748 Chapter 748

Nearly two years had passed since Marcus and his group had completed the eleventh through twentieth floors of the special dungeon, Realization of Self Perfection.

Immediately after they had braved the next set of ten floors with all of them getting through and coming out stronger than before.

Yet the second they were done they all needed to rush back to the real world to attend to the duties that they had.

For Lilia and Alaric this meant going back to school. They had already taken time off and missed plenty of classes and had a lot to catch up on if they did not wish to be expelled.

Marcus for his part needed to check in to do his work for the kingdom during winter. Which turned out to be the very 'thrilling' experience of being treated as cargo plane once again. And when that came to an end the spring was filled with politics as he continued his job as representative to Glena Reota, the ice elf city.

James and Lyra had their own respective leadership positions that demanded their attention, and Mrazivy had things to deal with as a princess and to prepare for her and Marcus' wedding.

Still even with all that they needed to accomplish during the year all of them made time during the summer and sometimes into the fall to head back into the special dungeon.

Now they had all come back together to once again take on the challenges of the special dungeon once again and were currently deep into clearing floors forty-one through fifty.

…

'Vorpal Fang.'

Shockwaves shook the area as Marcus clashed with his powerful opponent.

Both of them unleashed rapid slashes with their weapons that for any normal person would have been moving too fast to see.

'Damn this thing is strong. I suppose I should have known that floor fifty was not going to be easy.'

Taking a step back Marcus carefully examined his opponent again and tried to think up some other strategy to deal with it.

'I even used skill points to level up creature appraisal to eight, but all I can get is that it is a level eighty monster called a Shinigami.'

Staring at the creature before him Marcus tried to find any weakness it might have.

However, the humanoid figure clad in a dark robe that hid all but its skeletal hands, wings made of bones, and glowing red eyes seemed to have no vulnerabilities to speak of.

Marcus had already tired to attack it with magic, but the thing seemed to be immune to anything he threw at it.

He had buffed himself up with his spells and used his supreme skill but found that the creature before him was still able to match him.

Certainly, with his level being sixty-eight it was twelve levels higher than him, but that did not explain how powerful it really was.

'And of course, it is also wielding a scythe.' Marcus thought as he looked up and down the pitch-black blade the Shinigami wielded.

Up to this point it had not attacked him, but any assault her tried was deftly countered by its impeccable strength and skill.

With nothing to pressure him Marcus gave up on the meaningless clashes he had thrown himself into so far and thought deeply about what the purpose of this floor was.

Fortunately, with all the experience he had in the dungeon he was fairly well versed in figuring out what it wanted him to accomplish, and luckily this floor was quite easy to decipher.

'It is immune to any magic or soul-based attacks. But it makes sure to block my scythe and is using the same weapon as me. Clearly it is meant to be teach me how to better wield my weapon, or possibly learn some impeccable attack of defensive skill focusing on the scythe.'

Marcus believing this to be the point of the trial shut off his supreme skill and magic that was buffing him.

If this was a challenge that would be based purely on skill, then trying to brute force his way through with overwhelming power would just needlessly exhaust him.

"I have never had a true master before to teach me the way of the scythe. Everything I know is from my own personal training, battle experience, and the assistance of skills. I humbly thank you for your teachings." Marcus said while bowing before the Shinigami in front of him.

As he did so the monster created by the dungeon that should have had no will ever so slightly shifted its demeanor as if accepting Marcus' sincerity to learn.

After that he brought his head back up and wielded his scythe in both hands. Ready to begin training.

Strike after strike Marcus tried to break through the Shinigami's defense but was rebuffed each time.

Yet each blocked attack only made him more exited as he ingrained the techniques his opponent was using into his mind.

Six days went by as they continued to do battle. Neither of them having any physically limits and continuing on endlessly.

During this time Marcus had gotten noticeably better at wielding his scythe and had nearly ingrained every move his opponent had into his mind.

Then finally after much struggle and ceaseless battling he finally broke through and landed an attack on his scythe master.

His blade rung out as it struck something hard which felt like bone.

'I managed to land a hit!'

Absolutely thrilled to have achieved his goal Marcus threw his hands into the air and shouted out in joy.

Except this lapse in concentration found him wholly unprepared for what came next.

The Shinigami had been holding back on attacking until Marcus landed the first blow, but now it no longer held any such restriction.

Marcus' danger sense went off like blaring alarm bells and he barely managed to maneuver his scythe and body to prevent his head from being taken off.

A large spray of grey mist shot out of his neck and a slight pain was transmitted to him.

Halfway through his neck had been sliced into by the Shinigami's scythe. Leaving what would have been a fatal wound to any normal flesh and blood human.

"I see the lesson is not over yet." Marcus said as he tightly gripped his scythe and gave his master and adversary his attention once again.

By what would have seemed to be some sort of miracle the Shinigami had not made any follow up attacks and waited until Marcus was healed and ready to go again.

It was as if its first attack had simply been a warning for Marcus to not get conceited simply because he managed to land one hit.

Now on the defensive Marcus was besieged by an unending stream of attacks which he had to do everything in his power to block.

He did not even have any room to try and launch a counterattack and had to focus solely on defense.

Every clash had him getting injured and it was taking all of his healing abilities to stay in proper shape to continue battling.

It was painfully slow how long it took him to adapt to the Shinigami's attacks, and instead of just analyzing its defensive style for weaknesses now he needed to fully incorporate it in order to block its ferocious attack.

Time seemed to blur for Marcus as he continued to fight.

While before when he was on the attack, he had not needed to exert more mana than he recovered. Now that he was incurring numerous wounds it was draining for him to fix them swiftly enough to not be slain.

'Shit!'

Barely ducking his head out of the way on time he received a nasty gash that sliced through his face and nearly took off a chunk of his head.

More and more attacks kept coming, and he had lost count of how many times he had needed to grow new appendages to replace one that had been cut off.

Even with all the power he had gained his spiritual energy and mana were not infinite and after days of fighting he was beginning to be worn down.

'None of my defenses work other than blocking with my scythe. It rips through my mana barrier and spells like nothing. I am going to go down at this rate.'

Failing at a parry while his thoughts were in turmoil Marcus felt his hands go flying.

This was the first time he had completely lost his grip on his scythe, and his regeneration did not move fast enough for him to grip it again before the follow attack came.

In a final act of desperation Marcus used the only hand he had left and brough of his spectral arm.

With it he gripped ahold of his falling scythe and braced it to block the incoming attack.

He had already found that the auto defense function could not properly block the Shinigami's attacks and knew he needed something more solid.

Thankfully his gamble paid off and he managed to block that attack that would have cleaved his head in half.

The next instance he regripped his scythe with his newly regenerated hands and prepared to continue the battle.

Slowly but surely, he grew accustomed to the attacks of his deadly master and began to fully incorporate the defense techniques it had previous employed until he finally learned a new skill.

All of a sudden it just clicked, and he finally was able to perfectly block a series of attacks.

'Stalwart Full Moon.'

Using the new skill he had obtained, Marcus felt a sphere around himself which encompassed the range of his scythe. Within it he could instinctually feel attacks coming for him and move to intercept them.

Of course, he had just learned the skill, so it was not perfect, but it helped to alleviate some of the pressure he had been feeling.

More and more days went by as Marcus started to counterattack now that his defense was capable of keeping up better.

Every time he got a bit better the Shinigami would match him, until finally he managed to get the Stalwart Moon skill up to level six and he gained a slight edge.

That was when the Shinigami revealed its last and card.

Marcus had learned its defensive technique and how it wielded its scythe to fight normally, but it still had a powerful attack skill at its disposal.

Its scythe seemed to distort as it waved it back and forth and suddenly Marcus felt like eight attacks were coming at him from multiple different angles.

Each one was fast and packed with power and it took the fully extent of his defensive technique to block six of them.

The joint areas of his armor around his knees were sliced through like butter where he was unable to guard, and he suddenly felt weightless as he stumbled back after losing his legs.

Nerveless as a ghost he simply gained his balance back by floating and his severed legs began growing back in the blink of an eye.

Yet this same attack came at him before he could fully recover, and once again, he incurred another set of injuries he was unable to fully block.

A third time, a four time, a fifth time. Marcus took more and more attacks from this skill he did not fully understand, until on the six time he saw it he managed to deflect each of the strikes.

Then when he was comfortable blocking the attack, he began trying to imitate it.

His first thousand tries were sloppy at best. The skill was not an easy one to pick up. But with every attempt he got a bit better, and eventually used the powerful attack skill.

'Crescent Moon Strikes.'

His blade seemed to multiple as he unleashed this, attack and he struck out with everything he had towards the monster that had been his scythe instructor.

Except this time, it did not move to block. It simply allowed each of the strikes to hit its body, and its once solid form was no where to be seen as Marcus cut through it like butter.

In less than a second the being that had taught him how to further his scythe skills was destroyed and began fading away into nothing.

For the first time Marcus felt bad about destroying an enemy. He had recognized this Shinigami as his master and now that it was over he did not want them to simply fade away.

Instinctually he held out his hand to heal the fading monster, but it was already too late for that.

It was a creature created by the special dungeon, and now that its job was over all it could do was fade away.

Yet before it was fully gone, for the first time Marcus was able to see its face.

It was practically just a skull with only a very thin layer of transparent flesh hugging the bone.

Still in its eyes it seemed proud, and it had a content smile on its face as it faded away.

Once it was gone Marcus heard two different chimes.

One signaling that he had beaten the floor's challenge and another signaling his level up.