level up; that's when he would use the system level up to increase the foundation of his level. When he leveled up, he would have a much more stable base.

"Grandpa System, level up!"

Enveloped in the light; Kyle felt all of his injuries health and his spirit energy returned to its peak. His fatigue was gone and he felt stronger and even more energetic than before.

"Woooh!" Kyle shouted out as he flashed quickly and his moves became smoother. He dropped the monsters much easier even without Riley's help.

"Did he just breakthrough? Is he crazy?" Riley wondered to himself. Sure, entering the next level in the midst of a battle wasn't unheard of, but it was dangerous.

"Are you crazy? How can you have a breakthrough now?" Riley shouted out his question.

"How do you think Kingsley expects us to survive this ordeal? He's going to send us once challenge after another to push our ranks up.

You said they need us to be at level 25; how do you think he's going to do that? This is an opportunity for us. I don't like his method but it's effective.

He suddenly realized that what Kyle was saying made a lot of sense. Instead of calling Kyle crazy for breaking through; he should call himself crazy for not.

He was ready to breakthrough himself. In fact, right before the second group attacked he was ready just about to start.

After thinking through everything for a few seconds; Riley also began to his breakthrough. According to Kyle's HUD, Riley was moving from a level 19 to a level 20.

One of the creatures nearly bit Riley's head off, but Kyle deflected the attack. Once he finished his breakthrough; he too had all of his wounds healed and his spirit energy filled up.

His stamina was back to normal as if he hadn't fought at all. Now that they both leveled up and had a second wind; their movements and coordination became much better.

Their Hi-Low technique was a great fighting technique against the horde of monsters. Kyle continued his slide tackle and Riley chopped down all the air-born monsters.

They finally defeated all of these monsters, but within just a few breaths, another wave came at them.

"You ready?" Kyle asked.

"Yeah, let's get strong," Riley said with a determined smile.

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We have been reset to 0 power stones for the week. Let's aim to break our record of 124 power stones from last week!

Thank you all for your support! This book wouldn't be possible without you.

--Straythought