Remains of buildings scattered on barren ground. Boulders, pillars and debris were everywhere. Only a few buildings were still intact. Among the debris, there was a wide broken paved road which was still passable. It seemed it was once the main road.

The ruin was really quiet. It gave such an eerie atmosphere. Mirage was gazing to certain places while I was looking around and searching for anything to loot. Unfortunately, only stones were found.

"Do you see anything?" I asked.

"No..." She answered and shook her head.

I sighed and took a glance at her. Her face seemed anxious. I also felt something strange about this place. This was supposed to be hunting ground, but monster was nowhere to be found.

After we were wandering around, suddenly I felt something beneath my feet. The ground shook in a small scale. It was slowly becoming stronger to the extent like the ground under my feet could fall at any moment.

"W-what!?"

My stomach was stirred. Mirage grabbed my arm and closed her eyes. I gritted my teeth and tried to pull her to a place where the ground looked sturdy... but I couldn't move.

It was like my feet were glued to the ground. Not only my feet, but every part of my body couldn't move at all. A few minutes passed until it suddenly stopped.

We both fell on our knees. We were breathing deeply. I stood and gave my hand to her.

"A-are you okay?" I asked her while helping her stood. "Careful..."

"Y...yeah." she answered. "I'm fine."

I observed my surrounding. I didn't need a good memory to know that the debris around us weren't moved an inch. Also, one building not so far from where we stood didn't even fall or crumble.

'Strange.' I thought. 'The building could be really sturdy though.'

After our body felt a bit relaxed, we continued walking. However, drumming sounds could be heard and the ground shook once again.

This time I was calm and I could tell where the source was. I saw a Sleethar running in a distance. She mobbed monsters and lured them to her party.

'Well, that explain about the monsters disappearance...'

Were they also the one making the ground tremble before?

I hid myself behind crumbled wall and watched them. After a while, the Sleethar came closer to her party and the Human Tank immediately pulled the mobs aggression to him.

When all the monsters attacked him, everyone began to attack and use their spells and skills. I could feel the ground was shaken, but it wasn't as near as the tremor before. I thought I might overthinking about it, so I moved on.

'Time to move... I don't want to bump into them.'

We continued searching the secret lab while hunting monsters that didn't get pulled. Mostly, we encountered Ruin Skeletons and Ruin Zombies. But when we were at the northern part, Arachnids and Ruin Wolves were dominant.

"Keep the pace like before..."

I said to Mirage while avoiding three wolves attack. I used my sword to parry their claws and fangs. I thought they were attacking me recklessly and moving at random position.

In fact, they were clever. Their attack actually had patterns and planned perfectly. It was like they were humans that had been hunting together for years. I didn't know animal could be this smart.

'Okay... one from the right.'

I raised my sword and stepped backwards. I matched the timing to parry, then its claws clashed against my sword. The wolf passed through.

'Next one from behind...'

I took a glance behind me and immediately spun my body 360 degree to the right once. I saw the second wolf was passing through. I successfully evaded two wolves.

'Last attack will be that one!'

The third wolf jumped and bare its fangs. I held my sword with both of my hands. When the wolf was right in front of me, I moved sideways and slashed my sword down. I separated the wolf's head from its body. Blood gushed when the body fell to the ground.

'One down.'

I gritted my teeth. I began to feel pain in my arm. The one from behind actually got my left arm cut by its claws. Blood dripping down painted my left arm crimson.

Bleeding's effect can be felt.

Bleeding state. It was one of annoying debuffs which decrease your health every second. It was also known as Damage Over Time or DOT in short. Mirage also had one. The one she used while I was fighting Uruzak. It wasn't really a pleasant memory though. But, it was also a good thing that I met her.

Mirage used Healing Serenade.

484 HP has been healed by Mirage.

The blood evaporated revealing my skin color and the cut was patched. Unfortunately, the wound still wasn't closed. The blood gushed from the wound.

Mirage used Song of Purity.

Bleeding has been lifted.

I smiled.

'I really don't deserve her.'

She became an amazing support within short amount of time. If she wasn't here, then I would be troubled dealing with these wolves. So, it was easy to take down the other two within minutes.

【Ruin Wolf】

They were always hunting in a pack. They were set as a three-wolf team and wandering around the northern part of ruins. Not only they were fast, their bleeding debuff was what was scary about them. When you were in a bleeding state, they would occasionally land critical hits. Thankfully, Mirage prevented that from happening, and because of that I also gained bleeding resistance skill.

Bleeding Resistance Level 2 Passive: Decrease a certain amount of damage caused by bleed. It also has a chance to prevent bleed.

Damage reduction: 20%

Resist chance: 6%

I was satisfied. I took wolf hides on the ground and put them in my bag.

"Good job." I praised Mirage.

"Thank you..."

Mirage thanked me and smiled. Then she furrowed her eyebrows while staring somewhere behind me, so I followed her gaze.

I saw a skeleton lying in front of small building. I told her to stay behind me and we took a closer look.

【Prisoner's Skeleton】

Looking at the name itself made me had a goosebump. I remembered what Halton said. He could be one of the artisans or spies. So I was thinking that there might be some clues inside this building.

There were three rooms inside the building. One big room and two restrooms. It looked like it was an office, because there were a lot of tables and papers in the big room. Despite some furniture were a mess, the place wasn't really in a bad condition.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

I found some loots, but they were all common materials. I didn't find any clue of the secret lab yet though. Only undecipherable texts were found everywhere. I could actually read them if I focused, but most of them just scribbles. It seemed they were reports and stuff.

Well, I didn't have a slightest interest about it. So I just skimmed or read the titles and threw them back if it wasn't important.

Tired that I found nothing, I sat down on a sofa at the corner of the room. Then I heard a growling sound. I looked at Mirage... Her face becoming red.

"Shall we eat?"

She nodded.

I took out wrapped sandwiches from the bag and gave one to Mirage. I chomped the sandwich while I was thinking and day dreaming, unconsciously tapping my right foot on the floor.

When I came back to my senses, I noticed Mirage seemed a bit worried about my behavior. It was then I realized my right foot was making bang sounds. I curiously looked down. There was metal floor under my feet.

'Wait a minute... I thought the floor was concrete?'

I got a feeling something was hid under the sofa, so I moved the sofa away. A steel trap door was revealed. I opened it right away. Steep spiral stairs were what underneath the trap door.

'Bingo!'

After we finished our meals, we began to descent the stairs. And then digital texts popped out...

Underground Passage

Long narrow hallway was in front of us. I unsheathed my sword and moved my feet while Mirage was following behind me. Around ten meters walking, the path turned into a 2-fork.

'A maze, huh?'

Then, it would be different from Norwall Cave which was a one-way dungeon. We would respectively encounter multiple forks ahead. In these forks, the wrong paths might lead to a dead end or something worse.

Nonetheless, my gamer instinct told me that treasure chests or items would be waiting for me at every dead end. Excited, I led Mirage to turn left.

Perhaps it was a bad luck. We encountered something unexpected. It wasn't a treasure chest, but it was something that would make someone shocked and terrified.

Two big red oval eyes and a long beak-like mouth, slender black and crimson body with two pairs of long white wings on its back, three pairs of long thin legs and two hands with claws. Its upper body, somehow, was humanoid.

【Mutated Mecoptera】

It was also known as flying scorpion. It was literally a flying scorpion. People of the internet would call it a flying nope. And they weren't small as you thought.

Inside this game, they were human-sized insect. We ended up in a big room which was filled with them, and dozens of big eggs were among them. One wouldn't even care even if legendary treasure was there.

When I saw Mirage, it seemed we were in a same thought. We slowly moved backwards and went straight back to the fork. We chose another path.

Alas, fortune goddess wasn't granting us any luck today. Not long after we stepped our feet on the other path, we could see falling stones were blocking the way. It was a dead end.

Our expressions were grim.

・・・

Meanwhile, five people were resting among the trees. A male human with heavy armor was eating preserved food on his hand.

"This thing tastes good..."

"Yeah." Female sleethar responded the man. "It also gives us good buffs too!"

"Please let's go to our main hunt after this, boss!" Male wolf beast was talking with ferocious smile. "I'm tired beating skeletons and zombies!"

"As always..." A male elf was sighing after he heard the beast spoke. "Animal brain like you should learn to control yourself first."

"What did you say!? You want to die?"

"Ugh." The female sleethar rolled her eyes. "Not again..."

"You two..." the heavy armored human was glaring at them "Shut up."

"Yes, boss... Sorry..."

The two were apologizing to their boss and immediately shut their mouth. The last man that left out, who was a human, anxiously asking the boss.

"B-boss... W-what is main hunt?"

"Ah, right. You're new, aren't cha?" The boss was looking at the man and sighed. "Main hunt is, of course, this group sole purpose. It's hunting players!"

The man's eyes were sparkling in an instant, then the boss continued.

"That is also the reason you join this group, right?"

"Ouuh...! Yeah, I always wanted to be a villain. Heheheh!"

"Good!" The boss was glad and smiled. "Then it's settled. After we finish eating, we will back to Orbania outer wall and see if there's any prey to hunt."

"Roger!"

・・・

Why did they make nest here? I didn't really understand ecology though. Perhaps it was because the humidity, or there was something drawing them here... food for example. Nonetheless, we had to pass through them.

"We do as we planned..."

Mirage nodded and stayed still. I was slowly walking into the big room. I noticed that it was filled with mosses. Up above, I could see holes on the ceiling. It seemed those holes were the entrance doors for the Mecopteras.

I came closer to the nearest Mecoptera and tried to trigger its aggro. Luckily, they were aggressive monsters. When I was within five meter radius, it noticed me and began to attack me. I barely dodged and ran back to the passage.

It was fast. When I managed to enter the passage, I turned around. I instantly saw the claw was right in front of me. It stabbed my chest.

You have received 298 damage from Mutated Mecoptera.

Mirage used Healing Serenade.

568 HP has been healed by Mirage.

Mirage immediately casted healing spell to me, however...

You have received 272 damage from Mutated Mecoptera.

You have received 237 damage from Mutated Mecoptera.

'!?'

The Mecoptera hit me with two consecutive attacks. I kept seeing its claws flying towards me. I found it hard to do anything other than evading or parrying. Even though Mirage covered me, its attack speed was way too fast. It was really hard to dodge even with Wind Blessing.

Was my stats the problem? No, it was because I was not an athlete. If athletes were playing this game, they would adapt well. War veteran or trained assassin would beat this monster easily.

On the other hands, a person who almost spent his entire life in front of monitor like me would get a hard time dealing with them. I didn't get used with this kind of thing. That was why I kept training until I feel it was enough when I started this game. Still, it seemed I wasn't good enough.

'There's only one way then... I can tank the damage.'

I knew dodging was way more efficient than tanking all the damage, but I didn't do this action because I was reckless. I could build up my character, of course. I might get a skill or two, or I could raise my endurance. I was patient, even though I had to waste a day or a week. Perhaps it was because Aphu personality influence.

'Yeah, hard work is inevitable for people like me.'

My mind filled with 'what if' situations. What if you encountered high AGI players or monsters? What if you fought debuff specialized ones? What if you got hit by high STR ones? Those situations you couldn't avoid...

Depending on one specialty wouldn't be enough. In reality, luck was random and you had to be all-rounder. Especially if you didn't have any talents or you weren't a son of billionaire. Therefore, you had to prepare in any kind of situations if you wanted to survive. And that what I was aiming for. 'No pain, no gain' was a perfect line for this matter.

'If it wasn't because of Mirage, I wouldn't be here.'

Indeed, Mirage was my savior. Fighting Uruzak made me realize how weak I was. I even got helped by her when I was about to give up. We would certainly encounter stronger enemies in the future. Because I knew I was just an ordinary and mediocre player.

I took all hits and tried to get closer. Thanks to the narrow passage, its high AGI and DEX were useless. I thrust my sword two times to its abdomen.

Shriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiek!

The Mecoptera suddenly screamed and instantly ran back to the room.

'What? What happened?'

I noticed I cut its HP down below 30% with only two hits. It was actually very weak. Of course, nimble monster would be low in defense. That was a common sense.

Still, I could feel something bad was going to happen because of its behavior, and I was right. Mecopteras inside the room turned their gaze to me, and they all immediately flying towards me.

'Shit!'

No matter how weak they were, one would tremble in fear if dozens of monsters swarmed towards them. I told Mirage to run and I followed behind her. I tried to look back and I could see two Mecopteras were chasing us at five meters away. My eyes widened as an idea came to my mind.

'Ah right! I could use that method!'

The passage wasn't wide enough for three or more Mecopteras to fit in. I was in advantageous position since they wouldn't have any space to dodge my attack. If three hits were enough to take one down, then it should be easy to beat all of them... theoretically.

"Mirage, cover me..."

Mirage stopped and turned around.

"Okay!"

I turned right away after I heard her answer. Then I rushed towards them and thrust my sword. As expected, I was slowly decreased their numbers. Mirage kept healing me when my HP dropped low.

Of course I didn't make her use all her mana on me, I also drank some potions during the fight. She also drank some mana potions when her mana was low.

After ten minutes passed, only five of them remained. However, it was as if they were scared... they suddenly retreated.

'You all dare to show your back to me?'

I grinned and then charged. I used Back Slash followed by one attack afterwards.

'One down, four remains...'

I chased and killed them one by one, until I realized I was back inside the room. I stopped and looked around. I could see countless glowing eyes in the dark.

It was a trap.

There were still plenty of them waiting inside the room. And they finally surrounded me.

'Fuck! I thought all of them were chasing me.'

I saw Mirage standing in the passage. Her eyes widened. It was as if time had been stopped. I was glad she was safe. I smiled to her then I yelled...

"RUN! WAIT ME AT THE TEMPLE!"

I saw an unexpected response, she shook her head and closed her eyes instead. The next thing I could hear was a high pitched sound from her mouth. It almost ripped apart my eardrums.

I instantly put my hands on my ears and pressed them hard. System messages popped in front of me.

Mirage has remembered Siren's Cry.