“Come on, guys. Just form a line here and we’ll get them,” I said. I didn’t position myself right at the opening of the tunnel. What am I, some kind of hero? If a group of players who were mostly higher leveled than me ran away then there must be something really scary coming up, right?

I wasn’t going to solo all that shit.

I just needed to look like I was super enthusiastic to fight so everybody else would also fight. The problem with us was that we had no ‘leader’. No really strong player was present. The people here looked like they were going to just take care of their own stuff, especially the other Foragers who were poised to harvest everything and run.

An organized group of player would not run away, but we weren’t organized. We didn’t even know each other, and that presented another problem with helping each other in fighting.

“Here we go,” I said enthusiastically. I lobbed one poison bottle down the tunnel as a present for the nasties coming up. The tunnel went down at a steep angle so my bottle tumbled deep into it before exploding.

Sharp cracks echoed as the tunnel crumbled from the number of monsters struggling to pass through. Red eyes in the dozens glittered in the darkness of the tunnel. I threw two more bottles at the entrance for more poison cloud coverage when the monsters exit and spread out then I made some distance from the opening because I seriously did not want to get trampled by whatever was coming out.

With my [Pyro Shell] coated shield and my [Urus Stance], I faced the mass of somethings hiding in the tunnel. They hissed and snarled, piling on each other, apparently sizing us up. I couldn't make out what they were because they jumbled all over each other.

Santi stood by my side, sprinkling traps around me, those bear trap things with wicked teeth, then he bounded off. Pathfinders should not be in the thick of battle, they should be mobile, ready to take advantage of the situation.

Mephisto positioned himself to my back while buffing me. “It’s stupid to run away,” he said. “Show me the power of the shield I made.”

To their credit, the others also came over and formed a defensive line without any bickering. They must have realized that the best way to protect the gardens and the shops setup in our headquarters was to work together. The support players retreated to the back while Hunter-Warriors cast overlapping buffs with their sigils. Pathfinders made one pass in front of the tunnel, going through my poison, to lay down mines and traps. Other Foragers also threw their poison and fire bombs. Maybe I should also try fire bombs?

A high-pitched howl nearly made me go deaf. My vision wavered a little and I felt a slight static shock.

[Dissonance Scream]

Accuracy -20%

Attack Speed -20%

Resilience -10%

“What the fuck status is this?” I said looking at my interface. The others were also surprised, spouting off strings of curses. All of us shut up as a cacophony of barks and howls answered the first one.”

“Here they come,” Santi said.

Dozens of white flashes zipped out of the clouds of poison and fire. One of them hit me and then bounced off. And then another, and another. My health went down little by little with each hit. I tried stabbing at them as they attacked but they were too fast for me to catch. Eventually, as they increased in number, I was able to hit them because they were bumping each other.

The fuckers stopped bouncing around for a while so I had a good look at them. They had the body of a flea, or at least something like a flea, insect-like with long, powerful hind legs. Yet, they had a snout on their face instead of those weird mouths insects have they were covered with white fur. Half dog, half flea? Is this some kind of joke?

My spear glowed red after I used [Ignition Blood Pact]. I timed my attacks as their legs sprung to jump on me. I attacked twice, and before the third attack, I kickstarted to double the power of the last attack. My spear erupted in flames as it connected with the thick furry backs of these dogfleafucks.

More and more of them came out. They assailed our lines without fail. The Healers made sure we could continue standing against them. Their attacks were relentless; it was as if I was assaulted by white cannonballs. But we held. I don't know for how long.

“Someone message the other players,” I said. “They should return here to help us out.” Oh, look at me, commanding them and all that, heh.

Some of the monsters jumped over our lines, attacking the support in the back and even going for the gardens in the cavern. The other players who were not part of the defensive line went after the monsters jumping over us.

“Be careful, they can destroy armor,” a player said. He was one of the players who came running out of this tunnel.

What? Isn’t it normal that durability goes down?

“Why only tell us now, dipshit.”

“Hey, no fighting.”

“What the fuck. They really are destroying armor.”

“Huh,” I said. I mentally commanded my user interface to open. There was no need to use my hands but it was easier to manually operate it so that you didn’t have to really think about it. But my hands were quite busy spearing little shits.

My upper pair of eyes stayed with the battle, trying to time my attacks with the fast leaps of the monster. My lower pair of eyes checked out my inventory and then the state of my armor.

“Holy shit,” I said. Durability plummeted fast. It was like I had been fighting for several hours already.

“I’m on it, my man,” Mephisto said. There was the clinking of metal as he hammered my armor. Apparently, that restored durability.

There were only a few blacksmiths among our ranks. If this kept up, the dogfleafucks would destroy all our equipment. We could easily kill the ones coming at us but the waves of attacks steadily increased. Bigger monsters with gold and brown fur were adding to the mix. There was even a red one with spikes on its back. The waves slowly became stronger.

It was only a matter of time until they ground our equipment to dust. With no equipment and plenty of strong monsters, we would also meet the dust soon enough. I was sure the others also realized this. There were some players who were looking back at their gardens or shop setup even. Damn it.

“Mephisto,” I called. “Mephisto, I need your help.”

“What?” he said as he ran back to me after fixing the armor of others.

“I’m going to dive into them,” I said.

He buffed me to increase my armor and durability. “Why do you want to that?”

“It’s better if I take most of the attention of the monsters. The other blacksmiths could catch up repairing the gear of the others.”

“Oh, I get it,” he said.

“Can you repair my armor from afar?”

“I don’t have that skill yet. I have to come up to you and repair it. But I have an alternative.” Mephisto took out a bottle of glistening silver liquid. “This is a bit expensive, but it would make your armor take half the durability damage for a seven minutes, but it will slow your attack speed.”

"That's fine, just use it on me."

He flicked the bottle at me and my armor glowed silver.

“I’ll pay for this later,” I said. Shit, I don’t have money. “I’m going in, people. Cover my part. With I kickstarted charge, I plunged into the mass of monsters, pushing the ones in my way as I targeted a monster deep in their midst.

My shell exploded as I rammed them. I cast it again and threw a poison bottle at my feet. A violet cloud engulfed me and my health started going down even though I still have my shell; my hefty regeneration was steadily losing. I wasn’t trying to be a hero here. If we just continued what we were doing, we would eventually be overwhelmed. And everyone would just run to harvest their crops and pack up their shops.

That would be a huge waste for me because I just planted my crops! I wouldn’t be able to harvest them yet. They would all be wasted. I couldn’t afford that given that I was super poor and I planted a substantial amount of seeds.

“Lava Overflow, bitches,” I said with a smile.

Pulses of fire burst out from my body. The flames covered a circle with the radius of about three-quarters the length of my spear. The damage wasn’t great but I could see that the monsters were Ignited.

The monsters crowded around me, throwing their bodies at me. And then the magic started to happen. My life started to trickle back up, fighting the poison, as the attacks of Ignited monsters healed me. My shell exploded again because of the numerous attacks but I had Solar Spirit to cast it as I pleased.

“Heal me you fuckers,” I said.

I kept on exploding, with my [Pyro Shell] while waves of fire flowed out of me. Fucking awesome shit. I turned on the video recording so that I could put this scene on my phone as an animated wallpaper.

I ate some Spirit herbs just to make sure my Solar Spirit was more than fifty percent in case I needed to cast [Pyro Shell] in rapid succession. The rate my Spirit healed back from the attacks of Ignited monsters still wasn't fast enough for my liking.

The rings of fire emanating from me increased in size as [Lava Overflow] got more powerful every few seconds. I didn’t use it earlier when I was in the defensive line because the monsters only came the front so there were less chances of Igniting them. I wasn’t sure if the Spirit I regen back from getting hit by Ignited monsters would be enough to sustain the cost of [Lava Overflow] if monsters only came at me from the front.

And I was right. With all of them going at me from all sides, my Spirit was barely enough to pay for [Lava Overflow] and the constant casting of [Pyro Shell].

Damn, they were melting fast from all the damage I churned out. But my armor was also getting chewed. I was just buying time, anyway. After a few minutes, the others would be back to full health and full durability for equipment, then I would run out, get myself healed, and jump back in again.

There was another [Dissonance Scream] to reapply the earlier debuff.

“Who the hell is howling?”

“Their boss obviously.”

“Where are the other players? We need help here.”

“Megiddo said he’s coming,” said a player who was probably friends with Megiddo and chatted with him.

A dogfleathing leaped for my face. I raised my shield as my shell exploded, blasting it back. Using [Ignition Blood Pact], I made another eat all three attacks and die. It was very annoying to attack them because my attack speed was reduced but my passive damage sources as well as my AoE spell was doing well. My [Lava Overflow] reached its full strength and steadily ignited everything that came out of the tunnel. I had to eat some fruits because my Spirit was running dangerously low.

And they just wouldn’t stop coming.

There was another howl that made me dizzy and stagger a bit. You know, that thing that happens when you get up so fast after being in bed for some time.

[Frightened Heart]

Healing -30%

Regeneration -20%

Resilience -10%

“Fucking shit,” I murmured. Maybe I should get out now. I ate Health fruits and Spirit herbs to counteract the reductions.

A large scythe peeked from the darkness of the tunnel. It latched on the sides. It was like those front legs of a praying mantis. Another limb appeared. They pulled a gigantic body from down the tunnel. It was the boss. Picture a werewolf slash mantis. Really weird. And it had a large abdomen covered with overlapping thorny scales. The little mobs tried to jump out of the way but many of them were squished. They weren’t even trying to attack us anymore. They just milled around, trying to get of the way of the boss monster.

I turned, considering charging out. No. If I did that, the others would also run away. If they run away, my garden would be left unprotected.

[Aura of Corrosion]

- 10 Armor per ten seconds (Max -300 Armor)

- 20% Durability on all equipment

“Oh, my me, because I’m a god,” I said.

“Woah, let’s get out of here!”

“Where’s the back up?”

“I don’t know.”

Shit, these fuckers are going to run. Maybe I should go to my garden and try to defend a small portion of it until help came. Every man for himself?

“Just hold for a little longer,” shouted Santi.

I frowned and then decided to get out of the masses of monsters. I charged out while the others killed the monsters in my way. "Did I buy you guys enough time? Are your equipments repaired?"

"Yes, thanks for that."

"What do we do now?"

"They're here," said a player, pointing to the tunnel on the other side of the cavern.

I was about to do another charge and head for my garden. About damn time. I was ready to bail out and try to harvest what I could. Fortunately, reinforcements have arrived. Meggido came out of a tunnel, his huge axe in the air, leading about twenty Mardukryons to help us like some hero straight out of the movies. The thought made me smirk a little.

ChilliMaster also came from another tunnel. Yep. This was sure win. Deus ex machina saves my plants. Maybe I should just go back to my garden. My job here was done.