Pressed with no choice but to follow their leader, Isolde and Ragnar slipped into the Boss's chamber, footsteps echoing off stone slick with age and cobwebbed gloom.
"How did you meet them—if you don't mind me asking?" Ragnar murmured to Isolde as they moved, eyes never leaving Ren's back.
"I ran into Ren during my first run at Thunder Cave," Isolde said. "He warned me not to go in. I ignored him and got wiped. The rest . . . is history."
"So he's a beta tester, then?" Ragnar's tone was neutral, but the conclusion felt obvious to him—how else could Ren know so much, how else could he stride toward a Boss that had just annihilated ten players who likely already had double-digit ATP?
"Is that a problem?" Isolde's gaze sharpened, a thin chill slipping into her voice. Ren and Leonel had been nothing but decent to her. She wouldn't let anyone—Ragnar included—use that kindness as leverage.
"Not really. I don't care," Ragnar replied, eyes shifting back to Ren. "I just don't want to die to some stranger's overconfidence. If he is a beta tester, at least it tells me he knows what he's doing."
"Tch." Isolde clicked her tongue, glancing aside. "Then you shouldn't have joined us in the first place," she muttered, too low to invite an argument, but loud enough to be heard.
Behind them, the colossal door thudded shut. Fresh webs laced across the frame in an instant, sealing them in with a sinewy, silken hiss. Dust cascaded from the trembling wall, debris pattered across warped flagstones, and the chamber seemed to exhale.
When the rumbling faded, torches along the perimeter flared to life with a sputter and then a steady blaze, throwing long, jagged shadows across a wide square floor. Decayed cobblestones buckled beneath moss and creeping vines; roots speared through mortar like the fingers of something ancient trying to reclaim its bones. From ceiling to walls, thick sheets of cobwebs crisscrossed the space—layer upon layer, like a cocoon spun around a tomb.
[Warning! You have stepped into the domain of Dread Widow!]
Heads tilted up as a fine sprinkle of dust sifted from above.
From the ceiling, a colossus hung in silence—a spider so vast its eight legs spanned six meters each, ending in points like polished spears. Its swollen body matched the footprint of a one-story house, glossy and terrible. Two baleful red orbs pulsed at the center of its distended abdomen, while eight smaller eyes, the color of fresh blood, glittered with an alien cunning. When it parted its mandibles, rows of razor-edged teeth gleamed wetly.
ScCreEch!
The cry scraped across nerves like a blade over glass. Leonel's eyelid fluttered; his knees wobbled until Ren's steadying hand pressed his shoulder.
"Focus," Ren said—quiet, anchoring.
Isolde swallowed and lifted her [Monocle].
[Used Monocle x1
Remaining number of Monocles: 1]
ǁ D R E A D W I D O W ‖
Location: Gargantuan Cave
Description:
Spawned from the deepest pits of the Fiendweb, these horrors exist to prosecute their master's will. With venom that can fell dragons, unnerving stealth, and unwavering loyalty to the [Mother of Spiders], the Dread Widows cast their nets across the world, hunting all who oppose their mistress.
‖ A T T R I B U T E ||
HP: 2,400
MP: 200
STRG: 16+3 [Domain Bonus]
DEF: 20+10 [Domain Bonus]
MDF: 10
INT: 19+4 [Domain Bonus]
AGL: 25+5 [Domain Bonus]
LCK: 8
‖ D A M A G E R E S I S T A N C E S ‖
❶ Bludgeoning [Non-Magic]
❷ Piercing [Non-Magic]
❸ Slashing [Non-Magic]
‖ C O N D I T I O N I M M U N I T I E S ‖
❶ Poison
‖ W E A K N E S S ‖
❶ Fire
‖ S K I L L S & S P E L L S ‖
Passive Skills:
❶ Death Throes — On death, explodes in a 10-meter sphere of poisonous ichor.
❷ Razor Webweaver — Leaves razor-edged webs in its wake (even suspended in air); contact deals damage equal to its base attack.
❸ Shadow Stalker — Becomes invisible while lurking in darkness until it initiates an attack.
Active Skills:
❶ Multiattack LV.2
– Performs three leg strikes plus one bite.
– 50% hit chance if LCK is higher.
– Cost: –50 MP.
❷ Bite LV.3
– 50% chance to inflict Poison on a successful hit.
– 50% hit chance if LCK is higher.
– Cost: –20 MP.
‖ E N D ‖
Isolde's face drained to paper white. No wonder the previous group was wiped—the passives alone could dismantle an unprepared party.
This was supposed to be a "newbie" dungeon . . . but with defenses buffed by domain bonuses and non-magical attacks blunted, only precise play—and fire—would matter. Her kit skewed toward non-magical damage.
Realistically, Ren would have to carry their burst.
Leonel, by contrast, stared serenely into the middle distance. The wall of numbers flickering across his UI might as well have been ancient prophecy—best left unread. He gripped his shield tighter. If it tried to eat his friends, he'd hit it. That was all he needed to know.
Information shared seamlessly across the party—the Monocle's scan propagated to everyone, the same way mapping data did. This was why larger guilds fielded a dedicated support team first: Hunters and Animists to scout routes, log traps, flag hidden alcoves, and codex the Boss. Then the main squad rolled in armed with knowledge rather than guesswork.
At the edge of the group, Ragnar ran numbers in silence. His mind translated the stat spread into a plan. His STR was comfortably above +20, his DEF around +17. With Leonel's taunts and mitigations, they could probably hold the boss's aggro on the dwarf for about five minutes—longer if Ren pumped sustain.
If Ren supplemented with spot healing or damage control, Leonel would buy them another five, ten minutes total before the Widow's AI recalculated threat and pivoted.
Accounting for resistances, Ragnar estimated that his and Isolde's raw non-magical damage would land around +20 combined per cycle, +30 if they chained skills with clean positioning and tight timing.
The Dread Widow's Fire weakness was their lever; Ren's spells would have to pry it open.
If Ren could deliver ~+100 per burst and occasionally spike [Critical Hits] with [Fire], while minimizing MP drain through whatever resource trick he kept tucked away . . . the math didn't look hopeless. Bloody, but winnable.
The exercise also etched one lesson in stark relief: a tank was the lynchpin. Without Leonel to eat the hate, the Widow would shred the DPS line first.
Ragnar fixed his grip on the axe. Angles, attack windows, escape vectors—he set them all in his head, breath steadying.
SHhHrReEkK!
The Widow shrieked—and the room answered with fire.
Out of nowhere, multiple blooms of flame detonated. Two gouts roared outward in sweeping arcs, scouring a hundred-square-meter swath of web into smoking gaps, carving lanes of movement through the choking silk. A third streak speared straight into the Boss's gaping maw and vanished into the furnace of its throat.
–542 Critical Hit!
[Dread Widow is afflicted with BURN.
–5% HP per minute]
–27 (BURN)
"What the—" Ragnar's composure cracked as damage numbers flared over the Boss like falling stars. His head snapped toward Ren. To chunk that much through domain-boosted DEF and base MDF, Ren's INT had to be in the thirties—no, higher. Much higher.
But what snagged Ragnar's attention wasn't only the magnitude—it was the multiplicity. Those flames had landed in parallel, perfectly sequenced.
Multiple fires? Did Ren just cast concurrent projectiles—or copy something from the Dread Widow's kit?
Curiosity prickled, but Ragnar strangled it quickly. Whatever Ren was, whatever tricks he had—good. It meant they had a shot. And Ren clearly preferred to keep his cards close, which Ragnar respected. He lived by a simple policy: mind your lane, don't pry, fight well.
The truth was straightforward: Ren's INT was monstrous, and with the Widow's modest MDF, his Fire—already key due to elemental weakness—bit deep. The crit only twisted the knife further; BURN ensured the knife stayed in.
On top of that, Ren had just copied the Widow's [Multiattack] and filed it into his [Mind Palace]—a frightening synergy for a caster who could now chain four strikes in a single window. The skill's limitation was the coin toss of its mechanics: a flat 50% hit chance cap where LCK superiority governed success.
If it were 70%, Ren would likely have landed all four. As it stood, it was powerful but unreliable—strong enough to swing momentum, not guaranteed enough to build a strategy around.
He made a silent note: if he found a similar multi-proc skill with better odds—or none of those luck-gated restrictions at all—he'd overwrite this copy without hesitation. The Mind Palace had room, but clutter dulled the edge; he curated ruthlessly.
Flame light rippled across the chamber. The scorched webs recoiled like burned parchment, curling into brittle knots. The Dread Widow convulsed, screeching as smoke vented from its fanged maw.
Ren's gaze never left it, fingers poised for the next weave, mana thrumming under his skin like a second pulse.
"Positions," he said—calm, certain.
Leonel planted his shield with a booming thunk, drawing the Widow's hate.
Isolde rolled left through the newly cleared lane, sighting down the barrel for soft joints between chitin plates.
Ragnar cut right, boots grinding web-ash, angling for the abdomen where those twin red orbs pulsed—if they were organs, they were targets; if they were lures, they were traps he'd force the Boss to spring on him instead of the backline.
Above them, the monster seethed, legs uncoiling in lethal patterns.
And below, four players moved as one—plan set, nerves steel-wired, the first decisive blow already bleeding through the darkness.