{You have created a 3-man Team: Team Ghost!}
{Team Captain: Endrickdinho!}
{You have triggered Stadium Storyline Quest: Estadio do Arruna!}
{Pulling players into storyline…, brace yourselves…}
Bzzz!
Endrick felt a feeling like he just went through a portal.
When he opened his eyes, he was alone levitating in the clouds. Below him, what felt like a theater screen appeared which displayed a football story.
{Arruna City- The City of Dawn!}
{Once upon a time, in the delightful City of Dawn lived an ecosystem of creatures led by the kind and football-loving Celves.}
As the story played out, a community of Celves appeared before Endrick. Despite knowing them through the memories that he inherited from his body already, Endrick was still amazed by what he saw.
The Celves were really short. They looked like humanoid birds, with large eyes, tiny nose and mouth, and ears that were covered by a lot of hair. Some of the bigger Celves already mutated their ear hair to become feathers.
Another prominent feature was that their hands and legs had only 3 fingers and toes, also, their hands had feathers through which they could levitate.
Their flight was not as smooth as real birds but they could fly in a limited fashion. This delightful city was ruled by the Celves.
The bright morning sun, the chirping sound of the birds, and the different cheerful creatures in this city painted a picture of peace and harmony.
{Arruna City was a peaceful environment until the Devourer attacked!}
{Challenging all the masters to a one-on-one game of football, he won against all of them and confiscated their life balls, killing the love of football.}
{With the death of football, Arruna City was plunged into gloom.}
{For centuries, this city regressed until the Bald Celves arose. With his iron head technique and his explosive ball, he was able to fight his way through and defeat the Devourer, killing the enemy of football.}
{After victory though, he made an extreme decision.}
{Too much football brought this calamity, I will purge this city of free football. I love football so it will remain a game but it can only be played under my rules.}
{Apart from my tournaments, no one is allowed to play football elsewhere.}
The screen continued displaying it as the once cheerful city regressed into a rigid and monotonic city where football became nothing but a business initiative.
{Free football is no longer a thing in Arruna City…}
{Storyline Quest: Defeat the Bald Celves, restore Free Football to Arruna City!}
*****
{Quest Rules: There are no goalposts to score, this is a purely attack and damage-oriented quest. Defeat the minions of the Bald Celves, and defeat the Bald Celves through ball attacks!}
{NOTE: Every player retains access to his/her ball in dungeons like this, but if you want, you can change the setting to enable single ball mode where you all can use and pass one ball around like it is a real football match.}
{NOTE: The aggro of enemy NPCs are only attracted to the players who are actively with the ball.}
…
Thud!
Endrick finally fell down, he landed on his butt.
Scrambling up, the first thing that he noticed was his 2 teammates then the unfamiliar environment. They were inside something like a medieval game cave, it felt like dungeons in VR games that Endrick had played before.
A distance away, he could notice the group of 4 Celves that held their own footballs, watching everywhere in an alert manner like sentries.
Endrick also noticed his map tab blinking.
Clicking on the map, Endrick saw the full layout of this map, it was divided into 3 different phases. The first phase where they currently stood was the sentry stage with the ordinary Celves sentries like the one a few distance away.
The 2nd phase would pit them against elite Celves footballers, football warriors' intent on protecting the sovereignty of the Bald Celves.
As for the 3rd phase of the cave, that was where the Bald Celves was.
"Ok". Endrick turned to look at his teammates. "I think the main problem is the Bald Celves, let's mow through these ones".
"We'll decide on the battle strategy once we meet the Bald Celves".
"Ok". Maria202 agreed.
Legion nodded.
The next moment, kicking their individual balls forward, the 3 teammates rushed forward as they finally attracted the attention of the sentries.
"Free footballers!"
The alerted Celves sentries screamed angrily as they dropped their balls and got ready to attack.
Before the Celves sentries could attack, they did.
{Enemy: Celves Sentry!}
{Health Points: 90/90}
"Special Skill: Electricity Shot!"
Pow!
Endrick kicked the ball with force, it left like a missile that was just launched out of it's launcher as it hit one of the Celves Sentry square on the face.
{+38 Damage!}
{+15 Additional Electricity Damage!}
{Passive Stun Effect triggered!}
Bam! Bam!
Maria202 and Legion's shots also hit their marks as the Celves screamed.
"Cri!" "Cri!" "Cri!"
Legion's passive effect also triggered, making use of both their passive effects, they were able to stall the Celves sentries till they unleashed shots again.
BAM!
Endrick's shot was straight at the liver and it had an effect.
{CRITICAL HIT!}
{Total Damage increased by 40%}
{LIVER ATTACK!}
{Total Damage increased by 36%}
{You have killed a Celves Sentry!}
{You have been rewarded with 340 Experience Points!}
Endrick's eyes shone greedily. "Let's take our time here. We're leaving none behind, we're killing them all!"
"Agreed". Legion spoke for the first time in a long time.
Maria202 was stunned. "So, you can talk?"
Legion ignored her, she laughed as they officially started their onslaught.
This time, they didn't need any complicated formations to win, all that was needed to defeat the Celves Sentries was their individual skills.
Dodging constant ball attacks from them, they lost a few health points before they were finally able to wipe off all the Celves Sentries here after 23 minutes.
Without hesitation, they proceeded deeper into the dungeon.
They encountered 3 more dens similar to the first where they encountered more Celves Sentries, they left none alive, they killed them all for the experience points. This way, they spent more than an hour in the first phase alone.
On getting to the 2nd phase of the storyline, it finally became hard.
{Enemy: Elite Celves!}
{Health Points: 190/190}
"Special Celves Skill: Celves Eyes- Elite Vision!"
"These guys are actually able to pass!" Endrick recognized it too late.
"Special Celves Skill: Floating Shot!"
As soon as the 2nd Elite Celves controlled the pass from its comrade, without hesitation, it spun with the ball before unleashing a shot at the closest enemy.
The closest enemy was Endrick.
It was close but it was not at point-blank range, Endrick was able to barely dodge when the ball changed trajectory in mid-air. It floated like a sentient bird flying in the air, then it hit him straight on the face.
{+22 Damage!}
{Health Points: 228/250}
"We need a formation". This time, Legion was the one who spoke first.
"My killer instincts are highest, I'll be the striker and both of you will be the midfielders, supply me with more balls to attack".
Maria202 and Endrick obeyed without hesitation.
Hiding behind structures from the lethal balls shot at them, they timed it and started throwing passes with their own balls towards Legion. Once the ball touched Legion's legs, they transformed into his own shadow ball.
This way, he was able to attack with 3 balls.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
Legion fully showed his assassin instincts at this moment as he attacked while dodging like an elusive leaf floating in the wind. His stamina was also crazy, it took him 36 freaking minutes before he was able to finish the Celves in this den.
Going to the 2nd den, they improvised their strategy a bit, allowing all of them to attack at intervals while being able to dodge behind different structures.
It worked, after almost 2 hours, they cleared all 3 dens of the 2nd phase.
They couldn't leave immediately though; their stamina was low.
They waited for it to refill before they went into the 3rd part of the dungeon.
This was where they met the Boss Character, Bald Celves.
*****
Character illustrations and illustration for the Celves race is in my discord server, link...
https://discord.gg/4kauKusRZU