Dungeon Core Online

Chapter 70

"What the hell is this" Z's tone was echoed across the face of all the other adventurers with him, as they walked into James's dungeon.

His alarms had alerted him to the appearance of Z and his group, so he had instantly switched from the tab he had been watching, to Z's instance. Of course, doing so had cost him the latest bet with Rue, giving the pixie a simple 5 extra resources, however, it was worth it. Besides, he and the pixie were about even on their morning betting on the Dicken Races, and he had a bigger bet in mind coming up, with a much larger payout.

"Gotta give it to the game devs, this game just keeps delivering." Skar spoke up as he stepped besides Z, taking in the scene before them. It seemed, just as Z had planned, Skar's group had joined the Knights for the raid on the Terminus. Even though their raid party now had 10 members, they weren't actually the first ones in the instance though. Instead, as they walked in, they were greeted with the sight of a party of five taking turns dicken racing.

Another party of five, could be seen a little past the dicken track, where James's pet trainer was located. The two parties had completely forgone clearing the floor, in exchange for the new activities. From what James had seen over the last hour, almost all groups had done exactly that. Like proper gamers, they were instantly, uh…flocking, to the newest activities on the floor. That, and James had seen more than a few groups shy away from the now giant dicken flocks running about his floor. He was watching the reddit page actively, just waiting for someone to find out the new dicken mobs could drop mounts. Part of him almost missed being on the adventurer end of things. Almost.

Z's eleven character brought a youthful hand up to his face, scratching at his chin. James couldn't help but imagine Z's actual form making the motion, and he had to grin. Z was very much himself, both in and out of the game, a fact that James really enjoyed about him.

"Yes, but this likely means our raid just got a bit more difficult." He continued to scratch at his chin as he glanced around the party, his eyes scanning over his members. James could guess he was inspecting their stats as well, likely trying to get a gauge of their success rate. Was the risk worth the reward?

Skar smashed his fist into his shield, a move that likely was meant to be inspiring. However, the Orc Knight was dressed as a demonic farmer, so he looked goofy instead. He also lacked the upgraded gear that Oak had, so besides the Knight's actual tank, Skar seemed like a beginner.

"We've still got this." His teammates all let out a cheer, while the Knight's glanced back and forth. Well, almost all of the knights. The afore mentioned tank, Oak, was glancing down at his pet dinosaur, Cera, and the pet trainer. James could tell what Oak was thinking.

After a moment, Z's face showed he made up his mind, and he let out a grin. "Alright, well let's go storm the castle, shall we?" His comment caused a frown to cross Oak's face, and James could tell the knight was about to speak. However, Z silenced him with a hand.

"Don't worry Oak. We will have plenty of time to IV train our pets after the raid. Besides, if we wipe on terminus, we will be stuck on floor 1 for an hour anyways. Plenty of time. But for now, let's get this raid done, and earn ourselves another first." His grin seemed to reassure Oak, and the rest of the Knights let out a cheer, along with Skar's group.

Just as they all passed the dicken track, exchanging pleasantries with the group utilizing the NPC, the entire floor seemed to grow dark.

"Oh…shall we start the stream earlier?" Rue's eyes widened as she looked over the instance, and she suddenly had a box of popcorn in front of her. James could have sworn she didn't even wave her hand this time. It just appeared. Could she control these things mentally at will?

"I think so." James whispered. He had already had the stream option pulled up, and had been waiting to start the stream after Z and his group stepped onto his second floor. James hadn't wanted to share all of his secrets just yet, and he knew the chat would likely explode with questions over all of the new additions to his second floor, which would detract from his raid. The last thing he wanted was for people to be commenting about things other than his epic boss fight. He had put a lot of work into it, after all.

"You're going to be so popular." Rue's eyes fluttered in a sarcastic, dreamy manner, and James couldn't help but chuckle.

"Don't worry. When I'm famous, I'll still talk to you." His chuckle continued as the pixie stuck her tongue out at him, and he activated his stream.

20 Players take on a Massive Dicken

He really couldn't stop laughing as he posted the stream. Especially after Rue began choking on a piece of popcorn, the poor pixie gasping for air as she saw his title. Almost instantly, the view count shot up. Oh yes, he spoke internet really well. And, following his popularity from Dwight's mimic fail, and the Knight's initial battle with the Terminus, well, the views just kept climbing.

As they did, comments began racing through the chat bar at lightning speed, even as the air on his floor began to crackle. James wanted to read the comments, he was certain he saw something in there questioning what color the dicken was, but he pulled his eyes away. While he was certain, given the alarm on the instance, this was his World Boss summon, it just so happened to be the first time it had activated.

Alright… maybe that wasn't quite right. James had found out he had the power to instantly activate and deactivate his world boss feature as well. He may have gone in and modified it, so that the first time it appeared would be with Z's group. He did this for two reasons. One, he wanted a group to beat his boss the first time, and the only group he could think of that had that power, was Z's raid party. Second, he wanted them to have a little more xp before facing the Terminus…because then when they died, well, he would get more experience. Maybe that was a little dirty…but hey, he needed to close the gap with Blank.

Regardless of his motives, he couldn't help but chuckle. Besides, he was certain beating the world boss would give the Knight's another world first, so they wouldn't be too bitter about losing their raid, right? Besides, judging from the growing numbers of views, this was probably his best idea to date. An idea that he hadn't shared with Rue, which was probably for the best, since he bet her the Knight's would be the first ones to defeat his world boss. Oops.

Demonic energy crackled about like lightning, and a massive glowing red pentagram appeared on the ceiling above. All the adventurers on the floor, as well as everyone in James stream, watched as a massive, black egg descended from the pentagram, stopping to rest in the open expanse between Z's group, and the barn.

For a long moment, no one did anything. Even the chat went quiet. Then, chat and the instance erupted in the same statement.

"World Boss." Z screamed out, drawing his bow instantly and firing arrows at the massive egg. "Burn it down." And with that, the very first World Boss battle of DCO began.