Chapter 74: Dungeon Run (2)

As soon as they stepped through the portal, Arthur and his group were teleported inside the dungeon. It was nothing like what it looked like from the outside.

They weren’t inside some random ruin. It was a wide open area, full of greenery. A kind of forest, but not a dense one. The trees were spread far apart, very different from the forest where the elven settlement was located.

Before anyone moved, Arthur talked to his team.

“How many hours do you all have left?” he asked.

Since everyone had logged in around the same time, the answers were similar. Arthur had 2 hours of playtime, and the person with the least was Shadow Cloak, with only 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Time moved differently inside the game, so even though those numbers showed up in-game, the real-world time was actually less than that.

“That’s not a lot of time,” Suzy said, pulling up a few system tabs. “From what I’m reading here, the developers said this dungeon takes at least 3 hours to complete, and it usually takes longer than that.”

The moment they entered the dungeon for the first time, the game company had already started releasing some information about it. Not exactly what it looked like inside or what enemies were in it, more like some of the possible rewards and average completion times for a level 20 dungeon.

And even that minimum time was already more than they had. On top of that, they were all between level 15 and 17, which meant the dungeon would be even harder, and in theory, would take even longer.

Everyone was worried they wouldn’t make it in time.

“Is it even worth starting?” Tower said, crossing his arms and looking straight at Arthur. “If we run out of time, we’ll have to log off and start the dungeon from scratch tomorrow. That’s just a waste.”

Nobody was confident they could pull it off given the time gap.

Arthur tried to convince them it was doable. And it was. He knew the dungeon, and he’d already bought the most important item for completing it: the repellent. It was one of the dungeon’s gimmicks, one players had taken a long time to figure out.

“Trust me,” Arthur said. “We have more than enough time to finish it. We won’t waste a second.”

His words weren’t enough. Tower, Suzy, and Shadow Cloak weren’t convinced. Even if Arthur was a great player, the gap was still brutal.

“Look, I trust you,” Shadow Cloak said, “but you and Point Blank have 2 hours, and I’ve only got 1 hour 30. I’m also tired. I’m not sure it’s worth trying. We can do it tomorrow. Nobody’s going to steal this dungeon from us.”

Suzy felt the same way.

“They just found the dungeon near the city, but nobody’s going to clear it anytime soon either since it takes multiple attempts. We can come in early tomorrow and finish this one, and be the first group to do so.”

Arthur tried to convince them, but Tower, Suzy, and Shadow Cloak decided to log off and rest. They’d come back first thing the next day to tackle the dungeon.

The only one who stayed was Point Blank. She’d spent more time with Arthur than the others, so she trusted him more.

“What now? Do we log off too?” she asked, looking down, clearly down about the situation.

“No way. We need to show the rest of the team what we’re capable of. That way they’ll actually believe us next time.” Arthur had a confident smile on his face. “We’ve got 2 hours. That’s enough to clear this dungeon as a duo. You want to try?”

“Without a tank and a healer? Are you serious?”

“Well, I’ve got a lot of HP, so I’ll be the tank. And yeah, we’d have to burn more HP potions than usual, but it’s fine. I’ve got money. It’s worth spending a few potions to lock in the reward for being the first duo to clear.”

It wasn’t just the reward for being the first duo to clear that dungeon. It was the first duo to clear any dungeon in the entire game.

That was why Arthur wanted to clear it before everyone else. On top of the extra EXP and gold, which was already incredibly useful, the game also had some more interesting rewards lined up.

“If we clear it first,” Arthur paused for dramatic effect, “we’ll get a title that boosts our damage inside dungeons by 5%, plus some free attribute points, and reputation too, of course.”

There was one more reward, but Arthur decided to keep that to himself for now. Point Blank got excited the moment she heard about those rewards.

“Alright, let’s go for it then,” she said, smiling as if she had heard the best thing ever. “I believe in you. And in myself too, hehe.”

“Perfect. Let’s step out of the dungeon and come back in.”

Point Blank nodded. They left through the dungeon portal and then entered again, but this time the system announced something different to everyone.

[Cinder and Point Blank have entered the dungeon as a duo]

[Dungeon difficulty will be adjusted accordingly, as will the rewards]

They returned to the same spot as before. The dungeon layout hadn’t changed at all.

“The difficulty scales down in the sense that there are fewer monsters with less HP and damage, but in the end it’s way harder than doing it in a full group. The reduction is way smaller than the penalty of having fewer players.”

Even with the monsters being weaker, the reduction was minimal. Not having a tank, a DPS, and a healer was far worse. So clearing the dungeon as a duo would be harder than clearing it in a full group.

Point Blank got worried.

“Isn’t that going to make it take even longer?”

“Relax,” Arthur laughed, and said something he probably shouldn’t have, but he trusted her. “It only takes long for people who don’t know the dungeon. You brought the repellent I asked for?”

“Yeah, I did. But what do you mean? How do you know this dungeon?”

An idea crossed Point Blank’s mind.

“Did you clear it during the beta?”

That was the lie he’d told her before. Saying he tested the beta was the easiest excuse, and it made sense. Eventually, Point Blank would figure out it wasn’t true. After all, the beta had only gone up to the lower levels, and Arthur knew way too much about the game for that to add up.

“Yeah, something like that,” he replied. “That’s how I knew about the repellent. Can you hand me one?”

Point Blank pulled the repellent flask from her inventory. Arthur took it, applied it to himself, then spread it around her too.

“There are 2 reasons for the repellent. First, there are some insects in here that aren’t attackable enemies, but they apply debuffs that hit really hard and make the dungeon way more annoying to get through.”

“The second reason is the final boss. You can use repellent to deal damage to him.”

“Seriously?” Point Blank had to laugh. “A dungeon final boss gets hurt by bug spray?”

It seemed absurd to her, but it was actually pretty common. Not in the sense that lots of bosses were weak to something like a repellent, but in the sense that every boss had a specific strategy behind it.

That was why players usually needed more than one attempt to clear a dungeon.

“Let’s get started. Stay with me, and be ready to fight. The enemies in this forest are elves.”

“What?”

Point Blank obeyed and pulled her bow off her back, already nocking an arrow. Arthur drew his sword too.

After roughly 50 steps, leaving the dungeon’s starting area, the first enemy appeared. Or rather, it was already waiting.

“This part of the forest has invisible elves. One of them is behind that tree over there.”

“You memorized the location of every single enemy? You’re joking, right?”

“The way you say that makes me sound like a nerd… But yeah, it’s all in here.” Arthur tapped the side of his head with his index finger.

He swapped his sword for his bow. Even knowing where the enemies were, he still wasn’t sure if the dungeon had changed in this timeline, so every precaution was necessary.

Since he knew the elf was invisible behind that tree, he aimed at it and used his Sniping Shot. And so did Point Blank!

Both of them channeled the attack and fired almost simultaneously, with just a slight gap between shots. The two arrows flew straight to the tree and hit dead on, punching through the wood and striking the invisible elf hiding behind it.

[750 damage dealt]

[480 damage dealt]

The higher number was Arthur’s, of course. Point Blank still couldn’t wrap her head around how his damage was so insane.

The dark elf that had been hiding behind the tree stumbled out with two holes in his chest. He took a few steps before collapsing dead on the ground.

[+1400 EXP]

[+5 silver coins]

[+Dark Elf Dagger]

“Look at that, we dropped an item off the very first monster. That’s pure luck! I’m feeling good vibes from this dungeon.” Arthur slapped Point Blank on the shoulder. “Cheer up. We’re going to walk out of here rich.”

After killing the dark elf, Arthur and Point Blank moved deeper into the forest. The area was dark, and it wasn’t because it was nighttime. It was a mix of black mist hanging in the air.

Arthur knew why that part of the dungeon was like that: the first boss, a powerful dark elf mage, was the one causing it all.

Anyway, since Arthur knew where every invisible elf was, taking them out was straightforward, even without Sniping Shot. Just not getting caught off guard made a massive difference.

Things started to change as they got closer to some structures deeper in the forest.

“This is the dark elf city, and here the enemy positions are randomized,” Arthur said, gripping his sword tightly. “Get ready.”