Chapter 96 – Red Dragon’s Lair (2)

“Here it comes! Careful!”

The ‘Immortal’ shouted while covering his body with the shield. A magma golem came charging towards them from the distance while letting out immense heat, stomping loudly. The hunters tensed up at its sight.

This magma golem was designed to be fought in a group of ten; it was much stronger than normal mobs of most other raids. To compare it to other chapters, it was nearly as strong as the main raid bosses of the other chapters, or perhaps just a little bit weaker.

Taking it lightly for being a normal mob could lead to instant death. And if anyone were to die, it would make the later fight against the Red Dragon more difficult.

‘Woosh’

The Golem swung both of its arms made of Lava.

The two tanks of the team, ‘Immortal’ and ‘Iron Wall’ each stopped an arm but were pushed back with every strike, even being sent flying a short distance.

Meanwhile, the other eight hunters launched their attacks, clubbing and stabbing.

“Ice Lance!”

Some fired spells

‘Ssst sst’

Others fired bolts and arrows. But everyone had to be careful. Being hit by stray droplets of magma would lead to serious burns.

“Ahh!”

The barbarian waved his hands as he backed off from the front. The Magician in the back quickly shouted

“Frozen wall, to me! Ice Shield!”

He protected the Barbarian with an ice barrier. The Barbarian’s glove was on fire. A droplet of magma must have landed on him while swinging his spear.

He quickly removed his gloves, but it was after he had sustained a severe burn. Seeing his injury, everyone else began to move more cautiously.

But one of the key strength of the magma golem was that it had an enormous health pool. Despite ten hunters endlessly smashing against the Obsidian exterior of the golem, it could still fight on.

If they didn’t have a swordsman like Sungjin ‘who exceeded common sense’ that is.

While the other hunters were focused on the golem’s front, Sungjin slid between its legs and went to the other side

“Binding Frost! Frostbite!”

He fired the chilling air from his hands. Because of the immense heat of the magma, it was difficult to freeze it. It did slow it down slightly and successfully reduced the amount of magma that splashed back.

After casting the spell, Sungjin charged towards the golem with the newly upgraded Moon Specter and the Blood Vengeance. But then the magma golem used its left arm to swing towards Sungjin.

A Magma Golem does not have front or the back; such logic only worked with humans who had limited joints. The magma golem was able to attack Sungjin without difficulty. Sungjin blocked the arm with the Blood Vengeance on his left hand.

‘Clang!’

And used the Moon Specter on his right to cut the arm. Then

“Boom!”

The arm of the golem which withstood the attack of others sliced off without much difficulty and fell to the ground. The other hunters exclaimed at the sight.

“Wow…”

The golem looked impervious to all the attacks until now, but Sungjin was able to sever a large portion of its body with a single strike. Truth be told, even Sungjin was shocked.

Sungjin looked at the Moon Specter which had upgraded to a ‘Unique Legendary’ Tier weapon.

‘S…So sharp…’

Last time he faced the Magma Golem, he had used the Blood Vengeance. But in that time, he had to cut the same spot again and again until he could deal a bit of damage.

‘As I thought… just one tier makes so much difference…’

Sungjin thought as he began to cut apart the Magma golem. Meanwhile, the other hunters became emboldened and joined in the attack. Soon the Magma golem collapsed on the spot.

“Whew…”

Everyone let out a sigh of relief.

“Let’s take a quick break before we move on.”

Everyone who had taken damage including the tanks sat down to take a drink of their potions. Meanwhile, an Asian man came up to Sungjin. His title was ‘Blue Magician’.

It was the same title Sungjin owned. From the earlier fight,

“I noticed you used the spell Frostbite… you also have high magic power. Excuse me but… how much is your magic power right now?”

Sungjin didn’t really want to answer, but he decided to make a half-hearted reply anyway.

“Well, about five thousand? That should be about right.”

He couldn’t afford to act like a loner in this raid.

“Ohh, amazing. You have strong physical stats but a high magic power as well.”

Sungjin focused on his voice rather than his words. This man had an unmasculine soft and high pitched voice. It was very different from the low and raspy voice of the troll.

“Ahh yeah well…”

Sungjin replied absentmindedly as he checked the other hunters. Everyone was silently recuperating, no one spoke.

‘I need to find out who the hidden troll is… So I can make preparations ahead of time.’

Sungjin wanted to leave the ‘Blue Magician’ behind and have a conversation with the others. The first person he spoke to was the ‘Royal Ranger’, an archer.

He was a red headed Caucasian, but his skin was clammy and unshaven, giving him an ill look.

‘Do not judge a book by its cover’ he knew, but his appearance bothered him regardless. Sungjin approached him and asked

“Hey, are you alright?”

He replied

“Ah, Master Hunter.”

It was a thick tone, but a clear one. It was not the rough tone of voice he had heard before. And he was polite.

“I am fine. Thank you for your concern.”

He was then approached by the black middle aged axe-wielding ‘Destroyer’ who asked

“Hey, what is that sword made out of? What are its specs? How did you cut off the golem’s arm in one strike?”

He pointed at the Blood Vengeance instead of the Moon Specter. Blood Vengeance was far neater and beautiful in appearance.

And he must have thought that it must have been the Blood Vengeance which cut off the arm instead of the Moon Specter. Sungjin picked up the Blood Vengeance and said

“Well… Legendary class. Bought from the Market.”

“Oh really? How amazing.”

A low tone. But far lower than anyone else. He had a low pitch even among men.

‘So he’s not it.’

Sungjin wanted to speak to two more hunters, but the ‘Immortal’ announced

“Okay, let’s continue. As you might have read, the chapter has a maze, so it is possible for us to run out of time before we even get to the dragon and die then and there.”

Everyone prepared to leave, standing up and picking up their equipment. Sungjin was forced to stop searching for the ‘Troll’s voice’. But

“Kaa~ phew”

Someone spat phlegm from behind. A white man who had been smoking all this time, the ‘Friar’.

He was a healer who mainly used white magic, and had been smoking at every opportunity since the raid began (Sungjin didn’t smoke, but there was a merchant who sold cigarettes in the market. Cigarettes were not considered a combat related item, so it was provided for free).

Sungjin carefully observed him. He had thought that smoking might have something to do with the roughness of the voice he had heard earlier. But he answered back politely.

“Master Hunter, right? Are we going?”

“Ah… yes.”

Sungjin nodded

‘Did I get the wrong person?’

But then he added

“This raid is proving to be difficult, as expected. We are going to have to… cough… “

When he coughed, his voice was identical to what he had heard earlier.

‘If I monopolize 10 people’s worth of contribution… how much would that be?’

Rough voice full of phlegm.

‘It was this guy after all.’

Despite thinking so, Sungjin said to him

“I will be giving it my best, Sir Frior. I look forward to your support.”

“Of… of course.”

The guy was pretending to be upstanding. Except for his smoking, he looked very clean and presentable with cleanly shaved beard and short cut hair.

‘I guess the bad guys have to keep up appearances…’

Sungjin thought as he continued to glance at him. He was pretending to be a White Mage healer, but without a doubt, he had spells from other classes as well.

Actually, trolling while pretending to be a Healer is extremely advantageous. It is easy to earn the trust of teammates while healing, it does not reveal any aggression, and it allows one to stand in the back while being protected by everyone else, which improves chances of survival.

‘So, he would pretend like this till the end and suddenly strike when one or two people die.’

If this was the case, then an incredibly dangerous situation could occur. If he pretended to be preoccupied when a heal was needed, he could freely manipulate the number of survivors in a party.

Landing a spell or an Arrow on an ally by ‘accident’ would have you flagged as a troll by the Operator, but a Healer not healing being flagged as a troll is highly unlikely.

Sungjin stared at him as he thought

‘Wow… he is smarter than I thought. What should I do?’

He couldn’t out him as an undercover troll. The only reason why Sungjin found out was by reading his mind. There was no evidence to present to the others.

And at this point, everybody was aware of the 10% penalty for trolling, so unless they were like Franz and were deeply righteous, they would not attack anyone unless they were already flagged as a troll first. Even if Sungjin declared

‘This guy is a troll’

The only thing he will hear back is

‘And the evidence?’

‘So, what the hell do you want us to do? Become a troll first?’

And etcetera.

‘Well my hands are tied’

He had no choice but to continue for now. At least until the raid boss, ‘Red Dragon’ was killed.

‘Well if close to 10 Hunters survive he probably won’t try to commit trolling alone.’

Sungjin decided to focus on defeating the Red Dragons first. This raid was 2 hours and a half hours long. He had to complete the raid as soon as possible in order to go hunt trolls in other raids.

But the two tanks in the front stopped walking. The ‘Immortal’ looked behind and said

“It is a fork in the road. What should we do?”

Sungjin tilted his head to look ahead. The pass split into two. The only thing visible inside of the dark caves was the red hot lava lazily running downhill. Sungjin stared at the lava as he thought

‘Where was the boss again?’

The Dragon’s Lair was a maze leading from Cavern to Cavern, and within a large cavity in one of those Caverns lay the sleeping Red Dragon Khal Gal.

The problem was that Sungjin didn’t really remember the path. The first time he had come here, Sungjin had been too preoccupied with survival to worry about remembering exactly what path they had taken.

And he had never thought that he would ever return to the Dragon’s Lair again.

‘Goodness… if we get lost here, I won’t have time to go hunting for trolls…’

But then the Barbarian stepped forward and said

“Our priority is killing the red dragon first, right? Since we can increase our contribution points after the fact.”

“Of course”

“That’s right”

“I have the ‘guide’ title. The title can guide us to the boss.”

‘Oh yeah, that’s right’

There was definitely something like that. Henrik from the Cemetery had obtained the same title. The Barbarian glanced at everyone present and said

“Then I will use it right away. Operator, I will use the ‘Guide’s’ special effect. Please show us the way to the boss.”

The cave to the right became blue. The Barbarian pointed towards that cave and said

“It must be that way”

The hunters headed towards the Direction he pointed out. Sungjin followed suit.

‘It sure is nice to have more people sometimes.’

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