33: Chapter 33 The Reasons for Not Being Late

The boss area of the Trial of the Troll.

The only entrance slowly opened with a deafening roar, the sound of the heavy stone door scraping against the ground echoing through the empty cave.

The Troll King, who had been snoozing with snot running down its nose in front of the throne, was startled awake. It blinked dazedly and slowly stood up, preparing to welcome the challengers—though, to be fair, "preparing" was just a loose term for picking up the spiked club lying on the ground.

Even this simple, crude movement was troublesome enough for it.

However, when the entrance fully opened, what met its eyes was not the humans who usually came to challenge it, but a group of panicked kin.

Those trolls from the previous area, as if chased by something terrifying, scrambled into the boss room and hid behind it in a blind panic.

"What is going on! Don't you know you aren't allowed to leave your own area?" the Troll King roared angrily, its voice like muffled thunder.

Yet before it could finish speaking, it saw its underlings trembling, their eyes filled with nothing but fear and despair.

An instinctive sense of crisis rippled through its heart, making it involuntarily tense up.

The air was permeated with a scent that was somewhat similar to a troll's, yet extremely repulsive.

This scent triggered its hidden instincts, stirring waves of repulsion and fear deep within its heart.

Like other trolls, the Troll King had low intelligence. It squinted, trying to discern the source of this scent amidst the chaos.

"Running away because you're afraid of humans? For a troll, this is truly shameful!"

It muttered, and finally saw the real intruders—they were humans.

It snorted coldly, appearing dismissive, but for some reason, its agitation grew stronger, and that instinctive unease became increasingly difficult to suppress.

The nature of this anxiety was soon laid bare.

Just as it was struggling to analyze the situation with its limited intelligence, the true challenger appeared.

"Dragon, a dragon!" the Troll King let out a fearful shriek, its voice pitch rising sharply.

Although most viewers believed the Mythical Summoned Beast was omnipotent, Little Jin's ability to suppress the trolls didn't rely on level dominance, but on racial restraint—trolls were originally a servant army created and tamed by the dragon race, and the fear of dragons was engraved deep within their genes.

Even if their levels were equal, this fear stemming from their bloodline was enough to make the trolls completely collapse before the battle even began.

The Troll King's reaction was more intense than any of its minions.

As a pure-blooded troll, it had completely inherited the extreme fear of the dragon race from its ancestors.

Facing Little Jin, who was approaching step by step, its sanity collapsed instantly, and its massive body began to retreat involuntarily.

Behind the boss area was a lava zone connected to the second area; whether it was a player or a troll, falling into it meant certain death.

"Karuma, Kara Kaka!" The minions tried to grab the crazed king, but were flung away by its brute force.

In the end, the Troll King shrieked as it fell into the lava, emitting a shrill wail accompanied by intense burning, its figure instantly swallowed by the fiery red magma.

"Karuma!"

"Karuma!"

The once ferocious trolls gathered around the edge of the lava, crying and wailing in pain. The battlefield, which should have been a bloody scene of carnage, had now become eerie and desolate.

[ "Jin Hao" tipped 50 Yuan. — — (Little Jin is too scary...) ]

[ "Madman" tipped 50 Yuan. — — (Did it jump into the lava to commit suicide because it was too scared?) ]

[ "Caramel" tipped 500 Yuan. — — (So it wasn't Hao carrying the team, it was Little Jin carrying the team.) ]

- "They didn't fight a single battle the whole time..."

- "Is this reasonable?"

Fu Hao, Rebecca, and the others, who had been fully prepared for the boss battle, were now all dumbfounded.

"Running away is one thing, but why jump into the lava..." Fu Hao was also confused, but a dungeon was a dungeon after all; getting the rewards meant victory.

Shortly after the Troll King fell, a massive prompt box popped up:

[ "Trial of the Troll" dungeon cleared ]

[ Clear time: 26 minutes 11 seconds 591 ]

[ Clear time ranking: 1st place ]

[ Clear time and ranking have been recorded on the "Trial of the Troll" dungeon entrance leaderboard ]

"Wow, the system says we're in first place?"

"But we didn't do anything..."

Rebecca and her group had indeed been slacking off for almost the entire run—laying down carpets to play Monopoly in the second area, and spending the rest of the time following behind Fu Hao and Little Jin.

"What did I do? This is all Little Jin's credit." Fu Hao gently rubbed Little Jin's head, and the latter proudly raised its head, flicked its tail onto his shoulder, puffed air from its nostrils, and huffed in a tsundere manner.

"Thanks to me! Do you understand?"

In fact, it didn't know why the trolls were afraid of it, but that didn't stop it from enjoying the credit with peace of mind.

The prompt box continued to scroll:

[ Speedrun record refreshed ]

[ Obtained title "Trial of the Troll [Fastest Clear]" ]

[ This title will disappear when other players refresh the record ]

[ First to achieve "Trial of the Troll No-Hit Clear" achievement ]

[ Obtained title "Trial of the Troll [First No-Hit Clear]" ]

"Is this the speedrun title Fu Hao was talking about?"

"And what is a first-kill no-hit clear?"

"Do trial dungeons always give out titles like this?"

[ "Trial Maniac" tipped 50 Yuan. — — (My title ㅠ.ㅠ) ]

- "So envious!"

- "Are they even human? Winning by lying down and getting two trial titles!"

- "Check the effects quickly!"

Trial Maniac and the viewers were critically hit by the "natural humblebrag" of Rebecca and her group; their feigned ignorance was even more annoying than showing off. The viewers and "Trial Maniac" were full of envy, but the prompt box still hadn't stopped:

[ Due to the "Master of Dungeons" title effect, the first clear reward for the Trial of the Troll has been increased by an additional All Stats +10 ]

[ Achieved "Clear dungeon without killing any monsters" achievement ]

[ Obtained title "Immortal" ]

[ Achieved "100% dungeon contribution with 4+ people" achievement ]

[ Obtained title "Perfect Leader" ]

— — —

NewNew was sprinting all the way, rushing toward the Trial of the Troll dungeon.

"Sigh, I shouldn't have watched Fu Hao's stream yesterday..." she muttered regretfully.

She couldn't resist the temptation to watch the replay last night, ended up oversleeping, and now had to rush desperately. As the guild's recognized "latecomer," she was probably going to get scolded severely by Rebecca this time.

"Rebecca must be furious..." Thinking of the impending lecture, which would last anywhere from ten minutes to half an hour, NewNew's head began to ache. After finally boarding the ferry, she finally had a moment to catch her breath and opened the stream to see what was going on—even if she was late, her passion couldn't be interrupted.

"Second speedrun challenge...?" The stream title made her heart race. Since Fu Hao started streaming, she hadn't missed a single one, and the one that got her most excited was that night when he first speedran the Novice Trial dungeon.

"Could it be... the Trial of the Troll?" Considering that Fu Hao was still at level 100, and that this dungeon was located near the Rowen Kingdom... she could almost be certain.

Sure enough, in the stream, it was that familiar troll terrain.

"If I had come earlier, maybe I could have seen Fu Hao in person..."

But strangely, there was no sign of other teammates on the screen.

"Grouped up with viewers? So envious. Did he recruit them temporarily from the chat?"

NewNew's heart suddenly skipped a beat: the three missing guild members, the dungeon currently being challenged was indeed the Trial of the Troll, and the stream start time...

"No way..."

Just as her heart was racing and sweat was beading on her forehead, in the video, Fu Hao summoned Little Jin, followed immediately by a scream she was all too familiar with. The camera panned, briefly showing the teammates' faces—they were the three people she knew all too well: Rebecca, Mister, and Claude.

NewNew's throat tightened, and she finally squeezed out:

"Damn it!!!"