They all fell down to their knees. Tier even let his body fall flat on the icy floor, ignoring the cold chills that seeped through his armour. His heart raced due to the remaining effects of adrenaline. Panting, he tried to regulate the stability of the core of his being. The people around him shouted in joy and euphoria while Tier only wanted a little bit of peace.

Limping on his steps as usual, Nubram approached Tier and chuckled. “So that’s [Primal Unleash], huh? Convenient. At least for me.”

Tier sighed, he avoided the discussion, “Shouldn’t you be taking the loot?”

“Your way of changing the topic is too shallow.” Nubram shook his head. “Any severe drawbacks yet?”

Tier stood up and dusted off the snow and ice from his body. He answered, “Not anything that I’m aware of. It's just that I’m not used to using the ability nor sharing it.”

“There’s no side effect on me,” Nubram assured. “You don’t need to worry about burdening us.”

“I’m still unsure, you know. That was a short lived synchro.”

“That’s just some observation of the current usage.”

Tier nodded, he walked towards the real entrance of the room as he mumbled, “Let’s just hope it works like that all the time.”

Due to their way of entering the dungeon, Tier and the gang had to fight smaller drakes on their way out. As with the case in the previous dungeon, this time they also avoid fighting other bosses in the cave-like nest.

However, unlike the place where the yetis lived, this cave had very smooth crystal-like surfaces. There were no stalactites nor stalagmites protruding around. Sometimes they could see their reflections on the walls due to its smoothness.

The experience points they received from such a dungeon seemed pretty low as nobody managed to get to level 80 during this whole journey to go outside of the dungeon. When they almost reached the entrance of the cave, there was a loud sigh from Rushvatte.

“Man, just a bit more to 80,” he said.

It was then that Tier suddenly got a whisper from Arkengrad.

[What are you doing in such a dungeon?]

“Command on: reply. Nubram needs something from here.”

[Got bad news for you.]

Tier raised his hand as a sign for his friends to stop their steps. He looked at the uphill slope before the entrance of the cave. Light glittered from snow’s reflection, giving a relatively blinding effect to whomever walked out of the dungeon.

“What do you mean?”

[I saw DeusVult and Zullvic around that area? Bet they are waiting to ambush anyone who goes out of the dungeon.]

Tier frowned. “DeusVult? Zullvic? Who are they?”

[Lyra’s gang, duh.]

“I beat DeusVult before,” Rushvatte suddenly said. His eyes turned stern at the mention of the name. “What about him?”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“You mean, we beat him?” Flick grinned, there was a clear confidence in his eyes. “With the help of NPCs.”

Tier glanced at his two friends before closing communication with Arkengrad, “Alright, got it, we’ll think of a way.”

[Just remember to give me some credit to Steven and Manna.]

“Sure.”

The hunter then turned to his friends, and relayed Arkengrad messages about the probability of an incoming ambush right outside the dungeon.

“Just beat ‘em,” Rushvatte snorted. “Beat him before, could beat him now that my level is higher.”

“That’s exactly the problem you halfwit,” Nubram groaned in his protest, “We don’t have the proper equipment yet and the level difference penalty is not there to protect us.”

Rushvatte quickly countered, “Then what? Wait here, man? The dungeon timer is gonna kick us if we are not doing anything, and there is no guarantee that they won’t be camping outside.”

Nubram was unfazed by the counter. He explained, “Stop being shallow like your childhood friend, alright. We still need to conserve our death quota. And I think Zackhs already got five.”

“It’s okay Nubram buddy, I'll try to manage.”

“Ugh, Toy, why do we need to bring Manna to this again?”

“I’m just giving an example, okay.”

Both Nubram and Rushvatte seemed to almost have a bickering, but Tier quickly interrupted, “Our other option is to clear out the mobs here to buy some time….”

Tier didn’t manage to finish his words before Renma interrupted, “... then why not kill the boss as well?”

“And risk everyone dying?” Tier countered, clearly annoyed. “I haven’t finished my sentence, okay? We have another problem if we try to buy time, those two might be calling for Slicer and Lyra.”

“Come on, boddy,” said Zackhs who tried to lighten up the situation, “You made it sound like there’s no solution. We’ll definitely find one.”

“Solution, huh….”

Tier mumbled and looked around. He glanced outside and quickly deciphered that the two campers might position themselves on the side of the entrance or above it. He deduced that the two would most likely choose above the entrance to have the element of surprise. Which means they would have some blind spot since the dungeon instance entrance was slightly inside the cave rather than right at the entrance.

That would mean they can hide something there. Most probably a portal to grandar or somewhere.

He then quickly scanned his eyes through his teammates and realised Macepaw was not paying attention and busy toying with the crystal like reflection on the cave using his fire magic. The shaman blinded himself several times by focusing the light from his fire and seemed to think it was funny.

Tier turned to Nubram and asked, “Toy, can you use [Flash] on the floor or ceiling of the cave?”

One of Nubram’s nonexistent eyebrows raised. He pointed his sword upwards and questioned, “Like this? [Flash].”

In that instant, Tier was blinded, followed by yells of protest from Rushvatte, Renma, and Flick.

“Come on, Toy! What the hell, bro?”

“What? Pras asked me to.”

“Good one, Toy,” Tier chuckled. Though it took his eyes several seconds to be able to see again, he felt that he got the impact he needed.

“Okay, guys, gather up. I have a plan,” Tier called. As the others gathered around him, even Macepaw, he explained his plan, “First we get out and dash slightly towards the open area, the three casters will stay right outside the dungeon’s entrance. We’ll try to provoke them to make them realise Pitoy is at the entrance, then use [Flash] to blind them while Alvin will cast [Smokesteam]. After that, Pitoy will warp towards the open area and cast a portal to Grandar. They would probably think we’re going to run back into the dungeon or make a portal near where they saw Pitoy last. Any objection?”

Renma raised his hand, “I don’t understand, what do I do again?”

Tier sighed, “Nothing but heal.”

Renma raised his hand again. This time, Tier sighed again, “No, we don’t need to waste time while waiting for you to use archangel form. Just run to the opposite side.”

“Wowza, mate, you guessed that?” Flick giggled. “Due to one and a half years of sharing your desk, eh?”

“Kinda.”

Renma just laughed defeatedly at the comment. It was a clear sign he agreed with the answer.

Tier took a deep breath and let it out again. He then waved his hands to them and commanded, “Let’s do this.”