Chapter 3

Jax awoke the next morning to some humming. He opened his eyes to see Summer checking her equipment. "Morning," He said, sitting up. Jax stretched and yawned before putting on his equipment. Today was the day to beat the first boss. At least that WAS the plan

"Morning." the young girl said. "Hey, I know you just woke up but do you know where someone could get a scythe?"

"All I know is you need curved blade fragments. Nobody got the item to drop in the beta." Jax said, looking down. "Sorry."

"It's alright." Summer said

"Let's wake the others and get down to breakfast" Jax said. "We should let the others get some training after that."

"I agree we should have everyone around the same level." Summer said

A message popped up in front of Jax. He quickly read it and sent one back to the sender, "You go wake everyone up. I have somewhere to go" With that Jax left, leaving Summer alone in the room

Jax went to a small alleyway a bit away from the inn. It led to a clearing that was only a small circular area with just buildings surrounding it. "I'm here." Jax said as he reached the center

"Good of you to come." A woman's voice came from behind him

"My best friend asks me to be somewhere to meet her after a month of not hearing a word from her. Kinda had to see what was going with you." Jax said. The woman walk towards him till she was five feet in front of him

She had short pink hair. She also had beginner swordsman equipment but unlike Jax her shirt was pink rather than blue. "I need your help."

"Not yet," he said. "First Liz tell me what was going on with you." Jax said sitting on the cirb.

Liz sighed and sat next to him. "I'm only level 9. I met up with a few people here and they allowed me to team up with them for the raid against the boss. I've been trying to level up my smithing skills."

"Same old Liz trying to be a blacksmith." Jax said, smiling, putting his hand on her shoulder. "Anyway we didn't come to chat about the boss raid or our levels. Why did you want to meet me?"

"Straight to the point as ever, aren't you Jax?" Liz said. "Fine I want to disband from the party I'm in and enter your party. At least just for this raid."

"Why team up with other people just to leave them?" Jax asked. "And if it was because you didn't know if I made it in. I told you I was and here I am. Still alive even though 2000 people have died. Liz, tell me why?"

"Fine I feel better with you and your party then the party I'm in." Liz said which didn't shock Jax but his lackluster of an expression shocked LIz. "Ahem anyway I feel that if I go with your party I'd have a better chance of survival."

"What is the highest level among the players that you're partying with right now?" Jax asked, opening his menu and looking at his party. Liz did the same and looked at her party.

"13, why?" Liz asked. Then a message popped up adding her to Jax's party. With a warning message that she would disband from her current party. She accepted the party invite.

"Our lowest level is now you." Jax said as he got up and started to walk out of the clearing. Then he looked back to Liz when he was about 20 feet away. "You coming or what? We need to grind you up."

Liz smiled and ran but when caught up she started talking to him about nothing in particular.

Jax left Summer. "Damn, I didn't get to talk to him about what I really wanted to talk to him about." Summer said to herself. "Well time to get the others and do some early morning grinding."

She opened her menu, put on her equipment and walked out of Jax's room. She then went to wake the other girls but was surprised to see Raven and Luna up already and Winter starting to get up. "Wow you girls are up already." Summer said shocked

"Of course Rubes, you think we would sleep in when we're taking down the first boss." Raven said

"Raven, remember no real names…" Luna warned and started

"Even nicknames can have consequences." Winter finished.

Then a name popped under Luna's. "...Lisbeth… who is that?" Summer asked. The girls shrugged their shoulders. "Maybe that's who Jax went to meet." Summer thought.

"Looks like she's with Jax and she's our lowest level party member now." Winter said.

"But why would Jax add her to the party?." Luna said.

"Probably an old friend." Raven said. "But sitting wondering about it isn't going to help our grinding. Let's get to it." The girls nodded in agreement and left the room to get breakfast and start their grind.

Jax has been helping Liz grind for the past hour on a repeatable quest that gives good XP and only takes 10 minutes to do. "Okay Liz, do you think you can do it yourself?" Jax asked. He liked hanging out with Liz but the quest was repeatable and boring. Just take out some slimes that made it close to town.

"Yeah I think I can do it on my own… But you'll be close by right?" Liz said.

"I'm not leaving you out there alone." Jax said. He knew he could just leave her to do the quest a few more times on her own to at least match Winter's level. But in all honesty he couldn't leave her. He was "training" her and didn't want to skip out halfway through.

"Um Jax… What is the King slime?" Liz asked.

"Liz there is no such thing. At least on Floor 1" Jax said and laughed but stopped when Liz showed him. "Well we have a problem."

"What, you can take that out right?" Liz asked

"That's a Floor 5 boss mob and a floor 10 regular mob. I can't take it out alone. Let me call my friends." Jax said and sent a message to the girls to meet him.

The girls met him 20 minutes later. "Alright I know we are supposed to take out the first boss but we have to fight a King Slime." Jax said

"Isn't that supposed to be a boss mob on a higher floor?" Winter pointed out

"It could just be a glitch but I would rather have strength in numbers and be overpowered than just go alone and be underprepared." he said. "So you girls ready?"

They all nodded. But Liz stopped him as they made their way to the quest area. "You think you, me, and these girls will be enough?"

"I asked for help from an old friend and he said he'd help. He should be here by now" Just then Jax saw Kritio running towards him.

"Sorry I got caught up with something. So what do you need help with?" Kirito asked. Jax nodded to Liz and she showed him the quest. "A King Slime. You gotta be kidding me."

"I wish I was but it doesn't look like it." Jax told him and noticed Winter flipping through the guidebook. "Checking on the King Slimes abilities?" Jax asked her

"Yep and here it is… how are we supposed to kill this when we have smaller slimes to contend with." she asked looking up at me

Instead of answering though, Jax just looked at Kirito and asked a question with one word. "Level?"

Kirito just looked at him and said "20"

:"Alright I say we break up into two teams. Team A which will consist of Raven, Luna. Liz and Winter will take down the smaller slimes. Try to keep the slimes away from us. Team B which leaves Kirito, Summer and I will try and take down the boss." Jax said and the others nodded somewhat in agreement. "Let's go"

They ran outside to take down the King Slime and it was huge. Some groups were fighting the King Slime but it didn't look like they did much to it. It didn't help that they were only attacking the boss and not focusing on the smaller slimes. "What's a floor 5 boss doing here?"

"Doesn't matter take him down:"

"Team A take out those smaller slimes now. Summer Kirito let's go" The two teams went their separate ways,

The King Slime jumped and landed on someone just before Team B got there, killing them. Jax just looked at the other two and silently asked them… "Ready?" They nodded. "Winter, where was the weak spot again?" Jax asked. He went straight forward towards it as Kirito and Summer went for the sides of the boss

"The eyes. According to the guide book that deals massive damage." Winter said

Jax noticed a shield guy and ran up to him. "Hey I need you for something?"

"A boost?" Jax looked at him confused on how he knew that then he said "I heard your friend "

"Yeah. Wait till I say 'now'. That's when I'll need the boost." Jax said and ran back to deal… less than chip damage to the King Slime. Then all of a sudden it jumped up. "NOW!" Jax yelled. The dude ducked and put his shield up. He pushed off as the guy pushed him off his shield. Jax made it above the King Slime and stabbed it in the eye. It dealt a lot of damage. The bad part was Jax's sword was in the eye and wouldn't come out. He was also going down… fast.

"NOW! He heard Summer yell and the shield guy boosted Summer just a bit and she caught Jax so he didn't take any damage from the fall. They landed in a pile and Jax maneuvered so Summer landed on top of him. With the King Slime next to them. When Summer picked up her head all Jax and Summer could do was look into each other's eyes.

"I'm going to finish this." Kirito said, climbing up the King Slime and stabbing it in its other eye. It also brought Summer and Jax back to reality. And more importantly killed the King Slime. Summer got off Jax and offered him a hand up which he took.

"Thanks for catching me Summer and killing the boss Kirito." Jax and they both nodded in acknowledgement. Everyone could hear cheering as Jax looked behind him and showed that his party had gathered quite an audience. "Is… everybody safe?" He said turning back to his party as he didn't know what to tell the cheering crowd.

"I'm still pumped to fight." Raven said

"More or less." Luna said

"I could do with a rest." Winter said

"I'll go and turn in the quest." Liz said heading towards town.

"I'll go with Liz\" Summer said and ran off to go catch up with her.

"And I'm okay." Kirito said and tossed Jax his sword which of course Jax caught and put on his back.

"That was a fight." Jax said.

Just then the guy in blue armor appeared to them. "That was not an easy task. Were you going to be part of our raid group to take down the first boss?"

"Yeah my party was. Kirito here is not part of my party but was going to take part in the raid as well." Jax said

"Well we were about to go after the boss room. It would be amazing to have your teams skills If you are not too tired from defeating the King Slime please come with us" The man said

Jax looked at the time it was 2:30. Jax and Kirito looked at each other and chuckled. "Guess time got away from us." Liz and Summer got back.

"Jax we got a problem." Liz said when she got back to his side.

"We just dealt with a problem. What could it possibly be this time?" Jax asked a little annoyed

"The quest. It won't restart. Apparently so many people did this starting quest that when someone continuously did this quest the King Slime was supposed to be there to protect its children. I don't think the game creators thought many people would do this quest as many times as I did." Liz explained.

"Well that does seem to be a problem. But do you have enough energy to take on a boss with more people?" Jax asked and looked over his party and at Kirito

"I always get a second wind for that." Kirito said. "You should know that better than anyone."

"I can still fight." Summer said

"I want to get out of this floor" Winter said

"It would be nice to get higher." Luna said

"The faster we clear this first floor the faster we can get out of here." Raven said

"I guess." Liz said

"Liz if you're not ready for this then we don't have to be part of this raid."

"No!" She yelled which scared Jax. She only yelled at him when she was mad at him. "I'm sorry for yelling that but I want to help you clear this floor. I… I want to help. I want to fight."

Jax turned to the man in the armor. "Lead the way."

The armored man smiled. "My name is Diabel." he said, extending his hand out to Jax.

Jax told everyone else to introduce themselves and when everyone did he took the hand and said. "And that leaves me to be Jax"

Diabel turned and looked at everyone. "The King Slime has been destroyed. Now let's get the boss for this floor." Everyone cheered. Then the huge raid party walked towards the boss room.

A/N: I know this was a long chapter. I know I said I was going to make this better then the last time I did this story but I'm trying. Next Chapter will be the boss