95. Raid Preparation
The faction quests that begin on Floor 7 extend all the way up to the 20s depending on how you progress. But the floors where faction quests take center stage only go up to Floor 9. After that, they're just sporadic side quests here and there. If you think of it like a game, it's like post-story epilogues or fan service—elves or humans popping up occasionally. The consensus among community challengers was that the "worldbuilding" doesn't strictly connect across floors.
But you could tell just by looking at that mess. A massive serpent devouring the World Tree, radiating an aura like it was about to literally end the world. And the desolate backdrop of this floor, featuring just a handful of elf NPCs. This Floor 9 storyline probably carries over to other floors too. Probably set in a world that's already been destroyed once by that snake.
"My god... how could this happen."
We'd used shadow magic several times to put some distance between us and the serpent, and now we just stared blankly at the crumbling castle. Elenoir and I couldn't find words for the sudden catastrophe, but Mercedes was the most shaken, of course. Her precious prince had been possessed, and her homeland was collapsing in real time under a giant monster.
"Wh-why... why like this, why."
The most heartbreaking part was that Mercedes had a chance to stop this disaster. Up until her exile, she'd been guarding the high elf king and knew his changes well. If she'd had even a bit more knowledge about the World Tree, she might have resolved things before it got this bad. But she couldn't act, just struggled alone, and ultimately got exiled—losing her shot.
"..."
Mercedes, who had been dazedly watching the destruction, picked up her sword with a resolute expression and stood.
"Hey, where do you think you're going?"
She clearly wasn't in her right mind, so I grabbed her right away.
"Even if I'm exiled now, I'm the high elves' first knight. I can't just stand by while our city falls."
"And if you don't stand by, what? You see it too—that place is already fucked, right?"
"Even so... it's something I have to do. I have a duty I can't abandon. I won't ask for your help."
Normally, I wouldn't give a shit, but this time I couldn't let her go. The labyrinth zone had vanished, and if I didn't complete the epic quest, I couldn't go to the next floor. And unless this epic quest had a separate "ruin" ending, I had to kill that serpent to clear it.
Form a raid party.
Available challengers on current server: 1
The problem was that the serpent was a world boss you had to fight with a raid party, and this goddamn tower had only me in it. I far exceeded the average specs for Floor 9 challengers, but I couldn't take down something like that solo. It required a minimum 50-man raid, so to beat it alone, I'd need to be about 100 times stronger than a normal challenger. I wasn't that strong. Losing a powerful ally like Mercedes would be game over.
"You think charging in there and dying alone is your duty?"
I said to Mercedes. Whether it was okay for me to say that—I had no idea.
"If you wanna go save your kin, I won't stop you—hell, I can even help."
"...With that state you're in?"
"It's not like my limbs got blown off. Guts got shredded? Chug some potions, it'll be fine. Give it a bit, and it'll heal up."
The war wouldn't drag on anyway. From now on, we needed to recruit every possible ally, faction be damned. Being able to add NPCs with 80+ affinity to the party was probably designed for exactly this.
"Elenoir, can you help?"
Even with me pitching in, it wouldn't be enough, so I asked Elenoir too. I figured she'd gladly—
"...Yes, if that's what you want."
—agree, but she nodded with a somewhat bitter expression. Her eyes still lacked their starlight. Whatever, her face didn't matter. This was exactly the kind of thing to end the war Elenoir wanted.
I scraped together every scrap of info on world bosses from the community. Massive raids requiring 50+ players, difficulty varies by spawn floor but generally very high. Guaranteed epic-grade rewards on clear—items or epic job change certificates. Rumor has it the famous UK S-rank hunter Gerard Graham got his Dragon Slayer epic class from a world boss raid.
And crucially, world bosses enter a brief rest state after their initial spawn pattern ends. Right now, a countdown to the serpent's reactivation was ticking down in front of me. Probably the system's way of giving time to form a raid. So, obviously, I had to make full use of it.
Splat!
I sliced through a thorny vine monster creeping near the coiled-up giant serpent and headed for a collapsed building. Shoving aside massive stone chunks with raw strength, I pulled out the elf buried underneath and fed them a potion. The rescued elf was then shadow-warped via Elenoir's point to the village for evacuation.
I'd been repeating this for hours now. Felt like a firefighter at a disaster site. The only difference? I had weapons.
"This shit never ends—kinda nice, actually."
I kept hacking away at the endlessly spawning vine monsters while roaming the ruined city. These trash mobs blocking access to the dormant world boss made for great potion fodder. Normally tough, but against my specs, they were just fodder. Plus, my skills and weapon options let me recover HP and MP with every kill.
"This area's pretty much done."
Mercedes joined me from the other side, where she'd been doing rescues.
"Heavy damage near the palace—very few survivors... How about your side?"
"Same here."
"As expected... I knew it, but... should we be glad we saved even these few?"
I wasn't the eloquent type, so no good response came to mind. I just quietly handed her a potion. Only I could infinitely restore HP and MP; Mercedes would tire out eventually.
"...Thanks. Without you, we couldn't have saved this many."
She took the potion and bowed her head slightly. Sure, I'd done the heavy lifting on rescues. But Elenoir and the dark elves took in the survivors, so it wasn't that big a deal comparatively. Still, it probably felt different to her. After all, it was my idea that made it happen. For me, it was just about bulking up raid allies.
"Really... thank you."
Seemed like it'd been enough to change this high-and-mighty elf's attitude.
The high elf forces were completely shattered by the sudden world boss spawn, leaving only a handful of refugees. But they weren't the only victims. The kingdom army, prepped to assault the city, took heavy losses too.
The dark elves were the only faction unscathed—but with a serpent declaring it'd devour the world, their turn was obvious next. High elves wiped? Dark elves up. Then the remaining humans.
Anyway, the one unscathed faction—the dark elves—were now a refugee camp.
"What a clusterfuck."
Rescued high elves and a few kingdom soldiers huddled together, all battered. The high elves got less suspicion since they were fellow elves, but the kingdom troops were on edge—swept up without knowing shit. And the human-loving dark elves were showering these surprise human refugees with massive attention. War memories tempered the automatic goodwill, but old habits die hard. To them, it was like rescuing grimy kittens from a fire—they were holding back pretty well, all things considered.
But I didn't rescue them for this awkward standoff. The world boss's downtime wasn't long. I had to rally these guys into fighting strength before it ended.
"Gonna need Elenoir to handle this well."
I'd already sent a messenger to the kingdom army HQ requesting cooperation. Soon, a summit of the three factions would happen here. Convincing them to join as allies? Impossible for someone wordless like me. I'd set the stage—now I just had to focus on what I could do and hope.