Corwin was ecstatic about completing the dungeon raid. The fact that eight of his teammates died was unfortunate, but somewhat expected given the poor gear. That was a problem that would soon be remedied as Corwin had several powerful recipes. Upon his resurrection, Corwin asked Kyo to work on selecting 10 more players for a 20-man team. Corwin spent the next 4 hours manufacturing. He made cloth armor, plate armor and rings. While he was working he received 3 notifications:

Congratulations to Corwin Swordborn for being the first in Eternity’s Wake to reach Journeyman Tailor. Rewarding with 1 Tailor’s Tools (Silver Tier) and 160,000,000 XP.

Congratulations to Corwin Swordborn for being the first in Asterith to reach Journeyman Tailor. Rewarding with 1 Tailor’s Medallion (Iron Tier) and 80,000,000 XP.

Congratulations to Corwin Swordborn for being the first in Orleans to reach Journeyman Tailor. Rewarding with 1 Tailor’s Belt (Bronze Tier) and 40,000,000 XP

Corwin continued to make rings. In total he made 60 gold tier rings. He planned on giving 40 to the team to raid the 20-man dungeon. The remainder would go in the guild workshop to give people something exciting to work towards. Corwin also put in some spare silver-tier cloth and plate armor.

While Corwin was crafting Kyo was working on figuring out the 20-man team. Kyo selected 2 healers with resurrection, a 2nd warrior and a 2nd antimage. He then added 5 DPSers: an archer, a ranger, two assassins and a berserker. When Corwin was done crafting he handed out relevant gear to the full team. This put plenty of people in the red on GCPs but they’d just have to do guild quests to make up the difference. It was important that Corwin get this first clear and enhance the guild reputation and guild experience as fast as possible. Corwin also wanted the items from the 20-man dungeon. In 20-man dungeons set items were more common, so it was possible to get better equipment even though the different modes still only awarded bronze, iron and silver tier equipment.

The main boss from the 20-man dungeon could also drop the Level 1 Guild Workshop upgrade. Corwin desperately wanted to upgrade to a level 1 guild so he could continue to expand the membership. Corwin returned his thoughts to passing the dungeon, everyone was ready.

Since the common-tier gave out free passes for the next level Righteous Destiny raided it first. The items they got were all minor, with the best items being iron tier recipes. Regardless, some satisfying announcements rang out.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of Hellbane Dungeon in normal mode. Rewarding 1 dungeon pass, 40 guild reputation, and 200 guild experience.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of a normal difficulty 20-man dungeon in Eternity’s Wake. Rewarding 200 guild reputation, and 1000 guild experience.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of a normal difficulty 20-man dungeon on the Asterith continent. Rewarding 100 guild reputation, and 500 guild experience.

The 20-man rewards were double the 10-man rewards which was quite exciting. We continued to hard mode. In hard mode we found 2 silver-tier recipes, one for leather armor and one for cloth boots. The rest of the items were iron-tier or worse, but still made sense for filling out some slots where people didn’t have level 20 items.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of Hellbane Dungeon in hard mode. Rewarding 1 dungeon pass, 80 guild reputation, and 400 guild experience.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of a hard difficulty 20-man dungeon in Eternity’s Wake. Rewarding 400 guild reputation, and 2000 guild experience.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of a hard difficulty 20-man dungeon on the Asterith continent. Rewarding 200 guild reputation, and 1000 guild experience.

Finally, after completing two practice runs at lower difficulty and receiving some small rewards we were nearly ready for the main event. I took a break to craft the silver tier items, giving the ranger and archer their first key pieces of armor. I also made cloth boots for all the cloth classes. We were as geared up as we could be when we went for the hell mode run.

Hell mode was a new challenge. The regular enemies were swarms of special elites and it was tricky to defeat them without burning too much stamina and mana. Resting to recover hurt our time so we tried to be efficient. Hell mode in 20-man dungeons or higher was a time attack, there were additional bonuses for setting a record time, provided the time was under a dungeon threshold time. I wanted us to beat that threshold very badly.

The first boss consisted of 3 demon lords, all of whom focused on physical damage. With 2 Warriors and a knight we were well equipped to tank them. We focused them down one at a time, enjoying our much higher damage with better equipment. Fortunately, these demons were not the kind that cursed, so there weren’t any serious consequences to beating them.

Things got tricky at the 2nd boss where we had to fight 2 demon great lords. These demons were fire and lava users and did a lot of magical attack damage. Our 2 antimages became the tanks and the knight rotated in support. This fight was tricky and almost half of the team died. Fortunately, we got through, and with 2 priests available we were able to resurrect the team quite quickly.

The final boss was an elite superior lord. Elite superior lords were tricky opponents, with roughly twice the stats of superior lords. This became a problem quite quickly as the tanks weren’t equal to tanking many blows. Even rotating all 5 tanks, Righteous Destiny had a hard time healing fast enough. This was despite having 2 healing summons and 2 healers in the party. Corwin finally decided to step in and draw aggro, using dodges to tank. Him and his party got the enemy down to 80% at which point he triggered his skill. Unfortunately, it was a buff skill, making him even stronger. Worse of all it seemed to be permanent and stacking.

Corwin knew the tanks weren’t equal to taking on the buffed monster so he had to tank the whole fight. His equipment made him up to the challenge, but it wouldn’t be easy. He needed to dodge a lot to keep the healers refreshed and he pushed his dodging to the limit as he scored blows whenever he could. After seeing the skill pattern of the boss, disrupting blow got saved for the only AoE. This kept everything manageable. At 60% health Corwin started to get hit regularly. At 40% he could only dodge about half of the blows. Fortunately, all four healers could focus on Corwin so he was still doing okay thanks to his large HP pool and high Def. But at 20% health things became a real slugfest.

Corwin’s health started to drop faster than the healing. Even worse the healers were under mana pressure. He nonetheless persisted, trading blows and dealing huge damage to the elite superior lord. Finally, the boss reached 5% health. Corwin was at 20% health by this point and the 2 priests were out of mana and had used up their potions. Everyone went all out to stop the ultimate. Fortunately, it had a long countdown. Unfortunately, the boss had high HP. It was going to be close. Corwin used rapid blow aggressively along with all his skills and techniques trying desperately to burst the boss down. Alice fired off all her powerful magic. Kyo’s summons wailed on the boss. Everyone else was doing their part too. The ultimate triggered when the boss had 1000 HP left. It was an AoE that turned the ground into lava dealing massive fire damage to anyone caught within it. Fortunately, the lava existed for only a brief moment before the demon fell. Corwin was caught inside, as were some summons. The summons died and Corwin had stabilized at 2% HP. They had done it. They had raided a 20-man dungeon.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of Hellbane Dungeon in hell mode. Rewarding 1 dungeon pass, 160 guild reputation, and 800 guild experience.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of a hell difficulty 20-man dungeon in Eternity’s Wake. Rewarding 800 guild reputation, and 4000 guild experience.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the first clear of a hell difficulty 20-man dungeon on the Asterith continent. Rewarding 400 guild reputation, and 2000 guild experience.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the fastest clear of Hellbane Dungeon in hell mode. Their time is 1h51m32s. Rewarding 1 dungeon pass, 400 guild reputation, and 2000 guild experience.

Along the way there was all sort of loot, including two lucky triggers. The highlights were a gold tier plate cuisse recipe and a gold tier amulet recipe. Corwin was ecstatic that his high luck was leading to so many recipes and so many gold tier drops. Level 20 gold items were as good as level 40 silver items, so this amulet and cuisse were extremely powerful. The cuisse in particular was part of the demonbane set, which gave bonuses against Demons for its set effect. Unfortunately, they hadn’t found any other parts of the demonbane set yet.

Corwin took another break to manufacture a ton of items. With all the recipes the team was earning, the players had paid off most of their GCP debt. Of course, they’d cycle back into debt quickly as Corwin handed out amulets to the full team. The plate classes got their gold tier cuisse as well. We then raided again.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the fastest clear of Hellbane Dungeon in hell mode. Their time is 1h38m29s. Rewarding each member 1 Tier 3 Gemstone. Rewarding the team 400 guild reputation, and 2000 guild experience.

Unfortunately, the rewards changed for the top clear and we no longer got an extra dungeon pass. It would be fun to keep time attacking and raid the dungeon till we had boatloads of great equipment. Alas, we’d only have one more run. We equipped some new gear and experience before continuing, but we didn’t have any gold recipes this time so it wasn’t as much help. Righteous Destiny’s time only improved a little.

Congratulations to party Righteous Destiny for the fastest clear of Hellbane Dungeon in hell mode. Their time is 1h34m58s. Rewarding each member 1 Tier 3 Gemstone. Rewarding the team 400 guild reputation, and 2000 guild experience.

Corwin ended up being stuck crafting after that, creating enough equipment for a 2nd team to go raiding. That team had to start of normal difficulty to get used to the bosses so it would be a while before they could contribute any silver tier equipment or recipes. Nonetheless it was good to have 40 members of the team raiding dungeons. At level 30, the 50-man dungeons began, and Corwin wanted to be ready.

Corwin was happy that both of his tier 3 gemstones were agility and he took the opportunity to socket them into two of his armor pieces that had yet to be socketed. This brought his agility over 4000, which was a cause for celebration. Finally, he went to the auction house and bought up rare crafting materials, particularly those that were undervalued.

Corwin Swordborn

Spoiler : Level 20: 93% of level 21

Str: 3865 (base:25)

Agi: 4025 (base:125)

Con:3865 (base:25)

Int: 1177 (base:25)

Cha: 1177 (base:25)

Lck: 409 (base:25)

Cnc: 409 (base:25)

Sta: 409 (base: 25)

Qi: 409 (base: 20)

Soul: 409 (base:20)

Air Affinity: 409 (base:20)

Fire Affinity: 409 (base:20)

Water Affinity: 409 (base: 20)

Def: 12601

MDef: 9729

HP:80300/80300 (base: 1000)

MP:26540/26540(base: 1000)

Gear:

MW: Epic Tier Level 24 Longsword, +384Str +384Agi +384Con

Base Damage: 480-576, Def 576 MDef 480 Durability 690/768, Requirements: 768 Str

OW: Epic Tier Level 24 Shortsword +384Str, +384Agi, +384 Con

Base Damage 392-480, Def 480 MDef 392 Durability 696/768, Requirements: 768 Str

MA: Epic Tier Level 24 Plate, +384 Str, +384 Agi, +384 Con

1536Def,1536MDef, Durability 710/768, Requirements:768 Str

LA: Epic Tier Level 24 Plate Cuisse, +384Str, +404Agi(20 Gemstone), +384Con

1536Def, 1536MDef Durability: 716/768 Requirements: 768 Str

G: Epic Tier Level 24 Plate Gauntlets +384Str, +404 Agi(20 Gemstone), +384 Con

1536Def, 1536MDef, Durability 713/768 Requirements: 768 Str

B:Epic Tier Level 24 Plate Boots +384Str +394Agi(10 Gemstone) +384Con

1536 Def, 1536 MDef, Durability 711/768 Requirements: 768Str

H: Epic Tier Level 24 Helm, +384 Str, +394(10 Gemstone) Agi, +384 Con

1536 Def, 1536MDef Durability 709/768, Requirements: 768Str

RR: Epic Tier, Level 24 Ring of Hidden Attributes (+384 All base attributes, +384 All Hidden Attributes)

LR: Epic Tier, Level 24 Ring of Elements (+384 All base attributes,

Ignore 4.8 Levels, Ignore 4.8 Equip Levels

AM: Epic Tier, Level 24 Amulet (+384 All base attributes)

Skills:

Spatial Slash, Legacy, Tier 0 Level 0

Haste of the Warrior, Legacy, Tier 0 Level 0

Time Manipulation, Special, Tier 0, Level 9

Space Manipulation, Special, Tier 0, Level 9

Air Manipulation, Special, Tier 0, Level 9

Earth Manipulation, Special, Tier 0 Level 9

Fire Manipulation, Special, Tier 0, Level 8

Water Manipulation, Special, Tier 0, Level 8

Dragon Fist, Martial, Tier 0 Level 0

Qi Blade, Martial, Tier 0 Level 0

Demon Slayer, Rare, Tier 0 Level 0

Thunder Slash, Rare, Tier 0, Level 1

Wave Chop, Rare, Tier 0, Level 1

Wind Charge, Rare, Tier 0, Level 1

Disrupting Blow, Rare, Tier 0, Level 5

Double Slash, Uncommon, Tier 0, Level 2

Slash, Common, Tier 0, Level 2

Pierce, Common, Tier 0, Level 3

Parry, Common, Tier 0, Level 2

Techniques:

Rapid Blow

Vanishing Steps

Sword Light

Mana Drain

Health Drain

Stamina Drain

Strength Drain

Agility Drain

Endurance Drain

Flicker

Precision Dodge

Curses:

Curse of the Lust Demon, Days Remaining: 29

Bloodlust Malediction, Countdown: 5 days