Chapter 18

Minorous suddenly slammed its giant axe onto the ground in front of it, creating a crack spanning a radius of 10 meters. Concurrently, the air waves from the axe brought forth ultrasound with it.

There was no space to dodge. The thin white wave simultaneously struck Hiro, Jacob, Noah, and Liberty and heavily flung them to the wall.

[Health -1,000]

“Ughh!”

Hiro groaned while covering his sharply ringing ears. He was trying to stand with the help of his greatsword, but the piercing pain was causing his legs to heavily tremble.

He looked around. Liberty and Jacob had fallen unconscious. The two’s HP was already at 0%, and he didn’t know what would happen when their HP completely ran out.

“Damn it!”

Noah was only squinting at the spacious cave’s ceiling. His HP had also gone down by over 70%.

After a while, Hiro finally managed to stand properly and drank his health potion without delay until he returned to full health.

‘No way I’m going down here.’

[Your health is rapidly decreasing.]

[Health -200] [Health -200] [Health -200] [Health -200]

“…”

‘What the hell is going on here?’

Hiro’s HP kept going down. He turned to check Noah’s condition next to him, and the same thing was happening to him.

“You better restore your HP, Newbie!”

Although Noah was somewhat displeased, he still followed Hiro’s suggestion. He just realized that his body was getting weaker because his HP was being drained incessantly by something. He wasn’t receiving any attacks, but…

“Our Heat Resistance is nullified, and the boss’s ultimate skill is why,” Hiro explained before Noah asked. He already found out why his HP was going down so fast when he checked his HUD system and saw the two small icons at the corner.

[Player has been afflicted with the Burn effect.]

[Player has been afflicted with the Silence effect.]

As expected, just a while later, they could feel the temperature in the cave instantly spike up as their protection skill was nullified by the boss’s ultimate skill.

Their only option was to finish the boss before running out of health potions. The two looked at each other in understanding and prepared themselves.

But suddenly, a miracle occurred.

Ding!

[Your party member: Liberty has been revived.]

The two simultaneously turned to look at Liberty, and sure enough, the girl had come back to life. She violently coughed before looking around confused, and judging from her movements, she was also suffering from the extreme heat.

Both Hiro and Noah looked at her full of questions. How did she revive in a dungeon? And without a cleric!?

“What happened, Hiro?” she asked, confused.

“The boss’s ultimate skill. How did you come back to life? Weren’t you… Ah, can you revive Jacob?”

“Jacob?”

Liberty crawled toward Jacob’s still body. The girl then took out what seemed to be a 100ml glass bottle with light green liquid from her inventory.

Ding!

[Your party member: Jacob has been revived.]

‘Interesting… who revived Liberty? And that revive potion…’

Hiro remembered seeing it sold while scrolling through sold in-game items, and each one cost 5,000LSC.

‘She’s definitely a crazy rich girl.’

He was impressed yet again.

“NightFall, something’s wrong! I can’t use my magic!”

Hiro looked at Noah. He seemed to be trying to cast magic spells, but nothing came out.

Noah began to panic.

It seemed that Minorous’s ultimate skill negates all kinds of magic in its area of effect. And both Heat Resistance and Noah’s abilities were magic-based.

Occurrences like this were quite common in boss areas, and this one was from the Silence effect.

[Silence prevents the afflicted from using Magic and other commands that require speech.]

‘So I’m the only one left, huh.’

Hiro didn’t have much time. There was no way he was going to let it end here.

Whoosh!

He dashed forward at the boss monster waiting for him with its axe raised.

CLANK!

SPLAT!

This time, he didn’t only rely on his greatsword. He used all the fighting capability he had and punched Minorous’s stomach with all the strength he could muster.

“HUP!”

Whoosh!

SPLAT!

[3x Critical Hit Combo] [Health -2000]

Ding!

[The Boss’s HP has been revealed.]

[HP 7,999/20,000]

‘Its HP is only 5,000 points higher than Desmodus, but this one is tankier in its defense stat, huh?’

Minorous’s movements were extremely slow in Hiro’s eyes. Despite its immensely fatal heavy attacks, he could dodge them with ease.

Nonetheless…

[Energy 30/100]

“Tch!”

Whoosh!

Hiro jumped away while taking out an energy potion from his inventory.

His last energy potion.

‘I have to end it fast.’

[Energy Potion has been consumed.]

SPLAT!!

[2x Hit Combo]

SPLATT!

[3x Critical Hit Combo]

SPLATT!

[4x Critical Hit Combo] [Health -4,000]

‘Just a little more!’

[HP 1,249/20,000]

But…

CLANK!

Hiro was thrown into the air. The boss monster had accurately punched Hiro’s stomach. Hiro managed to parry it with his greatsword in time, but his body was still thrown far.

[Health -1,000]

“Damn it!”

‘I really need a real armor now.’

“Mine!”

Noah suddenly ran toward Minorous while taking out a sharp black dagger from his inventory.

He was after the last hit to get the best item drop from the dungeon.

Tap! Tap! Tap!

Splat! Splat! Splat!

[Health -100] [Health -100] [Miss] [Miss]

The physical damage Noah inflicted on Minorous’s body was negligible. Even so, he was persistent and also quite agile in dodging melee attacks.

In the meantime, Hiro had just landed on his feet. With a serious gaze, he calculated Noah’s damage while taking out his long-range weapon.

[Batarang]

Right when Minorous’s HP fell to 500, Hiro swiftly threw the weapon with all his strength.

Whoosh!

SPLAT!

[Fatal Damage]

The Batarang accurately stabbed Minorous’s face before Noah could swing his dagger once more.

THUD!

Hiro smiled. Right at the last second, he managed to aim at the Minorous’s head with his Batarang.

Noah, who didn’t expect that Hiro could still attack in his condition, dumbfoundedly looked as Minorous’s body heavily fall to its back with the last hit landed by Hiro.

Ding!

[Congratulations! NightFall’s Party: NightFall, Liberty, Jacob, Noah has successfully cleared the dungeon [Hidden Cave]]

[NightFall has obtained a Non-Fungible Quest (Locked)]

[Liberty has obtained Skull Necklace (Acc).]

[Jacob has obtained a jackpot of 2,500LSC.]

[Noah has obtained Minorous’s Skin (High-Quality Craft Material).]

“…”

Hiro and his party members’ names were broadcasted by the system and could be read by all the CBT players on the server.

He received a non-fungible quest, which was a special one-of-a-kind quest that could not be repeated. According to what he had read, the kinds of quests in LSO by rarity were as follows:

[Non-Fungible Quest]

[Rare Quest]

[Hidden Quest]

[Special Quest]

[Main Story Quest]

[Monthly Quest]

[Weekly Quest]

[Daily Quest]

Non-fungible quests were the highest-tier quests in the game.

“Hell yeah!”

“What the hell!? That’s mine! Give it to me, NightFall!” Noah annoyedly ran toward Hiro with his tome open, ready to attack.

Hiro chuckled. He had just stood up. Meanwhile, Liberty and Jacob were running toward him.

“Hiro, are you all right?” Liberty asked, worried.

Hiro smiled. Even though Liberty did not help much in the battle, her presence itself motivated him.

“Good work, Libe.” Hiro’s hand landed on Liberty’s head and stroked her as usual. Perhaps it was because she was part of the Beast race, but she liked it.

“Give me the NFQ!” Noah hissed, ignoring what was happening in front of him.

“Are you dumb? NFQs are untradeable. Go read your guide book again, Noobie!”

“You!”

[Noah has been kicked from the party.]

Because the number of party members no longer met the requirements, all four of them were automatically kicked out of the boss area.

Hiro once again felt the sensation he very much hated. His body felt as if it was being pulled back hard and forced into a narrow pipe. He felt as if the insides of his stomach were going to pop out.

Fortunately, it only lasted for a short few moments.

“What happened?” Jacob finally spoke after being pale from fright since a while ago.

“You’re all right, Jake.” As if the two were already very close, Liberty already had a nickname for Jacob.

But the girl suddenly screamed in panic.

“KYAAA!”

“My clothes!”

The three boys’ eyes widened when they saw the condition of her clothes. They were so focused on arguing that they didn’t notice the beautiful sight on display.

The front of the uniform Liberty was wearing was torn, ruining the buttons along with it. The girl quickly pulled her shirt to cover the part they briefly saw. Furthermore, the shape of her skirt was barely recognizable.

Hiro caught a glimpse of her underwear.

“Is your girlfriend always like this?” Jacob forgot how to blink.

“What is with this lady? So unethical,” Noah frowned uncomfortably.

As for Hiro…

“Black…pink?”

Liberty jolted.

“You…! What are you looking at, you pervert!?”

BAM!

The girl used one hand to punch him and the other to keep her shirt pulled.

[Health -150]