Dusk (BL Light Novel)

[Weak Point Reinforcement: Guardian – Detecting Guardian’s energy. Enters an Attack Power Up state.]
[Weak Point Reinforcement: Harmonizer – Detecting Harmonizer’s energy. Enters an Attack Power Up state.]
Reading the buff names and descriptions made me feel a little relieved. Looked like the golem had recognized our party comp—tank and healer, basically a team with godawful DPS—and decided to compensate by only buffing its own attack power. The fact that we’d shaved 6% off its HP in the opening phase meant its base defense wasn’t so high that we couldn’t manage even with just a tank-healer duo. If we’d both come in as DPS, I bet the game would’ve stacked two layers of defense buffs instead to balance things.

Retaking must’ve relaxed too—he jumped a few times behind me. Gamer instinct. When you’re in a good mood, you mash the spacebar to show it.
[Party] Retaking: Flag
[Party] Retaking: Picked it back up ^^

…That bastard probably just meant he was relieved that, despite the flag he set earlier, the golem didn’t seem like it was gonna be a slog to kill after all.
[Party] Honeybread: don’t
[Party] Honeybread: forget

[Party] Honeybread: there’s
[Party] Honeybread: still
[Party] Honeybread: one left

He seemed to have forgotten he’d planted a death flag on me, so I made sure to remind him—between skill inputs—via chat. His bouncy little jumps suddenly came to a halt.
[Party] Retaking: heh;
The following mechanics weren’t anything special yet. There was a circular AoE around the boss, a cone-shaped AoE aimed at Retaking, and a very obviously labeled tank-buster skill. Since this was a 2-player dungeon, it didn’t seem like there were any party-wide AoEs so far.

Maybe they designed this first boss to be relatively easy. The golem’s low defense made its HP drop at a steady rate, and my own HP was staying stable.
Just when I was starting to feel bad for doubting him over that death flag—it really was a smooth run so far—the golem suddenly raised both arms and started casting a new skill: . I had no idea what that one was.
During the short cast time, I debated whether to head over to Retaking or stay where I was. The name made it harder to guess the mechanic. Was it a shared hit that required us both to take it together? Or a solo-targeted attack where one player has to "mourn" the other? Or something we both needed to dodge entirely?

As I hesitated and paced around indecisively, I figured—it’d be a problem if the healer died to this. If # Nоvеlight # someone had to take the hit, it should be me. So I stopped wobbling back and forth and stood my ground, dealing damage without retreating to the rear.
But it looked like Retaking had a different opinion.
[Party] Retaking: Come here
His judgment was probably better than mine anyway. As soon as I saw his message, I moved to his side and stood behind the golem to continue attacking. Just in case, I cast Moonlight Protection to apply a party-wide damage reduction buff.

The golem’s cast bar emptied. I watched its motion carefully and stepped in front of Retaking, pressing my Shield Block. When a party member stands directly behind you, Shield Block also reduces incoming damage to them—within a certain range.
[“For my children who are already dead…”]
[“I shall scatter your dying breath to bloom a flower of mourning!”]

Then the golem slammed both its fists into the ground. The shock sent Retaking and me into the air—an airborne state where we couldn’t use any skills. While we were still floating, the golem swung its right arm and grabbed Retaking.
Only my character had landed back on the ground. I scrambled to stand up and saw that Retaking was still caught in the golem’s fist. The attack didn’t seem over yet. The golem was winding up to slam the fist—harder—this time.
Yeah, no way. That’s 100% lethal. Even I, the tank, would probably die to that.

I braced myself to strip gear and hit retry if Retaking died. I was already opening the equipment window when suddenly—an unfamiliar alert sound played. A black silhouette of a moth, roughly the size of a child’s fist, appeared at the center of the screen.
‘What the hell?’ I thought—but before I could finish the thought, the dark shape began glowing rapidly. It revealed the wing design used in the Dusk logo—the wings of the Bia race. Just as the image started to shine with that distinctive, dazzling luster associated with the in-game tag “Resplendent,” a soft white light gathered around the silhouette, and a small message appeared beside it:
Press any key.

I hit the spacebar on instinct. Didn’t think, just felt the timing and reacted. The glowing moth flitted in place, then vanished midair.
[Party] Retaking: Looks like I’m gonna die here, huh?
He had no idea what just happened on my screen. He was calmly accepting his fate.

But I didn’t think so. I stared at the screen with heightened focus.
Something was happening. Something new.
The game proved me right. The golem’s massive right fist, ready to crush Retaking, was suddenly intercepted—my character, Honeybread, slammed it aside with his shield. Considering this boss was made of literal earth and boulders, the sheer weight must’ve been massive, but the animation turned it into a full-blown dramatic moment. The golem’s arm recoiled from the blow.

And it didn’t stop there. My character used that momentum to vault onto the golem’s hand. He tossed aside his shield, gripped his sword with both hands, and brought it down with all his might. The hard, rocky surface cracked under the strike, grew brittle, and finally shattered. That crack gave Retaking the opening to escape. His HP was down to about 30%.
The finisher? Chef’s kiss. A clean landing, followed by a smooth recovery motion—my character reached back and scooped up his discarded shield in one hand while glaring up at the golem. My heart thudded like a war drum.
(Meanwhile the medic was stumbling like a baby deer. Truly, a healer to the core.)

Seriously—what the fuck. You put in a move this insanely sick and don’t even say anything about it?
[Party] Retaking: ?
[Party] Retaking: ?

[Party] Retaking: ./?
[Party] Retaking: ??
[Party] Retaking: what was that just now?

Looks like he saw it too. Judging by his reaction, at least. But before I could reply, the golem let out a furious roar and started slamming me with basic attacks, so I had to return to position.
As I got used to the chunky attack animations and started timing my shield blocks better, I noticed Retaking was casting a long-ass spell. One of those skills no one uses because the cast time sucks and the damage’s worse.
But then I realized—

[Party] Retaking: what was that just now???
[Party] Retaking: holy shit please
[Party] Retaking: can we get on VC???

He was casting that useless skill just so he could talk to me. He gave up DPS to type. And yet he refused to give up on DPS altogether. The dedication was admirable.
[Party] Honeybread: no
That was it. Just no.

I was already busy spamming skills to keep up. And he wasn’t even trying to show off by typing mid-cast. He was legit asking to switch to voice chat like this was some serious negotiation. Maybe if we had wiped and couldn’t talk through chat, I’d have considered VC. But no way was he gonna turn on Discord while he was still streaming.
His chat window filled with increasingly desperate pleas and puppy-eyed flattery. I read every single one. And ignored them all.
If he’d sent me a cutesy message through KakaoTalk like last time—maybe. Maybe I’d have wavered. But clearly he was keeping things PG for the stream. Playing it safe. That kind of half-assed resolve wasn’t going to win me over.

Eventually, Retaking gave up. He left a few trailing "ㅠ" faces in chat, then went quiet.
Now that we were repeating familiar mechanics and I was starting to internalize the boss pattern, we picked up speed. The golem’s HP was dropping faster. Most of its attacks were avoidable. Apart from the tank-buster, the mechanics were easy to read. Even the “Flower of Mourning” attack—though it caught us off guard the first time—wasn’t that threatening if you were paying attention.
But something felt… off.

Why?
I’d just used my attack buff, which increased my damage for 20 seconds. This was prime DPS time. So why did I have a bad feeling?
If I had to put it into words, it was like… “Flower of Mourning” was about to start again, the same way it did before—when we got launched into the air and I couldn’t deal damage for ages—and that my buff was about to be completely wasted.

[“For my children who are already dead!”]
My gut feeling was dead-on.