Is this really a Game?!

"What the hell, why do all the bosses lately have a second phase?!" Shadow curses as he looks at the Dullahan that was enveloped in green fire, the monster grows a bit before stopping at the height of 2.2 meters.

"I'm sorry to disappoint you and your friends but this isn't really something you would call a phase 2," Aethion speaks to Reign with a serious voice suddenly.

"What?"

"It's a small evolution," Aethion continues, "You have managed to deal a lot of damage to the Dullahan, not to mention you managed to make his fire almost useless. As Dullahan's are of a higher grade of undead they do have some intelligence, he probably realized that the only way he could win is if he can improve his soul flame, and by allowing it to consume the horse that had become useless he achieved so."

"A Dullahan without a horse is usually weaker compared to normal, unfortunately for you this one is stronger since he has just gained a new power, if he however manages to get a new steed he will become even more powerful, I don't know if you guys will be able to defeat him then."

Reign listens to Aethion's words with great care, the old necromancer was incredibly knowledgeable and his words were very helpful to him and the others. Luckily for them, the new Dullahan didn't really have any better defense, the only difference now was that he has physically stronger whilst having better control over his flames that were now coming out from every gap of his armor, the headless body now had a silhouette of a face being formed from the flames blazed from its neck.

The powerful boss suddenly attacks them, his speed was almost equal to how it was previously with the horse, his attack, however, was much more powerful, with a single swing of the sword the ground split open upon impact. Reign and the others could feel the wind blowing from the power of the attack as they managed to dodge it.

Beast and Laura had retreated as they knew they couldn't help them in close-quarter combat, they instead used their long-range attacks to bombard the Dullahan from afar, as the boss was a lot larger compared to the others, they didn't have any trouble hitting him.

Laura suddenly takes out a book and holds it in her left hand, her right hand held a staff and she started casting something as she stared at the book. In a couple of moments, a pitch-black flame was levitating above her hand that held the book, she puts her right hand in front of her as she aims at the boss.

"Guys, get away from it!" Laura shouts as she releases the black fireball that zooms towards the boss, it explodes in a brilliant fashion as black flames start burning the Dullahan, even though it didn't seem like any damage had been done, they were able to see that the soul flame had weakened a bit after Laura's attack had hit the monster.

Black Flame

That was the first skill recorded in the tome that Laura held, they had gotten it as a reward for defeating the necromancer and Laura was trying to learn the spells that were written inside of it. The spells were incredibly powerful and even the weakest one, namely the Black Flame that Laura just used was very hard to learn, even after so many days of trying to learn it she only managed to use it together with the tome as it made it a lot easier.

The mana that was needed to use the spell however was huge, it was a lot more compared to the skills and spells that Laura had from her Demon Hunter class or from the ones she made herself with the help of her ability, still, the power it could exhibit while holding the tome was incredible.

Reign and the others used to have a Rank B Deserted Codex, however after breaking the seal they saw that it only had some normal spells in it, even Laura wasn't interested in learning them back then as they truly thought it wasn't worth it, however after seeing the power the spells from the Dark Tome had, perhaps they had made a mistake, even if the spells there were a lot weaker they would have allowed Laura to learn more and perhaps it would have been easier to learn the ones here.

The Deserted Codex was sold to another squad that was still trying their hardest to learn all the spells from it, the squad was one of the top 4 in the territory and the Codex had a lot to do with that, each of the members learned some of the weaker spells that allowed them to have a greater arsenal, to Reign and the others that would have been useless, but for the others, it was a treasure like no other.

It was too late for regrets however and the party was still satisfied with what they had, the Dark Tome was incredibly powerful and even though Laura had managed to only learn the weakest spell it was still an incredible achievement.

The boss turns his body towards Laura as the flaming face shows an angry scowl, it suddenly runs towards her. It seems that the boss was angered by the fact that the black flame was able to weaken his soul flame and it wanted to eliminate Laura as fast as possible. Beast had already summoned his beasts, even though they wouldn't be able to fight against the boss for long, they would still be able to at least stall him for a bit if needed.

The boss swings his sword after seeing Reign who was standing in his path.

Clang!

Reign, Wolf, and Shadow had attacked at the same time, their combined strength managed to stop the powerful attack from the boss before Shadow jumped up with a ball of darkness in his hands.

Immediately he threw the ball as the Darkness Implosion skill activated right in the middle of the armor. A loud noise of metal bending and screeching could be heard as the armor deforms, the powerful armor that none of them were able to go through suddenly took a hard hit from the skill as it was clearly weakened now. The boss was seemingly outraged at the fact, first, his flames were weakened by Laura and now the armor that protected him for so long was damaged by Shadow, he suddenly stabs the ground with his sword as a fiery, green explosion takes place around it.

The soul flame burns powerfully as Tank and Greenie got hit, even though it was only one arm and leg that was touched by the flame the pain they felt was enormous, the place where the flame touched was cold as ice while their very soul felt like it was burning.

Reign and the others look at them with concern as Shadow teleports next to them in case the boss decides to attack. The flame was still burning and it shrouded the entire area, the boss wasn't visible to any of them thanks to that. Suddenly one part of the flame opens as the boss blitzes through it, he was heading straight at Laura and Beast as destruction was left in his wake, and the soil was sent flying through the air as pebbles hit the surroundings with great speed and power.

In a couple of moments, he would be in front of Beast and Laura who were the targets of his wrath.

Seeing the situation Reign suddenly pushes Wolf strongly as the latter slides back a couple of meters. Before he could even ask Reign why he did that he was greeted by an incredible sight, black and white lightning exploded from Reign as his hair stood straight up, he lowers himself a bit as the lightning covers him completely before disappearing from the spot.

In a flash he was next to the Dullahan, his two swords stabbing the monster from the side as a huge head of the Kirin materialized around him. A sonic boom was heard again as the Dullahan was sent flying away from the powerful attack, his armor had two holes on its side as cracks could be seen around them. The green flames immediately come out of the wound as the Dullahan stands up slowly, the attack was incredibly powerful and he wasn't even able to see it before it was too late.

Reign on the other hand was panting heavily as he looked at the boss that was charging at him, that was possibly the strongest attack he had used to date, and yet the boss still seemed fine, only two holes could be found on the armor, even after using such an attack, he was only able to barely pierce through the armor.

However what Reign failed to see was that he pierced through the armor, not a gap or a place where the armor was thinner, he managed to pierce through one of the hardest places the armor had, that was not something that was easily done as even Shadow's skill was only able to deform the armor.

His stamina and mana were running a bit low but Reign still stood straight against the enemy, Wolf and the others had arrived next to him as they all prepared to continue fighting against the boss.