6 Serpent Nest

System: "You've crafted a basic recovery potion! Alchemy Proficiency +1! Requirement met, upgrading to Apprentice Alchemist!"

Alden let out a sigh as he fell onto his back, resting on the inn's bed, "Finally!"

Extensive amounts of time had passed since he started concocting potions. Most of his concoctions were failures, so it took an immense amount of time to become an apprentice.

'I'm a bit surprised, I thought I'd be the first in the Sorus Empire to become an apprentice... maybe one of the alchemy experts in my last life was quicker?' Alden mused.

It wasn't too unexpected. If a strong power backed them, someone could simply pay for others to gather herbs for them as they concocted potions. Then, they would be much faster than Alden, who put an hour into gathering herbs.

Still, with this achievement, Alden's success rate in the brewing of common potions would increase by almost 10%! If he found a recipe, he could even give uncommon potions a shot.

As if to interrupt Alden's excitement, the call sound started playing in his ears.

'Seems like Baron arrived...'

Alden answered the call and was instantly graced with Baron's complaining.

"Faceless... you must carry me. I only spent a few hours traveling, and yet everyone in this town is already level 2 and 3! I was ahead of the competition just a few hours ago!"

However, Alden didn't need to respond, because only a few seconds later, Baron's voice picked up again.

"Oh! Did I get a title for that? What?! 10% cheaper carriages?!"

It went without saying that Baron was the first person in Sorus Empire to travel from one town to another. Obviously, he'd get some form of reward.

Finally, Alden responded, "Oh? The reward for being the first person to travel from one town to the next is a title?"

"You knew about this?" Baron questioned.

"Yeah, of course."

Being the first to do anything was a big deal in Realms Online. If Alden could remember correctly, around now, Realms Online's player count was around 3 billion, globally.

Alden continued, "Well, I just finished my preparations, so I guess I can't start carrying you. Stay at the town gates."

"Alright," Baron said as he ended the call.

Alden quickly put himself together, rushing out of the inn. As he ran out, the woman clerk watched on with a disdainful look on her face.

'He must be poor because he wastes money... leaving an inn after only a few hours...'

If Alden could hear what she was thinking, he would only respond, "You realize I can come back later, right?"

Since Tri-Star Inn was near the town gates, he arrived in no time at all. There, he saw a clueless-looking, level 2 "Death Knot."

"Death Knot! Let's hurry over to the dungeon!" Alden exclaimed while running over.

Baron, the player controlling the Death Knot account, jumped up. 'Faceless??? Did he just say the dungeon?'

Then, Baron's eyes inched toward Alden's head, and he too was shocked. In fact, he wasn't the only player that went wide-eyed as Alden ran through the area.

Simultaneously, many players around the town gates jaws hung wide open, "level 4?!"

If anyone within the entirety of Realms Online was asked how long they thought it would take to reach level 4, they would almost certainly respond, "Tomorrow, of course."

After all, even a team of level 3 experts had reportedly failed to make any progress in the first team dungeon! And with no other opportunities for quick levels, ordinary and elite players' grinding slowed to a stop.

Hearing everyone's proclamation, Alden could only say, "I think you all just need to find the right quests."

Little did he know, this phrase would make him rather infamous in the days to come.

Soon, Alden arrived in front of Baron. "So, let's go to the dungeon."

Baron pursed his lips, and he immediately thought that raiding the dungeon was impossible. He was starting to think he was relying on the wrong person to carry him.

"Even the current top guilds, run by prestigious and insightful corporations, have said that every early team dungeon was simply impossible until level 5! Why don't we grind elsewhere?" Baron questioned.

In the background, someone could be heard, "Yeah! Death Knot is right!"

Upon hearing someone call him "Death Knot," Baron involuntarily shivered. 'I shouldn't have used the same username I did as a teenager...'

"Don't worry about it, Death Knot. I have a strategy, let's just go."

Baron shrugged. Experiencing the dungeon may help him become more skilled anyway. 'I'll just trust him... I doubt he'd gift himself the Realms' death penalty.'

"Alright, the closest team dungeon to us is the 'Serpent Nest,' a level 1-5 team dungeon that requires 5 players. We can just select any random set of people upon arriving, it's only an hour's walk from Cedar Town."

"...Let's go," Baron relented.

-

In a little under an hour, the duo arrived at the dungeon. A broken-down, cobblestone path led up to the dungeon's entrance. There, players would find a dark, dirt cave.

"I see why they call it Serpent Nest," Baron commented.

The cave was a perfect circle, and probably just the trail of a magnificent MMORPG serpent.

"You've guessed correctly, the boss of this team dungeon, Exsslor, is a powerful and large naga. He created these caves."

Baron only stared at Alden, confused. 'How does he know the boss's name and species, when no one has even reached the boss chamber?'

Even though Alden noticed Baron's inquisitive gaze, he simply continued toward the dungeon, and shouted, "Level 4 expert here! I'm Going to carry you level 1 to level 2 noobies through this dungeon! We need one mage, one guardian, and a cleric!"

With Baron as the team's melee dealer, a rogue, their team composition would be just fine.

Immediately, a group of 20-odd, dejected players rushed over, tripping over each other as they did. All day, they had been trying to find a party, only for responses such as "Sorry, waiting for friends" or "Sure, if you join my guild."

Alden directly chose a random 3 players with the classes he needed.

Then, as the others exited the area, Alden scanned his team.

There was MouseAndCheese, the magician, whose red hair and ugly face were rather prominent. His gear was actually still the very same gear every player received upon logging in.

'I thought no one besides me would keep the leather armor,' Alden chuckled.

TrulyDo, the guardian, who actually surprised Alden. 'This girl is the only person I didn't choose randomly- in the future, they're an expert!' TrulyDo was even the chief tank of his own guild, Relentless.

"Don't look so gruff, TrulyDo ."

"That's my natural face..."

And OurLordOlympus, the cleric. They were rather skinny, and clearly not athletically talented. Alden wasn't surprised about their inclination toward the Cleric class, which could stay in the back.

After scanning over the players, Alden simply explained, "Everyone here should understand their roles relatively well. The cleric will heal us, the magician and rogue will do most of our damage, and the guardian will tank. Listen to all of my commands and we'll be fine."

The team nodded and followed Alden into the dungeon.

System: "Entering 'Serpent Nest,' choose the difficulty (easy, medium, hard)."

"Hard!"

Following Alden's choice, the entire team went wide-eyed. Obviously, they were all thinking one thing, 'Is our team leader crazy?!'

When the group of 5 entered the dungeon, Alden assured them, "No, I'm not crazy. Now, I'll give you all 4 common recovery potions. With these, you'd have to be an idiot to not make it to the boss."

This dungeon was rather nostalgic. After joining Relentless, he was tasked with leading a team to defeat it in his past life. Thanks to Alden's diligence, the bountiful rewards from Serpent Nest boosted their guild's status in no time at all.

'Small holes on all sides... the 360-degree attack that players are so terrified of.'

Alden was confident. The monsters in hard mode were still limited to level 5, only that they were a little smarter and there were a little more of them.

Everyone looked at each other, and they nodded.

"If expert Faceless is confident..." MouseAndCheese drawled.

"I guess it might be possible?" OurLordOlympus nodded.

Then, they all heard a noise.

'Sssssssss...'

Alden ran in front of the party, "Get in positions, the enemies are coming!"

'Oh right, another thing about hard mode... the enemies don't wait, they come.'

The entire team caught Alden off guard. They swiftly and calmly got into their positions, with the cleric at the back, and guardian running in front of Alden. The magician stayed just a bit ahead of the cleric, and Baron ran to the guardian's side.

'I expected this performance from TrulyDo and Death Knot... but the others may be hidden gems? Or maybe they're just following the flow.'

Then, from one of the holes, a snake crawled out.