Frostfire Legacy

Monsters of the dungeon could develop immunity to attacks at times. As such, there were three categories of attacks that were devised to address this problem. The usual melee attacks, long-ranged attacks, or spell attacks.

Boss monsters above the 10th floor, where the "real" dungeon begins, usually have at least one type of attack immunity, but most often, it is missile immunity. As such, boss fights usually end up with melee up front and long-ranged mages behind, while weapons like crossbows, bows, or guns are rendered completely useless.

This time, however, the mutant rogue boss, the Red Cave Spider Mother, was immune to spells, a rarity even in the first 50 floors. As such, they were supposed to be facing an uphill battle, but...

"Alright! The air seems fine, but wear makeshift facemasks just in case! When you feel dizzy, alert your allies and retreat here immediately!"

Aster directed with a firm tone of voice. "Liz, the boss is weakened due to poison, so please take that into consideration while commanding everyone!"

"G-Got it..." Liz answered, a little confused.

After all, Aster only used "flames" and "ice" in her eyes, so she wasn't sure when he used poison at all. "Everyone! As you heard, there might still be some poison remaining! Follow Aster's words and wear masks!"

As she had no mask, she simply stripped about three inches of fabric off of her skirt before using it to cover her nose and mouth. It wasn't much, and Aster wasn't even sure if that could block carbon dioxide poisoning, but it's better than nothing.

As soon as she saw everyone having put on makeshift masks, Liz nodded and pointed her mace forward.

"Brave Adventurer! Now's the time! Follow our initial plan! Charge!!!"

The initial plan was supposed to be Parties 1 and 2 taking on the boss monster from up front, with Parties 3 to 7 raining down attacks whenever possible. However, now that they knew the boss was immune to spells, they had to switch to physical means of attack.

Liz was the first to arrive at the boss monster's vicinity, standing like a mouse facing a cat. However, she didn't falter and instead cast her skill without hesitation.

"Knight's Challenge!"

*SCREEEE!*

The enormous spider mother had enough strength to scatter everyone around it despite the poison's effects. With a casual swing of its legs, it "could" send adventurers, covered in armor from head to toe, flying toward the far walls!

*BAAAAM!*

"KUH!"

But Liz swung her mace forward, meeting the incoming leg. A powerful impact stopped both sides in an instant. A loud ring echoed before, finally, the effect of Aster's actions showed.

*CRACK!*

The thick carapace started to break down!

Aster's repeated cooling and heating of the room had two ideas: one was to pull back oxygen from outside, making the room survivable. The other was to induce thermal fatigue on the monster's hard carapace, making it brittle and easy to break!

Liz herself was surprised at what happened, not expecting the monster's protection to fail so easily. Of course, she wasn't one to miss such a golden opportunity.

"Everyone! Rain down heavy attacks on it!"

At her words, those with spears and hammers moved fast, attacking the monster from either side. Since it was under the effect of Knight's Challenge, it wasn't able to attack the others and could only receive their beating.

*BAM!* *CRACK!*

And with each strike its body suffered, more cracks started to spread, creating gaps that the long-ranged attackers could take advantage of.

"Fire!"

With a show of perfect coordination, all melee fighters backed off before Liz gave the signal. Bullets and bolts flew, striking the monster. Although more than half of the projectiles bounced off its carapace, a few managed to slip into the cracks and inflict severe damage to it!

*SCREECH!*

The Red Cave Spider Mother raised a pained cry before its legs failed, its body falling to the ground.

"NOW! ALL HANDS, ATTACK!"

Everyone didn't hesitate and followed her commands. With the spider sprawled on the ground, it wasn't able to fight back!

"Bullet Storm!"

"Heavy Blow!"

"Armor Breaker!"

All sorts of skills rained down on it, turning its well-protected body into a battered piece of flesh in just a few seconds. While everyone was attacking its body, two figures stood before its head. Liz and Kali!

"SMITE!"

"Assassinate!"

A mace and a dagger fell on top of its head, cracking it open.

A moment later, the entire spider's body started having spasms as it turned belly-up, with its eight legs waving around randomly. Of course, keeping their distance when that happened was elementary, so nobody was injured from its random "attacks."

"Evil monster, let me send you back to your creator!" Liz was the only one who stayed behind, his mace giving off an even brighter glow. "Radiant Strike!!!"

Her mace went down with thunderous force, the mana around it crushing the monster's head into a pulp. With her final blow, the monster finally died for real. Its legs stopped moving, stretching as far as it could, before starting to relax and collapsing in.

"..."

Silence enveloped the venue before everyone's bodies started to glow. All of those who participated in the boss fight rose to a new level!

"Woah! Unbelievable! Shared EXP?!" Aster groaned in surprise.

He could only land about one or two Vertical Slashes with his sword, but he still gained enough experience to reach level 6! But more than that, he was surprised that the experience wasn't monopolized by the one who delivered the last hit but was shared with everyone who participated!

"How did this happen?"

"I leveled up!"

"Hey, what's going on? Why did I...?"

Of course, it wasn't only him who was confused. Even the others were!

It was a universal truth that the last person to land a hit would gain all the experience, no matter what. As such, parties usually let the one who contributed the most take the last hit, if possible, or just shower attacks on it and let the one who delivered the finishing blow be random.

"This... I suppose since this monster is irregular, the experience distribution didn't follow the norm?" Even Liz herself, the one to deliver the last hit, could only state a random guess.

To address everyone's curiosity, Kali stepped forward and explained.

"A normal Cave Spider Mother should be level 7 on average, but we defeated a mutant, probably around level 15. If not for Aster weakening it, then we could only face an impossible battle and die."

Of course, everyone agreed with her words.

Even the brittle carapace was still able to bounce off weak attacks. Thinking of how tough it might be before Aster weakened it, they could only feel chills run down their spines. Such a monster would most probably be invulnerable on lower floors!

"We hunted a monster three times our level. I guess the dungeon itself is rewarding our efforts."

"That might be the case..." Liz smiled, nodding lightly. "Anyways, everyone, well done! We won!"

Her words sank into everyone's minds, and smiles showed on their faces. A wild cheer followed, shaking the entire cave.