My Creations Followed Me to Another World-Chapter 11: Boss Fight

Dante stood in the quiet, thorny embrace of the bushes, the silver locket heavy in his hand.

It was cold. Colder than the night air. It felt like a piece of ice, a tangible piece of victory.

He had done it.

He, the Level 2 "Creator," had successfully run a Level 50 "Infiltrator" on a perfect retrieval mission.

He had the bonus loot. The main boss was incapacitated. The trash mobs were unaware.

’This is it.’

This was that surge of pure gamer. The feeling of a plan perfectly executed.

He was in absolute control.

[Creator Mana: 20/20].

His regen had already topped him off.

"Creator...?" Shivvy whispered from beside his knee. She had finally finished her apple, and was now just holding the core, her eyes wide with an awe that bordered on worship.

"We... we did it...?"

"We did, Shivvy," Dante said, a wide, unfamiliar grin splitting his face.

He felt good. He felt powerful.

"That was Phase One. Now... Phase Two."

He tucked the locket safely into the pocket of his new, sturdy trousers.

"Stay here," he ordered, his voice crisp and confident.

"And... cover your ears. This next part is... the concert."

Shivvy nodded, her admiration total. She immediately hunkered down and pressed her hands over her ears.

Dante stood. He focused his will.

He was the "Producer." And it was time to bring his star out for the encore.

He found her on The List.

Summon: Rin-Rin.

[Creator Mana: 20/20] -> [10/20].

The air popped.

The high-pitched, chime of a 3-Star pull echoed in the clearing, followed by the requisite shower of holographic pink glitter.

Rin-Rin appeared.

And she was furious.

She didn’t squeal, "Tadaa!"

She materialized with her arms crossed, her platform boots planted firmly in the dirt, and a pout so intense it seemed to have its own gravitational pull.

"So," she snapped, her voice a sharp, icy contrast to her usual pep. "You’re finally done?"

Dante’s confidence evaporated.

He was just a "Producer" again. A flustered one, at that.

"Uh... Rin-Rin, the mission was—"

"The mission was boring!" she cut him off. "You benched me! Your star! Your center! For... for her!"

She gestured vaguely at the empty air where 47 had been.

"She has zero stage presence, Producer-sama! Zero! She’s grey! And quiet! And... and competent!"

She said the word like it was a terminal disease.

"An idol is sparkle! An idol is passion! I’m the star! You can’t put the star in the dressing room!"

Dante, who had just been feeling like a tactical genius, was now just a man being yelled at by a magical girl.

"Rin-Rin, it was a ’stealth’ mission," he tried to explain, his voice weak.

"It was rude!"

"Okay, look, I’m sorry. But you’re on now. This is the big finish. The ’mop-up’."

"A mop-up? I am not a mop-up act! I am the star!"

Dante was losing control of the situation.

He tried to re-assert his "Producer" authority.

He pointed, his hand shaking slightly, toward the tower.

"Look. The plan is simple. You stay here, in the bushes. You’re... ’backstage’."

Rin-Rin’s eye twitched.

"And then," Dante continued, "I’ll ’pull’ the audience—the Goblins—out of the tower. They’ll run to us. So basically we create a kill box. You hit them with [Toxic] and it’s going to be a perfect show. Easy."

Rin-Rin just stared at him.

Her expression was one of such profound, artistic disappointment, he almost flinched.

"A... ’kill box’?" she whispered, her voice trembling with offense. "You... you want me to hide in a bush? Like a... a stagehand?"

"It’s not... it’s tactical!"

"It’s insulting!" she shrieked.

She stomped her platform boot.

"NO! I am done with your boring plans, Producer-sama! You clearly don’t understand my art! A real star doesn’t hide in the wings! A real star is on the stage!"

Before Dante could form a single coherent syllable of protest, before he could begin to explain the concepts of "aggro radius" or "don’t stand in the fire", she moved.

She bolted from the bushes.

She was running. A blur of neon-pink and righteous fury, her twin-tails bouncing.

"Rin-Rin!" Dante screamed, his voice a panicked croak.

"NO! GET BACK HERE! THAT’S NOT THE PLAN!"

She ignored him.

She ran straight into the middle of the clearing. The four Goblins, who had been muttering around their sputtering campfire, looked up.

They just... stared.

Their piggish brains simply could not process what they were seeing.

This... thing... had just appeared, bathed in a cloud of fading glitter, and was now standing on their campfire rocks.

Rin-Rin wasn’t just on the stage. She was the stage.

She planted her boots, grabbed her star-tipped microphone prop, and struck a pose, her free hand on her hip.

"HELLOOOO, GOBLIN-FANS!"

She shrieked, her voice echoing off the stone tower.

"YOUR REAL IDOL, RIN-RIN, IS HERE TO MELT YOUR FACES!"

Dante’s heart, which had been in his chest, was now somewhere in his shoes.

"Oh, shit..." he muttered, scrambling out of the bushes after her. Shivvy was right behind him.

"Rin-Rin, get down from there!"

The Goblins, recovering from their confusion, registered "threat." Or, at least, "loud and weird food."

They snarled, grabbing their rusty clubs and hatchets, and charged.

They charged the stage.

"Rude fans!" Rin-Rin scoffed. She didn’t even flinch. She just looked annoyed that her monologue had been cut short.

"Fine! You want the hit? You get the hit!"

She took a deep, dramatic breath.

"Oh-oh-oh, you’re toxic, my baby, so toxic, it’s driving me crazyyyy~ (Ugh!)"

The song, at point-blank range, was devastating.

The four Goblins didn’t just stumble. They seized.

Their skin instantly went from sickly green to a deep purple.

They clawed at their ears, their clubs and axes clattering to the ground. They gagged, they convulsed, they fell.

It was over in three seconds.

It was an instant wipe.

A cascade of chimes hit Dante’s brain.

[System: Goblin (Level 3) Defeated. 25 EXP Gained.]

[System: Goblin (Level 3) Defeated. 25 EXP Gained.]

[System: Goblin (Level 3) Defeated. 25 EXP Gained.]

[System: Goblin (Level 3) Defeated. 25 EXP Gained.]

[EXP: 231/100]

He was... he was Level 3. He’d get the "Level Up" pop-up later, he assumed.

Rin-Rin struck a final, triumphant "V" pose, her microphone held high.

"See, Producer-sama?" she said, striking a pose over the twitching corpses. "No kill box or hiding you mentioned before! This is my talent, and that’s how you do an encore!"

Dante was panting, his mind trying to catch up.

He was exasperated. He was terrified.

But he was also... relieved.

It had been insane. It had been chaotic. It had been stupid.

But at least it had worked.

The trash was cleared. The boss was still asleep.

’...Sleep, right?’

His chaotic plan had, somehow, landed on its feet.

"Rin-Rin," he said, pinching the bridge of his nose, his voice shaking with residual adrenaline. "You can’t... you cannot... just...!"

ROOOOOOAAAAAAAARRRRRR!!!

The sound was a physical force.

It exploded from the second-story window of the tower; a deep furious sound, so loud it rattled Dante’s teeth.

Dante’s blood, which had been returning to his veins, turned to instant slush.

He stared at the tower.

The noise. The J-Pop intro riff. The shouting. The singing.

47’s takedown had been silent as a grave.

But Rin-Rin’s "encore" had been a rock concert.

His interface from 47 was gone, but he knew. He knew what he was seeing.

[STATUS: HVT... ’ALERTED’.]

[STATUS: ’SUBDUED’ (BROKEN)]

"Rin-Rin..." Dante whispered, his voice failing.

A crash echoed from inside the tower. The sound of a 400-pound monster kicking a stone table in half.

And then... thud.

THUD. THUD.

’Heavy. And fast.’

Coming down the stairs.

The Hobgoblin erupted from the tower’s doorway.

It was seven feet tall. Covered in plates of crude, bolted-together iron armor. Its skin was a deep red, its eyes yellow and burning with hate.

It held a "club" that was just a sharpened tree trunk.

And it was fast.

The Hobgoblin saw the dead Goblins. It saw the pink thing that had woken it up. Then it saw the pajama-man behind her.

It roared again, spittle flying from its tusks.

Dante’s gamer brain took over. His panic compressed into a single command.

"Rin-Rin! [Toxic]! Hit it! HIT IT NOW!"

"Right!" Rin-Rin, for the first time, looked a little pale. This "fan" was way bigger than the others.

She pointed her mic.

"Oh-oh-oh, you’re toxic, my baby...!"

The song, the debuff, washed over the charging Hobgoblin.

The air shimmered.

The creature’s red skin did take on a sickly-purple hue.

It stumbled. It gagged, and its charge faltered.

...But it didn’t stop.

It roared through the debuff, its eyes bloodshot. It was hurt. It was poisoned.

But it was not incapacitated.

Dante’s brain screamed the answer, the one terrible variable he hadn’t planned for.

[Magic Resist (Low)]!

It was resistant.

His nuke was just a weak "Damage over Time" (DoT) effect.

And the Hobgoblin, tanking the "poison," had identified the source of the song.

It ignored Dante.

It ignored Shivvy.

It raised its tree-trunk club, its eyes locked on the singer.

It charged, full-speed, right at Rin-Rin.

She was "squishy." She was a "mage." So she had zero armor.

"Shit!"

One hit. That’s all it would take. One hit, and she would pop.

Dante had no tank. He had no "taunt." Kaelen was 49,990 Mana away.

He had... nothing.

Except...

"Rin-Rin!" he screamed, his voice cracking in terror. "New song! NOW! [Dancing Queen]! On ME!"

Rin-Rin was frozen, her eyes wide as she saw the 400-pound club coming for her. But she was a pro. She heard her Producer and immidieatly swapped tracks.

She took a squeaking breath.

"You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happyyyy~ (Hey!)"

The buff hit Dante.

It wasn’t a gentle warmth. It was a jolt.

But he sped up.

The charging Hobgoblin’s club, which had been a descending blur of death, suddenly seemed... slow. 𝒇𝓻𝓮𝓮𝙬𝙚𝒃𝒏𝓸𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝓬𝓸𝒎

He could see the impact zone.

’Well I had no armor or weapon.’

But he had [Haste].

And he was, apparently, the tank.

He moved.

He grabbed Rin-Rin by the back of her ruffled dress and flung her sideways.

"GET BACK!"

He stumbled into her spot, right into the path of the monster.

"HEY, UGLY!" he screamed, his voice a high-pitched squeak.

"YOUR REAL FANS ARE OVER HERE!"

The Hobgoblin roared, its eyes locking onto the closer target.

It didn’t care. It just adjusted its swing.

The tree-trunk club came down, a black shadow blotting out the purple sky, aimed right at Dante’s head.

The real boss fight had begun.