The first enemy approaches quietly from the back and chooses the most vulnerable of us all: A pale immobile girl with a weapon in the worst condition and basically no ammunition left.

  Her shield at the early baby stage which depletes her stamina massively.

  *Thud*

  *Wild screeching*

  Small monkey, like the one from before, is ragdolled in the process.

  White Guardian, level 19

  Astrid's arrow pierces through its little body easily.

  The thing is not dead yet, but it would be an easy process to finish, maybe it will simply bleed out on its own.

  "Mike!" She calls for him loudly, despite being glued right to him.

  "Small ones first! Two of them! Let's deal with it before the real encounter!" He warns us while looking around.

  To my eye, enemies are invisible, far in the distance, but with his eye he has them highlighted.

  Staying close to each other, we wait for the second encounter.

  *Shing!*

  Harald hides his gun in his holster and the two handed massive sword materializes in his arms.

  He grips tightly his longsword with both hands and a smile appears on his face.

  I crouch a bit, leaning over the hammer attached to my left arm and clean and polish the dagger over my pants.

  I notice that my hands are already turning black. If I don’t die in a fight, I will anyway due to necrosis and poisoning.

  "Here we go!"

  *Slash*

  Mike spins in place almost setting Astrid flying and slashes one ape easily, opening a deep wound over its stomach.

  Harald is confident as he's seen how easily Astrid dealt with the first one and ignores it, while it's still screeching and bleeding on the ground attracting everything to our position.

  *Slash*

  The old man finally strikes, he swings his giant sword and cuts the third monkey deeply on the foot, almost cutting it off.

  It barely avoids the blade with a swift and fast move which would definitely gut the beast.

  It attacks while screeching and scratches the old man's thigh with a set of deep cuts.

  His blood starts to pour down his leg, light reflects from the stream of blood over the black pants.

  “What the..” He raises his voice with an angry tone.

  He spins fast and stomps the monkey with his heavy military boot, which breaks some of the bones in an instant. If it weren't for the gruesome screeching we would hear more clearly bone breaking.

  *Stomp* *Thud* *Stomp* *Thud* *Stomp* *Stomp* *Stomp*

  “Raaargh!”

  As the small beast tries to run away in the first place, the angry man keeps stomping it, till it barely moves, or more likely twitches, as its head and face are unrecognizable.

  The blood on his pants itself would made him angry as hell, if there was the pain present.

  Another one marches towards us as the Astrid's one is still screeching for help, probably, but definitely slowly dying from the arrow.

  I can't imagine more than three small monkeys on one, without using the gun or being super skilled.

  I almost rush towards him to manifest my power, but Mike starts to yell and spin chaotically as more and more are incoming, by his words.

  Poor Astrid experiences a wild ride on his back in the meantime.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  "Old man!" Mike yells mid-fight.

  *Swoosh*

  A larger monkey drops from the top of the trees like from out of nowhere, attacking the one that did the most brutal damage. It again buries its deep claws and teeth into his calf.

  He does not react, but if it wasn’t for the acid, he would be in pain and probably overwhelmed.

  *Tschk*

  He grabs the sword with both of his hands by the tall hilt and stabs the ape down through the chest, pinning the creature to the soil.

  He buys some time to take out his gun and quickly reload.

  In the meanwhile, he stomps its neck and cracks the spinal cord in an instant. Health bar is disappearing in front of my eyes.

  Not high level, but definitely will render some points.

  I feel bad for not helping anyone, but spinning with the hammer arm I could easily bash to death one of us. My time will come as soon as one of the creatures chooses me.

  *Dirt and dry bamboo leaves rumbling*

  Astrid activates the shield a few times which distracts the apes and provides an opportunity for Mike to slash them more precisely while dual-wielding his sabres.

  Two low-level monkeys are no match for them, guts almost spilling out, tendons cut rendering the beasts immobile and vulnerable for thrusting.

  Astrid barely activates the shield before a large amount of blood spurts from the intestines towards her.

  "Do you want to fall asleep?!" He pesters her as she is wasting her power.

  "It was just a reflex!" She responds in a snappy manner.

  "I would need a backup with the tall ones!" He yells again and switches his eyes. Closes the small monkey predator and opens his human eye.

  He gestures with a sabre where our targets are.

  "All of them?" The old man asks with a voice containing fear and anger both at the same time.

  I start marching right towards the area.

  My turn is yet to come.

  A group of two fairly large humanoids is approaching me, and I ready myself. I can see only the silhouettes now, but I can tell these things are huge. A bit taller than regular humans and all furry.

  The sunlight shines behind them, making their features unrecognizable, only the fur and stature silhouettes.

  Arms and shoulders ripped and bulky, not too long like actual apes.

  I look at Harald chaotically as I have no idea what to expect.

  "Boy, how many were there?" Old man quickly asks, deciding to either help me or focus on a different group of two approaching.

  "Seven." Mike answers coldly, gazing at the slowly walking furry beast, not moving a hair, watching them like a true predator.

  It's me or them!

  There should not be room for them to even try it. For a brief second a thought flashes, what if these would like to communicate? Why are they approaching and without a sound, I wonder but the true feature is revealed to me quickly as I take a glimpse of the face of one of the beasts.

  Massive fangs, teeth and black gums exposed with a horrifying expression as their circular eyes are widely opened without any eyelids or eyebrows, almost reminds me of a skull. The fur is mostly white but partially dirty, camouflaged.

  Fuckers like these cannot be friendly!

  "Focus!" I say out aloud.

  "Focus!" Mike repeats as he decides to get on the move towards them.

  I manually release a lot of power to my left arm and gradually increase my walking speed to almost sprint.

  "Let's see!"

  Left arm heated, hammer ready to swing around from the uppercut. In my right modern dagger sharp and ready to sting.

  *Swoosh*

  First blow aiming for the abdomen is dodged easily.

  "Raargh!" But followed by a surprise stabbing attack with my dagger, I hit at least two spots in a rush.

  The white fur is immediately covered in blood at the spot of the stab.

  Massive red healthbars form with letters underneath them.

  It is crazy that I'm unable to read any of the letters as I'm more concerned about those horrible gazing faces. My heart is pumping intensely, focusing on the present moment and on my movements, time feels almost slowed down.

  I wonder how Mike's Focus feels, if he is able to dodge so well.

  At least the two stabs I was able to do leave me room for head smacking and skull cracking.

  Another attempt and I quickly notice massive teeth buried in my shoulder, almost ripping off the flesh.

  "Fuck!" I spit through my teeth.

  *Tschk*

  *Tschk*

  My knife enters the back of the neck of the massive muscular ape. I release the bite but it isn't dying at all. I notice part of its name, it starts with “Goro”.

  *Bang*

  *Bang* *Bang*

  Old man shoots and I can hear Mike screaming while dodging.

  Chaos is slowly taking over.

  I completely ignore the damage they do to my body now.

  Left arm is spinning like a beyblade and I try to hit whatever I can now.

  All I notice is a lot of blood dripping from my arms and legs after getting pierced by their claws which are long and sharp just like the teeth.

  Harald is unable to switch to a bigger caliber, he clashes with one of the apes in close combat.

  *Thud* *Thud* *Thud*

  The ape mauls him and starts to punch him in the chest, the blows are luckily absorbed by his bulletproof vest.

  *Bang*

  He shoots it through the dome from close proximity.

  Loud deep roaring of an ape resonates in the area, which is a great fear factor to us.

  I feel overwhelmed and useless as I'm unable to strike with my hammer precisely. These beasts are too fast and the second one plans on finishing my open wound on my left shoulder, dislocating it and making my hammer arm even more useless.

  Its teeth are buried deeply in.

  *Tschk*

  I stab the beast deeply, yet it does not react to it.

  "Raaaaaargh!"

  "Well of power, manifest!"

  Golden ray lightens the area around me as I open my mouth wide!