Under Michael’s feet, fifteen dead hound-foxes formed a gruesome, tangled barricade—a result of well planned strategy and proof that tactics were more effective than just raw violence.
The battle was over, but inside the minds of the students, a different kind of shift was happening. The blue status screens, which had initially been a source of sheer terror, were now being looked at with entirely new eyes. The cold rules of the System were finally making sense to them, and the rewards of survival were manifesting in real-time.
In this harsh new reality, the System was their all present helper. It gave them experience points and made them stronger by killing their enemies and leveling up.
To cross the first threshold from **Level 1 to Level 2**, it was required exactly **30 XP**. To advance from **Level 2 to Level 3**, the requirement rose to **50 XP**. For Michael, his current path toward Level 4 demanded a steep **100 XP**.
Michael glanced at his own floating notification at the edge of his vision. When he had reached Level 3 in the upper corridors, he hadn’t just hit the benchmark—he had exploded past it, accumulating a total of 57 XP. The System had deducted the 50 XP required for the level-up, meaning he had started his current tier with 7 XP left over. Now, with the 10 assisted kills from the second wave adding another 50 XP, his current progress stood at an incredibly solid **57 / 100 XP**. He was already well past the halfway mark to Level 4.
The two veteran students flanking him had also reaped the benefits of carrying their XP over.
They got 20 XP from the desperate early battle in the main halls. The first two kills of the bottleneck had pushed them to the 30 XP mark, triggering a level-up. The energy wave through their bodies had healed their wounds from their last battle and fully restored their stamina. It also granted them 5 unassigned attribute points. Because they had participated in the killing of the remaining eight monsters of the wave, they also gained another 40 XP and now stood at **40 / 50 XP** on Level 2, just a single kill away from Level 3.
But the true benefit of Michael’s strategy belonged to the ten students in the rear lines.
They had entered this ambush with exactly zero experience points, but their clumsy spear attacks during the fight had earned them 40 experience points.
One by one, a violent, chest-heaving gasp echoed through the rear ranks as the 30 XP threshold was shattered. Translucent waves of warm energy surged through the ten terrified students simultaneously, resetting their fatigue and pushing every single one of them to **Level 2**. Their status bars now showed **10 / 50 XP**.
The heavy, suffocating weight in their arms was gone. The trembling in their knees ceased.
Michael watched the subtle shift in their posture. His team was no longer a liability of trembling civilians; they were now a unit of Level 2 and Level 3 combatants, armed with unspent attribute points and newly discovered confidence. They were still beginners with nearly no battle experience but they now made their first steps to getting stronger.
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„Don’t lose your focus and distract yourselves right now with your status window,“ Michael urged, his voice interrupting the twelve. „Keep your eyes on the dark. We have turned this staircase into a meat grinder, and the smell of blood is going to bring up everything left down there. New monsters might attack any time!“
He noticed a few of them shifting their eyes, their fingers twitching in the air as they prepared to open their status screens anyway, desperate to spend their 5 new points most likely on Strength or Agility. Michael caught the glance of the veteran on his left, who looked at him as if waiting for a directive on how to build his stats.
But Michael remained silent on the matter. He chose not to interfere with their choices.
*I am just leading them in this battle, nothing more. I am not their guardian angel,* Michael thought coldly. *If I dictate their builds, I become responsible for their failures. If they lack the foresight to save points for Class, or if they ruin their own synergy out of panic, the world will filter them out soon enough. In this world, you either learn to think for yourself, or you die.*
„Stay alert,“ Michael repeated bluntly, his eyes never leaving the descent.
But to his surprise even after five minutes of nervous waiting, nothing came to attack and the oppressive quiet of the stairwell began to wear on them. The rooms below remained dark. Michael couldn’t afford to wait here forever, wasting the momentum of their recent level-ups and falling behind.
„Make some noise again,“ Michael commanded quietly, stepping back slightly from the edge. „Clash your spears. Shout. Give them a reason to come.“
The students hesitated for a second, then began striking the ash-wood shafts against the stone walls. A few let out low, rhythmic shouts, while the veterans scraped their iron spearheads against the iron railing, creating a sharp, screeching sound that echoed violently down into the lower vaults.
They stopped and listened.
But nothing happened.
Only the echo of their own noise returned from the deep. No frantic scratching of claws, no loud breathing, no rushing footsteps. The baiting had failed.
„They aren’t stupid,“ the veteran on the left whispered, a cold sweat breaking out on his neck despite his fresh Level 2 stamina. „Or maybe… maybe we wiped out the whole nest?“
„I don’t think so,“ Michael replied not convinced at all. „There must be more of them. They are either too deep to hear our noises or they must be busy with other stuff. I don’t know, but we need to be sure. We don’t have the luxury of sitting on our hands while a larger threat wanders under us.“
He gripped the shaft of his recruit’s spear tightly, his posture shifting from defensive to attacking position.
„Hold the formation exactly as it is,“ Michael ordered the twelve students, his tone leaving absolutely no room for argument. „Do not move from these steps. Do not break the bottleneck. I am going down to drag them out.“
„Michael, are you going alone? That’s suicide,“ one of the rear students blurted out. Now that they were Level 2, the thought of losing their commander terrified them.
„I don’t plan to waste my life here,“ Michael retorted bluntly, not even looking back. „I bevlieve in me, and I have the initiative. I will draw their attention and sprint back. The moment I reach this landing, you prepare to thrust over my shoulders. Got it?“
A chorus of nervous, determined nods followed his words.
Without another word, Michael stepped over the slippery, bloody mountain of fifteen carcasses, his boots crunching softly on matted fur and bone.
He descended into the dark and unknown territory, counting the steps in his mind, his senses fully alert to the dark. He wasn’t walking into a trap—he was going to become the irresistible bait that would feed the funnel once more.
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