Fate Online: Shadow

"This is good for us. Now, we don't need to worry about hunting grounds for new and old players joining our guild"

Maverick, Cereal Killer and the others stood before a large crevice at the foot of the mountain, and behind them is a large swath of forest.

The crevice before them is enough for three people to walk side by side, and its the entrance towards a medium-sized dungeon that they had recently discovered a week ago.

"We finally secured a hunting ground for our guild. Now, we only need to gather enough gold coins two months later to pay the rent for the dungeon to the kingdom" Miya said with a huge smile on her face, and the others nodded in agreement to her.

All existing and undiscovered dungeons within the territory of a Kingdom or Empire is considered the property of the ruling monarch. That's the reason why players who discover new dungeons would have two months of free occupancy of the said dungeon, but two months later, they would need to pay the corresponding fee for renting the dungeon to the kingdom or empire where its located.

And the inability to do so would void their rights to the dungeon, giving the others who are eyeing the place a chance to rent it for their guild.

"Guys..." Minerva's face slowly warped in horror and fear, and because she was the only one facing the other direction, the others couldn't see what she is currently looking at.

"Guys!" her voice that's filled with anger quickly got their attention towards her.

"What is…"

All of them turned around, but Maverick didn't even finish what he wanted to say when his eyes slowly widened in shock and fear, and the others with him were also not an exception to it when their sights landed on the scene before their eyes!

There was a huge dragon gliding through the skies, whose body is so big that it's blotting out the sunlight, and it's even heading towards their direction!

"An...Ancient Dragon, only an ancient dragon could grow that big!" Cereal Killer stuttered in fear and even though they know that its only game, they still couldn't help but palpitate in fear realizing how fragile humans could be in the face of true power.

Then the eyes of the dragon suddenly moved towards their direction and Maverick who was the first to notice it quickly realized that something bad...really bad is going to happen to them if they still don't flee from there.

"RUN! Inside the dungeon...Now!" Maverick quickly yelled to the others while his right arm swung towards the direction of the dungeon behind them.

"F*ck!"

It was because the dragon suddenly opened its mouth and spat a huge ball of fire that looks like a crashing meteorite as it flew towards them.

BOOM!

The land around the dungeon was devastated, and surprisingly, the mountain where the dungeon is located remained unharmed, and the only casualties are the monsters, grass, and trees in the surrounding one hundred meters of the dungeon.

*****

"We didn't manage to get inside in time, and all of us died," Miya said while sitting in front of a bonfire with Michael opposite of her and listening to her story while grilling two skewered two portions of meat over the fire.

"Then I appeared here two days later, and probably because of the life-saving item that I always carry around with me, I didn't lose any experience points, items, and my skill progress"

During the past two updates of the game, players discovered that there are now two ways to level up their skills, one of them is using the skill points they would receive every level up or from a Quest, and the new one is the repeated use of the specific skill which would slowly accumulate skill experience, which is very similar to the experience points towards a player leveling up.

"The only downside is that I would be transported to a random place in Nevareth, and that's how I got here"

Michael then handed one of the skewered meat to Miya and said, "Well, good thing that you're now here. Now, I don't need to worry about those Dullahans or running out of health during a combat"

"Thanks!" Miya took the grilled meat from him and quickly took a bite from it.

"So good!"

"Right?" Michael laughed as he also started eating his share.

"What about you? How long have you been here?" Miya asked.

"Well, I think I've been stuck here for five days now," Michael said.

"Game time or.."

"Real-world time. Yeah, I've been stuck here for more or less one hundred twenty-four hours now" Michael laughed, as it doesn't really bother him.

"Holy shit, so that's the reason why I never received any notifications that I was the first one to discover this place. It's because you've been here all along!"

Michael laughed, "It's mostly because my skills don't have any holy attribute like yours, that's why it's taking a long time for me to advance towards the dungeon floors"

"That makes sense. After all, it only took me two days to reach the sixth floor of the dungeon"

Michael took the last bit of meat from his skewer, and said, "I've been meaning to ask this since earlier, since when did players need to chant their skills?"

Miya just raised an eyebrow when she heard him, as she wasn't expecting that question from Michael.

"Well, that only applies to us healers. You know, because most of our spells are mostly for healing our allies, we barely have combat spells in our arsenals of spells, but that only applies to undead creatures as it doesn't do a thing to living creatures. That's why we need to chant our spells be it they are for healing or not so that we could turn them into a combat spell temporarily for dealing undead creatures"

"We're like the Van Helsing in this world when we are facing undead creatures or people who wield black magic"

"Black magic? You know about black magic?" Michael's eyes suddenly became sharp as he quickly put all of his attention to Miya.

Miya felt a bit uncomfortable with how Michael is intently staring at her, but she still answered his question and said, "Yeah, you don't know about it?"

"I don't"

"Wow, really? I thought you knew. Your level is really high and even your skills are clearly top-notch" Miya was a bit surprised that Michael doesn't have any clue about black magic.

"Maybe, I was just lucky" Michael just laughed it off.

"Yeah right," Miya snorted while smiling at him.

"Anyway, black magic, right? You already know that this place is filled with undead, yeah?"

Michael just nodded at her.

"The one who created this dungeon are creatures who wield black magic, they can summon the dead to make them do their bidding, and they can inflict curses to their enemies. These people are most commonly as Necromancers, but I'm not sure what they are called here as I had never met one here before and there's no Necromancer class right now, so yeah"

"But that's what they are called from other games similar to this that I had played before"

Michael kept nodding his head after learning a new game knowledge.

"Necromancer, huh. So it's an evil magic used by bad guys then?"

Miya suddenly laughed, and then she said, "No, like how a gun is not evil, black magic is also not, but its the purpose behind the actions of the person wielding it"

"So black magic is not evil, but they are actually pretty awesome, especially during wars"

"Why?"

"Well, calling yourself a one-man army is pretty cool, right? But I'm sure that whoever made this dungeon is an evil Necromancer because there is no such thing as good or evil, only good people and evil people"

Snap!

Miya suddenly snapped her fingers when she remembered something, "Right, I finally remember! They are still called Necromancers even here!"

"You must have heard of the Six Sages, right?" Miya turned her head towards Michael, and her voice was tinged with excitement.

"Yeah, why?" replied Michael while sipping some water from his wooden cup.

"I read a book about them back at the Temple before, and one of them is famous for being a Necromancer!"

"So who is it among them?"

Michael is now genuinely curious. After all, he didn't learn any information about one of them being a Necromancer, a person who raises the dead to fight for their battles.

"The person gained this famous moniker during the war 500 years ago, the Crazy Sage, most commonly known now as…"

"Sage Laura!"

Spat!

Michael had just taken a sip of water from his cup when he suddenly spat it towards the bonfire in front of him due to the shock of what he had just heard.

"Wh..what?"