Chapter 816: Switch Targets

In game, although the avatars of the players talk using their mouths, it was all but a simulation of reality. In truth, everything is interpreted by reading brain waves. As such, the movement speed of players, the reaction rate, body movements, are all limited by the human mind. It all comes to the ability of the player to step outside the boundaries of cybergaming. In short, the faster you think, the faster you chant.

Wei Yan Er had an epiphany and widened her eyes. She heeded Zhang Yang's advice and tried to outsmart her own "brain". It was hard in the beginning since everyone has gotten used to talking with their own mouths since birth. Hence, unless you're a rapper like Jay Chow or Eminem, you'll be a mere mortal. To gain speed, one must train. It was that simple. Luckily for Wei Yan Er, {Melodies of War} only had 30 seconds of cooldown duration. She could train as much as she wanted to.

That being said, the boss had no intention of allowing the team to have a good time.

"Darkness...heed thine power. Destroy in thy name!" cried the boss as a progress bar appeared on his character. He was preparing to cast {Shadow Blessing}!

"Stop that!"

Since it was just a test run, everyone had not been assigned their turns of interrupting his casts. Hence, everyone in the party had used all their disrupting skills on the boss at once.

Immune!

Immune!

Immune!

...

Completely, utterly useless!

"What the actual f*ck!?" cried Fatty Han.

How could they continue the fight? Just a single cast of {Shadow Blessing}, and the boss shall obtain an attack power that rivals a Celestial boss!

In a blink of an eye, the boss had created a cloak of shadow that hovered around his character. 100% attack increment! Hopeless. That was what everyone, even Zhang Yang, thought of, then. A {Lullaby of Death} after getting the buff deals more than 600,000 damage on everyone. Even though they were merely testing, all the four healers in the party had immediately jumped into turbo mode to heal everyone. Sadly, just 10 seconds later, the boss had once again used {Shadow Blessing}. This time, the cloak of shadow that hovered around him darkened.

200% Attack increment is the same as a 300% basic attack bonus. His normal attacks were now the same, or perhaps even exceeded the damage dealt by Angus' normal attacks! {Lullaby of Death} was now dealing 900,000 per cast, which had lead to Han Ying Xue started to running low on MP while the rest of the healers had already given up on healing.

When the healers slowed down, party members started to drop like flies. Worst of all, amidst their despair, Margalor had used {Shadow Blessing} for the third time!

300% Attack bonus!

At the third use of {Shadow Blessing}, the party needed no verbal commands to start retreating. At that moment, more than half of the party member had died, and the remaining players in the field died immediately after the chained use of {Lullaby of Death}.

By the time the boss used the fourth {Shadow Blessing}, Zhang Yang was the only player left alive.

'-2,468,392!'

Zhang Yang had taken more than 2 million damage and had died with a single use of {Shadow Claw} from the steroid-pumped boss.

The Book of Revelation revival effect immediately kicked in, and Zhang Yang used {Shadow of the Void} to immediately escape the battlefield after he got back up to his feet.

Han Ying Xue was greatly disgruntled as she thought that Zhang Yang had wanted to continue the fight. At her death, she had quickly revived on the spot with her own [Resurrection Monolith], and was immediately killed by the boss.

"Dummy! Why didn't you tell me that you have given up?!"

"Didn't I tell you that this is a test run?"

"Gah! You always say that. Did you know that most of us had actually believed that you could take on the boss by yourself?"

"What...? Anyhoo. Everyone! Go back to the graveyard and revive there instead. Don't come back up. Gather at the base of the valley!"

Zhang Yang flew down the mountain with haste and told the entire party to choose to revive at the graveyard, even though that would weaken everyone. (Revival at the graveyard will inflict a weakened status). Although everyone was confused at his command, they did listen to him and followed his words.

After everyone had gathered together, Zhang Yang scratched his head and asked, "So, how was the boss fight? Any thoughts?"

After a few seconds of solemnness, Fatty Han was the first to open his mouth. "It's impossible to defeat the boss! Not only that {Shadow Blessing} could not be disrupted, the cooldown of the skill is only 10 seconds! How are we supposed to fight that boss when he would only get stronger and stronger!?"

Although his intonation and speech pattern was unrefined, everything he said was on point. {Shadow Blessing} would allow the boss to have attack powers that could rival that of a Celestial tier boss, and perhaps even exceed that! Without a miracle like Felice suddenly going berserk, they had no chance of defeating the boss.

"There's no way the developers would make a boss that cannot be defeated. I'm sure there is a way that we have not seen yet." Said Zhang Yang.

"...How?" Daffodil Daydream squeaked. "The boss did not even use {Void Tornado} once! Yet, we were all dropping like flies!"

"Monsters," said Sun Xin Yu softly.

"Monsters? You mean the {Shadow Orbs} that the monsters dropped? That's no use against Margalor!" said Fatty Han angrily.

Lost Dream gasped in epiphany and said, "Guys, are we forgetting about another certain Holy type boss?"

Everyone that had followed Zhang Yang since the beginning of the guild formation was smart enough to understand that Lost Dream meant. "I see what you're getting at. The drops from the Shadow monsters are used to counter the Light boss. That means that the monster drops in the Light mountain could be used to counter the shadow boss!" said Hundred Shots.

"Aye!"

Zhang Yang nodded his head. "In that case, might as well give it a try then!"

Everyone agreed and rode their mounts towards the Light mountain and momentarily forgot about Margalor.

'Ding! You have received the effect: Holy Radiance Aura!'

[Holy Radiance Aura]: Takes additional 20% Holy attribute damage.

Compared to the other DoT effect and the damage reduction aura, the party was not too disgruntled when they received the damage amplify aura. Han Ying Xue, for one, was not too happy with that. Luckily, the {Holy Radiance Aura} was not a DoT effect. At most, Han Ying Xue would need to heal a few more times during a fight.

Like the other mountains around, the monsters in the Light mountain were all Holy based. Those monsters that roamed around the mountain were like gigantic light bulbs. They were shaped like one, and shone brightly like one.

[Holy Propagator] (Elite, Elemental Being)

Level: 230

HP: 115,000,000

Defense: 14,270

Skills:

[Holy Smite]: Summons the power of Divinity and deals 200% Holy Magic damage to a target. Casting: 2 seconds.

Note: The followers of the Holy Lord Dustan. Their purpose in life is to spread the teachings of Lord Dustan and to smite all that is evil.

Again, they were all grouped in eights. Due to the presence of the {Holy Radiance Aura}, the Propagator's attacks had dealt extra damage to the party. Even though one of them will only gain a 20% damage amplification, all eight of them would deal the damage of nine monsters! Furthermore, the monsters were attacking with magic. Their attacks ignored defense values and would deal powerful damage, enough to kill a single player if they were to concentrate fire.

Fortunately, there were three tanks then, and everyone had no problem attacking the monsters. After a few quick bashes and smashes, all the monsters were killed and dropped a bunch of ETC item and that one tool that everyone had been waiting for.

[Holy Orb] (Usable)

Use: Unleashes the Holy power within to dispel {Shadow Blessing}. Range: 30 meters. Cooldown: 200 seconds.

Level Requirement: 200

"Hah! Sister Sun was right! There was something here that we can use to fight the shadow boss!"

"That's actually a surprise. Who would have thought that the monsters of two separate bosses would drop items that could be used to counter the other!"

"There's one problem guys. This has 200 cooldown duration, yet {Shadow Blessing's} cooldown is only 10 seconds..."

"Looks like we need to sit down and arrange a proper sequence for us to take turns dispelling. If my calculations are right, not one of us, NOT A SINGLE ONE of us can make a mistake. If anyone misses the chance, the boss will gain its attack bonus buff!"

"Don't forget. There's still the skill {Void Tornado} that we need to stand inside to dispel! 5 of us needs to stand inside there for 20 seconds. During that time, those who have their Holy Orbs on cooldown should automatically run to the tornado."

"Hmm. Since that we have the {Shadow Orb} right now, we should just try and fight the Holy boss. I'm guessing that the two Shadow and Light bosses will have the same META(1). Shadow and Light are the same thing, just from two opposite ends."

Before they had a chance to examine the {Holy Orb}, everyone had their own minds set on the situation. After they had managed to farm a few more orbs and examine their properties, they voiced out their opinions and started formulating their own plans before Zhang Yang could even guide them.

Zhang Yang smiled with satisfaction, seeing that his party members were now working as team, instead of depending on him alone like old times.

Since the boss fight was expected to be long, a 10-second interval dispelling rate was tough. Everyone would need to be on their toes and be ready to cast on time. 6 players, one minute...that's a number that required intense concentration and preparation. There was no room for any careless mistakes or they will be the first to be killed.

As mention earlier, since they had many {Shadow Orbs}, they had all decided to try and defeat the Holy boss. They had no need to worry about monsters on the Shadow mountain respawning after they defeat the Holy boss. They were in a special map and they could take their time to kill the boss, for the monsters or the boss would not respawn after being killed.

The party took roughly the same amount of time as they did with other mountains to reach the peak.

The boss was an exceptionally large, perhaps industrialized version of a gigantic light bulb. 30 meters high...how many watts would it take to power up that thing? Unlike normal household light bulbs, this bulb shape..."thing" had a pair of hands that was wielding a long white staff. Unlike the other bosses that had a humanoid shape, the Holy boss had no legs. Instead, it was floating around like a balloon.

[Holy Lord Dustan] (Ascended, Elemental Being)

Level: 240

HP: 12,000,000,000

Defense: 37,330

Magic Attack: 210,392 - 270,392

Skills:

[Radiance's Prayer]: Dedicates oneself to serving the light. Restores 1,000,000 HP and deals 400,000 Holy magic damage to all targets within 100 meters.

[Divine Judgement]: Smites a target with the power of Divinity. Deals 300% Holy magic attack. Casting: 2 seconds.

[Radiant Chain]: Places a mark on 3 random targets. Marked players must stand at least 40 meters away from each player. Failure will result in an explosion that will deal 400,000 Holy damage every second until the distance between each Marked players exceeds 40 meters. All damage dealt by the explosion will restore Dustan's HP.

[Rage of the Light]: Increases 100% attack power. Stackable. Casting: 2 seconds.

Note: The Lord of Light. The One that brings salvation to all who repents. The One that smites all that is evil in the world. Born from the Holy Essence Pearl.

TL Notes

1. META - Most effective tactic available.