Chapter 157: The Second Wave of Dark Creatures Attacks

The main challenge with this elite monster isn’t its thick health bar—it just takes longer to kill, but it’s not particularly difficult. The real problem lies in its special ability:

Devour.

It can heal itself and boost its stats by eating nearby living dark creatures. Although Su You didn’t know the exact numbers, she had no intention of letting it use this skill at all.

Since it can only devour living creatures, if they killed all the surrounding dark creatures, it would have nothing left to “eat.”

After hearing Su You’s plan, Duoya and Meike immediately switched their focus to the ordinary dark creatures nearby.

There seemed to be less than twenty dark creatures in this wave, but their stats were noticeably higher than those from the early morning. As a result, Duoya had to use about half again as many arrows to take down a single dark creature compared to before.

This pace was too slow.

Watching the elite monster’s sluggish movements, Su You turned to the two brothers and asked, “Where are the bronze lanterns I gave you?”

There weren’t many dark creatures outside, and this batch was different from the previous one, so the brothers could actually join the fight outside—as long as they brought a light source.

Su You wasn’t sure what exactly would happen at night, but she’d prepared for the possibility that the two of them might need to fight outside.

Although the light source would send the dark creatures into a brief frenzy, it also offered some protection, since dark creatures couldn’t force their way close to the light.

“We’ve got them!”

“Right here!”

The two of them quickly took out the bronze lanterns Su You had given them that morning and hung them at their waists. The glow from the lanterns lit them up clearly.

“Be careful. You don’t need to attack—just drive the other dark creatures away from the elite monster. Got it?” She’d just checked: all the dark creatures were focused on attacking the territory, so their aggro was firmly locked.

Once they stepped outside with the lanterns, as long as they didn’t attack and draw aggro, the dark creatures wouldn’t abandon their assault on the territory to attack them—at least not right away.

“Don’t worry, my lord, we know what to do.” The two brothers already understood from Su You that the big guy could power up by eating other dark creatures, so they knew exactly why she’d arranged things this way.

Their job was to drive away all the dark creatures, so the elite monster couldn’t use its Devour skill. That would give Duoya, Meike, and the arrow towers enough time to clear out the ordinary dark creatures. Once those were gone, they could focus on the elite monster.

Time was tight, so they didn’t waste words and left the territory immediately.

The moment they opened the stone gate, a bunch of dark creatures tried to rush in, taking advantage of the open door. But Su You and Meike had already planned for this—

As soon as the door opened, a wall of fire sprang up between the stone gate and the dark creatures.

The dark creatures tried to charge in, but the instant they touched the flames, they were engulfed and burned. Their howls and roars of pain made them instinctively retreat several steps—no matter how dumb their AI was, they weren’t going to stand there and get roasted.

As soon as the firewall disappeared, the dark creatures surged forward again like a tide, but by then, the stone gate had slammed shut.

Unable to get in, the dark creatures went berserk, attacking the stone gate like trapped beasts. They were just waiting for the moment the gate fell, so they could rush in and snuff out the flames!

…

Lyle and Lake had already made it outside safely. Just as Su You had expected, although the sudden appearance of two “beacons” in the darkness made the dark creatures agitated, not a single one tried to attack them.

And since they were the only sources of light in the darkness, there was no way Duoya, Su You’s arrow towers, or Meike could accidentally hit them—they stood out too much.

Just like that, the two brothers made it to the elite monster’s side without a scratch.

“Roar—”

The elite monster was a bit stronger, but it was still a dark creature, and shared their traits. It hated the light, so Lyle and Lake could clearly feel it: as they approached, the elite monster first turned and roared at them, then shuffled a step away.

Noticing this, the brothers didn’t get any closer—they remembered their mission was to drive dark creatures away from the elite monster, not to control the monster’s movements itself.

All they had to do was act like “bodyguards,” making sure that aside from the two of them, nothing else got close to the elite monster. If they forced their way closer and provoked it, that would be bad.

…

With no other weirdly-skilled elite monsters interfering, this wave of dark creatures was handled smoothly.

The remaining dozen or so dark creatures didn’t even manage to take down half the stone gate’s durability before they were all wiped out, leaving only the elite monster on the field.

After the small fry were dealt with, Lyle and Lake didn’t return to the territory. Instead, they drew their weapons and joined the fight.

During the battle with the elite monster, Duoya got lucky: the fire damage from her Flame Mage set triggered several times.

Su You could clearly see the burning effect on the elite monster, and the monster noticed it too, trying to put out the flames.

But whether it was using the wrong method or the effect simply couldn’t be removed physically, it failed every time. In fact, it wasted several attack opportunities trying.

As melee fighters, Lyle and Lake hacked and smashed at the elite monster. They took some hits, but since the monster was slow, they dodged most of its attacks.

The few blows that did land didn’t do much damage, since both brothers were fully equipped with leather armor—shirts, pants, shoes, and even hats.

All this gear had been crafted by Dory, who now had sewing skills, using materials Duoya hunted in the forest or collected from her traps.

Even without enhancements, this set provided 18 points of defense. But Dory had managed to put together a fully enhanced set, bringing their defense up to a whopping 30 points!

(End of chapter)"

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