A campfire burned with a gentle yet endless flame right outside the log cabin. A couple of trees marked the top of the hill and a small stone path led up to the porch of the cabin where a few wicker chairs were placed outside.
Melody walked around the cabin while Gray followed behind her.
“Wow, we've got an actual house now! Wait, is that a pond?”
“Yeah, and I think you can fish in it too,” Gray said.
“Really!” Melody took out her fishing rod. She pulled an azure trout from the pond. “We can sell this baby for 150 gold.”
“What are fishes used for in this game again?” Gray asked.
“Cooks and alchemists use their materials to make certain items. I think some of the other crafting classes can make some silly weapons like a sardine sword. Anyway, let's go check inside.”
The log cabin within had a fireplace that was burning the exact same flame pattern as the campfire outside. A few leather seats were positioned in front of the fireplace with a brown rug underneath the seats.
The back half of the room had a kitchen and wooden dining table. There was a sink, a large metal oven, and a tomato shaped mechanical timer. A manner of items that weren’t exactly in place in a high fantasy world, but player homes were an exception to such rules. Players were allowed to decorate their homes however they pleased.
While Melody opened the surprisingly modern shaped oven, Gray saw that Harry or rather Jericho in this world was online.
Melody sat down at the dining table and kicked her feet up.
“I love it, Gray.”
“I’m glad.”
“A cozy start,” Melody put her hands behind her head. “We’ll make a cooler and cooler guild house. I know there’s some unique buildings that we can get.”
“Lots of gold,”
“Speaking of gold, what type of content should we do next?” Melody asked. “I think we’re good on the guild house building for now.”
“Well speaking of that, I have a friend from work who is at level cap,” Gray said. “I was thinking of asking him for advice.”
“Already? The game’s been out for like two weeks,” Melody scratched her head. “Is he online?”
Gray was able to invite Jericho to the guild house.
Harry had rolled the character Jericho Breaker, the level 50 duelist. Jericho looked like Harry. Except Jericho, had a pair of elven ears and bright orange eyes. He wore a red coat with a white sash that ran diagonally across his chest. Hanging from his hip was a golden rapier.
“It’s pretty cozy. I can understand why you all wanted to work on the house,” Jericho looked around. “My guild house is a little more serious. Like castle or stronghold vibes, but we have a lot of players that like to decorate it.”
“Your in-game character looks cool,” Gray said. “I like the eyes.”
“Yeah. I wanted to have some pizzazz. Didn’t want to just have a simple elf,” Jericho looked at Melody. “A paladin, huh. I heard that they pair pretty well with seers during half parties.”
“Half parties?” Gray and Melody asked. They looked at each other and shrugged.
“I forgot; you guys haven’t probably done a dungeon yet.”
“We were actually thinking about our next step and the type of content that we should do next,” Gray explained.
“Oh yeah? Let old Jericho explain how to progress,” Jericho sat down on the kitchen table and clasped his hands together as he was giving sagely advice. Gray and Melody sat next to each other and were ready to learn from the max level duelist.
“I’m not gonna explain everything, so you don’t get overwhelmed. At your level, you have two choices for content. The first is world farming is something that you probably have experience with since you got the house,” Jericho twirled his finger. “You get decent exp from farming monsters. World bosses can drop good gear as well. Not the best, but good.”
“I saw a world boss when I first booted up the game,” Gray said.
“Yeah, they’re cool. But not really the best unless you’re looking for specific legendaries. You shouldn't worry about those items for now.”
“I’m guessing the second choice is the one that you’re gonna recommend?” Melody asked.
“Yup,” Jericho said. “The second choice is doing dungeons. To get in you need a half-party. Which is just a party of four players that covers the four roles: Tank, healer, DPS, and support. The one that I recommend is Rol’s Library. Other than dungeons, there are two other main types of content that aren’t really important until higher levels.”
“What about PVP?” Melody asked.
“PVP is just to get fashion. You don’t farm the gear for stats,” Jericho patted his red coat. “I actually got this baby from PVP.”
“Are you good at it.”
“I lost every match, but you still get currency for losing.”
Gray searched Rol’s library online for a moment and found a picture of a circular stone door that was carved onto the side of a mountain. Deep within they players were fighting autonomous suits of armor. Gray didn’t want to spoil himself any further.
“Alright let’s go to Rol’s library then,” Gray turned to Jericho. “Do you have any other classes around our level that you can switch to?”
“I would like to help, but my guild leader’s been hounding me this whole time for a meeting,” Jericho responded.
“Hounding you? Is he your boss?” Melody raised an eyebrow.
“I run a raiding party. We’re starting runs for one of the encounters. Encounters if you don’t know, they’re just hard boss fights.”
“If you got responsibilities then don’t worry about us,” Melody said. “I’ll make sure that me and Gray catch up.”
The three of them left the guild house’s instance and returned to the great city of Alitz. They stood in the central square. Melody went to rent out a horse that they could temporarily ride to Severed Crags.
“She seems cool,” Jericho said.
“Yeah,” Gray responded.
“I can talk to my guild leader about letting the two of you join the guild. A bulk of us are hardcore raiders, but we still have some people that are taking it slow.”
“Nah it’s okay,” Gray shook his head. “I like the idea of building something up slowly. A fresh start.”
“I can see the appeal,” Jericho sighed. “We got so many people that I don’t even know that well. It’s kinda clicky too. A tighter-knit guild seems a lot easier to manage. I gotta head out, Gray. Let’s play some time later. I can help you farm some overworld stuff.”
“See yah,” Gray followed Melody towards the outskirts of the Alitz. She had a horse that players could rent for an hour with 1 gold. Gray climbed on to the back of the horse. It was a chestnut-colored stallion that seemed to have no soul when one looked into its eyes. Must have been all the players that it carried. “It’s cool that two people can ride on a single mount.”
“I heard there’s some mounts that can hold up to eight players,” Melody said. “But that’s another goal to hit. This game just has so much stuff to do.”
The two of them sped off towards Severed Crag. After a couple minutes and stopping by the teleportation portal. They grabbed the portal to ensure they could teleport to the area without renting a horse.
Melody and Gray climbed their way up the cliffside. They had to deal with the occasional giant hornet that would aggro from the sides of the path. After hiking up broken steps, they reached a door that was carved into the side of the mountain. Moss had grown along the outer edges of the entrance. An orb of light emanated from the front.
Melody and Gray reached out towards the pillar and before them etched in golden letters were the words Dungeon unlocked.
“Shame that your friend couldn’t join us,” Melody said.
“Yeah, but It’d be pretty boring if he just carried us through the dungeon,” Gray said. “We’ll have plenty of opportunities to play with him once we reach level cap.”
“Right, so let’s queue up as a tank and an um support,” The stone doors to the dungeon opened.
The game included a system called the mercenaries. The mercenary system allowed a single player or an incomplete party to queue up for a dungeon and find party members for the slots that were missing. It was a nice little, and necessary, system to make sure that solo players weren’t abandoned.
The queue popped and everything faded for a moment.
***
Sunlight came in through the ajar stone door behind them. The moss hanging from the ceiling twinkled and welcomed the half-party. The bright entrance gave way to a cave that had bookshelves carved into the sides of the walls, the ceiling, and even the floor. Gray imagined there was some in lore, anti-gravity magic to allow for the books to stick to the ceiling.
This would be an easy enough experience. It was one of the starter dungeons. Gray saw the words half-party appear on the corner of the screen as he saw their new party members appear.
The DPS was a shirtless human monk named Largesworth Sti and the healer was a Makhana, the robot bloodline, named Ervara Lato. Gray remembered that player that called him boring for playing a human and chuckled.
“Hi guys. It’s our first time in the dungeon,” Melody said.
“Samesy,” Largesworth said. He brought his fist together. “Let’s get some loot.”
Before Ervara could introduce herself, Largesworth sprinted down the hall. He plowed through a pile of tomes.
“Wait, wait, wait a tank needs to go up front!” Melody ran after him and by extension Gray and Ervara. Chasing after Largesworth, Gray also noticed that some of the bookshelves were emblazoned with a purple rune. He didn’t stop to examine them as he heard Largesworth screaming.
Largesworth was able to punch them with his magnificent golden fist technique before the three suits of armor raised their swords in unison and instantly dropped his health points to zero.
Gray, Melody and Ervara appeared soon after. The suits of armor lost interest now that the interloper was dead and sauntered away. Their armor had a rhythmic clanking. Ervara kneeled and revived Largesworth.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“I go first. I grab their attention and then you guys take them down,” Melody said. “DPS have too low health and defense to take damage like that.”
“Understood,” Largesworth drew his thumb against his nose. “Lead the way, brave paladin.”
With the team acting out their roles, they were able to deal with the suits of armor. The whole time, Largesworth jumped, kicked, and flexed around his enemies. Ervara didn’t say a word the whole time, but made sure to heal Melody’s wounds. Gray used a mana-shift on Ervara when her mana was low and gave a damage buff and defense buff to Largesworth and Melody respectively.
After dealing with three packs of sentient armor, the half-party reached a door that was marked with the symbol of a purple flame.
“Our greatest enemy, doors.” Largesworth looked around the sides of the door. The party followed his lead, but no lever or handle was found. Eventually, Melody raised her sword and imbued it with heavenly light. Gray blinked at her. Melody lowered her sword.
“No, go ahead.” Gray crossed his arms. Melody smacked the door with her sword a few times. Largesworth punched the doors. “Any ideas, Ervara?”
Ervara was silent.
Then Gray remembered the purple runes. The one that they passed by when Largesworth dove headfirst into enemies. Gray ran back to one of the runes. It wasn’t just on the bookshelves, but particles emanating from the rune seemed to focus on one book. When he removed it from the bookshelf, the pages flipped widely, and a flame flew down the hall.
“That’s why they pay you the big bucks,” Largesworth followed Gray’s lead and went to find the rest of the books. After finding a total of four, they heard the door open.
“Nice, now we can continue,” Gray cracked his knuckles. He could already see more suits of armor down the hall and the statue of gargoyle. One that would surely turn out to be a real enemy.
“Nah, sorry but I gotta make lunch.”
“Huh?” Gray watched as Largesworth abandoned them in the dungeon.
Ervara the silent, dematerialized soon after.
“Aw man, we gotta queue up again,” Melody slumped her shoulders.
***
The first boss of the dungeon was a librarian by the name of Izal with 12 tentacles. The arena where they fought the weird librarian arena no longer looked like a library and appeared like a proper cave. They were on a circular patch of stone that was surrounded by stagnant water. To attack, Izal hit Melody with a fireball. At the rest of the party, he would use telekinesis to chuck stalactites at everyone that wasn’t the tank.
At the end of each tentacle was an eyeball that would glow two different types of color. If the eyes glowed red, the tentacles would squirm on one side and sweep across half of the arena. If the eyes glowed blue, Izal would raise his staff and lightning would strike each of the players. After blasting Melody with a fireball, the eyes turned blue.
“It’s blue, everyone spread!” Gray called out. He threw a lightning bolt at Izal but noticed that the healer was too close to the DPS. “Don’t get too-“
Izal’s tentacle squirmed and wrapped around into a ball. Lightning struck the four of them. Gray and Melody survived the attack, but the healer and the DPS were down. Melody and Gray didn’t have enough damage to kill Izal quickly and they didn’t have any ways of healing the damage taken to survive.
They respawned at the beginning of the dungeon. The DPS was an elementalist named Orlin Orion and the healer was a dryad named Calypso Free.
“Ugh, Let’s do it again,” Orlin said. “This dungeon only has two bosses. A normal party should be able to finish in 15 minutes.”
“It's our first time.” Melody explained. Gray already had a feeling about what type of player Orlin was, but he didn’t say anything.
“Remember, red is the attack that goes across half of the arena and blue is the lightning,” Gray turned to Calypso.
“Really, really sorry. This is my first MMO. I shouldn’t have picked a healer if I was going to die so often.”
“It’s ok,” Gray said. “The mobs along the way stay dead, so we can just run back to Izal with no problem.”
“Ok.”
The half-party went back to challenge Izal. They started off strong this time. Calypso wasn’t making any mistakes and she was even able to attack Izal in-between Melody needing heals. Once they reduced Izal’s health to 50%, half of his tentacles flashed red and the other half blue.
“Spread out in the safe half of the arena. He’s going to be both mechanics at once!” Gray said.
“Ah!” Calypso panicked and ran straight at Gray. The mechanic went off and both dropped. The party was felled again by Izal, and they appeared below the sunlit moss once more.
“You idiot! It’s such a simple mechanic,” Orlin screamed.
“I didn’t know he was going to do both at the same time,” Calypso said.
“We’ve been at this dungeon for 15 minutes now because you can’t do a braindead mechanic. I’m not gonna going to waste any more time!” Orlin left the party.
“Alright fine,” Melody placed a hand on Calypso’s shoulder. “It’s alright. We can replace the DPS slot and try again.”
“...I think I’m done playing for the day,” Calypso left the party. Melody and Gray were alone in Rol’s Library again.
“You up to queue up again?” Gray sighed. “We’ve been doing this dungeon for half an hour now.”
“We’re finishing this damn dungeon today and nobody’s going to stop us!”
***
Melody and Gray reappeared at the start of the dungeon. Back at that same old twinkling moss, bookshelves, and suits of armor. The healer was a human bard named Lector Vector and the DPS was a foxian ranger named Akira Nakagawa.
“Hi,” Gray said. “We’ve tried this dungeon a few times, so we can give a couple of tips.”
“Sounds good to me,” Akira answered. “There’s a lot of books on the shelves…”
“Yeah, we need to get the purple ones to open the door at the end of the hall.”
“Interesting. Well, let’s get going.”
The encounters went smoothly as Gray, Melody, Akira, and Lector performed their roles. They smashed through the mobs and arrived at Izal.
“Blue eyes, spread. Red eyes go to the side of the arena. At 50%, he’ll do both back-to-back,” Gray explained.
“A magical experiment gone wrong,” Akira knocked an arrow into place and aimed at Izal.
“Experiment?”
“Izal was a mage who sought out greater knowledge, so he attempted to augment his body with blood from a corrupted beast. He ended up becoming that thing.”
“Oh, so it’s lore.”
“Yeah, there was a minor quest relating to this place down the mountain.”
The half-party was able to take down Izal without any issues and they entered the second half of the library. As soon as Izal died, a staircase rose through the stagnant waters and led down into the depths of the library.
They went down some steps. The only light came from Melody’s sword and hanging candelabras that were burning with the same purple flame as the runes on the bookshelves.
Gray kept a close eye on them in case they were related to another puzzle later on. Melody took a step on a slab of stone that depressed into the ground and clicked. The party stopped in place.
A giant axe swooped down and killed Melody.
Lector kneeled and revived her.
“Damn traps,” Melody mumbled. She took another step and heard another click. She jumped back before the second axe could get her. Proud of herself, she continued down the stairs.
At the bottom of the steps, they found no mobs, but a short entrance that gave way into a chamber room. The chamber had no floor. Instead, there was a platform in the center that was upheld by four separate chains.
“Well, I have sneaking suspicions about this type of place,” Gray said.
“Me too. If you look at the walls, they have the carvings of giants. It could be related to the broken waste,” Akira said.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Gray said. “I just meant that it looks like a boss arena.”
“Oh yeah totally, but if this place is connected to the giants, then that means it could be…”
“I’m just going to step inside,” Melody hopped into the arena and the hanging chains rattled. Gray and Lector followed behind her. Akira was the furthest back with his bow drawn.
“It’s a prison,” Akira said.
“A prison?” Gray and Melody asked. Then they looked up at a pair of red eyes. A beast howled from the dark ceiling and pounced on the arena. The arena swayed and Gray slid to the left side. Past his feet, Gray saw an abyss waiting to take him. He screamed, but he was yanked back by Melody as the floor evened out.
The party got a look at the final boss of the dungeon. It was a 20-foot black wolf. Its name appeared before the party as Tarx, The Punished. Saliva ran down from its maw.
“Oh cool, It’s Tarx.” Akira smiled.
“Why is something like that even here?” Melody asked. “This place was supposed to be a library not a prison!”
“No, no. He was one of the guys that betrayed the jaegers. He was like a cool dude, but then he wanted more power, so he made a pact with the demon Selon. Then he turned into a dog.”
“Please shoot the boss,” Gray gave Akira a damage buff.
“Right, sorry.”
Melody took the aggro from Tarx, and the wolf started swiping at her. A single attack could take half of her health.
“Lector please tell me you got this,”
Lector challenged the stoicism of Ervara, the Silent, and ensured that Melody was constantly healed after every attack. Gray placed meadow beneath Melody’s feet, but Tarx’s first mechanic was presented. The beast howled and bit one of the chains that was upholding the arena. It shattered into metal arches.
The party slid towards the top right corner of the map and the four tumbled off. On their way down into the void, Gray had his back towards the void and saw faint purple light. Then he saw Akira falling above him. Everything went black and they respawned at the beginning of the map.
“That looked impossible to dodge,” Melody said.
“Akira did you see that purple glow where the broken chain used to be?” Gray asked.
“Yeah, it had the same glow as the candelabras as we went down the stairs.” Akira closed his eyes. “You think they’re connected?”
“Maybe, let’s see if we interact with those flames.”
The party rushed back to the large, cobbled stairs that led to Tarx’s domain. They avoided the traps and found one of the candelabras.
“Should I hit it?” Melody asked.
“Maybe?” Gray scratched his head. Melody threw Talik’s javelin at the candelabra and the light was extinguished. Encouraged by the fact that the flames were extinguished to begin with, they did the same with all of them.
When they arrived at Tarx’s domain, they found the wolf just sitting there. No intense introduction, he almost looked like a dog waiting for their owner to arrive from work.
“We’ll get you this time,” Akira said. “Ready Gray? Melody? I would also include you Lector, but you haven’t said a single word.”
“Ready,” Gray said.
“Let’s do this,” Melody said.
Lector nodded, which served as the starting of the encounter.
Melody took the brunt of the damage as Tarx kept slashing at her, but she raised her shield and imbued it with her paladin magic. Lector ensured that she was healed after every attack. Gray shifted his mana over to Lector to make sure that he could continue healing.
“Don’t worry about attacking, Gray. I’ll make sure to keep up the damage,” Akira shouted.
The weight of the ground shifted as Tarx roared and shattered one of the chains with his teeth. The platform dipped and the party slid down to the floor, but right before their bodies went off into the abyss, an ethereal chain manifested and rebalanced the arena.
“Holy shit we were right?” Melody got smacked by Tarx paw again. “Aw! You!”
Tarx attempted to destroy the other chains, but the outcome was the same. The party slid, but were able to stay within bounds.
With one final shot from Akira, Tarx fell to the half party of Melody the Paladin, Akira the Ranger, Lector the Bard, and Gray the Seer. Tarx faded into black dust. For a moment, his red eyes lingered and stared at the party before they too disappeared. A chest appeared where Tarx's body left a black imprint on the platform.
The members opened the chest.
“A sword and shield,” Melody equipped a new sword and shield that were made of some black metal. The shield had a gem in the center that had matched the color of Tarx eyes. Akira equipped a feathered hat with a red plume. Lector received some black pointed boots.
Gray found a set of black gloves with red sigils named schwarzschild. The stats were worse than the gloves that he was wearing, but he thought the schwarzschild gloves looked cooler. Thankfully Elrin Online had a mechanic called sculpting where a player could make gear look like a different type of gear without sacrificing stats.
Lector gave a thumbs up before leaving the dungeon.
“Cool duds,” Akira said. “Well, now I’m off to find the codex.”
“The codex?” Melody asked. “Aren’t those the books you collect in the world map?”
“Yeah, you can also get them when you beat a dungeon,” Akira explained. “My goal is to collect them all.”
“That’s why you know so much about the lore.”
“Yup. You also get cool looking armor from it.”
“Cool armor, huh…” Melody stood still for a moment. Gray assumed she was looking up just how cool this armor could be. “Gray, we need to collect those codex things. The armor looks so sick. Let’s go find that codex, Akira.”
The party of three continued to explore the dungeon that they had already been through. All the traps were no longer active, and the mobs were still cleared. They ended up finding a floating white book with a quill in Izal’s arena.
Each of them picked up the book. Akira started to read it.
“Digging right in, I see.”
“Yeah, you never know what interesting stuff there is. Are you going to read it as well?” Akira asked.
“Later,” Gray lied.
“Same,” Melody said. While Akira read the codex, Melody turned to Gray. “Why don’t we invite Akira to the guild?”
“That’s a good idea,” Gray agreed. “What do you think?”
“Mmh. Neat,” Akira said.
“So you want to join?’
“Oh, I was reading sorry. You want me to join your guild? Are you sure?” Akira asked.
“Why wouldn’t we let you join?” Melody asked.
“Oh, I just thought you two were in a private guild or something,” Akira put the codex away. “Alright then, consider this ranger a part of your guild. I don’t really have friends that play Elrin, so this will be fun.”
“Glad to have you come aboard,” Gray extended his hand.
Akira accepted it. They shook hands and officially Akira Nakagawa was a member of the Daybreak guild.