"Let's try to smash a wall!" Van said as he rushed to the non-moving wall and slammed his hammer against it as hard as he could. The hammer bounced back off of the wall and the word Resist flashed against the steel. "Fredlin, can you enchant my hammer? Make it stronger!" Van ordered.
Fredlin shook his head. "Sorry, but I don't have the magic points for that. Using that arrow defense spell was expensive, so it'll be a few minutes before I can recharge."
"I wonder if we have a few minutes," Sahara said as the walls continued to press in on them.
"There's gotta be some mechanism powering this thing," Kylian said as he ran up to the walls and began to search for a secret compartment. "But I’m just not finding anything."
"Maybe it's not a trap," Sang said. "What if it's some kind of puzzle?"
"That's unlikely," Van said. "Normally, puzzles have some kind of indication that they're a puzzle."
The walls were getting very close now, and the team was beginning to huddle together. "We're gonna have to push back!" Van said. "Everyone, back to back!"
Van and Sahara stood back to back and pressed their hands against the opposing walls. They grunted and wheezed, but were able to stop the walls for the time being.
"My stamina is dropping!" Van wheezed. The green bar above his head was rapidly beginning to decrease. "Can't hold this for long!"
"I got it!" Kylian said. "The mechanism is in the moving wall itself! Look at that panel!" He pointed to a panel that was towards the top of the room, only slightly sticking out of the side of a wall. The seams of the panel were hard to see, but Kylian's pointing at it caused the outline to glow bright red. Kylian turned his short body to the side and pressed his hands against the walls, giving him enough of a foothold to start climbing between the walls.
The walls began to move a little more as Van shouted out in pain. Sang had tried to press her arms against the walls, too, but as someone of the ranger class, her strength was far too low to really prevent the wall from moving.
"Just hold on!" Sang said. "We're almost there, so just hang on!"
Kylian scrambled up between the walls and was able to position himself so that he could fiddle with the panel. He opened it up and began to disable the trap. After a few seconds of clicking, the words Trap Disabled +50 points appeared on everyone's screen.
"Whew!' Van said as he slid down to catch his breath.
"There's no time for resting," Fredlin said as he pointed at a small door that had suddenly opened up in the side of the right moving wall. "We gotta run!"
Van sighed, but leapt to his feet. "Come on!" he shouted as he led the team through this new door. The small door led them upwards to another level.
"What fresh hell is this?" Sahara asked as she pointed at a large pile of bones in the middle of the room. They had emerged from the trapdoor that was on the ground, and it appeared as if they were in some kind of a cave.
"Are we still in the castle?" Sang asked.
"Probably," Van said. "This might just be where the king keeps his pet monster until he needs it."
"Great," Sang said as she scanned the area for life. Her Spotting skill was extremely high, but she didn't see any signs of life.
"Over there, a door!" Fredlin said as he pointed at a large wooden door. "And we didn't have to almost die in order to find it!"
"Truly, we are moving up in the world," Kylian said as they hurried toward the apparent exit. As they reached the door, though, they heard a loud snarling sound. Sang glanced behind them to see that a gigantic weasel-like creature with red fur and huge fangs had climbed atop the pile of bones and was snarling at them. The beast didn't have any eyes, and greenish liquid dripped down from the creature's mouth, indicating that it was poisonous. The words Feralice Level 75 hovered above the beast.
"What do we do about that thing?" Sang asked.
"Leave it behind; the door's unlocked, "Kylian replied as he swung the door open. "We don't have time to play around."
"Or do we?" Van asked. "A monster that big and optional? If we killed it, we'd get a lot of points. Maybe even enough to pass the minimum requirements."
"It's risky," Fredlin said. "The timer's still running."
"Okay, so here's the plan," Van said. "Kylian and Sahara, you two hit the next room and figure out what it looks like. If you can engage in a fight and win, do it. Sang, Fredlin, and I will stick around here and fight this thing. We'll divide our times."
"That seems unnecessarily risky," Kylian said.
"If points matter in this tournament," Van explained, "then we're going to want to get as many as we can at the start. The bigger a lead we have, the better. I think it's worth the risk."
"Sounds good to me," Sang said.
"Worst case scenario, we just bail," Fredlin agreed.
"Fine," Kylian said. "You guys fight it and we'll check the next room. Stay in touch through private messaging, okay?"
"Fair enough," Van said as he turned around to face the creature. "It's on!"
The Feralice shrieked a terrible noise and raised its long, spindly arms up high. It bared its fangs at them and prepared for battle. The word Enraged appeared above its head.
"Watch out for those fangs," Fredlin shouted as he scrambled far away from the creature. "My Beast Master skill indicates that a single bite from either fang can poison you heavily. And we don't have a cleric."
"Yeah, why didn't we bring a healer?" Sang asked as she aimed her bow and fired two flaming arrows at the monster. The arrows sailed through the air and struck the coat of the creature, but the words Insufficient Piercing hovered above it.
"Clerics pretty much cap out in their usefulness after level 40!" Van explained as he gripped his warhammer and readied for a charge. The Feralice growled and slowly paced around the bones. It had its back arched like a cat, and Sang could see that it was trying to judge when to strike.
"Well, don't tell Bidane that," Sang said as she pulled out a Potion of Armor Piercing from her satchel. This potion would increase her Pierce rating by +50%, meaning that there'd be a higher chance of her weapons bypassing the natural armor of the Feralice.
The Feralice grew tired of waiting for Van to strike and leapt at the berserker.
"Haha!" Van cheered as he rolled to the left, avoiding the claws of the weasel-like beast. He swung his warhammer around hard then, smashing the side of the Feralice's left leg. The words 150 damage! Injury! ½ movement appeared over the creature as it howled in pain.
As Sang drank her potion down, she felt her body warm with a powerful heat. Liquid began to fill her eyes, and at first she thought her eyes were burning, but as she tried to blink the liquid away, she started to realize that the liquid offered something of a covering like that of contact lenses. She glanced at the Feralice and could see there were glowing yellow spots all over its body. Perfect!
She aimed her bow at one of the glowing yellow spots and released another arrow. This arrow sailed through the air and struck the Feralice hard underneath its soft underbelly. It shrieked in pain as the words 300 damage rose through the air.
"How much health does it have?" Fredlin asked as he began to wave his staff around.
"800 left!" Van replied as he swung his warhammer at the creature again. This time, it dodged out of the way and slashed at him with its claws. Van blocked the attack with the steel shaft of his hammer.
"Perfect, I'm gonna cast a fireball spell that will finish it!" Fredlin said. "Hah – this was way easier than Kylian was worried about!"
As Fredlin raised his hands to release a spell, though, the Feralice leapt from where it had been standing almost 60 feet away, landing right atop of Fredlin.