In the middle of the southern desert, amid the haze heat, a sight foreign to this world had appeared, hovering in the air. It was as if someone had cast a powerful floating spell upon a castle. On top of that, water seemed to endlessly pour from the elaborate decorative stone works. Most of this water disappeared as it fell to the desert sands below, however, some of this water began to collect, forming a unique oasis of sorts just below the floating castle. Desert dwellers, animals and people alike, flocked to this new sight, the water having been their motivation.
The chambers deep within the castle however, were still with a quiet and tense worry amid the 8 players present. There was the Barbarian warrior and healer that Night Silver killed first, they were currently sitting in less than praiseworthy ways. Sitting directly opposite them in a modified lotus position, grumbling internally at his failure, he was the one that Brightness and company had managed to kill.
Sitting in a more fancy looking chair, there sat a woman. She was pretty like an honest to goodness princess, but held herself as if she was a queen. Her classes reflected her role, so even as a level 100 player, she was only capable of mustering about the same combat proficiency as a level 85 player… That is, if she refuses to use her world class item, which temporarily changes her non-combat focused classes to ones that do focus on combat.
Then there were the other four members which included the elven fencer Hougan. These four had their own way of dealing with their instant deaths, some more instant than others. Hougan in particular was lamenting his rather painful death.
"So, it looks like you got your asses handed to you-" The Princess looking player said in a disappointed tone. Then she covered her mouth and narrowed her eyes. "Apologies, I meant to say, thank you for fighting so hard on my behalf gentlemen. So what are our spoils this time around?"
Everyone scowled, but the monk, sitting criss-cross pounded the table. "Quit it with all that, guild master. You already know how bad it was, don't you?"
"Pfft, I know how bad you did, but I wasn't able to see the others' failures. So I'm curious. How did our resource hunt go, Hougan?"
Hougan gulped. "The four of us killed 30 dragons, 6 escaped us, but those ones were heavily wounded." I really can't bear to mention the name… Of that woman!
"Oh? You look distressed Hougan. Is there perhaps something else you left out? You did well to kill 36 dragons, even if you only collected 30 of their corpses." Hougan just twitched when I said 36? I wonder… Is it possible we weren't the only players brought here? If someone else is here, to kill all 6 of them, in short order, would require no less than double that at 12, but this was done nearly instantly… So perhaps it's 24 players? I'll ask him this… "Hougan, what guild was it that killed all of you? Our next move will change based on your answer." She raised a glass of a reddish purple wine, swirled it around, sniffed with a calm smile and took a sip.
Hougan swallowed as he slumped down into his own chair, eyeing the wine that one of their castle maid NPCs had just poured for him. "It was… The Druid of Night Silver… And she is far stronger than I remember."
The guild master, also roleplaying as a princess that roleplayed as a queen, broke character and spit her wine across the table. There's no way I heard that right. I'll have to get some clarification. "Sorry, but I fear I may have misheard you, and over reacted as a result. I thought you said The Druid of Night Silver, but that must have been the wrong thing, did you mean the guild that went by a similar name, Silver Druid Knights, by chance?"
Hougan remained silent, and drank his own wine. "No, you heard right the first time. We were chasing after some dragons, and then before we knew we had been led into a trap. We didn't stand a chance."
The Barbarian warrior spoke up next. "She also seems to have given birth to several children, and these children are capable of taking on dragon form." He sighed. "It's no surprise she killed us so ruthlessly, after we targeted her children while in dragon form. Any mother would do the same."
"I'm not sure it's the same one though. Those dragon girls seemed to be 60 years or older. At least the ones I saw."
The guild master relaxed and sat back in her chair. "Then perhaps it's not something we need to worry too much about? After all, we did just arrive after the server shut down. How could she have arrived here more than 60 years ahead of us?"
Hougan, being well familiar with Night Silver, shook his head. "It is definitely her. She recognized me, plain as day. I'm not sure what happened to have such a difference in our arrival times, but we should be wary of this fact, we know she has at least 65 years of establishing herself here, this alone would have put us at a disadvantage." He paused… Should I also mention that other thing she said… "She also said that the dragons we killed wouldn't be respawning. Almost as if this world isn't just an updated version of Yggdrasil."
"What a dumbass. There's no way that's true. Watch, even if it's the longest of timers in the game, we only need to give it a few years and those dragons will definitely respawn." The queen scoffed.
"And if they don't respawn?"
"Then we will just have to worry about that when the time comes… Though, we should probably hold onto as many high level items as we can. Just in case we can't properly replenish the supplies." We should also focus on our own image a bit. Perhaps we should pay attention to those below us… "Alright, while we think of a strategy, let's begin building a city beneath our castle. It will help to improve our image. And… It will serve as a great starting place to take over the world." She smirked, receiving a smirk from everyone else.