Aegis and Darkshot looked on in horror at the scene, watching Lina’s confused face disintegrate as she was forced to log out from the game with an angry, battleaxe wielding Rakkan standing behind her. The blue scroll that she had picked up dropped from her inventory, falling to the ground at her feet.

“What the hell Rakkan!?” Aegis shouted angrily as Darkshot pulled an arrow in his bow and fired it.

“Pinning Shot!” Darkshot shouted without hesitation, but as it reached Rakkan, he deflected it with ease.

“After all we went through together, you’re going to betray us for a blue scroll?” Aegis snarled at him angrily, Rakkan turning his glare to Aegis.

“I don’t care about the scroll.” Rakkan kicked the scroll in its case across the floor at Aegis. Simultaneously he dashed with incredible speed across the room towards Darkshot, well beyond Darkshot’s movement capabilities to avoid. Aegis saw it coming and ignored the scroll, dashing to intercept Rakkan with his shield. Rather than attack Aegis, Rakkan stopped his dash and hopped backwards out of the way at the last second to avoid several arrows from Darkshot that pierced the stone floor.

“Then why the hell did you kill Lina?” Aegis shouted angrily.

“Forget it Aegis, this guy’s a no good PK player. I shoulda suspected something when he started using multiple weapons. He’s probably trying to become a battlemaster.”

“He said something like that, yeah.” Aegis nodded as Rakkan took a few more steps back.

“The number one class for player versus player combat in the game right now is widely considered to be the Battlemaster. So when you see someone playing a battlemaster, that’s usually the reason.” Darkshot explained.

“So you’re all about protecting NPCs to the point you almost get us killed, but you’ve got no problem killing players?” Aegis shouted angrily at him. Rather than answer, Rakkan tried to charge again around Aegis to reach Darkshot, but cleverly aimed arrows and Aegis’ movement blocked his path.

“I don’t expect a live streamer to understand. You just care about putting on a good show. Bet you hope to get a lot of views for pretending to be the hero and saving the helpless NPCs. All you really care about is yourself!” Rakkan shouted. “Switch!” His battleaxe was replaced by a crossbow.

Rakkan jumped into the air and fired the crossbow over Aegis’ head, aiming for Darkshot, but Aegis jumped upward to intercept it.

“I’ve been paying attention to how you fight. Charge Strike!” Rakkan shouted. It was his first time using that skill since Aegis’ had met him, so Aegis wasn’t completely sure of what to expect, but Rakkan got a sudden burst of forward momentum mid-air, flying toward Aegis, his true target of the attack. Rakkan swung his longsword down at Aegis from the left side, drawing his shield in that direction to Brace it.

“Switch!” Rakkan shouted. As his longsword was braced by Aegis’ shield, Aegis saw the crossbow dematerialize and re-appear as a long, intricately crafted spear of which Aegis hadn’t seen Rakkan use yet, and Rakkan thrust it forward at Aegis from the right side where he had no shield to block it, and it looked like it was going to pierce into the right side of Aegis’ head to deal bonus damage.

Equipped: Copper Short Sword

Level Up!: Sword Mastery reached level 2!

Your use of the Sword Mastery skill has unlocked the Sword Mastery Ability: [Parry]

[Parry] - Any Sword, Axe, Mace, Dagger, Polearm, Scepter, Staff, Hammer

Swing your weapon at an incoming attack to offset its trajectory, attempting to make it miss completely. Stamina is consumed regardless of the Parry being successful. Stamina cost of Parry is reduced by 1% for each related weapon mastery that reaches intermediate, or 2% at advanced. Stamina cost is doubled when parrying attacks of enemies 25 levels or higher above your level.

Stamina Cost: 15% of Maximum

Aegis used his sword to knock the spear away from hitting his head directly.

“I’ve been paying attention to how you fight, too.” Aegis said as they both landed back on the ground. Rakkan gritted his teeth angrily, forced to jump backward again to avoid a few more arrows from Darkshot.

“You’re finally going to fight back?” Rakkan growled after seeing the sword, but Aegis didn’t have time to reply, the fight was suddenly interrupted by a flash of bright purple light coming from the magic circle in the center of the room. They all briefly looked to see a glowing dark mist begin to rise up out of the circle and engulfed the body of the cultist boss.

“Lina was saying something about the door, I think she was trying to warn us that the boss wasn’t done yet.” Darkshot shouted to the others.

“I don’t give a shit about the boss.” Rakkan shouted back, making another attempt to rush around Aegis and get to Darkshot. “Charge Strike!” Rakkan shouted, and with another burst of momentum he shot forward through the room, this time around Aegis, but Darkshot saw it coming and dashed away, causing Rakkan to crash into the wall instead. “Switch!” Rakkan exchanged the sword for the crossbow and fired a bolt at Darkshot, piercing him in the shoulder and dealing 143 damage. Aegis was trying his best to get back in between the two, but Rakkan’s speed was much faster than his own.

“Rapidfire.” Rakkan shouted as his crossbow began to glow red, and seconds later it started to fire bolts in quick succession. Darkshot retaliated by shooting back at him while trying to dodge the bolts. While Rakkan easily deflected Darkshot’s arrows, Darkshot struggled to avoid the crossbow bolts and got hit by 3 more before the skill ended. Aegis realized that it wasn’t just in level that Darkshot was outmatched here, the Rakkan player knew exactly what he was doing and Darkshot wasn’t going to be able to beat him.

“Minor Heal!” Aegis shouted out in a panic, healing the wounds on Darkshot but immediately regretted it, as this drew the attention of the creature that was finishing forming at the center of the room.

The boss cultist was now once again standing, but 5 times as large with dark purplish black skin, covered in strange markings that emitted a black shadowy mist. It was wielding a gigantic maul and stood 5 meters tall up to the ceiling of the room, matching the height of the female statue behind it. It gripped the maul with both of its oversized arms and roared at Aegis, glaring at him with its glowing red eyes, the word [Boss] barely visible above it’s head from how high up it was.

Aegis was forced to stop dashing forward in favor of jumping back as the giant maul was swung down on him, the flat head of the maul was easily the size of a car and covered with tiny spikes and Aegis had no interest in trying to block or parry it, especially with his pain threshold at 10.

The maul strike crashed into the floor of the room causing it to shake and rumble violently, sending up chunks of stone and dirt from the point of impact and leaving a small crater in its wake. Aegis had stumbled away not far from where the blue scroll had landed and quickly grabbed it into his inventory, watching as Rakkan chased after Darkshot along the opposite end of the room behind the giant legs of the boss that was stomping towards him.

Aegis needed a moment to think and regain control of the situation, but he wasn’t going to get one. He could avoid the boss attacks and potentially keep Darkshot up for a long time as long as Darkshot dodged Rakkan’s attacks, but that would only prolong the inevitable.

“Rakkan, you idiot. We’re locked in this room until this boss is defeated. If we die fighting each other, every poisoned NPC in Orm is going to die!” Aegis shouted at him, hoping conversation could solve the problem.

“I’m not interested in making you look like the hero for your damn stream.” Rakkan retorted.

“A second ago you cared about NPCs, didn’t you? Look at Luryala!” Aegis shouted back angrily, pointing at the dark elf, still lying unconscious at the top of the stairs.

“Don’t try to use that against me. You don’t know shit about what I care about.” Rakkan snapped back.

“So try telling me! You want to kill me for being a streamer and recording the gameplay? I can delete it, I don’t care. But you’ve got to decide what’s more important to you, killing us, or caring about the NPCs.” Aegis replied as he narrowly dodged another strike from the boss.

“I’ll kill you and save them myself. I don’t trust anything you say.” Rakkan roared back as he deflected another pinning shot from the fleeing Darkshot.

“Forget it Aegis, this guy is messed in the head.” Darkshot rejoined the conversation. Darkshot was right, Aegis thought. Whatever Rakkan’s problem was, they weren’t going to be able to change his mind. He needed another solution. Taking note of the boss's attacks, a lightbulb turned on in Aegis’ head, and he dashed towards the sealed door of the room.

“Let’s see what this game values more, realism, or mechanics.” Aegis mumbled to himself, unsure whether or not his plan would work. He waited until the boss got close and swung his maul at him, then dodged out of the way at the last second so that the huge weapon slammed into the door and the surrounding wall, breaking it apart into tiny pieces and giving them a way out - his idea worked.

“Darkshot, the door is open.” Aegis said through the party interface so that Rakkan couldn’t hear. “Run towards the Dark Elf and pick her up. I’ve got a feeling Rakkan will stop attacking you. Bring her out of the room as fast as you can.”

“Gotcha.” Darkshot replied, changing his path to rush towards the top of the stairs as Aegis lured the boss away from the door. Rakkan was about to unleash another set of bolts at Darkshot, but he stopped once Darkshot got close to Luryala.

“Get away from her!” Rakkan snarled at Darkshot, but he didn’t reply and instead scooped her up in his arms and made for the door.

“He’s taking her to safety.” Aegis answered.

“Running away and trying to make yourself look like some sort of hero still, when you’re really just a slimy, pathetic, selfish livestreamer.” Rakkan turned to glare at Aegis across the room, the way he spoke caught Aegis off guard, he could tell there was a strong hatred behind his words, and Aegis thought of a way to take advantage of this.

“Oh please.” Aegis shouted back at Rakkan as he lifted his right hand with the sword in it up so that Rakkan could see it, all while still fleeing from the boss. “Show me on the doll where a live streamer hurt you.” Aegis said mockingly. He got a much more furious reaction than he had anticipated as Rakkan suddenly charged towards Aegis across the room with a look of pure rage. Aegis quickly concluded that Rakkan was most likely young based on his temper, but that didn’t make him any less threatening.

Hoping he’d be blinded by his rage, Aegis positioned himself right behind an incoming maul attack from the boss, so that Rakkan would charge right into it. He knew at least that Rakkan was still low health from the last fight even without seeing his health in the party interface, so all he had to do was let him get hit once and it’d be over. But Rakkan wasn’t charging blindly, he saw the maul coming and stopped, dashing backwards just as Darkshot made it out of the room.

“I’m out, what’s the plan now?” Darkshot asked through the party chat.

“Take Luryala back to Orm, tell Clara the poison source and complete the quests.” Aegis replied.

“Heh? You want me to leave you there with that PKer and the boss? No way.” Darkshot replied.

“I’ll figure something out, it’s not a big deal if I die, just, complete the damn quest.” Aegis replied firmly. Darkshot let out an elongated, reluctant sigh.

“Never a dull moment. Fine, but you’re dealing with Lina after, don’t want her trying to kill me because I left you alone. That girl’s scary.” Darkshot replied. He continued running down the corridors of the hallway back towards the staircase leading out of the dungeon, but he didn’t get far before encountering a group of 7 familiar faces.

“C’mon, whatever happened between you and other streamers. You can talk to me about it, alright? You’re not the only one who has a problem with a streamer in this game.” Aegis tried to de-escalate the situation now that he felt it was somewhat under control. With Darkshot and Luryala out of the room, he didn’t particularly care about the outcome of the fight and was more concerned with what could cause Rakkan to change so suddenly and drastically like he had.

“You’re one of them.” Rakkan replied angrily.

“Yeah, you’re right, I accepted a contract to stream, to pay for my university. That doesn’t make me slimy, or pathetic, does it?” Aegis shouted as he continued to dash away from both Rakkan and the boss, using the bosses legs and attacks to widen the gap between them at every opportunity.

“It does. You take this world for granted. You don’t care who you hurt as long as you put on a good show. That’s why I don’t feel bad about killing each and every one of you, over and over again.” Rakkan shouted back angrily.

“What the hell happened to you to give you such a jaded outlook on streamers? I’m new to the whole thing, but I have no intention of being like that.” Aegis asked, but Rakkan stopped replying - he’d reached his limit. Aegis could see in his eyes that mixed in with his anger, there were tears building up, a sadness behind his rage. Aegis let out a reluctant sigh, knowing that he couldn’t risk letting Rakkan survive or else potentially he’d chase down Darkshot. He had to fight this kid, and knew it’d only make his worldview worse.

“If the only thing that’s going to make you feel better is killing me, then do it.” Aegis shouted as he unequipped his shield and sword. Aegis carefully positioned himself near the wall, so that the boss charged at him from an angle out of Rakkan’s immediate field of vision. Rakkan didn’t hesitate and charged towards Aegis with his spear and now sword equipped. The spear went straight for Aegis’ head, but Aegis shifted to have it hit his shoulder instead. It was followed by the longsword swing.

You take 209 Piercing Damage.

You take 152 Slashing Damage.

Aegis didn’t go down, he had returned to full health since the Boss encounter, due to the healing of the manacles. Rakkan’s anger and sadness was clearly visible on his face as he blindly began wailing on Aegis. Aegis did his best to make sure none of the hits would hit his head, prolonging his death for as long as possible as the manacles closed his wounds ever so slightly.

He took another set of attacks which dropped him below 200 health, and in that time, Rakkan was too blinded with rage to notice the boss’s maul was swinging down on him from above. In the last second, Aegis dashed out of the way and watched the boss’s maul attack crash down on Rakkan from above, killing him and logging him out. Aegis didn’t feel good about it though, he had half a mind to stand there and let the boss finish him off as well, but he was broken out of this idea by a shouting voice.

“Aegis! Over here! Minor Heal!” Galanis shouted as his party of 7 rushed into the room. “Your friend told us to come help you. Sorry we took so long, we cleared the entire upper floors and got stuck fighting this crazy statue boss.” Galanis added as his party began bombarding the boss with attacks, drawing its attention away from Aegis.

“No problem…You guys can handle this boss?” Aegis asked as he nonchalantly walked away from it towards them.

“Y-yeah, we should be okay. All the enemies in the keep are dead, just this guy left. Don’t worry, we’ll handle it.” Galanis reassured him. Aegis gave him a nod and headed out of the room, walking down the dark hallways leading out of the dungeon, the sounds of the maul attacks echoing behind him. Even though he’d beaten Rakkan, gained a lot of experience and completed his quests, he still felt bad about the situation. Part of it was because he had let Lina die by letting his guard down, the other part of it was that he thought he was getting along with Rakkan, and the way he was angry at him for streaming felt eerily familiar to Aegis, he’d almost seen himself in Rakkan in regards to his anger towards Makaroth.

By the time he’d made it out of the dungeon he had sent a message to Darkshot letting him know what had happened, and his bad feeling was eventually replaced by concern for the Orm NPCs, moreso now due to how Rakkan had acted. Aegis almost felt a need to prove to himself that he wasn’t concerned because of a stream, but because he genuinely didn’t want the characters dying due to his failures.

With this in mind, he began the journey back towards the village of Orm.