*DING*
You have entered Castle Bran - Courtyard
Maria was a little surprised to see that the castle was actually a dungeon. It was quite a surprise but if it was like this then there was definitely a boss room and in that room was where they would find the Blood Lord.
“Alright, everyone. Let’s get this over with,” Maria said as she flew up and sat down on Orh’bankhur’s shoulder.
“Let’s go.”
“We go!”
Orh’bankhur began walking forward through the castle’s courtyard when a few Vampire Knights began spawning in front of them. The way the vampires spawned was reminiscent of how monsters spawned inside instance dungeons.
“...So it’s a hybrid dungeon, huh?”
These dungeons were a mix of regular field-type dungeons and instance dungeons. Hybrid dungeons were a bit annoying to deal with since monsters could spawn indefinitely inside them while also having the tricky clear conditions like in instance dungeons.
Dungeons like these didn’t have a time limit, but they might as well have it because if the players attacking the dungeons didn’t clear it before too many enemies spawned, then it would be a failure once they were overwhelmed by the monsters’ numbers.
Coupled with the ‘un-reset-able’ nature of a field dungeon, players could actually go about the rest of their lives playing this game not being able to clear a particular hybrid dungeon until they were at a level that could completely disregard the dungeons’ level and quantity of monsters.
Maria’s never challenged this kind of dungeon before and she only heard rumors about its dread through the online forums. She had yet experienced it for herself so she couldn’t wait to see how things turned out.
Unfortunately for her, however, she was going to be greatly disappointed. When the Vampire Knights registered Maria and her party as the enemies, they all began rushing towards her in perfect formation and prepared to attack with their skills. It was a rather grand display but it was soon broken by Ash and Carmilla who had stepped forward and blasted them away with their Blood Arts.
“Eh?”
“My Queen, let us take care of this rabble.”
“Your Highness, we shall deal with them.”
Ash and Carmilla respectively said before they rushed forward and began decimating the Vampire Knights. Alexa and Raijuu also began to participate in the fight so no matter how many Vampire Knights spawned in the courtyard, their numbers would be kept at a minimum.
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Eventually, they managed to kill every enemy in the courtyard which temporarily stopped the Vampires Knights from spawning while they were still attacking the dungeon. The monsters would only start spawning again if they cleared or left the dungeon and rechallenged or reentered it. If they left even a single monster alive, the Vampire Knights would have continued spawning even after they left the courtyard area.
It was thanks to this tricky mechanic that players needed to completely clear the first area of the hybrid dungeon they were attacking before they could move forward. If they let the monsters continue to spawn in the first area while they went to clear the rest of the dungeon, they’d have to deal with all of those spawned monsters if they wanted to exit and clear the dungeon. There was no automatic-teleport function upon defeating a hybrid dungeon’s boss monster. The players needed to manually exit the dungeon on foot before their dungeon run was considered complete.
If they left using a teleport scroll or died by a monster, then the dungeon run would be a failure, and the next time they went to attack it again, they’d need to face all of the monsters that had spawned in the first area thanks to their negligence.
Without clearing all of the monsters in the first area and putting a stop to their spawning, entering, or exiting the dungeon was going to be difficult because of the monster wave. Unless, of course, you had absolute power then it didn’t matter how many monsters you faced. Maria was looking forward to seeing this rumored Monster Wave but her subordinates just killed every monster before she could even say anything and stopped the spawning.
“Aw, come on…”
Her 4 subordinates returned to her side and Raijuu calmly stated, “Master, we’re done.”
“...Let’s continue. Tsk, I was looking forward to the wave.”
Maria mumbled the last part of her sentence so no one heard her except for Bankhur who only tilted his head and looked stupidly at her. She and her group had cleared the Courtyard but moving to the next area wasn’t so easy. She needed to find some kind of key to enter the Main Hall but after looting all of the Vampire Knight corpses, she didn’t find the key anywhere.
While they were looting, Maria had tasked her 4 subordinates to look for the key but they couldn’t find anything. Just as she looted the final corpse a gate suddenly appeared and out walked another vampire. This vampire was exuding a heavier aura than the previous rabble and Carmilla spoke up as she recognized the vampire immediately.
“It’s the Blood Knight Order’s General, Marquis Mercy Brown.”
The vampire was wearing a full-plate suit of armor and was wielding a unique-looking lance. Ash didn’t recognize this vampire because his face was covered but after hearing what Carmilla said, he immediately knew who this person was.
“...I previously knew this one as Count Mercy Brown…looks like becoming the Blood Lord’s most elite forces’ General promoted his rank, huh?” Ash said with a cold, murderous look on his face.
He wasn’t going to forget this person. He was one of the Vampire Nobles that helped Siegfried waylay his lands after he was caught in the bastard’s ploy. Mercy Brown led troops to burn down villages and towns in his area, resulting in the many massacres of his citizens. From what Maria saw, this Mercy Brown was [Castle Bran - Courtyard]’s boss. The key to the next area must be with him.
“My Queen, let me–”
Ash’s words were interrupted as Orh’bankhur stepped forward and roared, “Me want fight! Me want fight enemy General!”
Maria jumped off Orh’bankhur’s shoulder and landed on the ground before she turned to ash and said, “You heard him, Ash, let Orh’bankhur fight this one. You should preserve your strength since you have an enemy to kill later, remember?”
“Yes, my Queen.”
“No need to get too greedy. He’s your enemy, I know that, but you have bigger fish to fry so just sit back and relax for a bit. Let Orh’bankhur take care of him.”
“As you wish, my Queen,” Ash said with a bow.
Maria was excited to watch this battle unfold so she flew up and found a good place to sit down before waiting patiently for the battle to start. Orh’bankhur versus Mercy Brown. This was going to be a fight between the two enemy Generals from the Dire and the Blood Faction.
It didn’t have to be a one versus one but Maria was curious to see which of the two would be triumphant at the end–her nation's General or the enemy faction's general. They were both boss-level monsters so this was going to be interesting to see. Once everybody else was adequately far away from the battlefield, Orh'bankhur banged his large ax and hammer together before rushing towards his opponent with a battle roar.