"Eh? My sons and daughters? What are you doing here?!? Where did the commanders go?" The king shouted out loud. The hallucination effect from Irina's daggers. Everyone near him had been replaced by a few of his sons and daughters.
To the king it was as if his sons and daughters suddenly joined him and playfully ran around him with their pillows in hands. His weapons had been replaced by pillows. Suddenly, one of his sons hit him with a pillow in the leg, which was followed by a sudden gush of pain. The king grabbed his left thigh and noticed that it was gravely bleeding. "Wha... this? Heh?"
Confusion filled his mind and out of pure instinct he started parrying his kids' pillows with his own pillows.
Still the confusion as to what was going on did not allow him to fight to his full capabilities and multiple wounds quickly appeared on his body in the next 4 seconds. Because the level of Irina and the king were far apart, the effect didn't last the full ten seconds it originally would last, but only lasted four seconds. Still, four seconds of being effected by a debuff was a rather large time and the effect of it showed on the kings body, which was riddled with wounds.
The scene of his kids attacking him with pillows was replaced with the scene of the six commanders and Zaran's group attacking him, which only served to confuse the king even more. The damage dealt during the hallucination was by no means little and added onto the damage he suffered earlier, the king had already lost 25% of his health bar.
Zaran had tried to inspect him earlier but besides the name "Lee, king of the nayeran" he hadn't been able to see any of the other stats, the distance in their level was just far too great and did not enable him to inspect the king's stats.
With an additional nine attackers, the king was unable to return every strike and the pressure started to add up quickly. Especially Kru was a troublesome opponent for the king as the beetle's defence was no joke. While the king's hits did a fair amount of damage, not even a single one of his hits was able to knock Kru back, no matter how powerful his hit was. Because the knock backs that the king expected, did not happen, the king's follow up attack was slower, which gave an opportunity for a free hit.
"Good job Kru!" Zaran said as he noticed the opportunity that Kru had been able to create for them and he used 'Flutter' followed by 'Intent' at the moment Zaran's blade stabbed out. Even though the combo did a massive amount of damage, it had not been able to do a full percent of damage. The combo Zaran had landed increased the knock back effect and the king was knocked a meter back.
Even with the additional defence that the king may have had the combination of the two skills still would've dealt nearly 3000 hp. "What the hell! This bastard's health is no joke!" Zaran cried out alarmed. "It's over 400.000!"
"No way!" Sylphie yelled in surprise.
Nekorath just shook his head and said. "Fuck worrying, keep slashing and it'll die!"
Zaran wryly smiled at Nekorath's remark and backed off from the king right after finishing his combo. Without knowing the king's stats he did not dare take a hit head on. "Florance, use any stun skill that you have! Cindarrah use web shot the moment the king is stunned and pin him to the ground!"
"On it!" Florance said, using 'paralysis' to momentarily stun the king. Just like before, the effect only last for a little over a second instead of the usual three, but the time was still enough for Cindarrah's web shot to hit the king. In between the status effects, Nuvahn, Kirin, Nekorath and Kru kept hitting the king with everything they had, slowly chipping away at the king's health.
The king was annoyed by the beetle that he found himself unable to shake off and unleashed a combo of five successive hits on it. Even with the combo, the king was still unable to shake Kru off, but on the other hand it did do a fair amount of damage and Kru's health dropped to 60%.
Kru can only hold out for one more combo. We'll need to step up the pace... "Sylphie! Heal Kru as much as you can!"
"Got it!" Sylphie shouted as she started healing Kru with angelic tears. However because of Kru's high health, Sylphie's healing skills only restored 4% of his max health and she would need to cast angelic tears 10 times before Kru would regain his full health. Even though she was able to cast it in rapid succession, if the king kept hitting Kru, his health would disappear at a faster rate than she could refill it.
Both Zaran's group and the six commanders fought the king at the same time and while the two groups did not work together, they made sure to not hinder each other either. While Zaran and his group were able to combo together status effects and attacks, their damage was very lacking. The six commanders on the other hand had great damage but had been unable to hit the king... that was until Zaran and his group joined. Now that the king was nearly continuously suffering from status effects, the weapons of the six quickly found the way to the kings body. Compared to the measly damage that Zaran and the others were able to do, one hit from the six commanders cut away a full percent of the king's health.
Noticing the damage that the six commanders were able to do, Zaran quickly changed the strategy of the fight. "Everyone stop trying to deal damage and focus on keeping the king busy or applying status effects! Let those six nayeran finish off the king, they do way more damage than us!"
However the group still needed to watch out, as even one hit of the king might kill them. Even with Kru's high defense and health, a mere 10 hits of the king had reduced his health by 10.000.
The king turned to face the six commanders. Zaran didn't miss a beat, roared "Gravity!", instantly utilizing the spell to pull back the king. Because the king had not suffered under the spell earlier and because of the sudden shift in gravity, a huge opening appeared in his defenses, which two of the commanders took use of, delivering a full powered blow with their weapons, forcing the king's back to be wide-open.
With his back wide-open, Irina who had been skulking around and patiently waiting for a chance, finally exited stealth and drove her daggers deep into the king's back, activating anticoagulant and paralysis this time around as well as triggering the bleed effect which had a small chance of triggering with every normal hit for the assassin class. Kicking off against the king's back, she did a back flip and appeared a few meters further away, entering stealth as soon as her feet touched the ground again. The six commanders immediately took advantage of the 4 seconds that the king was stunned due to powerful effect of the poison that Irina's dagger applied and viciously hit their king with their weapons.
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The party continued to apply status effects and that combined with the damage the commanders were able to do, quickly depleted the king's health. 75% health soon became 50%... then 25% and finally... 10% health.
The second his health bar dropped to 10% the king's eyes got a dangerous glint in them and the status effects that he was suffering from lost their effect! At the same time, the little ki that the king had started to run along the edges of his weapons, which caused buzzing sounds to be clearly audible in the air.
Even though the leader of the six commanders had earlier said the cultivation level between the two of them could not be compared was because... that was how it was in their eyes. Compared to other who could freely cultivate, even their king which they deemed to be a powerful cultivator was merely a beginner in the eyes of any user!
With its movement no longer restricted, the king set his eyes on the six commanders who had betrayed him. As for the other nine who were attacking them... he paid them no heed. He felt that as long as his movement would not be restricted, dealing with them would be a trifle. Plus, if these six commanders were to die, the other rebelling soldiers would undoubtedly realize their foolishness and come to his aid. At least that's what the king believed.
With the king's movement no longer being restricted and moving against the six commanders instantly thereafter, Zaran could somewhat guess what the king was thinking. Still, Zaran was not just going to sit there and let the king do as he pleased.
"Barrage the king with the strongest moves you have!" Chasing the king, Zaran was ready to hit him with all his might!
One green, two blue, multiple purplish-black light and one red light flashed past Zaran as Nuvahn's wind slash, Florance lightning bolt, Irina's phantom daggers, Kirin's dark flame balls and finally Nekorath's dragon's wrath passed him and struck the king square in his back one after the other, a loud explosion sound following each and every single hit.
The unexpected hits caused the king to lose his balance and caused him to stumble forward creating an opening. One of the six commanders instantly stepped forward and stabbed out with his spear, using a skill of his own which dealt increasingly high damage the more damaged his opponent was. So far he had not used this skill as it was quite an obvious move and could easily be avoided. With the king stumbling, now was the best time to use it. The tip of the spear and the king's abdomen collided and a loud cracking sound reverberated throughout the air.
At the same moment the cracking sound reverberated throughout the air, Zaran's greatsword struck the king's back and a full-powered 'Intent' hit the king square on. Not letting up, Zaran followed up with 'Rise and Fall' and 'Velocity' while the second and third commander slashed at the king with their weapons.
GROOOWL! The king growled in pain, raised his twin sword and blocked the strikes of the two commanders. As for Zaran's strikes, he had no way to block them without taking a hit from one of the commanders.
A dark light flashed in the king's eyes as he slid his right hand's sword down along the weapon of the commander, freeing it and then instantly slashed towards the commander's throat.
Before the commander knew what hit him, his throat was sliced open and he was killed right there and right then!
The leader of the six commanders grumbled and ignited the ki in his body along with some of his blood essence, drastically raising his power for a short duration. Among all of the commanders, only he had a chance to hold him off for a short amount of time. The king and the leader of the six commander's weapons met and neither moved an inch. However the leader of the six was not the only one the king had to worry about as there were still four other commanders as well as Zaran's group to worry about.
While he could no longer be affected by status effects, the king's movements were now restricted to blocking the leader of the six.
A minute later the King finally fell, only leaving his twin swords behind as a drop, which Zaran picked up and stowed away.
The few remaining loyal nayeran swiftly surrendered when their king was defeated. After ordering a hundred nayeran to guard the nayeran who had surrendered, one of the commanders started to count the surviving troops. And a few minutes later he reported to the leader of the six.
"Report." With a weary expression his face, the leader of the six steeled his heart for the incoming result.
"850 dead, 1529 wounded, the remaining got off unscathed."
"So many dead... In the king's camp?"
"Only 453 survivors sir."
The leader's expression grew grim. He had expected huge losses but... the losses they had been incurred today were far too great. It would take them decades before they would regain the power they had lost today.
Pointing to Zaran and his troops, the commander said. "Leader... what do we do with them?"
"Well they have not attacked us in the past few minutes so... let's go over and talk."