The man panted hard, leaning on his sword. His left arm was broken, and he was bleeding from the wound in his stomach. It was nearly noon, and his gang had gone out to hunt other people to gain more levels. Recently, the monsters near their area had almost all disappeared, and his group couldn't hunt them to grow even stronger. They were based nearly on the other side of the city, and had seen a griffin pass by the other day, chasing a girl on a bear.
So most of them had gone out to find the griffin and kill it, if it was still on the west side where they had seen it heading. On the way, they had walked so far that they reached Madison Square Garden around late morning. One of his men, Leonard, sensed a dungeon nearby with his Energy-type skill, detecting it inside the building.
When they tried to enter, this kid appeared and told them to leave, since his own group was already inside the dungeon.
James tried to reason with the kid while Leonard checked if there were others. When they learned the kid was alone, they tried to threaten him, their first mistake. Their second mistake was feeling happy that he was unarmed.
Their third, and last, for half of them, was attacking the kid, thinking they could rob him and take the dungeon for themselves. How were they supposed to know the kid was a monster? How could they have predicted he would kill all of them if he wanted?
Leonard was the first to die. Then Jimmy, Daniel, Nate, and even Patrick, who had a defensive-type skill. Of course, the kid shot something at him and killed him. Now, James was alone; most of the survivors passed out from injuries or were dying slowly.
The kid, no, the man, stood in front of him. He had curly hair in an afro; he looked young, barely an adult. He wore a dark green trench coat that reached his shins, and brown boots that looked worn. He felt fear, staring into the man's bright green eyes.
It reminded him of a forest he'd gone camping in with family and friends before this hell started, and now it felt like he was staring at it again, except this time, as he died.
He could feel that his stomach and spine were punctured cleanly through by whatever the kid shot him with. His armor was shattered, as well as his arm. He was going to die here, and there didn't appear to be a single bit of regret in the kid's eyes. It was almost as if he didn't feel remorse for taking their lives.
He soon bled out, folding like a lawn chair at Achilles' feet, the system announcing his kill.
[You've slain an Unranked Human, James Dery. You've received ½+ EXP!]
[You've activated your bloodline! You've gained Perk 'Bloodred as a reward for killing fifty humans!]
Achilles sighed in relief. There were about eight of these guys here, and he had only killed about five of them. Naturally, he felt compelled to at least make it an even amount of EXP, since there weren't any Unranked monsters around.
He didn't understand his new perk, 'Bloodred', but it sounded cool. It didn't feel like it was unsettling; it felt more like a part of him he didn't know was missing had returned to him.
He did give these guys enough warnings, honestly. It was their fault for believing him to be weak and harmless. After all, it was always the things that appeared harmless that could potentially kill you.
With the help of his barriers, he gathered their bodies and hid them in some nearby dumpsters, those ugly things. The city had installed these ugly dumpsters all over the four boroughs, and the damn things took up space.
They weren't any larger than a small car, but were still placed in parking spaces as if nobody cared. Plus, they didn't contain the smell of trash, and were entirely made of plastic. He'd once seen one of them partially melted during the summer because of the heat, too.
In his opinion, they were quite useful now, but he still didn't like them. Just like the Korean trio. He didn't like them, and he only trusted them.
Meanwhile, with the rest of James' group, they had all been killed and slaughtered by monsters who had smelled James' search group leaving their building earlier. The smell of humans attracted them, and the monsters attacked, killing and eating the four people left at their base.
With the dungeon group
Kimsung and the others had completed half of the dungeon with Maria's help, as she had tamed many birds that flew around, gathering information on the boss and its minions. Barely a day had passed, and she was already showing her worth with them.
He felt that she was a good addition, and if they helped her rise quickly, they could challenge practically any of the dungeons in the city.
A few hours later, they attacked the boss, and with the help of her tamed bear, Kimsung was able to kill the E-rank quickly, unlike the other dungeons where their fights were drawn out. But now, he had killed an E-rank in less than half an hour, a new record for him entirely!
Keido and Heidi had similar thoughts, because the wolves Maria had tamed were great for tracking down their former packmates and forming a pincer attack one after the other.
The only issue was her mana, which would definitely improve once they cleared the dungeon. Soon after, once all of the monsters were killed, they were transported back to Madison Square Garden, where Achilles was waiting for them.
A sort of drill appeared to be moving around above his hand, and he was making it spin. Perhaps it was something he'd made as a sort of projectile.
"Hey, Achilles, what do you have there?" Keido asked, sitting down next to him tiredly. Running over long distances and fighting monsters was exhausting. Achilles looked up from his hand and looked above for a moment before speaking.
"I call it… A Spiral Shot. It's my version of a bullet, so when we run into stuff that's got a tough hide, I can kill it easier." He says, as he spins the drill at fast speeds, generating some small winds around it.
Keido looked at it in amazement as Heidi and Kimsung chatted with Maria, helping her with her much larger amount of mana.