A shocking revelation is standing in front of Kyle as he sees Emily blocking the fires of the Red Dragon as if it is nothing.
"Emily?" he said while watching behind Emily that is shielding him.
"Instead of watching there in amazement, why don't you do something about this gigantic flamethrower?" She said with a somehow intimidating tone that made Kyle think if she is in her monthly period due to the unexplainable irritation she is exhibiting, forcing Kyle to ask Emily something absurd.
"…Are you somehow feeling unease in some specific parts of your body, something like slimy and sticky?"
But Emily is too focused on the attack of the dragon that she didn't even turn around to Kyle while holding her shield tightly and slightly giving it a push forward with all her might to prevent the shield from moving backward and crash on them.
"How about I stick this shield to your butt? So, instead of asking something stupid… why don't you just attack that dragon now?!" She yelled and still not looking back at Kyle.
"You know, even if you say that, if I move a step towards any sides except from where I am standing right now, I'll get caught by the fires of that dragon that is being deflected by your shield." Kyle said to Emily, explaining to her their current situation.
The shield can perfectly cover them due to its wide dimensions, that a two fully-grown man can occupy at the same time, but since it is a fire we are talking about, the flames are also running smoothly on the edges of Emily's shield making a wall of the same fire on both flanks disabling Kyle to move any further away from Emily's back.
"Tsk, Fine then." She said after hearing the words of Kyle as she continues defending them both from the scorching flames.
At the same time, Kyle also noticed that she seems to not be making even the slightest movement, making Kyle think that she might be too focused on protecting the both of them, which is true, she is doing her best to shield the both of them but there is another reason behind her stillness.
The flame exhibition of the dragon ended as the flames coming from him slowly settles down. The two are glad that none of them is hurt or badly damaged from the attack.
As Kyle sighs in relief, he noticed that Emily is still having her stance when she was still shielding them from the ravaging flames. He also noticed that the huge shield of Emily is slowly retracting back into a smaller kite shield that is big enough to cover her entire left arm.
"Hey Emily… the dragon's done attacking." He said
But Emily stays still even after Kyle said it.
"Yeah I know I'm not blind." She answered in an aloof way, which the said statement of Kyle is obvious to her since she is conscious the whole time.
'Yeah, and I also know you are acting way too out of character since I last saw you about an hour ago.' He thought and walks slowly to her from behind.
"Hey, Emily… Emily…" Kyle said while poking her back.
Since Emily seems to not be moving, even a bit, his curiosity of what is going on rises to the highest point it could get.
'Could it be… that she die while standing? And those are her last words to me? I see some movies where someone fights extremely and dies while standing still.' Kyle thought as he recalls some Kung Fu movies he watched.
Kyle slowly reaches for her shoulder and plans to pull Emily to him to get a closer view if his hunch is right.
'There is a chance that excessive sweating before dying immediately triggers rigor mortis.' He thought
Tense that there is a fifty-fifty chance that it might be the case… Kyle prepared himself on whatever it might be.
As his palm touches the surface of Emily's shoulder, Kyle gives it a gentle squeeze and then suddenly pulls her to him, but something interesting happened.
'I can't even make Emily budge even a centimeter!' He thought after failing to pull Emily closer to him.
Kyle tries to pull her again and then again, but still, she won't budge, and after his fourth trial, Kyle gave up and confirmed that Emily is dead.
Kyle gently bows down as he places his right hand to his chest close to his heart.
'I'll be in debt to you for saving my life from draining and will be paying you back after an hour when your death penalty expires.' Kyle said, giving his gratitude to Emily.
"Are you ridiculing me?" Emily said, wondering what he is up to when he did what he did.
"Oh! You're alive!" He said gladly.
"Of course I am what did you expect?" She replied.
"So if you are alive and it is not rigor mortis as I think it is then… why are you so stiff?" Kyle said, wondering why Emily is somehow immovable in her current state.
"Please, don't say that I am stiff because it sounds so wrong." She replied with a sigh coming out from her.
"This is the recoil of "Art of Defense", after using it to block an attack… my entire body will be immovable and very vulnerable." She answered Kyle's inquisition.
Art of Defense, a skill that is the pride of all Shielders because of its ability to block any attacks and can be used as early as level one. But since this skill somehow unbalances the game, the developers added a stillness effect after activation and replaced the complete damage deflection to 90% damage reduction.
Since only the players that are using the Shielder class knows about this somehow, inconvenience in their convenient skill, so newbie players and players like Kyle who still hasn't experienced coop-play with other classes, don't usually know that a Shielder, upon activating "Art of Defense", can't even move a single muscle except for their means of communication for their party members.
"How long are you going to be like that?"
"About ten more seconds."
Then after the time, Emily said that the effect would worn-out, she became mobile again and began moving.
Kyle wonders how she was able to defend both of them from that attack that even players with higher levels than them had it hard, while she seems to have it smoothly.
Kyle also noticed that her HP gauge didn't even budge that much too.
"Looks like it will be hard for us to defeat this dragon." Emily said as she stares at it and turns back to Kyle.
"What?" He said, noticing the sticky gaze of Emily on him.
The gaze of Emily that somehow overlaps with where she is actually looking continues on scanning Kyle like an X-ray machine. While Kyle, upon seeing the way she stares at him began to feel uncomfortable.
'Maybe she noticed that I took some screenshots of her while she is covered in slime while having that flustered look on her?' He thought, recalling the time they met before the event starts and how he describes Emily's reaction as that coming out from a porn mag.
Then Kyle's mind gets a "What ifs" overload.
'Oh shoot I did hear a shutter sound after taking the pic or is it only available to me?'
'Is it considered as sexual harassment? If so, she'll sue me for sure!'
While being scanned from bottom to top by Emily, Kyle began sweating so hard that he can feel the cooling sensation of the sweat covering his whole body. (Which is the purpose of sweat people.)
Then after the whole body scan, Emily speaks to Kyle about her observation while leaning her face closer to him.
"Did you… broke your weapon…?"
Kyle responded blindly without processing what Emily just asked, he just assumed that what he is thinking is the same as that of Emily, but sad to say, it is not.
"Yes, yes I did took a photo, no! I mean photos, of you while you are being harassed and covered in slime by those slimes earlier, that you seemed to be enjoying too much especially the time when a slime entered your skirt and began wondering inside it!..." He said and continued on with another vital information.
"…And I also saved it on my gallery for reference!" Kyle said and realized that it is not the right answer to Emily's question.
'Oh shoot! Wrong answer!' He thought
Emily is stunned as she processes what Kyle said into her mind.
When she reached the point of realization of what Kyle just did, her face immediately turned red like a sun-ripened tomato as she exhibits that somehow appealing flustered look that might actually turn somebody on, to our Kyle that is covering his face, readying his self for an attack from Emily.
When Kyle noticed that he didn't receive any damage from Emily, he slowly uncovers his face to take a peek at her and saw Emily's face tinted in red with a hint of embarrassment that is as clear as daylight.
Emily hugs herself and squats down while her face shows immense horror at what Kyle did, on the same time she also mutters words as if she is chanting.
"I'll never get married… I'll never get married…"
Hearing it, Kyle impulsively took a step backward, because as far as he can see, Emily lost it, like going crazy kind of lost it.
'Just what kind of a conservative family is she from?' He exclaimed in his mind, as it seems to be a very big deal for her.
But aside from that problem, there is another unsolved problem that Kyle is facing and that is the Red Dragon that is hovering above them and seems to be listening to what is happening below him.
'How kind of him to give us ample time to talk.' Kyle thought as he stares at the dormant dragon above them.
But Kyle knows that it will be back in action after a while because he already caught the patterns of its attack.
'After attack with a skill, the dragon will charge up for around two minutes.' He thought and squats down to Emily to convince her that they should focus first on the dragon before they tackle their little issues.
"Uhm, Emily? I think we should first focus on…" Kyle said.
But is interrupted when Emily suddenly stands up from where she is squatting while bowing her head in embarrassment.
"Uhhm… Miss Emily?"
"Let's focus on what's important first." She said at the same time flicks down her left arm to open back her retractable shield.
"This dragon can't attack continuously or do a chain attack." She added while drawing a short sword out that is sheathed on the inner part of her shield.
Seeing it, Kyle knows that she is now up for business and is in a serious mood to whack a dragon ass, but he still has one question in mind.
"How did you know that?" Kyle asked, wondering how she able to know the attack pattern of the dragon.
"I saw it, like, since the time you and that blond chick got pinned down and are hiding in a crater."
"You've been here the whole time, yet you didn't help us out earlier?!" Kyle exclaimed, knowing that she's been there ever since.
"Well… I thought you and that blondie are having a good time?"
"We are not having a god damned good time even if you look at the replay if there is a replay to it!" Kyle sarcastically said.
Knowing that their argument won't bring them anywhere, Kyle reroutes their topic back to the dragon.
"So… you're going to eliminate it yourself?" Kyle asked, wondering if she can actually do it since Emily seems to be prepared.
"Of course not! I'm a Shielder, I'll be the vanguard while you do the major damaging." She replied, stating her class's role in a team fight.
"Yeah I get it, but as you can see."
Kyle shows his empty hand to Emily, telling her that he has no weapon to use at the moment.
"So you don't have an extra?" she asked but Kyle answers him immediately.
When Emily said the word "extra", Kyle recalls the time when he was in the Imp Dungeon and remembers picking up an item that has a "dagger" at the ending.
So Kyle immediately opens his inventory and scrolls down its contents until he finds an item that has a cross dagger image at the bottom of his inventory.
Kyle poked the item image and the item details pop out from another smaller window inside his inventory.
[Demon Fang Daggers] [Level requirements: 30] [Increase critical chance by 10%]
[Effect: converts 25% of the user's total Physical Damage dealt on enemies into additional Magic damage after each successful attack]
[Passive: Vampiric: coverts 9% of damage dealt into HP]
[Unique Passive: Weakness Finder: Dealing damage to enemy will decrease their Physical and Magic defense by 5%, stocks up to 10 times.]
'Woah! Why didn't I noticed this?' He thought after reading the item details that is way better than his previous one.
'Oh, right… I was too excited about going out of that dungeon that I only read the definition of the "Item Upgrade Card" and then immediately left the place.'
Now, Kyle's only problem is, if he is eligible to equip the item or not swiping the windows from his inventory to his character menu to check his current level and a grin shows on Kyle's face.
'I just leveled up again and I'm now level 32 thanks to this event especially to those lesser dragons back in town that is being eliminated by my co-party members.' He thought as he adds some of his stat points to his main attributes.
"You have an extra or what?" Emily asked him again and is now losing her patience when suddenly a phenomenon that happened to Kyle answers her hanging question immediately.
Kyle equipped the Demon Fang Daggers and same as his previous daggers, a pair of dagger sheaths with sophisticated black and gold design appear on his sides, replacing the older ones along with his new daggers that also have the black and gold motif showing on its hilts.
Kyle pulled out one of the daggers and noticed that it is a single-edged one, while the blade itself is made out of a black metallic substance with some red engravings on both sides of the blade that looks more like a vine design.
"Yes, I do now." Kyle answered her confidently
Seeing the confidence from him, Emily also gained the needed morale to face the dragon head-on even if she already knows that both of them have a huge level gap when compared to the dragon.
"Then let's get this over with." She said and then she slams the sword she is holding to her shield attracting the dragon.
[A party member used "Taunt"]
The dragon then immediately dash towards Emily in full throttle and is about to use his rock-hard head to tackle Emily.
When the dragon is close enough to the shield, Emily chains her skill with another one.
[A party member used "Petrify"]
With it, the dragon is stunned for a few seconds and is unable to move. Emily then shouts a command to Kyle.
"Now!"
And from behind, Kyle leaps forward towards the petrified dragon and is going to stab his dagger to its forehead.
'Adios dragon!' Kyle thought as he is about to land a critical attack to it.
As the dagger reaches the forehead of the dragon and is just a few millimeters away from penetrating its skull, a system notification appears on their screen that startled Emily.
[Red Dragon Used "Purify"]
And then the dragon whipped his spiked tail to Kyle that is above him throwing him away behind Emily.
Seeing the failed attack, Emily activates another skill to compensate for the unsuccessful one and also to give them enough time to regroup.
[A party member used "Shield Bash"]
And her shield began glowing brightly as she slams it to the face of the dragon pushing it a few meters backward while Kyle on the top fell on the ground below him that is just right in front of Emily.
"Are you okay?" She asked Kyle that is slowly standing up from the fall.
"Yeah, thanks." He answered somehow upset about what happened.
Kyle immediately checks his HP gauge and is somehow happy to see that it is not that much of a damage after that intense tail whip he just received.
'The dragon doesn't seem to deal that much physical damage' he thought.
"Maybe we should call for some help?" Emily proposed, thinking that it is the best thing to do now.
"Nah, we got this." Kyle confidently said.
'Especially after I saw that it doesn't have enough magic defense.' He thought as he stares at its HP gauge that now lost almost one-fourth of its HP just by landing two attacks and one of which is not that successful.
"Hey Emily, How many skills do you have that inflicts magic damage?"
"I have one more, but I need to charge it first." She answered Kyle somehow wondering why he would ask.
"Is that so? Can you do it now?" Kyle asked Emily if she could start charging the skill to save them some time.
"Well, it only charges when I receive damage and it needs a specific threshold so that I can release it." She answered Kyle, explaining that activating the skill requires the opponent to attack her.
[Warning Red Dragon is about to use "Macro Fire"]
"Will that work?" Kyle said referring to the upcoming attack of the dragon.
"I think so… let's find out?" Emily answered blankly.
'Damn, she's not sure about it either.'
"Alright then, Life's a gamble anyway." Kyle said.
And the two prepare their selves for the upcoming ultimate of the dragon as Emily positions her shield in front burying the lower pointy end of it to the ground.
[Warning! Red Dragon will activate Macro Fire in…]
[5]
[4]
[3]
[2]
[1]
[Red Dragon activated Marco Fire]
And then the two braced themselves for impact.
[A party member activates "Tenacity" and is now charging its threshold]
Emily's shield absorbs the raging fire of the dragon while the rest are being thrown away on their sides as fire spreads around them, leaving only a single safe line on their current ground and that is the space behind Emily's shield
[Threshold will be reached in…]
[5]
[4]
"Kyle we need to release it immediately or a strong knockback will hit us!" Emily exclaimed while holding her shield as firmly as she can.
[3]
Kyle checks the surroundings and saw an opening enough for a small object to pass through above them.
'I hope it'll work!' He thought as he grabs his dagger and wraps Emily's waist with his arms.
In shock, Emily twitches a bit on the time Kyle holds her waist and turns her gaze slowly to Kyle with an embarrassed face showing on her as she stutters words in response to Kyle's action.
"Wha-what are you doing?!" She said
Kyle then looks back at her and answers.
"Doing what you just said to do." he said and then throws the dagger above them as high as he could.
[You used "Dagger Blink"]
[1]
After which, Kyle and Emily are now falling from the sky down to the dragon as Kyle hugs Emily from behind as he tilts to a direction angling them so that they would fall above the dragon's head.
"Emily, now!" Kyle shouted while they are in mid-air, ordering Emily to use release it.
[A party member used "Enhanced Shield Bash"]
Screaming as they land on the dragon, Emily then bashed her shield to the dragon's head dealing huge damage to it as the attack cracked open its skull.
Then a crazy amount of damage appears on top of the dragon, even though it is only on the triple-digit side, the appearance of the damage is continuous and the HP gauge of the dragon drains down rapidly.
"How's the taste of your own attack?!" Emily shouted to the dragon as she refers to the amount of damage the dragon is receiving which is eighty percent of the damage of "Macro Fire".
And a System notification appears on every players' screen that is involved in the event.
[Red Dragon Defeated]
[Event: Attack of the Red Dragon is finished!]
And the roar of the players reading it echoes throughout the town of Florence as they celebrate their victory of the event.
And another notification appears, continuing the previous one.
[The player that dealt the most damage to the Red Dragon will receive the "Dragon Slayer" title.]
[Congratulations to player ID: 72941221]
[Avatar name: Emily on dealing the most damage on the Red Dragon and will be bestowed the title "Dragon Slayer"]
All players involved in the event saw the notification stating that Emily is the one who defeats the Red Dragon.
[All parties along with its party members that joined the event will receive 100 thousand coins each]
[Players involved in the event will have a chance to make a lucky draw from our "Lucky Box" in the premium shop interface]
[All players will receive an "Item exchange card"]
Then after the announcement, a notification appears on Kyle's screen stating the reward of the said event.
[You received 100 thousand coins]
[You received one lucky ticket]
[You received an Item Exchange Card]
And the two collapse back first on the ground, both tired of their fight with the dragon as they catch their breath while looking on the clouds above.
Yet grins of content are seen on their faces and are proud of themselves for defeating a strong foe and finishing the event.
"Good work, Miss Dragon Slayer." Kyle said, teasing Emily on her recently acquired title.
Emily turns her head on her side where Kyle is lying and jabbed him on the shoulder for teasing her.
When the two return to town, a huge crowd welcomed them as they swarm Emily for her success in defeating the dragon.
Kyle on the other hand logs out of the game and Emily saw him as he logout as Kyle's avatar pixelates and disappears.
'I'll thank you next time' Emily thought as she watches the guy exit the game.
Waking up, saw the same ceiling of his room, the very same picture he sees every time he logs out of the game.
Groaning, Kyle slowly stands up but a stinging pain on his palm made him twitch, forcing him to look at what is it that is stinging his hand.
As he lifts his aching hand slowly, he then looks at his palm that is in pain and something on it made his eyes widen upon seeing what it is.
'Why is my hand burned?' He thought, shock at what he just saw
And then remembered the time when he accidentally burned the very same hand back in the game when he and Carol are hiding in a crater.
"Hey, hey, hey... wait a minute. What's happening here?" he said
Then a ring on the doorbell followed by a couple of knocks on his front door was heard.