Is this really a Game?!

"Haaaaah" Reign exhaled after wiping the blood off of his sword. Two weeks had passed since the invasion on the elven base and Reign and the others had been busy fighting and leveling up. Unfortunately finding powerful bosses wasn't an easy thing and so far they had only fought 2 bosses, 1 one was a giant horned horse on the grasslands, not only was the horse over 4m tall but it could use the wind element and it was incredibly fast, even Reign and Shadow had difficulty when it came to catching up to it.

The second boss the party had faced was in the IronBark Woods, originally the party had actually passed the boss numerous times without even noticing it. A gigantic 12m stone golem was hibernating underneath the forest, during one battle the party had accidentally woken it up. The golem was level 49 and was on the crux of evolving, being suddenly woken up from the hibernation that was supposed to help it evolve enraged the boss that attacked the party with everything it had.

The defensive capabilities of the boss were unlike anything the party had faced before. Their attacks were barely making a scratch on the hard rocks of the golem and it was only after fighting it for more than 30 minutes that they started seeing some results. The tough stones of the golem had started to crack a bit as numerous attacks were landing on it, after seeing how powerful its defenses were the party had targeted one specific place of the golem to attack.

It was mostly thanks to Reign who was able to faintly sense where the golem's core was as that was the place where all of its mana originated from. The golem was thankfully incredibly slow and its feet had been trapped underneath the hard soil of the forest and it couldn't move from its spot for over 40 minutes. When it finally managed to free its legs the battle became harder but luckily for them they had already done a lot of damage at the targeted spot and 10 minutes later the golem's core was uncovered and destroyed.

That battle truly forced them to use everything they got except for the power-up skills, thanks to the golem's slow movements and attack speed the party was never truly in danger. Each time the golem would attack a part of the forest would get obliterated but there would be no one there as its target had managed to escape on time.

The two hard battles of course gave plenty of rewards. The horse had dropped a pair of boots, pants, and a bow that was all rank A. Luckily for Beast the bow was imbued with the element of the wind with which he was well-acquainted, he switched his current bow with that one as he felt that not only was it a bit more comfortable to use but he could also gain some insight in the element of wind by using it.

All of his wind-type skills were boosted by the bow and it had a powerful skill inside of it. The pair of boots went to Shadow while the pants were Reign's. Both of the items specialized in improving the user's speed, the boots a bit more than the pants of course.

The golem on the other hand dropped a giant hammer, a shield, an armor, and a necklace. All four were rank A of course. Greenie was finally able to switch his weapon to a more powerful one but unfortunately for them neither the shield nor armor were useful, Tank already had a great shield and he was used to wearing his armor, the one that dropped from the boss was a bit better but it was simply too clunky and he didn't feel comfortable wearing it while the shield was in his opinion not as good as his current one.

They gave the two items to Elijah's team, they would not get any money that way but since the trainees were meant to be an elite team that was under them they needed to be properly equipped. The necklace however went to Wolf as it mostly focused on boosting strength and would shine the brightest in his hands, or well, on his neck.

The fighters in the territory had also become stronger during these two weeks, not only were they also teaming up with the elves now but more and more people were joining the town from the town too. Some of the people were from a couple of safe zones that could be found in the town even now while others were people that survived on their own ever since the game had started.

The power of the players skyrocketed after being a part of the battle against the beast horde, in the relatively short time period of two weeks the average level of the players went up from 20 all the way to 28, Neil and his team were currently level 33, the same as Cameron and his team while Elijah and his team were all at level 30 which came as a great surprise to Reign and the others. Their trainees had actually become powerful fighters and were considered to be amongst the top 5 teams in the underground city right now. Of course, it wasn't only the other players that managed to become stronger.

Reign and the others had not only improved their equipment but they also managed to level up multiple times after two weeks of non-stop fighting. After they had helped the elves and built the buildings they were all itching to become stronger and fight the ape. They wanted to do it before going through their first evolution, not only did they want to face such a powerful opponent by being in the same evolution state as it was, but there was also the question of how long it would take to go through the first evolution.

They had a talk with Eldar who told them that the evolution was completely different compared to the class trials, there would be no trial they needed to face but a multitude of challenges that needed to be done. No one could tell them what challenges they might face as the system would decide when they reached level 50. Some people had incredibly simple challenges that they would be able to pass after a couple of days while others could be stuck for months.

The general consensus in the universe was that the more potential one showed the harder the challenges would be but, of course, there were exceptions. But judging from what he knew Eldar was certain that each of the party members would have to go through difficult challenges that might take them a long time to clear. Of course, since all of them were powerful and had potential perhaps by working together they might be able to do it quickly, but that was only if the system permitted them to do so.

As of this moment, all the party members were all level 48 and were approaching the limit of the first evolution. The stats they had gained from the items and their abilities were immense and there were barely any monsters below the first evolution that could pose a threat. Even the two most powerful bosses that they had faced, the horse and the golem were still defeated by them and both of them were actually field bosses.

Upon deliberation, they concluded that now was the time to go and attack the ape, even if they leveled up once more the difference in stats wouldn't be so great compared to what they were at right now. Their levels were high and they could only improve so much without evolving. The ape was powerful that much was certain but they didn't believe that it could defeat them, even the two field bosses weren't able to endanger their lives previously after all.

The whole territory was bustling with activity right now, all of the city inhabitants had heard about what was about to happen. They had complete faith in Reign and the others and even after knowing that the ape was the most powerful monster in the town and surrounding areas they were confident that its defeat was certain. Of course, Reign and the others knew that the battle would be a hard one, they knew better than to underestimate the giant ape as they knew that its power was immense and that defeating it wouldn't be an easy task at all.

The party took off from the territory and made their way towards the ape's territory. The giant government building and the park were their targets, of course, there was no need for them to enter the government building as the giant ape wasn't there, the powerful monster was in the park together with the other apes. Most of the apes in the government building were weak apes that had been thrown out of the park and they weren't the team's real target.