Chapter 120: Luck is also part of strength
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor:
300,000, 200,000, 100,000!
With Akashic's HP depleting wildly, it finally hit as low as 100,000!
Zhang Yang had only... 2,489 HP left to be exact!
'-528!'
'-528!'
'-528!'
In that instant, <Shield Bash> burst out a strong lethality onto Akashic! The <Shield Bash> was supposed to have a lower basic damage value, dealing approximately 400 damage point to bosses that were wearing high-defense armor. But Zhang Yang could neutralize the boss' armor to zero with <Cripple Defense> and <Eagle Eye>, completely unleashing the full damage of <Shield Bash>!
"Urgh!" Akashic was finally beaten to his last drop of HP, falling hard to the ground, while Zhang Yang only had 518 HP left!
'Ding! You killed Akashic - The Lionheart, acquired 400,000 experience points!'
'Ding! Congratulations! You have reached Level 31! All attributes +1, acquired 5 attribute points!'
A golden light flashed, with Zhang Yang progressing one level higher magnificently! And more crucially, leveled-up players would have their health reset to full!
Zhang Yang burst into laughter, as there was no more convenient time than this! He was mentally prepared to die once and to run all the way back to take out the second boss, but this sudden level-up occurrence was perfectly placed to solve his dangerous situation!
Now that he was battling a boss with low offense and high defense, Zhang Yang had no stress anymore. It was just a matter of time before he took it down.
Furthermore, Zhang Yang also believed that the boss would not continuously use <Berserker's Heal>. It was obvious that it would be a one-time occurrence, allowing the two bosses to square up with the players with full health regardless of the time they were battling each other. But it may also be a negligence in the design, seeing that there was a little delay before the skill triggered. If the bosses were programmed to use <Berserker's Heal> the moment they detected any players within their aggro sight range, it would become impossible for them to be affected by the reduction of healing rate in the first place, otherwise, facing Akashic with 400,000 HP would make it impossible for Zhang Yang to take out the boss without having his own HP being emptied out.
With more luck on his side, he actually leveled up the moment he took down the first boss!
Sure enough, luck was also part of strength!
Zhang Yang turned around to face Brandon!
The difficulty of this stage was facing two bosses at the same time, so taking out one of them instantly took away any further difficulty to face the other boss!
Every melee attack that Brandon threw at him was counteracted with <Block>. Zhang Yang only sustained some damages from the area effect damage coming from <Thunder Strike>. Even though AoE damage was around 600 every time it struck, the damage only happened once in every 10 seconds. Depending on his armor set's healing effect, some [Healing potion], constant use of <Berserker's Heal>, and the special effect of the [Lover's Sword] in play, Zhang Yang could totally hold on to it!
The only disadvantage at hand now was that the boss had a passive reduction of 20% damage in play, not to mention the boss having over 500,000 HP, making him slower and harder to kill compared to the previous bosses he encountered before.
The battle dragged for 12 minutes long before Brandon was finally beaten down to his last bit of his HP, forcing him to close his eyes.
Phew! Zhang Yang let out a sigh of relief. It was really tiring, but definitely satisfying! Beating two bosses at the same time all by himself, it felt awesome!
He could not help it but to giggle, "Hehehe...", to the point that he could not hear Han Ying Xue calling out to him from afar. With her multiple shout-outs on his name, he finally came back to his senses.
"Hmm?"
"Are you deaf or retarded? I have been calling your name for so long and you couldn't hear me at all?" Han Ying Xue was sullen.
"I was distracted, forgive me!"
"... Should I call you stupid Zhan or stupid Yu?" Han Ying Xue did not talk down to business, instead, she was mumbling to herself.
Zhang Yang let out a heavy sigh, "I'm guessing you are not here to ask me about this?"
"Oh, right!" Han Ying Xue quickly reacted, "So, we have passed through the first floor, but while doing the clear-out, the players in the whole city were provoked. So I did some discussion with Snow Seeker the others, and we came up with the conclusion to let the other players to come in as well. We've already entered the second floor, and the monsters on the first floor had already been cleared out!"
Zhang Yang nodded his head a few times, "It is best not to provoke any public anger, because when they are united, any guild will just be powerless!"
"So how's your progression now?"
"Just cleared the boss on the seventh floor!"
"Yo, that was actually pretty fast! You can take down a boss all by yourself? That's awesome!"
"Well about that..." Zhang Yang spoke out of his pride and smiled, "Alright, keep me posted on the progress up there!"
"Alright, roger!"
The most exciting moment after killing a boss was to open the dead body of the boss in front of him; the best moment to look forward to.
[Bloody Chest Plate] (Gray-Silver, leather armor)
Armor: +8
Vitality: +70
Strength: +8
Agility: +42
<Level 1 socket 1>
<Level 1 socket 2>
Required level: 30
Judging from only one attribute, [Bloody Chest Plate] had 50% more attribute value than the armor sets of the Thief and Hunter classes. But players would normally not give up on the set effects to wear the armor separately as the set effect only worked when all pieces of the armor were together.
Just like the current Zhang Yang, with the 5 pieces of armor as a set giving him a boost of 10% damage, it would take changing up at least 4 pieces of Level 30 Gray-Silver grade equipment to have the same effect again! The 3 pieces of armor that triggered the set bonus of healing attribute was one hell of the advantage for him, too. It was like having <Heal> with him all the time! Definitely not going to replace it!
If they were to be compared to each another, Level 30 equipment had the advantage of increasing higher HP, which was great for supporting the maximum HP.
But we should keep that aside first, because he could not meet the requirement of the maximum HP to challenge the 4th boss in a Level 40 castle region dungeon with his current Level 20 armor set. So he took precaution and kept it to prepare himself for what's coming in the future!
[Rapid Traveling Boots] (Gray-Silver, Heavy Armor)
Armor: +12
Vitality: +40
Strength: +16
Agility: +4
<Level 1 socket>
Equip: Increase Movement Speed by 10%.
Level required: 30
Increasing movement speed by 10%... that's really awesome! But it's a shame that the [God Oil] has been used up already. At recent times, even though Lone Desert Smoke conquered the boss in the Cave of Bones, but the [God Oil] that increased movement speed never appeared again among any loots ever since.
[Akala's helmet] (Gray-Silver, Heavy Armor)
Armor: +12
Vitality: +80
Strength: +34
Agility: +6
<Level 1 socket 1>
<Level 1 socket 2>
Level required: 30
Not bad at all... two pieces of equipment with high vitality values out of these draws!
After collecting the 3 pieces of Gray-Silver equipment, there were still 7 to 8 pieces of [Green-Copper Clothing]. Without any consideration, Zhang Yang put all of them into his inventory. If he could acquire the title deed for the land, in corresponding with a better property location, then maybe he could start a shop of his own. By then, these equipment may be used to make a merrier scenario.
There was also a skill book among the equipment.
[Skill book: Blood Rage]
Use: Teaches the skill <Blood Rage>.
Required: Warrior.
Zhang Yang had his eyes widened a little at the moment. He instantly touched the skill book onto his body.
<Blood Rage>: Sacrifice a part of HP to generate 30 points of rage.
Consume: 1% HP.
Cooldown time: 1 minute.
It was definitely useful for starting up battles on monsters. 30 rage points was actually enough to launch a skill!
Zhang Yang continued his journey forward, heading into the entrance of the 8th floor of the Tomb Tower.
Ting, ling, ling!
Just when he stepped out of the stairs on the right, he suddenly saw a flash of white light, followed by continuous thunder claps, issuing a deafening sound of thunder!
This was completely a world full of lightning, with flashes of white light constantly coming down from the top of the rock pits. They were just so dense and frightening!
At the ground, there were a few monsters scattered in the area. But they were constantly being struck by the lightning strikes. With just a few strikes, they died and were turned into white ashes. And then, new monsters began to spawn again in the area just to be struck down again by those frightful lightning strikes. The whole process was quick and short. Similar to the 2nd floor of the tower, this floor was more of the mechanism-style. Even the ground was covered with the same material of stone in the shape of square, just that this time they were not black and white but all white!
Zhang Yang did not have to personally test the damage these lightning could do, because all he had to do was to look at how fast the monsters were being struck to death, and he could already know the damage output of each lightning strike, which was about 4,000 points!
It's so disorganized!
That was the first impression Zhang Yang had when he first stepped in. There seemed to be no pattern for where the lightning would strike, with different strikes ending on different spots of the ground! He eventually began to grasp a pattern for it, with his eyes wide open with every passing second.
Left, left, right, right, right, and then left, right, right, left, left!
Zhang Yang repeated the sequence deep down his heart, took another look at the patterns again before he finally decided to act!
Go!
Left, left, right, right, right, he made it safely!
Left, right, right, left, left, it was a smooth breakthrough as well!
The lightning struck him once, but Zhang Yang insisted to push forward!
"Ow..."
One skeleton warrior spawned just beside Zhang Yang, holding a gigantic mace with both hands, instantly drawing Zhang Yang straight into battle. It slammed the mace heavily towards Zhang Yang.
He turned around and used <Block>, totally ignoring the monsters and kept on pushing forward!
Bang!
The lightning directly struck the monster, reducing 4,000 HP of the monster. It seemed like that was just 10% of the monster's health.
The enraged monster howled and smashed over and over again with his mace.
Zhang Yang turned around and used <Block> on the attack before pushing forward just like before, as he did not dare to stop even for a second.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The lightning strikes continued to drop, and the monster did not hold for long. Just in the matter of seconds, it turned into a white light, dropping a few loots. And among the loots, there was a piece of equipment that flashed a Green-Copper luster!
Zhang Yang could only take a peek without having any thoughts about stopping for it; he could only push forward. He knew that if he even gave in to his slightest greed, he would definitely end up being struck to death by those horrible lightning strikes!
At that exact same time, Zhang Yang suddenly had a weird thought: What if Han Ying Xue or Wei Yan Er were to be in the same situation? Would these two women rather be struck by lightning just to get to the loots?
Well with 80% probability, they would!
A gray shadow flashed by. It was another monster that spawned not far from Zhang Yang. This time, it was a spell-type monster. The moment it sighted Zhang Yang, it raised its staff and started to chant a spell.
Bang!
One lightning strike struck down, beating the monster's spell back by a length. With unyielding will, the monster continued to chant the spell again.
When players or normal monsters read spells, the incoming attacks would delay the time for them to finish chanting their spells.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
With the continuous strike of the lightning, the spell was interrupted continuously, with the initial 3 seconds to chant a spell delayed to 6 seconds! After that, a sound of "Shew" was heard, seeing a shot of shadow bomb being launched towards Zhang Yang.
'-800!'
In return, the monster was brutally struck by the lightning, 300,000 HP was instantly being brought down to 6,000 HP!
Bang! Bang!
Another two lightning strikes. The monster was turned into ashes while trying to chant its second shadow bomb spell.
50 meters, 100 meters, 200 meters... Zhang Yang constantly pushed forward.
1 monster, 5 monsters, or even 7 monsters, countless monsters were spawned on the way, but none of them survived even more than 15 seconds. Every single one of them were heavily struck by the lightning!
Monsters that deal physical damage did not worry Zhang Yang because he could use <Block> to neutralize the incoming damages. It was the monsters that dealt magic damage that worried him, as Zhang Yang would have no choice but to sustain one or two damages from their spells. However, one red potion, coordinated with <Berserker's Heal>, would allow him to maintain his high HP.
It was more than 10 minutes later when Zhang Yang had finally made it through the lightning area!
Phew!
He let out a very long sigh. Even though it was just about 10 minutes, but maintaining high focus for that long was mostly tiring!
And there wasn't even a boss over there!
Zhang Yang looked at the widely opened entrance. Deep down in his heart, he understood the design in this area: If the door to the next floor was shut still, then there must be a boss nearby. But, if the door was opened widely, it would only mean that there was no boss!
After reaching the door, there was no boss, only a chest with a flash of silver white light luster that was lying quietly by the entrance side of the wall.