“Roar roar…”
The earth dragon"s roar rocked the entire underground. When It suddenly sprung into action, its gigantic body nearly broke the ceiling above our heads. Worse, its humongous size didn"t seem to slow it down in the slightest, and like a snake it crawled toward us as quick as lightning!
“Dodge!”
I hurriedly backed away and pushed both Chaos Moon and Moon Dew behind a rock, and not a second too soon because the boss" horns pa.s.sed through the s.p.a.ce we were just a moment ago. It would"ve been bad if we got hit there.
……
But what goes up must eventually come down, and the Great Earth Dragon chased us all the way to the pa.s.sage we came through earlier. If we backed any further than this, this wouldn"t be a boss fight, but an escape for our lives!
“Get ready to heal me! Here I go!”
I backed a few steps and activated Thunderous Charge!
Swhoos.h.!.+
Luck was in my favor this time, and a Stunned icon appeared on the boss" head!
The formation of the universe appearing beneath my feet, I stabbed a cone of cyan flames into the thick scales of the Great Earth Dragon and followed up with a Burning Blade Slash right after. A bunch of damage numbers appeared—
16902!
5892!
8901!
12001!
It wasn"t a particularly impressive amount of damage because the boss" Defense was pretty high. Moreover, a boss" armor was naturally stronger than a mob"s, and the Great Earth Dragon was no exception.
Chaos Moon also pounced forward and landed a Barrier Break and a Rock Crush on the boss" head. Surprisingly, Rock Crush dealt over 5000 damage to the boss. This meant that the skill had pretty high Defense penetration. Her Barrier Break also dealt over 14k damage, although this was considerably less surprising to me. As the owner of the four Bone Scythe equipment, also the only three-star Outstanding Spirit-grade equipment set in the entire server right now, I would find it stranger if her damage was poor.
The stun faded quickly, and the enraged Great Earth Dragon swung its gigantic claws at us the second it recovered. With nowhere to dodge, the only thing we could do was raise our weapons in defense!
Bang!
A terrible pain exploded across my arm. This Earth-rank was no less deadly than the ones I fought earlier, deleting over 13k HP in an instant. So painful!
That wasn"t the deadliest attack it had, however. The Great Earth Dragon abruptly lowered its head and attempted to gore me with its three sharp horns. It was none other than the skill “Draconic Hornblade”!
“Oh no, it"s over…” Chaos Moon"s mouth fell open.
Bang! I shook like a leaf as the number 18k appeared above my head. If Moon Dew hadn"t hit me with a Greater Heal just now, I would"ve been one-shot where I stood already!
The powerful strike sent me rolling unceremoniously across the ground, the girls running right beside me. If even I was no match for the boss, they didn"t think they would fare any better.
“Run! We"re no match for it!”
I got up and used an Earth Triceradragon card, buffing my max HP by 30%. A Tenacity of the Dead later, I just barely pulled myself away from the brink of death.
Chaos Moon tried to tank a hit, but the Earth Dragon quickly shattered her dreams with a 16k damage slap to the face. Even with four Bone Scythe equipment, her Defense was hardly out of the world. Before the Great Earth Dragon, she was nothing but a small and fragile flower that could be destroyed at any moment.
……
We ran full speed toward the exit while I dumped two Ice Cyclone Domains behind me to slow down the boss. Unfortunately, the boss had high movement speed to begin with, and the Ice Cyclone Domains barely affected it at all. It was definitely catching up to us.
I stared at my skill window and waited for the G.o.d Binding Art to finish its cooldown. The second it was ready, I turned around and used it again. It"s all on you now, G.o.d Binding Art!
Swhoos.h.!.+
The four divine weapons descended from the sky again, and this time it didn"t disappoint me. We now had 15 precious seconds to escape from the boss!
We continued to run like mad toward the exit. I grabbed Moon Dew"s hand so she could keep up with us while Chaos Moon opened the path ahead of us.
“Wait!”
Suddenly, I let out a shout and stopped everyone in their tracks. “Chaos Moon, look!”
“Huh?”
Chaos Moon looked at the direction I was pointing. It was the small cave where we killed the Earth PanG.o.dragon some time ago. She shot me a puzzled look and asked, “What"s with the cave? Wait, you aren"t planning to…”
Her beautiful features abruptly turned paler. “No! I"m not going in there! Those Earth PanG.o.dragons are absolutely disgusting, and it"s so dark and scary inside…”
“The h.e.l.l are you afraid about? And don"t you want to kill the boss?”
I put my hands behind her back and pushed her repeatedly. “You should go in first and open up the path. Moon Dew will go next and heal both of us. Finally, I"ll go last and stop the Great Earth Dragon from coming in. If everything goes well, we may just have a chance to beat the boss. Now quickly, the boss is going to break free of the G.o.d Binding Art any moment now!”
“Uuuu…”
Chaos Moon whined in protest, but my brain automatically filtered in out of my head. Any amount of sacrifice was acceptable if it meant killing a boss, not to mention that there was no such thing as a squeamish top expert? Do you want to kill a boss? Do you want to become a top expert? Then you better man up and do what"s necessary even if it was something as disgusting as fighting inside a literal pile of dragon dung...
……
The girls quickly entered the cave. In fact, the cave was so narrow that it was almost impossible to turn around, much less fit the Earth Dragon"s gigantic claw. On the other hand, I could a repertoire of ranged skills to attack the boss with such as Dragon Slaying Slash, Burning Blade Slash, War Crush and so on. They were all pretty powerful especially since I was buffed by Martial G.o.d.
The best part of this whole plan was that I could attack the boss, but the boss couldn"t attack me. I was also one hundred percent sure that this exploit was intentionally left behind by the devs because they could"ve removed it to no detriment to the experience at all. Of course, most people would be too scared to notice this. Only a person with a calm and collected mind would notice this.
.……
“Thud!”
I leaped into the cave and felt my back pressing against Moon Dew"s. I made sure to put about 3 yards between me and the cave, a perfectly safe amount of distance where I could attack the Great Earth Dragon, but the Great Earth Dragon couldn"t attack me.
Behind me, Moon Dew said, “Be careful, Lu Chen…”
“Mn.”
But Chaos Moon spoke up with displeasure, “WTF, why didn"t you tell me to be careful? I"m… Wah! The Earth PanG.o.dragons are coming…”
“Why are you screaming? Just kill them already!”
The light of Stone Crush flashed from behind me. I swear, this girl. It takes a special kind of recklessness to use Stone Crush in a narrow s.p.a.ce like this.
The Great Earth Dragon let out a mighty roar at the cave entrance. Then, an eye the size of giant bronze bell appeared and looked straight at me.
“What are you looking at, b.i.t.c.h!”
I stabbed its eye immediately with a Universe Break!
Squelch!
42794!
Not only did I hit a weak spot, it was a critical hit too. The Great Earth Dragon immediately let out a yelp of pain, drew back and shook its head repeatedly. After it recovered itself, it started clawing at the cave entrance furiously. The big problem was that the wall was giving way before the maddened a.s.sault!
My heart sank. This is bad. I can"t believe this boss can destroy the terrain as well. G.o.d dammit...
I fired a Burning Blade Slash that shook the boss" whole body and deleted a small amount of its HP. At the same time, I looked behind me and shouted, “Chaos Moon, keep killing the Earth PanG.o.dragons! We need to push deeper because the boss is literally shaving away at the cave entrance! If you keep stalling like this I"m literally going to be swallowed by the boss!”
Chaos Moon whined. “f.u.c.k, you have no idea how disgusting these Earth PanG.o.dragons are! They keep ramming their heads into my chest…”
Me: “...”
……
I kept throwing Dragon Slaying Slash after Dragon Slaying Slash at the boss. The battle was fierce, but we weren"t in danger. The girls were also smart enough to give me enough s.p.a.ce to attack the boss.
“Hey, Lu Chen! Use this card…”
Suddenly, Moon Dew b.u.mped my back once before pa.s.sing over a fiery red card; a high rank offensive card—
Blaze Beast: User"s attack power and attack speed is increased by 25%, and chance to inflict Burn on the target and prevent them from regenerating HP. Duration: 120 minutes. Level requirement: 120. Cla.s.s requirement: None.
……
I was stunned by how powerful the card was. “Holy s.h.i.+t, Moon Dew, where on earth did you get this? This is amazing…”
Moon Dew smiled. “Not long ago, I went on a leveling trip with Li Chengfeng, High Fighting Spirits and Gui Guzi at Dragonbone Mountain Range. It was a loot drop from a level 145 Spirit-rank boss we killed called the Blaze Beast. The boss only dropped metal armor equipment, so they gave me this as my reward. Since this is the perfect opportunity to use it…”
I smiled and gave her a nod. This Blaze Beast card lasts for two hours, and its effects were pretty amazing. The buffs were pretty powerful on its own, but it was nothing compared to the Burn effect it inflicted. a.s.suming that the effect landed, it would reduce the boss" HP regeneration to zero until its duration ran out. Everyone knows how bulls.h.i.+t a giant dragon"s HP regeneration was, and this card could reduce the amount of time needed to kill this boss by 50% at least!
Swhoos.h.!.+
The icon of a red Blaze Beast appeared above my head. Alright, it worked.
My attack rhythm changed completely after applying the skill. The channeling time of Dragon Slaying Slash became lower, and my Attack was slightly higher than before. My DPS was much higher now.
Behind me, Chaos Moon kept killing the Earth PanG.o.dragons. At the center, I kept attacking the boss while moving backward. Outside, the Great Earth Dragon had transformed into an earth mover that wouldn"t stop clawing away at the cave entrance until it got to me. Its claws went through the tough granite like hot knife through b.u.t.ter.
Time pa.s.sed bit by bit, and half an hour later the Great Earth Dragon"s HP had dropped to 7% or so. It had unleashed its ultimate skill, Sea of Purgatory Flames multiple times during this period, but it was just wasted effort because the flames couldn"t enter the cave at all.
“It"s going to pop, it"s going to pop…”
The two girls were positively beaming as the boss" HP continued to decrease at a steady pace.
……
Meanwhile, inside the guild channel—
Li Chengfeng: “We"re taking a break at the B8 floor now. We can"t progress further because there"s some sort of restriction surrounding the B9 floor. Blue Sky Scar is here as well!”
He Yi: “Got it. We"re currently at B7 floor, and Snowy Cathaya is killing the floor boss right now. Oh right, where are you, Lu Chen?”
Me: “We"re still on the B5 floor…”
He Yi: “...”
Li Chengfeng: “Where are you and the girls right now?”
Me: “In a cave…”
Pure Love: “So, you"ve finally claimed them for yourself. But why didn"t you take me with you…”
I cried. “I did no such thing…”