Chapter 342

Defense Specialization and a Rival

What greeted the trio as they stepped into the boss room, was a mummy that was wrapped up in light purple bandages . And it was about three times their height .

It also had red eyes that could be seen through the gaps of its wrappings, much like the other mummies . And since the eyes were much larger, the trio could see the eerie glow even at a distance .

“Alright, let’s do this!”

Maple ran on ahead of the others, and then activated ‘Throne of the Heavenly King’ in the center of the room, so that the boss would be within range of their magic . Then Maple sat on the throne and looked at the boss .

It was letting out a disturbing moan, and in reply, mummies and golems began to appear from the ground . However, these mummies had a black aura about them, and the golems were wielding spears made of sand .

“Uh, now they have spears… Velvet! Could you please kill the golems with spears first . ”

Velvet was quick to understand that Maple didn’t like piercing attacks, and she promised to take them down first .

As Maple was sitting on the throne, some of her powerful skills were sealed . This meant her methods of attack had to change .

“‘Provoke’! Syrup, ‘Red Garden,’ ‘White Garden,’ ‘Sinking Earth’!”

The glowing field spread out from around the throne, and then the field was covered in white and red flowers . When the monsters near Maple stepped within reach of the pretty flowers, they sunk into the ground and were assaulted by debuffs .

“‘Hydra’!”

The flowers were not affected by the poison, and they continued to bloom proudly . The purple just made the scene even more colorful as it tore away the HP of the monsters . A place you should not approach . A forbidden area . The biggest weakness of these monsters was that they did not know this .

While Maple bound up the monsters surrounding her, Velvet and Hinata slammed the boss and the golems with magic attacks .

“Yes! This is going well!”

Monsters had attack patterns . And if all of them were ineffective against Maple, it would be a one-sided fight unless they could do something new . And while the boss mummy had buffs that increased its attack power, it was hardly enough, and it seemed like the throne was preventing any of its debuff skills from being activated .

“To- ‘Tornado’!”

“Alright, me too!”

Hinata unleashed a tornado that picked up all of the weak monsters, while also dealing great damage to the boss . And with Maple’s weapons now joining in, the boss’s HP went below the halfway point .

As the three waited to see what would happen next, the boss moaned loudly and the room began to shake . At the same time, a white, cold wind exuded from the boss and blew through the room . It enveloped the three, starting with Maple, resulting in the deactivating of all of their skills and buffs .

“What!? Are you kidding?!”

Because all of Maple’s skills were very powerful, they had long cooldown times . It was impossible for her to bring back the powerful fields immediately . Not only that, but all of the debuffs from the boss and mummies that the throne had been blocking now suddenly assaulted them . And since Dedicated Affection was no longer enough to protect them, their statuses dropped dramatically .

That being said, the effect on Maple was still quite low, but the same could not be said for the other two .

“‘Provoke’! ‘Savagery’!”

In order to survive until the debuffs wore off, Maple used ‘Provoke’ again and then activated Savagery . And with this monster skin, she went wild . The debuffs meant that Maple was doing almost no damage, but it had the merit of preventing her from dying immediately .

The spears of the golems had piercing attacks, just as she had predicted, and she dodged them as much as possible while blocking the attacks of the boss, so that they would not reach the other two . As the throne was gone, none of the boss’s skills were sealed . And when Maple came close to it, it put both its hands on the ground so that a dark fog-like puddle appeared . The puddle began to spread out ominously, but Maple could do nothing to stop it . It was the same with the other two . They parried the attacks of the monsters and waited for a chance to counter .

“Uhh, what should I do… Huh?”

Just after the fog spread throughout the entire room, Maple felt the sensation of the floor disappearing beneath her, and she was swallowed up by the black fog . A second later, her vision returned, but the boss that should have been right in front of her was now far away . Furthermore, she could see the backs of the other two in front of her .

“Woah! We traded places!?”

Velvet and Hinata were now surrounded by the monsters, and Maple was in the back . Preparing monsters, deactivating skill, casting debuffs and messing up your formation . That’s what this boss did .

“Cover Move…doesn’t reach…!”

As the debuffs were making her even slower, she could not use Savagery to run, or deactivate it and fly through self-destruction . She would not make it in time .

Maple ran forward anyway . But then the boss’s fists, which was enveloped in a black aura, came down over the two as if to make doubly sure that they died . The situation had changed too suddenly for them, and it was clear that they would be hit by the attack .

That’s when Velvet suddenly took a step forward as if by reflex, and opened up her umbrella in order to protect Hinata, as the fists rammed into her .

“Ha! You’ll have to do more than that! ‘Second Coming of the Thunder God’!”

Velvet shouted loudly, and with a great roar, a pale blue and thick bolt of lightning shot out . It ran through the ground, burning and binding all the monsters and even the boss .

As the electricity crackled, Velvet looked at Hinata with an ‘I shouldn’t have done that’ expression .

“Let’s escape for now . ”

“…Yes . ”

Velvet picked up Hinata and jumped with the thunder . Like that, they easily escaped the circle of monsters, and landed by the shocked Maple .

“Huh? What?!”

“Hmm… I’ll explain later . ”

“I think…the guys at the guild are going to say that you’re honest to a fault…”

“Well, Maple showed us a lot too . And she protected us . It’s our turn now!”