Chapter 67– Hidden Challenge Part 4, Healer Assassination

“Urah!!!” the level 76 wielding a sword and shield shouted, slashing at the fog demon while positioning himself in front of his back line. To his right, the level 79 female halberdier swung her weapon in a long arc and nicked the demon in the back.

“Permafrost!” the level 72 male mage shouted, as a blistering cold shot from in front of him and sprayed the fog demon. It seemed to be an advanced form of [Cone of Cold], a staple of the mage class and a basic spell. Some of the more accomplished human players were now capable of accessing second tier magic.

As the fight raged on, the level 75 hooded female in the background did not even attempt to move. Without a weapon in hand or any other indication of a class, it was impossible to tell what exactly she was or why she seemed to be inactive in the backline.

I approached cautiously, examining the situation unfold. Other players on the map besides the four fighting down below were avoiding this foggy castle and moat area because of the ominous mood that the fog set, as if something would appear and swallow them whole if they stayed too long.

Of course, I had the same concerns, but I had no intention of venturing too far into the fog covered castle. Or at the very least, I had no intention of being the first player to do so. I’d gladly follow other players in and allow them to trigger all the traps and ghouls and mimics that the area could be hiding.

Anyway, the point was that it was just me and June here, and the four players below fighting the fog demon. Nobody else was nearby enough to interfere.

“June,” I said. “I’m going for the halberdier first.”

June looked at me as if I was crazy. “Are you kidding me? Go kill that mage first! He’s the highest dps in that entire party, and the biggest threat!”

“No, the mage is last. I need to destroy the physical damage dealers first. Just focus on buffing me, and don’t show yourself or heal me unless I drop under half health.”

June crossed his arms. “Are you a noob? How did you even qualify for the hidden challenge if you’re this stupid? I said, the mage is going to blast you into pieces if you don’t disable him first. You just saw what he did there– he used [Permafrost]! That means he’s a second advancement mage with access to second tier magic!”

“Just trust me,” I answered impatiently.

“No.” June looked at me and frowned. “I’m not doing anything this suicidal. This is the end of our partnership, if you’re going to carry on with your delusions.”

I sighed. “You can use holy magic, right? Use [Smite] on me.”

June raised an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Just do it. Then you’ll know why I’m going to ignore the mage.”

June nodded and agreed to my proposition rather quickly, as if he was waiting for an opportunity to show off. “Alright, get ready.” He raised his staff and pulled a tome from his inventory, opening it and chanting. A magic circle appeared in front of him, trained directly on me.

I stepped forward in my fluttering tattered robes, completely unafraid.

“Smite!” June yelled, and a white beam of light shone down on me.

-5 health.

My health bar moved only a sliver. The beam was about as painful as a mosquito bite at the beach on a hot summer day. Barely noticeable at all, and hardly a problem. I could shrug these off any day of the week, rain or shine.

Sweating and panting, June leaned forwards and used his staff to prop his body up. It took a considerable amount of effort for priests to cast offensive magic.

“H-how?” he panted. “How did you take so little damage?”

I shrugged and summoned adamantite poleaxe. “I told you already, it’s my class. Magic doesn’t hurt me. Now get ready for our ambush–we go when there’s an opening.”

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The level 79 female halberdier wiped the sweat off her brow. The fog demon didn’t have much health, but it was so hard to land a clean hit on it. So many times she thought she connected, but her halberd just landed in a billow of smoke and some kind of fog-based illusion.

This level of difficulty was to be expected from a ten-ticket monster. After all, this was an elimination round.

“Asten, how much longer?” she shouted at the mage.

“Please don’t… rush me,” the sweating mage replied to her. His face was concentrated and laser focused on the demon ahead.

She needed to buy more time for their party’s mage to complete his next cast. He was the primary damage dealer, because his high damage area of effect spells were impossible to miss even on the elusive fog demon employing illusions. So their job was to just keep the demon occupied and deal a bit of melee damage when they could.

“Everlasting strength!” the halberdier shouted. The buff increased her strength by 10 for about an hour.

Goooooooooooooo–

The old man fog demon let out a strange wail, and began to collect energy in his mouth. A breath attack was incoming.

“Shit, get to cover!” their shieldbearer shouted in warning, while the fog demon’s wail intensified in volume and began to unnerve the combatants nearby.

The mage broke his magic circle and dove behind a rock to avoid whatever attack was incoming.

Cursing under her breath, the halberdier began running towards the far side of the castle. After all, a breath attack was only effective directly in front of the monster. But seriously, it was so hard to see in front of her because of the thick fog.

“Ah!”

Running into a long branch of some sort, the halberdier stumbled. She collected herself and tried to keep running, but what she originally thought was a branch seemed to be coiling itself around her body in a rather compromising fashion.

[You have been restrained. Due to your strength stat and level, the restraint will break in ten seconds.]

A rope of some kind seemed to have twisted its way across her body, wrapping her up and binding her as if it was some sort of BDSM play. She felt her body both loosen and tighten at the same time, as she fought to get out of the restraint. What exactly was this? An attack from the fog demon, or maybe even another player’s unique ability?”

“Get this… off…”

Behind her, she could hear shouts from her teammates, but it was too difficult to see them in this low visibility fog.

At that moment, a player stepped out of the fog in front of her. It was a tall, muscular young man with black hair and a strange glowing black mist that looked like an angry bee hive covering the left sleeve of his tattered sorcerer robes.

The female halberdier took a deep breath in and let out a booming shout, her [Battle Cry] ability which momentarily dazed enemies nearby.

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I stumbled backwards from the [Battle Cry], but regained my balance and lunged towards the restrained level 79 female halberdier, who was wearing light tribal armor that exposed her midriff. I had precious few seconds left before [Restrain] would break.

With a quick swipe, I launched my left arm at her exposed belly.

[137 damage]

A solid hit, but my dimension ripper could not fully penetrate into her skin. It seemed that the armor was protecting her midriff somehow, even though it was not visually covering it?

Ah. Fucking games, and female armor. This was a case where the skimpy female armor was just as strong as full body coverage male armor despite appearing otherwise.

I switched over to my adamantite poleaxe, thrusting it forward towards her belly.

[105 damage]

Her health was just a bit over half now, but she was already on the cusp of escape from love whip’s restraint. Her tan face and body were a bit flush, but she did not have the intense lusty expression that was present on previous victims of the ability. Not everyone was affected in the same way by the whip’s succubus charm effects, and girls with a propensity for some sort of perversion were more likely to be intensely affected.

“Rahhh!” the halberdier roared as she broke free. Using a charge ability, she launched herself at me at incredible speed.

This was no joking matter. I needed to disengage immediately, or suffer a halberd to the chest from a level 79 melee class. And right behind her, the fog demon was turning around. Time to go.

[Shadow.]

Using the fog as cover, my body instantly burst into a cloud and flew back up the hill towards June. There was no point fighting to the death and exposing myself to so much risk, when I could play it safe, almost like a poison type class.

And plus, I could always use [Thunderbolt] as a ranged cannon weapon because I had sustain from June. That was why a healer was so critical to my success– having a pocket healer let me take thunderbolt pot shots here and there without worrying about the recoil.

Of course, I could try to use [Love Whip]’s telekinetic mode, but my control was too poor to be able to rely on it. That was one of the problems with games. If you were constantly in conflict mode, it was hard to develop and train abilities that paid off later on, because more often than not combat was time sensitive, and you just didn’t have the luxury of developing. You just had to grab everything currently available and the kitchen sink and throw it at your enemy.

It was kind of like how in Fire Emblem games, characters were ranked by tier from F to S+ by not only their stats, but also by when you gain access to them. A character with B tier stats that came in the beginning of the game with plenty of time to cultivate and perform was vastly better than a character with S tier stats that arrived only for the final boss. Time was a resource that some gamers constantly underestimated and glossed over, but it was a resource that could not be ignored by RTS players. In an RTS, a horde of inferior units can beat a small group of superior units that is their supposed counter, just because the former gained access to the inferior units earlier.

In this case, love whip was the superior unit, and thunderbolt and basic melee attacks were part of that horde of inferior units, representing tools of necessity rather than desire. Although maybe I was underestimating the scaling potential of basic melee attacks.

Wisping up the hill, I arrived at our hideout. June was standing behind a large tree, and shook his head in admiration as I reappeared in front of him.

“You sneaky devil,” he said with a smile on his face. It seemed that his regard for me just went up a bit. “Hit and run, right before you get into trouble, while even baiting the enemy boss monster into your opponent. That’s some one of a kind playstyle right there.”

I laughed and caught my breath. “Now we just wait for our next shot. No need to rush, since by harassing like this, they’re going to have a hard time finishing off the fog demon. If we balance it perfectly, we can get four bodies worth of tickets as well as the kill on the fog demon.”

June nodded in approval, in appreciation of how calculated and relatively low risk my strategy was. “Sounds like a plan.”

“What sounds like a plan?” said an unfamiliar voice.

I turned, just in time to see a throwing dagger headed straight for my throat. With my attuned reaction speed from my demi-human race state and sky high dexterity, I managed to just barely move my neck out of the way of the razor sharp projectile.

June was not so lucky. Hit by the dagger in the head, he received critical damage and fell to the side. The assassin appeared out of shimmering pseudo-invisibility behind him like a dark templar, and performed that all too recognizable thief class classic, [Backstab].

It was a female assassin roughly the height of [Euphemia], dressed in black bandage garbs.

I couldn’t see her level, but having any sort of invisibility ability meant that she was at least level 90. It was sad to say this, but regular thieves were an unfavorable matchup for the dimension thief, much less assassins.

“Hi,” the assassin greeted me with a bloody grin on her face, as she twisted the dagger into June’s back and blood spurted from his mouth, killing him. The wolf icon appeared above her head.

“Hi?” I responded, greeting her by summoning adamantite poleaxe in my right hand, while drawing love whip in my left. My heart beat accelerated as I embraced the adrenaline rush of a life-or-death situation, yet again.

With shadow on cooldown and nowhere to run, I lunged forward with a practiced spear thrust.