Congratulations! You have encountered a Survival Event! Balra Horde! Defeat all beasts inside within six hours. Rewards available based on amount of kills and contribution. Death will result in failure, failure to complete in allotted time will result in failure.
We entered together in a large circular room that was lit by torches along the walls. There was only one way out of the room, directly across from us and we could already hear the sound of Balra scratching the floor as they moved. I could see everyone in the party's health bars just like the Old Mining Camp. The description for this one was very different from Old Mining Camp and the Balra Queens Lair.
“This is different. Be careful, let's move to the next room and see what we are facing. We have six hours, we can take it slow.” I said to the group.
There were murmurs of assent but no one spoke. Nerves on edge, we all moved towards the next room. It was another circular room, this one was much larger and we could see dozens of Balra milling about. Torches lined the walls, the only exit was a ramp down near the middle of the room. As soon as the first person crossed the threshold a timer and beast counter appeared in my vision.
Time remaining 6:00
Beasts remaining 200/200
The closest Balra snapped its head up and looked in our direction for a second before charging. We fell into the combat formation from the tunnel before. The doorway remained open so we slowly backed up to force the Balra to come one at a time. The first one impaled itself on the two swords, the force of impact and damage done to the front liners lessened as they continued to level. Unlike the Balra in the tunnels these corpses began to fade away shortly after dying.
We fought in focused silence, the unintelligent Balra charging one at a time. This pattern continued for the next half hour until the room before us was cleared of Balra. We had killed 30 of the beasts in the tunnel and every member of the party was now at least level 25. Our confidence in completing the dungeon had grown since entering. This was the fastest any of the others had leveled, my experience bar sadly had barely moved.
We waited for our health to return to full and moved out towards the far side of the room. There was only one exit and it was across from our entry point. Nothing was left of the Balra in the room so we walked over and passed through the doorway. This time there was a tingling sensation as we passed through into an even larger, well lit cavern.
Where the previous room had been full of Balra from the start, this one only had four Balra Queens guarded by four Horned Balra. My heart sunk to my throat when I saw the Balra Queens, if they all spawned the fierce Balra Queen Guardians we were in trouble.
“Back up! Back to the tunnel!” I yelled out to my party.
“We can’t! It’s blocked!” Mily called out in response.
“Damn!” I turned my head to look towards the tunnel behind us. It still looked open but I saw Mily trying to put her hand through it as if there was a wall there. The framework wasn’t going to let us clear the entire dungeon like we cleared the first room.
“Sylar!” Benn shouted.
I turned my head back to see the Balra Queen Guardians advance towards us all at once. If they all reached us at the same time the weaker members of our party were dead. I had a split second to decide if I could risk using a bomb without injuring my party. It felt like the Old Mining Camp dungeon repeating itself. I made my decision and whipped a simple bomb across the room towards the farthest of the Balra.
“Get down!” I shouted
I turned and ran to Mily, forcing her down despite her struggle. She had far less health and armor than the rest of the party and was in significantly more danger even from a simple bomb. I detonated the simple bomb as soon as I had her shielded behind me. The resulting explosion annihilated the closest Balra and knocked the other two over. Only the one that was farthest away continued its charge.
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
Ignoring the shouting from my party, especially Mily. I ran and met it with my spear and impaled it through the soft spot near its mouth. Now with a second to think I realized that had been far too easy. I triggered Identify on the Horned Balra and the queens on the other side of the room.
Horned Balra - Level 22 - Health 0/200 - Armor 150
Balra Breeding Mother - Level 10 - Health 50/50 - Armor 500
It wasn’t four Balra Queens which meant it wouldn't be the nasty Balra Queen Guardians they spawned. I breathed a sigh of relief even as eight more Balra spawned in the room. Each Breeding Mother had spawned a regular Balra and a Horned Balra. I backed away towards my party as the Balra began advancing on us.
“I’ll explain later, they aren’t as strong as I feared. You should be able to handle each pair, focus on the Horned Balra first. Arrows and Ice Bolt on the regular Balra. Quick!” I shouted out. I got a few stray glances of anger, or maybe fear, but nods of agreement. The party snapped into action.
I took down two of the regular Balra with two arrows. Mily and Rile managed to take down one each before the Balra crossed the room. I speared one of the Horned Balra and turned to see the rest of my party had already killed two and was working on the last one. Their growth in strength during the dungeon already was massive.
“I fought one Balra Queen in the last dungeon and it was incredibly tough and spawned massive Balra Queen Guardians. I feared we would have to fight four at a time in here and it would have killed us. Sorry. My cloak has increased explosion resistance so I wanted to shield Mily. I can’t always control the size of my explosions due to a skill with a multiplier on luck.” I explained.
“Thank you, Sylar.” Mily responded with a smile.
The rest of the party nodded and reset for battle. After two rounds of the spawns I checked the beast counter and realized it wasn’t counting down. As each Balra spawned, it was added to the total beast counter and then removed when it died. The Breeding Mother’s, the Horned Balra and the initial two waves had been the only ones to count.
“These waves don’t count on the beast counter. How much experience are you getting from each kill?” I asked the party.
“Let me check.” Rile said and shot another regular Balra down. He was crouched down near the ground to fire directly at the soft spot between the Balra’s armor. “Nothing from these.” He confirmed.
“We need to kill the Breeding Mothers and keep moving.” I replied. Nods and grunts of agreement sounded from the others.
We finished off the current wave and approached the Breeding Mothers in between spawns. They had a huge armor value and would require quite a few hits from the rest of the party to kill. Before we had a chance to start attacking another wave began to spawn, this time right on top of us.
“Back up. One wave at a time, we kill one Mother each wave.” I shouted out and we retreated back to our side just as the wave finished spawning.
After clearing it we quickly ran over to the closest mother and attacked. It didn’t even fight back as it laid there tucked in its defensive armor. It took the entire time between spawns to whittle it down near zero and we retreated before the spawn finished. It was still too risky to get caught by the Balra from multiple directions for the others.
Unfortunately the framework was working against us again and the Breeding Mother healed completely by the time we returned to finish it off. We began hacking at it with our swords, stabbing it with my spear and shooting it with ice and arrows until the next spawn started, retreating once more.
“This isn’t working. I’m going to place a bomb near it next wave and blow it after we back off. Each of you get as much damage on it as you can to get as much contribution and experience as possible.” I said to the group.
Clearing the waves of Balra had become routine. This time we had nearly killed the mother before the spawn but were a sliver of health short. I detonated the simple bomb as we hurried across the room and received a notification of its death. We repeated that plan for each of the remaining Breeding Mothers and finished the room three waves later.
Each member of the party had taken damage during the fight but would heal with potions. Each member was also now level 28. I was halfway to level 43 myself and would only get closer as the beasts grew more difficult. We took a small break, eating and drinking health potions if necessary before we moved on. I checked the counter and the timer to see how far we were.
Time remaining 4:31
Beast Counter 151/200