“I’ll throw the campfire down, if you want to get cooking, Ash.” Jazz said, as a campfire with a rather impressive loadout of cooking implements appeared in front of Aleister.

  “Got it.” Ash said, and Mellody scampered over to the cooking equipment and got started on prepping food for the party. Kieran watched Mellody go through various cooking animations - chopping vegetables, flipping food in a frying pan, and the like. He also popped open his character screen to take a quick gander at Caoimhe’s stats.

  Kieran was pretty happy with Caoimhe’s stats. The 10,000 HP and MP was the standard for every level 90 character with no exceptions. Buffs - like the food, for example - could alter it further, but the 10,000 was your base, regardless of [Path], or even [Trinity].

  Altogether, Caoimhe’s stats were pretty standard for a [Tyrant]. Decent to high physical defenses for a DPS, and fairly low magical defenses. [Accuracy] was the stat that governed critical hits, and a 12% chance to crit wasn’t too bad, all things considered. It could be better, though.

  Caoimhe didn’t really need any [Intelligence], as it primarily governed magical attacks, of which [Tyrant] had zero. Even the 8 she had in the stat came from a [Ring] accessory she had equipped for its secondary effect and not the [Int]; it automatically refreshed one of her [Reversals], with a 5 minute cooldown. A little extra survivability could go a long way, after all.

  “So, what buffs do you have for us today, O Master Chef?” Marissa joked.

  “Would you prefer some defensive buffs since we don’t know what to expect?” Ash asked.

  “Hell no.” Marissa laughed.

  “I didn’t think so.” Ash snickered. “Full damage buffs coming your way, plus the always included HP and MP boosts. I don’t feel like we’re going to be in enough danger to warrant defense buffs.”

  Kieran was happy with that. Eating foods conferred the [Satiated] buff, which was a 3% buff to whichever stats the food affected. The only exception was the HP and MP buff was a full 10%. It kept all of the numbers nice and clean, which was nice.

  “Sounds lovely.” Kieran said approvingly. “Don’t need more defense if things die fast enough. Besides, we should already have plenty of buffs thanks to our trusty Revel.”

  “...You do know that those buffs stack, Kieran?” Ash asked sarcastically.

  “Yes, Ashton, I know those buffs stack. But more damage is more damage. More defense is useless unless we would’ve died without it.” Kieran shot back.

  “Spoken like a true DPS.” Jazz said snidely.

  “That would be apt, if I didn’t know that Kieran prefers higher defenses to outlast a fight than a glass cannon type situation.” Marissa chuckled. “Even if more damage is the correct option here.”

  “Whatever. Let’s just get in there.” Kieran said, interacting with the meal as it appeared on the table. He saw the buff symbols appear on the screen right above his status read out.

  Everyone else followed suit, and in fairly short order, the group was ready to enter the dungeon

  “Alright, everyone double check your shit and let’s go.” Marissa said, before moving right over the instance boundary. Kieran, Ash, and Jazz all followed right behind.

  “Well. So much for it just being a cave.” Marissa said once they all loaded in.

  “No kidding.” Kieran said, rotating his camera around. The place was a cave, but it was also clearly man-made and maintained. It looked more like a fancy mine shaft, if anything.

  There were struts and supports every so often down the tunnel to keep it from collapsing, but the beams were pretty ornate considering their very practical purpose. In between each set of posts were beautifully crafted wall sconces as well, lighting the way down the tunnel.

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  “Well, there’s only one path.” Jazz said flatly.

  “Yup. Let’s get to it.” Ash agreed, as he popped one of his abilities.

  [Revel] was one of the [Dedications] for [Muse], which was basically a Bard-type support Path. It had enough healing to get by in most situations, but what it lacked in healing it made up for in AoE buffs and debuffs, as well as special effects in some cases.

  For now, everyone in the party received the [Forward March] buff, which was movement speed and a small 500 HP shield. It was designed for exactly this purpose - to help the team move through an area quickly, but with some assurance in case of an ambush.

  Though in this case, the shield was pretty superfluous, given they all expected to see whatever enemies were in wait before they attacked. The movement speed buff was nice though.

  And sure enough, right around the first bend was a fairly large, round room. And within it waited four automatons, weapons already drawn.

  “I guess lore-wise, this really is just the Clan overseers running a test for us. Those are the same type of training dummies you can hit in Lugh’s Courtyard.” Kieran said.

  “Oh yeah, you’re totally right.” Jazz said. “I assume these will fight back though.”

  “I would assume so.” Marissa agreed.

  Another buff went out from Mellody, this time a strength and attack damage one called [Overture of Might], usually just called [Overture]. It was a 3% [Strength] buff that also added an extra 3% to outgoing damage on top of that. It was a very solid buff.

  “Pulling in 5.” Jazz said, and sent Aleister through a quick set of pre-pull skills.

  The [Dedication] that Jazz played predominantly was [Ebon], branched off from [War], a tank that was flavored entirely around magic. [Ebon], in this case, was the dark magic styled version - which matched Aleister’s aesthetic perfectly.

  First up was [Shadowskin], a simple mitigation ability that split the damage taken between the character’s HP and MP. Then [Darkness Aura], which had a chance to [Blind] targets that hit Aleister. And finally was [Evil Presence], which was essentially [Ebon]’s taunt skill, making their attacks generate extra [Threat] to keep the enemies targeting them.

  Marissa was already charging her [Master’s Shot], ready for the pull as Ash had Mellody pre-casting an attack spell. When Aleister charged into the room, Kieran made sure Caoimhe was right behind.

  As it turned out, the group of enemies amounted to really nothing more than a trash pull. Caoimhe had been specced into a [Knockdown] and [Stun] set which was really strong against non-boss enemies. Combined with [Tyrant’s] natural ability to hit multiple enemies while swinging their massive weapon, it was a deadly combination for packs of mobs.

  [Wild Swing], was a massive, 500 [Might] sweeping attack that pushed Caoimhe forward and knocked down the enemies that were hit. The [Knockdown] effect was similar to [Stun], but far less dangerous as it didn’t stop defensive actions and reversals, only most other actions.

  With Caoimhe specced the way she was, it hardly mattered when most of her main attacks carried some kind of disabling effect. It made [Tyrants] an absolute terror in PvP - and that was where players usually had access to at least two defensive actions to combat it; enemies often had zero, leading to a long period of no incoming damage for Caoimhe’s side leading to an easy kill.

  Or in this case, four kills.

  [Wild Swing] combo’d into [Driver], a 400 [Might] forward thrust that propelled Caoimhe forward. It was particularly useful here, when [Wild Swing] pushed enemies away.

  Caoimhe immediately followed that up with [Punishment], [Tyrant’s] [Dedication Skill] on her right click. The skill was designed to be a high damage 600 [Might] follow-up to other skills, with a ten second cooldown. However, the main mechanic of the skill was that it did double damage to a [Suppressed] enemy - that is, an enemy that was [Stunned], [Knocked Down], or under some other movement hindering effect.

  Which meant that a fair portion of [Tyrant’s] gameplay revolved around making sure that [Punishment] was only ever used on a [Suppressed] enemy, and doing so as much as possible.

  The use of [Punishment] coincided neatly with the [Knockdown] wearing off. As the enemies went through a standing animation, Caoimhe hit them with [Damnation]. The skill was designed to be a heavy damaging hit that had a long cooldown as well as a long recovery animation and used as a finisher. However, Kieran had altered the skill to do less damage but incorporate an eight second long [Stun] effect instead.

  “Hit ‘em good, guys.” He called while laughing.

  As Caoimhe went through a lengthy recovery animation of pulling her massive sword from the ground, the others absolutely mauled the poor enemies.

  Aleister had several AoE skills designed to gather and hold groups of enemies in place while damaging them with flashy, evil-looking effects - lots of dark blue and purple inky effects, with writhing reds throughout. Keeping the enemies grouped up during the long [Stun] allowed Hibiscus to riddle the group with AoE attacks that dropped their HP incredibly fast.

  Evidently, Ash had taken Kieran’s callout literally, as he had popped one of Mellody’s better offensive skills, [Day’s End Nocturne], which made a target enemy - as well as nearby enemies in a small area take extra damage for a short period of time.

  While typically a 30% damage boost for 10 seconds with a two minute cooldown, Ash had altered the skill significantly leaving it as a functional mini nuke. The damage boost effect had been dialed up to 300% for 5 seconds, but with a ten minute cooldown. It basically left the ability able to be used once per fight, but with a massive spike in damage.

  By the time Caoimhe had finished the recovery animation, she only had time to swing at the enemies with a quick [Devastation], which was a simple, 900 [Might] high damage attack before the enemies were dead.

  “Well that was easy.” Marissa declared, sounding disappointed.

  “It helps when your team is specced to work together like that.” Ash said. “We’re perfectly tailored as a group to shred groups of mobs right now.”

  “He’s right.” Jazz said, as she set Aleister to [Rest] to recover his spent MP. “The downside is that we are totally not specced for a big boss fight.”

  “I have a few damage skills for that inevitability.” Kieran said. “But we’re mostly going to have to rely on Marissa for the big single target damage. I hope you can land all your big skill shots, Rissa.”

  “Hey. My aim has improved a ton since we started this game.” Marissa said defensively. Kieran chuckled, thinking back to how many crucial [Master’s Shots] she had missed in the first few months of the game. Especially the ones fully buffed by [Critical Eye].

  Marissa’s overly dramatic sighs and whines always made it obvious when she missed one, if Kieran had somehow missed the massive silver arrow effects flying off into the sunset.

  “That’s true. You are way better than you used to be.” Ash agreed while Kieran got his chuckling under control.

  “Should’ve guessed getting you to play a free-aim MMO would be the way to get you to finally practice your shitty-ass aim.” Jazz said as an aside.

  “So true.” Kieran agreed to more sounds of protest from Marissa. “The number of times I’ve died in a shooter because Rissa can’t shoot her way out of a paper bag is too damn high.”

  “Oi.” Marissa interjected. “I’d like to take this moment to point out that the two of you are also shit at shooters.”

  “Still better than you.” Jazz said snidely. Kieran snorted.

  “Assholes.” Marissa grumbled. She didn’t have much in the way of retorts when they all knew Jazz was right. “Finish your rest so we can get a move on.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’m good, let’s go.” Jazz said.

  Kieran glanced at the party’s status just to be sure that everyone was in good shape before they collectively began to trot down the hall.

  As they trekked their way through the cave system, the groups of enemies got progressively harder, but at no point did they reach the point where they became much of a challenge.

  The caves themselves barely changed as they traveled through it. The walls looked almost repeated, if not for the clearly distinct wooden struts holding up the ceiling every so often. The sconces on the walls gave off just enough light, and the group was even realizing that they could tell when they were about to be ambushed by the concentration of lighting.

  It all felt very purposeful.

  The pulls simply lasted a bit longer each time, and by what seemed to be the final group of automatons were taken down, the group consisted of eight enemies apparently of various [Paths].

  But they all went down to the same [Knockdown] and [Stun] combination while a super powered Hibiscus tore them apart with a rain of arrows thanks to a myriad of buffs from Mellody. Aleister did his job admirably as well, making sure to keep the packs of enemies in place and focused on him.

  And when the final room’s enemies were dispatched, the team gathered in the middle of the large, domed room to hit their [Rests]. The wooden struts that had decorated the cave throughout had changed design here, adding small carvings to the sides, and were spread equidistant around the circular room.

  “This absolutely reads like a boss room to me.” Marissa said as everyone’s characters sat down. Mellody even produced a [Campfire] for the short break, which gave everyone an extra little [Rested] buff. It was a minuscule 2% boost to all stats, but it was still a buff. Every little bit counted, especially if a boss was coming up.

  “Yeah, but I don’t know what happens now.” Ash said. “There’s only the one door, which we came through to get here. I’d assume if there was a door to unlock by clearing the room, it would’ve opened by now.”

  “It does feel weird for this to just be a dead end without a boss fight.” Kieran agreed.

  “What’s the plan then? I guess we just turn around and backtrack ‘till we find something?” Jazz asked.

  Right as everyone’s HP and MP topped back up - and before anyone could respond to Jazz - a targetable NPC appeared, walking into the room, through the entrance they had come in. As the party stood up, the NPC began to address them.

  “Nicely done, everyone. You’ve certainly passed the first part of your test with flying colors - not that the automatons were designed to be that difficult. But you made it to the end in a remarkably good amount of time”

  “Before we allow you to register your Clan to our official register, there is just one more person who wishes to test your mettle. Fear not. You need not win to continue with your registration, merely impress the examiner. Good luck.”

  With that, the NPC turned and walked back down the tunnel from which we all came, only to be replaced with a dangerous looking spearman. The NPC’s armor was a model that Kieran didn’t recall seeing before. It was light and included wrapped and tied furs in addition to some leather. Rather unimpressive looking, all things considered.

  But the spear he held was giving off a faint red glow, the head was a brutal looking affair, appearing serrated and dangerous.

  Kieran - and probably all three of his party members - knew he was looking at Cu Chulainn before the NPC’s nameplate even popped up.