Magic equipment

Rick, Allen, Ava, and Hal stood in front of Mark´s apartment complex. It was 10 in the morning.

"Do you think he´s awake?" asked Allen.

"I hope so. He said to get here before noon." said Hal.

Rick rang on the bell with Mark´s name and the group waited for a minute.

"Yes?" a tired voice sounded from the doorbell.

"It´s me." announced Rick.

"Come on, up." said Mark with the bell buzzing.

The team took the elevator to the eighth floor. Mark, wearing a bathrobe opened the door with his grimoire floating next to him.

"Come in. The equipment is in the living room."

"You ready for battle at 10 AM or what?" asked Allen with a chuckle.

"Oh, you mean this?" he referred to the magic book. "I got a lot of essence stones yesterday so I was upgrading my spells. This thing now floats permanently." said Mark leading the group into his living room.

On the table, there were three pieces of equipment.

Mark pointed at the lantern first and started explaining. "This thing lights up when you put in your mana. It can also make a flash bright enough to blind the monsters for quite some time. Don´t forget to close your eyes when you use it, though."

He then moved on to the spear. "I was having trouble thinking of a way to make a spear better because spears are already perfect, but I did come up with something. This is completely automatic, unlike the lantern. Whenever you impale something a giant needle grows from the tip, so it adds more piercing power, and also moving with a big needle in your guts isn´t pleasant."

"At last the shield. Rick, have you ever played Overwatch?" asked Mark.

"No. I´m not really into video games."

"Well, thank god. As soon as you put this thing on, it creates a barrier in the shape of a shield in front of the actual shield. When something hits the barrier it uses your mana to bounce it back. Grip it firmly with your hand, because the recoil is pretty strong."

After hearing the explanation the group took their weapons.

"That´s about it. Have a good raid and I´m going to sleep."

"Good night" said the group and set off with their new gear.

After half an hour they arrived in front of the gate. It was a D-rank one with an above-average magical reading.

Rick strapped the shield onto his hand and the barrier quickly formed. Hal poured his mana into the lantern and it floated from his hand.

"He forgot to mention this, but whatever. I won´t complain." Hal said.

"Are you ready, guys?" asked Rick.

"Locked and loaded." said Allen, with the crossbow in hand.

"Alright, let´s go." said Rick while stepping inside the gate.

Under the light provided by the floating lantern they looked around themselves. The cave was sandy, with the walls being yellowish in color. Rick proceeded to lead the group deeper with his shield ready.

The local monsters didn´t enjoy their company and so they commenced on an attack.

"That´s a big ass stag beetle." said Allen.

A beetle the size of a horse was charging at them with open jaws. Rick was prepared for the impact, covering behind his shield, but no impact came.

*Fwoosh*

Allen fired off a blue translucent arrow which penetrated the beetle´s sturdy armor as if it was just a layer of paper.

"Many envy this penetrative power of mine." said Allen with a grin.

"As if you ever use it, dude." commented Rick.

Hal, standing in the rear chuckled at their banter.

"This is the second time. I´ll get you when you expect it the least." said Allen towards Rick.

"And I´ll fight back with twice the power." Rick responded.

"Hey, you idiots, we´re still in a dungeon. That´s a pretty life-threatening situation, you know?" said Ava, bringing the group back to reality.

Hal was already trying to dismember the beetle in order to find the essence stone. However, he was having trouble with getting through its exoskeleton. "I´ll ask Mark for a new knife. You all get some advanced weapons and I get a night lamp."

Rick smashed the armor with his mace and said. "You don´t even have to ask. If we continue clearing gates like this, one hitting every monster, you can buy a legitimate magic knife from Daedalus."

"Yeah, I wanna see Daedalus make something better. Let´s look at how many automatic magic crossbows they make." Hal said sarcastically. "Ah, it´s here." he said after finding the essence stone.

"I think we landed a pretty good guild, not gonna lie." said Allen as they walked further.

"As if that was your merit." said Ava.

"Don´t badmouth me. I wiped your ass when you were little." retorted Allen.

"I´m gonna find a different raid team if this goes on." said Ava.

"Unfortunately you can´t, due to your contractual obligation." Hal told her.

"So you´re stuck raiding with your father, uncle, and some guy we met once in a college bar." said Allen.

"That´s a dream team for sure." said Ava.

On their way, they came across another armored monster. It was a scorpion this time.

"Another insect?" Allen said disappointed.

"Well, scorpions are actually arachnids, but you were close." Hal corrected him.

While these two were debating the biological classification of their opponent, Rick and Ava lunged into battle.

The scorpion threw its stinger forward. The stinger was met with a cold greeting by Rick´s shield. As they made contact the barrier sprung against the stinger, bending it, which made it essentially useless.

Without having to fear another attack from up, Ava thrust her spear several times at its body after dodging an attack from its claws. Every thrust created a long thin needle going all the way through its body.

The scorpion was very quickly subjugated.

"It seems you have a contender in the penetrative power category." commented Hal.

"Huh, just wait for the boss. I´ll show you." retorted Allen.

The sounds of countless little legs stepping on the ground echoed through the cave. Over a hundred cockroaches the size of a dog emerged from the darkness.

Allen suppressed the urge to shriek in horror and aimed with his crossbow.

"Close your eyes." shouted Hal.

A bright light coming from his lantern filled the whole dungeon permanently damaging the monster´s eyes.

Then the group started a full-on attack with Allen shooting arrows in rapid succession, Rick squashing the bugs with every swing, and Ava pinning them all to the ground with her spear.

'I really need that new knife.' thought Hal looking at the armored insects crawling everywhere.

After finishing this horde and dismembering all of them they continued on their stride towards the boss. They met several more beetles and scorpions on their way until they finally arrived in a large room where the boss rested.

It was a large coiled insect.

"Do centipedes have brains?" asked Allen, aiming at a headshot.

"First, yes, second, that is a millipede, third, have you not taken high school biology?" asked Hal.

"Shut it, smartass. It was over 15 years ago. Cut me some slack." said Allen.

Despite having no ears the millipede heard the group talking and uncoiled its large body. It headed straight towards the group, giving Allen a nice clean shot.

The translucent arrow mounted on his crossbow shone red as Allen used his only skill. It left the crossbow, whistling through the air.

It penetrated the several meters long millipede, killing it in an instant.

"Yeah, I think my [Powershot] still leads in penetrative power." Allen said with a cocky smile.