We hide under the giant mushroom’s cap, waiting for the monster to pass by. The mushrooms in this cave aren’t just big but also numerous. Their sizes vary from big enough to hide under to larger than any tree I’ve seen in real life.
“Sshh! Don’t make any noise.”
I roll my eyes. “I know. And don’t talk as if you were the expert here. I’m the one who wanted to come, not you.”
Hello? Do I need to remind you of your own words? I had to promise to treat you to ice cream to convince you to come, and now you’re acting like you know everything? Is your head empty, or it’s just that you have memory problems?
The giant turtle slowly walks forward. Peeking from below the mushroom’s cap, I watch as it moves its thick legs. Luckily for us, the turtle isn’t very smart, and its height makes it impossible to see below the mushroom we’re hiding.
Now that it’s closer, I observe the turtle’s shell. It’s thicker than my fist and looks incredibly sturdy. If this were real life, would the turtle’s shell resist anti-armored shells? It sure feels like so.
We hold our breaths. When we first saw the turtles we thought they were a joke. Too slow to catch us, and too dumb to find us. That was until we made a mistake that revealed our position, and several turtles fired their light beams at us from all around the cave system.
We almost got evaporated!
It was fun and exciting. With weak units as Champions, it’s very risky to face strong enemies or those that can team up against us. But it doesn’t matter because we aren’t here for a long time… We’re here for a great one!
Using smarts and skill rather than brawn, manipulating the battlefield to our favor, and engaging when victory is assured. We never know when we’ll succeed or fail, but we’re happy to risk everything for honor and glory!
Thrill seekers, that’s what they call us.
*Hihihi! Huhuhu!*
Oh, no! Not them again! The last time they showed up, it was when the turtles found us…!
Natalia and I turn around at the same time, trying to locate where those laughing noises come from. Why couldn’t they wait a bit longer? The turtle that was passing right before us is still nearby. If a battle starts, it’ll notice us and the others will join the assault.
We find the culprit hiding behind a nearby rock. Its two heads are observing us, grins on their faces, and the bow on their hands, ready to shoot.
Two-headed monsters always give me the creeps… I don’t know why, there’s no reason for it, but they do. Although it isn’t as awful as the slimes that always aim to eat me whole.
I hide behind Natalia before it can soot.
“Hey! Don’t use me as cover!”
“Shht!” Wasn’t it you who told me to stay silent? Follow your own advice, Natalia.
With the sound of the bowstring being released, the arrow strikes my comrade. I knew she would be useful as a cover.
“Ugh… you little…!”
I’m not sure if she’s angry at me or the monster. Probably both. Anyway, I urge her to stay quiet. “Shht!”
I observe the turtle’s movements. It must have noticed something because it has stopped moving away and is instead coming back to where we are.
Think, me, think! We can’t start a fight right now! It’s time to run away! But if we run away the two-headed monster will follow us and we’ll be in trouble again… Ah, I know!
“Natalia, follow me,” after casting my spell, I grab Natalia’s hand and drag her with me. “We must run away, right now!”
“U-uah!?” She makes a cute yelp.
We slip through the mushrooms covering the sidepath, using anything at our disposal to hide our presence from the turtle. And then…
“...three, two, one… boom!”
*Fwoosh!*
Fire engulfs the area around the two-headed monster. It’s the Fireball I cast right before turning around. Immediately after, the turtle releases a light beam in that direction, followed by two more light beams from other turtles that we can’t see.
“Haha, I knew it would work,” I chuckle. “Two birds with one stone.”
This is why I love this skill. In my opinion, the most versatile one in the whole game.
Delayed Cast (Active skill) Cost: 30 MP Delay the activation of the next skill you use that requires MP, up to a maximum of 10 seconds from the moment of activation.
Thanks to Delayed Cast, you can achieve so much! It’s perfect to set combos, to confuse the AI and other players, and to kill enemies without revealing your position. Perfect for thrill seekers like us!
Having gotten out of peril for now, Natalia crosses her arms and says with furrowed brows, “…I could have gotten us of that pinch too.”
If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
“I know, I know…” I approach her to hug her. “I know that our stacked shortstack is a good player too...”
Our dwarf player can’t hide her enormous mounds even if she tries to, and given her short height, it makes her figure quite extreme.
Natalia pushes me away. “I don’t want to hear that from you, Mònica!”
“Eeeeh!?” I act surprised, covering my chest. “W-when did you see it? With all the armor I’m wearing it shouldn’t be visible…” I send her a suspicious glance, “...did you spy on me while I was changing?”
She awkwardly looks away, “...I mean in real life, not in the game, you fool.”
Aaaah, I understand. Is that an inferiority complex that I hear? From my best friend, no less?
“Anyway, let’s continue,” I swiftly switch the topic. “There’s much left to do.”
Today’s objective and the reason to come here. A self-imposed challenge that can’t be achieved in all of the dungeons, because there are a lot of them that can only be cleared by fighting bosses.
Today, we’ll beat The Mat Rat’s Lab with weak Champions and without any member dying. A true display of skill and adaptability.
----------------------------------------
Sticking our bodies to the wall, we observe the spectacle outside the tunnel. A secluded valley filled with green grass filled with rabbits. The sun shines from above, and the wind makes the grass swing, bringing a fresh breeze that fills our nostrils. The little critters graze on the grass, skipping here and there.
A peaceful scenery. Or it would be if some of the rabbits didn’t turn into horrifying monsters. You never know when, or which one. The single thing that remains true is that they are hiding between the actual rabbits, and you shouldn’t disturb them.
“Ready?”
I nod, “Ready.”
Natalia makes a pistol shape with her hand and ‘shoots’. “Let’s go!” We start running at her signal.
As soon as we step inside the valley, Natalia turns invisible. I can’t see her, but right now, she should be taking a different path from mine.
She can turn invisible, but the Invisibility skill drains MP at a very high rate. She must take the shortest path to the exit to save as much MP as possible. Meanwhile, I who can’t turn invisible, am acting as bait. Any monster hiding under a rabbit’s skin will be too focused on me to pay attention to Natalia’s footsteps.
Our objective is simple. We must reach the relatively new greenhouse without allowing the rabbits to target us.
To achieve this, we’re sprinting through the field, spending as little time as possible inside this area. While Natalia takes the shortest path, I’ll be taking a detour around the valley because I have a higher speed. And then, I’ll use Leap to escape from any pursuers, landing on the path that leads to the greenhouse.
This way, we’ll reach the end at about the same time, and no enemies should be near us when we open the door to the greenhouse. The last thing we want is to be caught between them and the closed door, or even worse, that they follow us inside the greenhouse.
The best way to deal with the rabbits is simple: don’t deal with them. Don’t get close, and especially, don’t attack them. But at the same time, never lower your guard: you never know where they’ll come from.
Some of the rabbits raise their heads to look at me as I pass by. Their eyes are like dark holes, hiding all the dangers in the world.
“...they’re coming.”
I notice movement behind me. Instead of turning around, I immediately roll to the side before standing up. I do all of this without stopping, like an assassin from a certain video game.
A large shadow flashes through my previous position. An orc with white rabbit ears and a fluffy tail. If I hadn’t avoided the attack, I could have died.
But I’m not safe yet, those orcs are faster than me. Taking advantage of the fact that it lost its target and is momentarily confused, I use Shove to break its momentum, pushing it away from me and widening the distance. This is only temporal. It’ll quickly catch up.
I scan the area around me before suddenly changing the path. “Hmm… there!”
Right before me, there’s one of the rabbits. It quietly observes as I get closer. And then… and then, as I hoped, it starts transforming into something else.
At this rate, I’ll crash into it, so I use Leap before it happens.
I soar to the sky. Still in the middle of its transformation, the monster extends what looks like tentacles in my direction. But then, something running at an even faster speed than me crashes into it and they end in a tangled mess.
“Haha, it worked. Improvised confusion technique achieved! Nin-nin!” I put my hands together and make a pose as I run.
Two more times, a rabbit turns into a monster and attacks me, but I manage to avoid all their attacks and successfully reach the mountainside. I use Leap to reach the path running through it and look below. At this height, the chasing monsters shouldn’t be able to climb.
I continue running towards the greenhouse and reach it just in time to see Natalia becoming visible right in front of me.
She points behind me, “We forgot about the fliers.”
“Fliers…? Ah, right!” When I turn back, I see two Angels with rabbit ears. “I’ll take care of them. You open the door.”
“Alright.” Natalia doesn’t argue as she has spent quite a lot of MP just to reach here and knows I’m capable of keeping them busy by myself.
Hmm. How should I deal with them? If I recall, they liked to grab invaders and drop them from the sky.
In the middle of my thought process, one of them dives at me, confirming my suspicions. “It’s too early for you to try this on me.”
Using Leap, I appear right in front of the monster. Surprised, it can’t react on time, and I use this confusion to elbow it on the head. I then use the monster’s head as a stepping stone to jump back to the ground.
The monster, having lost track of me and momentarily stunned, crashes into the glass wall. *Bam!*
“Ouch, that must’ve hurt…”
I ignore the spasming enemy, slowly trickling down the glass wall like a water droplet, and face the second flying bunny angel. This one, maybe because it has seen what happened to its companion, doesn’t seem to kind on coming at me.
Is it waiting for me to lower my guard? It could be. But I’ll never do it, so it’s a wasted effort.
“Mònica, it’s open!”
Natalia calls for me. Not giving the back to the monster, I walk to the now open door. The monster observes my every move. It is planning to attack when I’m crossing the door and I can’t evade it? It won’t work.
“Natalia, I need a wall.”
“Okay.”
As I reach the door, a solid rock wall rises from the ground, blocking the entrance. It’s Earth Wall, one of Natalia’s skills. In this manner, I safely cross the door and close it from the inside. The monster shouldn’t be able to open it and chase us inside.
“You can release it now,” I say, dusting my hands as if they were dirty. “Alright. We’re inside. We just need to get the card in this place, move to the sealed area to get the other, and we’ll achieve victory.”
Natalia shakes her head. “Please, don’t say ‘just’. We haven’t achieved anything significant yet.”
“Eh? Why not? I’ll say ‘just’ as many times as I want. Just, just, just, just, just…”
“Sigh… I should have asked for two ice creams…”
image [https://i.imgur.com/ZGSK4Pl.png]
“The secret to reaching the pro level? Isn’t it obvious? It’s about the usage of the skills rather than anything else. A pro player must know how to best utilize any skill in their skillset if they want to achieve success. The same skill, utilized by a master or a noob feels completely different.”
- Excerpt of an interview with a high-ranking DMA player.