Boris gathered all the members of the crew into the lounge. The four ladies and two eldest members sat on the available soft seating while the other stood around facing Boris. They all noticed a masked stranger standing by one of the far corner and whispered amongst themselves.
"Is that a new member?" they all wondered.
Once all sixteen members settled down, Boris briefed them on the next expedition.
”We will focus on the Nemorode Dunes,” Boris said as he laid out a map with few landmarks. Nemorode Dunes were marked by five simple markings. “We haven’t been there in months and while everyone is focusing to explore the southwestern region, there will be less competitors there.”
Resources were plentiful, but scarce around the city as there were more competitions and bandits. Most crew needed to travel beyond the one-day travel limit to find real treasures and monsters. Boris's crew traveled to the three-days limit line. Even then, the chances to encounter rival crews were possible.
“I prefer that we do encounter bandits,” said Radley, the A-rank spearman. “It’s always better to loot from them.”
”We all know your inclination,” said Cory, the scout and navigator of the crew. “But we are not bandits.”
Radley hissed at Cory’s responsive. “You’re no fun.”
”Since it doesn’t look like there is any rejection to the plan, I’ll introduce you to Maddox,” said Boris. “He will prepare cymo potions as we approach the monster.”
”Neat, that will make the hunt easier,” said one of the magicians and co-leader of the crew, Ernest. “I can focus my energy to take down the monster.”
”That is the plan,” said Boris. He wrote down the name of the crew and assigned them with a position. A party consisted on a tank, three melee warriors, a scout, two magicians, a ranger, and a healer. Although there were mostly B-rankers, they had S-ranked ability. As to what they were, Maddox would have to wait and see. "With Maddox, we will have 19 people for this journey. If everyone is in agreement, we will set out in three days.”
All the members nodded. Crews within the S-rank realms did not operate under the ORA app, but through verbal agreements. It was far riskier, but also less restrictive. For Boris, it also meant looking for people he could trust to perform their job. They weren't people he could trust with his lives, but they were people he trusted to complete their assigned task.
****
With all the necessary preparation made for their six-days journey, the three camadons pulled the three wagons westward toward the sandy dunes. As the landscape was constantly changing, a navigator was crucial to return back to Halland City. It was difficult to see once the sandstorm picked up and blocked the city from view. Cory steered the camadon toward the northwest, away from the aura of the city. Cory ability worked like a radar, extending out a radius of mana to detect any disturbance. His tracking ability guided the wagon in a general direction of their destination and camadons plowed through the sandy storm.
As the wagon wheeled up to the top of the sand dune, large shadowy creatures jumped in the distance like dolphins. From the distance, the shadows appeared small, but they were most likely a pair of 30-feet long monsters. The wagons traveled closer to the shadow until they could discern from the general outline that there were two 1000-eyes scorpions. The camadons halted and the team split into two, with both wagons moving away from each other and around the creature in a pincher formation. The third wagon stayed in position, with vital supplies used as an escape plan. Once two wagons was in pincher position, the magicians transmitted a spell to communicate the signal to initiate an attack.
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The melee warriors moved out quickly to surround the 1000-eyes scorpion while the magicians casted their magical attacks. Melee warriors specialized in close combat, but all of them had ranged attacks that were used to push back the scorpion to a certain location. It was better to move the scorpions closer together and cast a spell with a large area of effect.
Boris and two melee fighters attacked from the South, Radley with two melee attacked from the North, Naza from the East, and Ernest from the West. The melee fighters closed in on the scorpion, attacking the creatures until both creature were back to back. Boris and Radley threw the cymo potions at them. The potion bottle shattered, releasing liquid can quickly evolved into cyan-colored gas that wrapped around the scorpions and held them into place. Then, a large magic circle appeared underneath, surrounding the two large scorpions. Icicles appeared from the circle, creeping up the sandy shelled legs and covered the scorpions thick layer of ice.
Maddox, who stayed on the West, watched Ernest as he casted the spell. Naza's kryomata spell was the main offensive ice spell, but it what Ernest dimiohydro spell that reinforced the strength of Naza's spell making the kryomata twice as effective.
With the two 1000-eyes scorpion frozen into place, Boris charged up his attack into his hammer and jumped up in the air. He slammed down toward one, cracking the ice and damaging the scorpion's armored shell. Radley speared pierced through the cracked armor, his mana seeped in and spread outward, damaging the scorpion internal organs. The other team followed suit, killing the other scorpion shortly after.
After killing the monsters, they wrapped up the carcasses and tied them to the camadons. As they packed up, the crew reviewed their approach.
"That took twenty-five minutes," said Ernest. "It's not bad, but I feel we could improve."
Most monster hunt was ninety percent planning and ten percent execution, which took less than thirty minutes. Any hunt that lasted longer than thirty minutes were dangerous. The more time spent on dealing with the monsters, they less energy they would have left to survive.
"Twenty-five minutes hunt is already good enough," said Radley. "It was two monsters."
"We all know the 1000-eyes travel in pairs," said Cory.
For Maddox, the conversation between them was difficult to absorb. There planning strategy wasn't so different from the low-ranking hunt, but the abilities and technique were impressive due to the variations and scale. As they continued their discussion, Maddox picked the scent of a spiritual plant.
"I think there is a spiritual plant nearby," said Maddox.
Boris looked around, but there was nothing but sand in the area. "You sure?"
Maddox jumped out of the wagon and looked around. He walked around the sandy dune, but nothing was visible in view. He tilted his head up, and took in a deep breathe while partially blocking his nose to prevent sand from entering. The scent was there, but not there at the same time. He walked down toward the valley of the dunes, knelt down and took another deep breathe.
“Can you track it?” Boris asked.
"It might be something below," Maddox said. "Are there plants that grow underground?"
Boris scratched his head. "If you're talking about truffle, then no."
“Is it possible there is something underground?” Maddox asked.
Boris turned to look at Naza.
“I can only dig around 10-feet deep, but 20 feet if you can narrow it within a smaller radius,” said Naza.
Maddox walked around and stopped within an area with the strongest scent. “Right here is the best.”
Naza looked at the location Maddox pointed to and began casting a spell. The spell required a bit of time, but within minutes, the sand slowly churned into a whirlpool, outwardly pushing the sand outward as though a drill screwed through the earth. After another few minutes, a 10-feet wide opening appeared.
Maddox moved closely to the sloped edge. The funnel shaped hole went down around 30 feet. It was amazing what a B-rank mage was capable of. He wondered how much stronger his brothers had gotten since studying at Matupa.
Maddox took the lead to scout the area. It felt strange not having to carry so much equipment on him. He jumped down the sandy slope, letting gravity take him down to the bottom. At the bottom, the scent of the aura indicated it was nearby. The only way for it to be possible was if there was an underground cave. The biggest problem was finding the entrance.
Maddox dug out more sand until he hit bedrock. “Can someone smash this boulder?”
Boris suddenly jumped down from above, his feet landing nearby Maddox. Maddox moved aside as Boris powered up a battle hammer. Within minutes, the hammer gave out a blue glow. With both hands on the grip, Boris lifted the hammer over his head and pounded the hammer down on the boulder. The impact shattered the boulder, scattering the debris and sand around. An opening to a dark underground cavern appeared. The crew smiled and chuckled. An underground cavern was dangerous, but there were always undiscovered treasures.