Chapter 66: Dungeon Part 7: Another Dragon!

Boom! Frey fires a shuriken through the jungle canopy. It connects with the player exploding his position with fire. unlike every other player, her spirit form suffers now movement debuff in the jungle. The Struum Front guys are all melee class an absolute feast for her team. The one she is chasing through the jungle is some kind of short sword dual-wielding human Psion. She scoffs as another mental attack from the payer misses. Frey throws a couple of basic fire spells his way. The jungle makes it difficult to keep an eye on her prey. 

Nineth Immortal breathes out as she is no longer prey to the mass body of monsters. Next to her the bloody head of the Salamander spewing rancid blood at her feet. Unlike the players, most of the monsters don't make sure that their whole bodies are in the bubbling smoke. The bubble only teleports that which is completely within its sphere of influence. 

Looking around she is in a body of water. Rena reaches out from behind her. Nineth Immortal jumps spinning around as fast as she can. A sparkling underground lake is in front of her. She can't the other side the way the waves moves make her thinks it's an underground sea. 

Nineth Immortal says, "Where are the others." They are standing in the shallow part of the warm lake. Rena hands her a potion bottle filled with refreshing blue water.  She inspects the glass bottle. The glass bottle is a potion of water breathing. 

Rena says, "We are on the lake bed waiting for you." She takes a single step back and her already short form disappears in instant sinking to the bottom. Nineth Immortal takes the entire mixture in a single gulp. The cool water doesn't show any visible changes to her. Her Heads up display does show a new ability that will last an hour. She looks down at where Rena vanished down to Nineth Immortal can only see water. The whole except for the beating of the waves is still. Taking the leap Nineth Immortal plunges into the depths. 

Tatiana feels the depths of despair she has just been killed again by the same encampment. Unlike everywhere else on the island. They managed to find their monster encampment with little to no effort. The problem is that the monsters in this encampment are not strong nor smart. They are numerous every team of players regardless of numbers that enter the encampment is sent to their own instance. here they have to defeat waves and waves of monsters. 

This is the worst kind of challenge for her and her team they are still unfamiliar with their skills the experience they get has allowed them to steadily level even though they keep wiping out. They are only a few levels behind Tyr and Nineth Immortal in terms of levels. Sitting at the respawn outside the crudely built wooden goblin fort. The skulls of the goblin are enchanted to laugh at the players being respawned and they cackle loud and it grates the ears. 

Omnicornlyre says, "Laugh at this, you boney bastards!" She throws an [Abyss Assualt] three black balls of abyssal energy slam into the bones. The fort bones only lightly wobble before their eyes. Azula says, "Seriously again how can you fall for the same taunt again!" Everyone starts running even people who are just bystanders waiting for their allies. 

When they died for the fourth time OmnicornLyre had attacked the fort skulls after respawning. Attacking the fort directly unleashes a  wave of Island Goblin archer on the walls. This state of emergency on the fort lasts an hour. The goblins during this time are active in teams and patrol the fort. 

Lelo says, "This is much harder than we thought." She can run and talk being a none magical class she has about as much damage as Tatiana. The others like Azula who is a Warlock has to focus on not becoming a pain cushion filled with goblin arrows. 

Tatiana says, "It is just that don't really coordinate well. Mostly because you guys haven't really been combat classes before." Her entire team is filled with real-life professionals. She hired them to dig into the company that developed Odyessy. Their combat synergy is average at best even with the help of one of Styxs' people. THier combat ability has only marginally improved. The main problem is that the goblins inside the forts are all in one place. Every time they enter the goblin fort the goblins are all in the centre and attack as one huge wave. This first wave is filled with all five goblin types.

The wave of goblins makes the goblin army unbeatable. Worst of all they are also being attacked by the Thaws. The thaws are a national level guild that use to be a dominant force in Unity.  Tatiana says absent mindedly, "If only Andromeda was here this would be in the bag." 

Omnicornlyre sees a strange look of forlorn on her cousin. She sneaks up to Tatiana grabbing her from behind and says, "Whos' Andromeda cuz?"  Tatiana grabs rushes her hands to her mouth trying to cover something she already let slip. Everyone on her team is good at investigating and this will definitely distract them from their constant failures. 

Boa-bob the living walking talking tree-like being is the first to try to get the root of this mystery player is. Boa-bob says, " Nothing on the link net or your friends' list. Gimme a hint it's clear she's a close friend so Andromeda is a new in-game name.' An excited Lelo says there si an Andromeda in our guild list. 

The team freaks out at found something they immediately send messages to all the connections in the guild. Tatiana sends a message to Tyr apologising. After a short frenzy, everyone has pulled up nothing. 

Lelo says, "I can't access anything about her." Usually asking Medium Bunz gets a short profile or something. In real life, she works in Human Resources and is good with building basic profiles of players. Raul has asked them to do this because some guilds are linked to real-life mega corporations and they need to investigate the large influx of players. Lucky for them they have access to a shackled a.i to help process the information. 

Boa-bob says, "Yeah and she was added at the same time as the rest of us but it was hidden by SKY Ocean Hunter, so he is also in on it. Does that mean he also knows her?" Tatiana plays it as cool as she can pretending to hear anything they are doing. 

Omnicornlyre says, "If that is the case then Styx must also be involved he is like a spymaster in those old thriller books. Plus he is so dreamy have you heard him when he says 'Chikita' is so sexy and rolls off those sexy lips." The others ladies besides Tatiana who knows Styx agrees that he is handsome. Leo thinks John baptist with all his muscles is more handsome but Raul is a close second. None of them think much of Tyr he is normal looking one. 

Lordo says, "I don't know Styx never spoke about her at all. But that sounds like something he would do now that I think about it. So she is known to the leaders and needs to be protected." 

The quiet and contemplative Azula says, "It's his sister, Tyr I mean! the thing I don't get though is all the secrecy." Tatiana holds her head low Andromeda is fighting for one of the few known unique classes a Technomancer in the capital of Asrugo. She is also the key to the mad plan the boys have cooked up. From what she has pieced together the Shifting ISlands are...

Omnicornlyre squeezes her hard and says, "Tell us something okay and I promise we will all let it go." Tatiana losses her previous train of thought. Her cousin has always kept her promises so Tatiana nods and frees herself from the surprisingly strong grip of the girl.  Tyr has just responded to her with a list of things she can and can't say. In fact, all the VC's got a list of things they can't allow to be exposed. 

At the moment everything the guild is planning hinges on them securing the island. It's even why they are assaulting the island with the old teams as this will allow them to secure the encampments and resulting dungeons without the other players and guilds noticing. They already are facing a massive wave of enemies. SKY Ocean Hunter according to the internal guild notice board is fighting waves of players more than a single coordinated foe. WHich is what Styx and Frey are dealing with. A number of players have been constantly on their heels. Even they are being assaulted by the Thaws and worst of all even the lifestyle players like Medium Bunz are being harrassed by NPCs' of all things. IF she didn't know better she would say they pissed off a global power. 

Tatiana says, "Andromeda is beautiful inside and out. She is like touched by the gods or something just being around her is intoxicating. Besides that, she is wicked smart and has an electric tongue but she is weak poisoned by Baron INternational has cut her life short. This poison has eaten away at her future and her body... But make no mistake she is by far out of all of us here the..."