"Reinforcements have arrived, people! Haha! Take out these Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen!"
I gave the reins a pull, and the Armored Ice Qilin Horse neighed loudly and bolted forward like lightning. As it slammed into an enemy cavalry, I threw Burning Blade Slash + Thousand Ice Slash combo into the crowd. Due to how narrow the area was, almost a hundred Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen were struck and frozen by the combo right away. Before they could heal themselves, I raised my palm to the sky and fired five golden seals into the sky in a row! The next moment, they crashed back down and flattened the cavalry troops like pancakes!
Bang bang bang...
A small half of the tower itself was shaking due to the sheer force of the Ancient Seals. I could not stack two or more seals on top of one another, but I could cover an incredible area with successive casts. In just the blink of an eye, a hundred Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen fell off their mounts, dead. There was simply no way for them to survive Burning Blade Slash + Thousand Ice Slash + Ancient Seal combo.
Heaven"s Rain cheered after killing a couple of Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen herself, "Wah, not bad at all, vice leader! Everyone, give it your all and take out these Northern Alliance b.a.s.t.a.r.ds!"
The Dragonlight Cavalrymen in Heaven"s Rain party were positively unstoppable because their Attack and Defense were boosted by 100% thanks to Knight General. They were utterly fearless despite facing over 200 enemies. Meanwhile, Heaven"s Rain and I acted as the point of our parties and wreaked havoc in the heart of the enemies.
The 17 Silver Soul players I had just added to my subguild also pulled their weight. Some of them a.s.sumed the role of damage dealers and fired Galaxy Storms and Spiraling Arrow Blades into the enemies. Others acted as the crowd control and drastically reduced the Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalry"s combat capabilities with Arctic Rain and Freezing Arrows. Their efforts definitely helped to ease our burden.
Crack crack…
Suddenly, I saw two steely flashes and one fiery explosion hitting the Dragonlight Cavalryman at the furthest corner. The poor guy let out a m.u.f.fled groan and died.
His attacker was an axe wielder called "Ghost Warrior”. His mount was a fearsome-looking Bloodthirsty Beast, and his eyes were burning with rage. He shouted, "Attack the Dragonlight Cavalry from both sides and kill them all! The others, ride with me to kill the enemy"s Divine General!"
Heaven"s Rain immediately looked at me. "I"ll cover you, vice leader!"
"It"s fine!"
I said with a casual smile on my face, "I was hoping that they would come to me!"
I spurred my mount and rode toward Ghost Warrior. The Heroic Bannerman turned out to be surprisingly skillful as he zigzagged long before he reached me and hid behind his comrades. A few seconds later, he slipped behind a comrade"s back one last time and vanished completely from view!
"Charge!"
At least a dozen Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen activated their Charge at once, and they came at me in a cascade so that the skill wouldn"t be wasted. This meant that I had to dodge as many times as there were Charges or risk getting chain-stunned until my death. Their stun rate couldn"t be ignored because the gap between my level and the Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalry"s was pretty small.
Thud thud thud…
I moved my mount backward a couple of steps before changing directions abruptly. After dis.h.i.+ng out Burning Blade Slash, I dropped an Icy Cyclone Domain and let the sprouting icicles do the killing for me.
It was at this moment I felt a cold wind behind my back. Just as I expected, Ghost Warrior"s true attack had arrived, and the skill he used was none other than Barrier Break itself!
"Die!"
He shouted as the flaming cone flew toward my direction. At the same time, a gigantic ice axe appeared out of nowhere above the battle axe and fell toward me as well. s.h.i.+t, it"s an AoE attack!
Chiang!
I crossed the Cyan Netherworld Sword in front of me and moved the Armored Ice Qilin Horse two yards to the side. Unfortunately, I only had enough time to parry the Barrier Break, and the ice axe"s range was surprisingly huge. A blast of cold energy engulfed my entire person the moment the axe hit the ground. It hurts!
19887!
Swhoosh swhoos.h.!.+
Two Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen seized my temporary lapse of concentration to Charge me from behind. They actually succeded in stunning me!
Panicking a little, Heaven"s Rain shouted, "I need a couple of Dragonlight Cavalrymen to circle back and protect the vice leader right now!"
……
Thud thud thud…
Barrier Breaks penetrated my chest again and again as 5 Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen attacked me frantically. I had lost more than half my HP in less than 2 seconds! This cannot continue!
"Get lost!"
The first thing I did upon recovering was to use War Crush. Then, I waved my hand at Ghost Warrior and shackled him with G.o.d Binding Art!
"He"s yours!"
I said to Heaven"s Rain before rus.h.i.+ng toward a group of Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen at the distance. After landing Burning Blade Slash on 20 enemies or so, I instantly regained almost 100k HP. G.o.d d.a.m.n, the 10% lifesteal of the Cyan Netherworld Sword was insane especially when the enemies were jam-packed. I was almost unkillable as long as there were enemies near me!
……
Behind me, Ghost Warrior wore an ugly expression on his face as Heaven"s Rain and two Dragonlight Cavalrymen deleted over half his HP with Barrier Breaks. At the distance, my new mages were shooting Dragon"s Roars at him as well. As powerful as a Heroic Bannerman might be, there was nothing they could do to escape the confines of G.o.d Binding Art. In the end, he died and dropped a pair of legguards.
There were still over 200 Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen clas.h.i.+ng against our Dragonlight Cavalry when the Heroic Bannermen died, so Heaven"s Rain and I wasted no time in diving back into the fray and killing them. Dozens of kills later, a new party of players suddenly emerged from the corridor at the side. The chanting of mages filled the air, and dozens of Galaxy Storms suddenly erupted across the battlefield. Over a hundred Bloodthirsty Beast Cavalrymen were deleted from existence just like that!
The newcomer was none other than Purple Lily, and the party leader, Luo River G.o.d of the Capital herself. Sitting at Level 169, she was the highest-leveled player in the entire China server right now. She was accompanied by the beautiful a.s.sa.s.sin Moonkiss, and a well-established party made of cavalry, archers, mages, bards, tacticians, tamers and more. There were about 500 of them.
……
After I picked up a couple of loot from the ground, I walked up to Purple Lily and greeted them with a smile, "Long time no see, Sister w.a.n.g Luo! I wasn"t expecting to see you here…"
Luo River G.o.d of the Capital shot my ragtag band of players a glance before commenting, "Why are you here and not with your main army? Are you trying to roleplay the lone hero or something, o" greatest Divine General of Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls?"
"Of course not, Heaven"s Rain is with me! Thanks for the timely a.s.sistance, by the way. We might"ve had to lose a couple more Dragonlight Cavalrymen if you didn"t show up."
"Hehe, you"re welcome!"
Luo River G.o.d of the Capital then looked at the direction where the center of the fourth floor was before saying, "The Northern Alliance think they could stop us by posting guards at every node of the map, but you and I both know that they underestimated us too much. So far, my party has encountered and taken out all the obstacles we"ve encountered along the way. What about you guys?"
"We"ve split up into several parties and are breaking the enemy"s control over the floor right now."
"Sounds good. Let"s join forces and continue to the center, shall we?"
"Okay!"
……
We spent a quick moment reorganizing the parties. First, we gathered almost 200 riders from each party and put them all under Heaven"s Rain. It would be wasteful not to utilize her 100% boost to Attack and Defense to the maximum. Everyone else joined my party to enjoy the 200% Attack boost provided by Martial G.o.d as there were still countless dread-rank Silver Halberdmen and Northern Alliance blockades to punch through. Unlike Knight G.o.d, Mage Soul and most other Famous General Skills, Martial G.o.d"s Attack boost applied to every cla.s.s. Considering our current circ.u.mstances, it was undoubtedly the king of all offensive stratagems!
We continued forward after everything was ready. A while later we encountered a group of shambling Silver Halberdmen, and Moonkiss asked, "Guild leader, Lu Chen, I count around one hundred dread-rank mobs blocking our way. How should we deal with this?"
I thought for a moment before replying, "Let"s take this slowly…"
But Luo River G.o.d of the Capital smiled and said, "You know, if you can keep these mobs busy for thirty seconds, I bet I can kill them all. What do you say, Lu Chen?"
"Really?"
"Purple Lily will join Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls as a subguild if I fail!"
"Alright then!" I smiled. "I"ll aggro the mobs and try my best to keep them busy for 30 seconds. I"m counting on you, Sister w.a.n.g Luo!"
"Leave it to me!"
……
I spurred my mount and charged toward the pack of dread-rank monsters.
"Hiss hiss…"
The undead halberdmen were wailing until they spotted me. Then, every last one of them used Charge!
"Oh s.h.i.+t! Oh s.h.i.+t!"
I groaned on the inside as I zigzagged for dear life. Changing my direction and speed repeatedly, I was able to dodge a dozen or so Charges per second!
"OMG, this Lu Chen is…" Moonkiss"s eyes widened in shock. "Is he even human? I didn"t even think this is possible…"
Luo River G.o.d of the Capital replied calmly, "Well, he is Lu Chen. Some of his talents are irreplicable even by Candlelight Shadow himself."
It wasn"t long before I aggroed the hundred or so Silver Halberdmen. After tossing down two Icy Cyclone Domains and running rings around the dread-rank mobs, I shouted, "Sister w.a.n.g Luo, it"s time! Do it!"
"Got it!"
Luo River G.o.d of the Capital raised her scepter high and surrounded herself in icy vapor. Eyes burning with determination, a hailstorm suddenly erupted from her weapon and hit the mobs head-on!
I s.h.i.+vered. It was because I saw this skill mentioned on the official webpage before—
Rage of the Snow G.o.ddess: Offensive AoE magic, 3-second cooldown. This skill increases the user"s magic attack power to G.o.dlike levels, but its drawback is that it costs 1000 MP per cast. Players who don"t have enough max MP shouldn"t even bother with it.
Most mages would"ve run out of MP in 4 casts, but Luo River G.o.d of the Capital had over 10k MP. The skill that would"ve sucked the life out of most mages was only slightly taxing to her.
……
BOOM BOOM BOOM!
There were icicles mixed within the hailstorm, and each one dealt over 90k damage per hit. I finally understood why the mage was as confident as she was. My Martial G.o.d boosted her attack power by 200%, so her Rage of the Snow G.o.ddess was stronger than ever before. She wasn"t boasting when she claimed that she could kill all these Silver Halberdmen in 30 seconds tops.
I didn"t slack off simply because my ally turned out to be capable, of course. I fired my Burning Blade Slashes and Thousand Ice Slashes at the mobs to kill them as soon as possible.
"Roar roar roar…"
The powerful dread-rank mobs could only scream and die as our skills destroyed them, and the battle was over in the blink of an eye. With me as the tank and Luo River G.o.d of the Capital as the damage dealer, the party"s mob killing efficiency was destined to break records.
……
Beside us, both Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls and Purple Lily members were staring at us with their mouths open. Even after the battle was over, they all looked like they were stuck in a daze.
Even Moonkiss was glancing back and forth between Luo River G.o.d of the Capital and me. The look in her eyes was weird to say the least.
……
Suddenly, I received a message from the Fruit Knife G.o.ddess, Lin Yixin. "Little Cheat, come to the center right now! Vienna"s Sorrow is starting the boss of the fourth floor, and we absolutely cannot surrender it to him!"