Chương 1: (1) B1 C1: Blood King Azkazan

"SWORD studios, the studio behind Forgotten Falsehoods Online, the world's largest online multiplayer video game in history, has just announced their next big expansion! Be prepared, this December, for a new adventure in the tumultuous waves of the just-released Rusted Sea. Battle skeletal pirates, board haunted ghost ships, and plunder forgotten ruins during the opening weekend of: Curse of the Iron Maiden!

Alongside this expan—" I sighed in frustration as the chipper voice behind the all-too-familiar advertisement pulsed from my headset. The furious key clicking that echoed through my apartment went silent as I turned my attention away from my main monitor. With a swift swipe of my mouse, I skipped the ad and returned my attention to the fight happening before me. I returned to the fight just in time, too, as a massive ball of shadow had already begun falling toward my character.

I pressed a few keys to back myself away from the attack and watched as it ripped through the obsidian floor where I had been standing. My fingers slid across the keyboard like the hands of a master pianist, albeit an extremely clumsy one, as I took the opportunity to reposition myself. I, along with eighty-nine other veteran players of the MMORPG, Forgotten Falsehoods Online, were located at the bottom of the toughest dungeon in the game, the Scarlet Citadel.

The Scarlet Citadel was a massive column-shaped monstrosity of dark architecture, containing exactly seventy-seven floors of chilling cold, darkness, and paralyzing fear. Each floor was filled to the brim with high-ranking undead enemies, such as Eternal Wights and Royal Liches, alongside a plethora of dangerous traps—the constant walls that closed in on us, numerous spike-filled pitfalls, and the occasional pendulum of swinging bone were the most tame among them.

Now, on the very bottom floor, the danger had reached an apocalyptic level. The dungeon itself was enveloped in a layer of cold that was so harsh that, without a decent layer of at least 50% resilience, it simply wasn't possible to survive without becoming a solid block of ice. We were already down a few of our players, even before the boss fight had started, as four of them were inherently weak to the cold and another had underestimated a wall trap on the fiftieth floor.

We lost another five during the first few minutes of the Boss fight, back when a large tsunami of blood had swept through the arena, despite their insistence that they were prepared for the trap. I backed off from the massive column of shadow in the center of the room, thankfully without any trouble, and eyed my steadily shrinking health bar located on the side of my screen. Next to it was the measurement for the temperature of the Boss room: -200 °C.

I couldn't feel any of the cold myself, thank god for that, but I couldn't help but sweat a little when I watched my character and those standing beside him fight in the icy environment. While I was unoccupied, I took the opportunity to drink another health potion before I returned my attention to the Boss. He was absolutely massive. If I had to guess, he was probably the tallest humanoid monster I had ever seen during my five years playing FFO, despite his vaguely human appearance.

He stood twenty meters tall and must've weighed several tons, but he moved fast enough to outmatch all the players fighting him, including those that focused on speed, and was strong enough to outshine the most powerful of our berserkers despite his lanky build. His unnaturally pale skin clung tightly against his refined jawline and body, to the point where he might have been mistaken for a corpse had it not been for his active movement.

His weapons, specifically the obsidian claws that grew from his thin fingers, were each nearly two meters long and were easily sharp enough to slice through solid stone. His bright red eyes, which constantly examined the battlefield with a fierce hunger, fell behind in spectacle only to the king-like regal attire he wore over his massive body. He was the only Vampire in the entirety of FFO.

One reason for that was because the Scarlet Citadel had never been cleared before—Dungeon Clears were required for new monster types to populate the game—but another reason was because he was just too damn strong. Blood King Azkazan LVL 700 Raid Boss Keeper of the Scarlet Citadel ANCIENT 100M HP"That's a lot of health," I couldn't help but exclaim aloud. As I looked at my own stats, just for comparison, I couldn't help but feel a little small. UserID: Sent1n3l The Living Fortress Vanguard - Level 700 HP: 974.

3K / 974. 3K (+223. 8K /Min) SP: 123. 3K / 135K (+101. 1K /Min) AB: 172. 3K / 280K (+8. 4K /Min) MP: 4.

2K / 28K (+56K/Min) - Max Level Reached - Attributes Menu MIGHT: 41, 610 182, 045 (+) Attack Damage 223, 328 (++) /Minute HP Regen WILL: 4, 200 10, 500 Spell Damage 8, 400/Minute AB Regen VITALITY: 50, 550 974, 260 (+) Health Points (HP) 101, 100 /Minute SP Regen ARCANE: 28, 000 280, 000 Arcane Barrier (AB) 56, 000 /Minute MP Regen AGILITY: 13, 500 135, 000 Stamina Points (SP) 126, 563 (+) Critical Attack Damage CLARITY: 2, 800 28, 000 Mana Points (MP) 21, 000 Critical Spell Damage Equipment Greatsword of Haven - (Treasured Artifact) DMG: 78, 020 CRITICAL DMG: 25, 313 Amulet of Light - (Treasured Artifact): +468, 860 HP Left Ring of Valor - (Treasured Artifact): +70, 330 HP/Min Right Ring of Courage - (Treasured Artifact): +70, 330 HP/Min Light Armor Hood of Achaman - (Treasured Artifact): +5% Resilience Robes of Achaman - (Treasured Artifact): +20% Resilience Pants of Achaman - (Treasured Artifact): +15% Resilience Gloves of Achaman - (Treasured Artifact): +5% Resilience Sandals of Acahman- (Treasured Artifact): +5% Resilience Everlasting Ward - (Treasured Artifact): +20% Resilience Total Defense: 70% Resilience Scratch that, I felt tiny.

Among the ninety players that had survived until now, I was the only one with an HP value approaching a million, even after considering the buffs from my gear, yet this monster completely and utterly outclassed me. Thankfully, this wasn't my first time participating in a Raid. I had already played with many of the other players surrounding me and had even grown quite close to a few of them, so I knew their playstyles, callouts, and even a few of their unique strategies.

Thanks to that knowledge, I was well prepared to fight this boss alongside them. My role, as a Vanguard, was to position myself right at the front of the fight to take as many of the Boss's hits as I could, which I was able to do with ease thanks to my huge health pool, so that the other players didn't have to worry about being targeted by the Boss. This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. Unfortunately, the boss's large health pool was the least of our problems.

His sharp claws and menacing appearance weren't just for show, as each of his attacks packed quite the intimidating punch. After only a few minutes into the fight, I found myself pulling back to the healers so that my Health could climb back up to its normal value. Raid operations this large were almost always easy, both because we were all familiar with the bosses and because the players participating were strong enough to hold out on their own without any trouble.

After I realized how fast my health had dropped down to a low percentage, however, I realized just how different this raid was going to be. So, over the course of the rest of the fight, I used a very specific and careful strategy. I would go in, take the aggro until my HP dropped to a dangerous level, then back away while a healer tended to my wounds. Usually, I would only be in the fight for a minute or so until a replacement tank, usually one of my guildmates, took my place so I could get healed.

Then, I would jump back into the fight to restart the whole process. It was a popular strategy, if a little monotonous and boring, due to its simplicity and reliability. I'd used it multiple times over the course of my career, but using it against this boss wasn't the same. Fighting Azkazan felt like walking on a tightrope. He had no minions and no arena terraforming, other than the single blood tsunami that swept through the arena during the beginning of the fight, but he was still terrifying to go against.

Each of his attacks, if not defended from properly, did more than 200K Damage. He was quick and agile with his attacks—and he knew how to catch me off guard with his unpredictability. I knew, even before the ten minute mark, that this would be a test of skill. …

"Fuckin' hell, that was tough," I groaned as I leaned back in my chair. The boss's death animation had finally begun to play, but I was hardly paying attention to it, instead choosing to turn my head to the alarm clock on my left. 2: 14 AM. The boss fight had nearly taken three hours to finish, and the dungeon itself had taken much longer. The raid started a staggering sixteen hours ago, and I didn't even include the seven hour strategy meeting that most of the guild leaders participated in last week.

All of us were exhausted, some more than others, and soon I was watching players around me disappear in flashes of white light as they began to log out. Most of them hadn't even waited for their loot from the Boss fight, but I wasn't worried about them losing out on the upcoming loot. Their rewards would be automatically placed in their player bank if they didn't collect it in time. I had half a mind to join them, but a notification for my impending loot collection quickly distracted me from that thought.

By the time I opened my inventory to check on my reward, I was yawning nonstop and stretching my limbs in every direction I could, but when I turned my attention back to the screen, the lethargic energy dragging against my body disappeared completely. Congratulations! You've acquired a LOST item! Among your raid group, you hold the record for the most HP lost while within [The Scarlet Citadel], at 302. 2M HP, and thus qualify for the first use of the LOST rank item: [Chalice of Immortality]'A Lost Item?'

I thought to myself, my mind struggling to understand exactly what I was reading. In FFO, there were seven monster ranks, each rank corresponding across about a hundred levels that the playerbase loosely followed along with. Our gear was determined by those same seven ranks, and among the items that were considered 'ordinary gear', the strongest was Treasured rarity. I, myself, was wearing full Treasured gear, as they were still considered ordinary by most of the playerbase.

But if one ignored what the game considered ordinary, one came across Unique Items. Only the strongest players were able to equip them, yet only the luckiest were the ones to find them in the first place. Even players who had only just started the game would recognize how coveted they were, as they were items that were capable of changing the course of the game itself. After a full 15, 000 hours playing FFO, I had only heard of three Unique items ever acquired by other players.

The other few Unique items, that I knew of at least, were only ever mentioned in the game's lore and were thus unattainable to the playerbase. I looked around at the other players who had participated in the raid and recognized most of them from their usernames. A good majority of us were the leaders of some of the strongest guilds in the game, while others had become so powerful that they were mentioned in the very lore of the game itself.

I, myself, was the game's strongest tank—an undeniable fact—and was the leader of the guild where the next six strongest tanks were counted as members. We were the best of the best—the top 100 players on the leaderboard—but even we could never compare to those that wielded Unique Items. Every one of them might have been able to clear this Dungeon as a solo player. So what the actual fuck was Lost rarity? Was it a secret rank? Was it the next rank after Unique?

As I stared at the blue notification hovering in the center of my screen, I nervously tapped my desk as I brought my attention to the comms channel. Other than the few whispers of disappointed players who had received items they didn't like and the cheers of players celebrating a Treasured item drop, I heard nothing. One person managed to get a Demon Egg, which was cool, but it was still only a Treasured item.

I quickly double checked my headset to make sure my mic was muted, mainly out of precaution, before taking a deep breath. Excitement built within me as my fingers twitched in exhilaration. I clicked on the alert, eager to inspect this new item of mine, and watched as another screen popped up in the place of the first. Chalice of Immortality (LOST) A small, steel goblet decorated with six ruby jewels.

Each of the jewels glow with a brilliant glimmer and can be melted down to form a few sips of blood elixir, though the goblet's basin is only large enough to be filled by melting one such jewel. Although the goblet itself seems untouched by age, the six existing jewels imply that it can be used six times. — Using this item will fully delete your current character, but it will allow you to start a new character with the 'Vampire' race, thus allowing you to access the Vampire-locked skill line.

Do you wish to proceed? [Y] | [N] I carefully read over the description, my heartbeat following alongside my growing excitement. From what I could understand from its description, this item's purpose was to grant a unique rebirth, and specifically in order to become a Vampire—a race that simply didn't exist in FFO, barring the dungeon boss we'd just killed. I couldn't help but feel a little confused as I read the description that stated how five others could use this item.

Was that a dash of lore put into the item for flavor purposes, or were there five other players that would be given the opportunity to use the chalice after me? Were those five other players in this very room with me? Using this item wouldn't be done through a half-hearted decision, as it would essentially wipe away all the progress I had made on my character so far. 700 levels and 15, 000 hours of progress would be gone forever.

Most players would be doubtful of the opportunity, while some would immediately ignore it and pretend they'd never seen the item. I, however, couldn't have cared less about the 15, 000 hours I'd already sunk into my current character. I'd played my tank character for years, to the point where I'd honestly done everything a tank could do, yet I wasn't even close to being the best. The simple truth of it was that I was not satisfied with my character.

Perhaps it was the potential of climbing to the top of the leaderboard that excited me, but most likely it was the potential of not feeling the gnawing frustration I felt every time I booted up the game. Something needed to change, and the item in front of me was exactly what I needed. Before I could consider the matter further, I already clicked [Y]. My character disappeared in a flash of light, as if I were logging out, and my screen blinked to the main menu of FFO.

My old save file, which contained the last five years of my life, was nowhere to be found. I only felt a small sense of loss at the sight, but the massive button placed in the center of the screen quickly distracted me from sinking too far into the depths of despair. The button in the center of the screen was decorated by a single line of black text. The letters were archaic, as if they were written in some sort of ancient language, and dripping with a thick red stream of blood.

I felt my heartbeat fluttering in my chest as I took another deep breath to calm my nerves. I hardly felt the previous lethargy of the all-nighter I had just pulled. Instead, my mind was filled with excitement and anticipation for what I was about to experience. I clicked on the massive button and watched as the coating of blood that fell from the button's sharp edges began to fall down the sides and toward the bottom of the screen, where it began to fill up my monitor like a bloody fishtank.

I chuckled as the animation played, my body inching closer to the edge of the seat. When the blood pool finally filled every pixel, the buttons for the character creation screen, which were black and red instead of the usual blue and white, appeared from within the scarlet liquid. With a gleeful smile, I began to design my new character. It had been awhile since I'd made a new character for FFO, and a part of me desperately wanted me to make this occasion special.

I wanted to keep up with the vampire theme that had been presented to me, so I first focused on the obvious black and red color scheme that was presented through the ocean of blood and the black buttons overlaying it. I wasn't that into vampire folklore, but I did watch a few vampire TV shows growing up, so I knew what to look for. I first turned my attention to the buttons on the left side of the screen as a reference for my character's hair color.

The buttons were almost metallic, with a slight shimmer that reminded me of volcanic rock. The darkness was almost captivating, in a way. The ocean of blood, on the other hand, was a little harder to ignore. It bathed everything, including my body and the apartment behind me, in a red glow that reminded me of a blood moon. I wanted to stick with the same pattern for my new character, so I chose a deep black color for my hair before adjusting it so that it shined like silver in the light.

Afterwards, I selected a pair of crimson colored eyes, but had them glow in the dark like an ember during the dark of night. A part of me wanted to stay away from the Vitality-heavy build I had been running for the last five years, as it had gotten too slow for what I enjoyed. Being a tank had been fun when I was new at the game, but I'd become bored with it after spending five years wearing heavy armor and moving at speeds significantly slower than my peers.

I wanted to be fast and lethal, so I made my character smaller and lighter in an attempt to make my character's figure more appropriate for high-speed combat. I didn't know whether I'd like to play more as a brawler or an assassin, though I at least knew I'd want to be fast. Toward that end, I chose to make my character a woman, simply because I believed she would look better in high speed combat compared to a male character.

I had also spent the last five years playing as a male character, so that might've been a heavy influence on the decision. After I created her base appearance, I began to adjust the 'vampire' parameters of her appearance. Unlike the usual character creation screen, I was given the chance to apply a few different variations of monster fangs, as well as various skin complexions that went from normal to pale enough to be corpse-like.

After a short moment spent looking at the options, I settled on a set of fangs that grew out sharply from her bottom and top lateral incisor teeth, which were the teeth directly next to the front teeth, and a skin tone that was cranked to be as pale as possible. Some parts of my character's skin, such as the skin around her lips and eyes, had gone blue from lack of blood flow. It was uncanny, yet perfect for a vampiric character. After I spent another fifteen minutes perfecting my character, I was ready.

When it was time to decide on a name for her, so I returned to the theme of Vampire. After searching on the internet for names that carried a strong 'V' sound, I settled on naming my new character Evelyn. I didn't enter a last name, as it was my style to make my usernames short and simple, and to my surprise, nobody else had taken the name. I didn't even need to switch out the letters for numbers, as I had done for my tank character.

Evelyn's figure represented my ideal image of peak athleticism, but more on the leaner side. Her muscles were firm, but not bulky enough to be noticed underneath a passing glance. Her figure would allow her to be flexible, quick, and precise—exactly as I intended—while keeping a level of elegant grace that allowed her to move with feline ease. She had a head of long, dark hair that rested comfortably against her upper back and a pair of glowing crimson eyes that reminded me of scarlet rubies.

Once I was satisfied with my character's appearance, I pressed the large 'FINISH' button laying on the bottom of the screen. The monitor went black and a powerful sense of excitement began to flood through my body. I leaned forward, my eyes boring into my computer screen as I waited for the tutorial zone to load. However, even after a few moments of silence, my monitor refused to change from the black curtain that had consumed it. I leaned back, confused, as I stared at my computer in awkward silence.

I hadn't broken it, had I? Then, a bright orange light erupted from deep within the computer tower. I heard a loud zap, followed by a blinding flash that brought a stabbing pain deep into my eyes. A wave of heat covered my body, pushing me back and consuming my flesh in the same instance. I panicked, my mind struggling to push past the sudden confusion, as an overwhelming sensation of pain traveled through my body. Then, everything went black.