The wolf's jaws were already wide and about to reach Aren's neck when he noticed the shadow. He reacted as fast as he could, spinning around and lifting his arm. The wolf bit into it hard, the pain shot through like an electric shock. He gritted his teeth in pain, forcing himself not to yell, and then swung down a blow with his wolf guard.

His armoured fist slammed into the head of the wolf so hard it cracked its skull, and it collapsed to the ground not moving.

[You have gained 50 soul fragments]

As the wolf died, he noticed that the soul fragments that he had gotten were not as much as the first wolf that he had killed, but rather the same as the guards from before.

'What could be the reason for that? Is it because I consumed that one rather than kill?' That would be the only explanation, so he used consume on the body of the wolf and it vanished, but nothing came up. He clicked his tongue and turned his focus back to the stage.

[You have gained 50 soul fragments]

[You have gained 50 soul fragments]

[You have gained 50 soul fragments]

[Level up, +4 free stat points]

Looking at the notifications that followed after that made him smile. He was getting stronger fast, and he liked that a lot. He couldn't help but smile.

He immediately used consume on all the wolves and summoned them, but instantly it felt like an entire mountain was placed on his shoulder. They were draining his soul energy fast.

'Shi, I guess I'm nearing my limit of what I can handle at once.' He muttered under his breath. He quickly unsummoned the goblins, leaving only the wolves. The weight lessened, but it still wasn't nice on him.

But regardless of that, he still had a smile on his face, looking at the shadows standing beside him.

'That reading might have been wrong.' He muttered, 'I'm definitely not the weakest here, I'm not dumb enough to believe that.' He said to himself. Aren wasn't dumb. He had read a lot of novels of oblivious MCs that thought they were weak but turned out to be strong, and they kept believing they were weak.

He hated such books to no end, it made no sense to be that daft. He wasn't. But he wasn't going to tell anyone he was strong. He would rather they fuck around and find out.

With a wide grin on his face, he looked up, and more wolves were approaching. He looked ahead and saw a black square that was two white squares ahead. Since they had started the second round, some black squares had already turned white, creating larger gaps between.

Aren took a step back and leaped into the next square just at the moment that the wolf was entering the square. His fist closed, he punched like he was hammering the ground. The wolf moved out of the way at the last moment and survived, only to be attacked by two shadows. They lunged at its neck and feet, immediately ripping it apart. It tried to fight back, but Aren attacked with a claw strike, completely killing the wolf.

[You have gained 50 soul fragments]

He didn't even bother looking at its corpse and simply used consume on it.

[You have consumed more than ten shadows, new skill unlocked]

[Merge: Merge two similar shadows to birth stronger shadows, cooldown 1 week]

That was the only description it gave, it didn't detail any drawbacks or anything else. Aren found himself staring at the skill while a wolf was rushing his way already.

'A new skill? This is crazy, shame it's only once a week.'

"Let's see what it does, merge two shadows." He said calmly and instantly behind him, two shadows were selected at random, their shadowy bodies intertwined, creating a shadow wolf that was fifty percent bigger but at least three times stronger.

Aren felt the connection between him and that shadow and it was far stronger than what he had with even Fang. The shadow also showed far more intelligence. He could sense some thoughts coming from it, though barely.

The shadow currently had one thing on its mind and that was to defend Aren. It lunged forward on its own and attacked the wolf that had been coming for Aren. In one massive bite, it crushed its neck and killed it.

[You have gained 50 soul fragments]

Aren was impressed by it instantly. He was already eager to merge all shadows, but now was not the time. He was low on soul energy, and it was drying out fast. He needed more time to practice with his shadows and learn the best way to use them.

He unsummoned all of them for now and only left Fang. He looked at Fang standing beside him and spoke, "I'll probably merge you when I get the best opportunity." He said and then focused back on the battlefield.

The entire platform was covered in blood now, both that of the wolves and that of the awakened. It turned out that not everyone could handle beasts like the wolves. But the number that survived was pretty high, still managing to keep themselves above three hundred.

'Some awakened have died, and a lot of black squares have turned white. If this is only the second wave, how are we going to make it to the tenth?' Aren wondered.

Suddenly, the entire platform shook in a loud hum, as if announcing the coming of something. All the wolves suddenly stopped their attacks and rushed to the center near the crystal, and from the crystal, a wolf appeared. White fur with black streaks, it was two meters tall and absolutely terrifying.

It let out a thunderous roar that caused black lightning to explode from its mouth into the air. Somehow the roar caused all the smaller wolves to crackle with lightning as well, as if buffing them up.

"You have to be kidding me, a boss fight with buff?" Aren muttered. He looked at the eyes of everyone and he could tell the tensions were high, but unlike them, there was also another thing in his mind.

'Land the finishing blow and make sure I get the soul fragments.'

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