The Apprentice Mage Who Could Use Shield Bash

So they had another trick up their sleeves: they could change their flight posture in an instant.

As the Giant Vampire Bats came for the scent of blood, Rain moved his right foot half a step forward.

Bang!

It was only half a step, but the ground beneath his foot visibly sank. A powerful reaction force shot up through his ankle, thigh, and waist.

Rain's left shoulder and upper arm muscles bulged, veins standing out along his forearm. His newly bought Kite Shield surged forward nearly half a meter, whipping up a fierce rush of air!

Whoosh!

Smack!

The shield slammed into the rat-sized head of the leading bat before it had any chance to dodge.

It did not even manage a shriek. Rain's Shield Bash drove its head straight into its chest, and it dropped to the ground like a stone.

One blow, one kill!

The sudden attack threw the four or five Giant Vampire Bats behind it into disarray.

"Screech, screech!"

The second and third bats clearly tried to change course rather than enter the passage, but they were too close.

Bang!

In its panic, the second bat scraped a wing against the rocky wall. Rain struck it with his Warhammer, caving in its head.

Two...

Rain counted silently.

Beside him, Grand was at a loss for words. He had not gotten a single one yet.

"Screech, screech!"

The commotion in the passage immediately alerted the seven or eight Giant Vampire Bats still hanging upside down in the Cavern Hall.

Enraged by their companions' deaths, the remaining bats packed themselves into a tight formation and charged toward the passage all at once.

"Watch out! There are more this time. A few might slip past me," Rain warned.

Grand, beside him, and Chris, behind him, both froze. Neither knew what to say.

Chris, in particular, could not help grumbling to himself. You're an Apprentice Mage wearing a full set of warrior's gear and holding the front line. If you don't let a couple through, what are we supposed to do?

But he kept that to himself.

Adventurers respected strength, after all, and Rain's was plain to see.

Bang! Smack!

"Screech! Screech!"

Thud!

Gusts from the densely packed wings swept through the passage, plunging it into brief chaos.

For Chris and the other two, those gusts battered the torch like a candle in a storm. Its flame flickered wildly.

The shifting shadows and wavering light made it extremely difficult for them to strike the bats' vital points.

Rain, on the other hand, had Dim-Light Vision. Every time he raised his shield, he precisely intercepted a diving bat.

Fangs and claws raked his shield one after another, leaving only a few faint scratches.

Whenever Rain struck out with a fierce Shield Bash, another bat dropped to the ground.

His Warhammer howled through the air in his right hand. A glancing blow injured a bat; a solid hit killed it.

And Rain was not even using Armor-Breaking Strike.

Combat techniques took considerable stamina. Since Armor-Breaking Strike was progressing quickly thanks to Hammer Proficiency lv1, Rain focused more on practicing Shield Bash in this fight.

A few minutes later.

The noise in the passage gradually died away.

Shnk!

Fabian's Dagger sank into a Giant Vampire Bat struggling on the ground.

"Well, I only killed this one," Fabian said helplessly.

In the narrow passage, he had been at the back of the party and had barely had a chance to finish off anything during the fight.

His sole kill was this bat, whose wing Rain had broken. It had crawled to the rear of the party amid the chaos.

"I only got one too," Chris said with a sigh.

"Three," Grand said steadily.

"What? You only got three, Grand?" Chris asked in surprise.

He had thought Grand, fighting beside Rain at the front, must have killed at least five or six.

If that was the case, then...

Chris looked at the Giant Vampire Bat corpses strewn across the ground a few meters away, then exchanged a glance with Fabian. Surprise filled both their eyes.

"Rain, how... how many did you kill?" Chris asked.

"Eight or nine, I think. I broke some of their wings, but I'm not sure whether they died," Rain said calmly from inside his sturdy Bull-Horn Helmet.

"Damn, you killed more by yourself than the three of us combined!" Chris's eyes widened as he shone the torch over the bat corpses.

He had been at the back and had not seen clearly how Rain had killed them.

But Rain had killed them so fast!

Chris had to see just how these bats had died.

How had Rain done it so quickly?

As he examined them, his expression grew stranger. "The caved-in skulls were from your hammer. But this one's head is buried in its chest. Rain, don't tell me you hit it with your shield?"

"Mm." Rain nodded without trying to hide it.

"It's a shield technique Instructor Humbert taught me. It's called Shield Bash."

"It takes considerable strength. You release it in a sharp burst over a short distance, making the shield strike with a jolting force."

"Instructor Humbert? But I went to him to learn how to use a shield before, and he never taught me that," Chris said, puzzled.

"It's probably one of Instructor Humbert's secret techniques," Grand put in.

He had fought beside Rain at the front. Despite the darkness and confusion, he had clearly seen Rain use Shield Bash against the bats.

As a warrior apprentice, Grand knew that although Shield Bash looked simple, it was fundamentally different from an ordinary Shield Block.

Without enough strength, the shield could not deliver that violent jolt at the moment of impact—enough to drive a bat's head into its chest and kill it in one blow.

Without enough strength, Shield Bash would become... a shield shove, with no power to speak of.

"All right, Rain, there's something I have to ask. Aren't you an Apprentice Mage? Then how...?" Chris asked the question that had been weighing on him.

"Rain, are you planning to become an Arcane Knight?"

"Arcane Knight?" Rain was puzzled. He knew nothing about that.

"Simply put, a warrior who can cast spells. It's supposedly an advanced extraordinary class... a second advancement for a Professional."

"That's a bit too far off for me. I just thought this move was useful, so I decided to get good at it," Rain said, shaking his head.

A second advancement?

He had not even become a Professional yet. That was much too far away.

"Huh? Are there still a few bats in the Cavern Hall?" Fabian seemed to hear something and looked up toward the hall's ceiling.