Pieces of Sonder

Freya moved further behind Tox as the black vulpes charged. She glanced behind her; the wall loomed close.

Tox hit with his shield again and stabbed out with his long sword. The fox demon bared down on him, scratching his shield with its long claws.

Dashing around behind it, Freya hit it with a bunch of normal punches and kicks, then retreated. Its hp was almost drained. As she did, she saw Tox glow green from receiving healing from Infamous Biscuit.

Her Light Jab Heavy Straight skill was now available again. It would be more than enough to take care of the fox.

“Let me aggro it again,” Tox shouted.

Freya held back. Tox moved to slash at the demon, missing the first time, but with a strong shield strike, the black vulpes shuttered and disintegrated into smoke.

“Alright, one down!” Tox said, picking up the silver coins. Infamous Biscuit told her most teams shared the loot from dungeons at the end, so Freya didn’t comment on the matter.

As they moved through the dungeon, a couple of level 5 monsters popped up, but they were easy to take care of. However, like the black vulpes, they all had extra eyes seemingly glued onto their skin that followed their every movement.

The eyes made Freya’s skin crawl as if they were watching her strip off her clothes. Hitting them felt rather satisfying. 

After a long period of no monster appearances, they entered a large cavern. Faint enchanted lights gave the dimensions of the space without highlighting much detail. 

Focusing into the darkness suddenly, dozens of text boxes appeared.

Covering almost every square inch of the walls, all the text boxes read the same:

[Lesser Cave Rat]

[Lvl 2] [12/12]

Tox stepped out and banged his sword against his shield. The sound echoed through the cavern. Freya heard the pitter-patter of a hoard of rats.

Once they came out of the shadows, Freya was less intimidated. They were about the size of small dogs with mangy fur and red eyes. Like the other demons in the dungeon, they also had white eyes covering them.

Squeak!

In one shield swing, Tox killed two of them. Freya joined in punching and kicking. Infamous Biscuit held out near the back, using his vine skill to hold back some of the rats. He also sent out watermelon bombs, killing rats in a pink fruit spray.

A few bites stung her legs, but she ignored them. Tox was getting far more than her. She worked to clear out the ones around him.

Punch. Jab. Shockwave. Kick. Punch. Sweeping kick.

More and more rats came.

Breathing hard, Freya glanced at her stats.

[Freya Evenkey]

[Lvl 14 Martial Artist]

[190/250 HP] [100/100 MP]

Her health stat concerned her. She thought about using her Self-Heal skill but remembered Infamous Biscuit’s words about saving good skills. While it made her nervous to see her HP so low, she wasn’t in a dire situation.

She blew a piece of fur out of her face.

After taking out a few rats held down by Infamous Biscuit’s vines, Freya returned to hit the rats around Tox. 

“It looks like there aren’t too many more,” Infamous Biscuit called out.

Freya looked up. The cave walls only had a few more text boxes.

Tox used his taunt skill again, making the last of the rats come out. During the fray, Freya heard her Light Jab Heavy Straight, and Sweeping Kick skills level up.

Finally, quiet returned to the cavern. 

“How long does it take for your healing skills to cool down?” Tox’s voice echoed through the cave.

Freya turned around. Tox was glaring up at Infamous Biscuit.

“My Nature’s Blessing skill takes a minute and twenty-five seconds, and Energy Boost takes thirty-five.”

“Why didn’t you use them more then?”

Infamous Biscuit raised an eyebrow, “Your health was never that low. I need to save MP.”

“If I didn’t have more armor I would have died!”

“I was watching your health bar; you were fine.”

“Yeah sure,” Tox replied. “Nevermind, let’s pick up the rewards. The next room might be the boss.”

They started picking up bronze pieces. Not every rat dropped something, but there were still enough of them that it took some time.

Freya snuck glances at Tox and Infamous Biscuit. She hadn’t been paying attention to Tox’s HP during the fight, but she guessed it probably got lower than hers, given the number of rats he took on. But she also saw Infamous Biscuit heal him, so it was difficult for her to judge how low Tox’s HP got.

She shook her head and thought to herself, I need to pay more attention to everyone’s HP bar. 

If she didn’t specifically think about it, other player’s statuses did not show up in the heat of battle.

Since there were no monsters in the room now, Freya used her self-healing skill. Infamous Biscuit also healed Tox again, so he was back to his full health.

Once they picked up everything Tox led the way into the next room. Still sweaty from the fight, a slight breeze down the dark corridor made Freya shiver. As they moved forward, the enchanted lights turned a bluish color. After several minutes of walking, an archway lined with stones came into view.

To Freya it looked like the archway framed a solid black wall. She wondered if they took a wrong turn. However, Tox approached the archway entrance, hefting his sword and shield. He stepped into the black wall and disappeared through it.

Infamous Biscuit nudged her from behind, “This is probably the boss room. Sometimes there’s a veil you can’t see through.”

Freya nodded. She cautiously reached her hand out. Despite her vision telling her she was touching the black wall, she felt nothing at all. Passing through the wall, she found herself in another large cavern.

The cavern was not as big as the last, but more enchanted lights lined the walls. 

From behind a pile of rocks a giant floating eyeball emerged. Its blood-red iris contracted around its black pupil to focus on them.

Underneath it two giant rats–more than triple the previous rats’ size–scurried out.

[Slow Eye]

[Dungeon Boss]

[Lvl 11] [120/120 HP]

The eyeball floated in place at the back of the room. The two rats moved out towards them, gnashing their teeth. Besides being bigger, Freya also noticed they were the only creatures they encountered so far that had no extra eyes.

[Greater Cave Rat]

[Lvl 10] [300/300]

Freya re-read the text boxes over the rats and the eye. Wasn’t the boss supposed to be the most difficult monster in the dungeon? But the eyeball monster had less HP than its rat minions. 

Tox taunted the rats. As soon as he had their attention Freya attacked first with her double punch skill.

Jab, punch… Her second punch didn’t feel that strong.

Slightly puzzled, she continued with more normal punches, then tried her Sweeping Kick skill.

It turned into just a normal kick.

Noticing her confusion, Infamous Biscuit put the pieces together first, “The boss’s gaze will cancel skills the eyes saw before!”

The eyeball hadn’t moved towards them from the back of the cave, but its gaze was on the fight.

Infamous Biscuit moved far out of its gaze and raised his staff, “Nature’s Summoning: Vine-pine!”

The familiar pinecone emerged and began sprouting vines. Once fully formed, it rushed toward one of the rats.

Freya left the rat it was headed towards alone. After seeing vine-pines in battle before she wasn’t sure how much control the plant had on its whip-like appendages. 

She wanted to draw the rats away from each other so they might be able to use skills, but Tox’s taunt still seemed to be in effect. He must have cast it before the dungeon boss looked at them.

Letting loose a flurry of normal punches and kicks, Freya battered away at the second rat, occasionally pausing to get out of the way of the vine-pine’s swinging arms.

Finally, Tox’s taunt wore out. The rat engaged with the vine-pine moved away from them.

Freya watched the giant eye slowly follow the rat and vine-pine.

She dashed over to Tox just as the second cave rat bit down on his arm. Freya unleashed her Shockwave skill.

Squeak!

It immediately released Tox.

[Greater Cave Rat]

[Lvl 10] [5/300]

Freya smiled. Saving that skill to the end was worth it.

Tox gave it one last stab.

On the other side of the cave the remaining cave rat had ripped off one of the vine-pine’s limbs and was latched onto another.

“Let me aggro it again,” Tox shouted, banging his shield.

The greater cave rat turned to him. Instead of releasing the vine-pine, it simply dragged the plant along with it.

Freya punched it squarely in the mouth. 

The rat still didn’t let go. The vine-pine weakly slapped the rat with wilted vines. Finally, the summoned creature vanished, allowing the cave rat to bite Tox.

The knight cried out.

He swung his shield at it, but it had much less power than his previous skill-based shield strikes.

Freya didn’t bother trying to use skills. The eye was surely on them now.

[Greater Cave Rat]

[Lvl 10] [103/300]

Punch! Punch! Dodge the tail, kick!

Grinning from seeing the rat’s HP drop despite not using any skills, Freya kept pummeling the demon.

Finally, she landed her last punch.

Now the Slow Eye dungeon boss stood alone.

“What the hell! Why didn’t you help me?” Tox shouted.

Freya turned to him in confusion.

“What?”