Boom!

Rocks shattered and earth flew high into the air as sword energy whistled in the wind. The attacker was no other than Snowy Cathaya’s guild leader, Lin Yixin. The Fruit Knife Goddess had launched an outrageous sneak attack against the boss of the ninth wave. She borrowed the Frostscythe Warhorse’s extreme speed to get a jump on God Dancer before galloping away!

“Despicable…”

God Dancer’s face warped into a grotesque and sinister mask as she let out a howl. She raised her jade flute in the air once more as another Flame Blast erupted from it!

Lin Yixin had activated her rear view so she was aware of God Dancer’s every movement. She had already adjusted her warhorse’s speed and the angle in which it was galloping. However, even though the Frostscythe Warhorse had a high level, it still had a pretty high turning inertia. Lin Yixin was going to get hit by that attack, no matter how fast her reaction speed was!

10982!

Lin Yixin flew into the distance with a soft groan of pain. She wasn’t going to engage the boss in a long and drawn-out battle. God Dancer wasn’t interested in chasing after her either, because she had to deal with Floating Ice City’s Black Cavalry that was charging straight for her.

……

Beep!

Lin Yixin continued to flee as she sent me a message: “Lu Chen, here. These are the boss’s stats and abilities, share them with the rest of your guild. Be careful when engaging it, this Earth Rank boss is simply far too ridiculous…”

After that, she sent me a string of messages. As those numbers played out on my HUD, I couldn’t help but break out into cold sweat. This girl was really daring, she even dared to challenge a Level 151 Earth Rank boss, a powerful being that had scared the rest of the players witless, by herself. And to think that this was all so she could obtain and share the boss’s status window.

God Dancer (Earth Rank Boss)

Level: 151

Attack: 2350~2790

Defense: 2400

Health: 5000000

Skills: Rally, Flame Blast, Soul Arrow Rain

Introduction: God Dancer’s origins have been lost in the sands of time, but legend has it that she was once a young magus of the human race who was tricked and killed by the demons. After her death, she transformed into one of the undead and gained an even stronger power in the afterlife. Coldblade the Infinite Storm took her under his wing and she is now one of the commanders of the armies of Hell.

……

I swiftly shared the boss’s stats in the guild channel. The Black Cavalry would only be able to hold the line for a little while. In the end, it would definitely be up to us players to kill God Dancer. Furthermore, the prospect of the rewards obtained by killing this Earth Rank boss was ridiculously enticing, it simply wouldn’t be like us to pass up such an opportunity!

The guild channel exploded into activity once everyone saw the God Dancer’s stats.

Xu Yang gasped: “My god! Five million HP…”

Li Chengfeng: “What a tough nut to crack! 2790 Attack. Hmmm, given the level suppression, the hidden stats that every boss and her Rally skill, God Dancer’s actual attack is probably closer to 8000 points. If not, there’s no way that she could poke a warrior like Li Le to death with a single thrust of that flute!”

Gui Guzi spoke up excitedly, “When are we going to go and kill her?”

I replied, “Let’s deal with all of the monsters in front of us first!”

“Okay!”

……

The players of Snowy Cathaya had also been shaken by this news. After consecutives brawls, they had even less players left than us. They would have to pause and consider their own situation before they decided to take on the boss. In truth, their core combat strength lay in Lin Yixin and the forty players under her direct command. The rest of them were good players but were inconsequential when it came to killing God Dancer. That was because this Earth Rank boss had 2400 points of Defense. After adding her hidden stats, her effective Defense might have exceeded 4000. Any player with less than 5000 Attack would not be able to deal any significant damage to her.

And if someone were to ask how many players in Sky City had 5000 Attack or more, the answer would be that there absolutely weren’t more than fifty people in the entire city who passed that threshold.

Giant Iceflame Beasts were slowly toppling to the ground one after the other as the players of Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls poured their all into the fight. To our right were our guild allies, Snowy Cathaya. To our left were the Iron Cavalry of Floating Ice City. As long as we could maintain our battle lines, the only thing everyone needed to do was to pour out as much damage or healing as they possibly could. The frontline fighters of our guild were unrivaled under the heavens, so they were perfectly capable of holding the line as long as our priests kept an eye on their health bars. After all, these Giant Iceflame Beasts were still landbound monsters, so we were actually able to physically block them this time.

My EXP bar was jumping like crazy and it soon reached 47%. It was clear that the monsters spawned during this event were providing the bulk of the EXP. Every time I killed a Level 151 Giant Iceflame Beast, I gained 50% of the EXP it gave. But the truth of the matter was that these monsters were giving far more EXP than the usual shadow-rank monsters, so the 50% was deceiving. In fact, I could safely say that these Level 151 Giant Iceflame Beasts were giving at least ten times more EXP than the Level 151 shadow-rank beasts in the Dragonbone Mountain Range!

These opportunities to frantically raise one’s level were simply too hard to come by. The players who managed to survive until now were killing monsters until their eyes turned red with bloodlust. They were seeking their fortune amidst this danger, because it was relatively easy to get Dark Gold–grade items from these Level 151 shadow-rank monsters. In fact, Li Chengfeng was lucky enough to get Level 125 Purple Gold–grade leather wristguards. Unfortunately, they weren’t an Outstanding item.

Everyone was killing as many monsters as they could to take advantage of our situation. It was clear that this opportunity hadn’t been lost on any of our players.

When I checked the server, I saw that the number of surviving players had been shaved down to less than seventy thousand. Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls still had about four thousand elites, while Snowy Cathaya had more than three thousand players left in the fight. The Monarch Descends hadn’t fared so well during this wave and they had already dipped below three thousand surviving players, but the ones who had survived had clearly gained a lot of levels.

When I checked the point rankings, I saw that it had changed yet again.

NamePointsBroken Halberd Sinks Into Sand

512830Wind Fantasy398020From Water321780Beiming Xue312370Legendary Brave286100Shadow Chanel261520Moonlight Stone260400October Rain251340Purple Marquis242710Ling Xueshang241280High Fighting Spirits228740Warsky213740Gui Guzi201470Clear Perfume192730Little Piglet192710

……

He Yi was using her Whirlwind’s incredible passives and stats to deal a ridiculous amount of damage, so she had jumped to third on the list. After having reached Level 120, Li Chengfeng was able to equip his Tempest Sword, so he had received a similar boost in DPS as He Yi, allowing him to climb to the fifth spot. Gui Guzi had also been steadily climbing the rankings.

Warsky and October Rain were still on the leaderboard, which meant that Warsky Alliance hadn’t collapsed yet. They were still holding off the Night Creatures in the western part of the battlefield. Meanwhile, Hegemon Palace’s defense was on the verge of breaking since Little Piglet could barely hold on to the fifteenth spot on the rankings. In all honesty, Little Piglet’s mechanical skill wasn’t that much lousier than Li Chengfeng or Purple Marquis’s, and this was something that was acknowledged by everyone.

As long as a skilled person picked the right organization, their career was bound to rise like a rocket. Too bad for Little Piglet though. A skilled mercenary like him had chosen to take the huge amount of money that Wang Dongliang was offering him to become Hegemon Palace’s chief hatchet man. He’d even learned the Famous General Skill, Vajra! However, Hegemon Palace’s prospects didn’t look good and he didn’t have guildmates who could keep up with him. In the end, Little Piglet could only languish in Hegemon Palace as they suffered setback after setback.

……

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The light of Reverse Scale Slash and Burning Blade Slash intermingled as the fighters at the very forefront finished off the last few Giant Iceflame Beasts in front of us. There were still pockets of monsters putting up that last bit of resistance, but it was clear that Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls had finally finished taking care of business. We were now free to attack God Dancer!

I raised the Heaven-stealing Sword in the air and shouted to the guild members behind me, “All players Level 117 and above, follow me! It’s time to form a party and beat that boss. I also need a party of strong priests to follow us! We’ll distribute the boss’s loot using contribution points, no one is to take any drops for themselves!”

A group of high-level players immediately left the formation and formed up behind me.

In the distance, God Dancer’s body swayed as she continued to use Rally. The group of Giant Iceflame Beasts around her howled like they were in heat. They flailed their arms toward the riders of the Black Cavalry with no regard for their own safety and even the NPC soldiers couldn’t withstand the continuous pounding of these gigantic fists. Only a short period of time had passed since God Dancer had engaged the Black Cavalry in battle, but hundreds of knights had already lost their lives. Karinshan had really paid the butcher’s bill during this battle to retake Sky City.

I readied my sword as I shouted towards the distant Lin Yixin, “Yiyi, are you able to join us in killing this boss? We could really use the boost from your Famous General Skill!”

Lin Yixin nodded her head before turning to Purple Marquis. “Hold down the fort here, I’m off to kill the boss!”

“Okay, you can leave it to us, guild leader!” Purple Marquis said earnestly, looking just like a devoted and courageous general who had stepped out of the pages of a history book. But he also didn’t forget to add, “Boss, remember to come back to us. Don’t let that punk Lu Chen steal your soul…”

“Hmph…”

Lin Yixin gave a soft snort before saying, “If you want to die, I can send you to hell free of charge!”

“Our guild leader is wise, our guild leader is beautiful…”

……

After a few minutes, Lin Yixin galloped over and joined our party. I immediately made her the party leader and said, “We’ll need your Bombshell to even stand a chance against God Dancer!”

“Mn!”

Lin Yixin activated Bombshell, causing the stats of everyone in the party to rise dramatically.

Tsk tsk, this king-class Famous General Skill is really ridiculous.

The only person in our forty-man party who wasn’t a member of Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls was Lin Yixin herself, and she was here so we could borrow her Famous General Skill. As for our party composition, we were mainly made up of melee combatants. We had some archers and mages sprinkled in, but the main strength of our guild lay in our frontline fighters. Moon Dew was bringing up the rear with her forty-man priest squad. They had detached from our main formation to keep us alive during the upcoming boss fight.

I sucked in a deep breath as I stared at the distant God Dancer. “We’re about to fight a Level 151 Earth Rank boss. I don’t want anyone to be careless when fighting her. In fact… everyone should fight her expecting to die at any moment…”

Li Chengfeng waved his hands and laughed. “I already expected to die from the very first wave of monsters…”

“Okay, I’ll go pull the boss. Everyone else, wait here. Wait for me to pull the boss over here before engaging her in combat!”

“Alright!” everyone shouted as they looked at me expectantly.

After that, He Yi sent me off with a gentle warning. “Be careful!”

“I got it!”

……

I held my sword at ready as I zigzagged through eight Giant Iceflame Beasts. I ran this erratic path so I could avoid pulling any of their aggro.

When I was about seventy yards away from God Dancer, this powerful boss actually took notice of me! Her beautiful eyes swept toward me as she spoke in a shrill voice filled with raging bloodlust, “Hehe, I recognize you, you treacherous bastard! You are the traitor who killed Undead Swordmaster Suren. The traitor who betrayed his dignity as an undead to become the humans’ lapdog! Well, it’s time for you to hand over your life!”

Her jade flute trembled as Flame Blast shot out of it!

I had been keenly observing her movements so I was ready to dodge before she even launched an attack at me. My boots suddenly slammed against the ground as I abruptly changed direction. I felt a scorching sensation burn past my face as the Flame Blast missed me by a few inches.

Holy shit, that was close! I had very nearly become a roasted pig!

Since I’d just barely dodged her Flame Blast seventy yards away from her, I’d be a sitting duck if I tried to get any closer.

Energy surged along the edge of my blade, forming a cyan crescent of sword energy in the air that I viciously slashed toward God Dancer’s head! This also interrupted her while she was casting another Flame Blast.

5982!

God Dancer flew into a rage after she got hit on the head by that Dragon Slaying Slash. Her eyes turned blood-red as she rushed at me with a sinister expression on her face. “Traitor, prepare to die!”