“How?” Brand demanded.

“What?” I asked.

“How did a rare Scale player manage to solo an epic Scale boss without taking any damage?” Brand pressed.

“Oh, I took so much damage. They just kept coming, and I just kept killing them. Beating them to death with my fists kept working, so I just kept doing that, then I healed” I admitted.

“I don’t buy it,” Brand said. “You would have had to have dealt roughly a quarter of a million points of damage in just over ten minutes. That is not Rare Scale damage output.”

“Brand you need to understand. I’m mean, I’m mean, I’m mean, you know what I mean?” I said the last bit in a sing-song voice.

Brand turned to Angelica, “He must have missed something,” his head went on a swivel, “There has to be something else in here. Something with stealth skills.”

Angelica took that claim extremely seriously. Then again, the idea of something that could hand out two-hundred and fifty thousand points of damage in minutes, and could do so in a way that avoided detection was…

Nope, no skill check required. I still wouldn’t want to face something like that though. I knew that I had factually bludgeoned all of these cats to death, which probably helped keep me from going down a paranoid path.

While Angelica and Brand kept glancing about, I examined the mound of corpses. Most of them were Uncommon Scale. But almost thirty were epic. I looted them and received another message:

Inventory 99.2% full. recommend sorting and removal of least valuable items.

I looked through my inventory and saw I had collected a truly ludicrous number of bodies of snow lions. After selecting the option to break down corpses. That took me from having 99.2% full inventory to 92.3% full inventory. I then checked the values of my items. The most valuable item was the Epic Scale hearts, then the epic Scale pelts, then the epic Scale meat, then the epic Scale claws, then the epic Scale fangs, then the epic Scale blood, then the epic Scale guts. This was repeated for the rare Scale material and the uncommon Scale as well.

Demonstrating my complete inability to read the room I dumped all the common Scale meat, blood, and guts. While this improved my inventory’s storage to 38% full, it also produced a significant mound of gore from seemingly nowhere.

Angelica almost charged the mess. Taking two steps toward it, before stopping short.

Brand looked at me in complete disbelief, “Mate, are you… sorting through inventory, while in the field?”

“It was almost full,” I responded almost lamely.

When Angelica spoke, it was in a tone of forced calm, “Doug, you need to focus. We are in danger. Brand and I are relying on you. Do you understand?”

I didn’t need the prompt from the successful empathy check to realize I was being a shitty team member. Looking at it from the outside for a moment. I was looking foolish and unreliable in a high-stakes situation that required complete coordination from all of us. This was piling more stress on my allies and causing distraction.

“Sorry, I don’t think anything with stealth skills is around. I should have said something before digging into the menu screen though. It won’t happen again.”

“Let’s take a moment,” Brand stepped in. “Doug has just been through something awful. I admit I didn’t believe he could tank. He can, but anyone would be pushed to their limits after this.” He paused for a moment, “Maybe we should turn around for today. Go for a better run tomorrow. The boss and the key will still be there.”

Angelica looked from Brand to me.

I shrugged, “If we are basing this decision on me, and whether I can keep taking damage, I think we should keep going. Are you able to keep going?”

“I’m good,” Angelica answered. “Brand, you good”

He unapologetically used some sort of evaluation skill on us. “Okay let’s keep going.”

Another mostly empty room followed. The only thing of note was the massive doors. Each was roughly 3 times my height and about twice the width of my shoulders. The left-hand door had a carving of three people that looked similar to us. The right-hand door had a rather crude carving of a lion’s paw prints.

We sort of stood by the door for a few moments.

“Should I open the door,” I asked.

“…yeah,” Angelica said.

I opened the door.

Heroic Boss White Shadow spawned

Arena sealed. Fight well

The wind picked up and snow flared. Suddenly the room was blurred by the swirling snow. I could see Brand and the shadow of Angelica through the icy haze.

Attack from White Shadow successful

You take 17 points of damage

2x sneak attack bonus 34 total

You are now bleeding

Titanic Regeneration plus 12 hit points

HP: 218/240

I didn’t see it coming at all. While my regen would of course restore me, I had no defense for that. A few seconds later it hit me again. Shortly after that, it hit me again. This had us in a sort of stalemate of sorts. Yeah, this thing was taking chunks out of me, and it hit hard, but it was slow and methodical.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

“I can’t see it!” Brand said.

This White Shadow hit me again. Angelica, charged. The explosion of thunder parted the blizzard. While her attack missed, it partially cleared the storm for a brief instant. In the moments of marginally clearer weather, we could see a slinking cat covered in gray fur that seemed to blend with the rock and snow almost perfectly. Brand managed to clip the damned thing, by the time I reached it the storm closed in again. My fist slammed into a rock. I am amazed I didn’t break every joint in my hand. The rock cracking was also surprising.

We tried this again, but the next three charges Angelica made revealed no sneaky kitty. It also hit me exclusively another five times. I suspect it focused on me because I read as having the lowest level. Couple that with the fact it was doing appreciable damage the thing probably believed it was making headway against us.

The moment I thought we could eventually grind through this, it hit Brand instead. His health went from green to yellow. Despite the savagery of the attack, Brand all but single-handedly turned the tide. His blood splattered the beast. As it tried to retreat into the snow, Brand flung something to where it was going. A split second later I learned it was a fucking incendiary grenade. With a flash of fire the damn cat had its fur burnt black.

Angelica hit it like a train. She slammed the spear into its side. Between the force of the impact, Angelica’s strength, and the thunder and lightning the cat was flung into the wall. Because the De Leon pain train don’t got brakes, she hit it again and again.

Attack from White Shadow (B) successful

You take 22 points of damage

2x sneak attack bonus 44 total

You are now bleeding

Titanic Regeneration plus 12 hit points

HP: 208/240

That was when the second cat hit me. More upsetting still was a third cat bearing down on Brand. The big cat had locked its jaw on his leg and was shaking him. Brand, screaming in pain and rage, kicked it with his free leg, while also shooting it. His health kept creeping down though.

I did what I needed to do. I grabbed the cat by the neck and pulled it off of him. The trouble was this caused two of the cats to turn on me at once. One hit me out of ambush. The other just turned and mauled me.

Attack from White Shadow (B) successful

You take 14 points of damage

2x sneak attack bonus 28 total

Attack from White Shadow (C) successful x2

You take 27 points of damage

Titanic Regeneration plus 12 hit points

HP: 167/240

This resulted in what I will refer to as a bad time. I was not able to block the attacks of these lions. They were not getting the multiplier for sneak attacks, but they just tore into me as fast as they could. This got unsustainable immediately. Without communicating in any way, Angelica, Brand, and I adopted the same strategy of ‘Get ‘em!’ In a flurry of gore, we killed the White Shadow (B). Then we turned to White Shadow (C). It again didn’t act like an actual animal despite being injured, outnumbered and an ambush predator, it attacked in a mindless frenzy. While this was absolutely the best way to kill me, it all but guaranteed it would die.

It managed to pin me to the ground and lunged to bite my throat. A bomb of images and memories of the Alpha Snow Loin trying to do the same flashed through my brain. Everything went black for a second

[Flag] Delete Message

Attack from White Shadow (c) successful x2

You take 38 points of damage

HP 0/240

Titanic Regeneration suspended

You have died.

Prepare to be sent to an afterlife scenario

5…4…3…

All processes halted!

Retcon begins in

5…4…3…2…1…

Everything came back all at once. Angelica impaled the final White Shadow’s head with her spear. The cat’s eyes rolled as blood flowed out of its slack jaws. Brand shot it four times.

New achievement!

Heroic opponent!

You have defeated an opponent of Heroic Scale!

Reward: 1500 experience

1500 experience to next level

You gain no experience for snow lion type enemies.

I closed out the prompt to see that my HP was 51. That meant that my hp was likely 3 to 27 hit points. I had been a second from death. Holy shit. …wait no. That wasn’t right. Something felt off. I checked my prompts. The retcon message was gone. Had I died?

When did I get on my feet?

Angelica was shaking me. “Doug! Can you hear me?”

“Yeah,” I started.

Before I could continue, she pulled me into a tight hug. “Too close. That was too close!”

“I have the key,” Brand said, holding up a large skeleton key. “Let’s loot the boss and get back to the safe zone.”

A lot could be said about Brand, but you cannot fault his survival sense.

Loot boss? Yes/No

I hit yes.

You have acquired

Tighty-Whities

You have acquired White Shadow corpse x 3

I waited until we made the short walk from the boss room to the safe space. Just like a videogame, this area led to a path that looped back to the start of the slog. We just had to pull a lever and part of the wall sank into the floor letting us through.

Tight- Whities

A heroic Scale pair of undergarments. This item will allow access to blend in, move silently, and ambush skills. Hehehe they’ll never see you coming in these.

Armor value 8

I blinked. Is Adora writing prompts again? Admittedly this was better than the current free-balling situation I was maintaining. Not sure if the skills were good or bad. I also had to wonder whether they would fit my build.

As we sat at the table Brand pulled out a pack of cigarettes. He slowly pulled one out and put it in the corner of his mouth. He offered me the pack. I shook my head. Angelica thought much longer than me but also said no. He then pulled out a lighter and ignited the tip. He sat there watching the smoke for a moment then inhaled and exhaled.

“What have we learned?” he asked.

“What?” I asked.

Brand sighed, “Have you never been on a team before?”

“Not for many years,” I hedged

“After any mission, it is customary to review what was done. Determine what was done right, and what needs improvement to prevent any sort of tragedy in the future.” Brand explained. He took another puff from the cigarette.

“Traps are a thing,” Angelica said counting off on her finger. “The mini-bosses are heroic Scale. That would imply the boss is likely Demigod Scale. Were you able to get any information from them?”

“The one White Shadow I was able to size up was level 25. I suspect the other two were the same level.” Brand said.

“Everyone hit about as hard as the next,” I added.

Brand nodded, “Anything else?”

I shrugged.

Brand sighed. “We will have time to think. I suspect It will take me more than a day to heal. That reminds me. Based on our previous altercation, we can assume this is not a safe zone. Violence is possible. I suspect it is simply a place the lions cannot spawn. I recommend we rest in shifts. Do either of you mind if I sleep first?”

“Go ahead,” I said.

Angelica nodded. Brand swapped his equipment from tactical gear to pajamas, nightgown, and cap. He flopped on a bed and immediately passed out.

Angelica turned back to me. She took a deep breath, and clenched and unclenched her fists, “you wanna talk about it, buddy?”