Stark squared his shoulders, feeling the energy crackle around him, and the gargoyle king flexed its wings, dust and debris scattering as it prepared for an attack.
“Bring it on,” Stark growled, clenching his fists, muscles tensing.
But right as the monster began to repeatedly flap its wings to float off the ground, Stark decided to use [Perception] as to, like usual, check out its level, HP, stats and skills.
…
[Name: Gargoyle King (ELITE)]
[Level: 140]
[HP: 650000]
[Strength: 8732]
[Stamina: 3213]
[Speed: 6426]
[Defense: 2938]
[Skills: Statue Camouflage, Winged Assault, Bloodlust Surge, Call of the Gargoyle, Shadow Claw, Stone Wings, Curse of Stone, The King of Gargoyles…]
…
Its stats were very high, although it was logical since it was a lvl140 elite, but strangely enough, it didn’t have this many skills.
Stark truly couldn’t understand how [Perception] worked: was it because these were its only skills that it showed them, or maybe it already knew which skills it would use during this entire battle, which are the skills it displayed for him to see?
~FLAP, FLAP~
Meanwhile, the king was now flying in the air around ten meters above the ground, staring down at Stark with its eyes, which were still burning with that green aura that surrounded its body.
“Crimson Spears,” Stark summoned five spears and threw them all toward the gargoyle one by one.
~FWISH~
But the flying monster had very good control over its flight, able to move wherever it wanted to avoid the spears easily, thus rendering any projectile useless as long as it wasn’t attacking.
It wasn’t the king for no reason after all.
“Ah…” none of Stark’s spears hit.
And then…
“WINGED ASSAULT!”
The gargoyle king soared down, wings spread wide, casting a shadow over Stark.
“Invincible Dodge!” Stark darted to the side, barely dodging the monstrous claws that sliced through the air where he had just stood.
“GRAAAAAAAK!” The gargoyle’s roar echoed through the garden, its fury palpable, and it wheeled around, circling back for another assault.
But yet again…
“Invincible Dodge,” since the interval between each attack wasn’t high (less than three seconds), Stark able to keep avoiding those winged assaults.
But Stark knew he couldn’t keep avoiding before since the gargoyle literally didn’t seem to want to stop, turning back and forth over and over and over, forcing Stark to avoid if he didn’t want to get fucked instantly.
“SHADOW CLAW,” and after around a minute of this, the gargoyle decide to enhance its arsenal as its claws began to burn with a dark flame, then dove toward Stark again.
Stark braced himself, eyes narrowed as the gargoyle king descended, its claws igniting with that dark power around it.
“Aura Smash,” he didn’t have the time to merge them, but he sent all three crimson fists toward the descending gargoyle as it should be able to momentarily stop it.
Yet it didn’t.
“Stone Wings,” while still keeping up its speed, the gargoyle rolled up its wings around its body, using its skill, and… the wings literally turned into stone, much like those from the statue Stark tried to destroy.
~BOOM, BOOM, BOOM~
“-0! -0! -0!” and obviously, it didn’t do any damage.
“Dodge Contro-” Stark instinctively tried to use that skill since [Invincible Dodge] was still on cooldown, but…
[Cooldown on ‘Dodge Control’, you can use it again in 39 minutes!]
“Oh,” he had forgotten about the one hour cooldown ‘dodge control’ had.
And so…
~SLASH~
“-37261!”
[Stark HP: 5766/64300]
He had tried to sidestep, but the shadow claws of the creature hit his side, hurting him like hell and making a ton of blood pour out from the wound.
He had obviously used [Domination]’s aura to surround the area that was about to be hit, and activated the [Domination Shield] to take 5000 damage, and yet… even then he was almost on the verge of death.
“Cough…” Stark’s mouth was letting out a massive amount of blood too.
And when he tried to hold his side, he immediately felt the crimson liquid on his hand, then looked at it, his hand now painted a beautiful lively red.
“…” Stark’s eyes burned as he saw that, and a powerful vortex appeared in them as he stared at the gargoyle, who was flying above him, spinning in circles as if it was some sort of bird.
Stark clenched his jaw, fighting against the pain. The wound throbbed, but adrenaline surged through him, igniting his resolve.
“Let’s do this,” he growled, pushing himself off the ground, “WIELDING CROSS!”
The crimson/golden cross appeared above him, and he immediately took his “baseball” player stance, ready to slam it if the gargoyle came to closer.
“CALL OF THE GARGOYLE,” but yet again, the gargoyle roared like crazy as it stopped spinning in the air, and instead just kept flapping its wings while moving left and right, staring at Stark.
And of course, the fact it used this skill meant one thing: more of ‘them’.
~CRACK, CRACK~
This time, only two of the gargoyle statues cracked opened, and the creatures hiding inside of them came out, both rushing toward Stark as they followed the orders of their king, who knew it was useless to wait.
But…
~SLAM~
Stark used one of his 3 strikes to absolutely decimate the two monsters at the same time, killing them both as they didn’t seem to have that much HP to begin with.
The two dead gargoyles were sent flying in the opposite, one crashing against the fountain and the other just falling to the ground.
And…
“Bloodlust Surge,” the king gargoyle dropped to the ground in a giant thud, then grabbed the bodies of its two minions and squeezed them out while placing them above its mouth, it was yet again drinking the blood of its companions.
And so just like last that time…
~BOOM~
The gargoyle’s body exploded as its aura became much more powerful.
“The more it eats, the stronger it becomes, huh…” Stark thought, and his stance didn’t falter at all as he didn’t want to be taken by surprise: if that thing comes close, he would smash it away just like its minions.
And just as he expected…
“WINGED ASSAULT,” feeling more powerful than ever before, the gargoyle tested its luck by flying above ground, then immediately dashing toward Stark, readying its [Stone Wings] and claws to deflect or attack.
But… that gargoyle was extremely dumb, and its confidence got the better of it, as even its minions should have felt the holy aura emanating from Stark, one that any undead would KNOW was deadly.
Maybe it was just so sure of its own capabilities that it didn’t believe it would affect it?
~FWISH~
“GRAKKKK~” at incredible, almost teleporting, the gargoyle was already in front of Stark.
But in the end… it didn’t matter: it had pushed its luck.
~SLAM~
Using [Focus] to follow its movements, Stark immediately swung the cross as the gargoyle came close to him, hitting it straight on.
“STONE WINGS!” it of course tried to use its wings as a shield and positioned them both right in front of the cross as it was about to hit its side, turning them into hard stone that couldn’t be destroyed normally.
And yet…
~SLAM, BOOOOOM~
The wing’s stone defense shattered as it was hit by the cross, the holy aura supressing its powers and weakening them enough for it to be able to pass.
“-183729!”
“GAKGR-” the gargoyle’s green aura flickered slightly upon being hit by the crimson cross, which clearly hurt like hell.
But even then… Stark wasn’t done.
“And another one,” while the gargoyle was still being slowly sent flying toward the other direction after being hit like a baseball, Stark immediately dashed toward it, ignoring the pain as he caught up to it.
And then…
~BOOOOOM~
He slammed it again using his final cross strike as he didn’t want to let it get up and have a chance to attack again.
“-211974!”
~BOOM~
It hit the wall on one of the sides, its aura weakened and a lot of bloor pouring out from different parts of its body.
And yet yet again, Stark wasn’t done.
He had learned something: if you want to end a battle quickly as you were injured, you shouldn’t let the enemy do anything, instead… just overwhelm it with attacks, and it will slowly but surely be unable to answer.
Two [Exorcist] attacks as powerful as [Wielding Cross] on an undead were deadly no matter how you think about it, and it was visible by the gargoyle’s expression and movements: one of its eyes had stopped burning with aura, meaning that the green light that was originally there disappeared, and blood and sweat could be seen all over its ugly body.
“…” Stark was hurting too, but he was still standing, staring at the gargoyle with disgusted eyes.
And… as he said before… he wouldn’t even let it do anything.
“CRIMSON PURIFICATION… HOLY CONCENTRATION,” and so he decided to use his exorcist skill’s new perk as to completely annihilate his opponent in one go, and also check out how powerful that attack truly was as the panels that had given it to him had hyped it up so much and described it as a [Legendary] perk, the first one he had ever gotten.
“Let’s see, now,” Stark’s eyes burned with crimson and golden aura as he smiled, pointing at the gargoyle king.
