VRMMO: World's First Glyphborne

Chapter 335: Hello Dungeon my old friend

Although Dawd had been shut down for the ’update’ and the world had been turned on its head by new superhuman abilities, that didn’t mean that businesses were ever going to stop working. E-sports players and professional guilds had been training all week long for the return of Dawd and had been preparing for this eventuality.

The manifestation of real magic was just another thing for them to exploit for profit and to use to compete against each other, nothing more. The fact that some nobodies topped the chart at the moment was simply a set back, that would help with their guilds inevitable rise to power.

So whilst the normal people had been spending their time trying to rob banks or playing around with their new magic, the guilds had been studying their dungeons closely. Footage was watched over, strategies devised, numbers crunched to create the most optimal plays.

All of the ways that one could possibly suck the fun out of a dungeon run and turn it into repeatable, manufacturer success they had already created, patented and thoroughly developed before forcing it onto their teams.

Fun? That was for children. This was a video game for crying out loud! And that meant it was to be won, used as an advertising platform and create a return on investment, nothing more.

So the fact that someone had reached and was currently encroaching on the previously insurpassable seventh floor was not the result of skill or good team work. But the result of the perfect investment into a product.

So what if people couldn’t normally get this far? For them, this was a simple inevitability. If they needed more potions, the corporations would toss money at the issue until it solved itself.

Thus, hearing that others had beaten them to their goal and were probably going to beat the dungeon before them did not surprise the Fate Breakers, nor did it dishearten them.

So what if they beat the boss first and got the first clear? Was it a missed opportunity, sure. But none of those gains would serve the corporations in the real world, whilst even the smallest gains would serve the Fate Breakers wonderfully. It was all about outlook, and maybe a slight touch of cope.

***

Belladonna was the first to log in, finding herself still in the same dungeon although not in the location that they were logged out in. They had been returned to the first floor, right at the entrance of the dungeon.

Surprisingly, the heat didn’t hit her the way she expected. She had been prepared to cycle an Ice infusion to cool herself down since her potion should have worn off by now, only to find that the potion was still chugging away through her system.

Glancing over to the others, she could see exactly why that was.

Each member of her party was frozen in place. Their bodies stuck in the pose they had held on log out, with Figg looking incredibly embarrassing as he was caught mid-blink as his face was twisted in a ridiculous expression.

Even Lilith’s little baby dragon, Gaia, had been frozen mid-stride with its tongue flopping out. They had been left exactly how they were when they logged out, not just position but the state of their bodies, as if time had absolutely no effect on them.

Unfortunately, that meant that Belladonna was still a complete and utter mess after her dive in the Lava. Just wonderful.

Although, even if it was inconvenient now, it was still incredibly interesting. If she could figure out how that worked, then that might be the way to transfer organic materials between worlds. It was definitely worth investigating later.

One by one, as their minds took over these bodies, they unfroze. The life returning to their eyes as their bodies started to move like nothing was wrong, not even a hint of stiffness from their time in stasis.

Once everyone was unfrozen, including little Gaia who unfroze with Lilith, the team exchanged a few words, helped Belladonna heal, as well as received a new potion from Figg for when their current actually did run out, before they eventually moved out.

They completely breezed through the starting floor, as they moved with the purpose of completion rather than cooperation this time.

After all, just because the pro’s looked like they might beat them, didn’t mean they actually would. They would only lose for sure if they didn’t try, and none of them were above showing up the corpo’s and the pros. Saige especially was eager to stick it to the pros, many of whom he had previously competed against.

Their only source of delay came from Lilith, or more specifically the item that she was holding. The cracked, grey metal rod was still giving her the pulling sensation as she waved it around whilst they traversed the first floor.

Just like Vestra had theorised, it was acting as a dousing rod and it led them to a few strange spots on the starting floor. It wasn’t just pools of lava, although one of the three locations it led them to was a small pool that thankfully wasn’t as hard as the last.

But there was also a doused location that was buried deep in a wall. Belladonna and Lilith, with a small assistance from Gaia, had to destroyed the wall to find the exact same chest sitting in a perfectly carved hole a few feet deep.

The final location of the floor confused them for a few minutes, as they kept walking in circles searching for it to no avail, until they finally did the one thing that no gamer would ever do.

They looked up.

Over a hundred feet above them was a chest, dangling from a thick chain that hung from a stalactite on the caves ceiling.

It was too high for them to shoot down with just a fire or lightning bolt. They had to use their muscles once again.

Channelling mana into their limbs, Lilith her arms and Belladonna her legs, Belladonna planted her foot in Lilith’s cupped hands before the towering demoness launched her high into the air, as Belladonna leapt from her hand at the same time.

She shot into the sky like a cannon, clearing three quarters of the height from just the throw alone, before she had to rely on her feet flames to cover the rest of the distance.

That part sucked the most, as she had to do it through strong and short bursts, and even then her feet still got singed slightly.

Getting down was significantly easier, however. Break the stalactite and simply let gravity do the work, with a small amount of feet singing, momentum cancelling flame bursts before she went splat.

And that was how they ended up with three more seemingly indestructible chests and the contents within.