"Are you sure we shouldn't help them?" I asked.

"I think they've got it." Atalanta quickly nodded.

White and Kuro were exploring the caverns' multiple streams of networks and tunnels while we were trying to catch up to them in sprinting fashion. The other Assassins split off on White's command, navigating the rest of the raid around the area. White managed to convince Dune somehow that we would explore the rest of the cave tunnels to finish the incomplete map.

Little did Dune know that White already had explored most of the dungeon's layout. He did this before the dungeon started, using his Shadow Partner's ability to create another copy of himself while we were talking to the other raid members from earlier. Kuro also helped, of course, which was why we were able to get so deep into the caverns without anyone noticing.

"What class are you, anyway?" I told White, forgetting ever to ask him.

"Shadower," Kuro said.

"Nightlord," White said, in unison.

"I was talking to..." I stopped midway, "Never mind, what's the difference?"

"Shadower is more melee-focused, using dual daggers, poison, and debuffs for high damage burst." Kuro answered, "Nightlord is a more ranged focus, using clones, agile repositioning, and consistent damage through the throwing of projectiles."

"Yeah, what she said." White agreed with Kuro.

During this whole time, both of them were jutting around the caverns rugged walls and stalactites, completely obliterating everything in their path. Small masses and the occasional meager formation of mobs could be seen, only to get killed immediately afterward. It seemed like there was an extra five people were in our small group. 

"Why do I feel like your classes aren't any different?" I shook my head.

"The early class tree starts pretty similarly," Kuro stated, "We both get a Shadow Partner, and our class's limits are close enough where it's hard to discern, especially early on. Sometimes that's a good thing for PvP."

"Yeah." White agreed, "It gets more variance as we level up, and it shifts pretty drastically once you get to the second skill tree."

"There's a second skill tree?" I widened my eyes, "What level do you unlock it at?"

"You get it as your second job advancement," White replied, "So around level thirty." 

"Oh, that's cool." I said, "I didn't know that."

"The perks of having a Beta Tester as your friend, I guess," White said nonchalantly.

"Hahaha. I guess so."

We promptly made progress through the early part of the dungeon. Since the mobs weren't concentrated at all, we plowed through floor after floor of the caverns. Demon bats, enormous ants, and other insectoid monsters roamed the floors, but they weren't too hard to deal with, considering their health and defense were pretty measly. 

They were Trash mobs.

As we descended deeper and deeper into the caverns, more and more concentrated groups started to appear. This caused our pace to slow down quite a bit; Atalanta and I were having to step in to assist Kuro and White. The experience gain wasn't terrible, however, since I managed to level up to level nine as a result.

Spoiler

Winter			Class		Age		Level
			Knight		24		9
Dex	33 (+8)	Base Stats	Race		Alignment		Guild
Luck	32 (+7)	DEX:  25	Human		Taurus		None
Intelligence	32 (+7)	LUK:  25	Health		Spirit		EXP
Strength	112(+72)	INT:   25	850	850	100	100	41	3539
Attack	1611	STR:  40	Current	Max	Current	Max	Current	Max
M.Attack	804
Def	266		Titles:	None	Profession:	None			Gold
M. Defense	218		Fame:	None	Other:	None			1.24

Ring	Necklace	Cap		Emblem
None	Sharptooth Necklace	None		None
Ring	Pendant	Face Acc.	Eye Acc.	Badge
None	Locked	None	None	None
Ring	Weapon	Top	Earring	Medal
None	Sharptooth Sword	Wolfskin Breastplate	None	None
Ring		Bottoms	Shoulders	Sub Wep.
None		Leather Bottoms	None	Iron Shield
Pockets	Belt	Shoes	Gloves	Cape
None	None	Wolfskin Boots	None	None

Item Inventory
Equip	Use	Set-Up	Other	Premium
Health Potion (14)

Skill Tree and Abilities
Level 1	Shield Bash	Tornado Slash	Cross Slash	Actives:	Dual Wield Mastery	Knight's Resolve	Iron Defense
	Shield Charge	Lunge
Level 10
Level 20				Other:
Level 30

[collapse]

 
Opening my Personal Interface and quickly allocated the required points, I leveled up my 【Cross Slash】. Closing the menu afterward, we descended further down the caverns. After a few minutes of nonstop attacking random mobs here and there, we stop to rest in small intervals. Although White was insanely good, he also needed to rest whenever his Stamina was low, just like the rest of us.

"How close are we to the boss?" I asked White, panting.

We found a nearby dead-end to stop and rest because everyone in the party was reaching its limits. We needed to wait for the rest of the raid to catch up because we haven't hit that point where we can safely taper off from the leading group and get 'lost.' More mobs were going to await us even further down.

"Not even close." He breathed heavily, "We still got about thirty more minutes of doing this to go."

"Oh, damn." I gasped, "I would be fuming if I wasn't so tired."

"Aren't we just giving the raid group a free leash, then?" Atalanta said.

"No." It was Kuro that spoke this time, "We planned to clear the beginning of the dungeon, while the raid group would clear the last part." 

"I already notified them of the correct pathways," White said, "They should be coming down within a few minutes."

"What are they even doing, taking so long?" I asked.

"Well, the raid group intends to clear the hidden content as well."

My eyes lit up, "Hidden content?" 

"It's nothing special. Just some standard equipment." White sighed, "They don't know that, though."

"Oh." I nodded, "Makes sense."

We sat a few moments in silence, our bated breaths lingering throughout the large encasement. All of us were pretty exhausted. We spent at least fifteen minutes clearing all of the mobs. There wasn't anything exciting, so I was suddenly getting bored. It was Atalanta that broke the silence, asking White a peculiar question.

"Hey, there were rumors of a Beta Tester that entered here before us. Was that you?"

White gave a small chortle, "Nah. That wasn't me. Probably someone else."

Kuro raised an eyebrow, almost as if she didn't believe White. White didn't say anything, too weary to talk back.

"Regardless, someone else thought of doing this dungeon before we did," I said, "Maybe there was something that they wanted."

"Is there anything you're not telling us, White?" Kuro narrowed her eyes.

"I told you that I would tell you once we get to it, but I guess I can tell you now."

"I'm interested," I said.

"So, there's a second boss in addition to the main one." 

"Oh?" Kuro questioned, "Explain."

White went in-depth into the explanation of each boss. The first boss was a giant Spider that lies dormant upon first meeting it. It only gets activated once you kill a certain amount of mobs in the boss room. Since the dungeon is instanced, there are going to the cocoons that always spawn at certain places for the party to kill. The rotations were pretty simple, don't let the mobs swarm you, and protect the ranged.

Since we were only a party of four, it wasn't going to be that hard to keep track of the rest of the group. The real kicker and the information that was worthwhile was that there's a secret second boss that spawns in the dungeon, however, it can only get activated through certain conditions.

"So, what are the conditions?" Kuro interrupted, unable to contain her curiosity.

"There are going to be runes in the boss room." White replied, "If you use a projectile ability, the rune will light up."

"So, do we have to hit them in the right order?" Atalanta asked.

"Correct." White nodded, "However, if you mess up the order even once. The second boss will disable for that instance, and you will get swarmed with spiders."

"So, we only have one shot at getting it right?" I asked.

"Yes." White nodded, "So, let's try not to rush when doing the boss."

As we were talking, the deep sound of shuffling footsteps and clinking metal resounded off the hollow cavern a few seconds after. I instantly knew what was up, and everyone immediately got up to regroup with the leading raid group. We were tired; however, we still had enough Stamina to follow behind the raid group, allowing them to take the lead this time around.

Dune was leading the members, and we noticed him when we came into a clearing. He spots us as well and quickly dashes towards our way with a worried look on his face. The Assassins that split up with us earlier had also seemed to regroup with the main party. I gave a big sigh of relief, knowing that we didn't send them to their doom.

"Are you guys, alright?" Dune asks.

"We're fine." I said, "Just had to take care of some mobs."

Dune's eyes lit up. "No wonder we couldn't see any of the mobs, you guys took care of them all." 

Some members from the group saw how out of breath we were and took us measures to help us tag along and keep up the pace with everyone else. Fwee, Tony, and Yama, the players we saw from earlier, raced towards to give us a helping hand. It was nice to see familiar faces in a large crowd, especially since this was only the beginning of the raid. We weren't even halfway through. 

"Are you guys good?" Yama said, his red hair vibrant under the torchlight brought by the other raid members. The players' torchlights were the only objects illuminated the surroundings since no sunlight was able to reach this deep into the cavern. Yama promptly caught one of my arms with his shoulder and propped my weight onto his joints.

"Thanks," I replied steadily.

Continuing with the expedition, the raid group was efficient in taking care of the buildup of monsters. The deeper we got, the more beasts revealed themselves. The Archers and Mages in the back took quick work of any flying bats and ceiling-hanging critters, while the frontline force pressed onwards unyielding. Their vigor was strong and mighty.

"We'll finish this dungeon in no time!" A member said.

"With this many players, theirs no way we can lose!"

"Keep formation, everyone!" Dune shouted, "Make sure to leave no mob standing!"

The crowd nodded, and we made our descent into the unknown.

The slow dripping of water down the stalactites of the cave gave a disturbing aura that caused the raid members to feel extremely uneasy. A multitude of shaking feet and dismal breathing rung out unconsciously as the raid group trudged through the murky slog and moist underbelly of the dark grotto. We had made good progress, clearing roughly eighty percent of the caverns; however, we weren't going to hold on for much longer. The cave shafts and tunnels were shifting thinner and thinner, and subsequently, our raid group was too.

"Alright." One of the leaders voiced out, "Time to take a break, everyone." 

A hefty heave of contentment echoed through the chamber in response, and the raid group started splitting off from the usual healthy raid formation. We had made decent work of most of the dungeon, spending around forty-five minutes total now. The monsters were appearing in droves presently, and we could only manage to take one set of waves at a time. It was still good progress, considering the remaining amount of people we had left.

I sat close to a wall, sweating profusely. The whole raid group was down on morale and energy, but we still trudged on the rugged caverns hoping to get worthwhile loot. Experience wise, everyone profited from being in a group; however, some people had perished along the way. Our group size was reduced to half of what it was initially.

We had gotten into several critical situations, where even I thought the raid group would have gotten wiped. We had just survived an onslaught of the most notable mob encounter we had seen yet, and some players, unfortunately, suffered considerable casualties. It took all our willpower to break through the dense amalgamation of subterrene beasts and insects. With some proper planning on White's end and a stroke of luck, we somehow used the terrain to our advantage to cheese¹In a gaming scene the word cheese is used to describe strategies or ways of playing that are really powerful and do not require much skill from the players side at the same time.our way through the battle.

Some quarreling about whoever got what loot drop started building up a while back, however with quick decision making from Dune and White, they managed to quell some of the anxiety of the collection of players. Some were content with what they gained through the dungeon and decided to quit halfway via an NPC that teleported back to the surface, while others were still in disregard for the opinion of the other members. Some quarreling even happened within our group. This caused White to change plans, spending time to talk to Dune about what we were going to do moving forward.

Atalanta, nevertheless, took quite a liking towards Fwee and the others, so she was busy conversing with them in the meantime. They were a critical part of helping us defeat said mobs, so Atalanta was probably thanking them on my behalf. Kuro, on the other hand, saw me alone against a corner and decided to come to visit me instead. She strangely asked if she could sit next to me, which is something she never does, but I nodded in acceptance anyways.

"Hey..." Kuro said, leaning down next to me, "How are you holding up?"

"Doing alright." I reply, "Just sitting to catch my breath. Again." 

"You seem to be doing that a lot." 

"I can't help it." I reply, "My equipment is a lot heavier than yours, and I'm usually the one front lining."

"Yeah, I saw."

"Saw what?" I asked, "Me front lining?"

"Yeah, you kept the raid members together when we fought that swarm a while back."

"Nah, I can't take all the credit for it." 

"Just take the compliment, idiot." She murmured.

I turned towards Kuro, and she avoided my gaze. 

"So, what brings you here?" 

She took a large breath, "I, uh, wanted to apologize for earlier..."

"During the fight?"

"Y-yeah." 

I gave a sparse smile. "Don't worry about it. I don't blame you."

"Even still!" She turned towards me, her face pink and eyes somewhat watering.

"I said don't worry about it," I reassured her, a bit surprised. 

We sat in silence, both of us wanting to say something, but none of us dared to do so.

"That can't be the only reason you came here. Right?" I reluctantly asked.

"Seonghw-I mean, White's too busy, so I wanted someone else to talk to..." She whispered.

"Really?" I said, "You don't seem the type to start a conversation."

"I'm not." Kuro's cheeks puffed, "I'm trying my best." 

"Want to come closer, then?"

"W-what kind of statement is that?" 

"Here, come lay down," I said, patting one of my legs.

"I'm not doing that," 

I shrugged in response, but she eventually caved in and did it anyway.

"Can you forgive me?" She said, resting her head upon my thighs. Her hair fell back slowly, and she looked upwards at me.

"Y-yeah." I stuttered, 

"White says I'm too mean to people I first meet." Kuro said, "I'm trying to fix that."

"Don't overthink it." 

"Thanks," She smiles lightly, turning to one side and closing her eyes.

"Let's move away from the gloomy stuff. Tell me a bit more about yourself," I asked Kuro.

"Like what?" 

"Like, some of your hobbies." I reply, "Maybe your age, where you reside, what color do you like. Those things."

"I thought you already knew my age." She slightly pouted.

"I can only guess."

"T-twenty." She said shyly, "My favorite color is black, and I live in New York."

"Oh, so same as me. I also live in New York."

"Really?" She exclaimed, lifting her head. Her head bumped against my chin on accident as a result. "Ouch."

I chuckled, "Yeah, I should tell you a little bit about myself then."

"But I don't wanna know about you." She jokingly said.

"Are you sure?" I asked, twirling one of her hair strands as she laid back down, "This is your last chance."

"W-well, on second thought." She remarked, "It doesn't hurt to know."

"Do you know about Conviction?"

"The game?" Kuro said, "Of course."

"I went by the name Aaron."

Kuro's eyes swiftly widened with disbelief, but she was hesitant to say anything. Her reaction was kind of cute, so I couldn't help but smirk.

"That makes sense." She says, "That explains a lot, actually."

I thought I would spare her from giving my life story, so I only talked about it in bits and pieces. She didn't shy away from my conversation, and we were slowly rebuilding our faith in each other as a result. Kuro had unfortunately berated me earlier among other players, for how incompetent we were. White and Atalanta were able to take it since they were familiar with Kuro, but the other raid members, not so much. 

She got more slack from the other players after some members decided to leave the party outright, causing Dune and some of the leaders to disagree with her actions. White defended her the best he could, but it was still hard for him to convince them to keep Kuro; the lowering morale and crumbling frontline played a significant factor.

This was a regular occurrence to me, especially with the experience I had in the past. A group isn't strong just because of the good players; a group is strong because they can tough out most of their indifferences to accomplish a particular goal. No one had time to deal with people that dragged the team down, especially when they aren't contributing. Kuro was technically in the right here, but her approach wasn't all too great. It's nice that she took the time to apologize to me, however, which means she wasn't completely unaware of her actions.

"I think it's time to take our plan into action," White said, appearing next to me, leaning on one of the cave walls.

"You think so?" I said, "What about the other raid members?"

White sighed, "You know what we have to do."

"Yeah, you're right." I lamented, "It doesn't feel too good, though, I feel like we're betraying them."

"You know how it is." White said, "I tried to convince Dune to pull back, but we wouldn't budge."

"What did you say?"

"I managed to convince him to let our group scout forward, which is the best I could ask out of him."

"Oh," I said.

"On the other hand," White said, raising one of his eyebrows, "It seems you're quite busy with Ku-" 

"Shut up," Kuro said immediately, butting in, "Fuck off, retard."

"Ah, there we go. That's the Kuro I know," White gave a small chuckle, "I'll notify Atalanta, so use that time to get ready."

"Sound's good." 

White disappeared soon afterward, and Kuro slowly got up from her resting position.

"I guess that's our cue." She stood up, stretching her body.

Atlanta, Kuro, and I hurriedly grouped up with White, and we went ahead of the raid group. Some of the members gave slight glances at us, but no one dared to speak up. White had too much presence within the raid, so they were afraid of saying anything to him. It worked out in our favor because with White's knowledge of the distinct tunnels, we were quickly able to change pace, managing to avoid most of the mob clusters that would have aggroed onto us if we had more players. 

"Watch out for this upcoming cluster." White mentioned, "We can't avoid this one this time, so make sure to be the frontline."

"Gotcha." I nodded, running behind White and Kuro.

"I also need to mention it." White added, "There's a mini-boss."

"So, that's what you were talking about in the beginning." Atalanta voiced from behind me.

"It's not anything we can't handle." 

Getting into formation, It didn't take long for us to understand what White was talking about. A cave encasement containing several unique mobs lay ahead of us. A medium-sized golem with vibrant phosphorescent orange runes that were surrounding its body could be seen. Small stone sentinels enveloping the golem came into view as we followed White forward. Stopping, he gestures us to slow down. We were getting close to the aggro range of the mobs.

"These golems are unique." White explained, "The main golem only takes damage when the sentinels die."

"Sounds easy enough," Atalanta replied, "Just drag them out and kill them first." 

"That's the thing..." White hesitated, "The sentinels actually won't move away from the boss."

"So, we have to take it straight on?"

"That's why we have Winter," White commented.

I nodded in response. Since the sentinels weren't going to aggro away from the boss, I had to take the full brunt of the damage. I needed to aggro all of the mobs myself, giving time for the rest of the members to dish out damage.

"I see why you brought me along now." I replied, "Are all the sentinels the same? What's their health?" 

"There are five sentinels. Two of them don't do any damage; they have a ridiculous amount of health. They will occasionally stun you. The other three don't have as much health, but they have a mana core. They can shoot projectiles off the mana core."

"Alright, got it." I said, "So, is the mana core their weakness?"

"Yes." White nodded. 

"Alright, I'll engage first." 

Putting everything into motion, I quickly activate my【Iron Defense】 and storm forward. My shield glowing bright blue; I got into a sprinting posture. A quick【Shield Charge】coupled with several 【Tornado Slashes】 in quick sequence let me pull all of the mobs together instantly. Since I had gotten new equipment, I was hyped to test them, so I went all out. In my mind, I activated【Cross Slash】, and my sword started radiating. I land two clean hits onto the mob, and it starts retaliating back. 

【Cross Slash】again! My sword glowing once more, I landed two more strikes knocking one of the sentinels close to the wall. Dazed, the sentinel charged up his projectile attack, so I jump forward, using my legs to kick him even closer towards the wall. I disrupt the attack, but he bounces back and tries to repeat the same action. Using【Shield Bash】, I swing my shield at its stone body. The sentinel collides with the wall and is stunned in the process.

An arrow sparks right past me, hammering the sentinel deeper into the wall. Looking behind me, Atalanta was prepping her attacks. Volleys of arrows swished towards the stunned mob, dealing tons of damage and applying another set of stunlocks. 

Kuro and White weren't dillydallying either, their fierce coordination and unrivaled speed making clever work of the remaining sentinels. Since there were only three of them that dealt damage, we were prioritizing them first over the others. I would sometimes get stunned by the tanky sentinels, but I could only tough it out.

Every now and then, the sentinels would switch aggro from me towards the other members, but with some immediate action, I was able to change their attack pattern so it would hit me instead. White uses this opportunity to get close, understanding that the mob can't switch aggro that fast. Atalanta was just fine with staying in the back, providing much-needed support.

The main problem was the giant golem. Unlike the sentinels, it was more of a brawler type enemy. It had a mana core; however, no projectiles came out of it. It's runes started glowing instead, glowing bright every time it landed an attack. The attacks were no trick either, creating massive shockwaves on the ground floor, and causing the surrounding rubble to fall. 

I ducked down to dodge one the strikes it was aiming at me and retaliated with a【Shield Bash】. It didn't work out the way I intended to, because it seemed I got knocked back farther than he did. Perplexed, I activated 【Shield Charge】 instead, hoping I can push him away from the other mobs. This time, my ability looked like it worked, but why did I feel like he didn't get that far knocked back?

"He's too heavy!" I shouted out, "You guys better deal with those sentinels quickly! I don't think I can hold him off."

"We're on it!" Atalanta replied, nocking another arrow. She pierced the sentinel that I aggroed from earlier, and it died soon after. The body crumbled into dust, and the mana core that was glowing broke into small pieces.

Atalanta started switching her attention to the tanky sentinels right afterward, while White and Kuro finished off their respective mobs, doing the same. A few seconds turned into a few minutes, and one by one, we steadily decreased the surrounding mob count. My health was tanking quite drastically as a result, but that let the other party members clear the additional enemies²Sometimes referred to as ADDS. without a hitch.

"I'm low!" I yelled, "I gotta tap out soon."

"Don't worry!" White replied, "Only one more left."

As the last stone sentinel crumbled to dust, something unexpected happened. The Golem lift both of its rocky protrusions that resembled hands straight into the air, and the runes around its body glowed even brighter than before. It also caught White off guard, meaning that this was something that he has never seen before.

"Fall back!" He said.

"You don't have to tell me twice!" Kuro agreed.

All of us retreated towards Atalanta's location, not sure how far the attack was going to reach. I'm glad that we did because the resulting shockwave completely opened up the cavern. Other mobs started to escape from the cracks and protuberances and flying demonic bats started swarming in.

"Atalanta, it's all yours," White said.

Atalanta nodded, knowing what this meant. She was going to deal with the flying monsters, while we aimed directly for the golem instead. Putting our plan into action, I rushed towards the Golem, arrows flying beside me to use as cover. Both White and Kuro went into stealth, and we produced a three-pronged pincer attack on the mini-boss. Alternating positions, we encircled the Golem, performing our rotations of abilities and skills.

The mini-boss was slashed left and right, tumbling back and forth only to fall down in monstrous fashion. With the demonic bats dwindling in numbers, Atalanta was able to walk slowly towards our position to assist us. With my fleet footwork and nimble reflexes, I succeeded in keeping my health pool at a sort-of healthy position throughout the fight.

"Finish him off!" White sounded at Atalanta.

"G-gotcha," Atalanta replied, charging up her arrow.

"Keep him down!" Kuro replied, jutting one of her daggers into the golem's joints. 

I do the same, applying my full weight on the fallen Golem, and sticking my sword in its underpinnings.

A large and impossibly fast arrow whisked past everyone, creating a shockwave of energy that knocked us notably distant from the golem. The arrow emitted a bright cerulean, illuminating the entire cave and pierced its way into the center of the golem's core. The arrow broke, and so did the nucleus of the monster. The golem crumbled into pieces of debris, and items of several rarities spewed out from its dying body.

All that was left were the remaining flying creatures. They were taken out readily by Atalanta and the rest of the group, so by the end, we were left with four tired players, and a bundle of unlooted items. I collapsed onto the floor, and that caused a domino effect that led everyone to do the same.

"So, who's going to pick it up." White groaned, his arms and knees shaking.

"I can't move." Kuro complained, "Winter, you go do it."

"What?" I exclaimed, "Can't Atalanta do it?"

Usually, people would be excited to be getting loot, but right now no one had the energy to move from their positions.

"No, don't wanna." She pouted, sticking her tongue out. Her bare hands bruised and blistered.

"Alright, I'll take one for the team," I replied, limping towards the drops.

"How are we going to distribute the drops?" I asked.

"Fuck it," Kuro said, "I don't care anymore."

"I'll take the Stonebound Earrings then," I replied, "You guys can roll for everything else."

"Sure," White said.

"Works for me." 

Atlanta nodded slightly, unable to speak.

Just as we were about to distribute the drops, I got a familiar notification.

"Dune: Where are you guys? Are you OK?"

Wintertime

The next chapter will be a Q&A but expect chapter updates every few days. I'm back in the groove, and hopefully, this time it lasts longer since I have more free time. Thanks for your support. Rate my novel, and leave a review if you're interested in future updates.