Spiteful Healer

Chapter 132: The Thing Under the Mountain Pt.1

Rakkan’s memory of the former Darxon Hideout’s lower hallways served them well. They only made one wrong turn in their search for the door that led out into the large open cavern underneath the mountain, with a river flowing quickly towards the cliff that transitioned it into a waterfall. Aegis motioned for everyone to hang back but Christoph, Quinn, Erikson and his party, and the seven of them stepped through the doorway out of the ruined hallway and into the open cavern.

It was pitch black, the torches that were once enchanted to light up the cavern had long since been extinguished, but Pyri lit up her staff with a very bright lumina spell which did well to illuminate the cavern around them. Looking around, the group followed the flowing river with their eyes to see where the edge of the cliff was, and where the cave opened up into a giant cavern.

Aegis motioned everyone over towards the cliff and waterfall where they quietly walked to the ledge to look down over the seemingly bottomless drop below them. They only knew there was a bottom due to the sound of the waterfall below, but the light of Pyri’s spell didn’t reach it.

“Use cinderbolt along the top, see if you can spot the remains of the ruined tower so we know if we’re in the right place or not.” Aegis whispered to Pyri and she gave him a nod, followed by a few distinct finger movements to cancel her lumina spell and create a cinderbolt. She then waved it upwards into the open cavern ahead of them along the ceiling as it arched higher and higher with a curved roof covered in stalactites. All of it looked dark red due to the glow of the cinderbolt illuminating it.

It took a bit before the cinderbolt found the highest part of the cavern ceiling, and there, Pyri moved the bolt around and flattened it into a wide ring to illuminate more of the cavern. Sure enough, after a bit of searching, they spotted the hole in the roof with parts of the upside-down ruined tower sticking out of it, though the bottom half was now completely destroyed. Immediately upon spotting it, she canceled the cinderbolt and recast her lumina to light the area around them.

“This is the spot.” Aegis looked to the others and gave them a nod.

“Alright. You're the leader, so I’ll follow your instructions, but remember Aegis, Raid Bosses are nothing to underestimate. They are designed for large groups, you will need to use everyone to their full potential. Leadership in these fights is arguably the most important thing in achieving success.” Quinn whispered to him.

“He’ll be fine.” Christoph said, trying to dismiss Quinn’s words.

“I’m just saying. You need to have a deep understanding of a lot of mechanics of various classes, even the ones you don’t play, in order to use them all effectively.” Quinn said, and Aegis could see what she was saying, as well as the obvious look on her face that told him she didn’t think he was ready to lead a raid party.

She had a point, though, Aegis thought. He looked over the class names of everyone in their raiding group. In total they had 60 members, and nearly all of them were higher level than he was.

Yuki was an intermediate tailor, and Tullan an intermediate armorsmith, yet they were in the group with them. What could they do to help, should they be in the front, or at the back?

Cheryl was a Loki cleric, Sapphire was an Aphrodite cleric, and there were several other clerics and acolyte players. Which was more suited for healing who?

There were so many martial classes, Aegis couldn’t keep track of them all. Dragoon, Samurai, Berserker, Seeker, Battlemaster, Brawler, Monk, Rune Knight, not to mention Paladin and Crusader…

And Warlock players? There were three in the group, and Aegis hadn’t even really seen a beginner one in action before.

Lina was a Shadow Dancer, an intermediate thief class, but there were other intermediate thieves in the group. Two assassin players, and a Trickster.

Rangers, Aegis knew thanks to Darkshot, but what was a Sharpshooter, and what could a Bard do with their music? Those were archer intermediates present that he’d no idea what they were capable of.

And the Guardians, the other tanks… he knew how he would tank as a Shattered Healer, and he knew how shield mastery worked, but apart from that…

Just by reading over the list of classes in his raid, he was quickly becoming overwhelmed. He looked at each of his party members and saw them looking at him, with no doubt in his abilities, but he himself was doubting it, and Pyri could tell.

“You’ve never watched a raid fight before. It’s your first VRMMORPG. If you want to try it out and see how it goes, I think everyone would be willing to follow you.” Pyri smiled and gently put her hand on his shoulder. “But there’s no shame in wanting to watch someone else do it first, just to see how these things usually go.” She added, speaking quietly so that her voice didn’t overtake the sound of rushing water nearby. Aegis nodded back at her, and for that moment was extremely happy that his mom was there playing with him.

“You’re right.” He took a deep breath. “I’d like to watch an experienced raid leader in action, so I can see how things are done. I don’t know what half of these classes can do yet, I haven’t taken the time to study them and memorize their skills.” Aegis admitted.

“It’s fine, it takes a lot of learning and talking with people who play other classes to really understand how they all function.” Erikson shrugged. “Most people aren’t interested in doing that.” As Erikson said this, though, Aegis was only thinking of the fact that he knew Makaroth was the raid leader of his guild. He knew that if someone like that could do it, so could he.

“I’ll learn it all.” Aegis replied confidently. “I’ll watch closely. I’d be stupid not to take advantage of having an experienced teacher offering me a free lesson.” Aegis smiled as he fiddled with his interface and passed over the leadership of the raid party to Quinn.

“Whoa, a streamer who doesn’t have an over-inflated ego. I’m becoming a bigger and bigger fan by the minute.” Christoph smirked. “But, you know, I’ve also got plenty of experience leading raids. Quinn’s experience is primarily in just running Kordas. By sheer numbers, the Blades of Kalmoore have taken out more raid bosses.” Christoph crossed his arms and tapped his foot, staring between the two expectantly. To Aegis’ surprise, Quinn didn’t refute this fact.

“Well, either way, Quinn has more of her guild members here and is more familiar with my playstyle.” Aegis shrugged. “I’m still main tanking, by the way.” Aegis added.

“Alright.” Christoph shook his head with disappointment.

“I’ll give everyone their assignments. You guys wait here and let me know if you spot any changes in the cavern, but I think we’re safe from aggravating the monster from up here.” Quinn said with a smile before she turned and headed to the door that led back into the ruins where the other players were waiting.

“I think you’ll be really good at Raid Leading, once you see how it’s done.” Lina said encouragingly to Aegis after she’d gone.

“Yeah, definitely not easy to pull off, but you’re for sure gonna like it.” Darkshot joined in. Aegis was expecting them to be disappointed in him, but their words encouraged him instead.

It wasn’t long before the raid interface was being bombarded with very specific instructions from Quinn for the other members, but Aegis paid attention to every single one of them. He tried to get a sense of what she was prioritizing. They were fighting an unknown enemy, so how she prepared each class for it told him a lot about what each class's most important specialties were.

“Bards, hold off on using your mana and playing music until we know what the primary methods of attack are. Be ready to play songs for mana regeneration or movement impairments.” Quinn sent out.

“Tullan, Yuki, Sapphire and Cheryl, you’re on Aegis. Tullan, focus on durability upkeep. Yuki, focus on armor buffs. Sapphire and Cheryl healing. Guardians, cover flanks. Erikson, take left for the melee, Uggard take right, we don’t know how many targets the boss will be able to strike at once, or if he’s a damage splitter, so be ready to jump in to help Aegis if needed.”

“Baffo, cover the healers in case this is a fight where the boss summons multiple enemies. Pull them off as needed. Other clerics cover the melee fighters, acolytes hang back with the ranged damage dealers and be ready to heal them of any raid wide damage.” She continued without missing a beat.

“Sages, use your concentration spell on lighting up the cavern as best you can, spread lights out so there’s nothing that can sneak up on us. Rangers, use your birds to scout out possible entry points for additional enemies, we don’t know if he’s the sort to call for help or if he’s a solo raid boss.”

“Wizards, Warlocks, and Druids, hold off on using any damage spells until we’ve probed for vulnerabilities. Pyri, you’re capable of casting every element, so try each one out once Aegis has established aggro, and we’ll be able to see what damage types are most effective.”

“Remember, everyone, conserve mana for the first 2 minutes of the fight until we know what we’re dealing with. We may need to make use of your mana in specific ways depending on his mechanics.” Quinn finished this message as she stepped back out of the ruins to join Aegis, Christoph, Erikson, Lina, Darkshot, Pyri and Rakkan in the cavern. Behind her, this time, followed the rest of the group.

“Hold off damage until Aegis has established threat and Pyri has finished probing. Any questions?” Quinn asked, and no one answered. “Alright, let’s get into position.” She finished, and Aegis felt a tingle of excitement filling him up. He saw his viewership spiking up to 120,000, so he knew he wasn’t the only one excited.

“This is what I’ve been dreaming of. This is why I wanted to play this game with you. Oh man I’m so hyped!” Darkshot whispered excitedly, barely able to stay still, and it was contagious. Aegis could tell Pyri, Lina and Rakkan were all excited as well. Even Darkwing let out an enthusiastic coo and started bobbing his head around curiously. They watched as the full raid of players slowly fanned out in the cavern, remaining quiet.

“Rangers and Marksmen stay up on this ledge for now, as it’s likely the best vantage point.” Quinn motioned to where they were standing. “Final buffs before we activate auras.” She said as she turned to the group. Hearing this, a few more players began casting short duration spells on themselves and others.

“Here.” Yuki smiled as she walked over to Aegis and lightly tapped his shoulder. As she did, suddenly several threads of silk grew out of her fingertips, attached to Aegis. They were spectral, meaning Aegis was able to pass his fingers through the threads as he tried to touch them. They also extended themselves magically, allowing Yuki to take a few steps back after she’d used the skill. Aegis saw a new buff appear on his interface. [Silkskin(Yuki)]. He clicked on it to see that it was increasing his armor value by 35%.

“Thanks.” Aegis smiled at her, and she gave him a thumbs up.

“I’ll cover the aura of beauty.” Sapphire informed Aegis when she caught his gaze as he did one last look around at all the players, spotting Lina smiling encouragingly at him.

“Alright. Let’s do this.” Quinn sent this message, and suddenly the tension rose as everyone quieted down. “Mikala, make us a staircase.” She turned to a level ?? Night Hunter Druid player. She was an elf with long green hair with many flowers woven into it. She pulled from her back a gnarled branch and waved it, causing the earth to begin jutting out from the wall of the cliff face beside the waterfall in the form of a staircase. As it appeared, the guardian players and clerics lead the way down the steps to reach the bottom of the cavern.

“Hey.” Quinn approached Aegis, no longer speaking through the interface as she put her hand on his shoulder. “Let Ren take the first hit and pay attention to if he gets any debuffs. Ren’s mirror turtle has a unique skill that drastically reduces the damage of the first hit it takes. It’s great for the first hit, but it has a minute cooldown. So we’ll use that to see what kind of attacks this Raid boss has, to avoid you getting one-hit right out the gate.” Quinn explained.

“Some raid bosses will one-hit a player with high armor?” Aegis asked her with a raised eyebrow.

“Hah. You went with leather, so I wouldn’t call you high armor, even with the shield and Yuki’s buff.” Quinn smirked. “I don’t blame you for wanting a movement speed bonus from leather, rather than a penalty from heavy armor, but you’ll need to use that mobility to dodge some strikes while you are a main tank.” Quinn explained. “Leather armor tanks aren’t usually the type to just sit there and take a beating, they’ve got to take advantage of their speed to dodge sometimes.”

“I know that.” Aegis sighed as he shook his head. He’d decided on leather armor for this very reason, the flexibility to choose when to dodge and when to block attacks.

“Okay.” Quinn raised her hands with a shrug. “Go gettem.” She nudged him forward down the stairs. Quinn stayed up top with Quiver, Darkshot, and a few other ranged damage dealers, while Aegis made his way down the earthen stairs behind the others, Yuki staying close to keep the threads linked.

Once they reached the bottom, Aegis stuck with the group as several wizard players activated lumina spells to reveal the flat barren cavern floor and the edge of the water. He couldn’t help but stare at the ripples of the water flowing up onto the eroded cavern floor. Even with lumina spells, it was difficult to see much of the ground under the water beyond the very edges.

“Spread out, but be ready to collapse.” Quinn sent through the interface. Once she had, Aegis watched as the raid did exactly that, giving a much better sense to everyone just how huge this cavern was. The eastern side of the cavern, where the river was, opened up into a large still lake that went right up to the eastern cavern walls, leaving the only place with any sort of footing on the western side of the cavern where they all stood.

Aegis made his way to the edge of the water where the rubble of the broken tower was scattered about in pieces, while everyone else took advantage of sections of the cavern that jutted upwards, giving them better vantage points. The melee fighters spread out along the shore in two groups, one gathering around Erikson, the other Uggard. Aegis felt a bit like royalty with how Tullan, Yuki, Sapphire and Cheryl stayed close to him, watching his every movement.

“Alright. Ren, Turtle. Sages, light it up.” Quinn said once everyone looked to be in position. It went incredibly quiet from there, the tension rose drastically and the only sound that could be heard was that of the flowing waterfall. Various sage players held their staves high in the air, and from them came out dozens of tiny glowing white orbs that spread out around the cavern. Within seconds, all of the darkness was gone and they could see almost every detail around them.

There was only one other way out of the cavern, a downward sloping tunnel on the north side. This put Quinn’s worries to rest about being swarmed and surrounded by additional enemies.

At the same time, those still up on the ledge beside the top of the waterfall could now see deep down into the underground lake below them.

“I see it. Holy shit it’s huge.” Darkshot said giddily into the interface as he, Quiver, and Quinn leaned over the ledge to look at the Raid Boss under the water.

“Keep the party interface communications clear.” Quinn nudged him half-heartedly.

“Oh, sorry.” Darkshot apologized.

“It’s still sleeping, its eyes are closed.” Quinn explained.

“What is it?” Herilon asked excitedly.

“No idea, never seen it before. Unique monster, most likely. I see no limbs. Looks like a squid of some kind. Probably immune to water damage, or fire. Okay.” Quinn took a deep breath. “Ren, you’re up.”

“Beastshift, mirror turtle.” Ren whispered as he walked up excitedly beside Aegis, exploding in a puff of green smoke as he transformed, then emerging from the smoke as a turtle with reflective plates on the shell. With his weird green turtle eyes, he winked at Aegis with a smirk.

“How did you guys wake it up last time?” Quinn asked.

“Uhm, we flew a cinderbolt really close to the water, I guess heating the water up.” Pyri shrugged as she answered back into the interface.

“Okay. Ren. Try splashing around a bit.” Quinn said. Ren stepped forward to the edge of the lake where the water was still shallow and started excitedly splashing in the water with his big turtle feet. It took about four splashes before the cavern began to rumble.

“Here we go.” Quinn said anxiously, and Aegis heard the sound of dozens of weapons being unsheathed and arrows being nocked. He turned to his left to see Lina and Rakkan staring back at him at the edge of the lake some meters away, and they returned his stare with big excited grins.

First, one large tentacle shot out of the water and slammed down onto the shore nearby, then another, then a third. Long slimy black tentacles with suckers on the bottom and spines on the top. The creature was pulling itself up out of the depths of the lake towards the shore, and after several more tentacles slammed down on the shore, it lifted its huge body properly out of the lake to reveal its giant red eyes and large gaping maw of teeth.

It let out a horrendous, gurgling roar, then shot out multiple tendrils from around the rim of its circular maw and shot them forward like spears at Ren. Ren’s shell sparkled brightly as one tendril crashed into it, dealing 421 damage as Aegis saw the damage number appear. As Quinn had explained, Ren could take a single hit very easily, but the ability to do that had a long cooldown, so Aegis panicked when he saw that the boss had multiple other tendrils lined up to follow that attack, and shot them forward.

“Challenging Roar!” Aegis shouted the moment he noticed it, but even then, it was too slow, and Ren took two more tendril hits. These following ones did 2400, and 2300 damage.

Once Aegis had cast his spell, the boss turned its attention to him, and Aegis saw then just how many tendrils this thing had as they began to curl upward around the creatures maw. The larger tententacles were being used to anchor the boss in place on the shore and held it up above the water, while at least ten medium sized tendrils were taking on spear like shapes, and started darting down at Aegis repeatedly. Bracing that many attacks, that fast, was going to be hard.

“Ok, it’s a fast attacker. That’s perfect, we’ve got a leather tank. Use your mobility to dodge as many hits as you can, brace the rest. Pyri, start testing damage. Aegis, keep building threat.” Quinn ordered.

Easier said than done, Aegis gave up trying to speak the spell and started snapping his fingers to repeatedly cast a challenging roar while trying to dodge and brace the barrage of tendrils shooting down at him like bullets.

You take 1631 Piercing damage.

You take 1780 Piercing damage.

You take 1693 Piercing damage.

You take 1563 Piercing Damage

You take 1320 Piercing Damage.

Iron Shield of Eirene’s durability has dropped by 2.

You receive 6400 healing from Sapphire.

You take 1590 Piercing Damage

You receive 7130 healing from Cheryl

Iron Shield of Eirene’s durability was repaired by Tullan.

You take 1644 Piercing damage.

The numbers were scrolling by so fast, the attack speed of this boss was unlike anything Aegis had encountered so far. Each of the 10 tendrils were just relentlessly shooting down at him, then retracting back up and doing it again. He was grateful that it was piercing damage and not bludgeoning, as piercing felt like nothing in terms of his pain threshold, but he knew he could do better. He was not happy with how many hits were landing on him.

He took a deep breath and did his best to focus. Tanking like this, it wasn’t something special. All the best players could do this, He thought. He knew there were three guardian players in this very raid with him that were able to handle something like this. If he wanted to be at the top, he needed to be able to tank this thing as best as possible AND lead the rest of the raid. With this in mind, he stepped up his intensity. He began sidestepping every other tendril strike, and timing his brace around the ones in between, while maintaining his constant stream of challenging roars.

“Fire’s no good. Neither is ice. It’s lighting.” Quinn announced as she’d been watching Pyri test different spells on the boss, everyone else still waiting patiently in the wings. “Let us know when you feel you have enough threat built up, Aegis. Keep in mind we have some damage dealers that are much higher level than you.” Quinn said, and Aegis took a moment to glance back at the players around him and see that all eyes were on him. His viewership was at 200,000, and everyone in the raid was waiting for him to give the okay to start attacking.

“I should be good, go for it!” Aegis announced after his mana dipped below 500 from challenging roar casts.

“Start slow!” Quinn shouted, her voice carrying over the cavern, immediately after she gave the command, everyone else in the raid joined in the battle. Arrows began to fly, the melee fighters spread out around the parts of the boss on the shore, and the Wizards, Druids and Warlocks began casting spells. The cavern lit up, and damage numbers began to pop up in red all over the raid boss. But in that time, it never took its eyes off of Aegis.

“Yara, song of mana, make sure Aegis gets it. Aegis, keep up the roars.” Quinn ordered

“Okay!” Yara, a level 80 Night Hunter bard, ran up relatively close to Aegis with a lute in her hand and began strumming it, a light tune filling the area around them that provided himself and all nearby players with a massive boost in mana recovery. Aegis didn’t bother watching his mana, he just kept casting challenging roar and let the game decide if he had enough to cast it or not, while focusing on taking as little hits as possible.

As the numbers flew by, Aegis received healing, and the boss roared ferociously while glaring down on him, Aegis slowly got into the flow of it and started to feel more and more confident. It was a Raid Boss, sure, but it wasn’t elite, it had a style of attacking, and he was getting used to the pattern.

“You’re tanking pretty good, gerbil!” Sapphire shouted encouragingly as she’d stopped needing to heal him so often.

“Don’t get too comfy though. These things always have extra tricks, so be ready.” Tullan shouted to Aegis over the sound of the tendrils crashing into the cavern floor around him, leaving tiny craters behind. Aegis knew that much, so he did his best to focus on his surroundings as the battle went on.

Seeing this many players all working together, using their abilities and skills to help each other and take down the boss as they all fought around Aegis, he couldn’t help but feel it. The true excitement of playing an MMORPG was sinking into him, and against his will a gigantic grin grew across his face that he couldn’t shake off. Despite the fact that this gigantic, slimy black skinned beast was glaring at him with its huge red eyes and relentlessly trying to kill him, he was pumped full of adrenaline and filled with nothing but excitement. It was like the Guardians had said - knowing it was his job to protect everyone from this creature's wrath was exhilarating.

“This is really fun.” Aegis said excitedly, glancing back at the supporting players behind him. Yuki, Cheryl, Sapphire and Tullan all smiled back at him.

“Watch out!” Yuki motioned Aegis to look back at the beast, and he did. As it continued to barrage him with tendril strikes, Aegis and the other raid members saw that from within its maw of razor sharp teeth, a dark purple orb of light began to glow. It slowly and peacefully floated out of the boss's mouth, levitating in the air in front of it.

“Heads up, it’s using a skill, everyone be cautious.” Quinn shouted as damage dealers slowed their attacks to see what the purple light orb was going to do.

A few seconds after it had appeared, it suddenly shot out its own tendrils made of light in all directions around the cavern - five in total. Each tendril moved quickly, way beyond anyone’s ability to possibly dodge them. One tendril hit Herilon’s forehead, one hit Quinn, one hit Sapphire, one hit Miranda, and one hit an ex-White flame member. Once the tendrils hit their foreheads, their eyes began to glow red, and in an instant, Herilon turned his greatsword on all of the melee fighters standing near him, doing a wide swing. The closest player was Christoph, who took the brunt of the damage and was caught off guard.

He attempted to disengage from around Herilon, as did the other nearby players, but Herilon pursued him and began relentlessly striking out at Christoph, doing massive damage. The purple tendril remained attached to Herilons forehead, clearly controlling his actions.

Luckily, before Herilon could land a finishing blow on Christoph, Uggard jumped forward with his shield to block his greatsword strike.

As this happened, Sapphire stopped healing Aegis and instead rushed to attack him from behind with her scepter, but Tullan tackled her to the ground.

“Wall of Iron!” Tullan shouted, creating a cage of metal bars around Sapphire to contain her.

“Yeh’ve gotta keep Aegis up by yerself.” Tullan shouted at Cheryl, and she nodded as she stepped forward.

“Shit. Herilon’s gotta be the worst mind control target.” Uggard shouted in frustration as he blocked a few more strikes. In that time, the sound of whistling arrows could be heard over the cavern as Quinn began to bombard the players with volleys from the ledge, her eyes glowing bright red. Baffo reacted quickly and started using his guard skill and his shield to jump around and intercept all of the arrows, protecting the other party members from Quinn’s attacks.

“Someone else, take over, Quinn’s mind controlled.” Erikson shouted as he moved to take hits from the ex-white flame member that’d been mind controlled, doing his best to protect the melee players on the left side of the cavern.

“Give it a shot, if you screw up I’ll take over.” Christoph winked at Aegis as Aegis looked over and saw him hiding behind Uggard’s shield from Herilon. Aegis hesitated, looking at Christoph’s confident expression. He could tell that Christoph already knew exactly what needed to be done in this situation, just from how he looked at Aegis. He wasn’t at all panicking, despite how quickly things had become chaotic.

He clenched his fists and took a deep breath. If Makaroth could do this, so could he, he thought to himself.