POV Vesuvius:
“What?! These annoying bats attacked my army, destroying my stuff?” The huge dragon fumed angrily, a huge bolt of lightning striking his body.
A kobold on top of the tall cliff trembled under the eyes of the dragon, its whole body overwhelmed by the feeling of inferiority and subservience.
Vesuvius felt his blood boil in anger, ‘These cowardly vampires are attacking my minions, my army and my property. How dare they? No, it was my fault. I was acting too cautiously instead of striking them in one destructive strike.’
The huge dragon stood up, his neck and body quickly rising from the valley bubbling with magma, his tall body towering above the shivering kobold.
‘Dammit, I knew that this would happen… No, that is part of war; there will always be some casualties. As long as my key minions are safe, it is acceptable. As for the enemies? I will make them regret this.’
The dragon flapped his huge crystalline wings, sending powerful waves of wind in all directions, the ground and stone cracking under its force. The small kobold getting pressed down into the ground.
His body shot upwards towards the sky, the lighting and fire circling and dancing around his body, a few small diamonds glittering in his armour.
Suddenly the dragon froze, his domain expanding out of his body as he caught something moving through his land.
‘Small group, relatively high mana emission. They are intruders, and the only fools that would do that are players. Ohh, I recognise that one aura. Is it my master of sacrifices? Haha, just come. I need only two levels to the next evolution anyway, as my minions farmed me already XP for one level up.’
The double-evolution was always a controversial topic with its pros and cons.
‘On one hand, I will lose one opportunity to steer the direction and customise my direction. On the other hand, the power of the two evolution trigger at once will bring stronger effects, albeit with fewer options.’
In the end, most players decided it was a bad idea, as it would slow down levelling with players lacking the needed power boost to fight the stronger enemies.
‘However, there is no such con for me, and I have already decided upon my path. There is no need for more options.’
The dragon’s head turned towards the horizon, from where the party of players was coming, with his eyes burning in greed and anger simultaneously.
POV Commander Alabaster aka overconfident sacrafice:
A large group of people moved through the mountains with superhuman speed. Their armours were loudly banging as they leapt and jumped over the fissure and canyons, all moving like monkeys through a jungle.
‘A dragon? Haha, just wait until you face my legendary build. Even if you survive, I will return over and over until your turn into XP!’
All of the players burned in confidence, knowing that they were the elite exploratory squad of a large guild, ‘I will show the guild master that she made a mistake and I am the one worthy of fighting against the world threat.’
He looked towards the horizon, a wave of magic hitting his face, making him grin as he realised their target was close.
“I feel the boss is close! Prepare for the battle!” he glanced towards the small party following right behind them, a mocking smile forming on his lips, “And you noobs, don’t get in our way!”
“Of course, you are the pros here.” The player in shiny armour and a long blue cloak calmly nodded as he slightly retreated. Above his head was a floating nametag: MarcAntonius.
‘At least they know their place. They are good guides, but in the battle, they will be useless.’
“Spread out and be careful of AOE attacks!”
Instantly motes of light burst from the backs of his men, quickly arranging into massive wings as they rose high towards the sky.
The whole group spread through the sky in a wide fan-like formation.
Soon, the whole sky darkened, pitch black and thick clouds crawling all over the sky as if a storm was coming. Thunder rumbled in the distance, getting closer and closer towards them.
All the players gripped their weapons, the runes on their faintly glowing magical armours coming to life with calming, pulsing, yellow lights.
They all felt it, as an invisible pressure enveloped their whole bodies as if they were suddenly submerged into burning oil. It was uncomfortable, but no one let it affect their calm, as everyone was already used to the auras of powerful raid bosses.
‘Come on, be a good and arrogant dragon!’ Alabaster drew his two weapons, a small blue, glowing rune-covered dagger and a massive pitch-black spear with a spiky tip and red glowing letters engraving along its shaft.
“Huh, more fools? You should know that all of your efforts are futile, mortal. You are nothing but a speck of dust before my power.” a deep voice causing a burning sensation in everyone’s ears, spread from every direction as if it came from the land itself.
Ding!
//
New mission:
Objective: Survive for at least ten minutes against the regional threat
Reward: Reward based upon the survived time.
//
Everyone immediately tensed, their eyes looking around them, expecting an attack to come from any direction.
Everyone’s eyes glinted under their helmet, mana flowing through their veins. This was the actual reason why the players were determined to fight the extremely powerful beings.
‘We don’t have to win. As long as we survive, we will get stronger and stronger until we learn how to counter all of the bosses’ moves, gain more levels and bigger groups and then eventually strike them down. ‘
They were unbeatable. The more they fought, the stronger they grew.
Immediately a powerful wind rose around them, causing them to lose their balance as they desperately flapped their wings to keep in the air. They felt like they were in the middle of a hurricane, the wind playing with their bodies like ragdolls.
Everything around them was loudly howling, clouds of dust smashing against their visors, making it hard to see.
‘This is problematic, a movement and senses restricting environment.’
Suddenly the temperature of the air rose, a bright blue light illuminating the whole sky.
Without even thinking, Alabaster swung and poured mana into his dagger, a bright blue glow of mana enveloping his whole body. The world around him morphed and warped, the shapes and colours distorting.
[Teleporting to safety… Failure! Effect: <No Retreat> is active.]
A bright red light radiated out of his spear, his body stopping as if he had hit an invisible wall.
[Teleporting to safety… Failure! Effect: <No Retreat> is active.]
His spear flashed again and then again, the red lights constantly flashing, his body launching to all sides as if he was on a rollercoaster while more and more notifications flashed in the corner of his vision.
[Teleporting to safety… Failure! Effect: <No Retreat> is active.]
Finally, the shaking stopped as the world around him stabilised, the colours and shapes becoming normal once more.
[Teleporting to safety… Success]
The world around him morphed again as he appeared on the other side of the valley where he was before.
He levitated high above the ground, flapping his wings of light.
He blinked as a large blue ray passed through where he was before, its radiance illuminating the whole sky, penetrating even through the black veil of clouds and smoke.
A massive explosion of flames passed through the players in the air, burning through their bodies without any resistance.𝒪𝔳xt.𝐜𝓞𝕞
[Your party member Osidina died]
[Your party member Granite died]
[Your party member PebleStein died]
…
Alabaster shook his head, the heat from the attack reaching all the way towards him, making him feel as if he were gazing straight into the sun, ‘Damn, this was just a casual attack, and we already have casualties.’
A grin formed on his face, knowing that his perfect build worked as it was supposed to.
‘I still can’t believe there is such a broken combination of items in this game.’
He briefly glanced at his dagger, which was a rare item with a simple effect that allowed him to pour mana into it to automatically teleport into a random safe area in the surrounding region.
It usually was useless in combat as it was unpredictable. It picked a location based upon a priority, so he would likely end up far from a fight in some random village or a town.
‘Luckily, I have you. And they called you a bad item.’ he smiled as he looked at the vile red glowing, pitch spear in his second arm.
It was a piece of cursed equipment, giving immense power at the cost of a significant harmful effect.
‘No, retreat. One using this spear can never get further than a certain distance from his foe. Normally that would be a curse, but together with the dagger, it is game-breaking.’
He almost laughed, knowing that all he had to do was to pour some mana into his dagger, and he would automatically dodge any attack while still appearing somewhere on the battlefield.
‘There is no need even to think; all I need is to pour mana, and I will dodge while still not leaving the battlefield as the spear blocks any teleport outside, forcing the dagger to teleport me nearby.’
He got out of his daydream when small blue dots ignited all over the sky. The small silhouettes of the surviving party members unleashed bolts of mana that drew bright blue lines through the sky.
All of them were shooting in the direction from where the beam came, their flickering blue lights almost getting drowned in the black clouds.
Alabaster also aimed his glowing red spear, quickly pouring more and more mana into it, its tip glowing in a bright red brilliance like a red dwarf.
The next moment a thin ray burst from its tip, drawing a thin but concentrated line throughout the sky, piercing and penetrating the clouds.