Dungeon Core Online 49 Chapter 49

"Alright guys, let's go over the plan one last time." Z's group had stopped near the entrance to Jurassic City, and everyone was gathered around in a circle. The thing James really liked about the Knights, was that they actually did plan things out when they were trying to be serious.

"We've got this." Oak was grinning as he leaned against his new shield. He had upgraded from the smaller iron shield he had been using, to a new monstrosity, courtesy of farming the second floor. The shield mimic'd a tricercog's spiked armored fan that it had on hits head, and even had three spikes that James knew Oak could launch forward. The spikes had chains attached to them, and gears on the shield allowed him to retract them.

"Yeah, but I'm sure the city itself is going to have a few more surprises." Z's eyes were smiling, but his voice held the slightest hint of pressure. He was the leader, and it was important that they did as he planned.

"Well, good thing you went ranger." Elm laughed as he spoke and drew his bow. He and Z had both upgraded to what appeared to be compound bows crafted from the gears and alloys harvested on the second floor. James was sure those weapons alone greatly increased the archer's abilities. If that wasn't enough though, he noted each archer had arrows that appeared to be a combination of materials from both floors. The arrows were still fletched with dicken feathers, but the shaft of the arrow and the tip were formed of metal instead of wood. The heavier arrows would have presented a problem to a regular bow, but James guessed the new bows had the increased power needed for such deadly missiles.

"Yeah, speaking of, where's your companion?" Faust's quip caused the entire party to break out into laughter, while Z winced.

"I hate you guys." Z whispered as he held his fingers up to his lips and let out a shrill whistle. A moment later, a form appeared by his side.

"What, is that?" James looked at the strange creature but had no idea what the mob was. As he glanced at Rue, his pixie shrugged her shoulders. She didn't know either. However, the chat window next to her, was blowing up at the mob's appearance.

Luc Is that a freaking honey badger?

Firebreather- Seriously, did that guy subclass and get a honey badger?

ProQQ73- Man, he needs to take his pet's attitude… HONEY BADGER DON'T CARE

Chat was rapidly moving down, which made sense, given James had roughly 70 percent of the dungeon cores logged into chat watching his live stream. Apparently, everyone was at a lull for their dungeons, just grinding out experience with their adventurers, so they had time to watch a group try to take on his miniboss. From what he could gather, having level 20 adventurers was unusual at this time. Only about 20 percent of all the dungeon cores did, with the top dungeon cores mentioning they had level 25 players. James wasn't sure if that was good or bad for them, given it likely meant they would start struggling to get good experience. But hey, who was he to judge?

"Seems there is a joke there that the Knight's get, as well as some of the dungeon cores, but I'm at a loss." James turned away from chat, and back to the group. It appeared their laughter had died down, and they were finally ready to make their way into the city.

"Alright, so your honey badger is going to detect traps, as well as those Spys, right?" Oak looked like he was fighting to keep a straight face as he looked down at the angry looking creature. Z offered him a nod and motioned for the warrior to enter the city. James had noticed on the regular DCO reddit for his dungeon, that players had given his mobs nicknames for his second floor. His spy-nosaurusus were now known as Spys. The other nicknames for his mobs were raptors for velocity raptors, Tri's for his tricercogs, Breakers for his Break-i-asarus, though others wanted to call them long necks, steamers for his steamosaurusus, and fixers for his Archeaeo-repairerers.

James grinned as he remembered the first battle those mobs had come into play. A group had been whittling away at a breaker, when all of a sudden two of the clockwork bird-like dinosaurs began fluttering around the breaker, using their talons to adjust cogs, and repair the mobs. The group had to turn their focus on the little mobs and kill them, before they could bring the breaker down.

"Well then, this should be a cinch." Oak drew his sword and started forward, while the honey badger began darting around the party. James remembered Z had to go ranger to get the ability to detect traps, and he had to admit, it was good Z had. Before long, the honey badger was growling and staring in the direction of a Spy, alerting the group to the mob's presence.

"I think he's found something." Z was grinning at the others and nodded in the direction the honey badger was pointing. "Would you like to show us one of your new abilities Faust?"

The mage offered Z a nod and took a step forward. He rose his hand high, as is grasping at something, and pulled it back. A second later, the air around his hand began to crackle, and a bolt of lighting appeared in it. The mage whipped his hand forward, releasing the lighting bolt, and the magical weapon streaked impossibly fast towards the Spy. The moment it impacted with the poor mob, lightning arced all along the dinosaur's metallic body, dispelling its cloak and causing it to cry out in pain and rage.

"Oh, so he choose lightning mage as his first subclass." Rue was nodding approvingly, and James glanced at the mage. During the past few days, James had been reading up on the various subclasses that could be offered. For mages at level 20, lightning mage was one of the options, and it gave them the ability to cast lightning-based attacks, with shorter cooldowns and higher damage output, at the cost of a large amount of mp required per attack. James figured Faust was tired of having to sit around waiting for his spells to finish casting and was likely gambling on the higher damage output to defeat enemies before he ran out of mana. It wasn't a bad strategy.

James glanced at his Spy, checking just how much damage that attack did.

Spy-nosaurus (10) lvl 16

Type: Clockwork Ambusher

HP: 350 out of 500

MP: 50

Atk: 100

Def: 50

Unique Traits

Steamy Complexion: Spy-nosaurus emit a gaseous mixture that allows them to remain cloaked until they attack or are attacked

Surprise!: Spy-Nosaurus have a 75% to land a critical strike on their first attack if they are cloaked.

So, Faust's lighting attack had managed to do 150 damage with a single bolt. However, if James had to guess, the mage could only launch two or three of those, before he would need to recharge his mana. It also didn't help that the adventurers were 4 levels higher than these basic mobs, and that James's steampunk dinosaurs didn't have magic resistance, at least, not yet. James had been browsing his upgrades for his second-floor mobs, and he had a few surprises in for adventurers after he gained another few ranks. He couldn't have magic users walking all over his floor, after all.

A flash of light caught James's attention as he turned back to the instance, and he saw Elm launching arrow after arrow into the Spy. As the archer drew each arrow back, they became enshrouded in blue light, and as he let them fly the air around them seemed to crackle. Upon impact, they burst into small explosions, causing even more damage than Z's attacks. Elm had chosen to become an arcane archer, which allowed him to spend mp to enchant his arrows. James could tell Elm was using the most basic, an enchantment that gave his arrows a flat magical burst of damage upon impact.

"Well, that was anti-climactic." James whispered as he watched his Spy fall to the ground, defeated. The group of veteran players had made short work of the mob, but it was to be expected. They were 4 levels higher than his basic mobs, had all gained their subclass, and were armed with level 20 weapons. Heck, James was certain they would have no problem taking on B.L.U. Regardless, he, and the other dungeon cores, were watching, and as the party began moving further into the city, James could feel his excitement rise. His city had many surprises, and he couldn't wait for the Knights to encounter them all.

Chapter end