The preparation is complete. If anyone would see me who knows the Bladeheart before, they will not realize it was me in the first place, especially with the getup and weapon alone.
When I arrive at the entrance of the dungeon, players are gathered around recruiting other players to co-op with them and tackle the higher difficulties of the dungeon. But like always, I will be tackling the dungeons in solo mode. I don't want to deal with other players randomly while I am practicing in dungeons.
It would have been fine if it was the usual team I have like Dolly and the others as I can count on them in case things went south. It's crippling me a lot especially if I am not that familiar with the class I am using and annoying if things get worse and your companions are useless or just straight-up traitors who wanted to PK you inside the dungeons.
The dungeon I went into is the dungeon called the [Dollhouse] which is a natural habitat of living mannequins and living dolls. It's perfect for me to handle as I need a big body to hit using the sword and without access to magic, hitting them precisely with just physical attacks might prove a challenge if they aren't like the humanoid mannequins and dolls that appear here.
And because of the decent difficulty, it poses me currently, it's just perfect.
Ignoring everyone around, I went straight to the dungeon door and I was greeted with the difficulty selection mode. Of course, I didn't hesitate and choose the Abyss Mode. It might sound insane but I am confident enough to handle it solo. Besides, if I struggle, I can just ask to pull out anyone from my Summon's Area and ask for their help.
I don't know if anyone saw me entering the abyss mode but I don't care. Besides, it's not unusual for someone to challenge the abyss mode, there are already records of clear time here earlier while looking at the abyss clear time chart so it's obvious someone did the same thing to me.
With the difficulty selection complete, the entrance immediately teleported me to the dungeon entrance.
[You have entered the [Dollhouse].
There is no need for me to make a new map here as I already have memorized the place therefore, may only need to give focus on how the Swordsman class fairs against dolls.
Walking with a calm step, I enhanced all of my senses around here as the enemies are quite tricky here compared to normal dungeons and with Abyss Mode, it gets real trickier most of the time.
CLACK!
I immediately went for a slash behind me and a mannequin immediately got destroyed to pieces the moment I attacked. Yep, the reason I heightened my senses a lot is due to how the mannequins here do not just randomly pop up in the distance. They would instead try to make a jumpscare, by either appearing out of nowhere, dropping down from ceilings, or just suddenly moving when you thought that mannequin will not move. Knowing how the dungeon works, it would be best for me to keep my movements slow and precise until the enemy will appear to try and attack me sneakily.
Of course, not all of them will just do this. There is a second enemy form that will make a frontal attack instead.
The dolls.
In the distance, I spotted two ambush mannequins on both sides of the wall's cracks that would appear and one ambush mannequin just dangling at the ceiling being hanged and will drop down the hallway once I pass through and a little bit further is a group composed of life-sized dolls wielding a rapier.
Once I have identified all of the potential dangers, I immediately went on the move.
Like the expected outcome, the two ambush mannequins appeared and tried to pull me to where they are hiding. But since the jumpscare didn't work for me, I managed to immediately dispose of them. Since mannequins are just one-hit kill most of the time, I don't need to mind how long will I have to handle them.
Now they are not the main problem, the dolls are. The moment the mannequins are destroyed, the dolls who were just in the distance immediately noticed me and went into battle mode without a slight hesitation.
As much as I want a ranged attack, there is no other range attack available for me at the moment, and some of them are still locked away in Tier 4 and 5 ranks so I have to do with the skills I have at the moment.
"Come on! Give it your best shots f*ckers!"
The dolls came charging in with their rapiers and tried to pierce me with their fast attacks but even if they are fast, they aren't that much of a challenge even in Abyss Mode. I ducked and swing the longsword below the legs of the dolls before activating [Cut].
[Cut] is a normal tier 1 skill that does the exact same thing as the name does. cutting. This one has two forms, an AOE cut, and a single target cut. To perform an AOE [Cut], just swing the longsword Horizontally while if you just want the single target cut, performing a vertical attack while activating [Cut] will trigger the single target mode of [Cut]. It was a good skill as it has an AOE and single target and it doesn't have to consume mana at all and will only have a cooldown of 6 seconds.
Since I sliced the dolls horizontally, the dolls that were trying to attack me but missed had all of their legs cut off by the skill and fell the moment their legs are now gone. Of course, I didn't catch anyone from that slice but since there are fewer of them, I went in and eliminate those who didn't get caught by the [Cut] slice and personally executed them all before finishing off the dolls that have lost their legs.
The progress is smoother than expected and my weapon may not be the best compared to the Versatile Weapon but I can appreciate it that this weapon has given me a good alternative that is not so overpowered but not so underwhelming either.
And since the playstyle of the Swordsman is much identical to the Magic Knight minus the magic, it was easier than expected so It didn't take me that long to reach the First Boss Room for the Abyss Mode. Although it was a boss room, it contains two enemies inside, the normal boss and the hidden boss that will appear if I did something on that room once the first boss is killed.
Since I want to test my mettle against the enemies on how I can handle things using the Swordsman class, the next enemies would be the normal and the hidden boss. I don't need the extra drops from the hidden boss and other benefits from killing the hidden boss, I only wanted to test how I can handle them without any external help at all and two punching bags are better than one.