Former Hero, Solo Play Oriented

“Awake, I have awakened!”

“Ugh! I really woke up!”

“It was a nightmare of a pattern… Do we have to fight it again if we reset? I’m not confident.”

Blocked by an external barrier generated during combat, the fallen gathered together near the entrance of the Area 2 combat zone and cheered.

Bae Merong sat down on the ground with a heavy sigh.

“Haaa…”

“Good job, Bae Merong.”

Chris smiled brightly and patted Bae Merong’s head.

Bae Merong looked up at Chris with a sulky expression.

“…You’ve been so into Rain lately that you don’t even pay attention to me… You used to think I was cute too, remember?”

“Oh, come on, my precious Dayeon, you’re still cute.”

“Hehe.”

Chris, who was looking at Bae Merong with pride, suddenly checked the time.

How long has it been since we started strategizing against Jacam?

Today’s scheduled attempt time was coming to an end.

“This is a problem. I didn’t expect it to take this long.”

Chris wore a troubled expression.

She had planned to finish Jacam as quickly as possible and gather information on the last named enemy with the remaining time, but things had gone awry.

“By the way, it’s easier than I expected, right? Once you adapt to the terrifying normal patterns, the gimmick itself doesn’t seem like much?”

At Seob Seop Yi’s light comment, Chris shook her head.

“What do you mean? If we didn’t have any info on Rain, do you really think we could have cleared it today?”

Seob Seop Yi hesitated for a moment, stroking his chin thoughtfully.

“Well… I guess we wouldn’t have been able to figure out the magical rampage that makes a 12-stack of magic infusion.”

“The subsequent connecting patterns of absorption, feeding, and groggy are still likely shrouded in mystery.”

Bae Merong and Cherni chimed in in agreement.

“Honestly, if we just charged in blindly, it would have been too difficult. Rain’s handling this solo, right? How did they even figure out these gimmicks? Was it possible thanks to time restrictions? Still, to clear it, we’d need to cut off at least 200 million HP…”

“Isn’t someone possibly helping? I can’t imagine Rain taking down a raid dungeon all by himself.”

“That’s not it. If he wasn’t alone, finding the magical rampage gimmick would be a hurdle too. What kind of party would think to limit the magic infusion to a single person and create a 12-stack?”

“Is that so?”

Bae Merong and Cherni made puzzled faces at Deathly Death’s counterargument.

Chris nodded.

“If there had been several days of attempts, maybe they experimented with different things and discovered it. But… in just one day? Surviving through the normal patterns is tough enough! No way.”

Rain.

The more she knew him, the harder it was to gauge the limits of his abilities.

Clap!

Chris clapped her hands to draw the raid members’ attention.

Rain was fighting in his own way. It wouldn’t look good if they kept discussing him.

Chris shot daggers at the raid members as if to say, “If you disturb our Rain, I’ll kill you.” The party members, who had been chattering about Rain, inhaled sharply and fell silent.

“Alright, let’s always remember, we need to go at our own pace, okay? Shall we auction off the loot first and then talk?”

She then smiled wide and linked the dropped item.

[Abyssal Ring]

[Legendary Grade]

[Strength +80, Agility +80, Intelligence +80]

[Damage Reduction +12%]

[Critical Damage Reduction +30%]

[Unique Ability: Reduces all damage taken from NPCs by 10%]

(When acquired, bound to the user)

“Ooh, as expected. The Area 2 named enemy drops a ring with defense options. It seems similar to the drop table of the Elite Dungeon.”

“Technically, even with this, you could still die in one hit in a raid dungeon.”

“What do you mean? Damage reduction options are important. With something like that, you could deal with the Echo Stone recovery amount from the Elite Dungeon, right? You wouldn’t even need a counter for minor patterns. Even in Astria Online, where HP is nearly meaningless, damage reduction is a crucial option.”

“Just the stats alone would be a significant gain.”

“If we enhance the magic stone with special enhancements and replace it with a player option, we could go rampage in the faction battlefield.”

“With those options, it seems like you wouldn’t die from one hit of Jacam’s sword. I’ll use it for the inner dungeon. If I have enough left, I’ll bid for one more for PVP later.”

In “Astria Online,” players had no armor items. Metal armor was meaningless before the bizarre power of magic. While there were outfit items like armor, they served little more than for looks.

Mithril or magically processed armor could provide sufficient defense, but that was the NPC’s story. For ‘Adventurers from the Stars,’ the item ‘ring’ replaced that position.

Rings that imposed no movement restrictions provided great stats alongside substantial defense. It held value comparable to earrings.

However, members of the Hong Baek raid team watched Chris with greedy eyes. They couldn’t win if they got into a bidding war with her.

Chris chuckled softly and placed her bid.

“I’ll bid 2,000 gold. You’ll have a generous share of the distribution.”

“Whoa! As always, Raid Leader Chris!”

“Ugh, I will follow you all my life! I love gold the most!”

The ranger, Go Seung Woo, shed tears of joy.

“So, today’s attempt is extended, huh?”

“Tomorrow is Sunday, right? Since we extended it, I’ll delay the start time tomorrow, so let’s try to progress a bit more today.”

The 12 members of the Hong Baek raid team continued even after the regular attempt time was over.

Their strides as they traversed Area 3 were undeterred.

Chris had an obligation to relay information to Rain. Just sitting back and soaking up the strategy wasn’t something she could allow herself to do.

[Knight ‘Drizzle Rain’ (Offline)]

Rain was still offline. Assuming he had gotten enough sleep, she could imagine that the attempts against Jacam had been agonizing.

His real body would need recovery time as well.

Chris roughly wiped at her eyes, which were starting to redden, and moved forward beyond Area 3.

Finally arriving at the heart of the ‘Abyssal Tree.’ The entrance appeared to be a massive canopy made of enormous tree trunks.

In front of it was what seemed to be a clearing for a named enemy combat zone.

And, two giant golems.

[Flame Spear Soldier]

[HP 100,000,000 / 100,000,000 (100%)]

[Ice Shield Soldier]

[HP 100,000,000 / 100,000,000 (100%)]

“This is…!”

“A gatekeeper, a mid-boss!”

The placement entranced the raid members, draining their energy.

The combat zone was divided left and right.

“This is similar to the placement of the 1 named in the Ice Castle of the Frozen Land, right?”

“Well… even the gatekeeper isn’t a pushover.”

“There aren’t any cliffs in between, right? We can move back and forth, can’t we?”

“Should we split in half?”

Chris looked at the two giant golems with a dejected expression.

They were pressed for time.

They didn’t have time to be delayed by these things.

But it wasn’t the moment to be in despair.

Chris shook her head vigorously and gave the orders.

“Let’s split for now. The shield soldier’s tank will be Deathly Death, and I’ll take the spear soldier’s tank.”

The 12 members of the Hong Baek raid team split into two groups of six, taking positions in front of the spear soldier and shield soldier.

And then…

Wooong.

From the canopy leading to Area 3, a demon appeared.

Chris glared up at him, gritting her teeth.

“Gatekeeper Veid….!”

That was the demon controlling the Ants at the entrance of Area 1’s named enemy combat zone.

“Ka-ka-ka-ck! I never imagined the intruders would make it to the commander’s quarters! Was Death Knight Jacam not doing his job properly?”

He laughed as he looked down at the raid members.

Snap.

And raised his hand.

Woo-woo-wooong!

Mana gathered in his hand, and…

Boooom!

Thud.

The golems, which had seemed like eternal statues, started to rise at Veid’s gesture.

And…

Rumble-rumble.

The entire ominous combat zone of the ‘Abyssal Tree’ began to move.

“W-What!”

“It’s an earthquake!”

Rumble-rumble!

In the midst of the violent tremors, all the raid members lowered their stances and scanned their surroundings.

Thud-thud!

The ground beneath the users.

Naturally, it was also part of the tree.

Thud, thud!

It was moving.

And the ground collapsed.

What remained was a narrow rectangular combat zone centered around the ‘Flame Spear Soldier’ and ‘Ice Shield Soldier.’ A slightly raised combat area under each party member’s feet.

All other ground collapsed, revealing the bizarre dark hole.

“Th-That’s a cliff!”

“This is the same as the 1 named in the Ice Castle! No, maybe slightly different? But, still! We can’t cross to the opposite side!”

Chris scanned the combat zone with her eyes.

So, all the ground except for what the named enemies stood upon has collapsed? No. Tree pillars were rising about every 8 meters.

There was difficulty, but it seemed possible to use the 8-meter transport ability ‘Backward Evasion’ or similar skills to step on the pillars and jump to the other side.

However, if they were to separate to handle each enemy, crossing to the other side wouldn’t be necessary, would it?

That question was soon resolved when the battle began.

Whoooooosh!

Flames began to swirl around all raid members standing near the ‘Flame Spear Soldier’.

[Flame Infusion (3 minutes)]

[Attack Power 30% increased, will die after 3 minutes]

The same applied to the ‘Ice Shield Soldier’ side. A chilling aura began to emanate from the raiding members gathered around Deathly Death.

[Ice Infusion (3 minutes)]

[Defense Power 30% increased, will die after 3 minutes]

Chris gasped.

“This is crazy…!”

The meaning of this buff was clear.

Before three minutes pass, they needed to switch positions.

They had to step on the tree pillars rising every 8 meters.

Cross the cliff with the ground that has collapsed.

Chris screamed.

“Aah~! The gatekeeper in this dungeon is mid-boss level!”

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