We headed right, with Troll and Ha led the rest of us through. When we were here before, we met the mobs - in the form of a sole goblin - as soon as we opened the door. However, there was currently no sign of any which we found confusing...

"So... What the hell is happening? Why aren't they attacking us yet?" I asked at the end of my patience.

"Oh, right... One second," Hiiro said, the glitter like sparkles that coated the walls around him diminished completely.

In mere seconds after he did that, we heard the footsteps and groans of oncoming foes. The corridor was illuminated well, but the problem came with our positions which the goblins rushed to exploit.

Nx was with me standing in the middle of the group, and with the two samurais at the front, this left Hiiro and EXT left in the back. Neither having the health to really tank the oncoming hoard and with the corridor being so thin, there wasn't any room to get past her and Hiiro.

I did my best to cover them, firing arrows on mass which killed one or two. EXT killed a further two with a good connection with Scorch and wounded a third. But two managed to graze her with their knives regardless. She was defenseless as the two devastated half of her health before she could react.

Using the little buffer room the Samurai had opened, Hiiro quickly stepped back in the hopes that Nx could pass through. He sprinted at the opportunity, quickly reaching the battered mage as Hiiro did nothing. EXT quickly backed off the let the assassin cover the melee, and one of the samurais on the other side buffed him with defense.

More goblins bombarded both sides, so I quickly switched with EXT to tank for Nx. Though, it was completely pointless in the end. With his ridiculous skill combos and EXT's intense magic attacks, the reinforcements turned into XP before I took a single hit... Well, better safe than sorry I guess.

With no more coming through, we stayed in our current formation and went onward.

"So guys, are dungeons usually this hectic or were we just unlucky?" EXT asked, still regaining her health after taking a potion.

"The one I went through wasn't this mad, but I guess it could be a quirk of this dungeon?" Ha answered, clearly unsure.

"I don't think it's always that bad. It's probably due to me scaring them off that they built up in such numbers. Sorry, I didn't notice sooner," Hiiro added.

"It's fine, but... what did you change to suddenly start making them attack us?" Nx faced Hiiro with intrigue loudly written on his face.

"I deactivated the 'attraction_increase' skill. Although it seems dumb, it seems to do more than just cause me to look cute, it also seems to help with intimidation. Or at least that's what this example shows me... I'm still unsure about a lot of this skill's mechanics," he answered, scratching his head.

"Huh... I haven't heard that on the forums. Though, most of the Succubi deleted their characters soon after playing due to their low starting health," I said.

"Oh, right. You guys actually use the forums. Meh, I like playing underrated classes anyway," he replied in a bored monotone.

"Makes sense. On a different topic, why didn't you heal me? I mean, you're supposed to be the healer..." EXT asked, annoyance overcoming her usual lax nature.

"I'm a succubus. The skill I use to 'heal' is called Blood_Transfusion and requires me having hp to donate to you. Since you weren't going to die, I gathered you'd prefer me to not steal your XP to get health to heal you with. You had potions anyway..." Hiiro explained, as we finally reached the end of this dead end.

There were no alternative paths, so we were forced to turn around and go towards the exit already. EXT, Troll and I all leveled up in the process, so we didn't complain as we took the long stroll back.

-

A couple of encounters with individual goblins took place as we got back to the split paths. We double checked with Troll, before marching to the next level with only more individual mobs standing in our way. The were quickly disintegrated by EXT's fire magic before they could even notice us, so we kept our pace unhindered towards the staircase.

The seemingly endless staircase eventually led us to a slightly dimmer floor with the same wooden beams on stone aesthetics. We crossed our fingers that it would get less dull before continuing down the sole corridor we could see.

This time ,however, we only got five minutes in before seeing a branching path with three options. And one of the options seemed to clear out into a large, bright room.

"Locate Staircase," Troll murmured, her hands soon pointing towards the way we came from and the right option which lead into a long corridor.

"So... since we're grinding, should we check out the large obnoxious room first then?" I asked although we were already moving that way before I did so.

We found the source of the light before entering, it was due to the ludicrous amounts of torches hanging on the walls.

As we entered, a skew of arrows struck us with shockingly bad aim.

The source of those arrows? About twenty goblins holding small, flimsy bows with three rows of ten goblins wielding knives in front of them.

"Want me to do anything, or should I keep standing here and looking pretty?" Hiiro asked, reaching for his staff.

"Help us if we need it, I assume you can do that, no?" Nx replied.

He put his hands to his sides and answered "I can. If needed, I'll summon."

With this, the goblins charged. Breaking their formation as the hoard came streaming across.

They swarmed us with about ten goblins each, dramatically reducing our movement capabilities as the archers kept their arrows coming. Everyone focused on their own fights, so our teamwork and formations also broke. The occasional hit arrow added to the looming defeat that our individual work had been for.

Without any delay, some weird, tentacle-like growths sprouted from the ground and engulfed some of the numerous goblins surrounding us. I ignored them, focusing on the free mobs surrounding me and cut their numbers down as I made myself some room. The binds stopped when the others had fallen, and with one hit, they fell too.

I looked around at my allies. The tentacles also affected some of their mobs too. both Hiiro and Nx were already free, the latter rushed to help EXT with her group as former healed her.

Whilst looking at them, I realized the archers were still shooting. So I took out my bow and started to pick them off. I used a skill called 'Cross-hairs' to increase my accuracy. I hadn't used it before, so I tried to kill the goblins faster with it. After four successful headshots, which killed four goblins in four shots, my AP ran out and my next shots became more and more sluggish in turn.

Luckily for me, everyone else was freed from their individual fights now, so charged at sixteen archers that remained. They died without a putting up a fight, EXT now being at full health to spite her almost dead status.

-

We regrouped after the fight, and questions sparked from everyone.

"What the hell were with those tentacles?" the now angry mage asked.

"That was me. Most of my binds are made from tentacles for some reason... I guess the devs just had to get in some fetish into the succubus class or something," Hiiro shrugged as he announced.

"That was you? B... but there were like twenty of those going off simultaneously. Shouldn't that drain your AP like mad!?" she yelled.

"It should, but I have so much AP that it doesn't matter. For the record, I have a max of thirty-one thousand AP. And per second, the bind cost about forty to cast or maintain. Also, with my insane AP regeneration, I've maxed again. That's what leveling does guys." he explained.

"Thirty... Thousand!? I'm a mage and I have about nine thousand. I didn't spend many free points on it, but that's still stupid for you to have that much more AP than me!" she protested.

-

When her rage finally died down, we delved further into the room. The fact that we found no branching rooms and no treasure disappointed us. There were no other mobs, though, so we used the time to sort out our levels and have a small break.

-

My stats now looked like this:

Stats Level 28 AP 2900/2900 Defense 61 Damage 78 HP 2300/2300 Speed 33 Stamina 38 Spare 0

"All done?" Hiiro asked everyone as they seemed to stop touching the interface.

Everyone else nodded, so we made our way down the other way. Although long and seemingly empty, it eventually opened out to a small room with five archer goblins and a chest. The goblins died instantly and we closed up on the chest.

I looked at Hiiro, who was mischievously smirking, and called him out on it, "So why are you, being you, smiling like that?"

"I don't know what you're talking about... Ah," he replied, looking at Troll who tried to open the chest.

Large teeth impaled her arms, as googly eyes appeared above the chest.

"Oh yeah, something you should know about the people who made these dungeons. They love mimics. Thank your respective god that a samurai opened that up. Heal Troll73," he explained, trying not to laugh as he watched his allies health go from full to red in seconds.

Troll fled as soon as her arms were freed. Nx cut through the mimic in one swipe and the remaining people glared at Doki.

"If you knew it, why the hell didn't you say anything!?" Troll screeched as her health gradually crawled up.

Accepting the hate, he calmly defended himself, "Well, if you wanted me to tell you a spoiler, ask. I assumed I was here for moral and healing support, not to walk you through the fucking dungeon. Also, I like how you're only hating me, considering Haha is still laughing his arse off over there."

To the shock of all of us, tears streamed down Ha's eyes as he continued laughing under his hand. The hatred surrounding Hiiro passed for now, as we justly scorned Ha for his lack of remorse. Though, once we walked back to the intersection, we were all laughing with him.

-

With no more enemies on the floor, we rushed down the staircase to the next one. This floor opened up to a large, circular room which was very well lit. A large goblin sat on a boar, with four smaller goblins on wolves around him.

"'o dares kill mah bros!?" the large goblin roared.

This one sentence successfully intimidated Nx, who started to shake and almost dropped his weapons in this guy's wake.

"Huh? We killed your bros?" I asked, tilting my head as I said that.

This served only to fuel his apparent rage, causing him to reply by shouting even louder, "Ya tau'tin' sacks of skin! Ya kill mah bros and DARE to lie to ME!? 'UT UP AND DIE!"

We scurried into formation before the big guy charged himself at us with full force. Steam fuming from his warty nose and the mad look on the boar's face froze Nx solid. I grabbed him as I leapt away from the boar's path, the others did similarly.

When he passed I shot him with my bow, not realizing the other four followed him. As a result, a spear clunked against my helmet and I lost fifty HP. My shot hit but only did a sliver of damage to the boss.

Nx recovered from being scared in the nick of time, managing to slash the rear of the rider who attacked me for a quarter of his health. Flame magic in combination with both samurai's katanas managed to kill one of the wolves. But before they could finish the goblin off, another wolf rider turned around and darted to them.

With my attention elsewhere, the one that charged at me returned, this time going after Nx with the boss. We tried to connect some hits, but I reacted too late.

On its next attack, we tried again, but their movements were too quick and random for us to hit. So we played the dodging game, hoping some of the others would soon help us.

Jumping out of the way for the fifth time, both the riders went for the others instead. Using this freedom, I looked around. EXT and the two samurais were taking on three wolf riders, and the other one and the boar went against Hiiro.

Continually sidestepping, he proved way too fast for the boss. With them distracted, I took some shots at them. But even though he didn't even try to hit either enemy, and my arrows ate away at the minion's health, it took it forever to aggro back to me.

Anticipating the charging wolf, I went back to dodging, exchanging the occasional blow with the wolf riding goblin. The boar didn't join in, so I gathered he was still distracted by our pacifist healer as Nx and I destroyed this wolf rider's health.

His wolf soon died, and before he got another hit, we slashed him into pieces and were joined by another one. This one was already battered, though, so we made quick work of it and backed up the samurai. Well, we tried...

Once we got there, those three had finished off the last goblin on their side. So all that remained was the boss that was still chasing down Hiiro.

EXT's magic and my arrows flew across the room, hitting the boss with almost all of them. The others took some potions before charging to the healer's back. When they began to attack it, the bosses health was in the red.

It furiously began ramming towards the swordsmen, only hitting Ha once in the process. After ten more arrows and three more spells, the boar eventually fell. The leader on a sliver of health died to a single attack by Nx.

As the goblin boss vanished, a crumbling wall revealed a new exit.

In the wake of the bosses death, there was a moment of deep panting before our breathing evened out.

"W-was that it? Where the hell was the boss!?" Troll asked. Everyone tilted their heads whilst facing Hiiro.

"I have no idea. It just aggroed to me randomly, so I just dodged it. My speed is pretty high, so I just walked around it as it came in to attack. I didn't want to steal the XP and it just refused to stop attacking me without my input," he explained, joining in the confusion.

Ha, knowing that this would never end, prompted a new conversation, "So, what drops did you guys get?"

In the order of me, Nx, Troll, and EXT, we answered his question:

"I got an ID, a Tooth Necklace, a wolf summon and a stick bow..."

"An ID, two necklaces and a pouch of herbs."

"I gather we all got IDs, but I got a wolf summon and two... Sweaty Socks? Gross! I-I don't want to even touch their icons..."

"Eh, there's such a disgusting drop? I guess I've got good luck in getting an ID and three Pouches of herbs then."

We left the dungeon before we found out the other two's drops, but apparently, they weren't so impressive. After saying goodbye, we all logged out.