Chapter 146: First Boss of the Castle
Right after dinner, the team gathered to clear the floors; all the way until they have met the first boss.
[Captain Guard Gail Baghdad, Legendary Centaur Hero] (Gray-Silver, Spectre)
Level: 41
HP: 820,000
The male centaur was huge, with his white horse body, along with a muscular human half. With just one look, you would know that he was a formidable one, having emitting strong hostility and strength that even his attackers would doubt their capabilities. He wielded a long spear on his right hand, with a long bow hanging from his back.
His face stoic and rigid, with eyes glowing emerald flames burning evilly as the only noticeable movement around his complexion! Rather than feeling fear, Endless Starlight and Daffodil Daydream were both excited as they had never encountered a Gray-Silver boss before.
Looking at the boss, Fatty Han asked, "Am I seeing things, or is that a spear AND a bow? I'm pretty sure players could only use only one type of weapon, no?"
Zhang Yang scratched his chin and replied, "That boss is a legendary hero. He could be the combination of both Warrior and Hunter classed!"
Fatty immediately became envious. "F*ck! How could that be? Damn! I wish players could have double classes as well!"
Zhang Yang laughed a little and said, "If players could have more and one class, then what's the use of having class specializations in the first place?"
"How do we fight it?" Sun Xin Yu interjected abruptly. The Ice Queen did not like to waste time.
Only now, had Zhang Yang realized that the world of 'God's Miracle' was just too large for him. Taking the Underground Tower as an example, Zhang Yang had never heard nor took part in the raid before in his previous life!
As to Sun Xin Yu's sudden interjection, Zhang Yang had to think for a moment before he could say anything. "As we can clearly see the boss possibly having weapons of two classes, I can only conclude that he should have both the Warrior and Hunter's skills!"
"There's no battle plan to formulate now. Let's give it a shot and have a better understanding after." Zhang Yang unsheathed his sword and moved forward. The surrounding coast was clear; no more monsters around to interrupt the battle. As according to game mechanics, elite-tier monsters should have a 5-hour respawn time. They would not have to worry about monsters being around for the time being.
Gail Baghdad's effective aggro trigger range was rather large, and he smiled evilly at Zhang Yang even when they were 20 meters apart from each other. He stomped his hooves and thrust his spear at Zhang Yang.
"You dare to enter the domains of the Castle? Your living essence will pollute this land for the slumbering death! Begone!"
Zhang Yang used <Charge>.
<Block>!
'-702!'
'-1,504!'
Gail Baghdad growled loudly as he effortlessly spun his spear in the air, as if it was weightless. With the speed of lightning, the spear burst forward. Zhang Yang could barely move away, but fortunately with his skills, he managed to dodge with his face only an inch away from the tip of the spear.
KIIIINnnnng!
The sound of sharp metal connecting to its target, accompanied with the sparks that were generated from his armor scraping.
'-2,912!'
He was hit! Gail Baghdad's physical attack was more then 4,000, and Zhang Yang still received approximately 3,000 damage even after accumulating the damage reductions.
Endless Starlight jumped in shock. "Damn! I always knew that a Gray-Silver boss was strong, but I never knew that it could be THIS strong! If I were to take that damage... I could die in just two seconds!"
Endless Starlight wore a full set of Level 30 Green-Copper equipment. Even with a shield, his HP was only at around 4,000.
Sun Xin Yu and the rest of the attacking team had begun their assault. Arrows, Fire Balls, all sorts of flashy skills were in the air, making what was once an empty sky into utter chaos in just a matter of seconds.
Wei Yan Er had a full Gray-Silver tier equipment on her, coupled with the ultra-slow two-handed weapon with 3.8 seconds attack interval, which made her one time normal attack devastatingly powerful. With Zhang Yang's <Cripple Defense> fully stacked on the boss, her damage could reach around 1,200! Excited with her all-time strength, she spammed her skills repeatedly while crying "OH YEA OH YEA" all the way.
Zhang Yang could not help but to be amused by her childish acts and said, "Little brat, it's about time you're returning to school now right? What a shame! Even though you still have holidays left, you'll have return to school the day after tomorrow! You might not even make it to the last boss!"
"You villain!" cried the little girl as she rolled her eyes at Zhang Yang. She wielded her weapon tighter in her hand and used <Tornado Cleave>, dealing 1,825 damage to the boss. In retrospect to a single attack damage count (skills or attack that attacks 1 instant of damage), her damage was much stronger than Zhang Yang's <Destructive Smash> and <Horizontal Sweep> collectively. She had been following Zhang Yang all these time and obtained many "First Clear" Achievements that awarded her with plenty of skill points. She had invested them all to <Tornado Cleave>.
[Tornado Cleave] (Level 9): Waves the weapon in your hands like a tornado. Causes 160% melee damage to surrounding targets within 3 x 3 meters range.
Cost: 20 Rage.
Cooldown time: 6 Seconds.
Requirement: Melee Weapon.
When the skill is maxed out, the cooldown time will be reduced to 5.5 seconds and the damage will be increased to 170%. This was a Beserker's main attacking skill.
Daffodil was a Spellcaster; a Pyromancer to be precise. She always had the pride of having better attack damage as compared to others. They say that grass was always greener on the other side, but when she compared her own damage to Sun Xin Yu, she was considered as a puny little noob player! As a woman of pride, she could never express her dissatisfaction. She only focused harder and fought faster with an unrelenting heart.
99%, 97%, 95%... the boss HP dropped down faster than ever with everyone trying their best to have the highest damage.
"Bunch of pests! I'll show you my true power!" Gail lifted his spear and spun it around, creating a circular radiance.
'Ding! Gail Baghdad has used <Tornado Cleave>!'
'-3,712!'
'-4,123!'
'-4,940!'
'-4,963!'
Everyone around the boss' melee range received instant damage. Aside from Zhang Yang, Sun Xin Yu, Endless Starlight, and Wei Yan Er were killed instantly!
"What a strong <Tornado Cleave>!" Zhang Yang had already guessed that Gail would have several Warrior skills, but he could never have guessed that the boss' skill damage would be any higher than 5,000!
Sun Xin Yu and Wei Yan Er were both having full set of Gray-Silver equipment, yet their maximum HP were only around 4,600 HP. Since neither of them had any damage reduction skills, they were killed in just one single stroke of the spear.
That skill did not have any progress bar; so the team thought that the boss was only taunting them instead of casting anything! Wei Yan Er's death was as expected, but Endless Starlight and Sun Xin Yu both had skills to protect them, they were just not able to anticipate the boss' skill.
Aside from the strong attacking power, the boss' skill also contained a knockback effect, pushing Zhang Yang back 3 to 4 feet away from him.
"Wuu... Cousin! I died!" cried Wei Yan Er.
"Sigh... I told you to be a Spellcaster instead of a Berserker! You're the one who insisted to be a Warrior!" Han Ying Xue sighed.
With the loss of two strong attackers, the party's attacking power dropped by a huge gap, slowing down the boss' HP loss.
Gail laughed happily and said, "Ahh! Souls! What wonderful souls! I can feel my strength growing!"
'Ding! Gail Baghdad has absorbed the power of the soul. All attacks increase by 50% for 10 seconds!'
'Ding! Gail Baghdad has absorbed the power of the soul. All attacks increase by 100% for 10 seconds!'
'Ding! Gail Baghdad has absorbed the power of the soul. All attacks increase by 150% for 10 seconds!'
Gail Baghdad's body glowed in a bloodied red color! Frightening and disgusting! Laughing maniacally, the boss' spear flew across the air and thrust towards Zhang Yang.
'<Block>!'
Without hesitation, Zhang Yang activated <Shield Wall>.
Another attack struck through, tearing the air around it.
'-1,928!'
Even under the <Shield Wall>, the boss could still inflict close to 2,000 damage to Zhang Yang. Obviously, after obtaining the buff, the boss' attack was now close to 10,000 damage!
Han Ying Xue quickly cast a <Holy Shield> and healed his HP back.
10 seconds later, <Shield Wall> ended and the red hue on the boss' body faded away, returning its attack back to normal.
"Crap! If there was any more melee fighters around, they will be killed off by that <Tornado Cleave>. I don't even dare to think how strong the boss would be!" said Fatty Han.
"That is why I had once said, the number of party members doesn't determine certain victory with a field boss!" said Zhang Yang.
If he had recruited several more people, and have them die off, the boss' increased damage would surely break through the defenses, and none of them would even survive even if Zhang Yang used <Shield Wall>. If the tanks and melee attackers perish, the next one who would suffer the same fate would be the ranged attackers. With the boss devastating attacks, everyone will surely die as well. It would only end with a complete wipe.
After a while, Gail Baghdad used another <Tornado Cleave>. Zhang Yang calculated the time and figured that the boss will use the skill after every 20 seconds.
For then on, Zhang Yang did not dare to use <Block>. If the boss made a combo with normal attack and the <Tornado Cleave>, the instance itself would deal more than 6,600 damage which exceeded his current maximum HP! If he wanted to survive the boss fight, he had to keep the skill ready to use anytime he needed it.
90%, 80%, 70%...
Once Zhang Yang solved the <Tornado Cleave> conundrum, Gail was really not a tough enemy to defeat. After all, he was just a mini-boss, the weakest among the 5 bosses!
50%!
Gail Baghdad stopped attacking suddenly. He then switched his weapon to the bow that was behind his back. He holstered the spear horizontally on the side of his horse body.
"Weak little beings, I have underestimated you all! You have forced me, the great Gail Baghdad to this end!"
Pew!
The boss shot an arrow towards Zhang Yang at melee range and immediately <Dazed> him! He then quickly galloped away from Zhang Yang and attacked from the maximum ranged distance.
'-2,112!'
Another arrow landed, causing significant yet lowered damage.
So, he has finally switched from a Warrior to a Hunter.
Zhang Yang had a sudden thought and quickly kicked his feet to chase the boss.
'-2,112!'
'-2,112!'
Even though it was lowered, the attack interval was shortened! Before the change, the attack interval was 3 seconds once; now it was faster at 2 seconds an arrow! The accumulated damage would still be higher! To make things worse, ranged attack could not be negated with <Block>, ultimately putting a stress on Han Ying Xue's healing load.
<Merlinda's Shadow>
Zhang Yang had to cast the special ring skill to temporary ease the burden of Han Ying Xue.
Hunter-type monster's weakness was that once any player got close to it, it could no longer attack!
However, Zhang Yang was worried that the boss might have the <Tumble> skill. He did not dare to use <Charge> to get closer to the monster, instead, he had to only rely on his own regular movement speed. This 4-legged boss' speed proved to be something else. He could attack and run at the same time! As his speed was no slower than Zhang Yang himself, coupled with the vast area of the floor, Zhang Yang could be kited to death!
Zhang Yang could no longer let things run like this any longer. If he did not use <Charge> now, he would not even need to wait for the boss to use <Tumble> and just die before that!
Once Zhang Yang was close to him, the boss did not use any other Hunter skills on him, aside from <Breaking Shot> and a fist to his face.
'<Block>!'
Zhang Yang raised his shield to block the incoming fist.
"Split up! As long as you can attack and can be healed, spread out as far as you can!" said Zhang Yang in the party channel.
If the boss could use <Tornado Cleave> in his Warrior state, that meant that he could use <Barrage> in his Hunter state to counter overwhelming odds.
His party obliged immediately and spread out into a half moon shape to surround the boss. Han Ying Xue was behind them to make sure none of her team mate lost too much HP! She made sure that she could heal anyone the moment they received damage!
"Feeble little beings! Let the rain of arrow crush your souls!" Gail Baghdad shot an arrow into the sky suddenly, a progress bar appeared on his head. Rain of arrows suddenly started to appear towards Hundred Shots.
'Ding! Gail Baghdad is channeling <Barrage>. Every target in 5 x 5-meter range will receive 3,000 natural every 2 seconds for 10 seconds!'
Hundred Shots' reaction was rather fast; once he saw an arrow head coming towards him, he ran to the side to evade. However still, he was still not as fast as the arrow that was raining down on him. He had only received 3,000 damage. Luckily, the second wave of arrow would only attack after 2 seconds. Hundred Shots had already left the effective area.
Han Ying Xue cast <Regeneration> on him instead of casting a long casting healing spell. Since the boss would rarely attack a non-tank player in the field, she estimated that she could save some time instead to allow the <Regeneration> slowly heal Hundred Shots over time.
Zhang Yang summoned [Servant: Clear Lotus] now since he had used <Barrage>. While the boss was still in Warrior state, Zhang Yang did not want to waste Clear Lotus as she would die from <Tornado Cleave> too.
10 seconds later, <Barrage> ended. Gail Baghdad immediately shot a <Breaking Shot> and caused Zhang Yang to enter <Dazed> state once again.
Zhang Yang came up with a quick idea and commanded Clear Lotus to attack him.
'-1!'
Clear Lotus attacked Zhang Yang from the front, causing a nullified damage value. Zhang Yang did not mind the damage. The importance of the attack was to quickly dispel <Dazed>!
<Charge>!
<Thunder Smash>!
Zhang Yang slid through the field and slowed the boss down.
Unable to get away from Zhang Yang even after running left and right, Gail could only fight him with his fist.
<Block>!
Zhang Yang finally laughed. Comparing Gail when was in his Warrior state to now, it was easier to fight Gail in his pitiful Hunter state.
Everyone was gaping when they saw Zhang Yang's series of impressive maneuver. Even Daffodil Daydream was impressed.
"As expected from a legend. Zhan Yu really lives up to his name!"
40%, 30%... Gail Baghdad's HP was dropping even faster!
In that period, the boss had used several <Barrage>, but everyone was quick enough to react, taking only 1 instance of the attack each! Excluding Fatty Han, the rest of the party were all future professional players. Their reaction speed and intuition were strong. Moving around while avoiding attacks was just a walk in the park!
Though, on one hand, Fatty Han had been with Zhang Yang and received indirect training, therefore his reaction speed was also commendable.
20%... 10%... Gail Baghdad HP was almost dropping to zero!
Finally!
'Ding! You and the party members around have killed Gail Baghdad. Obtained 163,050 Experience Points. (50 points party bonus)!'
THUD!
Gail Baghdad's humongous horse body fell, slamming heavily onto the ground.