Kaiden and his companions, Luna, Calypso, and Aria, fight back a horde of monsters. Kaiden's stats and artifact-enhanced swords allow him to decimate the enemy, accumulating Dungeon Master Points. As they battle, Kaiden realizes the incoming wave is a test, and he needs an army to face the true threat. The monster horde suddenly pauses as the gate to the Abyssal Cavern begins to strain under an immense pressure, signaling the arrival of a much larger enemy.
The ancient portal strained, its stone edges groaning under immense pressure as an unseen entity forcefully pushed its way through. The protective ward flickered violently, the gate’s frame buckling. What emerged did so with agonizing slowness.
First, a shoulder breached the threshold. It was encased in dark, ridged plating made of bone, unlike any beast cataloged by the probe waves.
The gate’s architecture itself yielded, widening its aperture as the being’s sheer will dictated the environment would conform rather than the invading form. The shoulder passed.
Then the second shoulder. Following was the chest, covered in scales that absorbed all light, rendering them invisible against the Cavern’s dim glow. Ribs, as thick as support beams, expanded with a drawn breath, a stark contrast to the stillness before.
The head emerged last. Four eyes surveyed the surroundings from above a maw that stretched across most of the skull. Its horns, impossibly wide, necessitated an awkward angle to clear the portal’s frame, the abyssal stone scraping in protest.
It halted at the precise edge of the Safe Zone.
With both feet planted firmly, its tail settled behind it, impacting the Cavern floor with a deep, resonant thump that vibrated through the rock and into the very bones of every defender. Then, it unleashed a devastating scream.
The palpable pressure struck their chests before the sound reached their ears. The guttural roar, alien to any known vocal cords, echoed through the Cavern, dislodging grit from the ceiling. The abyssal stone beneath Kaiden’s boots vibrated intensely. Aria’s silver hair lifted from her shoulders, momentarily defying gravity before her moonlight powers stabilized her. Luna’s customary grin was absent. Calypso’s axe, mid-swing, hung suspended for a beat longer than physics allowed.
An unshakeable tremor coursed through the defenders, whose very foundations were built upon resilience.
"This is a boss monster from at least a B-tier dungeon, possibly A-tier... and it must be at least level 150," Scarlet announced, her voice devoid of the lighthearted amusement that had characterized her demeanor throughout the siege.
The Flame Monarch had ceased her jesting.
"A-tier? Level 150?!”
Nyx’s sharp voice cut through the tension from behind Kaiden, her strategic mind rapidly calculating the implications. “Kai, that’s far beyond anything we’ve ever faced!”
Aria’s grip tightened on Kaiden’s hand, a silent testament to their shared concern.
The line, having felt the raw power, now grappled with the daunting statistics, a chilling prospect.
Suddenly, Scarlet moved past Vespera’s protective lattice, stepping into the open.
A visible curtain of heat rose from her shoulders, the air around her shimmering with an orange hue against the abyssal darkness. A lopsided grin, familiar to countless combat-stream subscribers, spread across her face. Planting her palms on her hips, she exuded an aura of swagger and confidence, having apparently awaited such an opportunity.
"Relax, younguns."
Her voice, clear and carrying, retained its signature Monarch register. “I’ll dust the big bastard myself.”
And then, she unleashed her full power.
The gentle heat radiating from her shoulders erupted into an immediate inferno. Her body ignited from within, every ounce of power she had restrained throughout the entire siege unleashed in a blinding flash. The orange haze surrounding her exploded into a column of crimson and gold fire, soaring twenty meters above the Cavern floor and expanding outwards in a slow, concentric ring. Her hair caught aflame, transforming into molten orange locks that streamed as if caught in a tempest.
Her eyes blazed with an inner light. The ambient temperature of the Cavern spiked dramatically, a wave of heat washing over the defenders.
She then opened her jaws wide and let loose her own primal scream.
The sound that erupted was no longer human. It was a guttural, ferocious war cry, tearing from her slender frame with the undeniable might of a true Monarch. This cry resonated with the defenders’ bones, mirroring the boss monster's vocalization but with an inverted effect. Where the beast’s scream had weighed them down, Scarlet’s cry lifted their spirits.
Her unwavering gaze remained fixed on the colossal boss monster. Across the expansive Cavern, her head tilted slightly downwards, eyes locked, the fiery column around her solidifying into a focused declaration of challenge.
Although the flames did not reach the creature, the Safe Zone’s hundred-meter boundary effectively halted the heat at its perimeter. This same rule ensured that the gang’s intended targets remained unharmed within the protective bubble.
Scarlet’s fierce outburst struck that invisible barrier and ceased, yet the veil itself responded to the impact. The seal ignited along its entire circumference, glowing with a rim of red-gold light that illuminated the abyssal stone for thirty meters in every direction. The system’s own architecture seemed to hum under the strain of containing a Monarch’s unrestrained power.
"Step over the line, bastard."
Her grin returned, more radiant than before.
"I’m right here."
A moment before Scarlet unleashed her fury, Vespera had already made her move.
From the abyssal stone, a single dome of shadow ascended in one fluid motion. It was intricately woven from the Shadow Monarch’s own essence, formed in the brief instant it took her to angle her wrist a mere degree. This dark canopy enclosed the gang like a flawless curve of shadow, cleanly intercepting Scarlet’s heat just shy of their skin and shielding their eyes from the blinding flash.
Within the confines of the dome, the temperature returned to a comfortable level, the intense light softened, and the overwhelming pressure that had threatened to cook everyone on the perimeter vanished as if it had never existed.
Inside the dome, Nyx’s composure shattered.
"Oh my god...!" Both her hands flew to her cheeks, her usual cool demeanor completely gone. "That’s her aura release! I’ve watched the recording like sixty times, but the stream can’t capture it. You can’t understand what it truly feels like in person. Look at her hair, her HAIR!!"
Luna let out a low whistle that ascended in pitch midway, culminating in an outright cackle.
"I’m liking this chick more and more!"
Calypso’s tail whipped up behind her, coiling tightly. She rocked forward onto the balls of her feet, a wide, Carnage-filled grin stretching across her face.
"She’s speaking to me in a language I understand better than anything..."
Beyond the dome, Scarlet’s pillar of flame remained steady against the Safe Zone’s barrier. The boss monster’s four eyes had finally shifted, tracking her without a flicker. Its body remained rooted at the edge of the Safe Zone. The two of them held a silent gaze across the boundary the system had meticulously drawn.
The palpable tension that had settled in every defender’s chest following the initial scream began to recede by a noticeable degree. Scarlet had assessed the formidable level-one-fifty boss from an A-tier dungeon, and she showed no fear.
Kaiden’s gaze flickered sideways to Vespera. Her crimson eyes had returned to the gate the instant Scarlet stepped forward, and her shadow lattice remained utterly still. Yet, he knew she had felt the weight of the stare.
Of all the strategic decisions Vespera had made for the family over the years, placing the Flame Monarch on this frontline was about to become the most significant.
He turned his attention back to the gate.
Behind it, the probe wave broke apart in the aftermath of the monster’s—and Scarlet’s—scream.
Though the retreat order was not uttered in any language the dungeon could comprehend, the surviving low-tier monsters sensed it, much like a school of fish detects a changing current. Those still within the kill zone beyond the Safe Zone’s edge were already eliminated, incinerated into the very abyssal stone they had occupied the moment Scarlet’s fiery column was unleashed.
The survivors were primarily the latecomers, those who had remained concealed within the bubble, clustered behind the boss, and had not yet ventured into the open. They began to withdraw.
Every striding, slithering, and flying entity still inside the Safe Zone turned and regrouped towards the gate, opting to retreat rather than advance into a cavern that had just vividly demonstrated what lay beyond the boundary. The imposing intruder paid them no attention. They flowed around its firmly planted feet and back through the threshold, akin to water moving around a large boulder.
The probe had concluded.
The system displayed the verdict in the periphery of his vision, rendered in stark, flat text.
Six minutes and a few seconds. It had taken the Claimant only that short span to observe his line, confirm its reality, recall its weaker elements, and make his commitment. The Phase 1 timer still showed nearly two full hours, and the second wave was already being prepared.
His eyes drifted down to the second numerical value.
