The Earth After Rebirth

34  Swamp Dwellers

They entered the forest and abruptly, their noses were attacked by the foulest smell, so foul it caused even Hiro and Kiro to gag. They hadn't realised that they had walked into a swamp.

They were amazed that the two forests were so close together, yet the moment they crossed the line, the smells vastly differed. Even the way their senses perceived it was not the same. The other one was peace and serenity, this one was pure chaos.

That's when Kiro realised, this was the swamp, the swamp that harboured swamp apes. And the boss was usually 2 meters tall. These creatures weren't very smart, but they were bright enough to set up traps.

"Don't move!" Kiro gave the order.

Immediately everybody stopped dead on their tracks. But it was too late, Kiro had already triggered a trap. Arrows came raining on them.

"Hiro protect both of them!" Kiro gave yet another order.

Hiro didn't hesitate, he grew to trust his friend's way of playing this game, they'd never failed with his instructions, so he had no reason to refuse him.

Though he was a bit worried about how he could turn into a human skewer, if his plan turned into a disaster.

'What is his plan anyway?' Hiro watched attentively, ready to step in if he had to.

Kiro was a bit panicky, he didn't want to experiment while hundreds or so arrows were aimed at him.

But he had an idea, he figured he could activate staff wielder and spin the staff with his hands, while it's spinning 100 kilometres an hour, he would activate palm crashing and hurricane punch.

Something that would increase the damage it can cause by a hundred fold. Thus driving the arrows far away with the wind pressure.

The probability of this working was 50%, at least that's what Kiro had calculated and theorised before trying it out for the first time in battle. Kiro had always been a brainy kid, but in the society he lived in, being smart wasn't enough.

He started spinning the staff, within 2 seconds it picked up speed and eventually you couldn't tell it was a staff. It resembled a lightning fast fan. Then he activated palm crashing and hurricane punch.

The results were almost instantaneous, the nearby trees shook, the incoming arrows were blown away in an instant. They couldn't even reach within 10 meters of where they were standing.

The three hiding behind the shield were shocked by what they witnessed. All of them were sure they couldn't produce a skill of that calibre.

"When did you get that skill?" Hiro asked

"So this is really your weapon?" Isla asked, as she didn't think a staff suited Kiro, it was too uncool for him, she thought.

She originally thought it was just something he carried around to show off, even fighting off the guardian, she was more or less expecting him to take out his real weapon.

Kiro turned to them and smirked, "Of course this is my weapon, why else would I carry a steel-stone rod around?"

Ding!

[You've successfully used three skills to enhance each other, would you like to combine them?]

Kiro immediately answered yes, the skill was just too overpowered to let go.

[You've combined three skills, gaining one. Please name the skill]

Kiro thought for a moment, "Whirlwind." He answered.

[Whirlwind

Rank: B

Can Evolve

Uses 100 Mana Points per second. No cool down.]

Kiro was kind of depressed with the B Rank, but was thankful that it can evolve all the same. So he checked his character sheet. He saw that he had 30 AP and 15 SP. He dumped 10 on Vitality and the rest on other stats equally. He poured the 15 SP on his new skill, which raised it to A.

Name: Kiro

Level 30

Race: Dreki

Class: Sagehood

Subclass: -

HP: 5000/5000

MP: 4500/6000

Attack: 1000(+100)

PDEF: 2000(+100)

Strength: 50

Vitality: 50 (+5)

Dexterity: 50(+2)

Stamina: 50

Intelligence: 50

Equipment: rare dragon newt cloth armour and boots and ??? Staff.

Skills

Vibrations (AOE Rank S, can't evolve)

Consumes 5MP per second, no cooldown.

Blink Step (Rank S, can evolve)

Consumes 10MP per second.

Martial Arts (Ranked S, can't evolve)

Chi (Ranked A, can't evolve)

Bending Kick (Ranked A, can evolve)

Regeneration (Ranked S, can't evolve)

The skill regenerates 100 HP and MP per second

Whirlwind (Ranked A, can evolve)

Uses 100 Mana Points per second. No cool down.

0 AP

0 SP

Kiro was satisfied, but cursed in his heart because even though the skill ranked up, the MP used per second didn't decrease. He had a bad feeling that, it'll never decrease.

Hiro looked at him expectedly. He knew he'd never let it go.

"I'll tell you later." Kiro winked at him.

Saanvi rolled her eyes at how happy Kiro seemed, "who made you the boss anyway, the leader? You've been bossing us around since we started."

Hiro was about to say something but Kiro shook his head, and said, "I did. Problem?"

Kiro didn't believe it, weren't they sort of getting along now? They even meditated together.

Saanvi flinched at how hostile the words out of his mouth were. "No problem, just thought we'd vote on it that's all."

Kiro raised an eyebrow, "Who said this was a democracy?" He massaged his temple and continued, "okay, fine, let's vote on it. All those in favour of me being the leader raise your hands." Kiro's hand shot up first.

Saanvi was dumbfounded at how shameless he was, to be the first to vote for himself. But Kiro didn't care, he didn't think this was necessary at all. Saanvi raised her hand next, the two others soon followed.

"Okay, it's unanimous. Let's go. Be careful this swamp has monsters. The traps would not have been a coincidence."

So they walked on, in silence. It was so quiet, their senses seemed like they were enhanced, they could hear each others breathing. Kiro could hear his heart beating, even though he was not frightened or nervous. This made him a bit paranoid.

Just then, a small army of swamp apes walked out of the swamp and the trees. As if the trap was an alarm for them that an intruder was here.

They looked to be 150 centimetres tall. They were brown in colour, with red eyes, they had fur all over except for the eyes, nose, lip area. They brandished spears with no shields.

'How brave.' Kiro thought.

Swamp Ape

Level 20

HP: 5 000

Now then, let Volume 2 commence!

Arrkein