Second World

After passing through the woods, they came to a steep cliff that had a large hole at its bottom. That was the cave John was taking them into. Before they entered, John stopped and said to them, "the last time I came, this place was crawling with Goblins. We wipe most of them out. I'm not sure if they respawned, but even if they did, you guys should have no problem dealing with the creatures. The Boss is at the end of the cave which opens up to a large cave hall. This cave hall is not entirely empty, it has many stalactites and stalagmites around the cave. I suggest we used these stalactites and stalagmites to organize our assault against the boss."

"What organize, we just gang-bang the Boss to a pulp!" The Man said aggressively.

"Did you forget the part about the Boss being level 20?" John asked.

The Man's face was frozen in his expression. It looked like he really had forgotten it.

John took out his weapon which was a wand and used it to draw some sketches on the soft dirt on the ground. He drew a large circle and within it, several large dots.

"This is the cave which the Boss is," he referred to the circle. "This is the stalagmites," his wand pointed to several of the large dots. "We will be coming from here," he pointed to one side of the circle.

"You remembered all that from your last encounter?" Bowler asked. "I thought you were running for your life after seeing the boss?"

"I only need one glance," John said.

When Bowler gave him a cynical look, he added, "I got a photographic memory."

"Photographic my ass! You said you don't remember the color of the treasure chest."

"I said I didn't see the color clearly. I didn't say I didn't remember. The chest was dark in my memory," John explained.

"Can we get on with this please?" The Man expressed his impatience.

John pointed to his drawings again, and said, "In our party, we have three range players and tons of melee. So for all the melee, we will break them into four teams."

"Why four?" Bowler asked.

"Can you let me finish first, please? The sun would have set already if you keep interrupting me," John uttered in irritation.

The Man concurred with John as he gave Bowler a death stare.

Bowler shut himself down with a grumble after getting reprimanded with words and glare.

After seeing Bowler behaving himself, John got back to the drawings at his feet. "The three Magicians in our team will place themselves here, here, and here," he said as he pointed at three of the large dots.

"Now for the four melee teams, you should spread out to each corner of the caves," John pointed to show the positions in his drawings. "The idea here is consecutive combat by taking turns in engaging the Boss for each team. While one team fights, the other recuperate while the other two on stand by to take over. The range team will continue to bombard the Boss with range attacks while melee teams keep the Boss occupied. In this way, we will grind the Boss' HP until it runs out. I suppose every one of you has prepared recuperative potions, haven't you?"

"What if the Boss attacks the Magician from range?" One of The Man's subordinates asked, which immediately received The Man's glare. The subordinate shrank to the back of the team.

"It won't, the Boss is a melee type." John still answered nevertheless.

He then continued, "now that I have explained our general tactic, please understand that things might go wrong inside. In fact, expect things to go wrong. That's why I need you to memorize some things."

"There are still more?" The Man asked with restlessness.

"To beat an opponent much stronger than us, we need to coordinate well. We can't just charge in like normal. Bear with me please," John said.

The Man sighed and waved for John to continue.

"Now, this is the thing I need you to memorize," John wrote alphabets on each of the dots. "I need you to remember the alphabet on each of these stalagmites. They will be your point of reference inside. If you have difficulty remembering, then just take note that the first alphabet is closest to the entrance, while the later ones are further from the entrance."

"If needed, I will send messages in Party chat and telling you to go to which Alphabet. Please pay attention and moved once I gave the instructions. Now for the four melee teams, please divide yourselves. Since there are fourteen of you, two teams will have four members, while the other two have three members. I suggest Storm Wind and The Man be among the ones with three members team."

Flame and Trap were originally standing close to Jack, so they chose to form a team with him. The eleven members from Men of Solidarity formed another three teams.

Looking at the composition, John said, "the two rangers should be separated. One of you can perhaps swap with the other team?"

Hearing that, The Man uttered, "I'll follow your strategy, but Men of Solidarity fight with their own. We don't need Ranger nor Magician in our team!"

John stared at The Man as if asking him, are you for real? But then just shrugged and said, "suit yourselves."

He then looked at Jack and said, "I'm going to call you team 1," then he looked at The Man, "you are team 2."

As he was turning his head to the other team, The Man uttered, "I want team 1!"

John stared at him with irritation, then exclaimed, "fine! You are team 1. Storm Wind, yours is team 2."

Jack shrugged. John then continued to assign numbers on the remaining two teams.

"Are we done here?" The Man didn't bother to hide his impatience.

"Have you memorized the alphabet positions on the stalagmites?" John asked back.

"Yeah, yeah. A, B, C, near the entrance, others further into the cave," The Man replied.

John shook his head. "Fine! Let's go!" He said with annoyance.

"Wait!" Jack said, he then took out the food he had prepared and distributed them. For Men with Solidarity, he gave five to The Man. "Sorry, I didn't have enough ingredients," he said.

They looked at the food and read the description and its effect.

"Good stuff," John complimented.

After they consumed the food, the group then entered the cave. It was dark all over. John took out a torch and light it.

"Where do you get that?" Bowler asked.

"I bought it in a shop," John answered. "You should pay more attention to wares in the shop. Many tools that can assist in adventuring are available other than weapons and armors."

Tip and Trap also took out a torch each. They must have prepared them before they left town for their quest.

"You going to fight while holding the torch?" The Man asked.

"My weapon is a one-handed weapon," John replied. "Don't worry, the cave hall where the Boss is located is quite bright. So you can fight even without a torch."

They proceeded further into the cave. It was awfully quiet inside the cave. Probably the Goblins that John mentioned really didn't respawn. The cave was quite deep. They walked for a while. Several times they met forks on their way, but John chose which path to go without hesitation. It seemed like he really remembered the way without fail.

After walking for almost half an hour, they heard many footsteps approaching. The footsteps sound was small, they were made by light persons like children.

"Goblins!" John informed. "So not all were eradicated. Get ready, they like to utilize the dark. Tip, Trap, spread out! Provide lightings to all sides!"

Jack didn't need the light, he could see the red dot positions in his radar. The Goblins were coming from all sides, they tried to find the group's blind side in the dark.

"They are here!" Jack said as he executed Swing. His one move hit two of the approaching Goblins. Flame followed up by dashing to them and delivered several fast stabs. The others also started to clash with the Goblins. The Men of Solidarity didn't disappoint, they were ferocious and seemed to revel in the fighting. Some of them received damages but they didn't fall back. It didn't take long before all the Goblins were routed.

After the fight finished, Jack checked his Container of Souls. He had received another dose of souls again. Even though all the monsters he had met until now gave only 1 soul, from yesterday night until now, he had collected 38 souls. The soul count in his Container had now reached 48. It was still far though till the needed 1000 souls before he could use them to upgrade his basic class skills.