Dante led the twelve-man squad down the central corridor and left the pulverized remains of the Obsidian Serpent horde behind.
The environment shifted rapidly.
The narrow claustrophobic tunnels widened and expanded into a massive sprawling subterranean cavern.
The jagged black rock walls fell away and were replaced by an enormous bubbling lake of pure white-hot magma.
The heat radiating from the liquid fire was absolute and warped the air into thick heavy waves of visual distortion.
A narrow and incredibly precarious stone bridge spanned the center of the magma lake and led directly to a massive dark archway on the far side of the cavern.
[Zone Alert: The Molten Core]
[Hazard Detected: Searing Atmosphere.]
[Warning: Ambient temperature rising to critical levels. Severe thermal damage imminent.]
"Keep the songs playing, Aria," Dante ordered and did not slow his pace.
Aria brought the wooden flute back to her lips and resumed the soft airy melody of [Life Song].
The massive continuous passive regeneration of 1,000 HP per second instantly engaged. It completely overrode the environmental burn ticking away at their health bars.
The squad stepped onto the narrow stone bridge.
The silence in the massive cavern was eerie. It was broken only by the aggressive popping and hissing of the magma lake below them.
"Something feels wrong," Nyx murmured. She pushed her dark glasses up and scanned the lake.
"The serpent horde we just cleared was massive, but their individual stats were relatively low for an endgame zone. A Gold-tier mob rush usually acts as a screen for a heavier threat."
Dante didn’t stop walking, but his Intuition stat suddenly flared violently.
It wasn’t a single ping. It was a massive overlapping wave of absolute aggression erupting from beneath the surface of the magma lake.
"Stop," Dante commanded sharply.
The squad halted in the exact center of the narrow stone bridge.
Before Dante could order a retreat, the surface of the white-hot magma violently ruptured.
It wasn’t a single geyser. Dozens of massive fiery pillars exploded from the lake simultaneously and completely surrounded the stone bridge.
Colossal shapes pulled themselves out of the liquid fire.
They weren’t serpents. They were heavily armored winged drakes forged entirely from flowing magma and blackened jagged obsidian scales.
Their wings were massive and trailed ribbons of liquid fire. Their eyes burned with an intense toxic white heat.
[Monster Spawn: Magma Drake]
[Tier: Dark Demon]
[Level: 45]
[HP: 250,000 / 250,000]
"Dark Demon tier," Sera gasped, and her professional facade cracked completely.
"Dozens of them. Dante, the scaling in this room is broken. These are Level 45 mini-bosses. They have a quarter of a million health each!"
The Magma Drakes didn’t roar. They didn’t dive to engage in melee.
The thirty towering drakes hovered in a perfect equidistant circle around the narrow stone bridge. They opened their massive molten jaws simultaneously.
The air inside their throats didn’t just glow. It actively pulled ambient heat from the cavern to compress into blindingly bright spheres of concentrated plasma.
[Boss Mechanic Triggered: Synchronized Annihilation]
[Warning: Unblockable overlapping Area-of-Effect environmental execution.]
"They are not going to bite us," Casanova shrieked and pressed his back against the massive frying pan of Mei. "They are going to glass the entire bridge!"
Dante evaluated the situation in a fraction of a millisecond.
He couldn’t use [Meteor Stride] to teleport out. The bridge was suspended over a massive magma lake and offered no solid ground to anchor to, and the archway was too far away.
He couldn’t use [Cyclone of Ruin] to disrupt their casting. The drakes were too spread out, and the Zenith-tier wind wouldn’t cover the entire thirty-mob perimeter.
If they fired, the overlapping unblockable plasma breaths would generate millions of points of environmental damage.
The [Spiteful Bulwark] of Garrick would shatter instantly under that volume. The [Life Song] regeneration of Aria would be vastly outpaced.
"Aura," Dante stated. His voice was completely flat and completely devoid of panic.
The tiny silver fox was hovering faithfully by his shoulder and didn’t need further instructions. She understood the mathematical reality of the threat.
Aura flew to the absolute center of the squad.
She didn’t pulse a quick heal. She didn’t use her reality-bending three-second invulnerability dome.
She activated the ultimate defensive skill she had unlocked upon evolving to a Grade 8 Mystic Sovereign.
[Skill Activated: Ultimate Guardian Halo]
Aura let out a massive, resonant, and incredibly sustained chime that echoed powerfully across the entire molten cavern.
A massive blinding dome of pure concentrated starlight erupted from her tiny form. It expanded instantly to completely envelop the twelve-man squad and a large section of the stone bridge.
The dome didn’t look like a fragile energy shield. It looked like solid polished celestial glass.
[Buff Applied: Ultimate Guardian Halo]
[Effect 1: Flat 60% reduction to all incoming physical and magical damage.]
[Effect 2: Grants a massive continuous AoE heal equal to the Magic Attack stat of the caster. Duration: 60 Seconds.]
The Magic Attack stat of Aura was absolute astronomical. It was bolstered by the massive cosmic weight of Dante and the shared scaling of the pet binding contract.
The passive healing triggered instantly.
[+5,400 HP/sec]
Dante looked at the massive green healing numbers popping up above the entire squad.
"Five thousand health a second," Dante noted. A slow dangerous smile spread across his face.
Combined with the 60% flat damage reduction, the squad wasn’t just heavily armored. They were mathematically and functionally immortal for the next sixty seconds.
Outside the starlight dome, the thirty Magma Drakes finished their casting animation.
They unleashed the [Synchronized Annihilation].
Thirty massive continuous beams of blindingly bright superheated plasma washed over the stone bridge simultaneously. The magma lake below them boiled violently from the sheer thermal runoff.
The plasma hit the starlight dome of Aura.
The entire cavern turned a blinding white. The roar of the flames was deafening.
Inside the dome, the squad braced for impact.
[-12,000 HP]
[+5,400 HP]
[-12,000 HP]
[+5,400 HP]
The damage numbers flashed frantically on the interface of Dante.
The 60% mitigation blunted the apocalyptic breath attack to completely strip away its lethal potential.
The remaining damage was instantly and continuously overwritten by the massive 5,400 HP per second regeneration of Aura.
Their health bars rapidly jittered, dipping slightly before instantly snapping back to full.
They were literally standing inside a concentrated inferno entirely unaffected.
"It is holding!" Lila yelled over the roar of the fire and stared at the starlight dome in sheer disbelief. "She is out-healing a thirty-mob ultimate!"
"She is a good fox," Dante said smoothly.
He didn’t draw the [Dawn-Breaker Blade]. He didn’t want to use standard weapons for this.
He needed to clear the drakes before the sixty-second duration of the Halo expired.
He opened his system interface and navigated to the Mythic-tier class skills of his [Asura Vanguard].
"Mei, drop the pan," Dante ordered. "You do not need to block."
Mei lowered the massive cast-iron skillet and trusted the boss completely.
Dante didn’t activate [Starfall]. He didn’t want to drop meteors on a bridge suspended over lava.
He triggered his primary stance.
[Skill Executed: Asura’s Descent]
The system interface violently flashed white, then aggressive crimson.
[Physical Defense reduced to 0.]
[Magical Defense reduced to 0.]
The massive defense stats of Dante vanished.
He was completely naked to the combat engine of the game.
The 60% mitigation from the Halo of Aura still applied, but his personal armor was entirely negated.
The trade-off hit instantly.
[Maximum HP multiplied by 10.]
[Attack Power Doubled.]
[Absolute Invulnerability Applied. Duration: 5 Seconds.]
His health bar skyrocketed to an absurd 355,000 HP. His raw attack power spiked to a terrifying level.
He didn’t stop there.
"Aria," Dante commanded. "Play the combat song."
Aria immediately lowered the flute, took a quick breath, and switched the melody back to the deep resonant hum.
[Hidden Class Skill Activated: Hymn of Strength]
[Party Buff Applied: Total Attack Power increased by 100%. Flat +1,000 True Damage. Critical Hit Rate locked at 100%.]
His already doubled attack power was instantly doubled again.
He held out his right hand. The black brand on his wrist flared violently.
[Voidsever] materialized, and the primordial greatsword devoured the blinding light of the plasma outside the dome.
"You guys really should not clump up like that," Dante said to the drakes.
The golden invulnerability frames enveloped his avatar.
He didn’t have to worry about the zero-defense penalty. He was entirely immune to all damage for five seconds.
He stepped directly through the edge of the starlight dome of Aura.
He walked out onto the narrow stone bridge to completely expose himself to the overlapping plasma beams.
The fire washed over him. The invulnerability frames sparked and totally negated the damage.
Dante raised Voidsever.
He didn’t use [Abyssal Cleave]. He needed to hit all thirty flying targets rapidly before the five-second window closed.
He opened his inventory and equipped a basic Novice-tier skillbook he had absorbed earlier.
[Skill Executed: Sword Aura (Novice)]
The anomaly triggered.
[Talent Activated: 10,000x Multiplier.]
The basic sword buff instantly evolved into the Zenith-tier [Aether-Blade Projection].
He didn’t trigger the skill once. Because of [Chrono-Shift], he had zero cooldowns.
Dante swung the massive jagged black blade of Voidsever.
He didn’t just swing it. He moved in an absolute terrifying blur and launched a flurry of rapid horizontal arcs.
With every single swing, a massive thirty-foot-wide crescent of pure pitch-black spatial energy erupted from the blade.
Because Voidsever possessed the [Absolute Severance] passive, the projectiles ignored 100% of the physical and magical armor of the targets.
Because Aria was playing her flute, every single hit was a guaranteed critical strike. Because of [Asura’s Descent], his base attack power was mathematically absurd.
He fired thirty black crescents in less than two seconds.
The projectiles shot outward in a massive expanding ring to completely pass through the plasma breath attacks.
The crescents slammed into the thirty hovering Magma Drakes.
The combat engine of the Zenith Protocol violently hitched.
[-240,000! Critical Hit! OVERKILL!]
[-240,000! Critical Hit! OVERKILL!]
[-240,000! Critical Hit! OVERKILL!]
The overlapping red damage numbers completely filled the massive cavern.
The thirty Level 45 Dark Demon drakes didn’t even have time to cancel their breath attacks.
The black spatial fractures sheared cleanly through their obsidian scales and molten cores.
The massive beasts violently exploded simultaneously.
The sky above the magma lake turned into a blinding shower of blue and silver polygons as thirty endgame mini-bosses were instantaneously flawlessly deleted from the server.
[Target Eliminated: Magma Drake x30]
The plasma breath attacks instantly ceased.
The cavern fell completely silent save for the bubbling of the magma below.
The golden invulnerability frames dropped from the avatar of Dante.
He deactivated [Asura’s Descent], and his massive defense stats returned as his health pool normalized.
He dismissed Voidsever and took a slow breath.
He didn’t take a single point of damage.
He turned around and walked back into the starlight dome of Aura.
The squad stared at him.
"I am so glad we are on your side," the recruited secondary tank whispered. He lowered his shield in absolute disbelief.
"Start picking up the loot," Dante ordered casually.
He gestured to the massive glowing piles of Dark Demon gear currently raining down onto the stone bridge.
"The final chamber is right across the lake. We are almost done."
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