"It's getting harder," Ning said to the two.
Issi nodded. "Can we upgrade the monster, please? I cannot fight that crab at all. It is resistant to all water attacks," he said.
"Sure," Ning said and for the first time upgraded the monster. "It also looked like Drake had a hard time with it."
"Yeah, its shell was too tough for me," Drake said. "I will need a bit more energy for myself."
"How will you get it?" Ning asked.
"Same way I got it from Group 5," Drake said and stood up. "Can you handle the monsters yourselves? I will go and get stronger."
Ning thought for a moment. "Will you be able to do it?" he asked.
"Don't worry. Even if I fail, I have a way to escape," Drake said.
"Very well then. Go," Ning said.
Drake nodded and left the group to go towards Group 9's area.
"Was that a good idea?" Issi asked.
"It's not a bad one," Ning said. "We might even get another gem out of this."
"We might also lose one," Issi said.
Ning sighed. "I know, but he doesn't seem like the person to throw his life away," he said. "Don't worry. Worst case scenario, I will simply have to go find one of the groups to get their gems."
Just as they were talking, the monster spawned again. This time, it wasn't the crab as Ning had already upgraded it.
This time, the monster was a massive humanoid piece of rock that slowly started walking toward the group.
"What the hell? A rock golem?" Ning thought as he stared at the beast.
Issi brought out his water sword and started slashing tons and tons of water at the beast. Each slash had so much ferocity that it nearly carved into the rocky monster itself.
However, it was still tough enough to block it.
Ning jumped into the air to attack it, but the golem's hands were surprisingly agile and managed to swat him down like a fly.
"What the hell? How is it so fast?" Ning thought as he stared back at the beast. It seemed it wasn't going to be as simple as jump and strike.
At least, not if he wanted to save his Aether.
He would have to spend 5% of his Aether reserve if he wanted to immediately end this fight. However, in between the 17 or so minutes of free time, he could only gain back 2% at most.
Overall, he was losing Aether each time he had to fight seriously, and he had no way of gaining it back mid-fight. He could only afford to lose so much. So, he needed to think of a way to defeat it without using too much strength.
Ning went back for an attack a few more times, but he was either swatted like a fly, or the golem wouldn't take enough damage.
It wasn't as tough as the crab, but the damage it took would recover as fast as it took the damage.
Also, fortunately, because of Issi's relentless slashes of water, the beast wasn't moving a step further and was never in the range of attacking the tower.
Ning looked up at the monster and thought of something. If the monster was swatting him down before he could reach it properly, then he would have to bring the monster to him.
The monster's arms were agile, but that wasn't the case for its legs. So, Ning dashed towards its legs and started cutting it from below.
The monster couldn't reach this far down, so it had to lift its feet to smash Ning.
Ning dodged easily and continued attacking, but it didn't work at all. Even when he managed to destroy a major chunk of its body, the rocks regenerated back to fill the void.
In the end, Ning was forced to use his Aether, and he decided to use it in the most efficient way possible.
Ning opened a portal and appeared on its head. The monsters didn't seem to have vision over its head, so Ning wasn't attacked at all.
At the same time, Ning placed his hands on the monster and used a skill he hadn't used in a while.
Ning used the skill to find the natural frequency of the golem underneath him. The moment he learned the number, he started creating sounds directly from his palm and vibrated the golem.
The monster soon started cracking, and with each crack, its natural frequency changed. However, Ning was keeping his eye on the frequency and changed it every single time to maintain resonance.
The stone on the golem's head started cracking and soon enough it crumbled to pieces.
When it did, Ning saw a blue core inside of the golem and immediately snatched it. Without even looking, he knew that it was the source of the monster's powers.
Ning immediately put the core into his storage and that cut off its connection to the monster.
As soon as he did that, the monster beneath him disappeared in a bunch of light and he saw the words 16 points.
"Oh," Ning thought and checked the screens. He saw that Group 2 and Derel had already defeated their share of monsters.
Derel was stronger than he had assumed her to be and she had given them a lot of points by now.
Group 2 had also defeated, but Ning couldn't tell if it was the Lion or if they needed the help of another person.
"What was that? It was like you created an earthquake," Issi said from the side.
"It's something similar," Ning said and brought out a bottle to drink again.
"Is that alcohol?" Issi asked curiously.
"What? No this is my source of power," Ning said. "I could take it from the surrounding, but I prefer to drink it directly like this."
"I see," Issi said.
"Anyway, I think the situation is getting more and more difficult," Ning said. "We can't take the risk of a monster with ranged attacks coming and destroying the tower."
"So what are you going to do? Upgrade the tower?" Issi asked.
"No, I'm going to upgrade our firepower," Ning said. "I'm going to call Derel back."
