Right when everyone arrived at their designated positions and readied their weapons — large, coarse polygons surged out from the center of the room. The black cube-like polygons clashed and combined to form a giant humanoid silhouette, uneven shapes formed at the edges as the amount of information increased continuously.
Finally, innumerable fragments scattered in the air and the Boss materialized.
A black giant over four meters in height. On its muscle-filled body grew two heads and four arms, and in each of its hands was a savage-looking blunt weapon.
The giant stepped forward, and the room immediately shook as though there was an earthquake. Compared to its lower body, its upper body was irregularly large; yet even though its entire body was inclined forward, its head was still considerably far above Asuna and the others.
It looked at the intruders disdainfully out of the corners of its four glowing-red eyes and let out a brutal roar. The upper arms held two battering ram like hammers high, and the two lower arms swung a thick chain strong enough to anchor a cruiser at the floor—
Chapter 6
“Aaaaaaaaaah, we lost, we lost!!”
Nora, who was the last to return, slapped Taruken in the back as she shouted cheerfully.
They were situated in a giant dome-shaped building opposite of Ronbaru’s city square, the seven of them were transferred to the Save Crystal erected on the slightly lowered floor in the center of the room. Of course, this meant that they got wiped out from the 27th floor’s black giant Boss’ ferocious attacks.
“Ugh―― even though we tried so hard…”
As Yuuki’s shoulders sagged in dismay, Asuna suddenly grabbed her by the collar.
“Fue?”
Asuna dragged the surprised Yuuki along and ran to one of the room’s corners.
“Everyone come over here quickly!”
Jun and the others, who originally planned to return to the inn to rest and reflect on the previous fight, ran over with their mouths opened.
There was nobody else around the «Respawn Point», but just in case, Asuna gathered everyone in a place where they couldn’t be heard from the outside and said:
“We don’t have time to rest. Do you remember the three people in front of the Boss room?”
“Yeah, I do.”
Shiune nodded.
“They’re scouts sent out by guilds that specialize in hunting Bosses, their goal is to monitor players outside the alliance that challenge them. You must have been seen by them before you entered the Boss room on the previous floor and also the one before that.”
“Eh… We didn’t even notice…”
“I’m afraid that their goal isn’t to stop you from challenging the Boss, but to gather information. This may be a bit rude, but they’re using a small guild like the Sleeping Knights as a sacrificial pawn to figure out the Boss’ attack patterns and weakness. This way, they don’t need to lose experience due to the death penalty and can also save quite a bit of potion costs.”
At this point, the spectacled Taruken raised his right hand and asked:
“Bu-but, the door immediately closed behind us after we entered the Boss room. They, they can’t even see our battle, so how do they gather info?”
“That was my oversight… Right before the battle ended, I noticed a small, gray newt squirming around Jun’s feet. That’s Dark Magic «Peeping» ―― A spell that summons a familiar that can be attached to a designated player, allowing the caster to steal a look from the player’s viewpoint. The instant it’s cast, an icon indicating a debuff should appear for about a second…”
“Eh, that’s bad, I didn’t notice it at all.”
Hearing Asuna’s explanation, a look of remorse covered Jun’s face. Everybody softly patted him in the back.
“Don’t say that, I should have warned everyone in advance. It must have been mixed in when Shiune was renewing everyone’s buffs right before we entered the room. There were so many icons appearing at that time, so it’s natural that you didn’t notice an extra one.”
“… Speaking of which, can it be…”
Yuuki’s eyes widened as she clenched her hands in front of her chest and shouted:
“Both the 25th and 26th floors’ Bosses getting defeated immediately after we got wiped wasn’t just a coincidence!”
Even though Yuuki was fairly shocked, there wasn’t a hint of anger or resentment in her voice. Once again feeling renewed respect for Yuuki, Asuna nodded and replied:
“You’re probably correct. Your unrelenting attacks exposed even the Bosses’ last resorts, which is why they were able to do it in one fell swoop.”
“That, that means…”
Shiune furrowed her brow and whispered:
“This time we’ve once again acted as sacrificial pawns…?”
“How can this be…”
Right when the remaining five’s shoulder were about to droop following Nora’s sigh, Asuna hit Yuuki’s armor.
“No, we still have a chance!”
“Eh…? Asuna, what do you mean…?”
“Right now it’s around 2:30 in the afternoon, even a large alliance will have a hard time gathering dozens of people, it’ll probably take at least an hour. We’ll take action now ―― Listen up, we’ll finish our discussion in five minutes, and then rush back to the Boss room within thirty!”
“Eeeh――?”
Even this group, consisting of top players, can’t help but shout in astonishment this time. Looking around her at the rest of them, a smile appeared on Asuna’s face ―― a prideful smile extremely similar to a certain someone’s.
“We can do it. And ―― we can definitely defeat the Boss with just the few of us.”
“Re-Really?”
Yuuki leaned so far forward that her nose almost crashed into Asuna, and Asuna faced her and nodded.
“All we have to do is calmly attack its weak point. This is my strategy. This floor’s Boss is a Giant type. Even though its multiple arms are a little troublesome to deal with, it’s still much easier to manage than atypical ones which have no real front or back. Its attack patterns include swinging down its hammers, sweeping with the steel chains and a charge with its head lowered. It’ll start using a wide range breath attack at half health, and once it drops into the red it’ll even use an eight-hit sword skill utilizing its four weapons…”
Asuna placed a holographic image display on the ground, switched over to the input screen and quickly drew images of the Boss’ attack patterns. She then listed out ways to defend against these attacks.
“… Therefore Jun and Tecchi can just disregard attacks from the steel chains and focus their attention on the hammers. Next is its weak points ―― If its hammer hits the ground, it’ll take about 0.7 seconds for it to recover. Nora and Taruken should take advantage of this opening to use powerful skills. Also, it has plenty of openings behind him. Yuuki can just remain behind its back and use charge type sword skills. Be careful though, its chains will also sweep behind its back. The way to defend against its breath attack….”
Since the time she worked as the sub-leader of the Knights of the Blood, this was the first time she has spoken so much in a strategy meeting. As she thought to herself, Asuna continued to rapidly explain to them her strategy, and the six of them nodded as they listened to her seriously.
Asuna felt that it was almost as though she were a school teacher, and promptly finished the strategy meeting within four minutes. She then opened up her inventory to materialize the vast amounts of potions she bought using their budget and the gifts she received from Lizbet and the others.
All kinds of glass bottles constantly appeared on the floor with a clack. Asuna divided the health potions based on the amount of damage they received in the battle just now, and placed the mana potions in her and Shiune’s bags. With that, all of their preparations were completed.
Asuna straightened her back, swept her eyes across everyone’s faces once again, smiled and nodded.
?
??I’ll repeat once again, if it’s you… No, if it’s us, we will definitely defeat that Boss. I, who’ve battled here since long ago, can guarantee you this.”
Yuuki’s usual brilliant, innocent smile immediately spread across her face, and she confidently said:
“My feelings were correct, it’s great that we were able to have Asuna help us. Even if we fail, these feelings of mine will not change. Thank you ―― Asuna.”
The other five nodded in unison. Shiune, who appeared to be the sub-leader, added in her clear, gentle voice:
“I’m really thankful. I’ve once again ascertained that Yuuki’s decision to bring you here was correct, you’re the person we’ve long-awaited.”
Asuna desperately tried to suppress the feelings welling up inside her, raised a finger and winked――
“… Words like these should be left for the afterparty. Now… once again, let’s try our best!”
* * *
Once again taking flight from Ronbaru’s streets, the seven of them flew to the dungeon at an indescribably fast speed. They flew out through the shortest route, and got eyed on by the field mobs. However, the gang kept on using Nori’s illusions and got past the mobs as they dashed through.
They took merely 5 minutes to reach the tower, and then flew into the entrance without hesitation. They took the shortest path to the top floor. Even though they couldn’t break through the monster mobs in the narrow dungeon, Absolute Sword Yuuki activated her ability at this moment and instantly sliced the enemy leader.
As the timer was set past 28 minutes, the corridor leading to the boss room finally appeared in front of them. This long and narrow passage was curled slightly to the left, and the spiral-shaped road led to the middle of the tower.
“Thank goodness. There’s still 2 minutes!!”
Jun shouted excitedly and ran past Yuuki.
“Hey, wait!”
Yuuki raised her right hand and gave chase.
In that case, we should be able to disrupt the guild alliance. Thinking about this, Asuna started to run forward desperately too. The group of people continued to run in circles and up the corridor, arriving in front of the gates leading to the boss’ room――
“…!!”
However, the scene in front of the gates made Asuna gulp. Jun and Yuuki, who were running in front, used their boots to scrape the ground and stopped quickly.
“Wha…What’s going, on…!?”
Nori blankly muttered beside Asuna.
At the final 30m leading to the boss room, approximately 20 players blocked the way to the boss’ room.
These people were of assorted tribes, but the only common point between them was that every one of them had a guild emblem beside the cursor, just like the trio that were hiding at the door.
――We didn’t make it!? They unexpectedly gathered so many people so quickly at such a short time… Asuna bemoaned deep inside, but found that something wasn’t right. There were still too few people to conquer a boss. 20 people, 3 parties. There wasn’t enough to make 7 parties, 49 players altogether.
The members that should be taking part in this conquest were probably not here yet. It was truly daring to choose the gathering point at the deepest part of the dungeon, and one could tell that these people were rather impatient.
Asuna walked beside Yuuki, who was murmuring with a nervous voice, and whispered to her ear that was covered by the deep purple hair,
“Don’t worry. Looks like we still have a chance to challenge it.”
“…Really?”
Yuuki finally heaved a sigh of relief at this moment. Asuna lightly patted on her shoulder and quickly walked towards the group. The other party’s stares were all focused on Asuna and company, yet they didn’t show any surprise or tension. One could even say that these people were looking forward to a show that was about to begin.
Asuna ignored their expressions and stood directly in front of the crowd, saying to the male Gnome player who looked like he had the most expensive looking armor.
“Sorry, we want to challenge the boss. Can you please make way?”
However, the Gnome that folded his thick arms as if trying to display them actually said something Asuna didn’t expect,
“Sorry, this place is currently sealed off.”
“Sealed off…What do you mean?”
Asuna, who couldn’t say anything for the time being, finally squeezed out this question. The Gnome twitched his eyebrows in an exaggerated manner, and then said in a rare calm tone,
“Our guild’s going to challenge it next. We’re still preparing. Just wait here for a moment.”
“For a moment…how long?”
“Well, about an hour.”
At this point, Asuna finally understood their intentions. They were just the scouting group assigned in front of the boss room, collecting information. Once other groups that could possibly defeat it appeared, they would try to force a physical barricade through numbers.
Recently, Asuna heard of some high level guilds creating problems by occupying hunting points, but unexpectedly, they would show such brazenly occupation. Wasn’t this similar to the Army that savagely governed old Aincrad?
Asuna tried her best to suppress her anger and finally said in a calm tone,
“We can’t wait for that long. It’s different if you want to challenge it, but if not, please let us in.”
“You’re sorta right…”
But the Gnome shamelessly continued,
“But we came first. You have to get in line.”
“Then you should have prepared before coming here. We have to wait for an hour even though we can attack anytime. That’s unfair.”
“That’s why even if you grumble, I can’t help out. This is the higher-ups’ orders. If you have any disagreements, go over to the guild headquarters to negotiate. Our headquarters is at the World Tree city.”
“IT’LL REALLY TAKE AN HOUR TO GET THERE!!”
Unable to bear with this anymore, Asuna finally shouted. She then bit her lips and took a deep breath to calm herself down.
No matter how they negotiated, it seemed that the other party didn’t intend to move aside. What should they do?
They didn’t know if they could strike a deal with the boss drops items and the Yield. Probably not, as the allure to beating the boss wasn’t just about the drops, but also the vast skill-up points and the real reward of leaving their names on the Monument of Swordsmen. These guys probably won’t accept such conditions.
If this were some other VRMMO, they could complain to the GM about such acts that defy net-gaming etiquette. However, the ideal player argument in ALO was to be settled amongst players. GMs basically only handled system errors.
The Gnome shot a glance at Asuna, who was at her wits end, and thought that negotiations were done and got ready to return to his allies.
At this moment, Yuuki, who was standing behind Asuna, shot out,
“Oi, you…”
«Absolute Sword» used that ever energetic voice to ask the Gnome that stopped and turned around,
“You mean that you don’t intend to let us through no matter how we ask, correct?”
“――To be honest, that’s the case.”
After hearing Yuuki’s direct words, the Gnome couldn’t help but blink. However, he immediately regained that arrogant attitude and nodded. Yuuki merely smiled and said,
“Is that so? Can’t be helped then. We can only use force.”
“Wha…what!?”
“Ehh!?”
The Gnome and Asuna let out cries of shock at the same time.
ALO was truly a game that had the selling point of ‘being able to attack players unconditionally in a neutral area’. All the players will resort to using their weapons to vent their dissatisfactions, and this code obviously existed in the game instructions.
However, in addition to being an actual rule, there’s still some hidden taboo to attacking players. Players have to take note if they’re taking on a
large guild. That’s because even if they win, the guild in question may send out a large-scale attack for revenge, and would sometimes even bring their resentment to the net community outside the game. Right now, not many players would challenge a large guild aside from those who were already aiming to PK at the beginning.
“Yu…Yuuki, that’s…”
Asuna’s mouth was wide open, yet she couldn’t let out a voice as she didn’t know how to explain this. However, Yuuki merely smiled and patted her on the shoulder and said,
“Asuna, some things have to be done through forceful means for the other party to understand. For example, right now, we should show them how serious we are.”
“Yeah, you’re right.”
Behind them, Jun nodded in agreement. Asuna turned back and found that the other 5 members wielded their weapon as if it was normal.
“Everyone…”
“These people who are sealing this place off should be prepared to defend this place to the last man.”
Yuuki again turned her eyes to look at the Gnome, tilted her head and said to him,
“Isn’t that right?”
“Ah…erm, we…”
The petite Imp girl immediately drew her longsword at her waist right in front of the guy who hasn’t recovered from the shock, and pointed it at the sky. The smile on her lips vanished, and her eyes showed a stern glint――
“Now, draw your weapon.”
The Gnome that was devoured by Yuuki’s presence undid the large battleaxe at his waist and easily made a posture to attack.
At the next moment, the petite Imp girl stormed through the entire corridor like a whirlwind.
“NUAA…!!”
Having finally understood what was going on, the Gnome pricked his nose and roared, moving the large axe in his hands. However, his movements were really too slow. Yuuki’s obsidian longsword left a dark trail before swinging up from below and stabbed it straight into the center of the guy’s chest.
“GUU!!”
Yuuki used this hit to make the Gnome, who was much more muscular than her, lose his balance. She then added on with a straight uppercut. The longsword let out a heavy sound, slashed into the Gnome’s shoulder, and caused the HP bar to decrease drastically.