The atmosphere was frigid as the five players stood before the mammoth. Yuki had a stone's haughty expression on her veiled face, her skirt flowing in the wind as she gripped her sword. The mighty weapon looked daunting even with the mammoth's gigantic stature.
The woman resembled a Goddess and Elizabeth stared at her with amazement in her eyes. Jake, who was in a compromising position still had an aura to him that was badass. His body was trembling with the fight inside of him boiling over. The giant's eyes were molten lava as he stared at the beast with the fire to fight.
Selene was the same with her claws spread, chest pushed out and mouth extremely deadly with the insults she spat. The teenager felt her cheeks warm as she stood up and clenched the blade she summoned to her chest.
“I'll aim my blade right in the center of its throat.” Elizabeth proclaimed to the rest of the group. She was anxious seeing the mammoth fight its chains. But she wasn't going to let the others down. Not when they were full or so much fight and aura inside their beating hearts. Her body was shaking.
{PLAYER 04 ☆ ELIZA ATTACK}
“If you're going to say it, do it now!” Selene encouraged her new friend with a bright smile on her face. The fox's eyes glowing with feral spirit.
The brunette began to run towards the mammoth with determination pumping in her veins and powering her body. Her legs felt like they were on fire as she jumped over mountains of snow and glided over black ice. Like she was invincible, the dark-haired girl was moving without a care in the world as she was hit with all types of blockages.
The bitter, freezing air hit her face and made her eyes begin to water but she kept going. Her lips began to flake from the temperature drop but she just didn't give a damn. All the girl cared about was making sure her blade butchered her enemy. This wasn't just a video game to her anymore.
Suddenly the walls between 2D and 3D fell apart in the teenager's mind as she attacked. Her body was acting as if she truly was in a life-or-death situation in which everything was at risk. Her hair whipped around and her dress was heavy as she screamed.
“Take this!” She screamed as she lifted her dagger and threw her arm back before letting loose and slashing right at the beast's burbling throat.
{RANDOM EVENT ☆ MAMMOTH ATTACK}
Elizabeth felt like she had been knocked unconscious from the force of the mammoth's leg striking the side of her body. Her blade brought a shower of its disgusting blood out into the air as the teenager flew to the side. She fell to the ground and yelled out in pain from the sensation of the rocks hitting her back.
This sudden brutality made the others react in multiple ways. Yuki had grown wide-eyed and she was shaking with rage. Her knuckles were white like snow as the woman fought against the in-game code to kill the beast. Catherine, the previously silent elf who had stood watching this all yelled at the veiled woman to control herself before she acted carelessly.
“Don't do anything stupid!” The long-haired elf said as she stood looking back and forth between Yuki and the injured Elizabeth. “Hey, listen to me!”
The veiled woman said something under her breath in what the teenager believed to be Portuguese. She then looked at Catherine with annoyance. “You expect me to stand here after she nearly got crushed by that thing!”
The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
“No, I'm saying act with common sense!” Catherine yelled back as she pulled up her menu. The elf dug into her inventory before smiling. “Yes!”
{PLAYER 05 ☆ CATHERINE}
The air surrounding the white-haired elf became full of sparkles and freckles of rainbow light. In her outstretched hands appeared a staff that looked to be crafted out of crystals. These crystals then were held together by a collection of jade, pearls, and metal which crafted the pole together.
She gripped the staff with her eyes darkening before spinning it around. As it finished spinning she stabbed the staff into the ground. The snow beneath her flew into the air as the dirt cracked and the ground became chunky. Her jaw was clenched as she looked blankly at the group and then the beast. The air became heavy as the staff glowed and the earth beneath them trembled.
“WAIT CAT–” Selene began to yell as she realized what her friend was doing but she was stopped by a beam of rainbow light.
The attack to the teenager's disbelief one shot the mammoth. Turning it into a pile of ashes. You could hear a pin drop as the elf turned their fearsome opponent into little more than cow dung.
Her hair flowed in the air like water in a riverbed and she held her weapon with ease. The elf looked at what remained of the mammoth with boredom. Disappoint really.
It was clear the woman had expected the attack to injure the creature but not incinerate it. She sighed and the remnants of the mammoth started to become buried under the light snowfall that covered the entire path.
With this, the fox woman threw up her hands and walked back to the carriage. She kept out a long and tired exhale. “Well. That was fast.”
Elizabeth sat up on one arm and shivered. “How? How did she do that?” The teenager then looked at a silent Yuki. “I thought she was just a healer.”
“She just prefers to heal so it's more fun for us,” Yuki told the shocked girl as wiped her broadsword off and smiled. “Catherine is the highest level out of all of us so she can pack a mean punch. It makes battles pretty boring.”
Elizabeth gawked. “What level is she?”
“She's level fifty,” Yuki said to which the maid just sat there mouth agape. “That's why we all agreed to make her focus on support. But that mob was gonna beat us all, which was the exception we gave her to that agreement.”
[CONGRATULATIONS PLAYERS • YUKI • JAKE • ELIZA • SELENE • CATHERINE ON DEFEATING THE LVL 25 WITHERED MAMMOTH]
{LOOK IN YOUR INVENTORIES FOR YOUR AWARD 🎁🎈🎊}
Jake stood up with his hands on his knees. He shook his head and let out a relieved sigh. “You're telling me that was a level TWENTY FIVE mob?”
He had a look on his face that everyone else reflected as they took it all in.
Her veiled teammate had walked over to the dormant teenager and offered her a helping hand. Elizabeth accepted it gratefully and was pulled up onto her feet by Yuki. The woman looked at her pale complexion and bruised knees with worry. “Are you alright?” She asked her with a deep frown.
The maid looked down at herself, wondering if she was okay. This was the third time she had been attacked by a monster in-game in just a few days of owning the copy. Frozen Hearts had been advertised as a slice-of-life cozy game with minimal combat as that had to be seeked out.
But that didn't leave her feeling scorned as she thought she would. Instead, Elizabeth felt exhilarated that she had been involved in something that was out of the fantasy books she read as a child.
The teenager felt like she had suddenly become a protagonist in a story and she loved it. Plus, not only had she been given a cute slime companion but a group of awesome online friends. Elizabeth looked at her character's knee scrape feeling pretty damn lucky.
“Kiddo?” She blinked and saw that Jake had walked over. The older guild members were worried about the group’s baby and she blushed.
The brunette nodded and winced. “I'm alright. I'm just relieved you guys are all okay. I'm only level two so facing a level 25 mob is a death sentence. You guys saved me back there.” The teenager still felt wonder from the display of sheer power and badassery Catherine had showcased.
The knight and Yuki shared a look as they watched her flinch. Her character needed to rest from the beatdown she suffered. Yuki grabbed one of her hands to help her walk which made the teenager groan. This made the older woman frown and she let go of the girl.
Instead, she just wrapped a muscly arm around her waist to help her walk back to the waiting carriage. The woman's biceps felt like steel and the girl shivered from the sensation. It was truly incredible that she had teamed up with such a capable player.
All of the team was strong as hell with Catherine especially. The elf had one shot at the beast and walked off without breaking a sweat. It was unbelievable. As they walked the veiled woman began to talk in a sudden serious tone.
“Your character needs to sit this one out. We can register you as a part of the guild without you being logged in. Just send me a friend request and once I accept it I'll have your player code. We can then put that in the registration form and you'll instantly be accepted as a guild member.” Yuki explained to the exhausted girl who sat on it with a somber expression.
Elizabeth knew that even though she wanted to keep playing, the older woman was right. About everything as she needed to log off and to keep herself from losing all her progress.
“Will you guys watch Pudding for me? I don't want to log off if he's not in good hands.” She begged the woman with her hand grabbing her shoulder and squeezing it. She couldn't risk it.
Thankfully, by the softening of Yuki's expression and her sweet voice, the teenager knew she was being truthful. “I'll watch over him till you log back in. I swear I'll make sure to feed and hold him as you would. I promise.”