The Mad Rat's Lab

Chapter 282 - He fell for it


"Ahaha! Ahahahaha!"

"Here we go again…"

"Go! Go, Benjamin the Third! Go and smash all those pesky pests! We'll feast on their otherworldly souls and make them join our forces! Ahahaha!"

Ignoring the demon woman shaking her head behind him, the undead player laughs like a demented lunatic. He punches the air and points at his minion's next target, giving him orders while staying out of range of the enemies' abilities.

"Sigh… He does know he can't obtain souls in PvP, does he?"

"Ahaha! Feast upon their souls, Benjamin the Third! I'm not sure how, but I'm sure they're somehow related to your vengeance targets, so inflict as much pain as possible! Avenge your dead son and family and make them suffer for all eternity!"

"Please, not this again..."

The two players stand still, watching the battle unfold through the open door, staying safe in the security checkpoint. The only thing they've done since they opened the door was throwing an Imp inside to get all the monster's aggro and force them out of their hiding spots, and giving orders to the undead called Benjamin the Third.

"The more I watch him, the more proud of him I am. Lily, don't you agree with me? Isn't Benjamin the Third the best?"

The demon woman sends a weird gaze to the man, grinning with his arms crossed. His somewhat intimidating glowing blue eyes make him look like a buffoon to her right now.

"You do remember that the idea wasn't yours, right?"

"Aah, that doesn't matter." The man waves his hand in dismissal. "What matters is that the Ancient Curse skill is doing wonders right now. I was skeptical at the start, but after seeing it in action, I can understand how useful it can be in the right circumstances. If the monster just cares about surviving for as long as possible, Ancient Curse is perfect to avoid being caught in unusual circumstances like the one we're in right now, ahaha!"

Ancient Curse (Passive skill) All your stats are reduced by 20%, but you are also immune to all effects from non-allied units that would drain or reduce your stats other than HP.

Without answering, the woman glares at him.

"S-stop glaring at me like that. I know I'm leeching off his idea, okay? It's just that I never thought it could work so well, and I didn't want to waste cp on a useless unit…"

The woman slowly exhales. "Haaa… I agree that his ideas can be a bit too crazy, and sometimes backfire. But after playing with him so many times, didn't you learn that they're never completely useless?"

He makes a pained face.

"I know, it's just… It's hard to acknowledge him when everything he does seems so random… He doesn't even respect the classics and always goes against my ideas…"

Shaking her head, the woman leaves him to mutter to himself and turns her gaze towards the laboratory. "It's almost over. We can't waste any more time, let's go and finish the remaining monsters ourselves."

"But it's more effective if we leave it to Benjamin the Thi–"

"More effective, maybe," she cuts him, "But is it more efficient? You know time is important too."

"I know, but…"

Watching him lowering his head and standing still, the woman decides to take the lead. She steps into the laboratory, followed by the two imps that are still alive, and leaves the man behind.

"To still be so scared of losing some MP, he can be so stubborn…" She speaks to herself. "This time, things remained still after invading this room. Did they change it, or is there some kind of trigger?"

As she advances, she looks around, but finds nothing special. Just the same desks, flasks, and computers. She stops in front of an empty spot, takes her whip, and swings it.

*Swiish! Plaash!*

Surprisingly, the whip's tip stops in mid-air. The air stirs, and a humanoid shape, created by the distortion of the light caused by sudden movement, appears in the empty spot.

"It's no use trying to stay hidden when you've shown yourself before." She says to nobody in particular. "After killing my Imp, you can't just stop moving and hope we won't know where you are."

The whip strikes again. One, two hits. After the third, the monster realizes it has been discovered and growls at the attacker, lunging at her.

"Nice try, but better luck next time." The succubus player sends a flying kiss at the invisible humanoid. "Now, shall we dance? Fufufu!"

She keeps an eye on the screen in front of her while fighting. Although against a monster this weak she doesn't need to use magic, she doesn't want to be drained by other enemies while distracted with this one.

"You two," she says, pointing at the two Imps, "go get that thing."

Following her orders, the imps start casting small fire bolts at a dark spot on the ceiling. The spot, looking like dark moss, defies all common sense and dodges to the right to avoid the attacks.

Fire splashes on the ceiling. When the spell's visual effects fade off, they reveal a hole the same size as the black moss, as well as a dark blob with three eyes and two tentacles, right next to it.

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It twists, and the movement makes the tentacles swing forward. They extend in the imps' direction, something that didn't seem possible due to the dark blob's small size.

The imps try to evade, but the attack is too fast. Yet before they touch the imps, another black and thin object intercepts them.

*Swish! Plash!*

The two objects collide, making a loud sound.

"Fufufu. Did you think you're better than me at this? I'll show you how wrong you are." With those words, the succubus licks her lips, holding the other end of the whip tightly. "How long will you last?"

At this moment, the demon kicks the empty air, sending something invisible flying. The monster lands on the ground a few meters away, crashing onto a table and breaking a few glass containers.

That 'something' invisible doesn't move anymore.

The two start swinging their tentacles and whip, making them clash all over the laboratory. With every strike, they break the surroundings, and the once immaculate laboratory slowly transforms into a mess.

Like this, the woman proceeds to methodically eliminate each one of the remaining hidden monsters. She also keeps track of the screen in front of her and changes her position to avoid as many status drain effects as possible.

It isn't until all of the monsters are dealt with in a brutally effective way that she stows away her whip and takes a long breath.

"Haaa… It took longer than I wanted. Fighting while avoiding looking at them is difficult, even if I know where they are. If only Baldy helped me…" She shakes her head, tired of her companion's antics. "But I wonder. What triggered the sudden change last time?"

She observes her surroundings. The destruction caused during her fight, as well as that caused by Benjamin the Third, isn't much different from the one she caused last time when she used Hellfire to fill the whole room.

"Is it because of the AoE skill? That could be. It could be something else entirely… What do you think, Baldy?"

It's then that she realizes that her teammate has disappeared.

"Where did he go? I swear, I'll kill him once this ends if he ran away." She approaches the security checkpoint door. "Where the fuck are you, Baldy? …what's this?"

She suddenly stops and kneels. Like sea waves during a storm, the ground in front of her is shaking uncontrollably.

"Weird."

Looking closely, the woman realizes there's an HP bar, one that's quickly being depleted, right on the floor level, almost hidden by the gray waves. She jumps away, understanding what this means.

She then tests by touching the ground with the tip of her boot. Her feet slowly dips into the ground, and when she tries to pull back, the ground sticks to it, dragging it inside.

"No way… he really went and did it."

After blinking away to safety, the woman takes seat on a nearby chair and starts watching the waves, a smile on her face. She waits until the HP bar is depleted and a popping sound, like one produced by a giant bubble, sends grey goo splashing everywhere.

"Puha…! Cough, cough! Aaah, it was awful…!"

From within the gray puddle, the blue-eyed man slowly pulls himself out. Covered in goo, he looks completely exhausted.

"How is it that you end up inside that thing all the time?" The demon woman asks with a grin.

"I'm not doing this on purpose!" Indignant, the man glares at her. "As if I could have known that thing was mimicking the floor!"

"You know. If you had helped me, you wouldn't have fallen for it."

"I know! But now isn't the time for this, Lily."

The demon woman shakes her head and shrugs. "I understand you're childish and don't want to admit your errors, but don't you think this is a bit too much–"

"No, this isn't it. Look!"

She looks behind, following the man's finger. A chill runs down her spine, making her body shake.

From the cracks on the wall, the dim light is quickly growing in intensity. At the same time, dark eyes start appearing.

"This is the same…"

The woman can't finish her sentence, as at that moment, the whole building starts trembling. A low, guttural growl makes the walls and floor shake, almost making her fall.

Unlike the first time, there's no sudden influx of monsters rushing at them, because they've all been dealt with, but the visual and sound effects are the same. The two players quickly check their status screens and realize something horrifying.

"It's the same as back then."

The man grabs his head and starts shouting. "Noooo! Not my MP again! What the fuck is this!? I assumed it was the monsters, but they're all dead! It makes no sense!"

Unlike the man, the woman remains calm and analyzes the situation. She scans the area as if searching for something, until her eyes stop on the gray puddle on the ground. After splashing around and the man getting out of the puddle, there's now a visible hole in the ground.

She snaps her fingers. "Aha, so this must have been the trigger. But then…"

"Not 'but then'. There's no time to think! We must do something right now!" The undead player grabs the woman's hand and pulls her forward as fast as he can.

"Ah, aha, ahaha…" I start laughing. Why? Because, otherwise, I'll cry. "We made it. We survived… but at what cost? At what cost!?"

"It's fine. We didn't die and can go back for revenge!" Clara… 'smiles?' next to me. I'm not so sure myself.

I ignore her and go on with my ramblings. "My Good Follower is dead. Everything's lost…"

We almost got caught in the demon's encirclement. Between them and the repeatedly reassembling skeletons, it was a nightmare. But luckily, thanks to my Good Follower's valiant sacrifice and my sister's suicidal minion, we got out of it relatively unscathed.

"Don't exaggerate so much. We just lost your minion, Mr. B, and Jenny. With the rest of my minions, we still have a good chance at this."

I glare at Clara's remaining minions. They glare back. Uuuugh, my whole body shivers. I suddenly got an extremely bad feeling about this, I shouldn't have looked in that direction. You know what they say: if you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes into you. That's why I avoid them.

…well, it's one of the reasons I do.

But why is she so happy? Didn't one of her precious and 'cute' minions die?

My previous assumptions must be true, since Jenny didn't 'die' but 'sacrificed' herself with another Call the Forbidden. Yeah, that must be it. As long as her minions commit suicide, she's fine with it. I don't think I want to understand why, though.

Just the vision of that thing using such a horrifying skill will haunt me for days to come. Those visions will give me nightmares for days to come…

Ah, by the way. The reason I forgot she had another minion with Call the Forbidden is the same as with Mr. B: repeated head-slamming.

"Yeah, you're right…" I stop acting like a fool and stand up. I then dust my robes and pull my staff from the ground. "Now that we know what we're facing, we can plan properly. If anything, let's try to find the dungeon core for our next matches."

"Yeah, let's do that!"

Clara happily nods next to me. But, ugh… it gives me the creeps. Too much contact with the Abyss lately.

"Do you want to give your monsters a name but can't decide which one? Don't worry. Just send me a message and I'll give you a perfect one."

- Message posted one day in DMA's forum. If any player asked for advice or not, nobody knows.

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