The Squads which Yue Han and Xiong Da had with them were the revamped version as introduced by Bear Cub One. Instead of having three individual squad members who provided versatility for the individual, it was simultaneously a slight downgrade but also quite the upgrade.
Xiong Da, Yue Han and a few other Pandawans had been bestowed with five squad members and decided to take it upon themselves to lead the raid. Fortunately, Xiong Da recently became Grade 5 after finding the time to spend some intense training in Jin’s dungeon since the number of squadmates was now fixed to the cultivation level.
After the Hungry Hippo’s last test, Jin had evaluated the feedback after receiving a series of analytical reports from the System which Jin shuddered upon opening the PDFs.
He tweaked the AI helper’s weapons, and they would have default weapons which were also pegged to what the cultivators had been using. Should they change weapons, the default weapons would be changed as well.
As Grade 5 cultivators, it meant that the Pandawans basically had five more identical masked cultivators that were similar to them. In terms of strength and other attributes, the System decided to bestow those AIs half the original stats of the cultivator leading them. Thus, it made the ones that Xiong Da and Yue Han used earlier against Prince Stolas and his guards at a power level of Grade 2 Peaks. This was to ensure that the squads would not be too much of an overpowered feature in the future.
These ‘nerfs’ in the AI fixes the wide versatility dilemma Jin had to make sure that it was balanced since the Pandawans were able to utilise them fully after learning how responsive they were when it came to battle.
It was also indeed a pity that Jin had removed the option to outfit them with armour and the likes of it. Still, they roughly understood that it could be because the current technology might have limited the advancement of those squads on a massive scale.
However, that did not mean they could not customise their squadmates at all. It was actually easier (and cheaper) to equip them since the cultivators could pass down old weapons that they had used as well as changing the weapons on the fly in case they needed to do so. For example, fighting an ice boss? Equip all five Squadmates with the very same fire lances if the cultivator could afford them.
Another unfortunate setback was that the squad AI mates couldn’t use any cultivator techniques, which only made them act as extra hands in a fight.
“Damn, can you imagine how effective it will be to have another 6 copies of Luo Bo in a fight? She will basically dominate the dungeon without breaking a sweat. That will be way too cheesy.” Bu Dong had wondered out loud when they had used the USB to get access to this feature.
Everyone smirked as they looked at the high school student since the same could be said about him. They had all seen how his rampaging ape was basically a cultivator on heavy steroids.
“If you say anymore, I believe Boss Jin would also limit the number of squad mates based on the size of the dungeon too. Like those four men or eight men dungeon instances.” Bin Yong commented randomly until Shi Zuo poked his friend on his arm and told him to scroll down.
“Gah…he really did limit the squad mates…oh well, at least we can fully utilise these squads in raids like this?” Bin Yong replied, and Shi Zuo shook his head.
“Stop jinxing it already…” Shi Zuo secretly hoped that Boss Jin was not listening into their conversation. (But the System is!)
“Also can you imagine going into the Deep One Escape City with a full squad! We can show those fishes the true might of our strength!” Bin Yong said excitedly as he happily equipped each and every of his squad mates with the old swords and shields. For once, the closet hoarder finally felt that playing all Jin’s dungeons to get the various type of equipment was worth it.
———
“Humans?! Moloch, have you stooped so low to fight with humans?” Prince Stolas thought to himself, as he used his shield to block Xiong Da’s swing. Furthermore, the Prince could not believe that his blow was as hard or even harder than the training coaches ever gave. And yet the accompanying human was using some shadowy, dark arts to strike at the Prince whenever he managed to block Xiong Da’s attack.
They were not giving him any chance to take a breather to counter-attack. If not for his wind affinity aiding his dodges, he believed he would be dead by now. His helpless situation made the lawyer snickered.
“Is this all you got? C’mon even the slimy creepy Deep Ones proved to be more of a challenge than you.” Xiong Da taunted out loud as he aimed towards Prince Stolas with his warclub, hoping to break his shield in the process.
“Imbecile! You think this is the end?” Prince Stolas shamelessly used his magic to jump backwards and back into the safe zone where there was still a shield blocking the barrage of artillery. After which the two cultivators could see that Prince Stolas was readying his cavalry to trample over Yue Han and Xiong Da.
“Heh, guess he’s one of the big bosses after all.” Yue Han said as he swung his sword and bounced around a little to keep his momentum going before a massive group of a demon looking horses charged towards them.
“Now, how about we test if the squads actually work as intended.” Xiong Da had a smile on his face. He was trusting that Jin wouldn’t disappoint him, so he emitted his chi all around the area. Yue Han noticed this strange behaviour and saw that his other squadmates were all receiving the chi energy from Xiong Da himself.
“What are you doing? Why’re you wasting your chi?” Yue Han had no idea what his Pandawan comrade was doing until Xiong Da laughed out loud daringly against the incoming cavalry who thought that those two were insane for continuing to stand their ground. The cavalry felt challenged, so their captain ordered them to charge forward even faster, ignoring the petty attacks from the animated clay statues.
“The long ass explanations told us that the squadmates cannot use any cultivator techniques. Yet I do not believe they lack the data and knowledge on the skills themselves, especially when you think about how long we’ve been going to Jin’s dungeon. Even more so, if you consider that they use us and our stats as the guideline.” Xiong Da explained before he took a deep breath and roared out with all his might, emitting even more chi than ever to ensure his AI squadmates all received their fair share.
In the next moment, he lifted his war club, and the rest followed what he was doing as well.
“War Club Art! Breaking Shockwaves of the Hippo!” The Hungry Hippo Cultivator smashed his warclub down on the ground, and out came ripples of chi waves which were further multiplied by his squadmates, enhancing his basic war club art technique to the next level of epicness.
This was it.
The ‘loophole’ within the rules which the cunning lawyer had managed to discover (It was actually Jin messing up mentioning it because it was so last minute). When Xiong Da found out that the squad AI could absorb chi, he had the feeling something must be up. Believing that there was always a reason why Jin did things and the practice within the expanded conference room instance made him understand that it was not just a testing ground for them.
“Boss Jin would never short change us when it comes to upgrading, and this was one of the situations when it looked like it was a downgrade with lesser versatility. But in actual fact, he basically made little mini-mes in the process.”
“He needed to place penalties to ensure that dungeons are still relatively balanced, but at the same time, he gave us the opportunity to ‘cheese’ things if the conditions are right.” Xiong Da was satisfied when he saw his efforts paid off.
However, he did notice that all his squadmates were now looking worse for the wear. It appeared that Jin did not intend to allow them to use it all the time, but to force them to use it sparingly. And with this successful experiment, both Yue Han and Xiong Da learnt something new, particularly the former who wished to perform the same.
As the ground was being split open, the shock waves sliced the cavalries just like a slab of meat going into the grinder. It was extremely gory with blood, organs and metal pieces flying along with the shock waves that subsequently dealt a great blow to the enemies’ magical shield.
For once, Prince Stolas had to see his mages’ magic, which was deemed as one of the most revered in the demon metropolis, get cracked momentarily by both the shockwaves and perfect timing of the artillery blasts.
Even though the cracks were patched only seconds later, Stolas’ mages gritted their teeth and exerted even more force to ensure the protection of their soldiers for they knew this was the only entrance that they had.
They had never encountered such a fierce and dangerous combination of attacks that could so much as to dent their shields, especially given the vast amount of mages being part of the process. This made Prince Stolas extremely wary, and he began to vaguely understand why Moloch might have changed sides.
