AN: Hello, dear readers! It's been a while since I last posted (*cough* understatement *cough*) but here is a little chapter to appease you all, hopefully.

Anyways, I hope you enjoy this chap!

"Thomas, watch out! Don't aggro too many, we wouldn't be able to handle all of them!"

"Don't worry, I can take care of this noobs. Geez, you really sound like Franc- oops, hey little help over here!"

"Dammit, get down! [Plasma Inferno]"

Kuoooooohhhhh

In a small clearing in the midst of [Grimsbear Forest], a wide array of [Iron Bears] and [Giant Iron Bears] were strewn on the forest floor. Leaning on a tree trunk, Hiccup scanned the surroundings for other monsters. His face was a bit pale and he was gasping for breath. Even in his prime, he wouldn't have been able to keep up with this one wave rush.

A one wave rush happens when a team gathers a whole lot of monsters into one space, lessening the time of moving one place to another after killing mobs. With Derek's long range shooting, gathering the monsters proved to be easy. The problem was they don't have a reliable damage dealer which usually is a mage to cast AOE spells. Although he himself have an AOE spell in [Plasma Inferno], it had a considerably long cooldown and his magic damage was a bit lower due to a low intelligence stat.

"Here I thought I was quite in shape, I didn't expect I would be this exhausted!"

He muttered between his gasps for air. His other companion, the archer Derek was squatting on the ground, exhaustion clear in his face though not as bad as Hiccup's. Out of the three of them, he had one of the easier jobs, just sniping from a distance but as the fight drew longer he had no arrows left so he had to resort to close range combat with his hunting knife. With that said, an all-agility Archer doesn't have many experiences involving close range combat but being a former Berserker he still had a fairly good sense of the battle.

"Damn, the leveling tactics of a top player is really out of this world"

He said, trying to stabilize his breath while watching Thomas, who was playing with his spear, jabbing at the corpse of the monsters that they had hunted. Just where did this guy's stamina come from, Hiccup and Derek had the same thoughts but neither have the answer.

"Whoo! I've never hunted like this in a while. Without those two girls, I don't have to restrain myself! Hahahahaha!"

Thomas was having fun laughing by himself, while his other companions have lines forming on their foreheads in slight annoyance. Really, just what the Hel is with this guy? Is he some sort of cyborg or something. Truly, the geniuses were always the weird ones.

"Our formation is really a mess. Aren't we supposed to act as a three-man cell?" Derek asked, as he salvaged some arrows that could still be used.

"Three-man cell? I thought with our class build we're going for aggressive three-man unit?" Thomas turned around, tilting his head in confusion. Derek and Hiccup face palmed so hard they lost some health.

Formations play a huge role in [Vikings of the North]. Simple formations like having one tank to keep the monsters occupied, one damage class to dish out tons of damage and a support for healing and crowd control. Such a simple formation is commonly called the three-man cell. Thomas's suggestion, aggressive three-man unit works by having three main damage dealers and defeating the monsters with a strong offense. The best defense is a strong offense is the motto of this style. By wiping the enemies quickly with high damage output, the team would clear the dungeon.

It sounds easy but usually the cohesiveness and cooperativeness of the members is the focal point of this as they had to disregard supports and tanks to kill the monsters. It really wasn't the best formation for people who partied for the first time. Add to that the explosiveness and unrestrained nature of their spearman, it really is a bad fit.

"Never mind that, we survived using this in a dungeon even if it's the first time we played together so I guess its fine. Let's just tone down the aggression in the future, okay Thomas?" Hiccup said, as he stood and scanned the ground for drops. Thomas showed two thumbs up and grinned widely, "Okay Hiccup!"

The drops were rather mediocre, a few [Iron-ranked] armors but they were lower gave lower stats than their current armors. Well, they couldn't be lucky every day ad these would fetch not less than fifty silvers in the village. They agreed to split the earnings later after they return to the village as they proceeded to the boss area.

"Intruders! Leave right now or forever be buried here!"

Their faces paled as they saw a giant Panda wielding a dragon-patterned staff. It wore a wide brimmed conical hat, which it threw to the side in a sort of cool way. Standing in front of the [Hidden Boss], they all thought of the same thing-

"We are so dead"

"Whooo! Lucky!"

"I wonder how Panda meat tastes like.

-or so Hiccup thought. *cough* Okay, their minds are still not on the same page but that is something they can work on later. He quickly summoned Toothless with [Dragon Call] and a jet black Night Fury was summoned, snarling as it glared daggers at Hiccup.

'What's with you?! The opponent is right there, not me?!' He thought as he gripped [Endeavor] and focused his mind. [Apex Predator] was triggered as he dashed towards the Panda and slashed downwards forcefully. The Panda met his sword strike with its staff, leaving Hiccup open. Just as the Panda was about to kick Hiccup away, Derek fired a [Scattershot] at the monster, stunning it.

Thomas and Hiccup capitalized this and attack at both sides. Thomas stabbed with [Trident], triggering the hidden effect and applying bleeding status on the staff-wielding Panda. While on the other side, Hiccup slashed sideways, followed by a stab with his sword.

The Panda roared in pain and used a sweeping attack, forcing Hiccup and Thomas to retreat in a hurry. Some trees around them were torn in half causing both of them to inhale sharply. If that were them, no, let's not think about it. They straightened their postures and adjusted their formation.

"Okay guys, we can do this. This guy doesn't enrage when fired with a [Scattershot] so we can just cycle through our [Scattershot] and [Earth Spike] to hold it in place. We'll have Toothless cover us if something doesn't go according to plan." Hiccup said, as they avoided some wild swings of the Panda.

"Good plan, just be careful. The two of you are melee, so don't get caught with its attacks." Derek said as he used [Camouflage] to lessen the aggro on him.

"Yeah, no kidding. I don't think I would survive if I get hit with that." Thomas said with a laugh. His eyes had an insane look but still the seriousness was hidden there somewhere, hopefully, Hiccup thought.

"Ready, guys? Let's start off with [Earth Spike]. Thomas, use it on my signal, I'm setting the pace so don't forget our rhythm okay? Go!" Hiccup said as he dashed towards that Panda, while the earthen spears struck the Panda from all sides. The fight has just begun.

AN: How was it? Let me know in the reviews :D

I'm hoping to release regularly but med school is coming up so lets hope (pray for me) for the best, aight?!

Let's aim for 150 reviews before the next chap. See you soon! :D