Swish
Reign suddenly cut through the air as the ape was no longer in front of him, well, to be more exact the ape was a bit below him as it had used its skill in order to make itself even smaller. The ape was now standing at 10 meters tall, it was still a huge monster by any standards, but compared to its original size it was 50% smaller.
The ape suddenly moved and appeared behind Reign in a matter of moments, its speed had increased sharply and it was almost able to match Reign in his boosted-up state. Drawing back its fist the ape looks at Reign with hatred in its eyes before punching him, the powerful punch sends Reign flying back but it was obvious that it was much weaker compared to before.
Decreasing its size to 10 meters had allowed the ape to move much faster than before, compared to its original speed right now the ape was now over 200% faster. Of course, that didn't come without a price as both its defense and attack power had decreased by about 40%. The party's attacks could now deal more damage and the ape had to be a bit more careful in order to not get injured, of course, thanks to its great speed it was able to dodge most attacks that were sent its way.
The ape understood while fighting Reign in its boosted state that it would lose if nothing changed, its powerful attack and defense allowed it to ignore most attacks and simply swing around for a long time in order to hit someone, but after Reign had used the weapon skills he was much faster than before and could easily dodge any attack the ape sent his way and counterattack. Even its powerful defense wasn't able to block the fearsome attacks that Reign suddenly had and the ape knew that its speed had to be increased in order to defend itself against Reign who had gone on a rampage and inflicted many wounds on it.
Reign quickly got up and charged at the ape again, only to be sent flying once more as the powerful monster had slapped him back into the hole he had jumped up from. The ape landed in front of the hole right after Reign and suddenly started bombarding it with punches. Each of the punches could still deal a fair amount of damage even in this state and Reign was already having problems blocking them.
His swords were crossed in front of him as he used them as a shield against the numerous attacks, even with that however he was still feeling some pain as the sheer impact from them was making his body hurt as the vibrations of the attacks were passing through his body. His back and shoulders especially were starting to hurt and Reign didn't know how much longer he could take.
Suddenly the boss gets flung away as a white-haired ogre appeared beside him, Greenie had used his abilities and transformed into his most powerful state while Wolf and Tank had already used their weapon skills. Tank had switched out his axe for the scythe as the incredible boost it provided was truly too great to pass up on.
With four of them now boosted up they should be able to take on the boss without any issues, after all the boss had been now sacrificed a great deal of its attacking power and defense in order to match Reign. When three more fighters of a similar caliber joined the battle, that should quickly become a mistake.
The boss however simply stared at them and charged, its speed had increased even more even though its body had stayed at the same size. The longer the battle progressed the angrier the boss became which in turn increased all of its stats, not only was his speed even greater now but both his defense and attacking power were slowly returning to it as it continued fighting against the four with incredible rage.
Trees were smashed apart and uprooted while the soil around them was getting blown everywhere from their powerful attacks. Wolf's flames were finally strong enough to burn the ape's body and they couldn't be extinguished as easily as before. The mark he had received from Miriam was shining splendidly as his flames were further strengthened by it.
Both Reign and Tank also used the marks they had been given, unfortunately for them as their weapon skills weren't something that the marks would connect with like Wolf's did and as such they couldn't really use them as easily as he could in his dragonized state. Lightning raged around Reign while Wolf had become larger as his skin started turning slightly red while two small horns grew out from his forehead.
The boosts that they would receive from the marks were great, not only did the marks increase their stats for a bit, but the bonus to their abilities was great as well. Wolf would gain a higher level of control over his flames whose power had increased, Reign would be able to let out more lightning and fight more fiercely with it. Tank's mark was a tad bit different compared to theirs as his ability was, of course, the only thing the mark did was give him the power of a demon ogre, the increase in strength, endurance, and vitality was enormous and he could not only deal more damage in this state but his skin would also become incredibly hard and he wouldn't need to even use his shield to block most of the attacks directed at him.
Shadow and Beast had also used their marks, Shadow's whole body was shrouded by darkness as his control over shadows had increased tremendously while Beast was able to bring his archery to a completely different level thanks to his. Greenie and Laura were the only two that had no marks, of course, there was a good reason for that.
Vajra was one of the most powerful beings known in the universe and none would dare try and incur his wrath simply to put a mark on a newly ascended ogre that could perhaps die in the following years while Laura was a possessed, her fleshly body had once been used by a demon and most gods would simply ignore her, most of her power came from the memories of back when the demon controlled her body while her demonic energy originated from it. Only once a possessed was able to kill the demon, or somebody else killed it would the mark that was left on her soul disappear.
That was why the demon hunters existed, a powerful existence in the universe had once been possessed and managed to break away and kill the demon in the end. After becoming more powerful the existence felt angry at the gods who simply didn't care for people that were currently in the same situation as he was a long time ago. He created the demon hunters in order to show hope to such beings and soon the whole organization became very powerful, the gods were surprised after seeing the sheer number of people that were possessed but it was already too late as the demon hunter association held the monopoly when it came to them.
The gods in the end simply continued acting the same as always towards them for some reason, of course in the universe the status of the possessed skyrocketed as the powerful demon hunters were a force to be reckoned with. Rarely would a god ever show any interest towards a possessed, and when it happened it was mostly gods that were part of the association that did so.
The power-ups that they had gained allowed them to fight against the ape on a more even playing field. Beast's arrows had started hurting the monster as he was finally able to penetrate through the thick fur, with the bonus from his mark he was able to follow after the now incredibly fast monster and land his shots.
Tank and Greenie did their best to hold the ape every time it was caught by Shadow's ability, the ape however was still incredibly strong next to being fast and it was hard for even Shadow to catch and stop it from moving with his ability. He only needed to do it for a second thought as the others would immediately pounce on the monster, both Tank and Greenie had incredible power, and together they could rival the monster.
With the two of them holding it down the others would be able to immediately launch numerous attacks at the ape. Of course, the ape would always find a way to escape from their grasp and counterattack, with each passing second it was becoming more and more powerful as the hatred it felt toward them became larger. The incredible boost the ape was getting was incredible as its power had become almost the same as earlier, both its attack and defense were nearly at the same level they were in the very beginning.
Of course, even with all of that, the party was able to suppress the monster with their powers, until however, the ape unleashed a terrifying war cry that created shockwaves around it. A red aura had suddenly appeared around the ape as the latter was breathing heavily while staring at them.
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