Chapter 167: Uneasy

"Kindly cease your needless speech." Aria bashed the life out of a nearby Xaga with all her might and drew farther from Blythe's position. 

Blythe seemed to have given up on trying to communicate with Aria and went towards the other direction as well. 

Things weren't looking particularly good. She was getting better at fending them off, but the amount of creatures they had to face and take out was pretty overwhelming.

Of course, the others' kills also helped Aria, but it should be noted that everybody didn't know how to fight these Xagas. It was their first time coming in contact with this creature, so they were noticeably burdened by the monster's troublesome characteristics.

"Wouldn't it be better to gather all of the monsters in one place, then strike them with an area magic attack?" Reina neared Aria's fighting spot once again, asking her this question.

Reina was panting and covered in sweat. Her graceful, untouchable appearance befitting of her title Queen was nowhere to be found, all that was left was this woman who had spent a considerable amount of her mana.

"Still, that would take a lot of spells to wipe them in total. I'm talking about hundreds of creatures here, and we aren't even fighting the boss yet. Not to mention, there is nothing that can guarantee that there isn't a second stage after this. We need to preserve our energy reasonably as well." Aria clicked her tongue as she twisted her body and slayed another two Xagas.

Aria eyes Reina multiple times. If she fought for any longer than this, she might collapse out of fatigue. The fight would probably continue for another ten to thirty minutes at maximum, depending on how well they deal with the Xagas in the long run.

"I think we should leave this one to the close combat warriors. Hitting the flexible Xagas is hard for the mages. Instead, the mages should focus on giving us supportive blessings." Aria instructed. "Reina, you are almost at your limit. This is still the beginning, so go to the backlines. Unless you don't treasure your life, retreating is the best option for now."

Reina wasn't all on board with the plan since she was one of the mages, but she knew that what Aria said was true. Being haughty for nothing was not a viable choice. Clenching her fists tight, she climbed up a rather tall hill. She began to cast blessings over Aria and her team, who received them well and felt themselves get immensely stronger.

"..This is good enough. Thank you, Reina." Aria smiled, looking back at the woman who was still breathing heavily and fanning herself .

She bounced back into the crowd, jumping left and right to kill the creatures with a high momentum.

Ding! Ding!

Her experience points kept rising and rising as the monsters around her died. Reina's buff was completely on the offensive side. She didn't place any defensive spells over her people. The spells' manifestation was that of a purplish shadow mist that covered their bodies and their weapons.

Aria borrowed the blessings of her spirits as well and enchanted herself, essentially creating a maniacal killing machine out of herself.

Her sword was swung carelessly, yet in an effective and swift manner. Whatever the Xagas shifted into, they were beheaded by Aria in an instant and hit by an elemental spell that finished them off.

Aria was so confident partly because she knew that she was going to advance into the next level sooner or later. Thus, she could just slaughter all of them until she was dead tired, and recover herself using the System's convenient regenerative ability.

Aria had a smile on her face as she thought about acquiring a regenerative ability separate from the level up. Judging from how hard it took for her to get the Summoning skills, she would have a higher chance of trying her luck in summoning a healing spirit from her circle.

Aria planned to become a one man army, while also mingling with others that were necessary to her growth and opportunities like Alena or Reina.

She had already covered offense and defence with her three spirits. Healing was able to be done by Dianthe, but the spirit could only soothe the wounds and couldn't perform the real 'Heal'.

Healing was a rather difficult topic. One could restore health through two different types of spells. Healing and regenerative spells.

Regenerative spells could come from all sorts of different elements. For example, Dianthe's soothing fell into this category. If Rallaka, Igna, or Ilyin's abilities were cultivated further, they would be able to learn a regenerative spell of their own element.

In contrast to this, healing was exclusive to one element, which was Light.

Light spirits were few in numbers, and aren't very attack based. Them and the Nature spirits were the most well known supportive summons.

As Aria slowly approached the three hundred kill count, she hummed. From the corner of her eyes, she was able to spot Blythe, who was also speeding through the creatures in a similar speed as Aria. The one who blessed him was his sister, Cha Seol-hyun.

Aria's eyes narrowed. Around Cha Jeong-in, there was an ominous power. Not the one he himself possessed. The [King's Might] was part of the Light element in its foundations, but his power somehow seemed quite impure for someone of his caliber.

Did the impurity come from Cha Seol-hyun after all?

Blythe was strong. Very strong for a human. The Xagas were no match to him. With one strike of his sword, he was able to take out the enemy in one go. Even better when he added elemental spells to his attack, taking out several enemies at once.

At this rate, they would be cleaning out the crowd within no more than fifteen minutes or such.

Was this really it? Taking care of five hundred Xagas. It was a high number, but she couldn't believe that this dungeon, which the System personally took notice of didn't pose a higher difficulty. 

Perhaps, the Serpent Boss that laid beyond all this mountain of corpses they were going to create... Was that terrifying of a creature that it single-handedly made the System place its eyes on it?

She was bothered quite a lot, but continued to fight passionately, farming her experience points from the pitiful Xagas.