[You have dealt 62 damage to Blazing Barrier Lvl. 2.]

Hao Ling was surprised by the notification she received.

'A shield?' she thought. 'What just happened?'

Based on what she declared before casting her spell, the party members understood that they were to fight with the intent to eliminate the target. As soon as her spell connected, the rest of the members, except the tanks, launched their attacks.

Pinning Shot!

Power Shot!

Double Shot!

Lightning Bolt!

Fireball!

As soon as they saw the identical message on their status window, they were all equally surprised at what they saw.

But the confusion was only momentary.

"It's an elemental shield!" said the other Elemental Mage, Xing Li. "He must've used a scroll!"

While the attacks from the ranged classes were pouring into the man's location, the two melee fighters, Ming Jian and Bai Jianghong, charged ahead and closed in on the target. Their goal is to overwhelm and corner him physically while the ranged class attacks him from a distance. Whatever shield the man used, it surely wouldn't hold for long under such an intense attack from multiple sources.

However, just as they were about to close in on him, he disappeared a second before the fiery shield was destroyed by the concentrated ranged attacks.

"Watch out!" warned Ming Jian, the dagger-wielding scout. "He used a stealth skill. He's approaching you, Bai Jianghong!"

As one of the top scouts in the Excavation Team, Ming Jian has an innate trait that allows him to detect the approximate location of targets within his vicinity. However, his warning came a second too late.

"How far away is he!?" the Spear Warrior, Bai Jianghong yelped in confusion. "Where i-ARGH!"

The man they were looking for appeared on the Spear Warrior's left side and delivered multiple slashes too fast to count. It was so quick that Bai Jianghong couldn't even react.

The next thing they knew, there was a message on their status windows.

[Bai Jianghong, Spear Warrior Lvl. 68 has died.]

Just as the message flashed on their screen, something erupted from the feet of the ranged and magic dealers. Intense flames rose from the ground up and engulfed several party members at once.

Only the ranged scout, Sun Chao, could react in time and dodge out of the erupting flames.

Meanwhile, right after casting a spell, their target vanished again. He was barely visible for one second and now they don't know where he is again.

Then, the status window once again flashed showing the party members claimed by the massive wall made of fire.

[Chang Yichen, Cleric Lvl. 70 has died.]

[Xing Li, Elemental Mage Lvl. 69 has died.]

[Xu Liang, Hunter Archer Lvl. 66 has died.]

[Shi Bao, Hunter Archer Lvl. 65 has died.]

Within just a few seconds after the fight started, 5 out of 10 of her party members died.

The sudden appearance of flame beneath their feet is one thing, but it so happened that the flames targeted the members with the lowest HP of the party. It was a devastating attack that immediately reduced their number in half.

At this point, the tanks closed in on their captain to protect her from the vanishing opponent. Unfortunately, Hao Ling herself cannot make a move as most of her attacks are AoE in nature and they can't get a fix on the location of their target.

"What's happening!?" screamed Hao Ling. "Scouts, tell me where he is!"

Before either of the scouts could respond, their opponent appeared out of thin again once again.

And just as he did, a small red-hot orb left his fingertips and flew straight at Ming Jian. Then, not even a second later, there was another small orb aimed at him again dealing a surprising amount of damage. Finally, their opponent aimed a flaming bolt that hit him with such force that it threw him back several feet. They didn't need a status window message to know what happened.

[Scout Ming Jian Lvl. 70 has died.]

This happened 2 seconds flat.

Before the bow-wielding scout, Sun Chao, could either answer his captain's question or react to the death of his fellow scout, a fireball struck him squarely in the face. The poor archer caught fire and died a few seconds afterward due to the lingering flames.

[Scout Sun Chao Lvl. 69 has died.]

Within a span of 3 seconds total, both of the scouts perished, and the man who eliminated them once again disappeared from their sight.

Now, only the two tanks and Hao Ling herself are left standing.

"Dammit!" screamed Hao Ling in frustration. "What the fuck is happening? Wasn't he an assassin?"

Based on the man's equipment, they all assumed he was an assassin. So none of them expected to be suddenly dealing with several high-level missle-type and AoE spells.

Hao Ling couldn't even cast a spell to counter the man's spells due to how quickly the man appeared and disappeared. In the few instances that he appeared, he dealt immense damage costing her 7 of her party members.

"Where are you?" she roared in anger. "Show yourself!"

Now that she lost both scouts, she and the remaining Shield Warriors had no way to pinpoint the man's location.

"This was a poorly handled fight, Captain," the man's voice softly responded, not revealing where he was. "Flame Pillars!"

Five pillars of fire erupted around the remaining three members of the Hao-Wei team. Thinking that the pillars were conjured to limit their maneuverability, the tanks stood their ground and activated their defense-boosting skills to ensure that they could protect their captain.

To the surprise of the tanks, the pillars started converging right where they were standing!

Hao Ling herself didn't panic. She cast her most versatile spell which can act both as an AoE and a defensive spell.

Ring of Fire!

Yellow flames started to form around the Hao-Wei team as if it were a weird hula hoop. Then, just as it was deployed, the Ring of Fire started to expand away from them. At the same time, the Flame Pillars closed in on them.

The five pillars of flame collided with the yellow-colored ring of fire.

Crrrrrrrzzzz! Crrrrrrrzzzz! Crrrrrrrzzzz!

The clash between two opposing fire spells was intense, yet brief.

Unfortunately for Hao Ling, the enemy's Flame Pillars prevailed and she as well as the two Shield Warriors were subsequently engulfed by the enemy's spell.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The first to perish was Hao Ling herself due to her low HP, followed swiftly by the two tanks. In the split second before Hao Ling's HP dropped to zero, she realized that not a single one of them had a chance to inflict even one point of damage on their enemy.

'We only destroyed his shield!' she thought in frustration. 'What a humiliating defeat!'

***

In one of the tallest skyscrapers in Manhattan, the defeated Hao-Wei team members one by one woke up from their DreamWave Capsules.

Upon leaving their capsules, they all put robes over their bodies to cover themselves up. While the special suit that they wear while inside the pod covers their bodies well enough, its fabric is too thin that the private curves and details of their bodies can be seen if one were to take a closer look. It's more like a cross between body paint and a form-fitting handkerchief suit.

As they covered themselves up, their faces had various shades of surprise, confusion, disappointment, humiliation, and defeat. Nobody spoke, their minds too busy to process what just happened to them. One moment, they were fighting. And then the next, they died.

What made it worse is that they were defeated by a single person.

Their thoughts were occupied with what happened when they heard a scream in the private room nearby- the room where their captain's pod was.

It is obvious what happened- she too had been killed by their opponent and was awakened from her pod.

While the team's feeling of defeat is palpable. Their captain's current emotion wasn't that of defeat but of anger.

Not even bothering to put on a robe, she immediately stormed out of her room to where the rest of her slain team were.

"What happened!?" she demanded. "How did we get defeated by a single person!? If word of this gets out, Hao-Wei loses prestige!"

Nobody answered her. Nobody could.

They all just looked down on their toes, too embarrassed to say anything. Either that or they were trying to avert their gaze at their captain while her near-exposed body was uncovered. Only Chang Yichen dared approach Hao Ling, but only to give her a robe; he too wasn't able to provide an answer.

Seeing a none of them were planning to speak, she slipped on the robe given to her and issued an order.

"Let's review our pod's recordings," ordered Hao Ling, her anger still barely concealed."We need to know what just happened to us."

"And then, wake up a member in each of the teams we had spread out all over the catacombs," she continued. "Have them gather at our last location and attack that man all at once."

***

Back in the clearing, Adam stood victorious against his first skirmish against another player. Or rather, a group of players.

'They seem to be the mid to low-ranked members of Hao-Wei,' observed Adam. 'But they're not particularly good and their teamwork leaves much to be desired.'

Adam himself is surprised his strategy worked to such an extent.

As soon as Hao Ling hurled the Fire Javelin at him, he cast his Blazing Barrier to protect himself.

While the rest of her party members attacked from range, he retrieved and drank a Haste Potion from his spatial ring. Then, in quick succession, he activated Fire Aura and Blazing Will, retrieved an Invisibility Potion, and drank it. Fire Aura gave his fire spells a boost in damage while Blazing Will and Haste Potion increased his movement speed.

It was then that from the perspective of Hao-Wei, he disappeared right before his Blazing Barrier dissipated.

While invisible and under the influence of Haste Potion, he dashed toward the Spear Warrior and made quick work of him. Adam can swing his longsword three times per second under Blazing Will, there is no need to mention how fast he can swing a dagger under the effects of it, especially while also under Haste Potion.

The Spear Warrior didn't even have a chance to find out how many times he was slashed by Adam's Sacrificial Dagger.

Of course, this 1-second attack broke the invisibility effect so just as his body became visible, he took advantage and immediately cast Wall of Fire where the ranged dealers were. And as soon as he was done casting Wall of Fire, he retrieved another Invisibility Potion from his inventory and immediately chugged it, thereby making him invisible once again.

He then moved to a different position to ensure the scouts couldn't mark his location.

To his surprise, the formation of the Hao-Wei team was so ineffective with the current situation that a single spell took out over 4 members. Additionally, the tanks were too passive during the exchange and it was clear that they were ordered to protect certain individuals on the team rather than work alongside the team as a unit.

They acted more like passive bodyguards than a tank working cohesively with a team. As far as Adam is concerned, he was fighting eight Hao-Wei members with one of them having two useless bodyguards.

It was at this point that Hao Ling demanded her scouts to tell her where Adam was. But to Adam, it sounded more like a panic reaction rather than a composed leader asking for information in order to properly mount a response.

Adam decided to eliminate the two scouts.

First, he aimed two Fire Bullets at the melee-equipped scout. Since its cooldown is 0.80 seconds, the effect of Ignition Gloves made it possible to fire a maximum of two times per second. The damage inflicted by the two bullets is decent enough that aside from stunning Ming Jiaan, the scout's health was reduced to such a low point that all it took was a single Firebolt to finish off the job.

Once again, his invisibility was broken- but only for a few seconds.

Perhaps due to a combination of shock and relative inexperience, the archer scout wasn't able to come up with any type of response while his fellow scout died. The archer simply stood there for two seconds without doing anything. Needless to say, Adam took the opportunity. While visible for a second, he hurled a Fireball at the archer.

'Two scouts with slow reaction time,' Adam shook his head in disappointment. 'Too inexperienced.'

As the Fireball made quick work of the second, and last, scout of the team, he drank yet another invisibility potion to completely neutralize the minimal threat the two tanks and one elemental mage could present to him.

After that, the Flame Pillars made quick work of them. The enemy's captain was so overwhelmed by Adam's firepower that she didn't even know that it wasn't the flame that killed her; Adam threw the Sacrificial Dagger at her a split-second after the Flame Pillars engulfed her.

With the entire Hao-Wei team eliminated, he turned his attention to the workers who couldn't believe their eyes at what just happened.

None of them even had the time to process the outcome. One moment, their employer was bullying a lone player, and then the next, they were all killed.

Fortunately, they will still be paid if they were killed so they're not at all too worried. They were just waiting for the man to kill them when suddenly, the man spoke to them in a rather friendly way.

"Well, there's that," said the man casually, as if dispatching 10 pro players was nothing. "Gentlemen, how would you like to make some extra money?"

***

"Okay, just keep digging in that area," said Adam. "Most of the beasts I'm looking for were buried in that spot."

After a quick discussion with the workers, he offered them extra payment if they were to do some work for him for the next few hours.

As grunt workers, they all have set up their bronze-level account to enable a quick and secure way of getting paid at the Mercury Auction House so Adam and the workers were able to come quickly to an agreement regarding the terms of the contract.

Since the workers are not part of Hao-Wei- most grunt workers are freelancers anyway, they don't owe any allegiance to them. As far as the workers are concerned, this is just another opportunity to essentially get paid double by doing the same job. There was no reason for them to decline.

Their job is simple: dig through the rubble and recover the bodies of the fallen undead- particularly the Crystal Beasts. Then he gave a knife to two of the workers to open up the stomachs of the beasts to check for any precious ore, gems, or metal that they may have in their bodies.

He also gave instruction to keep an eye out for the weapons he left lying around- particularly the Grappling Crossbow. It was lost in the climax of the fight and Adam assumed it was buried somewhere in the rubble. If he had it, he could use it to climb up the hole above the clearing and directly explore the Inner Catacombs.

Despite being level 1 players, it is clear the workers are highly experienced at doing this kind of work- most likely from previous VR games.

Adam gave them a few bottles of stamina-replenishing and fatigue-removing potions to ensure they were performing as best as they could. As level 1 players, their limit to drinking potions is severely limited but thanks to Adam's well-crafted potions, they can drink at least 3 bottles before they suffer adverse effects.

Ding!

[You have gained a Small Lump of Iron Ore.]

[You have gained a Small Lump of Silver Ore.]

[You have gained a Small Lump of Obsidian Ore.]

[You have gained a Small Lump of...]

[You have gained a Medium Lump of...]

[You have gained a Large Lump of...]

Most of the Crystal Beasts recovered so far had various lumps of iron ores in their stomach. There are the occasional rare types of ore such as Silver, Obsidian, Darkstone, Lightstone, and Titanium, among others. Surprisingly, there are also a few special gems that Adam reckons can be used to infuse certain properties on weapons and armor he will craft.

However, the majority of the loot he has so far is Iron Ore.

In hindsight, the Lich killing and turning them to his minions ensured that the bodies of the Crystal Beasts didn't digest whatever they ate last.

This is good news for Adam as he is certain that Vetius' Dagger requires Iron Ore. He has some experience with the smelting process so he can make an educated guess as to how much ore he currently has. With the accumulated ores so far, he estimates that once smelted, he should have enough ores to try and craft Vetius' Dagger at least 20 times.

As for the other types of ore, he can them save for now and wait until he reaches a higher rank in Blacksmithing. Other than crafting standard weapons, Adam is not confident at crafting equipment using ores with magical or elemental properties- especially since he has yet to even attempt any blacksmithing.

'I really need to continue this Blacksmithing quest,' thought Adam. 'I've postponed it for long enough.'

This is what was going through Adam's mind when he sensed another movement above the clearing. But unlike earlier, it didn't sound like players. This time, they are undead. He then remembered that his new cloak had the Necrotic Allure and staying in one location for so long inevitably drew the undead to his location.

"Boys!," he announced to his hard-working employees. "There's an enemy about to jump down. Stay away from the hole!"

It is clear that the workers are not new to this kind of scenario or command as they swiftly obeyed his instructions. They moved away as told and looked for another spot to continue work on.

Seconds later, several Skeleton Soldiers, Archers, Mages, Ghouls, Zombies, and Undead Warriors jumped down from the hole above.

Adam didn't have much of an opportunity to use his Sacrificial Dagger during the skirmish with Hao-Wei so he smiled at the prospect of being able to use it on several enemies.

"Boys, keep doing what you do," said Adam to his workers. "I'll take care of this."