The reverse black lightning splits the ground and sky – or ceiling, if you prefer –, destroying everything in its path.

We feel something ominous coming from it. It looks as if the world is going to end.

Targaroth, in the middle of his transformation, finds himself right in the path of that black lightning. Without giving him time to shout, the lighting strikes his body and his HP bar instantly disappears.

Then, the black lightning disappears, leaving nothing behind, other than his corpse.

“Hahaha! We won! We defeated him!”

Everybody cheers up when Targaroth’s body falls into the lava, signaling the end of this battle.

But then, another person appears right behind me, giving me a scare.

Enemy attack!?

“Haa… haaa… I’m sorry, Evil Mastermind… It took me too long to activate the last one. I had to relocate in the middle because the lava reached my spot.”

When I recognize Warpoke’s voice, I relax.

“You did a great job,” I pat his shoulder a few times. “It doesn’t matter that it took so long. You struck at the best possible moment. Hahaha! He couldn’t even finish his transformation! I’m sure Targaroth must be fuming right now!”

I’m so happy that I decide to forgive him for calling me ‘Evil Mastermind’. But just this one time.

“You’re right… Haha.” He chuckles.

Giving time for the enemy to fully transform is foolish. Why should anyone allow it? It’s the most stupid thing you can do.

What do you think would have happened if Targaroth released a large area attack right after transforming? With our already low HP and his crazy damage boost from the Wrath skill, we would all have been annihilated!

In novels and anime, there’s a trend to give time for the enemy to transform. Stupid. Simply stupid.

Ah, by the way. Did you realize it? Before, I was talking about the ‘remaining six’ players, obviously excluding Balmy who was paralyzed. But I never said anything about Warpoke, our last and eighth member.

That’s because he was busy with something else. That dark lightning that killed Targaroth in a single strike? It was Warpoke’s doing. It was this skill:

Ritual of Annihilation (Active skill) Cost: 100 MP, 50 MP per magic circle

After five seconds of channeling, the target unit takes (100 + 5 * SPI) untyped damage, plus another 10% of their Max HP for each magic circle. The damage can’t be avoided or prevented.

You must first create at least 3 magic circles to activate this skill. To create a magic circle, you need to channel for 10 seconds uninterrupted, and they must have a distance of at least 10 meters between them. There’s no upper cap to the magic circles used when you activate this skill, but you can only create a maximum of 10 per Dungeon Battle or Dungeon Invasion.

Once the ritual finishes, this skill can’t be used again until 10 minutes have passed. The magic circles can be reused.

I never took an interest in the ‘ritual’ type of skills because they take a long time to set up.

Furthermore, like all other ‘ultimate’ skills, they’re exclusive to Champions; which means that if I want to use it, I have to pick it for myself, I can’t give it to a random minion.

As you can see in the skill’s description, the ritual type of skills require quite a lot of setup. Ritual of Annihilation, the one Warpoke used, requires him to set up several magic circles before he can activate it, each one taking quite a long time to create.

Rituals are rarely used by players because of the long time they require. You will never know when, or if, you’ll have time to set it up. Or if it’ll be useful at all.

The only case players take ritual effects is when they are afraid of facing an enemy that’s so powerful that they can’t defeat it in any other way.

Like… well, like we just did.

I’m sure Warpoke chose this skill because he expected the possibility of facing a stupidly strong boss in the Mystery Event. With the Ritual of Annihilation, he would have been able to defeat it as long as his team bought him enough time.

Ah, and when it says that the damage can’t be avoided or prevented it means exactly that. Skills that reduce the damage taken won’t work. Skills that create a shield and prevent all damage do nothing. There’s only one type of skill that can save you from Ritual of Annihilation or similar skills that say that damage can’t be avoided or prevented: skills that trigger when you take lethal damage.

I knew Targaroth would have some skill that would save him when he was going to die the first time… I just didn’t know he’d turn into a massive purple demon. This is why we needed to ‘kill’ him at least once before activating the Ritual of Annihilation. Otherwise, we would have had no chance to defeat him at all.

As for the number of magic circles Warpoke created for this plan? Obviously, it’s ten. Which means he took 100% of his Max HP as damage. We couldn’t take any risks here. We went with the only number that would guarantee a single-hit-kill.

That’s why it took so long for Calaban’s party to get ready. Calaban’s team had to work hard to stay out of Targaroth’s sight while preparing the magic circles.

Warpoke was the only one who could create the circles, while the others had to protect and guide him, calculate where the next circle would be, and make sure Targaroth didn’t see anything. The latter was especially problematic because the distance between magic circles forced them to move through the whole cavern’s edge to set them up.

Meanwhile, we had to keep Targaroth busy in the central area.

Revealing Buddug’s Daze to him was the best decision I could make. I’m sure Targaroth would have suspected us if I hadn’t shown him our ‘secret’ (fake) weapon.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

He must have thought we avoided the edges of the cave because we wanted to surprise him with it when he lowered his guard. But, in fact, we simply wanted him to stay put in the central area.

If Targaroth had known this was our real plan instead of Buddug’s Daze, because he accidentally spotted one of the magic circles… my amazing plan would…

I’m sorry, I don’t want to think about it.

“Wow… I never thought your plan could actually work…” Calaban comes close, shaking his head in astonishment. “From your taunts to the coordinated assault, to Warpoke’s ritual… You even predicted he’d survive the first time we would kill him and instead grow stronger. You had that Calamity dancing on the palm of your hand, he did exactly as you predicted.”

Warpoke nods enthusiastically. “Yes, yes! The Evil Mastermind indeed! I’m so glad I could participate in one of your plans. Not only participate but be the keystone! I’ll save this as a video and show everyone how we defeated Targaroth, one of the top DMA players in such a way that he couldn’t even properly defend himself. We fooled him like a noob! Hahaha!”

Navigator, walking behind Calaban, says with a small nod. He then crosses his arms and smiles. “Nice job.”

“Ahaha…” I awkwardly laugh. “Yeah, we were quite lucky it all went perfectly.”

I expected my plan to work. I planned everything according to what my older sister would do if she were the one we were fighting…

…but planning something doesn’t mean everything will go as planned.

“Mooooooohahahaha! Vic-to-ry! Vic-to-ry! Moooooooo!”

“Eat this, you fake pyromancer! You were beaten by me, the actual best pyromancer in DMA. I’m better than you, and you’re dead! Hahaha!”

As Warpoke, Navigator, and Calaban talk with me, my two team members, Moo and Muribelle, start to make what you could call a ‘victory dance’. A very weird one.

Moo swings his axe around, taking classical and proven poses to show off.

Muribelle makes obscene gestures in the direction of Targaroth’s corpse.

If he hadn’t fallen into the lava, I’m sure they would be doing something similar but right on top of his corpse. You know, the ‘mutilate the cadaver’ type of things players do in online games.

Meanwhile, Thunder Thighs observes them with a mysterious smile on her face.

Soon, the lava waterfall dries up and the lava stops pouring into the cave. The rising lava, whose level was about to flood the whole cave, stops rising before it goes back to the original level. Then it slowly drains out.

The cave returns to what I can only assume to be its original aspect, right before Targaroth turned it into his Domain. Just his throne remains where he created it.

We can now clearly see the carved paths for the carriage highway, connecting several of the main paths traversing this enormous labyrinth together.

This cave was a strategic point connecting some of the most important paths in this Mystery Event. Now that we’ve defeated the Calamity protecting this place, all players will have an easier time moving around.

The cave starts to cool down, returning to the same temperature as the rest of the tunnels.

“Nooooooooooo!”

It’s then that we hear a banshee-like scream coming from above. Surprised, we all turn our heads at the same time.

“...a ghost?” Someone says.

“It can’t be we’re under attack, right?” Warpoke asks me.

I don’t know. Don’t ask me! “...” I stay silent.

“Nooooooooooo!” The scream sounds closer than before. “Aaaaaaaaah! This is so unfaaaaair! Kyaaah!

“Ah, this is…” It must be, right?

We can finally see the owner of those shouts. It’s a tiny and winged creature. “Fucking Calamity! It’s all your fault! The Great Fairy Explorer was going to make a big discovery, but you messed it all with your stupid lava! Kyaaaaaah!”

Please, allow me to rectify my words…

The thing coming our way is a flat-chested and annoying winged creature. She flies from above, near the place where the lava waterfall was, with an angry look on her face.

Ah, so this is where Balmy was. I was starting to get worried that she had run away before healing us first…

“What’s going on with you now? Why did you suddenly disappear? Where the heck were you?” I question.

“Huh?” She tilts her head, trying to look cute, but to me, she just looks dumb. “Ehehe, I’m sorry. I was… Do you remember early on, when I investigated the cave? I found a chest, but suddenly the lava washed me away, and couldn’t go back there until now that the lava flow has stopped.”

She nods to herself before continuing. Everyone looks at her with dumbfounded looks.

“I was trying to monopolize the contents now that the lava is gone, but…” Hey, hey! You aren’t even trying to fool us! “...but the chest has melted away! Buaaah, my precious treasure, gone! This is so unfair! It’s all his fault!”

Crying, she flies to the corpse of Targaroth, which emerged when the lava level fell, and starts punching it.

“Die! Dieeeeeeeee!”

I remember there was a time when I was worried about her well-being. It was a time she was submerged in lava and stunned for ten seconds… Well, I’m not worried anymore.

“I see you’re fine,” I say, walking closer. “When you’re done with… with whatever you’re doing, would you mind healing us? If a group of players or monsters attacks us right now, we’re going to die.”

She turns to look at me, and then, with a stupid expression, she says. “...huh? What’s that?” She points at me.

Looking stupid and asking weird questions is common for her, so I don’t pay special attention. But when I follow her finger, I realize there’s indeed something unusual going on: there’s a glow coming from my pocket.

I take out the other item we obtained in that dwarf’s secret hideout from my pocket, which is glowing with a tenue golden light. And when I do, it flies away. It slowly moves, hovering in the air, towards the corpse of Targaroth.

“Oh my god, oh my god!” I’m as excited as a child. “It’s going to evolve!”

No, wait. This is from another game I believe…

Anyway. The small white orb, emitting a tenue golden glow, approaches the corpse of the Calamity, and then, like all the monsters we’ve seen so far, its body starts to disintegrate into black particles. The black particles then fly upwards in a spiral and get sucked into the white orb.

When all the black particles are gone, the orb shines in a golden flash. When the light disappears, a new window appears in front of me.

Tears of a Fallen Kingdom All Calamities within 30 meters have their stats reduced by 50%. This item will break if it takes damage.

“Fufufu! Hahaha! With this…! With this, I’m unstoppable! Fear me, pro players, because I’m coming for you! Fufufu! Hahaha!”

I take my amazing laughing pose as usual and start channeling lightning.

This item will make everything so easy from now on! A 50% reduction is HUGE! It’ll bring them down to our level, which means we’ll have a chance to fight them on equal ground.

…As long as we stay together as a team, of course.

Calaban gets close to me and asks nobody in particular. “Um… Is he okay?”

“...No.” Balmy shakes her head. “He was never okay.”

Shut up, Balmy! You’re the last one I want to hear this from!

image [https://i.imgur.com/ZGSK4Pl.png]

“The thing I like the most in DMA? It’s the sheer variety of skills you can choose from. There are so many. The builds you can create are almost infinite!

Let’s use a pyromancer as an example. Do you want to focus on area damage or single-target? Maybe a bit of both? Will you self-harm with your skills to increase your damage output, or would you go the opposite way and reduce the damage you deal to yourself while attacking everyone close to you? Heal when you burn your enemies? Sacrifice accuracy to boost your firepower? Perhaps, you want your damage to scale up as your fight goes on; or the contrary, and quickly burn out in a big explosion? Or do you like rituals and like to prepare and plan everything to incinerate your enemies with a single attack?

You can do all that and more! And that’s just talking about a single type of mage.”

- Excerpt of an interview with a random DMA player.