Destiny Online: Halo Paladin

Chapter 23: First Dungeon Raid

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

On the second day when Nocturne came online, he realized the murloc villages around the river that he had been camping were almost cleared out.

He got quite the catch from his fishing as well, so he planned to clear some quests and dungeons.

Dungeons were everywhere in Destiny Online, they were basically implemented in every stage of a player’s growth from Level 10 onwards.

According to information revealed by the devs, there were a total of four levels for a dungeon. The easiest and simplest was a 5-man dungeon, then the 10-man raid dungeon, followed by the 25-man epic raid dungeon and the 100 to 1000 legion dungeon.

Players were free to run normal dungeons whenever they wanted; Hard dungeons had a 3 hour cooldown time and sudden death dungeons had a cooldown time of 1 day.

Level 10 normal dungeons were not difficult by any means. The devs made it clear that the first dungeon in the player’s adventure was a place for them to train, the monsters in the first dungeon could only inflict physical damage. There were no hidden monsters or any strange mechanics in the dungeon.

Only after Level 15, did elemental damage start to appear in dungeons.

Nocturne spent an entire morning clearing all the quests he accepted. When he finished lunch and handed in the quests, he managed to level up to Level 12, most of the EXP he gained was from the quests that required him to clear out the murloc villages.

He then followed the official guide to the guard captain NPC to start the prerequisite quest for the Level 10 dungeon, Underground.

The prerequisite, Cave Dweller’s Tracks, was simple. It required him to kill 20 cave dwellers around the dungeon entrance and hand in the quest to the guard captain.

After that, he received a continuous quest, Find Their Lair. Nocturne did as told and found the dungeon’s entrance.

When he handed in the second prerequisite quest, he would be able to access the dungeon by himself.

He also got two quests related to the dungeon when he got access to the dungeon.

[Kill the cave dwellers] (Quest difficulty: Level A)

[Quest description: You’ve accepted the guard captain’s requests to clear out the cave dwellers dwellings in the underground.]

[Completion: Cave Guard, 0/5, Cave Slaughterer 0/5, Cave Guardian 0/2]

[Destroy their nest] (Quest Difficulty: Level A)

[Quest description: You’ve accepted the guard captain’s request to search for the cave dweller’s leader and kill him.]

[Completion: Kill the Cave Lord, Darl. 0/1]

Nocturne arrived at the space in front of the dungeon. There were quite a number of players around and most of them were looking for a party.

“1/3, LF> Tank & Healer”

“3/4, we have Healer (a girl), PM now.”

“Lvl10 Hunter LF party”

“Piss off!”

…

The moment Nocturne arrived in his chainmail and with his shield at his back, there were already players trying to invite him into their party.

In Destiny Online, character information was hidden by default. Unless the player got into a party, others would never know the player’s name or even class.

However, players were able to speculate someone else’s class based on their gear, such as if someone was holding a shield or a bow. A tank Paladin would have an off-hand shield on them.

“Hey bro, we are looking for a tank and we are experienced in running dungeons. Our tank just went offline, so we are looking for a replacement. Do you want in?”

“Sure. Send me an invite.”

The best party was the party with experience, they could even guide Nocturne through the dungeon.

[Player FlyingFireball sent you a party invite. Yes/No?]

“Yes.”

[Joined a party. Leader: FlyingFireball. Distribution mode: Party distribution.]

Nocturne briefly went over the other party members.

There was FlyingFireball, a Level 12 Elemental Mage; ShadowKill, a Level 12 Assassination Rogue; a Level 11 Marksmanship Hunter, ShootingSheepFrom100ft; a Level 11 Holy Priest, BigVolumeHeal.

“Well, then. Now that we have every class, let’s roll.” FlyingFireball led the party towards the dungeon entrance.

On the way there, the Hunter and the Priest started to chat.

“Hey, I don’t know about you but the name Nocturne rings a bell to me…”

“Hmmm, now that you mentioned it, isn’t he the first name on the achievement ranking?”

“Oh? Really? Is he a pro then? Why is he here in our party? It’s so random!”

“I don’t know! Go ask him.”

“Why don’t you go instead.”

…

In the end, the Hunter girl lost to her curiosity and mustered up enough courage to ask Nocturne.

“Hey, Nocturne, are you the Nocturne on the achievement ranking?” ShootingSheepFrom100ft asked curiously. Her question also captured the other’s attention and they too looked at Nocturne with a curious look.

“Erm… Yeah, that’s me.”

“Wow! It’s really you? Aren’t you from Dreaming Back To Great Tang? Why are you here, in some random party? Is your party busy or something?”

“No, it’s not like that. I’m just a newbie solo player and got lucky with a skill, that’s why I was invited for the boss raid. I’m actually quite a noob, please take care of me in the dungeon later. This is my first run.”

“That must be quite a skill you got there, what kind of skill is it?” ShootingSheepFrom100ft asked like a curious girl.

“Don’t ask what you shouldn’t know. Skills and talents are people’s secret, unless he has the intention to tell, you better keep the question to yourself.” FlyingFireball interrupted ShootingSheepfrom100ft’s question and he sounded fierce.

He seemed to be a close acquaintance of ShootingSheepfrom100ft.

“Fine, brother.” The girl stuck her tongue out at him before she hid behind BigVolumeHeal.

“I’m sorry for my sister’s rude question. I hope you won’t mind,” FlyingFireball said with an apologetic tone.

“It’s fine. It’s not much of a secret anyway, it’s just a halo skill that can regen. When we were in the newbie village, everyone’s HP was only that high, the boss had a big AOE skill, that’s why I was chosen,” Nocturne said casually.

“Now that you mentioned it, I have two extra buff icons on my status bar! My HP and Defense got up!” ShootingSheepFrom100ft checked her status after hearing Nocturne out and she found two extra buffs.

Usually, only one halo skill could be activated at a time but everyone received two buffs instead of one. Everyone knew what it meant but everyone was able to keep the questions to themselves.

Then, the party arrived in the dungeon and the chit-chat stopped.

When they got inside, everyone was rather surprised because they found themselves in a ridiculously dark underground cave.

Fortunately, it was not pitch black. It was only normal because if the game wanted to mimic the hyperrealism of a dark cave, everyone would be blind and they would not be able to fight monsters in it.

Further away from the entrances were the cave dwellers, white and hunched back. They had no eyes on their face but had ears as big as fans, they were wandering around with sticks in their hands.

[Cave Guard] (Elite)

[Level: 10]

[HP: 1,000]

“Nocturne, just engage that monster normally, there’s nothing special about him.”

“Okay then, I’ll go aggro him. Be ready.”

Nocturne was good in aggro, or rather extremely cautious. He was able to Provoke the monster from a distance and lured the monsters to the party one by one.

His action attracted the brother and sister duo’s attention.

“Brother, is it me or is he a little scared? He’s gear is quite okay, he should be able to tank two at once, yet…”

“What do you know about tanking? He’s not scared, he’s trying to be steady and cautious. We are the first party clearing the dungeon, a single misstep and we are all dead, you cannot be too careful. Don’t forget about what happened to that tank in our last party, he had good gear as well but he got ahead of himself in aggro.”

Read latest Chapters at WuxiaWorld.Site Only

“In the end, he accidentally pulled four and wiped us all out. Fortunately dungeon runs don’t remove our EXP, otherwise I would have beat him up.”

“Oh, so you are saying Nocturne is a pro?”

“He’s a newbie. His block rate is unimpressive and he missed out a lot of details. But, he’s steady enough, he has the potential to become a good tank. With more practice, he can master the technique and perfect the details but one’s personality is fixed from the start.”

“Oh, I see.” ShootingSheepFrom100ft nodded, as if she understood what her brother said.