MarekSusicky

  Lisa leaned against an old piree in the forest’s heart, her red robe with golden ats fluttering in the breeze. Designed with a little too much attention to aesthetic detail, her robe showcased her slender figure—a “gift” from the developers to male pyers, no doubt. She didn’t mind the design itself, but sighed for airely different reason. Rob was te again. Rob was always te.

  “Should we just move on?” asked her cousier, his tone mildly impatient. A supportive priest, Peter was here to help her reach the pinnacle of the game. “Natasha’s gon in trouble at school if we keep staying out this te.”

  Natasha’s cheeks flushed red, and she ducked her head further into the folds of her oversized cloak. Just as Lisa was about to call it a day, a rge summoning circle formed nearby. She ched her fists. Finally.

  Rob—a fifteen-year-old warrior who never seemed to know the meaning of punctuality—emerged from the glowing circle. He didn’t even have a ce to blink before Lisa’s fist ected with his face, sending him sprawling backward.

  “You’re te agaiime we’re going without you!” she snapped, adding a well-pced kiphasis.

  “Jeez, Lis, it was only half an hour.”

  “Only half an hour? The Fire Tamer title is at stake here! I will be the Fire Goddess—do you get how big this is?”

  Peter stepped ily, pg a hand on her shoulder. “Lis, try not to get all worked up again. Dmitry beat you in every ame…”

  Her fiery gre cut him off mid-sentence, making him backpedal. That only added fuel to her resolve, and her eyes practically burned with determination. “Let’s go!” She led the group toward the dungeorance.

  As they reached the edge of the forest, the sery shifted into an ominous, dying nd. Gray ash bhe ground, and fire elementals roamed across the barren ndscape, casting flickering shadows that danced across the scorched earth.

  The elementals’ bodies were made of pure fme, and their semi-transparent forms left them unfazed by physical attacks. Varying in size and shape, they each had distinct, almost humanoid features, yet each was as unique as any pyer character.

  “Isn’t the forest line shorter than st time?” Rob mumbled, casting wary gnces back at Lisa.

  “Yeah, some old NPC said that until we clear the Scorg Dungeon, it’ll keep spreading,” Lisa said with unshakable fidence. Her steps were full of purpose as they marched onward, the fiery elementals being part of their routine.

  Rob braced himself, charging into the fray, tanking the elementals’ fmes with his shield and sizable health pool. Peter and Natasha worked in tandem, casting healing spells that kept him topped off.

  Their progress was steady, and after an hour of fighting, they reached the dungeorance—a jagged rift in the mountaihat exhaled waves of oppressive heat. The air was thick with the stench of sulfur.

  “I don’t want to die again,” Rob muttered, though his words echoed what they all felt.

  “ up!” Lisa said, giving him a reassuring hug and fshing a grin. “There’s y for dying here!” The heat and sulfur gave her goosebumps, but she brushed it off and ughed to rally the others.

  “Natasha, you’re up,” she ordered. The quiet redhead nodded, stepping forward and activatihief’s skill, [Detect Trap].

  With closed eyes, she sed the entrance corridor, her movements cautious and deliberate. The red glow from molten stones along the walls illuminated a maze of deadly traps. Though she couldn’t see them directly, an instinctive dread seemed to guide her steps as she inched forward, setting a path for the others. They followed, tiptoeing after her and mirr each careful movement.

  Suddenly, a massive explosion reverberated through the corridor, filling the air with firelight and jolting the group. They barely flinched.

  Just another Rob’s day in the Scorg Dungeon.

  [Teammate Rob has suffered 50 damage. Remaining HP: 10]“Rob! You stupid piece of fish! I will—aargh! Not again! Everyoop!” Lisa shrieked. In this dungeon, every time someoriggered a trap, the remaining traps would rearrahemselves, resetting the entire corridor’s yout. Peter hurriedly filed his staff, casting a quick heal on clumsy Rob, while Natasha cautiously started f their path forward once more. It took them two grueling hours to finally make it through the endless, shifting trap corridor.

  “I hate this; it’s so dumb! So annoying!” Rob grumbled, always the first to pin without much thought. Lisa’s own grumbles were a close sed, her irritation mounting with each step. Peter, however, stayed focused, a little worried as he sidered their future. He needed Lisa to succeed, but he also genuinely cared about her well-being.

  The corridor finally widened, marking the end of the trap zone. Just ahead, Fire Elementals appeared once more, apanied by enormous fming spheres known as [Fire Tails]—suicidal fireballs that hurled themselves at anyone nearby. There was no going around it; they had to push through.

  Rob braced himself, tanking two Fire Elementals at once, but his eyes widened as he saw a clump of ten Fire Tails rolling around the er.

  “Ining! Fet Rob—focus oails!” Lisa’s anding voice cut through the chaos. “From left tht, fast, or they’ll wipe us out! Natasha! That’s not left!”

  The team sprang into a, targeting the Fire Tails one by one as they raced toward them. But they were barely keeping up with the onsught; one ball was still hurtling toward Rob, who was fending off the elementals.

  Peter, sensing disaster, summoned all his focus and broke his own record, creating a healing rune in a fra of a sed. The ruivated just as the st Fire Tail struck Rob, healing him in the nick of time.

  [Teammate Rob has suffered 50 damage. Remaining HP: 3]“Man, these balls! I was the farthest of y’all!” Rob whined as the elementals tio burn him alive, but healers didn’t allow him to die.

  After two grueling hours and tless battles, they finally reached the Boss room. Lisa’s heart pounded in her chest. They’d already failed to quer this Boss five times, and just that m, she’d heard Dmitry had defeated the first Boss in the Hell Dungeon. The thought g her; uilds were getting closer to surpassing her and stealiitle as the “Fire Goddess.”

  The cavernous boss room stretched out before them, the rock walls roasted and scorched from the intense heat radiating from molten va streams snaking across the ground. Lisa gnced warily at a jagged ro the ter of the room; its surface was searing to the touch, a painful lesson Natasha had learhe hard way. Falling into the va streams, as Rob had done before, meant game over.

  The room suddenly darkened as the Boss emerged from an opening on the far side, a t figure cloaked in molten red. With a casual wave of his staff, the torches around the room bzed to life, illuminating his intimidating form.

  [Exed Lv.7]Type: 5-epigeon Boss | HP: 1800/1800“Here we meet once again, immortals! Hail to you, Lisa, self-procimed Goddess of Fire—you shall die again by my hand!” tauhe Boss, his voice rumbling through the cavern with a dark ugh that nearly made Lisa lose her focus.

  “You rew, ugly excuse for a demon! I am the true Queen of Fire—I am fire itself!” Lisa shrieked, her body trembling with fury. Her words only seemed to amuse him, his ughter eg through the room, mog her fiery passion.

  Not this time, Lisa. You’ve messed up three times already. She took a deep breath to steady herself.

  “Everyone, get into the positions we discussed! Rob, for the love of god, stay out of the va this time. I’d rather you die by his hand tha in that pit again!” The group moved with purpose—mages and priests took their pces in the back, cle fighters positiohemselves he Boss, and Natasha disappeared into the shadows with [Vanish].

  “Let’s make this iing, shall we? What kind of leader would I be if I used the same tactic every time?” the Boss sneered, summoning a new set of enemies. “Fire Elementals! Answer my call!”

  One by one, Fire Elementals crawled from the streams of molten va, some of them mimig the group’s own members. Lisa could see familiar, fiery copies of Rob aer among them, whily fueled her rage.

  “Switch to Tactic Four!” she anded, her voice sharp. “Everyohree o’clock! Focus fire at the front! Natasha, stay hidden!” The group repositioned swiftly, cle fighters shielding the mages and priests at the back. Lisa gripped her staff, maneuvering it expertly through the air as glowing ruterns appeared with each flick of her wrist.

  As she finished drawing the first rune and shouted the spell’s name, she was already halfway through the sed. Her trol was fwless, even mesmerizing. If Charlie had been watg, she probably would have jumped into the va out of sheer awe.

  [Perfect Runecraft! Damage x2. Target is resisting fire; damage halved][Critical hit! Target lost 15HP]

  The battle had been raging for twenty minutes. Each spell Lisa cast was faster, more powerful, and deadlier tha. Her focus was razor sharp, her stern gaze unwavering. She was the fire; she felt its heat flowing through her veins. With a fierce yell, she hurled a perfect fireball straight at the Boss’s head. “Take that, you ugly, winged freak!”

  “You puny girl! Fire against fire! As you wish, Doom Tails!” The Boss, enraged, summoned sixty [Fire Tails]. This was the dreaded attack that had wiped them out every time before. But to his astonishment, they charged toward him without a hint of fear.

  “You really thought fire would kill me?” Lisa ughed, her voiing through the cavern. “You poor, na?ve demon! You’ll be gone before it even touches me!” The fiery balls hurtled forward, closing in fast.

  At the st possible moment, Lisa shouted, “Now! Natasha, get ready!”

  “God’s will!” their padin ted. His spell cast a warm, divine light around them all, f a protective barrier for just half a sed. A hair’s breadth too te or too early, and they would have been lost. But the timing was fwless.

  [Boss Exed has suffered catastrophic damage. 50x50, fire damage halved. Remaining HP: 80][Exed ehe weakeate]At that moment, Natasha struck from behind. The timid girl was gone, repced by a steely, focused assassin, her expression fierce. Lisa couldn’t help but grin at the transformation. Natasha aimed directly for the Boss’s head, and the siing sound of her dagger slig through flesh and bone was both brutal and satisfying.

  [Nat4sha dealt critical stealth attato a weakeate, 10x2x2x5][Exed has beeed. +50XP (400/8)] [You found an unknown staff.][You found an unknown rune.][You found an unknown armor.][You have defeated the first Boss of the dungeon, your progress has been saved]