Surviving the Game as a Barbarian - Chapter 801: First-Class (3)
Arta Secret Base.
The story here is pretty simple. And to briefly explain it…
According to the story, the Arta family built a secret base at the location closest to the “Core of the Earth” near the island to seal away the “Beast.” The Arta family used an item called the “Divine Relic” to seal the Beast using the Core’s power, and that mission has been passed down through the generations to this day. The problem is, the secret base has gone completely unresponsive.
[A monster broke into the lab with the Divine Relic! It’s obviously the scheme of someone who wants the world to end!]
If you choose the right options in the dialogue, Arta says something like this and gives the player their first quest. The quest’s objective is to kill the monster that wrecked the lab and restart the Divine Relic.
[Sorry, but thanks to that thing, the elevator’s broken, so you’ll have to use the emergency ladder and climb down for a few hours. I’ll open the entrance now!]
[Be careful! With the Core in an unstable state, the moment you enter, all powers will disappear! Though that goes for the Serpent of the End too!]
Once you accept the quest, you even get lines like that. But maybe I messed up the first step?
‘When I actually met her, she came off weirdly rude…’
The moment I entered the lab, she even threw out a line that wasn’t in the game.
[…What is your name?]
After nearly two hours of climbing down the ladder, Arta’s voice came through the lab’s speaker.
[…Bjorn Yandel.]
[Is that a famous name in the Empire?]
[Well, somewhat.]
It’s not the Empire, it’s Lafdonia.
But I am famous, so technically it’s not a lie.
‘I think this is the first time she asks your name during this chapter…’
Well, that’s probably just part of the reality patch too. After the introductions, Arta didn’t say much more, so I began leading my team slowly into the lab.
BEEP—! BEEP—! BEEP—!
The lab interior was filled with an ominous, repeating siren. It was dome-shaped, and the inside was surprisingly spacious…
“Where’s the Sniktura…?”
Even more tense, the team couldn’t find the creature we came for. Well, it’s a first-class monster, Yaksha Rule or not.
“Raven, Marone, you two stay over there.”
I rounded up the mages who’d be useless in this fight and pushed them into one spot. And then…
Step. Step.
I moved toward the center of the lab. There, like a sinkhole, was a single bottomless pit…
WHOOSH—!
As I approached, strong ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) wind blew from behind. An effect caused by the Core below draining our mana and soul force.
“Ready?”
In response to my question, the team nodded slightly without a word and got into formation. Okay, looks like we’re ready…
[Survivor of the fallen Empire, right there ahead—]
[I know. I just press this, right?]
[….]
I pressed a button on one of the suspicious machines in the lab, and the gusting wind immediately stopped. And then…
[Command input complete.]
[Emergency restoration has begun.]
Along with the narration in ancient language, the BEEP—BEEP— sirens also went silent. Ah, but only temporarily.
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
Now the sirens began to sound again, even more urgently—
[Restoration failed.]
[Unidentified object detected inside connector.]
[Proceeding with forced ejection.]
With those lines, a strong wind blasted upward from the pit. And then…
[Forced ejection complete.]
Like a parasite hiding inside, a snake burst out of the pit.
“Prepare for battle!”
It was a first-class monster, Sniktura.
***
The Serpent of the End, Sniktura.
One of the many monsters that appear on the 10th floor. Honestly, even in the game, if I ran into this thing on the 10th floor, I usually passed it by. The 10th floor really was hell difficulty itself. My usual approach was to avoid all combat and head straight for the “Gate of the Abyss.” Of course, sometimes you’d still have to fight.
Anyway.
‘Seeing it here like this, it’s kind of cute.’
This isn’t the unrestricted 10th floor. It’s a small colosseum where both sides have their active skills sealed. In that space, Sniktura looked pretty small and cute. Well, even just its head was over three meters tall.
‘Hiss…’
Sniktura froze as soon as it bounced out of the hole and saw us, looking surprised. It slapped the floor with its triple-split tail—clearly annoyed.
“…It’s smaller than what we were told?”
Well yeah, it can’t use [Form Shift] here. On the 10th floor, this thing not only changed size freely but even had transformation patterns into other entities—really annoying to fight.
‘If [Form Shift] were judged to match Unification, it’d be a higher-grade version of [Giant Form]…’
Maybe that’s why I never hunted this thing much. Even though it’s first-class, its powers weren’t well-suited to shield-barbarians.
[Unidentified object ejection complete.]
[Sealing hatch—]
[Failure, failure, failure, failure—]
Ugh, shut up.
“What’s it saying now?”
Oh, that?
“It’s telling us to fight.”
And almost as soon as I said that, Sniktura lunged at us.
[Kyaaaaaaaah—!]
Its fangs were as big and thick as a greatsword, obviously dangerous at a glance. Fighting it with skills sealed looked overwhelmingly difficult.
But—
‘Active skills aren’t everything.’
“Defense successful.”
“Aegis Barrier absorbs all damage.”
Fangs that size could be countered with [Aegis Barrier]. As long as the attack’s within its coverage, it’s practically broken.
[…Kaak!]
Seeing me—so small—block its attack effortlessly, it looked briefly stunned. Then it sucked something up from deep in its gut and spit it at us.
Tap.
Ah, I should dodge that.
Sizzle—!
As soon as the spit landed, the surface began corroding rapidly. That was the effect of its passive, [All-Poison Physiology]. To summarize: complete immunity to all poisons, all fluids are maximally poisonous, and bonus poison damage.
It felt like the final evolved version of [Acidic Fluid], which I used to like…
Swoosh—!
Sniktura then swung its thick tail at me.
‘Ah, this one probably won’t count as a guardable hit.’
Maybe if I had [Giant Form] active. In this small form, I couldn’t fully block that tail.
Still—
‘Too late to dodge.’
I raised my shield to cover my upper body and reduce the impact as much as possible. Didn’t stop me from slamming into the wall.
BOOM—!
I crashed into the wall, shield still up, without any resistance. It couldn’t be helped. A first-class monster’s raw stats are beyond monstrous. No build in Dungeon & Stone can overcome that kind of raw power.
‘Well… maybe on 100x Mode?’
Yeah… maybe if you dumped 30 essences into it, it’d work… Meaningless daydream. Moving on.
“Behell—raaaaaaaaah!!”
To regain focus, I shouted a warcry and ran back into the fight. Holding the line were Ainard, Sven Parab, and Kaislan.
“What… kind of monster is this…!”
“Ugh… Bjorn! Without powers, I don’t know what to do!”
They were overwhelmed by the stat gap, but I wasn’t too worried. It’s not like this is their first time fighting monsters. They’d get used to the pattern soon enough. After all, the monster’s actives are sealed too.
Whoosh—!
While the frontline kept up the fight, support fire came from the rear—but it was barely doing damage.
“Yandel… is it even possible to kill this thing?”
Kaislan started to doubt as even arrows and blades failed to leave a scratch. And honestly, he had a point. A first-class monster’s raw stats were ridiculous. There’s no way we could do enough damage with just passives and no powers.
‘It should be about time…’
That’s when I started thinking that.
[Initiating restoration.]
This time, it wasn’t the narration—it was Arta’s voice over the speaker. And then—
[To proceed with manual restoration, I need assistance from inside the lab. I’ll show you with the lights—]
[I’m supposed to press the lit-up buttons, right?]
[…Correct.]
After finishing the conversation, I told the rearguard to press any buttons that lit up once the equipment powered on. And then—
[Emergency stabilization module activated.]
[1%, 2%, 3%, 4%…]
[Error detected.]
[Mana Core requires repair.]
Each press of a button led to updates in progress, and before one completed, another broke, forcing us to fix something else. And time passed like that.
“Kaislan, fall back and heal with a potion.”
“I’m still fine—”
Dude, your flesh is melted and your bones are visible. What do you mean “fine.”
“That’s an order.”
“…Understood.”
After nearly two hours of this fight, the vanguard rotated in and out, recovering and returning repeatedly.
[Emergency stabilization completed.]
Wooooong—!
With the sound of power returning, the dark lab lit up brightly. It meant the long first phase was finally over. And at the same time—
“Field effect – Destroyed Core Lab has changed.”
“Character resource values now fluctuate depending on distance.”
Now the raid could truly begin. The rearguard’s MP would start regenerating— not much, just up to about 10%. But even so, the most important factor in this raid was the vanguard.
“Listen up. From now on, you absolutely cannot let it push us back!”
I gave the vanguard another firm order. Because if we get pushed too far from the pit, it’s not just us regenerating MP—that damn snake will get its powers back too.
So…
“Parab! You fall back!”
I moved Sven Parab, our only healer, to the rear to act like a proper cleric.
“Elwen Fornaci di Tersia has cast [Spiritization].”
I also had Elwen focus on using [Spiritization] instead of dealing damage. Since the monster was poison-aligned, we obviously chose earth.
“Fire damage taken is halved.”
“Water damage taken is doubled.”
“Poison immunity bonus.”
“Blunt weapons receive strong bonuses for destruction actions.”
“Physical resistance greatly increased…”
“…”
With the poison problem resolved, she could fight more actively, and her knockback resistance improved stability.
‘Now we just wear it down and prepare for the final berserk phase…’
That’s what I was thinking as we calmly continued the raid—
“…Huh?”
Suddenly, Sniktura’s outer shell began glowing bright red. Which could only mean one thing.
“Sniktura has activated [Seed of Destruction].”
“Selects a random character within range for an unavoidable strike.”
Something went wrong.
.
.
.
.
“……has reached 0% HP.”
“Initiating countdown.”
