The lack of enthusiasm was glaring. Perhaps practicing raids on these low-level monsters was asking too much. She then offered a new suggestion after some thought.

“Shall we go deeper? The monsters are said to get stronger the deeper we go.”

“Deeper? …I’ve only gone halfway before.”

Low-level monsters, dying with one slice or one attack, were not suitable for understanding individual capabilities and roles in raids. It seemed better to team up to defeat stronger monsters.

“We can use the return skill if it gets dangerous.”

“Alright, let’s make our way north. Attack!”

The self-proclaimed raid leader was Luella, but the team was actually commanded by Kite. At her words, the team that had been grumbling began to lay waste to the surroundings without further complaints.

Kite sheathed his shield and drew his sword, taking the lead and slaughtering monsters. Hagen quickly summoned an offensive type of creature, different from his main defensive type, to clear the regenerating monsters.

Mitchell dealt considerable damage with rapid arrow shots, almost as effective as Lapellian’s area-of-effect magic attacks, taking care of the mobs coming from behind.

“Move faster. Ignore the regenerating monsters behind and keep pushing forward.”

At Luella’s words, Mitchell, who had been dealing with the rear mobs, moved to the front and began to attack.

“Returning later will be another task. We have to do this again.”

Tien sighed as she swung her staff. Being a supporter, her attack power wasn’t strong, but it was sufficient to handle the monsters coming toward Luella.

However, monsters seemed to love the healer class, both in games and reality, and continued to flock toward Luella instead of attacking Kite and the others.

Kueeek.

A monster that Tien missed was quickly taken down by Kite, who said to Lapellian,

“Area-of-effect magic attacks would be better to clear the path. Let’s switch places.”

As Lapellian moved forward, Kite closely stuck next to Luella and said,

“Is it that easy to die even at level 7?”
“What do you take me for! It’s not like that anymore. It has increased by three rooms.”

“My goodness, you’ve become much stronger, Healer.”

With a playful tone, Kite, who was swinging his sword, gave a serious instruction upon seeing the monster that came back to life as soon as he killed it.

“Tien, deal with the guys attacking Luella from behind with Michel. The rate of coming back to life has suddenly become too fast. It’s incomparable to before.”

As they moved inward, the monsters’ respawn rate exceeded imagination. Even if killed, they immediately came back to life and attacked.

“The atmosphere has changed.”

As they broke through the monsters in a frenzy, they found a forest thick with fog. Although there were no buzzing monsters here, the atmosphere was unusually tense for some reason.

An eeriness of stillness. Although it wasn’t a normal forest with the sound of birds or the sound of trees rustling in the wind, there was a certain level of noise; it felt as though they had entered a zero-gravity space where no sound could be heard.

In a silence that felt like even the flow of air had stopped, Luella opened the map to check where they were. On the map, it was simply marked as “forest.”