The defensive ability of the Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors was even greater than Kyle had originally expected.
The skeleton warriors that had been sent flying by the Mine Wolf King earlier had rolled several times across the hard stone floor after landing, but it didn’t take long for them to climb back to their feet.
A few thin cracks had appeared across their blue-gray bones.
Yet those cracks didn’t continue spreading.
Instead, as the soul flames in their eye sockets flickered, the damage slowly began to heal.
Before long, most of the minor cracks had already disappeared.
The dark red soul flames in their eyes still burned steadily, showing almost no sign of weakening.
Kyle watched everything from behind them.
He now had a much clearer understanding of the Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors’ actual defensive ability.
At the very least, the Mine Wolf King in front of him wasn’t capable of truly breaking through their defenses.
In that case, there was no reason to continue testing.
“Use your skill.” At Kyle’s command, the Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors that hadn’t been knocked back immediately rushed forward.
Dark red light spread across their blades.
[Savage Strike]!
The two at the front reached the Mine Wolf King first.
Their blades fell almost simultaneously.
Slash!
The sharp edges tore straight through the wolf’s thick gray-black fur, carving two deep wounds into its enormous body.
Blood sprayed outward.
“AWOOO—!” The intense pain forced a miserable howl from the Mine Wolf King’s throat.
The skeleton warriors gave it no chance to recover.
Several others closed in from both sides.
Two used the momentum of their charge to leap directly onto the Mine Wolf King’s massive body.
Their bony hands clamped down on its thick fur.
Fingers dug deep into flesh.
The blades in their other hands lit up with dark red light again.
One strike.
Two.
Three.
The blades fell repeatedly.
Wounds rapidly spread across the Mine Wolf King’s back.
Watching from behind, Kyle suddenly remembered the vision he’d seen on the day of his class awakening.
Those skeleton warriors had climbed onto the dragon in exactly the same way.
One after another.
Strike after strike.
Until the enormous dragon had finally been dragged down beneath them.
Of course, the Mine Wolf King before him couldn’t remotely compare to the dragon from that vision.
Its size, strength, and defense existed on completely different levels.
Besides, Kyle’s Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors now had 3,500 points in all four attributes.
Their Strength alone already far exceeded the Mine Wolf King’s.
Every strike inflicted obvious damage.
After taking repeated heavy blows, the Mine Wolf King went completely berserk.
Its massive body suddenly rolled across the ground, trying to throw the skeleton warriors from its back.
When that failed, it simply charged sideways and slammed itself into the rock wall.
BANG!
A heavy impact echoed through the tunnel.
The entire passage seemed to tremble.
Fragments of rock rained down from the wall.
Yet the Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors clinging to the wolf didn’t let go.
Their bony fingers remained buried in fur and flesh.
Their bodies shook violently with every movement of the Mine Wolf King, but the blades in their hands continued falling.
The skeleton warriors on the ground didn’t stop either.
They stayed close to the Mine Wolf King and focused their attacks on its legs, clearly trying to restrict its movement even further.
Blade after blade struck its hind legs.
One attack cut so deep that it nearly reached the bone, producing a dull sound almost like metal striking metal.
The Mine Wolf King howled again.
It spun around violently and swung one massive claw at the nearest Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warrior.
BANG!
The skeleton was knocked away.
Its body slid several meters across the ground.
Only a few seconds later, however, it pushed itself back up.
After confirming that its frame hadn’t suffered any serious damage, it picked up its blade and charged back into the fight.
On the other side, the Mine Wolf King opened its jaws and bit down on another Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warrior’s shoulder.
CRACK!
A sharp snapping sound rang out.
Kyle initially thought the skeleton had been damaged.
Then he looked more carefully.
The Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warrior’s shoulder bone was still intact.
Instead— a broken piece of fang had fallen beside the Mine Wolf King’s mouth.
At that point, Kyle stopped worrying completely.
The difference in their attributes was simply too large.
The Mine Wolf King might have possessed an enormous body, but if it couldn’t even properly damage the Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors’ bones, then the advantage brought by its size was greatly reduced.
If anything, that huge body only made it a larger target.
“What good is being big?” Kyle calmly watched the heavily wounded Mine Wolf King.
“You still die.” The battle continued.
In only a short time, the wounds covering the Mine Wolf King’s body multiplied.
Large amounts of blood dripped continuously from its gray-black fur, leaving dark red stains across the stone floor.
Its movements were also becoming noticeably slower.
One of its hind legs had taken so many repeated attacks that it could no longer support its weight properly.
It was almost at its limit.
Just as several Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors prepared to attack again, the Mine Wolf King suddenly raised its head.
“AWOOOO—!” A roar even louder than before erupted through the tunnel.
The sound reverberated violently through the narrow passage.
Then a visible shock wave exploded outward from the Mine Wolf King’s massive body.
BOOM!
The skeleton warriors clinging to its back were the first to be thrown away.
The nearby Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors were struck next, one after another being sent flying.
Blue-gray skeletons slammed into the walls before falling onto the stone floor.
Kyle remained behind them.
His expression barely changed.
This was already the second time the Mine Wolf King had used a similar ability.
Based on its actual performance, the skill certainly looked impressive.
Its knockback effect was especially strong.
But the actual damage it dealt was limited.
“Average damage.” Kyle watched the skeleton warriors rising from the ground again.
“Good knockback, though.” Just as expected.
The Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors quickly regained their footing.
A few small cracks had appeared across two of them, but their ability to fight remained unaffected.
The moment they raised their blades again— the Mine Wolf King didn’t attack.
Instead, it suddenly turned around.
Dragging its injured hind leg behind it, it limped deeper into the mine as quickly as it could.
Kyle paused.
“It ran?” That was unexpected.
He had assumed a dungeon boss would continue fighting until it died.
He hadn’t expected the Mine Wolf King to realize it was completely outmatched and simply run away.
But Kyle soon realized things weren’t that simple.
After disappearing into the tunnel ahead, the Mine Wolf King didn’t become quiet.
Instead, it continued fleeing while raising its head and howling.
“AWOOO—!” The sound traveled through the long mine tunnel and disappeared into the darkness.
A moment later— something answered.
“AWOO!” Then another.
“AWOOOO—!” A third.
A fourth.
More and more howls began echoing from different directions inside the mine.
Kyle’s expression gradually became serious.
No.
The Mine Wolf King wasn’t simply escaping.
It was calling others.
Kyle didn’t immediately send his skeleton warriors after it.
Instead, he gave a mental command.
All eight Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors retreated toward him.
The forty Black-Iron Skeleton Warriors remained inside his summoning space.
Clack.
Clack.
The sound of shifting bones filled the tunnel as the eight Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors quickly tightened their formation around Kyle.
Then— Creeeak!
A harsh metallic sound suddenly came from the left.
A moment later, the same sound came from the right.
Creeeak— Kyle looked up.
The iron doors lining both sides of the mine tunnel were opening.
One after another.
From the darkness behind the first door— a pair of crimson eyes appeared.
Then another pair.
A third.
More and more.
Deep breathing gradually filled the passage.
Soon, a large gray-black wolf stepped out of the darkness.
Then a second.
A third…
Kyle immediately used Detection.
[Mine Dire Wolf] [Level: 14] [Strength: 650] [Agility: 650] [Spirit: 250] [Constitution: 1,500] [Skill: Bite] Judging by attributes alone, the Mine Dire Wolves weren’t particularly powerful.
Their Strength and Agility were only 650.
Their Constitution reached 1,500, but compared to the Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors’ 3,500 points in every attribute, there was still an enormous gap.
The real problem— was their number.
Ten.
Twenty.
Thirty…
More iron doors continued opening.
More Mine Dire Wolves poured into the passage.
Their number quickly passed fifty.
And they kept coming.
By the time the final iron door had fully opened, more than a hundred Mine Dire Wolves had gathered throughout the tunnel.
Low growls overlapped from every direction.
Kyle swept his gaze across the monsters.
Something immediately felt wrong.
More than a hundred Level 14 elite monsters.
If this was the normal number of monsters intended to appear on Nightmare difficulty, an ordinary five-person party would have almost no chance of fighting through them head-on.
Kyle glanced back toward the entrance.
There was indeed a particularly narrow section of tunnel behind him.
If a defensive class holder blocked that position while a mage used area attacks and a healer continuously kept the frontline alive, then theoretically, a party could slowly clear the monsters.
But— Blackstone Mine was currently under an [Unknown Anomaly].
Kyle had no reason to assume that the hundred-plus Mine Dire Wolves in front of him were part of the dungeon’s normal mechanics.
Especially after what the Mine Wolf King had just done.
It hadn’t simply fled.
It had deliberately called other monsters to its aid.
That alone was already different from the fixed behavioral patterns of ordinary dungeon monsters.
Kyle didn’t have much longer to think.
The wolves moved.
Those at the front lowered their bodies.
The next instant— more than a hundred Mine Dire Wolves charged at once.
RUMBLE—!
The pounding of countless paws filled the entire tunnel.
So many monsters were running at once that even the stone beneath Kyle’s feet began to tremble faintly.
The eight Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors immediately tightened their formation.
Two guarded the front.
Four covered both sides.
The final two remained close to Kyle, ready to fill any opening that appeared.
As for the forty Black-Iron Skeleton Warriors— Kyle still didn’t summon them.
The tunnel was too narrow.
Against more than a hundred monsters, simply adding more bodies wouldn’t necessarily produce the best result.
Besides— Kyle now had another skill that was far more suitable for a situation like this.
But before he could use it— he needed a corpse.
“Kill one.” Kyle gave the order.
Five Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors immediately locked onto the Mine Dire Wolf at the very front.
The moment both sides met, the wolf lunged toward the skeleton warrior ahead of it.
Before its jaws could close around the target, two blades struck simultaneously from the sides.
Slash!
Blood sprayed.
The Mine Dire Wolf lost its balance and crashed heavily onto the ground.
Three more Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors immediately followed.
Their blades came down one after another.
Less than two seconds later— the Level 14 Mine Dire Wolf stopped moving.
[Level 14 Mine Dire Wolf killed.
EXP +2,800.] Kyle didn’t look at the drops.
All his attention was focused on the fresh corpse.
The rest of the Mine Dire Wolves continued surging forward.
Ten meters.
Eight.
Five…
More and more entered the area surrounding the body.
Kyle still didn’t activate the skill.
He waited.
Waited for more.
The dense wolf pack continued squeezing into the tunnel ahead.
Only when enough of them had entered the area did Kyle finally raise his hand.
His Spirit locked onto the corpse.
“Corpse Explosion.” The next instant— BOOM!
A violent explosion erupted in the middle of the wolf pack without warning.
The Mine Dire Wolf’s corpse exploded.
A brutal shock wave carrying blood, flesh, dirt, and shattered rock swept outward.
The nearest wolves didn’t even have time to react before the blast threw them from their feet.
More wolves were hurled backward.
The pack that had been charging forward in a dense formation instantly fell into chaos.
At Level 1, [Corpse Explosion] originally had a range of only one meter and dealt damage equal to ten percent of the corpse’s health.
After being enhanced twentyfold by Level 2 [Total Amplification]— [Corpse Explosion] [Actual Explosion Radius: 20 meters] [Actual Damage: 200% of the corpse’s maximum health] A large number of Mine Dire Wolves within twenty meters were swallowed by the explosion.
They were all Level 14 monsters.
Their Constitution and health were roughly similar.
And now they had just taken explosive damage equal to two hundred percent of the health of one of their own kind.
There was almost no suspense about the result.
One Mine Dire Wolf after another collapsed.
The dense chorus of howls filling the tunnel was instantly cut by more than half.
Then— system notifications began flooding Kyle’s vision.
[Level 14 Mine Dire Wolf killed.
EXP +3,500.] [Gray Wolf Pelt ×2 obtained.] [Level 14 Mine Dire Wolf killed.
EXP +3,500.] [Beast Bone ×4 obtained.] [Level 14 Mine Dire Wolf killed.
EXP +3,500.] [Gray Wolf Pelt ×6 obtained.] [Level 14 Mine Dire Wolf killed.
EXP +3,500.] [Beast Bone ×6 obtained.] …
Notifications appeared one after another.
They almost completely filled Kyle’s vision.
At the same time, his experience began rising at a visible rate.
[Current EXP: 38%] A moment later— [Current EXP: 78%] A single [Corpse Explosion] had increased his experience by forty percent.
Kyle stared at the rapidly refreshing notifications.
For once, clear surprise appeared in his eyes.
This efficiency— was beyond what he’d expected.
Having his skeleton warriors hunt separately had already given him a leveling speed far beyond that of an ordinary class holder.
But when facing large groups of tightly packed monsters, the efficiency of [Corpse Explosion] was even more astonishing than his summons.
Most importantly— he had only detonated one corpse.
And now?
The ground ahead was covered in dead Mine Dire Wolves.
One corpse could explode.
So could ten.
As long as there were enough monsters and they were packed closely enough together, every creature killed by the first explosion could become fuel for the next [Corpse Explosion].
The chain could continue.
Kyle looked through the smoke still hanging over the tunnel.
Then at the corpses covering the ground.
Only after using the skill in a true large-scale battle did he fully understand what made [Corpse Explosion] terrifying.
It wasn’t one explosion.
It was the fact that once the first corpse appeared— there could only be more.
Against enemies gathered in large numbers, it was practically a chain of death capable of continuing on its own.
Kyle didn’t immediately activate a second [Corpse Explosion].
Because on the other side of the smoke— the surviving Mine Dire Wolves suddenly stopped.
They no longer charged.
Instead, every one of them turned toward the depths of the mine.
Then— a howl came slowly from somewhere deep in the darkness.
“AWOOOO—” It wasn’t particularly loud.
But the instant the remaining Mine Dire Wolves heard it, they all lowered their bodies.
Even the ferocity they’d shown moments ago seemed to vanish.
Kyle’s expression gradually became serious.
Again.
Ever since he’d entered Blackstone Mine, the monsters here had behaved less and less like ordinary dungeon creatures following fixed patterns.
He didn’t detonate another corpse.
The eight Bronze-Rank Skeleton Warriors regrouped around him.
Kyle looked past the field of dead wolves and toward the tunnel swallowed by darkness.
That howl just now— hadn’t come from the Mine Wolf King.