Vol. 2 - Chapter 24 - Iljnoks Den Raid

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On his way toward the base of Gravelmark, he encountered a pack of Dire Wolfs, of level 20, which started growling at him as he descended the mountain.

“Do you wish to die?”

Asked Mathias after turning his attention to the beasts gazing deeply with his crimson eyes at the Dire Wolves, while his body was giving off an imposing Red Aura which made the wolves cower away.

The wolves could sense that they were no match for Mathias, and retreated quickly to the interior of the mountain, afterward he resumed his journey toward the cave, and as he got closer and closer to the cave, he could hear the sound of people discussing something with a voice of a man being predominant.

“This is the third time we have failed this raid that we found in this mountain after following that Beta User guide from the past.”

“Anjo, we need more people for this raid, otherwise we can’t defeat the bear. You also noticed that after each instance that monster grows in levels and becomes more powerful.” mentioned a girl in a calm voice, which made the same man, called Anjo, reply.

“From where should I get such a high-level player, Vivian? We are high rankers, we need people who are level 20+ otherwise, if we feed that bear with cannon fodder, we will just sabotage ourselves.” 

“I don’t know Anjo, but I am not getting there to get myself killed by the bear just because you are stubborn.” 

“Tsk, let me think.”

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Mathias, who surprisingly could hear them for a large distance without even approaching them to eavesdrop, stepped closer to the cave point where an arrow was shot in his direction with the appearance of a girl with brown hair and a Caucasian appearance wearing skin-tight leather armor and holding a bow in her hands. 

‘[Arcane Barrier]’ 

Fully aware he didn’t have time to dodge the arrow, he cast his protective shield and got hit by the arrow before a dark-purple lighting struck the huntress in question, Vivian.

[You have suffered 287 damage.]

[☆ Arcane Barrier effect 'Reflect' has been triggered, dealing 123 damage to Vivian.]

“Argh! What was that lighting strike?” inquired the young woman, who was pushed back by the reflect of Mathias' spell.

When she reacted vigilantly and even fired a preventive shot at Mathias, while the rest of the players in her group also came to back her up, with a blonde man in his mid-twenties, wearing leather armor and a longsword at his waist, followed by a black-skinned person, wearing the attire of a knight, followed by one blonde girl with the attire of a magician.

“Vivian, do we have an enemy monster on our hands?” asked Anjo, the blonde man, but when he turned his attention to Mathias in the distance, he could see the crimson-haired man with ruby eyes surrounded by a dark-purple barrier, wearing a clean black suit with a victorian style black hat, gazing at them in a calm manner.

“What are you doing Vivi? This person is a player.” 

“I know, but what about it? The player community is filled with backstabbers looking for opportunities.” remarked the huntress, and when Mathias started walking toward her, she pulled the string of her bow again.

“Your face seems familiar to me. Especially the two young ladies and the warrior. Where have I met you in the past?” mentioned Mathias not caring much about the wound he gained, because his HP began recovering even when he was in a fight because of the Regeneration Stat, recovering 6 HP each second.

“That voice? Are you Mathias? The one who helped us with the Empar Forest?” asked the magician girl called Paula, who recognized Mathias's voice rather quickly.

“I see so that feeling of familiarity wasn’t for nothing, it was you guys.” replied Mathias who walked closer and closer to the group, but with the huntress still on her tiptoes ready to strike, it made Mathias chuckle, before turning a bit serious.

“Huntress, do you want something from me? If you keep showing your sharp claws, I might also have to retaliate.” said Mathias as he took off his hat that covered his nameplate.

“Vivi, cut it off, can’t you see that it is indeed that Mathias?” said Paula to the huntress, who lowered the tension on her bowstring, but watching Mathias vigilantly. 

Mathias still had about 4 minutes of ‘Arcane Barrier’ and he wasn’t going to cancel it, just in case that huntress had some ideas behind his back. Placing back his hat, he arrived in front of the ground, greeting them calmly,

“You’ve reached this deep and even passed Empar Forest, getting to Iljnoks Den. But, I’ve heard from my passing that you failed to defeat the bear in four, why so?”

“Hah, it is a bit embarrassing to talk about it. But our party doesn’t have enough firepower to take down that bear monstrosity, no pun intended Vivian, Paula, but that’s the reality. That monster also has a recovery skill which heals him for 5% his HP each second for 15 seconds.”

Vivian gritted her teeth, while Paula just sighed, when hearing Anjo tell Mathias the details of their fight.

“Ohh, so you got stuck at that mechanics of Iljnoks fight.”

“What do you mean by that? Don’t tell me the reason the cave was empty in the Beta Phase was because of you?”

“Well, I don’t wish to hail myself, but you got the idea. Now, since I don’t want to waste my time too much around here, are you ready to take on a fight against that bear?” asked Mathias the group of players in a casual manner, which made the group have an inner discussion.

@Anjo <Mathias, is one of the first players of the Beta Phase, and if he is right, he even defeated Iljnoks while he was only level 25. What do you say guys, are we going to try again or coward in fear?>

@MikeIron <I got most of that monster attack patterns so if I don’t make any stupid mistakes, I could tank as long I get some heals from you Paula>

@Paula: <I can’t guarantee you anything. However, I am willing to give it a try again.>

@Anjo: <Vivi? What do you say, another try?”

@Vivian: <Hmph, I will try again, but if you blame me for not delivering enough DPS, I am done with this boss fight and party. As for that ‘Secret’ guy, we’ll see how good a Beta Player is>

@Anjo: <Aren’t we also Beta Players?>

@Vivian: <You call playing two weeks a Beta Phase experience? Anjo, don’t fool yourself, the original Beta Players are the ones who began from day 0. Anyway, I’ll do it, go send an invitation to that Mathias guy.>

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Finishing with their discussion, while Mathias walked toward the den entrance, he was stopped by their party invitation.

[You have been invited by ‘Anjo’ to the 'Leveling Experience' party.]

[You have accepted the invitation.] 

Accepting the invitation, he opened the party system interface, where he saw the information of all members of the party.

[Anjo: Lv. - 23 (Warrior)

MikeIron: Lv. - 22 (Guardian)

Vivian: Lv. - 24 (Ranger)

Paula: Lv. - 22 (Nature Magician)

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Mathias: Lv. 23 (???) (A/N: Players can choose if they want to disclose their class information to others) ]

 

“Hmph, you are just level 23 even after knowing most of the beginning content?” inquired Vivian, as if to rub some salt into Mathias’s unexisting wounds.

“Haha, how cute. Are you ready, little huntress?” asked Mathias, after turning his crimson eyes at Vivian which the latter was also focusing on, making her ponder.

‘What is up with the crimson hair and crimson eyes? All the videos on the forum that captured you, are when you had black hair. Don’t tell me you dyed your hair? But the eyes can’t be explained, so what happened to you? Black Spearman?’

“Who are you calling cute and little huntress? I will show you what I am capable off.” responded Vivian after breaking away from her thoughts, following Mathias who entered the instance.

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[You are about to enter the instance 'Mutated Bear Den'. Once you enter inside, you can't exit the instance.]

Not stopping in place, he entered inside the instance, where darkness entered his crimson eyes with a moldy atmosphere around him, and with dirt on the ground. The tunnel system of the den was the same, without any changes and immediately after his presence was felt, Giant Rats started exiting from the crevices of the tunnel.

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[Giant Rat - Lv. 18] (7000 HP)

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“Wait for my buffs and I will come to take over the rats.” said MikeIron, who saw Mathias walking toward the Giant Rats.

“No need.”

‘Arcane Intelligence’ ‘Item Enchant’

A dark-purple eye appeared on his forehead from his buff, and still walking forward, from his hand a red aura started circulating as waves, before entering Ragnius. With all preparations done, he lunged at the Giant Rats starting off with ‘Treachery’ where each of the jabbing attacks targeting individual rats made them scream in pain, and when the spin sequence of his attack came, he did an AoE attack where all 10 Giant Rats got wounded.

[You have dealt 540 damage to the targets.]

[Critical]

[You have dealt 1030 damage to the targets.]

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Afterwards, seeing all the rats gathered around him, he saw it as a good chance to test his new skills, and with his crimson eyes turning dead serious, he gripped Ragnius shaft tight, and concentrated his Red Energy on the spear, before doing a large spinning swing in an 360 * radius.

‘[Ghost Spear - Mars]’

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When he did that swing spin, the force and momentum he felt was another experience compared to ‘Treacheries’ spins or even a basic spinning attack. The wind created by his attack blasted all the Giant Rats around him, hitting the walls of the cave, causing more damage to them in the process.

[You have dealt 736 AoE damage, and successfully triggered the debuff ‘Slow’, slowing the enemy hit by ‘Ghost Spear - Mars’ attack by 25% for two minutes.]

There were some critical hits, on two of the Giant Rats, and behind him the arrows started flying, hitting the Giant Rats spread out from Marhias who was releasing a red aura around himself.

[Party member 'Vivian' has dealt 850 damage, with skill 'Power Shot' to Giant Rat]

[Party member 'Vivian' has dealt 650 damage, with skill 'Power Shot' to Giant Rat]

[Party member 'Vivian' has dealt 720 damage, with skill 'Power Shot' to Giant Rat]

"What are you waiting for, guys? Go into action and start doing something, we can't have only one person fight." said Vivian, as she put another arrow on her bow, pulling it and using another skill, targeting the Giant Rats.

Once she said that, the Warrior Anjo, also jumped in the fight, slashing at the rats using his longsword, while MikeIron, activated his taunting skills while shouting some curses at the rats, drawing the aggro on himself. Paula, started channeling her mana, and 'Nature Protection' which buffed the entire party with a defense increase by 15%.

Mathias was surprised too see the coordination of the party and how smooth their transitions were, from attacking and retreating, with Vivian making him whistle when seeing her damage and fast long ranged attacks.

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[You have defeated one ‘Giant Rat’ gaining the following rewards: 100 EXP, 50 silver coins]

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[Party Member ‘Vivian’ has defeated one ‘Giant Rat’ granting you the following rewards: 50 EXP, 15 silver coins]

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[Party Member ‘Anjo’ has defeated one ‘Giant Rat’ granting you the following rewards: 50 EXP, 20 silver coins]

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When they finished the rats, the party took a break to recover their resources, chance where Paula asked Mathias about his magic spells, to which he just told her it was something he gained from a dungeon, without making his skills sound all that great.

“What about the spear skills? I've watched you do that spinning strike which dealt about 7000 or more damage in total against the rats.”

“Just your average skills, if it was a 1vs1 situation it wouldn’t be that strong. AoE skills are only good in such cases, and you also need the correct enemy because if it was a smarter monster, it wouldn’t attack me like a flood.” commented Mathias, who rapidly recovered his mana, without suffering many hits from the rats.

“Don’t try to brush it off, you are among the first Beta Users, you sure hoarded on some skills without sharing with people.” remarked Vivian picking up the arrows from where the Giant Rats vanished in gray fragments.

“Hehe, what if I tell you, I didn’t even respawn in Titan to gain the advantage of quests? I am just your average player, haha.”

'The Leader of Leviathan?' 

“Average? You are part of the Leviathans" continued Vivian, pointing out something surprising for the party, as for Mathias, he looked at the woman with a look that questioned her.

“Ohh, has my guild become famous?” asked Mathias insinuating he didn’t know what she implied.

“Famous? Red, Evan and Lane destroyed an entire guild who was hoarding on a hunting ground in Dewars. Do you want to know what Red told the Guild Leader of Blackdawns?”

“Not really.” replied Mathias gazing at the huntress, who still continued.

“If you wish to declare war on the Leviathan besides fighting me, you will have to face other players that you will fear until the game ends."

‘That big mouth. This is why he passed the guild leadership to me? To push off the burden of managing guild relations after he messes up?’ thought Mathias to himself, before entering the Guild chat, and starting to ask questions, and pulling Red’s tongue out for answers.

Soon enough, Red just replied to Mathias' message in a casual manner.

@Red: Don’t worry man, those are just some scrubs who thought of themselves as some great players. That guild is also based on Dewars, so if they want to fight against us, it is only me, Lane, Evans in this region. Thus far, we only antagonized those guys.

@Mathias: Only those guys?

@Evans: I mean, guild leader, what would you do when some retard comes into your face and tells you they own the hunting ground as if it is his home.

@Mathias: Ignore his bullshit?

@Lane: That’s exactly what we did, but those fuckers later come to kill steal our hunt, so we obviously PK them.

The group made of four could see Mathias facepalm himself, before not long returning his attention to them.

"Done with your recovery? Are you ready for the next part of the tunnel?" 

“Yes, we can advance.” replied Anjo, who took the lead along with MikeIron, and Mathias, who used his Red Energy to make a bird he sent out in advance to scout the tunnels.

‘Hmm, there’s new changes to the instances, those tunnels didn’t exist before.’ contemplated Mathias who extended his sense using his Red Energy bird, and also his abilities.

“YIP, ME KILL!” screamed from one of the tunnels he was scouting, before the bird collided with a creature the size of a kobold, that looked rather morbid. 

“YOU NO TAKE CANDLE!”

Vivian ranger senses picked on the commotion, turning herself to the tunnel the kobold who screamed was heard, and with her Bow drawn, she called out her skill in a calm manner.

“[Skullpiercer Shot]”

[Party member ‘Vivian’ has dealt 2037 damage to an Undead Kobold Kott.]

“Bullseye! Guys it seems we have missed some content from this instance by ignoring those split-up tunnels.” remarked the huntress, who took another arrow, drawing it tensing the bow, and firing another shot.

“[Power Shot]”

[Party member ‘Vivian’ has dealt 656 damage to an Undead Kobold Zazz.]

As she drew for another shot, from the tunnel a group of 6 kobolds exited the tunnel, looking like rotten kobolds, similar in style to Iljnoks which made Mathias to frown, starting to ponder on what this new change meant. 

‘New content? Those tunnels were not here in the Beta Phase. Hmm, they should be the Champions of the Kobolds that got killed by Iljnoks mentioned by Vek.’

While he was trying to figure out the new changes, the party already started working on killing the new monsters, without putting them to heart, since compared to Iljnoks they were far weaker. Yet, there was some level of difficulty compared to the Giant Rats, and the first one to test the power of those undead creatures was MikeIron who even as a Tank class was pushed back.

“Damn, those little dead bags really have power in their attacks.” commented MikeIron, who used his Guardian Shield to block most attacks from the six Undead Kobold Champions who were themselves mini field bosses.

“[Iron Guard]”

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[Iron Guard]: You fortify your defenses, reducing melee damage taken by 40% for 15 seconds. You also gain Immunity to knockback and knockup effects for the duration.

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The fight only began when the kobolds entered their first phase after Anjo, Vivian, MikeIron and Paula took 25% of the kobolds HP, before things turned fast paced in the fight.

Mathias entered the fight only at this point after he put in order his fleeting thoughts, assisting in the fight, an already successful party from his standpoint. 

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[Undead Kobold Zazz -Lv. 28](18750 / 25000 HP) / [Undead Kobold Kott - Lv. 29](18345/ 25000 HP) / [Undead Kobold Mekks-Lv. 30](18750 / 26000 HP) 

[Undead Kobold Solbe - Lv. 29](18345/ 25000 HP) /  [Undead Kobold Nive -Lv. 28](18750 / 25000 HP) / [Undead Kobold Appi - Lv. 30](19345/ 27000 HP) 

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Entering the fight, the stress on Mike’s shoulder was instantly lifted, when he saw the dark-purple projectile fly past his head and blast the undead monsters that he was taunting, dealing a significant hit of [850], before seeing another three of the same looking projectiles who flew around, hitting randomly three of the kobolds, dealing [1316] per hit.

Next, he saw the crimson-haired man get in melee range, and strike with his spear in quick succession three times, later jumping using his spear almost hitting the tunnel roof with his head while descending and striking three of the closer undeads with ‘Bloodfall’, dealing a hit of [813] damage. 

“YOU NO TAKE CANDLE!” screamed the undead starting to hit MikeIron harder, with their frail bodies giving off a green liquid that released smoke when touching the ground, which when touching his Shield he got a debuff that shocked him.

"Fuck, they hold toxins which turn your items into garbage for a period of time."

"Keep the front line, Mike. I will buy you a shield from the auction market." said Vivian, who fired off at the kobolds at full gear, that she started giving off an intense presence around her, which made Mathias who was fighting the kobolds notice.

'I wonder what class is that, except for being a Ranger. Weren't you mad at me for being a Beta Phase player, young lioness? Aren't you hitting almost the same as me?"

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The fight continued against the kobold undeads, and after five minutes of fighting, to save his shield MikeIron started to retreat, handing the aggro to Mathias who took it without sweating too much, holding them at bay using his 'Arcane Barrier' and 'Ghost Spear - Mars' which would blast the enemy around him, however on his third try of this spell in the fight against the Undead Kobolds, the pull effect was triggered.

"You fool, what are you doing, do you try to kill us? Why pull them so close to the party?" 

"The skill backfired on me." replied Mathias not placing to heart the comments of the huntress, while preparing to eat the hits of the monsters.

[You have suffered 468 damage.]

[You have suffered 346 damage.]

[You have suffered 420 damage.]

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Followed by one more hit which hit him for [445] damage, before he rebounded and unleashed 'Waning Moon' one of Haycien's techniques that had at the basics a trigger sequence similar to 'Treachery', and luckily for him the activation was successful, not making a fool of himself.

Starting with the three lighting fast jabs similar to 'Piercing Rain' in style but holding a greater force, he stopped the other two kobolds from attacking him, and while gathering his spear closer to him, he did a spin attack closely related to [Mars] technique wounding all of the monsters in the process and while they charged to attack him, he stepped back, attacking with basic attacks that were boosted by 50% attack speed.

 

"Don't come this way! Anjo, take on the aggro." 

"You know my forte is not tanking monsters. Mike, come here man, switch to your sword and help us."

"Damn, if my sword or shield gets destroyed all of you will have to pay." remarked the Guardian who from the backline, shouted like a madman.

"Thundering Charge"

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[Thundering Charge]: Increase your movement speed by 100% for 5 seconds. At the end of the duration, you will stomp the ground dealing 150% of your attack power.  This attack will generate threat. While this effect is active you cannot stop moving.

Cooldown: Five minutes

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"Move, I'll take care of those zombie rats." shouted MikeIron, who felt like superman flying toward his enemy, and when he arrived in front of the party gathering the attention of all the kobolds using another skill, 'Arcing Strike', with all the monsters focused on him again, he stomped on the ground dropping the kobolds on the floor.

"Paula, give me some healing, I got touched by their toxin."

"I got your back, don't worry. You guys continue your fight, and I will make sure you don't die." said the nature magician, who pointed her staff toward Mathias casting a spell which restored his mana, instead of health.

"Thanks, after this instance, I would like to try to learn that spell."

"Sorry, but this is a locked ability just for Nature Magicians."

"What a shame. Still, an interesting spell."

"Arcane Barrage." casted Mathias his spell, shooting another three arcane missiles in the direction of the kobolds who were occupied with IronMike.

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The fight took another five minutes before the zombie Kobolds dropped on the ground, turning into gray light, even for Mathias.

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[You have leveled up!]

"Let's continue on this path, maybe we will find more monsters." suggested Anjo, who began recovering his resources.

"This is my intent, last time when I was here, those tunnels didn't exist. So I am more intrigued than you are." mentioned Mathias, who checked the EXP his skill had accumulated along with Ragnius that began getting closer and closer to upgrading, returning back to his Normal Rate.