The teleport light flashes, and even before it starts to disappear, I start giving orders.

"Chaaaaaarge! Everyone, chaaaaarge!" I shout, pointing forward. "Ignore the monsters, ignore the traps, ignore everything that doesn't block our path to victory! There's nothing to worry about, we're stronger than this dungeon! Just charge ahead, and don't fall behind, because we'll assume you're dead and continue without you–"

Laura interrupts me. "Mad Rat, did you forget your sister's words?"

Ah, right. She said no deaths.

"Khm! As I was saying… Charge, but don't leave anyone behind."

Right when I finish my speech, the light has completely disappeared, and I can see my teammates looking at me with awkward expressions. Nothing new here.

What a shame Laura caught on to my verbal slip. My speech was so epic… but it lost all its weight after Laura's reminder.

Clara raises her hand (tentacles) into the air and breaks the silence. "Yarr! Charrrrrge! Chaaaaaarrrrge!"

She puts on a pirate accent, which, paired with her horrifying presence, makes her look like a cursed creature from the deep seas. If only she were dripping water… No, Andreu, no. Stop imagining weird stuff, or you'll get nightmares tonight.

Well, at least I wasn't the one who made the greatest fool of themselves.

After this short and awkward exchange, our party immediately starts moving forward. Unlike usual, it's Clara who takes the lead today. Not because we trust her to find the path and protect us, but because our tactic requires special considerations.

For once, we don't need Ricard to hold the frontline. If we plan to skip ahead and ignore almost everything, we don't need to worry about maintaining the front. Instead, he'll be most useful at the back, being able to provoke the monsters and keep them behind us as we run.

Also, Clara is our certified 'trap killer'. In this kind of tactic, the most dangerous elements are those you can't see. Having someone who can survive most of them – either by sheer luck, reflexes, or tentacle use – at the lead is best.

Me? Always at the back, but not quite. The second from last is usually the safest position, after all. That's my rightful place.

…because if I take random damage from enemies and traps, I tend to unknowingly kill myself when casting spells, unless I or Laura keep a close eye on my HP bar all the time. But let's ignore that minor detail, okay?

Right in front of the dungeon portal, we find a large castle gate protected by human soldiers. They glare at us, but don't approach yet.

"Humans!" Ricard's eyes start shining in a dangerous light, but then he remembers a critical piece of information and deflates like a balloon. "Sigh… But I can't collect their souls…"

Hah! Now you understand my pain!

Usually, it's only me who can't get bodies, while all of you automatically get your special resources just by playing the game.

So unfair…! But not anymore, hahaha! We're all on the same page today!

The real reason the DMA staff disabled all special resources during the preliminary matches is clear: so the players focus on the matches and nothing else. But this also gives us, the Flesh Monstrosities, the discriminated faction in the game, an equal playing field to the other factions.

Equality! I'm a true defender of equality! …though only when it benefits me, of course.

But what matters now is that my time to shine has come. I step up. My gaze lands on the pitiful humans.

"Ten, twenty, or even a hundred of them! It makes no difference! Fufufu! Hahaha!" I say, channeling Chain Lightning. "Die, insignificant human garbage!"

Oh, how much I wished all humans disappeared from the game…

Lightning flashes through the air, striking its first victim and spreading through the human ranks. Given their dense formation and weak strength, my spell is extremely effective, rendering a whole section reduced to ashes… I mean, stunned on the ground.

We slip through that gap and approach the stone wall. Breaking through the front gate will take too long; we won't do that.

Arrows fly towards us from all directions, especially from the top of the wall, and the remaining soldiers swarm us from both sides.

"Throw me, Baldy."

Ricard lifts Laura and uses all his strength to throw her up. She soars through the air, and right when gravity starts to pull her back, she uses Blink to reach the top of the stone wall, bridging the gap with the teleport.

As expected, she finds resistance and can't easily step into the flat side. Again, it's my turn to shine.

"Chain Lighting!"

Since I don't have a clear view of the archers shooting through the arrow slits, I use Laura as the target for my spell. The lighting hits her and spreads through the human soldiers and archers, clearing the top of the wall.

Laura jumps down the embrasure and starts killing the stunned humans. Meanwhile, Clara uses her tentacles to pull herself up the wall. Now that no humans are stopping her, dislodging her tentacles, she easily reaches the top, with Ricard on her back.

I watch everything from below, craning my neck. They won't leave me here, right? Not after all that 'don't leave anyone behind' speech, right?

"Mad Rat, your turn." Ricard peeks through the gap between two merlons and extends his hand in my direction.

Ugh, I hate what comes next…

"Dark Grab!"

My vision suddenly shifts, and I feel something slimy and disgusting sliding over my body. It's my sister dragging me towards the flat part of the wall.

Well… as disgusting as it is, we've cleared the first obstacle, the castle's outer wall, in less than thirty seconds since the teleportation took place. If that's not fast, I don't know what 'fast' means anymore. We brought no support monsters with us, following Marta's instructions, so we're ready to continue.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

"Let's go," I say, recovering from the sudden pull, both mentally and physically. Laura is healing the HP we lost. "We already know our objective."

"Yes, the second tower to the left," nods Laura.

"Using a castle like this one in this match is useless," adds Ricard. "It's a true waste of humans and cp. We know from the start where the dungeon core is, so they can't hide it and force us to explore the whole castle. In an open field, it's very easy to skip parts and focus only on the core."

Ricard, your analysis would be perfect if only you stopped looking at the humans clumping at the bottom of the wall with regret.

But still, he's right. We got lucky and got matched against a team of four Iron Shield players. Four humans, the most standard of factions, using the most standard of human-style dungoens: a castle. Four humans, which means all of their units have higher average stats but no unique innate skills to worry about.

Standard faction, standard tactics, standard dungeon…

Standard is easy. Standard is best. After all, this is the single reason we thought that the blitzkrieg my sister suggested to us would work.

Even better is the fact that we know where the dungeon core is, and that this dungeon is an open field. There's no need to think; we just need to find the shortest path, charge ahead, and break through the dungeon core's protective measures.

"Make haste," I remind the rest. "We must reach the keep's second tower before the griffin knights show up."

I know, I know, don't look at me like that. Marta told me to stop making plans unless Laura's had already failed. But 'making plans' and 'giving orders' are two different things.

We were lucky regarding this. The griffin knights, the single unit we might have had to worry about due to their aerial mobility, were part of the 50% of revealed dungeon elements. Now that we know they exist, we just need to adjust our tactics to counter them.

When we go inside the tower, they won't be able to do anything to us. They won't fit through the door. Being large isn't always an advantage, hahaha!

Everyone's eyes automatically move to the sky, but there's nothing visible yet.

It's Laura who makes us return to reality: "Don't look up, the real danger is below."

"Below…?" I tilt my head. Danger, below? How could that be… But when my gaze lands on the bottom of the wall, I realize that everything is filled with humans. "The fuck!? This is worse than a zombie apocalypse!"

There are tons of Knights and Heavy Warriors! Two of the best units to counter Champions, for their high offense and defense capabilities, respectively.

There's even a full unit of freaking Paladins and Royal Guards!

It's impossible to jump down the wall as we planned and expect everything to go smoothly. If we can't jump down… we're left with standing on the wall, then.

I quickly think of a plan. We'll use the wall to approach the keep and avoid the ground…

"Lily, what do you think?" I ask. "What about staying on the wall for as long as possible? This way we can avoid the human horde…"

Our original plan was to find a straight path towards the second tower, but… We didn't expect the ground to be completely flat, nor did we expect it to be filled with zom– I mean, humans.

Laura scans the human horde, the wall, and our objective: the keep's second tower from the left. Then, she nods.

"Alright, let's do this."

Perfect! We're following my plan, but it's Laura who approved it. There's nothing Marta can complain about now.

"Lemon, you protect me as I take the lead. Lily, Hellfire on the stairs. Baldy, you… You protect me, too…"

I don't know, just do something useful.

Everybody nods in agreement, and I start running while channeling another Chain Lighting. I aim the spell at the archers and soldiers stationed on the narrow wall, and about eight of them 'die' to my lightning.

I shove them off the wall as I run. We must advance as fast as possible before the Paladins climb the wall and block it.

"Lemon, tell me if the griffin knights show up…"

"They're already here, brother!" Clara cheerfully says from right behind me.

"Why didn't you tell me!?"

"Because I was watching the ground until you said so?" I can't see her, but I'm sure she's tilting her head right now with a foolish grin on her face. Or she would, if she had a face. "Brother, duck!"

I duck, and something huge passes right above my head, followed by an eagle-like cry.

Shiiit! That was close! If a griffin swoops in and grabs one of us, we're dead meat. When they drop us, the fall will kill us instantly.

…Well, everyone but Ricard. But even then, he won't survive the onslaught of the human horde below after the fall. You must admit that the sight of a zombie-like human horde killing an undead obsessed with collecting human souls sounds like an amazing spectacle. Karma? Divine retribution?

I'll have to test it one day. I just have to fool Ricard into a human dungeon I've previously scouted, he'll surely agree, and then… Hahaha!

"Lily, Baldy, keep the griffins busy! And Lemon, you carry me."

Running, shoving obstacles off the wall, casting spells, and aiming them while avoiding the griffins, while giving orders at the same time? That's way too much, even for me!

"Sure thing!" I can feel Clara's tentacles envelop me. Ugh, I'm going to regret this… "But what about my passive drain?"

"Don't worry about it…" No, wait. It is important. "Lily! Keep healing me!" I add yet another order.

Saving up EP and MP doesn't matter as much as usual. Our goal isn't to kill the enemies but to avoid them. As long as we reach the dungeon core, even if we're in rags by then, if we're alive, everything will be worth it.

We continue like this for about three or four minutes. The appearance of the griffin knights has slowed our progress significantly, which in turn has given the units on the ground time to climb up the wall, slowing our progress even more.

It's then that we reach a dead end.

"I knew this would happen…" Say Laura from behind. "What now?"

"Hmm…"

I observe the flood of humans pouring out of the tower in front of us. Like real-life castles, this one features several towers that split the wall into various segments. The towers serve both as a defensive point, in case a wall segment falls, and as a place to climb up. Now, right in front of us, a true horde of humans is continuously pouring through.

"I saw the Paladins go inside a while ago," adds Ricard.

Wait. The Paladins and Royal Guards, the most dangerous units, are inside that tower right now? Then, even if we try to force our way through, we'll inevitably face them!

But at the same time, that gives us a chance. If they're inside, that means…

"Why don't we jump down and run to the second tower?" I propose, climbing down from Clara's disgusting back.

Why use stairs filled with enemies when it's shorter to jump? Not like we risk breaking our leg because this is a game anyway…

Once again, I look towards Laura, waiting for her to approve my idea. Tsk! This is getting tiresome.

"Jump…"

Laura's eyes move from the tower blocking our way to the ground below. We've killed quite a few humans, and a lot more are struggling to climb up the walls. The streets are still filled with humans, but they're mostly useless rabble like Farmers or Soldiers.

"It sounds good," she nods. "What do you say, Baldy? Up for killing a horde of humans?"

"Kill humans? I'm ALWAYS up to it! Hahahahahaha!" Ricard hasn't finished speaking, but he has already jumped down and has activated Whirlwind to open a path forward. And all that while laughing like a lunatic.

Sigh… there he goes again. I'm sure he'll stop once he remembers there are no 'souls' to obtain today…

…Maybe.

"A good team player understands how to mesh with their team. A good team player understands their companion's strengths and weaknesses, as well as their personalities, and is ready to cover for them if the need arises. It sounds easy, but believe me: it isn't.

It's hard to be a good player, but even harder to be a good team player."

- Tip from a random DMA player.

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