"Holy shit, dude! What the hell was that? You're a monster!" Jenna exclaimed. The look in her eyes as she stared at Ronan was one that could only be described as zealous.

Howard's shock mirrored Jenna's, but his enthusiasm for the win was much dampened. Alyssa was moaning in relief as the healing wave of leveling up saved her from her torture.

Ronan prepared to explain himself, when all of the flickering torches in the braziers were snuffed out. The two cyan flames beside Tharaxes' throne burned brighter, and a familiar voice echoed through the room.

"How… THRILLING! Four hundred years," Tharaxes said, a giddy delight dancing in his previously rumbling tone. "That's how long it has been since I last had one of my vessels destroyed by a group of challengers. I'll be waiting for you at the end of the dungeon. Don't dally too long, or I might grow… frustrated."

"Oh, you've got to be fucking kidding me. I hate this place," Howard cursed, slumping to the ground.

Even the usually perky Jenna and the ambivalent Alyssa seemed much deflated at the boss' reveal. Ronan, on the other hand, couldn't contain his excitement. The mini-boss battle had ended far too soon, and his thirst for a challenge was far from quenched.

The throne crumbled as they watched, and a staircase leading back up into the dungeon was revealed. It was an ominous invitation, and they now knew exactly what was waiting for them at the end of that tunnel.

"Wait a minute," Jenna said, frowning as she puzzled something out. "So that little guy was actually the big boss of this place, but also the mini-boss? How the hell does that work?"

Ronan, well used to the system's fuckery by now, had barely even blinked at the deception and subsequent reveal of Tharaxes' real identity. However, he understood why the others might have a hard time wrapping their heads around it.

Howard ended up coming to the rescue. "Well, do you know anything about liches? If I knew all those hours of 'wasted' time, as my wife put it, spent on my hobbies would pay off in such a big way, I might have pushed back more." Seeing the accusatory looks of the others, he shook his head and continued. "There are a few ways liches were depicted back in our old media, but they almost always have a phylactery, or a vessel for their true soul. Death or destruction of a body means nothing, as long as that phylactery is secure. I'm guessing this Tharaxes had multiple bodies, and the real one is waiting for us at the end. We'll probably have to destroy his phylactery to complete this stage. We might end up fighting a dozen of his vessels, or more."

"No way! What kind of overpowered crap is that?" Jenna exclaimed. Then, she suddenly smirked. "That's lich-erally bullshit!"

They all winced at the awful pun, but it didn't dampen the woman's amusement one whit. Once she finished giggling to herself, the conversation moved on.

Ronan didn't agree with the overly pessimistic appraisal of the boss, but he felt that Howard was on the right track. "Yeah, that sounds about right," he added casually. "It doesn't really matter though. We were going to have to kill everything anyway. At least we know what to expect."

Jenna regained a bit of her earlier enthusiasm. "So wise!" Her fingers crackled with black lightning as she stared towards the staircase. "Let's go, let's go."

"Wait, we haven't even checked out our rewards yet. A mini-boss should drop some great loot. Tharaxes will be waiting for us, and we can afford to spend some time thinking about our stat allocation," Ronan said, grabbing her arm as she began to march off.

"I want to rest a little, too," Alyssa chimed in. "Leveling up may have healed the damage, but that was not a fun time. At all. Chemical warfare was a fucking war crime back on Earth, and that little shit just casually used it as though it were a party trick. I want to lie down for a bit."

That was fair. Of the four of them, Alyssa had certainly suffered the most. Technically Ronan had dealt with the worst damage, being consumed by the dust inferno and the battering of the boss, but he was used to such things.

Not that his teammates knew that. He did, though, and that was enough. He wasn't going to rob Alyssa of some well-earned rest simply because he didn't need it. Jenna grumbled a little, but agreed to the general idea of a brief pause.

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The four spread out, and Ronan sat down against the edge of the ruined pond. He hadn't even glanced at the kill notifications for the entire battle, and he was looking forward to another leap forward in levels, and hopefully, masteries.

You have killed [Skeleton Soldier Lv.32-39] x51, [Elite Skeleton Soldier Lv.37-41] x6, [Giant Skeleton Soldier Lv.43] x3, and [Tharaxes - MINI BOSS][Hobgoblin Lich Lv.35]!

+19 Bronze Credits

+704 Copper Credits

+18 [Mace I] Mastery

+11 [Stamina III] Mastery

+17 [Momentum II] Mastery

+22 [Pain I] Mastery

+9 [Health I] Mastery

+13 [Mana II] Mastery

+8 [Critical] Mastery

+Rusty Longsword Lv.33

…

+Tharaxes' Thunderrib Lv.35 (Rare)

+Bone Dust (Common) x51

+Skeleton Knuckle (Uncommon) x6

+Bone Shards (Uncommon) x3

+Lesser Spark of the Undead (Rare)

+Elite Shard Lv.37 (Soul) x2

+Elite Shard Lv.39 (Soul)

+Elite Shard Lv.40 (Soul) x2

+Elite Shard Lv.41 (Soul)

+Mini-Boss Shard Lv.35 (Soul)

+Mini-Boss Shard Lv.35 (Energy)

You have leveled up to Lv.39!

…

You have leveled up to Lv.45!

You have been restored x4!

+7 Vitality

+35 Endurance

+14 Resistance

+28 Strength

+28 Tenacity

+14 Free Stat Points

You have reached the mastery cap for [Pain]!

Pain I has evolved to Pain II!

Your pain is converted into a regeneration buff at an minor exchange rate. The more damage you suffer from an opponent, the more you resist their strikes. (Lasts until death or five minutes after combat ends). Nervous system impulse reactions to pain are infinitesimally reduced.

There were far too many mundane loot drops for Ronan to be particularly interested in them. He suddenly had a realisation, and opened his inventory, frowned when he saw the number of items filling it. Wasn't it limited to just ten slots at the beginning? When did that increase?

His conundrum wasn't solved by prodding the system. It refused to explain. For the time being, Ronan just had to assume it increased with level, or something. His heritage might be locking his inventory size to his highest achieved level, too, which would be great news.

Two mini-boss shards was an exceptional reward, and when he added it onto the handful of elite shards, almost all of which were soul-aspected, Ronan felt it wouldn't be a challenge to reach the second realm of soul cultivation before the end of this iteration. Even the third realm might be possible, but he would take things as they came.

Assigning stat points took little thought. They were split between agility and dexterity, as was his habit when using the juggernaut class. He wasn't a talented enough sorcerer to need the excess mana that wisdom offered, and right now he wasn't trying to game his loot drops, making luck equally pointless.

The class itself boosted his durability and strength to ridiculous levels, meaning his only real shortcomings were in his speed, flexibility, and reaction times, hence his choice of mainly increasing agility and dexterity.

Aside from the shards, the only loot drop that truly interested him was the lesser spark of the undead. He pulled up the description of the item, wondering if this might be the first iteration he dabbled in the dark arts—namely, necromancy.

While most of the standard monster drops, such as goblin toes, and the bone dust, had proven fairly useless except to sell for a piddling amount of credits to the marketplace. Ronan suspected—no, it's basically guaranteed—that they would eventually prove to have use as some kind of crafting materials, but he lacked the expertise or desire to find out for himself.

Maybe if he one day grew bored of fighting, he could spend a few dozen iterations tinkering with random materials. Every young boy wanted to be an inventor at some point in their life, and he was no different. Only, the appeal of battle had taken a far stronger hold on his heart, and refused to budge.

With his loot appraised and stat points invested, Ronan had little holding him back from advancing through the dungeon. However, if his party was willing, he wanted to take another break to raise his soul cultivation.

Tharaxes might obliterate them in its true form, and he would curse himself for wasting such a large supply of soul-aspected shards if that eventuality came to pass. So, he called over the other three, and shared his plan. "Look, I think if I can manage this, defeating that annoying goblin will be a piece of cake. I know it's annoying, but it's better to be bored and alive, than to rush ahead and die in haste."

Jenna scowled, but with some persuasion from Ronan, and surprisingly, Howard, she relented. Ronan chuckled as Howard came to immediately regret his decision—another long break meant more 'fun.' Before he settled into meditation, he watched as Jenna started casting lightning bolts at the poor man.

Ronan started with the elite shards, hoping to work his way up. He planned to burn his way through all of the shards, provided it didn't take too long.

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