Latludious, focused, and confident, took out a lighter and cast a fire pillar spell. The eerie flames engulfed the dark creatures but did not cause any visible damage. They screamed and rushed towards the magician. He recoiled, cursed, and found no other way out but to defend himself from the attack of four dark creatures at once with a magic shield.
“Goddamn it!”
Latludious was shouting with both hands outstretched, palms facing forward. He was spending a huge amount of mana on defense, but he felt like he was approaching his limits. Faolandan ran to his aid.
“Hold on!” he said.
The machine gunner, all dirty and beaten, stood next to him and with rage and anger, shouting at the top of his voice: “For Tina!” fired all the cartridges from the disc magazine. The caliber was too small to penetrate the creature’s skull bone, but it bought time. Latludious weakened his defense, accumulated some mana - spending a couple of seconds to recover - touched the ground, and cast a spell. Stone spikes burst from the ceiling and floor and closed together like the fangs of a predator and broke the monsters’ bones. The mist in their bodies, exactly like magical limbs, dispersed.
“Holy shit,” Faolandan said and lowered his DP. “I’m just getting in the way here.”
“Don’t be absurd!” Latludious shouted and continued the battle. He picked up small stones around him, changed their shape, and showered several more monsters with a terrible hail.
Yleen was dodging grapples and direct punches. He rolled and fired in a U-turn, aiming at the monsters’ heads, threw smoke and flash grenades, and broke the distance again. He did not even notice how he separated from the group. The creatures forced him to move further and further away.
“I can’t handle all of them!” He shouted.
When the first clip ran out, he reloaded the magazine with his right hand in a second and saw a lot of darkness with small green lights flying toward him. The speed was too high. A sharp intake of breath. Fear made his heart stop for a moment. Yleen lowered his head and saw how the spell had pierced through his stomach, and now a thick black liquid was flowing out mixed with blood. Freeze-frames of how he and the rest of the group could pass the dungeon further flashed through his imagination. The Lord fired the last rounds of his second magazine sideways, feeling no strength, his legs buckling.
“Bugger,” he said, and felt the hot blood fill his mouth and trickle thinly through the blockage of his closed lips and down to his chin.
The creature flew up to Yleen and reached for his neck. He was sitting on his knees, dropped his weapon, clasped his stomach with his hands, tried not to fall. The Lord removed the protective mask through the interface and looked into those dead, lifeless eyes, ready to accept his own death face on.
“What the fuck are you doing, moron?” Ronnie shouted.
The sniper in the heat of battle saw this dramatic picture and dodged three straight blows and blocked with his rifle’s barrel two hooks and one uppercut, twisted and shot the monster point-blank in the head. The skull shattered into splinters. Avoiding further confrontation, he rushed forward from a low start, shouting to Vvy, “Cover me,” and after eleven yards he stopped and crouched on one knee and took aim and exhaled and pulled the trigger on the Barrett. The bony head of the dark creature had already released its tentacles and drained Yleen, but the 12.7mm bullet prevented him from finishing what he’d started. Ronnie cursed at the sight of such terrible wounds on the Lord. He ran to his aid, but three dark creatures surrounded him.
“Bring it on, bitches!” He roared.
Vvy swung his one-handed sword and shield, distracting the monsters. The sound of fire and bright light momentarily distracted him and turned to see Illyseh and Latludious playfully dismembering the enemy, then suddenly froze. The creatures howled and teleported away, leaving the defender of the group standing still, disoriented and bewildered. Vvy missed a punch from behind, then a second. He swung his shield back and stunned the creature. He used his only skill, ‘Amplify’ (which doubled his physical power for ten seconds), and sliced the skull in two.
Illyseh used the first spell in a combo and summoned three light spheres that froze above his head. He put the Scar-L behind his back, concentrated light magic in his palms, and jumped into the thick of the darkness. One blow, one corpse. The dark creatures flew two yards up and circled over his head and shot magic clots. The healer used the second spell in the combo, “Kyrie Eleison” and the light shield absorbed all the attacks for three seconds. Then he crouched down and pronounced the third spell in the combo: “Christe Eleison” and three light spheres zigzagged over his head and carried away five monsters at once, absorbing part of their power. The fourth spell turned out to be “Transformation into Light”. Shields used earlier appeared around the healer. They released black clots electrified by light thunderbolts outside, which connected with the light spheres. “Energy Blast” directed all the resulting power with a bright beam into the healer’s chest. Illyseh started counting ten seconds in his head and flew up and conducted a series of close-range attacks, glowing more and more. As soon as he counted ten seconds, he used the “Riot of Energy” which transformed all the accumulated power into a blue semicircular wave. The last spell in the combo flew forward and annihilated a dozen creatures at once. Faolandan stood behind the stone and looked at this fight and marveled. His palms turned white from the force with which he gripped the handle of his machine gun.
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“I wish I’d find a hole to hide,” he said to himself.
One of the dark creatures attacked him stealthily. With the first blow, it knocked the machine gun out of his hands, the second almost broke his jaw. Faolandan fell to the ground, took out a pistol, and fired five bullets into the monster’s skull. A couple of scratches. The tentacles stuck into the machine gunner’s body, and he felt the life coming out of him. Illyseh noticed it. He was behind the dark creature and with lightning speed, grabbed it by the limbs and, lifting it up with a jerk, threw it to the ground and used a magic cage in conclusion. The healer straightened his shoulders and turned his back. Faolandan heard the crunch of old bones.
Illyseh felt incredibly excited. Emotions overwhelmed him from the glorious battle. The blood was boiling. It was as if his soul was twenty or thirty years younger. He, joyful and happy, approached the cage and observed how the dark creature could not pass through the barrier, and then touched the skull with his hand and used the spell ‘Poena’—it did not work—then he conducted a quick analysis—also no information. With the next wave of his hand, he crushed the enemy’s skull. At this time, Ronnie sent the last enemy back into the void with a well-aimed shot and received the twenty-fourth level.
There was silence, interrupted by heart-rending moans and squeaky sounds of bubbling. Latludious intensified the effect of the light sphere, and the group saw the Lord lying on his back. Filth, which seemed to boil his internal organs, struck his stomach. Poisonous bubbles swelled and burst.
Illyseh ran up to him and used the ‘Duple Sunlight’. The small spheres sucked in the thick filth. This relieved the pain, but only delayed the impending death. The healer did not stop. Vvy and Latludious watched the process with excitement. They were relieved when Illyseh completely defeated the infection, and then used the spell ‘Liberandum’, which regenerated damaged skin cells and restored internal organs.
“If you’re restoring my stomach, could you make it a little smaller?” Yleen asked.
“I’m not a plastic surgeon,” Illyseh mumbled in a calm voice in response and felt his pulse not drop below a hundred and fifty-five.
The players from the Top Secret guild walked away, unable to stand the pungent smell of feces, and sat down nearby and took a breath.
Damn, what are these monsters? Latludious wrote.
If this is just the beginning, I shudder when I think what will come next, Vvy answered.
Nothing, if we keep leaving Yleen to his fate. If we don’t act like a team, we won’t make it halfway through the dungeon.
They won’t let us go through the dungeon from start to finish and clear all the monsters and bosses.
As long as they don’t create troubles, stick to the plan.
Ronnie walked over to the monster, took out a scanning chip, and stuck it into its skull. A loading bar appeared in the HUD. At 20%, the interface went red. An error popped up.
“AI.”
“At your service.”
“Why the error?”
“Most likely, these monsters are summoned with magic, and as a result, when they die, their remains carry no information.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“I... am not capable of registering a monster in the bestiary without a scan.”
“Why not?”
“That’s how my script works.”
“Can you recreate an image from a photo or a screenshot?”
“This function is at the moment unavailable.”
“Send a complaint to the game developers and have them change it.”
“Your request has been sent.”
Yleen pitched his tent and retired to a three-hour meditation to regain his strength. Illyseh approached Ronnie and thanked him for saving his comrade.
“We can’t scan these monsters. The AI said it was a summon.”
“I got the same suspicion when I applied the Analyze spell on the creature I caught. No information whatsoever. Blanks. It was like scanning a fireball.”
Ronnie nodded toward the obsidian pillars and said:
“So, they are the original source. Destroy it, make it easier for the rest of us to move forward.”
Illyseh took the sniper away from the others and said in a whisper:
“A subtle moment. The first time they activated when Faolandan hit them with a bone. The second time was when the bullets ricocheted off them. I think if you don’t touch them, they won’t cause any problems.”
“The first pillar didn’t go off during the second attack. So, they have a cooldown. We lose nothing. You can’t recover bullets, but you can recover mana. Try it.”
Illyseh approached the nearest obsidian pillar. The Top Secret players looked at him and tensed. Vvy shouted:
“Hey! What are you doing?”
The healer summoned one orb and used the spell ‘Pierce’. The orb crashed at breakneck speed into the pillar and exploded. Nothing happened. Latludious jumped up in fright. No sounds, whispers, or anything else.
“What are you doing?” he asked, huffing.
“The dark creatures are the call of these pillars. I tried to destroy them, to avoid future trouble for others. But they seem to be tougher than I thought. Latludious, won’t you try it?”
“What if they activate again?”
“Don’t worry about it. They’re on cooldown.”
The magician looked at Vvy and said:
“Well, the hell with it.”
Latludious drew a circle with his hands and pronounced the spell “Squeezing”. Air currents appeared around the obsidian pillar. They let out a gravitational wave with a piercing squeak. The spell was gone. Illyseh went to the pillar and checked it.
“There’s a small crack.”
“That’s the strongest spell I have.”
“Well,” Illyseh shrugged his shoulders, “Then I’ll write a walkthrough guide for the forum. I’ll post it later.”
When everyone had dispersed to their corners, they set up their tents and went to rest for a couple of hours. Latludious took advantage of the quiet moment to write to Nika and tell her about the monsters and then he found out about Nevernah.
Did Hebanyac do this?
Yes.
The magician spat. Vvy nodded at him with a mute question, “What happened?”
Illyseh’s steward, military commander, and the deputy are now blocking the entrance. Not only did Hebanyac not fall into the trap, but he somehow killed a player without getting a PK debuff.
How is that possible?
I don’t know. We can’t contact the dead.
Latludious looked at Illyseh’s tent and thought: What other aces did you hide up your sleeve?