Chapter 16: The Flawless Carry

The mid-boss’s “near-instant death” move turned out to be a room-wide floor pattern that dealt massive damage. There was a slight delay before it triggered, meaning if you didn’t top off your health during that window, you’d be floored instantly.

Of course, being a two-day-old character, I died instantly even with full HP.

Following the plan, Sephiroth used a resurrection scroll on my corpse and powered through to finish off the boss. After spending so much time chipping away with my “spoon” damage, I fell into the illusion that I had actually contributed to the fight. In reality, the level gap was so vast that our party wasn’t even gaining experience.

“Thanks for the rez.”

“That’s why we came here.”

“Still, the patterns weren’t as hard as I expected. I could dodge them because you explained them so well.”

Surprisingly, Sephiroth’s leading was detailed. It was a customized education at a level even a first-timer could understand. Actually moving the body to match the theory is a different story, but since I could pull it off, it was fine.

The mid-boss, the Black Frost Dragon King, had four main patterns. The first was a breath attack combined with a claw swipe. The breath would ricochet off the ceiling, floor, and walls five times, so predicting its trajectory was key. He said if you get hit by the breath, you’re automatically sucked toward the boss to be mauled by the claws—but since the breath itself was an instant kill for me, that was irrelevant information.

The second pattern involved the floor tiles changing every 5 seconds. After ten changes, “Friendly Fire” was enabled for 20 seconds. This wasn’t an issue at all. There was no way Sephiroth would hit me by accident—though he might on purpose—and even if I attacked him, it was obvious I couldn’t kill him with 1 damage per second. As for the dangerous tiles? Sephiroth told me the sequence to stand on, and honestly, anyone who made it this far into the dungeon should be able to do that with their eyes closed.

The third was the orb generation. Different colored orbs gave different buffs to the Dragon King, except for the gold one. Young dragons spawned to protect them. This wasn’t hard either. While I pulled aggro by plinking the boss for 1 damage, Sephiroth systematically wiped out the small fry and smashed the orbs. Apparently, if an orb breaks before the young dragons die, something “unfortunate” happens, so it was a bit tedious making sure the boss didn’t accidentally hit his own minions. Other than that, Sephiroth handled everything.

The fourth pattern was the “Death Flowers” falling from the sky while the boss charged in a random direction. “Random” was a stretch, because you could see where his front paws were pointing during the wind-up. The flowers were petals made of five blades that rotated slowly, exploding for AOE damage upon hitting the ground. Since the flowers required exactly five hits to be neutralized, it was a “sweet” pattern that even I could easily handle.

Each pattern was manageable as long as I followed Sephiroth’s advice. I made peace with the “Infection Breath” that triggered below 20% HP; I knew I was going to die anyway. I had hoped Sephiroth might take his time reviving me, but he dashed over like a ghost the moment I went down and popped a scroll.

“Right? People usually can’t understand these simple things.”

At my praise, Sephiroth’s voice sounded slightly uplifted for once. I nodded in agreement.

“They really can’t understand this?”

“That’s why I solo dungeons. To save myself the frustration.”

“I mean, this is on the easier side, isn’t it…?”

[Guild] JustOneHitOppa: Did u guys rly go to Walpurgis??? [Guild] JustOneHitOppa: Isnt the Dragon King insanely hard;??? [Guild] Eiron: They probably didnt even reach the King ㅇㅅㅇ [Guild] Eiron: The map is too tedious [Guild] Eiron: Even if they did, they’d have to retry dozens of times [Guild] Eiron: No matter if he cleared Nightmare or not ㅇㅅㅇㅋ [Guild] JujiyukLim: I’m just amazed they made it into the instance ㅋㅋㅋ

Hmm. It seems my guildmates are among those who ‘don’t understand,’ so I’ll keep my mouth shut.

I closed the guild chat and looked at Sephiroth. Before the mid-boss, I was mostly just annoyed, but watching him dismantle the boss shifted my feelings a bit more toward the “favorable” side.

I mean, he explains patterns clearly, clears bosses without taking a single hit, and uses expensive scrolls on me. Of course, I didn’t take a hit from the boss either (excluding the unavoidable AOE).

Sephiroth turned toward me. “Why are you looking at me with a face that says you’re falling for me?”

“You really have a talent for ruining a mood.”

Whenever I try to give him some credit or feel a bit of goodwill, he just… always.

“Just lead the way. How much further to the boss?”

“Just two more rooms.”

“That’s short.”

“Yeah. People say the map is a nightmare, but honestly, if you just stay focused, it’s fine. I don’t see what the problem is.”

I could now nod in agreement with his nonchalant statement. At least within the context of a dungeon raid, I could trust Sephiroth completely.

“There really are a lot of traps.”

Looking at it now, this ruins was more like an adventure game than an RPG. There wasn’t a single flat stretch of ground. Ironically, the large combat rooms were easier because you could actually step anywhere. If Sephiroth hadn’t been guiding me, I would have died on the path at least twice.

“But you can dodge them.”

“True.”

I’d have learned my lesson after a death or two.

Sephiroth and I crossed a series of corroding stepping stones over a pool of acid. Mutated poison frogs lunged at us, but they were easy to weave through. Actually, seeing an olive-green frog pop out of purple poison was kind of cute, and I almost got grabbed by the back of the neck by Sephiroth for stopping to watch.

“Does this game not have instant-kill combos?”

“Basically, every attack is designed to be avoidable. The reason everyone has the same base Agility stat is so every character can dodge every attack with the same difficulty level.”

“Ah. That explains it.”

I liked that every attack had a counter-pattern. Unless an attack had a “Pierce” attribute, you could even use the environment for cover. If that wasn’t the case, I would have retired from this ruins a long time ago.

“Then I guess I’ll never die in any dungeon.”

Sephiroth glanced back at me at my words. He moved just as a stepping stone was about to fully corrode. Because of that, I had to scramble to a different stone while yelling at him.

“Hey! Are you even paying attention to the game?!”

Instead of an answer, I heard Sephiroth’s chuckle.

The long path of stones was finally ending. Following his back, I asked:

“I have a question.”

“What?”

“How did you find me today?”

Sephiroth tilted his head. “It’s obvious where a newbie who just made their ID would be.”

“No, but I might not have been logged in. And even if the location is ‘obvious,’ the map isn’t exactly small.”

Usually, you can’t see someone’s location unless you’re friends. I was genuinely curious how he kept tracking me. I couldn’t even run away because I never knew where he was.

“I figured you’d be where the most people are gathered.”

“Ah.”

That was a surprisingly logical deduction. I suppose I had become a temporary server celebrity.

I narrowed my eyes as I stepped onto the final rock. Sephiroth, who had reached solid ground first, was standing with his arms crossed.

“Setting that aside, how did you know I was online?”

“You check login status by sending a whisper.”

“You were just… constantly sending me whispers?”

“Yeah.”

Wait. At this point, isn’t Sephiroth more dangerous than the dungeon boss?

“……Hey, you aren’t actually obsessed with me or anything, are you?”

“Are you stating a wish?”

“No, you psycho.”

“Getting angry after bringing it up yourself.”

Hearing him laugh with such confidence, he didn’t seem like a total creep. That was a relief. One Han Gyu-tae in my life was more than enough.

The path to the boss room was littered with traps. However, if you stayed calm and used your eyes and ears, they were easy to disarm. Sephiroth sighed as he watched me disable a trap.

“See? This is how you run a dungeon. I was about to die of frustration watching those ‘wild monkeys’ run around calling themselves dungeoneers.”

His voice was sincere. Hearing him talk like that, I could almost understand why his personality had curdled.

Games were like group projects.

When people gather to run a dungeon, everyone has a role. Someone is the Tank, someone is the Dealer, someone is the Healer. If even one person fails their role, everyone suffers. I’ve had more than a few experiences where my lifespan felt shortened by a bad team.

In this particular group project, Sephiroth’s role was basically the “Perfect Bus Driver.”