Translator: HunterW
Editor: RED
Second floor of the Bristol Dungeon…
The forty members of the Windsor Guard’s 94th hunting party were moving as one as they hunted Sand Giants. There were ten more members than the hunting parties on the first floor because Sand Wizards occasionally spawned from the sands in the middle of the party. This moment was one example of that, as three Sand Wizards emerged from the sand amid the party’s dealers.
Melissa, the captain of the 94th hunting party, shouted to her team,”Tanks, focus on the Sand Giants! Make sure they don’t push forward! All dealers, focus your attacks on the Sand Wizards! Don’t let them fire off any attacks!”
“Yes, ma’am!” Her party members reacted at once to her orders. The Sand Wizards not only cast Sandstorm, a powerful AoE spell, they also cast buffs onto the Sand Giants, making them a bigger pain than they already were. Killing these Sand Wizards the moment they appeared took priority.
“Iron Wall!”
“Steel Body!”
The tanks formed a solid shield wall, preventing the Sand Giants from moving any closer to the rest of the party, and the dealers immediately focused their attacks on the Sand Wizards. They all received damage from the Sandstorm spell a Sand Wizard managed to cast, but ignored it for now.
“Focus your attacks on the Wizard on the left!”
“Got it!”
“Ifrit’s Raging Flame!”
“Thunderstorm!”
“Chain Lightning!”
“Piercing Power Shot!”
“Triple Shot!”
The attacks flew nonstop and soon, the three Sand Wizards collapsed back into the sand. Once the Wizards were dead, the party members quickly shifted their attention back to the Sand Giants. It was clear the 94th hunting party had a great deal of experience dealing with the sudden appearances of the Sand Wizards.
——
Two hours had passed since I entered the Bristol Dungeon. I was now on the second floor of the dungeon and watched another hunting party as it worked. They seemed to be hunting with ease and no worries.
“It looks like they haven’t been notified yet.” I had wiped out seventeen hunting parties on the first floor alone. Each party had thirty or thirty-five members, but I was able to deal with all of them with ease. This dungeon was under their guild’s control, so they all focused on the monsters in front of them. No one in this dungeon knew of my existence or expected it, and I made sure to wipe out each party I encountered as quickly as possible to keep it that way. As long as I prevented them from using their Comm Links to report their situation before the first deva I killed here resurrected, my existence could be kept hidden.
“Oh, it looks like they’re starting again.” The party lured another horde of seven Sand Giants and began their hunt once more. This party had ten more party members then the others, however. “It won’t make a difference!” I said to myself as I charged at them. I had already killed about six hundred Windsor Guards, but that wasn’t nearly enough for slighting me.
“Blink 1.”
“Gah!”
I ambushed this party the exact same way I did the parties before and it worked on this party just as well. The tanks that were too busy dealing with the Sand Giants did not have time to react to my attacks and quickly fell to my attacks.
“What… what’s going on?”
“Who is that? Is he not one of us?”
“This is the second floor of the Windsor Guard’s dungeon. We haven’t heard anything from the guys on the first floor or the entrance about an attack!”
“You fool! Leave that for later and focus! It’s clear he’s an enemy! We’ll figure out who he is after we defeat him!”
“Right! Attack! Shift your attacks on this asshole!”
“Roger!”
“Dancing Fire Sparks!”
“Earth Spear!”
“Flame Whip!”
This party actually reacted quicker than the parties on the first floor, but that was it. There attacks did nothing to slow me down.
“Gah!”
“Debuff! Cast debuffs on him!”
“Roger! Weaken!”
“And you, get on your Comm Link and notify command what’s going on!”
“Yes ma’am!”
The captain of the party was a woman this time and I could clearly hear her orders, especially when she ordered her subordinate to contact the command post. I still had fifty minutes until the first deva I killed was going to resurrect. I could at least wipe out five more parties within that time. “Blink 2.”
“Gah!” I Blinked right next to the subordinate reaching into his inventory to take out his Comm Link and stabbed him right through. He died with his hand still inside.
“We haven’t had our interview yet. I’ll let you make your report after, okay?” I said to the captain with a smile and attacked her while she remained silent. Chopping off the head of the snake never fails.
The captain quickly retreated as I began my attacks, but I was much faster than her.
“Gah!” My spear pierced her heart before she could take two steps back.
“You’re…Lee Jiwon…aren’t you?”
“Nope. The name’s Angry Duck!” All of the party captains said the same thing, asking if I was Lee Jiwon, and I answered the same.
“Don’t… bullshit me. You’re going to regret this. You’re going to pay…Gah!”
Not wanting to hear anymore, I stabbed her twice more, killing her. “We’ll see about that.” I turned back to the remaining twenty hunters and charged at them. I had no time to lose.
——
The Green Park was the smallest of London’s Royal Parks, located right behind Buckingham Palace. Beneath the Green Park was a bunker established for the entirety of the Windsor Guards. The Windsor Guards existed solely to protect the United Kingdom’s royalty, so unlike other large guilds and organizations, they didn’t ever come out in public, nor did they need to. That was Queen Elizabeth’s role.
This giant bunker was the Windsor Guard’s base and also served as the Respawn Point for all Windsor Guards. A guild with the history of a crack military branch such as the Windsor Guards was capable of investigating all of its soldiers deaths, such as how many had died and why. Twelve investigators staffed the Respawn Room of the base because anywhere from ten to as many as one hundred soldiers resurrected a day.
“It’s quiet today.”
“You’re right. We haven’t had a single death today.”
“It should be like this every day. It’s not like we have an infinite supply of restoration gems.” The twelve investigators were marveling at the fact that they hadn’t had a single death to report today. That is, until they heard the dreaded thud as one of their fellow soldiers finally resurrected.
“I guess we spoke too soon.”
“Yes sir. I’ll go check up on him.”
“Very go…” The lead investigator trailed off as more thuds were heard consecutively.
“What the…?”
“One of our hunting parties must have been wiped out.”
“That may be the case, sir.”
“Tsk tsk tsk. They really should be more careful. I feel bad for the party for having such a careless captain.” The lead investigator just clicked his tongue and didn’t pay much attention to it. But soon, he and his team slowly stood up from their seats and looked out the window into the Respawn Room. The sounds of devas resurrecting did not stop. It was evident by now that at least two teams had been wiped out. But more and more continued to resurrect and soon the Respawn Room was just about full.
The twelve investigators looked at one another. This had never happened before. Each of them felt fear and knew that something terrible had just occurred. As they dumbly stood there, unsure of what to do, they all heard their recently deceased comrades utter a single name: Lee Jiwon!
——
Duke Glavis met with N to hold an emergency meeting.
“I’ve already notified the hunting parties still in the Bristol Dungeon to cease all hunts and to make their way to the nearest FOBs.”
“Good,” Glavis said with a nod at his subordinate’s report.
“And this is a video we just received from the 114th hunting party. They were notified, but were soon attacked by the invader and managed to record the battle.”
“Put it up.” By now, Glavis and N knew that the invader was Lee Jiwon, but it was difficult to launch a counterattack… because it was Lee Jiwon. The video soon showed a man wearing a golden duck mask and wiping out the hunting party, while calling himself the Angry Duck.
After a short silence, N spoke up. “He really is Lee Jiwon.”
“So he is.” It could only be Lee Jiwon. Only he possessed that much attack power. But why was he here? Why was he attacking them so gleefully? Glavis turned to look at N and N looked right back at him.
-The six hundred Templar soldiers.-
They both realized that was the only reason Lee Jiwon was here.
“Ha… how did he find out? This was the only foreign mission of the Templars.”
“I… don’t have an answer to that, but I doubt it was the NCR Guild that tipped him off. It would be suicidal for them if they did.”
“Then how? How did he learn about the Templar Order, and how did he sneak into the Bristol Dungeon?”
“…” N didn’t know how to answer Duke Glavis’s question.
“We’ll report to the queen for now. We’ll have to… observe the situation more to figure out what to do. Cease all hunts in Bristol Dungeon for the time being and make sure to punish the guards over at the Bristol Dungeon entrance.”
“Yes, sir.”
Soon, Duke Glavis and N met with Queen Elizabeth and together, they decided they would meet with Lee Jiwon first. There was no way the existence of the Templar Order was known to the rest of the world, so the best thing they could do right now was to outright accuse Lee Jiwon for invading without reason.
—
A whole day had passed now since I had come to the Bristol Dungeon. “I don’t see any more of them now.” I hadn’t encountered any more hunting parties for some time. They were still there, just hidden away in their FOBs.
“Hmm… should I stop here, or should I attack the FOBs?” There were many guards manning the FOBs, as these bases were still right in the middle of monster territory. There always needed to be enough guards to protect the FOBs from any potential monster attacks.
“Since most FOBs have about two hundred guards manning them at one time, and since the hunting parties probably haven’t returned to the surface yet, each FOB should have somewhere between seven hundred to a thousand soldiers right now.” That was a lot compared to the hunting parties I’d wiped out so far, and I had also lost the element of surprise. They were all definitely prepared for me.
“But… I should try at least once, shouldn’t I?” I didn’t want to retreat just yet. My goal was to force the Windsor Guards to recall the Templar soldiers in Mexico back to the UK. I needed something bigger, something more spectacular to grab their attention.
“I’ll need to destroy at least one FOB to do that.” I headed for the FOB I saw as I searched through the dungeon’s third floor.
——
Windsor Guard’s FOB located on the 3rd floor of the Bristol Dungeon…
“Hmm…there’s a lot more here than I expected. Should I try a FOB on the first or second floor instead?” There was only one FOB on the third floor of the dungeon. I could see from a fair distance away that there were about five hundred soldiers out in the open. If I took the hidden soldiers into account, there were well over a thousand soldiers manning the FOB. This FOB looked far sturdier than the FOBs on the lower floors.
Still, I soon made my decision. If I was going to do this, I might as well go all out and destroy their most well-defended base…
