The giant puppet didn't just stay still: Although it was slower than the normal puppets due to its size, each step it made caused the ground tremble ever-so-slightly.
Leiu also charged at it, his Stamina had fully recovered so he wasn't feeling tired, his speed was faster which would obviously give him a huge advantage.
The increase of his stats and Lv notwithstanding, Leiu knew that the odds were against him. One hit from the puppet's huge axe would surely be the end of him.
'It's at least 5 meters in height. I can't even reach it with a jump'
The distance separating them was not big, a mere 10 meters, so it was crossed in seconds by the dashing Leiu, who, even when he saw the enemy about to attack, didn't pause.
As he was near the puppet's wooden legs, he instantly used [Invisible Strike] at its left leg, he wanted to at least get rid of one of the lower limbs to destabilize, and, possibly, make it fall.
However, what he was expecting to happen did not happen as his strike dealt some damage to the wooden leg but the health bar decreased by 1%.
In such a situation, there was two likely possibilities: Either his damage was low and unable to breakthrough the enemy's defense, or the Boss' Health was ridiculously high.
While tightly clenching his hold on the Steel Sword, Leiu hastily jumped back, evading the slowly moving leg of the puppet, which was targeting him.
Refusing to draw a big distance as it would allow the puppet to use its axe, Leiu rushed in again, dashing under the Boss. Once behind it, he spun around and slashed with the Steel Sword, hitting the back of the left leg but dealing minimal damage, like the first time.
Even without using [Invisible Strike], Leiu was able to slash two times, however, the speed and power of the slashes were noticeably worse.
The giant puppet ruthlessly stomped on the ground, trying to shake Leiu, who was slithering around it like a snake.
Such attacks would not touch Leiu, who put all his mind to avoid and grab any given opportunity to either thrust or slash his sword at the legs of the boss.
Five whole minutes were spent using this inefficient tactic. Even then, Leiu succeeded in decreasing the Boss' Health by 10%.
The wooden puppet which never ceased using its legs to stomp left and right, unexpectedly stopped, its eyes flashing with an ominous glint. It raised the huge axe above its head, clearly about to smash it down.
Leiu immediately knew what was to happen but his proximity to the Boss made it impossible to evade in time. While bracing himself for the inevitable hit, he raised the sword diagonally in front of him and swiftly backed away just as the axe struck the ground, causing strong vibrations coupled with a tremor.
This was an Area of Effect attack, and being in range, Leiu was blown backwards. He felt a twisting force wrap around his body and fling him a distance away until he crashed into a wall. That one hit
'This game is too realistic, damnit!'
He had previously praised Hell Gate's realism, something he deeply regretted as, for a couple of seconds, his body refused to obey him. Of course, the game wasn't exactly like reality, and despite such wounds, he wasn't going to be incapacitated and become unable to fight.
Now on the offensive, the wooden puppet sprung into a ran while swinging its axe at him. It wasn't going to use the same attack, fortunately.
Leiu managed to get up and roll to the side, barely dodging the incoming axe. Thereafter, he performed another roll as the puppet's continued its onslaught, its movement clearly faster than before.
Afraid that the same Area of Effect attack would be used again, Leiu opted to dodge and distance himself. After two minutes, the Boss didn't show signs of using that skill. It purely relied on its weapon to attack, and though that was more troublesome than when it used its legs, it was still something Leiu could deal with.
While taking rapid breaths, Leiu shot towards it, evading the axe and striking the wooden legs, slowly but surely chopping bits and pieces off of them.
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Just like that, the puppet's Health Bar kept decreasing until it reached 80%, which made it pause for five seconds before raising its axe.
However, this time, Leiu, with half of his Health left, was prepared for this eventuality. Ultimately, Hell Gate was a game, and the Bosses had specific mechanics triggered at specific points. In this case, every time it lost 10% of its health, it would use that Area of Effect Skill.
Just as the axe crashed into the ground, producing a tremor, Leiu jumped in the air.
He couldn't jump high, only 2 meters, but it was, fortunately, enough to not suffer any damage. Relieved, he safely landed on the ground and rushed at the boss again.
Slashes, simple strikes, accurate thrusts, he used everything he learned while limiting any unnecessary movement to not lose more Stamina. When he had first seen the Boss, he feared it would be too much to handle, but it didn't seem to be the case. It only had one strong attack that was easily manageable. Besides that, its random attack patterns were to slow.
..
Thirty minutes of constant attacking and dodging passed, in which Leiu maintained the same exhausting yet boring tactic. When the Boss had little Health left, he heard System Notifications ring in his ears but he ignored them and focused on the threat.
Congratulations! You successfully passed the second Trial!
Reward : +2 Level | 10 unallocated stats points.
Leiu breathed heavily as he sat on the ground, only 1 Stamina point left. He could barely move his body, sweat pouring across his forehead.
'My head hurts.'
Feeling an intense and piercing pain, Leiu let out a soft grunt while glancing at the fallen body of the Boss. He suspected that this headache might be because he had been playing for a long time so he unhesitantly logged off.
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Leiu, still experiencing a bad headache, opened his eyes and sat up. He removed the Synch Helmet and stretched for a bit. He had been playing for several hours without rest, which, even in a Virtual Game, was simply too much.
He was planning to log off earlier to get some sleep as he has to work later, but he was so immersed in the game that he forgot about time.
As he checked his phone, he was shocked to see that it was already 6:30 PM, meaning that he had spent over 8 hours playing.
His shift began at 10PM, so, after eating something, Leiu went to sleep, waking up three hours later..
After a quick cold shower, Leiu checked the time and saw that he it was still too early to leave as the workplace was relatively close.
He grabbed his laptop and opened the browser: He wanted to check about any new information regarding Hell Gate. After all, there was bound to be people boasting about the secrets they had discovered.
In Hell Gate's website, there was an official ranking, which displayed the top 10 highest leveled players.
1 Acyle Lv26
2 Emperor Lv26
3 Mister Kind Lv25
4 Dylena Lv25
5 Lucky Dog Lv25
6 Kirito Lv24
7 Commander Luo Lv23
8 Messiah Lv22
9 Little Rabbit Lv22
10 Frankenstein Lv22
Leiu was surprised to see the second one in the leaderboard. Amongst these ten players, he only knew Emperor as he was a famous individual in the gaming community. He was the guild leader of Renaissance as well as a vastly wealthy young businessmen. Basically, he was someone born with a silver spoon, but even then, he had many fans.
Unfortunately, the leaderboard didn't show the classes, which left Leiu curious about them.