Chapter 208 Instance Dungeon (4)

"THIS IS BULLSHIT!" Ashton yelled at the top of his lungs while running away from a horde of naked Trolls that had... not so subtle intentions.

Just a minute ago, he was walking toward the mysterious pond, and now he was running away for his life and integrity. Before taking any action, Ashton wanted to take a closer look at what was going on with the trolls and the lady, but the moment he got too close, the trolls stopped humping themselves and charged toward him.

It seemed they did not like Ashton disturbing their 'hormone balancing' session and were now wanting to settle the scores. If Ashton wanted, he could have easily killed them all.

But that wasn't the issue... the main problem was the aftereffect of killing the trolls. As soon as he killed a troll, a single message popped up in front of him.

[Death heals the <Maiden of The Pond>. Total HP at 69%]

If Ashton had to guess, the Maiden was the lady sitting in the middle of the pond while the 'mermen' hunted down the trolls. That would also explain why the mermen were killing the trolls. But, a couple of things didn't make any sense...

Why were the mermen helping the maiden? Was she some kind of a godly entity to them, therefore they wanted to help her?

"Why the heck are you bastards so angry with me? I'm the one who saved you from death, you assholes!"

However, no matter how much he screamed, the trolls did not listen to a word he said. They were clearly under some kind of spell that made them respond to the will of the maiden and no one else.

"What should I do? The only way to get the trolls off my back would be to kill the maiden. But with these bastards on my back, it doesn't look like it'll be possible to even reach the maiden, let alone kill her." Ashton was lost in his thoughts.

In the meantime, Astaroth was staying true to his words. He had not offered a single piece of advice to help Ashton. This in a way could also be due to the fact that so far Astaroth could only gain control over Ashton's body when the latter was unconscious or grievously injured and wanted Ashton to get injured.

Thus in a way, it could be that Astaroth was hoping to reenact what happened back on the Island. But Ashton was dead set on not allowing that. mainly because having someone else control his body was weird.

"Should I put [Regeneration] to test?"

Ashton had gone through the details of his new skill while waiting for the second batch of trolls to get killed by the mermen. Apparently, the skill was actually strong enough to reconstruct broken bones and heal most of the injuries, just with a few moments worth of rest.

However, there was a drawback to the skill. After five minutes of using the skill, all of the user's stats would get halved for the following 12 hours.

Even if the debuff only affected the organic stats of the user and not the stats Ashton received through the items, losing his stats would not end up in a positive scenario. Especially since he didn't know what was in store for him next.

"I don't know what stats I'll need to face the mermen and the maiden, so I can't compromise my stats here. I could summon Sven and Celeste, they should be able to keep the trolls away while I deal with the Maiden. But first, I would need to seal the entrance to the field."

While Ashton was more or less sure that the vampires weren't coming to help him out, he couldn't take the risk and reveal his secret by accident. That's why sealing the entrance was the primary objective before summons his servants to his aide.

Also, by blocking the cave, Ashton would be able to prevent more Trolls from spawning. Which in turn wouldn't allow the Maiden to heal up any longer. His one move would kill two birds with one stone. The only problem was that he was out of hand cannons ammo or extra cannons to deal an explosive blow and cause the cave to 'cave in'.

Bolts shot from a crossbow weren't going to be able to able to do much either. He would have tried to destroy it with his hands, but by the time he would do that, the trolls behind him would catch up to him and might trigger [Regenration] as it was a passive ability and Ashton had no control over it.

Leaving only one choice for Ashton.

"I sure hope this works, or I don't know what I'll do."

Saying so, Ashton summoned the power of winds by his side and threw a dozen gigantic [Wind Blades] towards the entryway of the cave. Although he hadn't mastered the control over the winds, he knew the strength of the blades depended on the amount of mana he poured into the blades.

"Yes!"

Although it took a bit more tries than he had anticipated, Ashton was able to block the cave temporarily. Once that was taken care of, he abruptly stopped, allowing the trolls to catch up to him.

The trolls were blinded by their lust and had lost all sense of reason. Thus they failed to see through Ashton's obvious plan. A moment later, Ashton's servants jumped out of his shadow and lunged at the enemies who dared to threaten their master.

"Be careful not to kill them!" Ashton instructed Sven as he was about to swing his sword.

Sven was about to take the troll's head off, but upon Ashton's order, turned his blade, slicing off the creature's arm. Meanwhile, the five vampire skeletons Ashton had, were busy attacking their legs, putting a stop to their horny march towards Ashton.

Celeste, on the other hand, couldn't feel more offended as half of the trolls gave up on chasing Ashton and decided they wanted to hump her instead. Given how appealing she looked even after death, it was a no-brainer the clubs between their legs responded to her more than to the master.

"You brutality disgusts me!" She barked at the trolls before binding them using their own shadows, "This body shall only ever please the one who granted this form to me."

"... yeah, I know better than to stick my dick into crazy. Thanks for the offer though." Ashton sighed awkwardly as Celeste licked her lips for some reason, "Do that again and I'll rip that tongue off."

"Ooh... you make me want to do it more... ma-st-er."

"The hell is wrong with this dungeon? Why is everyone so sexually excited!?"

Sven shrugged his shoulders, while the trolls kept humping the ground even after their limbs were chopped.

"Forget it, the sooner I'll kill that maiden, the sooner this mess will come to an end. Celeste, keep them down till then, I'll leave the skellies to help you out. Sven, you're coming with me."

"As you wish..." Sven replied, placing his broadsword on his shoulder

[The Maiden had noticed the decline in healing.]

[The Mermen have been alerted!]

[New Quest: Stop the mermen living inside the Pond of Dissonance.]

As soon as the prompt popped up, hundreds of bluish creatures jumped out of the pond, draining it of its bluish tint. The lower half of their bodies looked like that of the fishes, but the moment they touched the ground, their fish-like bottom disappeared.

In their place, the mermen grew legs and began rushing toward Ashton and Sven. Their weapons n hand, ready to chop their enemies down.

"I have to stop them, huh? Sven, kill one of them will you? I want to confirm something first."

Sven nodded and stood in front of his master like an unbreachable wall. The moment a merman got within the range of his sword, he lost his head. But the outcome was something Ashton had predicted, but he wasn't happy that his hunch was correct.

[Death heals the <Maiden of The Pond>. Total HP at 69.32%]

"Fucking hell! Does killing anything end up healing her?" he sighed in annoyance before taking out the twin blades, "Sven, focus on the limbs, try not to kill them."

Sven acknowledged the new command and got to work. However, unlike the trolls who were huge and thus easy targets when it came to dismembering their limbs, these mermen were proving to be quite troublesome.

Their agility and unpredictable manoeuvres made it difficult for Ashton and Sven to make contact. Even when they managed to get them, the slippery scales covering their body made it even more difficult to slice their limbs off in one attack.

That being said, it almost felt like the mermen wanted to die and despite Ashton's and Sven's best efforts, sometimes they were getting successful in their suicidal mission. As only their limbs were covered with scales and not their torso.

[Death heals the <Maiden of The Pond>. Total HP at 72.32%]

"Damn it! How am I supposed to stop them without killing them?"

[Administrator has altered the existing quest into: Kill the <Maiden of The Pond>.]

"And here I thought you didn't want to help me out." Ashton smiled and promptly received another quest.

[Admin quest: While you're at it, kill yourself too.]

"..."