Chapter 650: Death Knight, Ishildur
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
It took Zhang Yang and his party approximately 2 hours to clear out every single Death Knights in the surroundings before they finally stood before the 4th boss. The Transformation Skill of Hundred Shots had expired for some time by now. However, Daffodil Daydream had activated her {Soul Breaker Transformation} right after that. She made sure that their party would always have at least one player with a Transformation Skill active.
The 4th boss was a Death Knight riding on a 3-meter tall and 5-meter long battle horse. That battle horse was gigantic! It was covered in metallic armor all over. The boss was larger than any ordinary player in the game. He looked intimidatingly large as he rode on the back of his battle horse. This was clearly two bosses in one battle. There was also a blade that went as long as 7 meters slung across the back of the boss. There were many words that could be used to describe the boss and his battle horse, but ‘domineering’ was definitely among those lines.
The attack range of Melee combatants had varying reach. For instance, two-handed weapons were basically one and a half meters longer than one-handed weapons. It meant that players with two-handed weapons would be able to attack one and a half meter further than those who wielded one-handed weapons. However, this Death Knight’s weapon seemed to be 7 meters long! His attack range could be considered as vast the attack range of a ranged Class!
[Death Knight, Ishildur] (Ethereal, Spectre)
Level: 148
HP: 800,000,000
Defense: 9,410
Melee Attack: 60,138 - 70,138
Skills:
[Death Strike]: There is a 33% chance to deal double damage to the target.
[Death Plague]: Unleashes a plague into the surroundings and cause 60,000 Shadow Damage to all non-Spectre beings.
[Spectre Build]: Recovers 1% HP once in every 30 seconds. Recovery amount will not be affected by any other effect.
[Blood of Madness]: Every time when Ishildur loses 10% HP, his damage dealt will be increased by 10%.
Note: Ishildur is the synonym of ‘Death’. When he pulls out his sword, there will be bloodshed and slaughter.
"Oh my god... I was so happy to see that the Attack of the boss was similar to the Attack of an Elite Tier Death Knight... apparently, the boss would get more agitated as he loses his HP... god damn it!" Everyone began to frown and curse the moment they came across the description for the {Blood of Madness}.
"It’s still alright. At least the boss does not have any automated Skills other than normal attacks." Zhang Yang nodded. "{Death Strike} has a rate of 33%. That would mean it might be triggered once in every 3 attacks. The damage is still within acceptable parameters."
"We’re only 20% away from completion now. Should we activate all our Inheritance Transformation Skills then?"
Zhang Yang gave some thoughts on it and said, "Then Ice queen should activate her Transformation Skill. Phoenix pets are more suitable for area battles that involve large numbers of monsters. Witchy Snow only excels in her Healing Capability, nothing else!"
"Hahaha! Are you asking sister Sun to work overtime to the point that her mother might not recognize her?" Wei Yan Er laughed out loud.
Zhang Yang flicked his finger against Wei Yan Er’s forehead with a thwack and said, "Don’t be delusional. Ice queen is not like you! You cannot differentiate what’s important and what’s not!"
"You stinky noob tank! Stop hitting my forehead! It’s swelling up like a bun now!" Wei Yan Er snarled at Zhang Yang, baring her teeth.
"Let’s move out!"
Zhang Yang took the lead and led his party members into battle. Everyone took their positions as they already knew where they should be and what they should do.
"Death is just the beginning of all things!" Ishildur uttered his ‘slogan’ as he rode out on his battle horse towards Zhang Yang and his gang. Swinging his long-*ss sword across the battlefield, the boss could reach Zhang Yang from afar. The cartoonish longsword as unexpectedly swift. Zhang Yang could only see a flash of light as if the sword was moving at lightning speed!
However, Zhang Yang was not slow to react either. He raised his shield up right before the blade could touch him. Instantly, Zhang Yang blocked the blade with his {Block}. However, the boss was extremely strong and powerful. The impact of that powerful strike had almost pushed Phoenix pet down to the ground. Well, it pissed off the Phoenix pet, alright. It flapped its wings and glided over towards the boss in fury. It opened up its mouth and spat out a crimson blazing fire towards the boss.
"Annoying light!" Ishildur felt disturbed by the assault and he swung his hand across the air and said, "Get lost!"
The blazing flames that were spat out by the Phoenix pet were extinguished all in an instant. Still, the boss took the full damage of it. It was just some cinematic visual effect that they could ignore.
Sun Xin Yu activated her {Shadow Dancer Transformation} on the spot as a pair of mysterious-black translucent wings spread out from her back. Upon entering her ‘Stealth mode’, she fluttered her wings a little and activated her {Leap Dodge}. By doing so, she arrived at the rear of the boss in a flash. With her dual swords ready in both of her hands, she activated {Ambush} as two flashes of lights were seen cutting across the boss! The boss took a great amount of damage.
‘-311,947!’
‘-155,973!’
Two extremely high damage values popped right up on top of the boss. Her aggro values instantly exceeded the amount of aggro Zhang Yang had. The boss turned around immediately and launched his assaults on her.
--- It made perfect sense. Without her transformation, she could already deal as much damage as Zhang Yang. Upon activating her Transformation Skill, she acquired an increment of 500% on her damage. So it was natural to see Sun Xin Yu at the top of the boss’s aggro list. Although Tankers could create additional aggro values with their attacks and Skills, nothing would top that sheer amount of damage gap.
However, Sun Xin Yu initially had over 200,000 HP. That amount of HP was boosted up by 40 times the moment when she activated her Transformation Skill. Hence, her Maximum HP had reached up to 8,000,000 HP. Though the boss was hitting hard, her HP bar stood strong.
However, a DPS player is not a Tanker, after all. There is a huge difference between the Defense of a Thief and the Defense of a Tanker. She could still get into trouble if left untended to. Han Ying Xue, Fantasy Sweetheart and the other three Battle Companions also had to heal the others other than Sun Xin Yu, in order to counteract the boss’s {Death Plague} at the same time. Hence, they were not able to fully focus on healing Sun Xin Yu’s HP back up.
In other words, Sun Xin Yu was relying on her 8,000,000 HP to tank against the boss. The moment her HP level was decreased down to a critical level, she would have to activate her {Vanish} to withdraw from the boss’s aggro. Or, she could activate her life-saving Skill --- for instance, Zhang Yang had his {Radiance of the God of War} and Sun Xin Yu had her {Slaughtering Feast}. Upon the activation of {Slaughtering Feast}, Sun Xin Yu could recover her HP back to full within 10 seconds while causing immense damage to her enemy.
Based on Zhang Yang’s understanding of this woman, Sun Xin Yu would definitely hold up until her HP bar is almost at the bottom. Upon that, only she would activate her {Slaughtering Feast} to recover her HP back to full. She would continue battling the boss until she is one again in the red. Only then would she use her {Vanish} to get clear of the boss’s aggro.
As expected of her, Sun Xin Yu’s HP bar almost hit the bottom 5 minutes later. A bright red mark flashed across her body as she began to spin rapidly like a spinning top. Her sharp blades turned the boss into mincemeat!
[Slaughtering Feast]: Causes damage based on the Attack of both Primary Weapon and Secondary Weapon once every second. At the same time, recover 10% of HP each second. Lasts for 10 seconds.
When the bladed ‘top’ stopped spinning, she had almost fully recovered. The boss was infuriated for receiving heavy damage from her. He began to swing his blade at Sun Xin Yu so strongly that the air was swept up by the force of the swing. It seemed like the boss was attempting to vent out his anger towards Sun Xin Yu.
"Sister Sun looks to bad*ss when she was using that Skill!" Wei Yan Er widened her eyes. She looked like a fangirl admiring Sun Xin Yu, "That’s so much stronger than noob tank’s {Radiance of the God of War}! Not only can she recover her HP, she can also cause a lot of damage to the boss!"
Zhang Yang silently smiled. Although {Slaughtering Feast} could recover HP and deal damage at the same time, life-saving Skills were meant to keep users alive. Furthermore, healing in one shot is always much better than healing over time. Well, healing over time would take time in order to fully heal a player. For instance, Sun Xin Yu required 10 seconds to fully heal herself. The healing effect would only kick in once in every second. Just imagine a player being shot by hundreds of arrows after one click of the regeneration, wouldn't the player be dead, still?
"Rest in peace for all eternity!" the boss roared out loud. His ignited Spectral eyes danced about violently.
Because the boss had an extremely long HP bar, and the boss had {Spectre Build} to recover some amount of HP over time, so this boss battle would definitely exceed an hour. Zhang Yang attempted to use {Glare of the Death God} at the beginning of the boss battle. However, the Skill was resisted by the boss.
"Haha!" Ishildur revealed a disdainful look on his face, "I’m the embodiment of Death itself! How dare you try such parlor tricks on me! How dare you try to use a curse on me!"
"What a clever boss! He actually knows how to curse with idioms!"
"Let’s give him a small red rose as a reward!"
Fatty Han and Endless Starlight immediately ‘joined forces’ in taunting the boss. Ishildur was provoked to the pointed that he almost wanted to jump off his battle horse and charge after them.
Sun Xin Yu managed to last for another 5 minutes. Her HP bar was once again going to hit the bottom. So, she quickly activated her {Vanish} and got herself clear of the boss’s aggro. She handed the responsibility of tanking the boss back to Zhang Yang. Given tens of minutes to get himself replenished, Zhang Yang was certain that he had built enough aggro value on himself, giving Sun Xin Yu the gap of 5 minutes to channel all her damage onto the boss without going OT1.
Meanwhile, {Vanish} only had a 5-minute cooldown period. As long as she does not put herself at the risk of going OT, then she would never be attacked by the boss throughout the entire battle --- unless Zhang Yang falls or activates his {Shadow of the Void} to clear the aggro values on him.
Although Zhang Yang could not beat Sun Xin Yu without his Transformation, he still had over 720,000 HP while mounted in his pet. So he need not worry about being taken out by the boss in an instant. Meanwhile, Zhang Yang also had extremely high Defense, extremely high Damage Immunity. These attributes had greatly reduced the pressure on Han Ying Xue and the other Healers.
80%, 70%, 60%. The HP of the boss was slowly decreasing. However, on the contrary, the Attack power of Ishildur was slowly increasing because of his {Blood of Madness}. He could deal approximately 100,000 damage with only one normal hit.
However, the biggest threat came from the {Death Plague}. The Skill would cause DOT effect to all players within the effective range. Every single member of the gang was suffering damages of 100,000 consecutively. Han Ying Xue and Fantasy Sweetheart were having a very hard time healing the party up.
At the same time, Battle Companions with weaker Attacks had all but left the frontlines to prevent adding pressure on the Healers at the rear. The boss battle was getting harder and harder by the second as the HP bar of the boss got lower and lower. The battle was going to get even tougher soon.
By the time when the battle entered the ‘killing cleave’ stage, the boss’s Attack would have been boosted up by 80%! The rate of activating his Skills would become even higher than before. That would prove to be a great threat to Zhang Yang and his party.
It was ironic. To kill the boss, they must bring down the HP bar of the boss as quickly as possible. On the contrary, the Attack of the boss would increase and cause the battle to become tougher the more damage the boss takes. When that happens, the entire party might be wiped out!
While everyone was trying to wrap their heads around this self-contradiction, the HP bar of the boss was reducing at a constant rate. In more than an hour, the HP bar of the boss had dropped down to 20%. The battle had entered its ‘killing cleave’ stage!
Ishildur was acting like a roided up undead. He activated his {Death Plague} more frequently than ever, causing havoc to the party’s HP bars!
Fortunately, Zhang Yang had {Vitality Aura} with him. Everyone’s Maximum HP was boosted up by a notch. Furthermore, the {Life Aura} that Han Ying Xue was carrying had increased the healing efficiency of any sorts of healing effects. The party was not wiped out, even if they were that close to death.
"Silly Yu! We can’t keep up anymore! I’m activating my Transformation Skill now!" Han Ying Xue said.
"No! Stop!" Zhang Yang shook his head decisively, "There’s still one more boss up ahead! That boss should be much harder to take down than this one! It’s best to reserve your Transformation Skill until then!"
"Just hang in there!"
"That’s right! Zhang Yang could just throw {Glare of the Death God} when the HP of the boss drops down to 12% or 13%! Then, the boss should be as good as dead!"
"But what if the boss resists that again?" Wei Yan Er slipped her tongue and said it out loud. She immediately became the focal point of everyone’s eyes! The little brat blushed in shame as she knew she said something wrong, so she said, "Why are you guys looking at me like that? I’m feeling uncomfortable now!"
Oh my god... that little brat had managed to divert the others’ attention away by acting cute. Well, she succeeded at least.
"I will eviscerate you!" Ishildur let out a raging roar. He was known to be the great Death Knight. Not only could he not take out a single one of these ‘noobs’, they had managed to deal quite a number on him. Of course, he would feel infuriated. Although the boss did not have the idea of HP bar and damage values, he knew that he would be eventually taken out by these insignificant living beings that he despised!
"Stinky boss! Just play nice and give us all the equipment you have on you!" Wei Yan Er laughed out loud while whirling about with her huge battle axe.
"Damn you puny living beings! How can you puny creatures have such immense power?!" As his HP bar was reduced even further, Ishildur was getting more surprised.
"Just hang on a little while more! We’ll try our best to bring the HP bar of the boss down to 11%! Then, I shall throw the {Glare of the Death God} at him! We cannot afford to have the boss get 90% additional damage! We’ll be wiped out!" Zhang Yang shouted out loud.
80% was their maximum limit if Han Ying Xue is to hold off on her transformation. If the boss could get 90% additional boost on his damage output, he could just wipe out the entire party by activating his {Death Plague} even more frequently. Wiping out the entire party could be done in just an instance!
14%, 13%, 12%, 11%!
The time where fate deals its hand has come!
Zhang Yang raised up his hand and threw out his {Glare of the Death God}.
Please do not resist! Please do not resist! Please do not resist!
Everyone was praying hard that the Skill would not be resisted. If the boss does resist the Skill, the party would need to activate the Phoenix pets’ Transformation Skills just to hang on.
So did the Skill got resisted by the boss?
A dark skull emerged and formed right on top of the boss! It smiled wretchedly in complete silence!
It was a success!
"Hahaha! Stinky boss! Your doom is nigh!" Wei Yan Er attempted to act cute as she laughed.
‘-8,000,000!’
‘-8,000,000!’
The higher the amount of HP the boss had, the higher the damage that the {Glare of the Death God} could cause to the boss. Each trigger caused a total of 8,000,000 damage to Ishildur! Ishildur was furious. He roared continuously and said, "You damned living beings! I’m the great Death Knight Ishildur! I’ll not be taken down by a bunch of weak, insignificant low-living beings!"
The HP bar of the boss had dropped down to 10%. Hence, his Attack power had received an additional 90% boost. Furthermore, the rate of Ishildur activating his {Death Plague} had been shortened down to once in every 5 seconds! It was as terrifying as it sounded!
Although the boss was near his own end, he was also at his most destructive. Any oversight or careless mistakes could lead to fatalities!
9%, 8%, 7%... the special effect of the {Glare of the Death God} was triggered consecutively under the heavy assaults of the gang. In just 7 seconds, the gang had managed to trigger the special effect 10 times. The HP bar of the boss was down to 1%!
Zhang Yang was forced to activate his {Vanguard’s Aggression} in order to maintain the HP of all his party members. He even activated his {Rearm} so that he could use his {Vanguard’s Aggression} two times in a row. Endless Starlight had also activated his {Vanguard’s Aggression} right after Zhang Yang’s second {Vanguard’s Aggression} expired. By activating 3 {Vanguard’s Aggression} consecutively, the two Tankers managed to buy a 30-second precious time frame for the other party members to launch their assaults on the boss.
However, after three effects of {Vanguard’s Aggression} faded away, the gang started to get into trouble. Even their mounts will not keep them alive for long!
7,000,000! 5,000,000! 3,000,000! 1,000,000!
Hundred Shots, Daffodil Daydream , Fantasy Sweetheart and the others screamed miserably as they collapsed to the ground, one after another. However, the [Zombie Potion] kicked in and extended the boss’ nightmare!
"%!^$!$#!!" The boss let out a series of undefined language. He was probably cursing something like ‘son of the b*tch’.
500,000! 200,000! 70,000!
"Argh ---" Ishildur let out a thunderous cry. He fell off the back of his battle horse, headfirst to the ground. Meanwhile, a magic circle with six-corner star appeared right beneath that battle horse. The next thing that happened was the horse disappearing into thin air. Wei Yan Er was not able to grab the horse before it disappeared. All she managed was to plant her face into the ground like the boss and gain a mouthful of sand.
TL Note:
1. Off Tank (OT) - a mistake by the tank which occurs when the aggro shifts from the Main Tank to a non-Tank and often results in the death of the non-Tank.