The party of five streamed into the empty room. Ronan's gaze swept the floors and walls, finding no differences to the last time he was here.

Stone bricks, cracked and weathered in an eerily artificial manner that made them seem almost naturally aged, yet he knew they were only constructs of the system. The tiles were the same.

He wondered if the monsters were even real, or more puppets. For that matter, were they?

Since the moment he'd been stolen from his old office, life had been dreamlike, resembling a game more than reality. It wasn't normal to return in time every time you died.

Ronan still had doubts, but what was he supposed to do? The unsettling truth was that he was truly beginning to enjoy the intoxicating thrill of progression. Of magic.

What was the alternative? If this was a dream, then it didn't matter what he did. On the other hand, if this was reality? Well, rolling over and giving in would leave him powerless if he ever did make it back to Earth.

The brief moral quandary had passed through his mind in the time it took to scan their surroundings. The others had taken up their positions, forming a squashed arrow shape.

Jackson and Ronan—the two mages—were at the back, with Dana and Keith in front of them, ready to take the goblins on in close combat. At the tip of their formation was Terry, the immovable bulwark of the party.

"What? Why is it empty? There's not even any treasure to take," Keith moaned, thinking back to the free pile of money they'd claimed earlier.

"Beats me," Dana replied, shrugging her shoulders but keeping her hand close to her whip.

"Stay on your guard. Who knows what this crazy tutorial has in store for us," Ronan interjected.

Right on cue, the torches in the room were snuffed out by an invisible hand, plunging them into impenetrable darkness. Ronan kept his senses sharp, his hearing slightly elevated by the loss of his sight.

The moment he heard a shuffle on the tiles, he summoned a mana bolt in his hands and lobbed it up and away into the far side of the dungeon. The bolt screamed through the air, illuminating the twisted leers of the goblins beneath.

The crackling explosion of mana against a distant goblin archer signalled an early start to the impending chaos. The last time, the goblins had waited for the torches to flicker to life before their assault.

Now that one of their own had been slaughtered ahead of time, they had no patience. As one unit of hatred and bloodlust, they began to screech and wail incoherently while surging forwards to claim the lives of the five challengers.

The others had no idea what was waiting for them in the shadows. Even under the dim light of Ronan's spell, they only caught brief glimpses of the hateful goblins.

"Don't get distracted!" Ronan yelled. "Form up and slaughter the little shits."

His shout snapped them out of their daze. Dana hadn't been caught off guard as much as the others. The crack of her whip rang out almost immediately.

The torches flared to life at that moment, revealing a goblin with its neck carved open. Ronan shivered at the display of skill and savagery from the fiery redhead.

While he was probably the most potent fighter in their group, he was a far cry from being talented. He knew that most of his expertise, even in close quarters, was a jumbled mishmash of half-remembered martial arts classes and primal instinct.

The goblins were already on Terry when the flickering torch-light returned. However, the man was utterly unfazed.

A red glow appeared around his body as he let out a guttural battle cry. Immediately all the goblins in the vicinity turned on him, losing what little of their sanity remained as they began attacking wildly.

Even his taunt couldn't reach the entire horde. There were simply too many of the monsters. With the pressure lessened the others were able to start slaughtering with ease.

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Ronan had already formed and launched three mana bolts in the time it took for Jackson to prepare his first. Each of the bolts brought another goblin to a sizzling end in seconds.

Keith proved himself to be no slouch, making mincemeat of the goblins with a looted shortsword. Ronan was proud of the man's accomplishments and rehabilitated personality. He only hoped he could prompt it to happen again in future lives.

The elites were the toughest challenge of all. Regular berserkers managed to draw blood on even Terry's tough skin, but were soon put down like the rabid beasts they were.

However, the elites moved like lightning and struck like thunder. The shamans' voodoo was tricky. Even as a mage, Ronan had yet to learn how to counter the spells of others.

Under the layered curses of slowness and with their enemies buffed to the gills like roided up bodybuilders, the group of five suffered quite a few savage cuts. At one point Keith even had his shoulder smashed so hard they thought it was broken.

Dana surprised them all by grabbing it and popping it back into place. From Keith's scream you would've thought she'd killed his firstborn and burnt him alive, but it turned out it was only dislocated.

"Couldn't you have just waited for the level up to restore it?" Ronan asked her with a raised eyebrow.

"Probably, but where's the fun in that," she replied with a devious grin and a wink that made his loins burn and his spine shiver all at once. "Also, who knows the extent of that weird healing. Maybe it would've healed his arm as it was, without setting it properly. That would be fucked up," she added, proving she wasn't quite as coldhearted as she often seemed.

Ronan appreciated her insight. He had healed from near death, but even then it was only from severe sword wounds and being peppered full of arrows. He'd never really broken a bone to that extent.

It reminded him that the system was not his friend. Even if it gave him power, it wasn't there to coddle him or save his life simply because he needed it to.

His heritage on the other hand… Well, he was barely beginning to unravel its mysteries, but it was proving to be an incredible boon and curse in one.

Jackson pumped his fist vigorously as his mana bolt burst the head of the final goblin like a melon. "Take that motherfucker!" he cried, only to yelp in pain as Terry slapped him on the back of the head.

"Just because the world's gone mad, doesn't mean you can join it, young man," he scolded.

Jackson looked appropriately sheepish, then turned bright red as the rest of the group laughed at his expense. Even while joining in the fun, Ronan had half his mind focused on their surroundings.

They all believed they'd won. That this trial was over. He knew better.

Ronan pulled up his status, ignoring the kill notifications that had piled up. He knew that whatever he'd earned would soon be wiped away. The only reward that might remain was in the form of mastery, provided he had reached the cap.

Actually, it's annoying having to go through the entire thing every time. System is there a way I can just see one part of my status? he asked internally. It didn't always listen, but occasionally it granted his wishes. This time, he was pleasantly surprised.

[Partial Status - Ronan Steele]

[Mastery]

Pugilist I 9/100

Mana 99/100

Pain 2/100

Spear 2/100

Sword 3/100

Stamina 4/100

Anti-Magic 3/100

Even his pugilist mastery had increased slightly. That was due to a few goblins making it past the frontline to rush at the 'vulnerable' mages.

He had taught them the error of their ways with a permanent lesson. Even anti-magic had made a reappearance thanks to his valiant efforts to resist the shamans' curses.

Unfortunately, he had failed.

Despite his best efforts and his rapidly increasing control over his mana, Ronan had fallen 1 point shy of reaching the mastery cap. All his efforts in this life were going to be put to waste.

"Looks like there's another door here. It was hard to see earlier what with the darkness and the carnage," Terry suddenly announced.

Ronan snapped out of his thoughts and looked up right as the big fellow threw aside caution and ripped the door open. Of course, he was left dumbfounded when all that was beyond it was a stone brick wall blocking their advance. Unfortunately he had set in motion the summoning of that monstrous hobgoblin champion, Magriz'al.

A few seconds later, the ground started to rumble. Dust sprayed from the mortar between the bricks and small shards rocked loose, clattering against the ground.

"What the hell?" Jackson exclaimed.

"Quickly, form up!" Ronan roared, startling the others. "Terry, face the middle of the room. Everyone else behind. Something's coming."

In the panic and chaos, no one noticed that it was a little odd for Ronan to have so much foresight. They'll probably be dead soon, so who cares, he told himself rather morbidly.

Even though that savage monster was fast approaching, Ronan couldn't calm his nerves. He still needed one point of mastery.

However, There was nothing left to kill. There were no sudden insights at the tips of his fingers, waiting to give him relief.

About three seconds later, the floor exploded as that gigantic goblin tore his way through in a shower of rubble and bricks. They had managed to form a rudimentary version of their formation.

Terry raised a goblin buckler in one hand, preparing to meet the creature head on. This was the moment of truth. Would a defender's class advantages give them a chance where before only death awaited them?

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