Dusk (BL Light Novel)

[- Abrea: Just what the hell is going on here? And what is this place supposed to be? It's deep inside a cave, and yet it’s lit up like a shrine. If I’d come alone, I’d have thought I was hallucinating.]

[- Abrea: Anyway, it seems like we’re being told to go through that castle gate... But since we don’t even know where this is, I’m not moving forward blindly. Let’s report to HQ first and investigate this place more thoroughly before deciding whether to go in.]
The script ended and the quest completion window popped up. I clicked the “Complete” button, and a small amount of reputation was awarded before the quest closed out.
That “child” Adam vaguely alluded to must’ve been that millet-sized angel thing earlier. It led us here and disappeared through the gate, so whatever the gods tried to hide is probably waiting inside that dungeon behind it.

What the hell was the so-called god trying to cover up if it’s got an entire hidden story attached? I was dying to know—but unfortunately, there was no way to enter the dungeon and find out right now. ZeroSoft always patches in the dungeon and then locks it for a week before opening it. So if I wanted to see the next part of the story, I’d have to sit on my hands and wait until next week.
Clicking my tongue, I stopped recording the video I’d been capturing this whole time. Then a thought hit me: Should I send this footage to Retaking? The guy was obsessed with lore.
The hidden storyline for the Holy Guardians hadn’t been leaked anywhere on the forums yet, so no one even seemed to know that Abrea was involved in it. Wouldn’t he love getting a full file of everything that just happened?

I opened my file explorer and dug through for the video. I was just trying to check the file size. It didn’t have any combat scenes, so it probably wasn’t big enough to need splitting. When I checked the file, it came out to 6.68GB. Should be fine to send it via drive upload.
[Guild] Honeybread: You done farming?
[Guild] NicknamesAreAllTaken: Yepㅎㅎ

[Guild] Ceylontea: Yeah
[Guild] Ceylontea: Why?
Alright. First step to sending Retaking the file.

[Guild] Honeybread: Let’s go grief
Ask him if he wants the video footage… after killing him.
“Griefing,” in this context, referred to invading the enemy race’s territory and relentlessly attacking—claiming the area, refusing to back down, and just generally being a menace. If you griefed a low-level zone as a high-level, you’d get flamed for bad manners. But griefing a high-level zone was just PvP—no shame in it.

It wasn’t even rare. It happened every couple of days. Sometimes players would grief right outside enemy dungeons or around key NPC hubs with heavy foot traffic. Occasionally, they’d go all the way to the enemy’s main base.
And those base raids? That was where the real fun began. If you could swarm the respawn point and keep enemies frozen there (they stayed invulnerable if they didn’t move after respawning), kill every player and NPC in sight, and even take down the super beefy base commander NPC with their giant HP bar and insane attack stats—then it was practically our server for a while. Of course, when reinforcements came and the NPCs respawned, we’d get completely wiped out in return.
I’d already tasted that chaos, so unless we were griefing the main base, I wasn’t even interested. That’s why when I suddenly suggested griefing, Ceylontea and Nickjung were clearly surprised.

[Guild] Ceylontea: ???
[Guild] NicknamesAreAllTaken: ??
[Guild] Ceylontea: You?? What’s going on;?
[Guild] Honeybread: Want to ask Retaking something

Retaking always followed a pattern. Especially on days like today. I could already guess what he’d do—after finishing his main quest, he’d start speculating about lore with his viewers, then head out to farm.
So no need to wander around wondering where he’d pop up. All we had to do was camp the farming dungeon.
[Guild] Ceylontea: What could you possibly want to ask him that justifies this? lolololol

[Guild] Ceylontea: I’m in tho ^^
[Guild] NicknamesAreAllTaken: Is it okay if I bring my warrior?
[Guild] Honeybread: Go for it

[Guild] NicknamesAreAllTaken: Let’s gooooo @!
Once they gave the green light, I sent out the party invites.
[Party] Ceylontea has joined the party.

[Party] NicknamesAreAllTaken has joined the party.
[Guild] Honeybread: Posting the recruitment
[Guild] Ceylontea: Let’s gooo

I opened the party window and hit the “Recruit Party Members” button. I set the minimum item level and rank for applicants, thought for a second about what to type, then posted something quick and dirty.
[Race Chat] Honeybread: Griefing 13th Outpost LET’S GOOO
[Race Chat] Angel: ?

[Race Chat] ImHyojin: ?
[Race Chat] Care: LOL it’s Honeybread
[Race Chat] GoodToCU: Honeybread’s griefing?

[Race Chat] BreakUpWithMe: LMAO required rank is Supreme Commander, are you serious
[Race Chat] ByeBye: Supreme Commander? None of us can even join lmfaoooo
[Race Chat] Honeybread: Supreme Commander or above is fine

[Party] Slayer has joined the party.
Oh. That name was familiar.
A well-known assassin ranker I often saw out in the field. Friendly with both me and my guildmates, Ceylontea and Nickjung.

[Party] Slayer: heyoo
[Party] Ceylontea: 55555 hey hey hey hey
[Party] Honeybread: yo yo

[Party] NicknamesAreAllTaken: Hello~!
[Party] Slayer: Oh lol, both Ceylon and Nickjung are here, this is gonna be good b
[Party] Ceylontea: Today we’ve got the #1 and #2 assassins teaming up to demolish Outpost 13 ^^b

[Party] Slayer: ^^b
[Party] Slayer: I’ll try to learn a thing or two today
[Race Chat] Angel: Hey Bread, mind if we form another party and grief together?

[Race Chat] Honeybread: yeah lol go for it
[Race Chat] Angel: lololol thanks
[Race Chat] QuitAlready: ilvl 202 Commander DPS grief party@@@@

[Race Chat] MintChocoPapi: ilvl 206 General Priest grief support!!!
[Race Chat] Angel: Griefing Outpost 13, raid minimum ilvl 200 Officer @#@@@@@@
Normally, if you announced your party this loud, some mole on our faction would leak it to the enemy side. So most grief parties went lowkey. But since /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ summoning Retaking was the whole point, it was better this way. If one of his viewers went, “Hey, Retaking, Honeybread’s griefing 13th Outpost,” that’d be perfect.

[Party] NicknamesAreAllTaken: So we’ve got 1 tank, 2 assassins, and 1 DPS... all physical. No mage or healer. Yikes.
[Party] Slayer: Hmm.
[Party] Slayer: I’ll grab a priest I know. Hold tight.

[Party] Ceylontea: Mage?
[Party] Slayer: Yeah, Destruction Priest.
[Party] Ceylontea: Coincidentally, Kosho wants in too. Should we pull her in?

[Party] Ceylontea: That’d make a full party easy.
[Party] Honeybread: Just Kosho? What about Sogo?
[Party] Ceylontea: Sogo said she has to go to her part-time job.

[Party] Honeybread: Ohh okay
[Party] Ceylontea: For now, let’s go in as six. If anyone else joins, I’ll let you know.
[Party] Honeybread: Cool

[Party] SeaSnailShell has joined the party.
[Party] SeaSnailShell: hiii~!~
[Party] FlipItIfItsPancake has joined the party.

[Party] FlipItIfItsPancake: HI
The party chat immediately filled with greetings. Even SeaSnailShell—usually one of the quiet ones—was unusually chatty today.
Holy Guardian Lv. 45 | Honeybread
Warrior Slayer Lv. 45 | NicknamesAreAllTaken
Assassin Slayer Lv. 45 | Ceylontea
Assassin Slayer Lv. 45 | Slayer
Destruction Priest Lv. 45 | FlipItIfItsPancake
Combat Medic (Harmonizer) Lv. 45 | SeaSnailShell

1 tank, 3 physical DPS, 1 magic DPS, 1 healer. It leaned a little too physical-heavy, but honestly, this was a solid griefing comp. Plus, everyone here was ranked Supreme Commander or above—top-tier players. Even with a few missing pieces in the party comp, we’d be fine. Though the healer might get a little stressed.
After setting my priority target list for who to protect first, I jumped into the party banter with a nonsense comment.
[Party] Honeybread: Everyone ready?

[Party] FlipItIfItsPancake: yes sir
[Party] Slayer: lololol your keyboard can’t type Korean and it’s cracking me up. I’m ready too lol
[Party] Ceylontea: yes ^^d

[Party] SeaSnailShell: me too lol ready!
[Party] NicknamesAreAllTaken: I think so?? Just in case, I’ll grab a few more potions—go ahead without me if needed~ㅎㅎ
[Party] Honeybread: okok then let’s go 45

Still in the quest zone, I opened my inventory, clicked on a teleport scroll, and selected Outpost 45. The loading screen ended, a chime signaled I’d entered a conflict zone, and the field view came into focus. I spotted Ceylontea, who—as always—was dressed in some absurd color combo I couldn’t even begin to guess the logic behind.
One by one, the rest of the party loaded in and gathered around. Once Nickjung—the last to arrive—showed up with his potions, we immediately sprinted toward Outpost 13, located at the far western edge of Jeopa-dominated territory.