Chapter 7

The strike from the serpent head landed as a critical, the skill, Blinding Strike, enhancing both the chance of it landing as a critical, as well as increasing the damage. Even against Oak’s formidable defenses, his life dropped by a good chunk. Even worse than the damage, was the effect of the strike on him. He screamed, the terror of the massive head emerging from the yellowish smoke to engulf him, throwing him sideways, did a number on his mental state. In a moment of panic, he activated a massive cooldown, entering immediately his Indra state to free himself.

As lightning crackled and his form grew, the lion’s head decided to further increase the chaos and confusion of the battle. It’s mane flared again, the fiery glow dancing menacingly in the gas filled chamber. It looked at the growing, screaming, crackling Indra, and opened its mouth. A burst of flames roared towards Oak, burning the very air as they rushed towards him. The radioactive fire rushed over him, burning him, increasing his screams.

However, Oak’s screams couldn’t be heard by his friends. For as the flames rushed from the lion head, the fiery wrath carried out its additional purpose. Both the serpents poisonous gas, and even more so, the goat’s breath attack, were highly flammable. The flames from the lion head caused the sulfuric gas to alight, causing a massive fireball to erupt within the room. In a flash of light, a wave of heat, and a concussive burst from the sudden temperature change within the confined space, the Chem-Era executed its extremely dangerous, and powerful, combo attack.

The Knights Who Go Ni, all but Oak, were sent flying backwards. They all crashed into different parts of the wall, their cries of confusion and panic echoing on deaf ears. Even through just watching, the sound had been immense, and James’s own ears rang slightly. He could only imagine the perceived heat the players had to be feeling right now, both from the actual flames that buffeted them, but even more so from the warm pressure indicating pain. It wouldn’t hurt, of course, but James had no doubt they were more than a little uncomfortable.

“New plan.” Z coughed as he stood. They could see the battlefield clearly. The combo had been executed in a brilliant manner, and yet now, not a single speck of gas remained. James knew too that those special breath attacks all had a minute long cooldown, meaning the Chem-Era wouldn’t be pulling off that trick any time soon. Though, there was no doubt in James’s mind the intelligent creature had used the trick to its full potential. A surprise attack, maximized in effectiveness, that caused confusion, spread multiple debuffs, and gave the mob ample time to assess its enemies, and focus its wrath down on the one taunting it.

Unfortunately for the mob… it was fighting the Knights Who Go Ni. And they weren’t going to go down without a fight. No matter what.

“Beat it to a pulp?” Oak had grabbed hold of the goat’s horns with two of his electrical arms in his multi-limbed Indra form. The other two arms were already jabbing spears of pure lightning into its neck, with reckless abandon. The lion head was trying to bite at him, but his form of pure, electrical power, was uncaring. In that cooldown, James knew Oak could tank a ridiculous amount of damage. And the power of the Indra form acted like a thorn enchantment, dishing back a percentage of damage received as lightning damage to the boss.

“Pretty much.” Z said with a laugh. Already the rest of the guild were back on their feet. James watched Med Ic point his staff into the air, and an orb of purplish light appeared near the ceiling above the Chem-Era. Strands of purple light rushed from it towards all of the members of his party, and an aura enveloped each and every one of them. The light pulsed, and James saw their health refill by a small amount. Another pulse, and another bit of life. Concurrently, Med Ic’s MP was decreasing with each beat.

“I’ll keep us topped off,” Med Ic said confidently. “Since we’re blowing cooldowns, I figured we’d give this skill a try.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

James glanced at Steve for guidance. James knew Med Ic’s current class was classified as a Bishop of the Void, but he didn’t know what type of skills that class had.

“Figure it’s the smart thing to do,” Elm commented as well, “at least we know now what to expect surprise wise from this mob in the future.”

“Yeah,” Faust added, “in short, negate the gas as quickly as possible, and keep the thing from burning us alive.” Lightning crackled. “I’m going to guess since it has mechanical parts, it’s got a weakness to lightning.”

The party went to town then on the mob, as Steve began his explanation. Considering the creature was just a mob, with the players burning cooldowns following Oak’s panicked trigger, he knew they’d manage to handle it. Even though its stats were impressive, strong enough to be equal to a floor boss on the fifth floor, the move set it had access to as a simple mob, hindered its flexibility. It was an all-around mob, with a decent range of attack options and patterns, but nothing that would put it on the same level as something like Sergeant Jenkins. That was fine by James. After all, if the Knights let the first mob they faced on the floor wipe their party, he’d be extremely disappointed. There was so much left of the floor he wanted to see them explore. And the party, for now, was just getting started.

“A Bishop of the Void is what happens when someone on a purely healing specific path, opts for a debuff based class as well. In Med Ic’s case, He went from Grand Bishop of Light in his sixties, down the path of the void when he reached 70. At 70, he picked the Cleric of Darkness class. That class, while a healing class, specifically involves transferring debuffs to enemies, and also draining the life of enemies and putting that life into the players. It’s sort of like how Rue’s Cleric of Blood works, but it doesn’t need the life of teammates or the caster to heal, well, teammates or the caster.”

“Sounds broken.” Rue quipped.

“Eh, the heal rate is abysmal early on.” Steve said with a shrug. “Sure it adds a little DPS overall to a fight, but the healing potential is severely limited as a result. Anyways, by selecting that, his class changed to an Ethereal Bishop, because it triggered a secret class change.”

“That’s what he was during the Siege Event.” James commented. “But when he was healing, I only saw his normal heal spell.”

“Probably playing it safe given the rest of you were all being extremely reckless.” Steve said with a grin. “Don’t think your shenanigans went unnoticed Mr. I’m suddenly a raging fire dps.” Steve chuckled. “Any ways, at level 80, his class progressed down the secret class progress tree, into Bishop of the Void. He can still heal by drawing life from enemies directly, but a few other unique skills and such too. That cooldown he popped, for instance, is called Heart of the Void. Every time it beats, it transfers health equal to a percentage of the amount of life the targeted enemy is missing, equally into all of his teammates. Once activated, it will last until cancelled, or he runs out of mana. Each beat of the heart, drains more mana from him to maintain.”

“That’s… interesting.” James said, trying to comprehend the skill. “Does it damage the enemy? And can it be transferred?”

“No, and no.” Steve said. “It simply takes into account the missing percentage of health from the targeted enemy. Flavor wise the concept was that it was transferring the health that had escaped into the nothing, you know, like a spirit leaving a body, it’s literal life force, into the others. If the enemy heals, the effectiveness of the healing is decreased. And if it dies, well, the spell sputters out as well. However,” Steve held up a finger, “because it doesn’t actively damage or effect the target, it can’t be cleansed either. Which makes it a very powerful cooldown.” He sipped from his drink, “which is also why it has a 30-minute cooldown timer,” he muttered softly.

“A what?” James choked on his own drink. Most of the massive cooldowns came with a 10 minute timer, or fifteen minute. Thirty minutes seemed steep for the ability, though, it wasn’t completely unheard of. After all, Fel’s Ultimate Cooldown, her bone dragon, had a 1-hour cooldown. But that… was an Ultimate, from being on a pure path.

“Yeah, it’s a doozy.” Steve said with a shrug. “There was a lot of back and forth on it. Against a boss the potential of the skill is crazy, especially if the healer can keep up their mana reserves. But given the increasing cost per beat, we figured it wouldn’t justify a full 1-hour cooldown. It’s not a floor breaking effect after all. But also not a skill that should be freely spammed, especially when you have,” he motioned at the floating image of the battle below, “powerful mobs on floors that are nearly equal to boss grandeur at higher tiers.”

“I suppose,” James said, as he turned his focus back to the fight as well. “What else can he do? What can they all do now?” He added.

Steve’s grin stretched so wide it almost looked painful. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”