POV Booba and his sidekicks:
Clouds covered the sky, only a faint trickle of moonlight passing through them.
A small castle submerged in the darkness grew on the black horizon, standing on a tall steep rocky mountain, overseeing the valley deep under it.
Its tall towers and walls towered above the single narrow passage leading up towards a gatehouse guarded by two towers from each side.
Heavily armed kobolds moved on the walls and the towers, their golden eyes faintly glowing with their heavy plate armours loudly clanging with each of their steps.
A small group of players stood on top of a tall round tower, looking down into the depths under them. One was a tall man with a spear, the second one was a fat dwarf in heavy plate armour, and the last one was a young-looking elven girl with a mage staff in her hands.
“You are finally back. Where were you?”
Suddenly something dark and fast whistled through the air, everyone turning their heads, up their golden glowing eyes looking towards the cloudy sky.
The spearmen Booba looked around, searching his head, but he couldn’t find anything. “Must…”
“Please don’t say that it was just the wind.”
Without any warning, a bright orange flame blazed on the opposite tower, a tall kobold on top of it swinging its massive polearm burning in fire, leaving behind a blazing trail.
“We are under attack!” A loud voice echoed through the dark castle, and more voices soon followed from all directions.
The sounds of heavy steps quickly multiplied, and more and more armed soldiers rushed up the walls.
At the same time, the sounds of dozens of tiny wings resounded through the air, a small swarm of bats closing towards the castle, their little eyes glowing in bright crimson light.
“They must be vampires!” the trio grabbed their weapons, their minds immediately alerted.
Lili raised her staff, lightning crackling around the sizeable blue crystal on its tip.
“Shoot them down, Lili.”
“Wow, that is an amazing idea. I would never think of it.” Lili shook her head and fed more mana into her staff.
The next moment a bright blue light flashed, and a loud bang echoed between the walls as an orb of lightning shot out, splitting into multiple branches and striking the swarm of bats.
The lightning cut through the swarm, the blue sparks and tendrils jumping between them, but the bats continued, flapping their tiny leather wings as they descended towards the castle.
The bats were landing all over the castle, changing into tall humanoids and pale humanoids with monstrous bestial faces, sharp-shaped ears and red ruby-like eyes. in puffs of smoke.
The armoured kobolds moved towards them, their weapons burning in a fire with runes flashing all over the black surfaces of their armours.
The battles erupted all over the castle, clanging and banging constantly resounding through the court as the claws, weapons, and armour were clashing and smashing against each other.
Ding!
//
New mission:
Objective: Defend the castle for as long as possible
Reward: Calculated upon the completion
//
The three players stood on top of the tower in panic, realising the meaning of the words.
“Even the system thinks that we are screwed…”
“Shit, do you have silver weapons? They are lesser vampires!” Finally, Booba got out of his shock.
“Use flames. They are as much of a vulnerability.”
A red light flashed before the players, the monstrous vampire appearing out of nowhere, swinging its long black claws, its overcoat made of unknown pitch-black leather rustling with each movement.
Booba stepped backwards, the claws narrowly passing by his chest, their sharp tips creating a bleeding claw mark on his chest.
The beast kept advancing, pressing against him, constantly swinging its claws in a chaotic and fast pattern.
The claws constantly slashed and cut towards Booba, who kept retreating and stabbing with his spear. The red streak of lights flashed before his eyes as the vampire unleashed a flurry of strikes.
“Quickly, help me. I can’t hold for much longer!”
The elven witch rose her staff, flames quickly gathered around its tip and growing in intensity, the bright orange light flooding the whole tower.
Booba kept retreating, more and more blood flying out of his chest, the claws digging and clawing through his armour as if it was just a paper.
“Ahhhh!”
Suddenly a flaming axe descended towards the vampire as the fat dwarf rushed into the fight, loudly shouting.
The vampire’s red eyes just glinted as he moved like a spectre with immense speed, the axe hitting only the ground and exploding into flames and magma.
At the next moment, Lili banged her staff against the ground, flames exploding and spreading in all directions, enveloping the whole roof.
“Ahhh!” the vampire blazed up like a torch, its body turning into cinders.
“Shit!” They all looked down, the vampires appearing everywhere, overpowering the kobolds with sheer numbers.
POV Vesuvius:
The huge dragon stood in the dark, burning valley. The ground under and around his massive body was littered with cracks with brightly glowing orange-red magma pouring out. It was impossible to see far with the thick haze of volcanic vapours drifting through the air.
The dragon’s golden eyes brightly glowed, observing a large chunk of black coal and a small blue diamond gem levitating in the air right in front of him.
“I need treasures to forge my armour. Collecting gold from conquered territories is not enough if I don’t want to ruin them. I need gems, and gems are something that I should be able to make myself. I am a force of nature.”
The dragon opened his mouth, and a blazing purple magma flowed out.
The long crystal horns on his head glowed in bright light, and the magma flowing out of his mouth moved as if it was alive, slithering through the air, gliding towards the coal and diamond.
The magma quickly gathered, forming a vast, house-like orb that was like a purple sun, its bright purple brilliance illuminating the whole valley.
‘This must work; I have everything.’𝓞𝑣xt.𝐜𝒪𝐌
Vesuvius looked at it, his eyes glowing in greed and his heart pounding in expectations.
Finally, he closed his long-clawed hand into a fist in a symbolic gesture.
Immediately his whole domain moved and swirled, and the glow of his horns became even brighter than before.
The giant sphere of magma around the coal was compressing around the coal, the domain, the element controlling horns and the fire core deep within his body, pushing the magma towards the coal.
The air shivered, the massive purple, glowing orb of magma becoming smaller as the immense pressure started to compress it, crushing and transforming the coal within its centre.
Vesuvius closed his eyes in focus, ‘I have a diamond seed, pressure and temperature. Now I need only a time.’
The dragon pumped even more mana into his horns, the light radiating out of them becoming even brighter than before, as if he had a crown of stars on his head.
The whole air was burning, the light refracting in the heated-up air molecules.
‘It should be faster than on earth as I am using much higher pressure and temperature.’ He quietly observed the compressing, searing orb of brightly glowing magma, all of the air around it burning, turning the whole valley into a hell-like scene.
Vesuvius moved his long neck, bringing his head closer towards the searing hot blob, not feeling any discomfort.
Then he inhaled, his eyes slightly distorting, his sensitive snout immediately catching that whatever was inside was growing in value.
‘Hahaha, to think I could use my nose this way…’
The dragon kept breathing, repeatedly inhaling the hot air, the flames getting sucked into his lungs. His eyes widened as he felt the price of whatever was inside constantly growing.
‘Well, whatever is cooking inside definitely is no longer just coal. I guess I should check inside.’
He stopped, the glowing blob of magma separating, the blazing hot liquid raining down towards the ground, leaving behind only a black blazing-hot material.
Vesuvius moved his head closer, his golden eyes carefully observing the material before him.
‘Wait, I need to remove the waste material from the surface.’
A powerful wind rose up loudly, howling and carrying the tiny ash particles. The smoke smashed against the smooth black material, grinding it under immense speed.
The black material quickly grew smaller and smaller, and then something glinted inside.
The dragon immediately went into a frenzy, the wind becoming even stronger, the massive black clouds around his enormous body turning into spinning and howling vortexes and twisters.
Finally, only a shiny blue crystal glowing in a faint light remained to hover in the air.
Vesuvius calmed down, the wind slowing down and carefully grinding and polishing its surface. The crystal was quickly becoming shinier and more brilliant with every passing second.
‘Haha, it worked. Now I can forge myself an armour of diamonds!’
Vesuvius inhaled once again, the beautiful aroma coming from the brilliant. Then he froze, realising that something was wrong, ‘No, this smells more expensive. This is not just a diamond. This must be something else.’
He couldn’t help but feel regret knowing that he should have studied more back on earth, he was more knowledgeable than an average person, but he wasn’t an expert in every field.
‘Wait, maybe there is something that I can do. I maybe don’t have access to the infinity library of knowledge known as the internet, but I know someone that does.’
He opened his faction menu, almost laughing as he started to fiddle with it. Finally, he finished it and confirmed it.
He closed his eyes, waiting in expectation, already feeling like the system would shut it down.
‘Well, even if the system blocks it, I will just ask personally, offering rewards by myself, bypassing the system.’
//
New faction mission registered:
Objective: Collect and deliver information on advanced carbon-based materials and diamonds to the faction’s leadership.
Reward: (100XP; 1 gold coin; 10 Faction points) per unique piece of information.
//
‘This is genial. I have a bunch of minions that can obtain any information I need. Well, I a large portion of it will be useless, but at least something must be what I need.’