Chapter 9: 8. Ruins of Genesis – 8

"Hey, let's collab!"

"Sure!"

My reflexes searched for a camera until I finally remember we were in a virtual world. And that he set the camera to automatically record whenever he goes online.

"Haha! Me too! You see the camera?"

"Camera?"

I searched for a floating camera icon that appeared when I recorded my playthrough.

"Hmm? It really can't be seen, huh?"

"Eh?"

"I thought they were trolling me. Don't worry, just stay by my side. Don't blame me if you were to appear sideways in my stream the entire time."

She then moved her hands in a similar way a photographer holds their camera. So it appears only the one recording can see the camera.

"Okay. It's going to be exciting from here. Don't worry, the previous wave only occurred 3 minutes after the warning so chill!"

She then counted from three while pulling Jenjen beside her.

"Okay! Hello everyone!"

She exaggeratedly waved her hands Jenjen felt he needs to go along.

"Those evil monsters will attack again! But don't worry! I have a secret weapon against them, guys!"

Her excitement has gone through the roof... or whatever remains on the higher floors.

"Wuuu! I'm so traumatized when they attacked a poor defenseless me! Wuuu!"

She's excited for someone traumatized.

"But now! We can take revenge against them! Muahahaha! KILL THEM ALL!"

Jenjen swore that she just called those players who liked fighting barbaric recently.

"Follow me! I know a good spot!"

Rachelle and Jenjen ran into the staircase. Now that Jenjen saw the staircase up close, he's surprised it remained intact despite the earthquake.

"We should be safe here! I know everything, so don't be scared. Let big sis guide you!"

I don't need your guidance, 'big sis'. Jenjen thought.

"He's the leader of the method one faction. His name is-"

"Just call me Juniper. We needed more young blood in this war."

He shook our hands with determination in his eyes. Are we going to Afghanistan? Jenjen thought.

Rachelle saluted him and then asked, "So, what nationality are you?"

Juniper froze from her question. The same person then stared into my eyes, perhaps asking for a hint.

"It's a joke, you see, during her stream, she was asked-"

Jenjen then narrated a 2-minute tale from history.

"Oh! Okay..."

Juniper still looked into my eyes. Begging for a way out of this cringe?

"Okay, okay. Uhmmm, right. Let's get into it! They should appear anytime."

Juniper stood at the top of the staircase preparing a flashy bow.

Rachelle then uttered words in a very low sound. What is she doing?

Jenjen then realized he's been passive the entire time. He saw a shield beside Juniper and took it for himself. Contrary to Rachelle, he became louder and more energetic than ever, narrating whatever it is for his third video.

The quiet majority became the noisiest at the appearance of a flame elemental. Everyone is excited to finally slash their newfound nemesis. The elemental then transformed into a flaming grasshopper, jumping over everyone's head. With the excess energy and a general lack of discipline, friendly fire is as common as stupidity.

"Everyone! Distance yourselves! Those who hold a weapon, go to the front!"

Juniper then gave clear instructions to players according to their weapons.

After Juniper's commands, Jenjen, wanting to get out of his passive state, talked endlessly about his observations as if his audience is blind and brought up his useless reaction to Juniper's flashy action, with complete disregard that Juniper is right beside him, and that he's louder than him.

"GUYS, CAN YOU SEE IT? THERE ARE SO MANY SWORDS! THEY ARE SO LUCKY! AND LOOK, IS THAT A STAFF? CAN THEY USE MAGIC? MAN, JUNIPER IS GREAT AT LEADING. I BELIEVE HE HAS A FUTURE IN E-SPORTS."

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Before long, a pack of elementals appeared from the cracks and holes of the rabble from the destruction of the second and third floors.

Juniper, having met people worse than Jenjen, decided to ignore him.

"Jenjen, use the shield to defend. Bash it to attack the incoming elementals."

Jenjen then gave an improper military salute.

Just 30 minutes ago, Juniper made a battle plan that will satisfy the 800 members of the Method-one faction: Just Attack Plan. It's so simple anyone can follow it. And now, that simple battle plan has shown results.

"Commander, seeing the battlefield, it's so chaotic. We outnumber them, and yet we can't defeat them. The majority just swing their weapons everywhere with no regard for their fellow allies. The flame elementals are too powerful. There are even people who get scared and logged out."

"... Don't call me Commander, and we can't afford a more complicated plan. The equipment has too many varieties we can't divide everyone into small groups. The terrain is a surprise. Some are too narrow. Some are too wide. But the majority is too dangerous. We can't even climb the hell out of it. And most importantly, people who can fight are too few. Their past life must be so great they have forgotten how to fight."

"Okay, I get it. I thought there was a cool action plan."

Just as he speaks, Jenjen is also on the lookout for interesting scenes. He found a group of players roleplaying as a typical adventurer team. The one in the front acts as defense with his offhand shield and a sword. The other one holds a great sword. There is also a priest and mage archetype with their clothes and their staff, and a hunter with a bow in between. In front of them are two flame elementals transformed into flaming unarmed humans.

During the fight, the one holding the shield became the main attacker, holding down one of the flame elementals. The one holding the great sword is too slow to fully swing the heavy weapon he failed to pin down the second elemental, which then attacked the healer behind them. The mage successfully cast the spell on the enemy, killing it instantly alongside the healer beside it. In the meantime, the first elemental ran away and attacked the mage instead. The hunter then used his bow to attack the elemental. The result is that it was missed. The arrow then strikes the other unlucky player near them who is also struggling to fight a flaming grasshopper. The second elemental was only neutralized right after the mage died by the one holding a greatsword.

Seeing the typical adventurer group's disastrous result, Jenjen can't help but ask how did they manage to fend off the enemies during the previous wave.

At the same time, Juniper finally unleashed the magical flashy bow and arrow. Jenjen is pretty sure he only saw a single arrow and yet it multiplied to 10 mid-air. The ten magical arrows all fell into 8 flaming elementals, with 2 of them falling into the two unlucky players.

"Amazing!" Jenjen didn't forget to record that magnificent scene. "Can you do it again?"

"Sure! It only has a slight cooldown which is manageable."

Jenjen was extremely jealous of that overpowered bow. But then, another flashy magic appeared near him. Rachelle shouted "ENERGY BEAM!", and after that, a large beam of light appeared, instantly killing 4 flame elementals while bringing severe casualties to 6 players who happened to be there at her ENERGY BEAM! Now, Jenjen sees another overpowered weapon worth getting jealous over.

The fight goes on and the same set of events happened again and again until a small remaining number of flame elementals retreated into small cracks of the walls.

A floating text box appeared at the end of the fight.

[Update: You have successfully defended against the second wave of hostile entities. The next wave will be exactly 60 minutes later.

A bonus Reward goes to @TotallyNotRachelle for achieving the highest contribution during the second wave.

Reminder: Important information such as the time of the next wave, statistics of kills-deaths-assist ratio, confirmation of the end of combat, and everything else will only be provided during the tutorial. It is up to players to obtain the necessary information for their accepted quests.

Note: It is also up to the requestor if he/she wishes to provide additional bonuses to excellent players.]

Jenjen gets more jealous when he found out that the overpowered ENERGY BEAM! is more than enough to land a bonus reward.

[Evaluating @Jenjen's combat competency... Rating: Terrible. Reward: 2XP]

"Two XP? Just how few is that?"

"Eh, few? I only got one!"

"At least you got one! I got none at all!"

Jenjen raised his voice out of rage, and now, it appears he is not alone with this terrible reward. Other players near him also talked about it.

"We don't even know our level. How come we could care about it?"

"Rachelle just announced she got 40XP... Yeah, all that for 40XP, so cheap."

"Does anyone know how much XP we need to level up?"

"Nah, no one. There's nothing on the status screen at all!"

"Wait, status? I don't know that. How can I see it?"

"Don't believe him. There's only one menu option."

For Jenjen and everyone else, their anger is completely justified. It had been the worst 10 minutes with the majority of them dying for nothing only to find out it's a fruitless endeavor.

Jenjen thought, now that I have recorded tons of content, it is time to return and edit it. Should I inform my collab... Nah Rachelle just left me after casting that cheat ability.

As he thought, Rachelle is now surrounded by her newfound fans who are curious to know where she got her new power.

Just as he is going to log out, he is greeted by an acquaintance with a pick axe.

"My friend!"

A 16-year-old Chinese teen is waving his free right hand to him.

"I climbed the third floor. Wanna join us?"