[Giant Rat Queen]
Lv. ??
HP: 30,000/30,000
Along with the appearance of the [Giant Rat Queen], dozens of level 15 [Elite Giant Rats] rushed out of the hole. They were the direct guards of the queen and much more powerful than all the ones they had faced so far. Although they weren't overwhelming in numbers, they now matched the levels of the players.
"Everyone, I'll focus on taking down the queen! You all must deal with the guards quickly, then come to help take down the queen with me!" Darius barked out some orders and immediately started hosing the [Giant Rat Queen] with bullets from his gatling gun. He intended to get all the aggro on himself and kit it around so it wouldn't go after the rest of the team.
"You heard the man, let's kill these stupid rats!" Someone shouted. Everyone began firing on the [Elite Giant Rats], but they had far more health than their lower leveled counterparts and their attacks did much less damage than they thought they should've.
[Elite Giant Rats]
Lv. 15
HP: 3,000
(Extra stats information hidden)
[Extra skill]
[Queen's Guard] Passive
As the Queen's guard, it's important to have a tough defense and high attack power. While in the vicinity of the queen, gain additional resistance against physical attacks along with sharper claws and fangs.
- Gain +40% resistance against physical damage.
- Gain +20% extra damage against enemies.
"Shit, they have resistance against physical attacks! Try to focus fire on a few so we can whittle them down faster!" A beastman said as he threw a grenade to disrupt the [Elite Giant Rats] charge. A few of the rats got caught in the explosion, sending them flying. Several damage numbers floated up only numbering in the hundreds. Not nearly enough to seriously hurt the rats.
Upon landing, though bloody and burned, they got up and began charging the players again.
"Shit, shit, shit!" One Elvish [Medic] constantly yelled expletives as they got closer. The rat queen guards were now upon them, breaking their line of defense apart. All everyone could do was try their best to dodge the attacks of the [Elite Giant Rats]. The battle quickly turned into a mess, with several already sustaining heavy injuries.
"[We need to deal with those guards, and fast! The team might get wiped with how things are going right now. Focus on the ones that are attacking our low HP allies! You should be fine up here on your own for now, so let Masterless Sword know that she should go help the others.]" Dags and Cynthia watched everything that seemed to happen in the blink of an eye. In just a few seconds the battle had devolved into mayhem.
"Un!" Cynthia turned around and waved for Masterless Sword's attention.
"Go and help the others! I'll be ok up here on my own!" She shouted before putting her eye back to the scope.
"Got it! Stay safe up here!" Masterless Sword replied as she jumped over Cynthia. She quickly bolted over to the action and snagged the aggro of 5 [Elite Giant Rats]. With her agility, she kited them without being hit, bouncing off of walls and jumping out of the way of their easy-to-read attacks.
"I hope she'll be ok…" Cynthia watched as the beastwoman got chased around by the 5 high level rats.
"[Looks like she'll be fine, and she took some pressure off of the others. Don't worry about her and focus on the other teammates who are in danger.]" Dags mentioned again. A few were already on the verge of dying from the relentless attacks of the [Elite Giant Rats]. Even though there were a couple medics in the group that could heal them, they had their own problems to deal with.
Cynthia sharpened her focus once again. In doing so, she unknowingly reentered the [Sharpshooter] state this time. She looked through the lens of her scope sighting in her first target. It was a rat that was attacking a Dwarven [Gunner] who had a light machine gun (LMG). With his heavy gear, he couldn't really dodge the quick attacks from the rats. Seeing an opportunity after one attacked, Cynthia fired.
*Bang!*
[Crit! -1728HP]
[Elite Giant Rat (Lv.15) has been killed!]
[Gained 135XP]
[Gained bonus 68XP for defeating an enemy at least 10 levels higher than you!]
[Level up! Lv.4 -> Lv.5]
[Gained 10 Free ATP!]
[Congratulations on reaching level 5! You've gained enough experience to make it out on your own. WARNING: Dying will now result in loss of experience and items you may be holding. Good luck, player!]
On top of her normal 4 times multiplier for critical hits due to her class, her [Sharpshooter] state boosted it an additional 55%. With the base damage of her rifle, it stacked to an insanely high number!
Dags got a notification as well. He was quite happy about it too, since Cynthia reached a milestone, he did as well!
[Repair Progress: 0.1%]
[Upgrade Points: 15]
This gave him plenty to purchase all the upgrades he needed! He wouldn't spend them all though, just in case there was something else that unlocked that he would want soon. For now, he spent 6 points, swiftly upgrading 1 of each of his mundane upgrades and also getting [Miracle]. Upon upgrading, he felt a lot of pain coursing through him as he was electrocuted once more, but it wasn't as bad as the last time. He gritted his teeth, baring with it. With the upgrade, his energy was refreshed as well with the surge from before! Since that was the case and he had extra energy, he immediately activated [Miracle] just in case. With Cynthia being level 5 now, she could die and potentially lose her sniper. That would almost certainly be a death blow to her ability to level up.
While Dags was doing that, Cynthia had already started taking shots at other [Elite Giant Rats]. She had no time to check her notifications, and couldn't care less about them at the moment.
[Hit! -480HP]
[Hit! -531HP]
[Miss!]
[Hit! -517HP]
She never kept shooting the same target, opting to instead hit the ones who were about to land an attack on someone with low health. It seemed like even though she was in the state of the [Sharpshooter] she didn't gain the 100% accuracy of the skill, merely the bonus to crit damage. Whenever she hit a rat, it would get slightly staggered from the powerful round hitting it, disrupting their attacks. This relieved some of the pressure off of the multitude of players who were trying to whittle down the enemy's health while trying not to die themselves. The consequence, of course, was that it messed up her ability to gain XP unless she hit a headshot again.
Cynthia reloaded her rifle and continued assisting those in need, but even that wasn't enough to stop people from dying.
"Gyah! No, my gear!" Someone finally dropped to 0 HP as an [Elite Giant Rat] bit their shoulder. He collapsed to the ground with a thud and started dissolving into pixels. Left on the ground was his plate carrier. Not far away, someone else was taken out by several rats.
"God dammit my XP! Fuuuu-!" Their scream of rage faded before they could finish, falling dead on the ground. Their rifle clattered to the floor, losing its owner.
"[It was inevitable that we would take losses. Don't let it get to you, Cynthia.]" Even as he said that, more people were dying from the might of these [Elite Giant Rats]. Their resistance to damage made them really persistent and difficult to take down, which led to people losing too much health when they couldn't dodge their charges from multiple directions.
Cynthia bit her lip until it started bleeding. She didn't want anyone else to die, but there was nothing she could do. The [Elite Giant Rats] were simply too tanky for the group to handle without taking losses. Nevertheless, she kept firing as much as she could to at least prevent some from dying.
[Miss!]
[Hit! -466HP]
[Hit! -549HP]
[Miss!]
[Crit! -1305HP]
[Elite Giant Rat (Lv.15) has been killed!]
[Gained 135XP]
[Gained bonus 68XP for defeating an enemy at least 10 levels higher than you!]
On the last shot in this magazine she finally killed another one, gaining another 203XP. She was on her last magazine now before she had to repack her mags or load bullets one by one into the chamber of her rifle. She quickly reloaded once again, but thankfully the guard rats started to die out. They had finally whittled them down with enough hits that most of them had no HP left. Soon enough, only 5 were left with less than 25% of their HP. Unfortunately, their team had also lost 15 people to the rats so far, with some barely hanging on by a thread thanks to the medics. The last ones were soon dealt with by the remaining team members, but the fight isn't over yet.
"I see you all managed to deal with the Queen's guards, but I'll need assistance with her now!" Darius was looking pretty worse for wear. His armor was torn apart, he was bleeding profusely in several spots, and his gatling gun seemed to have been destroyed. Dags and Cynthia looked on in shock seeing his disheveled state. He was having that bad of a time with the Queen? When observing the boss, it wasn't in much better condition. Its fur was soaked in blood, along with missing one of its front paws and fangs. Checking its HP, Dags saw that Darius had actually almost soloed the boss by himself.
[Giant Rat Queen]
Lv. ??
HP:4,196/30,000
Immediately, everyone who could hold their weapon opened fire on the boss. They all wanted to get the last hit and get all the glory. With their low levels, it hardly did any damage per shot, but the sheer amount of it was slowly chipping its health away. The [Giant Rat Queen] swung its tail at the annoyances, instantly killing another 5 people who screamed in terror before dying.
Cynthia,too, took shots at the Queen. With the level difference being so high, even her damage was rather pitiful.
[Hit! -126HP]
[Crit! -450HP]
[Hit! -102HP]
[Hit! -151HP]
[Crit! -523HP]
She managed to get 2 crits by shooting into its mouth, but the shots she took at the eyes didn't hit their intended target. The [Giant Rat Queen] was now thrashing around, killing multiple people as its health neared ever closer to 0.
[Giant Rat Queen]
Lv. ??
HP:1,462/30,000
Upon seeing the health, Dags knew that it was time to use his new process [Magical Empowerment]. It combined with Cynthia's actual [Sharpshooter] skill would likely net them the final hit. Just as he was about to tell Cynthia his plan, a sudden explosion erupted under the pipe! The wall crumbled, taking the pipe and Cynthia with it.