The statue that was sneak-attacked by the skeletons went flying and was already close to death.

After doing a few pitiful slashing attacks with its claws it died miserably, contributing almost nothing to the fight. The skeletons had a few scratches on their armour but that was it.

It seems these statues were designed to fight against living targets, causing damage over time effects with their poison and then bleeding them to death.

There was one thing though which didn’t make sense to Jay: the stone statues were magic resistant, so how could they cast spells?

Looking a little more closely at the one casting a spell, Jay found the answer.

They were invisible at first, but as mana was pushed into spells some faint blue veins spread over the statue’s arm. It seemed they were coated in some sort of mana-conducting material.

“Interesting…” Jay sneakily squinted at it.

His inner necromancer was impressed, however he had no use for such a material as his skeletons already could sense mana, each of them having their own mana pools.

“So… surely the skeletons could use spells?” Jay wondered.

A mischievous smile grew on his face as he imagined how insanely strong they would be if they started casting magic.

“But first, I will need to learn a purely mana-based spell myself.” He shrugged, reminding himself to copy his necrotic helminth’s spell.

*Doon Doon doon*

A large statue was approaching from the back of the room, but it would be too late – the second floating statue was getting bullied by the four skeletons.

The spellcaster types were usually much weaker in melee combat and this one in particular looked almost like it was suffering as it slashed at whatever it could, but it was all for nothing.

[85 Exp]

Suddenly a stone sword came flying powerfully from the darkness, silent until it connected with a skeleton.

*Crunch!~ Boom!~*

The sword carried the skeleton and penetrated deeply into a weapon rack, pinning the skeleton. Sweeper was desperately trying to pull the sword out or its body off but before it could do anything to get free, but there was no hope for it now –

*Boom-boom~ Crack!~*

Two more stone swords flew at it like perfectly thrown javelins.

Sweeper only had one more hit left till it died, but that would probably be a better option as right now it was pinned by three stone swords; if it was resummoned it could at least fight.

Jay was watching but remained cool headed and calculating. It was only one skeleton so far, so things were still manageable.

He had the feeble creature dash further towards wherever the swords came from. It was still carrying Jay’s luminous orb and he wanted to see what was coming.

*Boom!~*

A flying sword zoomed right towards the feeble creature, but it nimbly ducked behind the weapon racks, avoiding any damage.

It wasn’t only quick and agile, but it was a small target too. It would even be hard for Anya to hit it.

After weaving in and out of the weapon racks, the feeble creature finally brought the light close enough to reveal the statue.

It was not as bulky as the blacksmith statue, but its armour was just as decorative; covered in different patterns of steel-grass, eyes and five swords.

In each of its hands were long-clawed gothic gauntlets, while two floating stone swords were hovering in mid-air next to them.

*Boom!~*

It launched another floating sword at the feeble creature – this time hitting it.

The feeble creature was pinned down, a sword sticking into its rib cage.

It dropped the luminous orb, which thankfully rolled towards the statue, illuminating it even more.

It seemed the swords didn’t do a lot of damage, and were mostly for immobilising enemies since the feeble creature didn’t die in one hit.

The small skeleton survived the brutal attack, but only for a moment. With the sword pinning it down another was well on the way. It had zero chance to dodge, and all it could do was accept its fate.

*Boom!*

A direct hit right in between its rat-skull eyes ended its desperate struggle.

[Your feeble creature has died]

“Damn. Don’t get pinned down…” Jay thought. A simple lesson.

Jay had quietly made a bone pile next to him, and he resummoned the feeble creature along with Sweeper.

Instead of having them rush directly back in, Jay had them run around to other areas in the room before re-joining the fight. This would serve to hide his location as he continued to summon.

[85 Exp]

By now, the second floating statue was a pile of expensive rubble on the floor, and the skeletons were dashing towards their next target: the sword-slinging statue.

*Boom!~ – Boom!~*

Blue ducked under a sword as it slipped right past its shoulder, landing in a weapon rack somewhere behind it.

Another sword struck Red, taking it out of the fight for a moment – thankfully there were no weapon racks behind it, so it was only pushed back and took some damage.

Red was already sprinting towards the statue, but it still went about 10 meters backwards (32 feet) from the raw force.

After scrambling to get its body off the sword, Red was already running back into the battle again.

*Swoosh!- Crack!*

Two floating swords swept across the air in front the statue in a scissor motion.

Lamp was decapitated but its skeletal body still charged forward.

Lamps headless body got a hit in, but that statue quickly realised it was still alive so it sent a sword flying at Lamps skull lying on the ground.

*Boom!~*

Needless to say it was a critical hit.

[Your skeleton has died]

Sullivan gazed at Viladore across his desk, trying to figure out why he was so invested in Jay.

“Why do you want to go into dungeons with Jay? It’s unusual for you to leave the guild at all. Doesn’t your research take priority?”

“Uh, yes. I am interested in his… abilities. Perhaps it can shed some light on my research.” Viladore nodded with a light smile.

“His abilities.” Sullivan leant his hand on his chin.

“It will be too suspicious. We already registered him as a melee class.” Sullivan nodded.

“Well, we could just-”

“-No.” Sullivan’s voice was soft but filled with power, and Viladore could only clench his jaw.

“Was there anything else you wanted to talk about?” Sullivan glared across the desk.

Viladore only shook his head as he got up and left with a bitter frown.