Chapter 936: Dark or Actually Sly
“I say we stop here.”
The party ran to their respective corpses and Brother Windcloud Nine raised his hand.
The DPS output was not enough, the party was not fast enough, these problems were so obvious that even Sister Windcloud Nine who had always been slow saw what was wrong.
“Some of our members’ equipment is not up to snuff, we’ll have to gather some equipment for them,” Brother Windcloud Nine said.
More powerful equipment sets could not be bought with money, but wealthy folks like Brother Windcloud Nine could obtain as many individual pieces of legendary equipment as he wanted.
Brother Windcloud Nine was the first to mention getting equipment, hence all the expenses were naturally on him. He shouted on the World Channel, bought at the Auction House, and soon, the players in the party that had subpar equipment were transformed inside and out.
“You could blame your equipment before this, but if we fail again, I’ll have nothing else to say.”
Brother Windcloud Nine made it clear that this was as far as he could help the party to improve. He was not responsible for whatever happened next.
The members with new equipment were in high spirits, especially Zhang Yan. Her equipment was the worst before, and now, she was equal to them.
Of course, compared with Li Yi, it was still far from good. Disregarding her, not even Brother Windcloud Nine in his priceless Divine Punishment Set could stand before him.
With their equipment replaced with top-notch ones, their DPS output would certainly skyrocket. Brother Windcloud Nine’s kind gesture had no doubt helped Li Yi a big deal.
After changing their equipment, the party tried again. After 47 seconds, the five black eggs were broken.
The party then ran around and tried to stay out of the attack range of the curse spells that the Cursed Wing released.
“To the right!”
“To the right again!”
“Hold!”
With Li Yi having broken out of the egg, they had him as their commander. The difficulty of the boss battle immediately fell by more than half.
After a round of DPS attacks, the boss battle quickly entered into the second phase.
Compared with before their equipment was changed, the DPS output now was much higher and stronger. Zhang Yan had the most outstanding performance. In the past, her DPS was merely around ten thousand, now it had broken 300,000.
In the second phase, the Cursed Wing would continue to use a more powerful curse spell with longer a casting time which was capable of destroying the entire party. However, when the players attacked, the casting time would be extended, and it would eventually be interrupted.
As long as the DPS output was sufficient, the second phase would be even easier than the first phase.
The problem would soon return in the final phase.
In the final phase, the Cursed Wing would cast on all players a powerful curse spell called Divine Time Stop. The effect was that there would be a timer counting down from ten on the top of every person’s head. When the number hit zero, the player would enter into a frozen state.
Due to different classes having different skills, how fast the number hit zero would vary. The main tanks were the slowest, lasting for twenty seconds before hitting zero. The healers would be a bit worse off while the DPS was the fastest, and their timer would hit zero around ten seconds.
When the timer hit five or below, the player with an odd number and another player with an even number on top of their heads could bump their bodies against each other and the timer would reset to ten again. If their numbers were the same, or their numbers were both even or both odd, regardless of how much time was left, the timer would be immediately reduced to zero once their bodies bumped into each other.
Hitting zero meant certain death!
The Cursed Wing had a HP of 2 billion. Every time the party went on to the next phase, its HP would automatically fully recover once. In other words, it had a total of 6 billion HP.
Even if Li Yi was a superman, it was impossible to kill it with a few arrows, hence the only way to succeed was to cooperate.
Whoever collided with whom must make judgments a few seconds in advance, and because the speed of each person’s timer was different, it was impossible to plan for. They had to do it spontaneously.
In addition to the timer on the top of the players, there would be four totems on the side of the boss. The numbers on top of them were different than those above the players’ head. There were only two changes to the numbers on the totem.
The numbers above the four totems were 1, 1, and 3, 3, respectively. Each time the player hit the totem; the totem would move from odd to even.
Four totems, and the players were only allowed to collide with them once during the boss battle. The totems were for public use, available for anyone in an emergency.
“I am 1, looking for 2 and 4!”
“I am 2, looking for 1, 3, and 5!”
The number on each person’s head was gigantic, hence easy to identify. If it was a team of one or two people, the cooperation would be effortless, but the problem was that the party led by Li Yi had 50 people, and the more people there were, the more difficult it was for coordination.
“Puff! Bump! Splash! Oomph!”
There was no end to players who made mistakes. Black smoke appeared on top of their heads as their clock hit zero, and their bodies stopped moving.
“I am 1!”
Li Yi hollered and slammed into Fatty who had the same number.
“Puff!”
The pair hit zero and turned into wood…
“Brother, I was 1,” Fatty cried helplessly.
“Sorry, my mistake.” Li Yi coughed in embarrassment.
Black smoke appeared occasionally until the end. Very few of them were killed by the boss’ actual curse, all of them had died due to being in the frozen state.
The final two survivors surprised everyone. One was Zhang Yan, and the other was Sister Windcloud Nine. Both of them were originally thought to be the worst, yet they had survived together.
After the people returned to their corpses and the whole party was resurrected, Sister Windcloud Nine was praised, and she was so happy she grinned from ear to ear as she waved. “It was quite easy, really.”
She did not pretend to be modest, but her honest attitude made many people go red in the face, including Li Yi.
“Number 1, please do not bump into 1, 3 or 5, one hit and you’ll both die.”
“Pay attention. Try to look at your target before you collide and check if there is anyone else who was to collide with the same person. I bumped into Killer with Brother Nine just now and since I had the same number as Brother Nine, I died, Killer also died.”
“Man, this is hard. The numbers move differently even between the same classes. There is no way to plan in advance.”
After a failure, it was time to sum up their experience.
It took a bit too long. Half an hour passed, and Li Yi still had no intention of trying again.
“Brother, what happened? When do we start?” Brother Windcloud Nine asked.
“We should wait longer and take our time to analyze, maybe we will pass on our next try.” Li Yi waved.
After another ten minutes, Li Yi announced the start.
Since the whole party had been wiped out, it was necessary to start from the first phase…
After a long half-hour, the party once again passed the first and second phase with zero casualties, and during the third phase…
“I am 2!”
Li Yi screamed and slammed into Sister Nine who flashed a 4 on her head…
“Oomph!”
“I am 4, 4 is an even number, even number!” Sister Nine who turned into wood shouted.
Li Yi felt embarrassed.
The whole party was stunned for a long time, staring at him.
After more than half an hour of summing up the experience, this time the party improved significantly. Except for Li Yi who accidentally killed himself and Sister Nine, more than a minute passed, and there were, surprisingly, no mistakes.
Li Yi could not move but had no problem speaking. He continued to act as the commander. “Very good, carry on! Qian’er, seek an opening and cast the Divine Flames. Jiaojiao, use the Infinite skill!”
Li Yi observed the whole party, and Zhang Yan caught his attention.
He found that Zhang Yan’s choice of target was rather ingenious. When the number on her head turned 4, she would approach a main tank and bump into it on time. She would then return to her original position.
The timer on a main tank was the slowest. Using her method, it would be easier, and the results would be much more stable.
It seemed that she had not survived until the end previously due to sheer luck.
Li Yi was very satisfied with Zhang Yan.
Giving Dragonslayer to her was not about getting on her good side. From back in his school days until the present, he never thought that Zhang Yan had anything remarkable. He gave her the weapon because first, he did not really know any Violent Warrior; second, he was responsible for her tragic death in his previous life. It was logical to compensate her; and third, she had the necessary potential.
As the third phase came to its fifth minute, the Cursed Wing was left with one billion HP, and its attacks became more desperate and unpredictable. The speed of their timers also accelerated.
“Don’t panic, keep it cool!”
“Keep going, keep going guys!”
“Keep up the good work people! Keep up the good work honey!”
“Puff! Bam!”
Two pairs of players did not time it well and their numbers hit zero.
Jiaojiao wielded her greatsword as she circled around the Cursed Wing. Since Li Yi perished, her DPS output rose to be third place in the party, definitely worthy of being the main strength of the party.
Qian’er stayed in second place, and Brother Windcloud Nine took the lead and ranked first.
“Oomph! Whack!”
As the boss’ HP decreased, the frequency of mistakes began to increase.
“Fellow main tanks, distract the boss further! Everyone, stay in the vicinity of the totems, be ready for anything!” Li Yi cried.
Although Li Yi made a careless mistake during the battle, he remained very strong in command, even the Great Commander Pretty Good Mood mentioned that if the Guild Master was willing to be their long-term commander, he would be made redundant.
Past experience coupled with personal ability made Li Yi skilled in commanding.
“The Winged Ones are the gods’ favorite! You lowly creatures are not worthy of existence!”
The Cursed Wing shrieked, its arms wide open, and its body slowly departed from the ground.
“Keep your eyes open and stay near the totems!”
“Woosh—”
The Cursed Wing flipped in the air and the numbers on top of them began to fluctuate.
3,7,8,2…
It was all messed up. The numbers became completely random.
At this phase, the players were on the verge of life and death, and the totems which could only be used once were crucial for finishing this boss battle.
In the final phase, the players were no longer holding back. They would use their strongest skills and launch a barrage of attacks against the Cursed Wing.
“Puff! Whoop! Wham!”
Players were being frozen constantly. In the final phase, as time went by, the numbers above their heads would become more and more irregular. They could not care much, and everyone was doing their best.
The HP of the Cursed Wing was rapidly reducing. As Fatty raised his Orange Quality Scepter up high, the body of the Ice Queen suddenly exploded.
“Nature’s Destruction!”
“Boom!”
[-178765545]
The red characters floated from the top of the Cursed Wing as launched a suicide attack with his summon beast, and it dealt nearly 200 million damage!
The battle was over!
“Hahaha, nailed it!”
“Heal our comrades and loot the equipment!”
The healers mobilized and started using resurrection spells to save people.
Sister Windcloud Nine was the first to be saved, and then she waved her hand to use Dark Resurrection Spell and raised Li Yi from the ground.
Li Yi didn’t react until he hit the confirmation button…
“My god—”
…