"Spider Nest push, forming group NOW! Hiltless shortsword, armor, shield — full three-piece kit required! Must have completed the new course three-plus times and fought subterranean spiders without taking a hit! No inexperienced players! And if you need to log off within the next twelve hours, don't bother!"
At the dungeon gate, xX_ShadowBlade_Xx was hollering his lungs out. Beside him, Arthur sat cross-legged on the ground, honing his sword on a rock. Around them had already gathered the first-push veterans — BurningChestHair, ShrineNeko, Sylvana — plus a dozen-plus other players, twenty-odd in all. They stood around chatting in low voices, going over the forum guides on subterranean spiders and double-checking whether the rations in their pockets were packed. Those rations, naturally, were also bought from Simba the blacksmith.
As xX_ShadowBlade_Xx's voice carried, more and more players drifted over. Honestly, he'd been standing there shouting for a good ten minutes already — partly to wait for the few players about to wrap up their skill training.
Sharlock naturally noticed the otherworld players' activity too. It wasn't their first time spontaneously forming a group for the Spider Nest, so nothing new there — he was just curious whether this third push would succeed.
Group formation wrapped up quickly. There were only a hundred beta players to begin with, he'd been shouting for ten-plus minutes, and with conditions that strict, everyone eligible had already signed up. So Arthur's crew waited no longer — twenty-odd players marching off together toward the Spider Nest.
Back in the dungeon core hall, Sharlock used the core to track the players' movements. They followed the dungeon's road straight toward the Spider Nest — a route Sharlock had long since mapped and posted on the official forums, so there was no getting lost. Besides, with the great door open, there was only the one road to the Spider Nest anyway. An hour of walking later, they arrived in the Spider Nest's vicinity.
These players had been through days of Moros's training — most had attended the course several times over. They wouldn't claim veteran status, but they were no longer the raw newbies of day one. Most had been on the second push. That second attempt had been a bloody curb-stomping, yet this time every single one of them was brimming with confidence.
When the players reached the Spider Nest's entrance, they didn't rush in like the second time — they fanned out in a wide arc and tucked themselves into hiding. Then one goblin, xX_ShadowBlade_Xx, stepped out alone with shield and shortsword, planted himself by the entrance, and just went "WAAAAH!" at the top of his lungs for a solid stretch. All that hollering naturally rattled the spiders near the entrance, and four subterranean spiders came scuttling for xX_ShadowBlade_Xx from front and flank.
Seeing he'd baited the subterranean spiders out, xX_ShadowBlade_Xx hotfooted it back toward the encirclement the players had laid. Watching the spiders close in and judging the moment right, the players burst from cover in a wave and charged the subterranean spiders.
Subterranean spiders have zero brainpower — how were they supposed to know they'd been baited out to get picked off separately? Besides, every time these players had shown up before, it was basically a meal delivery. Seeing goblins again, the spiders weren't just unafraid of the numbers — they weren't afraid AT ALL — and came barreling straight at the players.
xX_ShadowBlade_Xx hollered that out while sprinting for the group.
"Two tanks to a spider! Everyone else lay in damage when you get your window — don't get greedy, one hit and back off!"
Arthur chimed in with a shout too. A player next to him, shield up, charged the nearest spider, slapping his shortsword against the shield and yelling his head off. Sure enough, the spider's attention snapped right to him, and it raised a leg, ready to come over and skewer him through and through.
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But the spider had barely gotten moving when Arthur came tearing in from the side, crazy fast, shield on one arm and shortsword in the other. Exploiting the moment the spider's attention was locked elsewhere, he swung the shortsword up and laid it right across the subterranean spider's belly. Green blood splashed on the spot, dousing Arthur head to toe, and he hastily hopped clear. The spider, stung by Arthur's slash, whipped around to deal with him — but the instant it turned, another player lying in wait rushed in and smacked it from behind. The spider whipped back around, only for yet another attention-puller to step up, banging on his shield and brandishing his shortsword at the subterranean spider menacingly. These subterranean spiders are low-wit creatures — they simply react to whoever's closest, with no ability to judge who's the real threat and prioritize taking them out. Which was exactly the opening the players needed to bait spider aggro. It was a trick Moros had drilled into them back in training.
The players divided the labor in good order — combat roles assigned by each person's reflexes, speed, damage output, and coolness under fire. The twenty-odd players quickly split the four subterranean spiders apart and took them on separately, rotating in shifts: shields up for cover, shortswords chipping away at the spiders nonstop. Before long the subterranean spiders were buckling, and a few tried to bolt. As if the players would just let them walk! They'd been busting their tails getting stronger specifically to push the Spider Nest — with their first personal spider kill right there in reach, they'd fight to the death to keep them from escaping!
The players' assault turned downright frenzied. A few close calls nearly ended in spider strikes, but the shields held and nobody got badly hurt. Before long, the first subterranean spider keeled over and stopped moving. Then the second. Then the third. But the fourth made one final dash, sent the player holding its aggro flying, and escaped, torn up but alive.
One spider got away, but the players were plenty happy with their scorecard. From getting wiped to the last goblin, to surrounding four spiders and killing three — that's one hell of an upgrade. In truth, goblins as a creature type didn't have the raw stamina of spiders, but they had spiders beat on agility. Stack on the fact that these otherworld players out-brained the spiders by a country mile, and — so long as you beat down the fear in your heart, with a bit of experience and training under your belt — killing subterranean spiders as a coordinated team really wasn't that tall an order.
Watching the players celebrate on the core's screen, Sharlock hadn't expected progress this fast either. He'd figured these otherworld players would need at least a month of training before they could kill subterranean spiders — and here they were, mere days in, already dropping them as a group. Honestly, the speed of improvement was a bit beyond what Sharlock had budgeted for.
Having killed the subterranean spiders, the players immediately crowded around the three spider corpses and started examining them — who knows for what. Sharlock was about to watch a little closer when Simba came in from outside. The moment Simba was in, he started grumbling and complaining — mostly about how those goblins had zero consideration for him, endlessly hounding him for weapons, armor, and shields, giving him no rest whatsoever, like he didn't need sleep. And when he WAS sleeping, players kept coming by to check on his sleep status, making decent rest impossible. That, of course, was the polite version. In Simba's own words: This chapter was taken from novelping.com without permission.
"These half-evolved morons think they're the only ones who need sleep — nobody else needs it, huh? While I'm sleeping, they come yank my bedroll for no reason at all. In the moment, I wanted nothing more than to crush their skulls with one hammer swing and see what the hell's stuffed in there!"
Simba's grudge ran deep — clearly he'd been banking up grievances against the players for a while and was about one nudge from eruption. As for the other two being treated as "NPCs" by the players — the little pixie and the newbie skill trainer Moros — one was still a slave, so even under relentless player harassment she didn't dare complain; the other was still in a state of profound shock, regarding Sharlock as nothing short of a god, and since he saw the goblins as Sharlock's own loyal, trusted servants, even getting poked awake mid-nap didn't summon much grumbling from him. At least, nothing that reached the complaining-to-Sharlock stage.
Having heard Simba out, and taking in the dark circles all over the dwarf's face, Sharlock agreed he needed to hurry up and sort out dorm rooms for Simba and Moros. As for the players — they'd just have to wait a bit longer!
Sharlock soothed Simba, then headed out to organize crews and build the two men their single-occupancy dorms. As for the little pixie — Sharlock didn't plan on building her a private room. It's not like his heart bled sympathy for everyone; why build a house for someone who refused to work? Besides, Sharlock didn't think the little pixie would even want to live in a house he built. From the look of it, the little pixie was more comfortable living in the field anyway.
Two houses wasn't exactly a megaproject, but it wasn't an overnight job either. Through the dungeon core "Bru," Sharlock quickly handpicked some players with solid construction skills to build the homes for Simba the blacksmith and Moros the trainer. Naturally, the task came with bonus rewards — extra coppers, extra rep — to make sure the players would bust their tails to finish in the shortest time possible.
The players who got picked for the job were delighted too. While building Simba's house, one of them turned to the player next to him and said:
"This dungeon is unreal. Not only is the whole environment interactive — we're the ones building houses FOR the NPCs. Once the blacksmith's place is done, I'm gonna try climbing in through the window. If the blacksmith stashes anything inside, I might just loot it!"
The player had barely finished when Simba hurled a hammer at him — drawing admiring clucks from the players nearby. Now THAT'S an NPC interaction mechanic! Badass!
By the time Sharlock had the Simba-and-Moros housing situation settled, a good while had passed. He was about to head back and check on how the push squad was doing when a commotion broke out at the entrance...