Translator:Nomyummi
Editor:Nomyummi
As they pursued Snow Eagle, what met Happy was ambush after ambush. These sorts of battles weren’t really hard, but they weren’t really easy either. Since there were so many people fighting, the situation was usually rather chaotic and demanded a high level of cooperation between teammates.
This sort of thing couldn’t stop Ye Xiu and co from progressing. Their entire pursuit was mostly smooth going. Snow Eagle’s ambushes were dealt with one after another. After wiping out four consecutive ambushes, the path came to an end and Snow Eagle charged into the courtyard at the end of the road.
Seeing this, they realized that this was most likely the place where the battle against Snow Eagle would take place. Since they were constantly in combat, they couldn’t really take a real break. Using food and similar methods to restore health and mana was something you could only do out of combat. However, if they left combat now, the system would probably deem them to have failed everything starting from the moment they entered combat with Snow Eagle and they would have to start over.
They couldn’t allow themselves to make such a low-level mistake. All ten of them charged into the courtyard and, as expected, elite monsters came out from different rooms in the courtyard. However, this no longer seemed like an ambush set by Snow Eagle. The Boss was yelling and crying out in a panic. It was evident that after the four ambushes had been wiped out, he was at the end of his line. This wave of monsters was made up of the reinforcements he had called out for.
This wave of reinforcements was more powerful than the ambushes from before. The Sealed Mountain Thieves that came out from the room in the courtyard amounted to a total of 12, more than any of the previous ambushes.
However, after clearing out all the ambushes on the way, Ye Xiu’s group became used to these sorts of battles. Among the 12 Sealed Mountain Thieves, there were two healers that immediately became their primary targets. As for Snow Eagle? Now that he couldn’t find any other way out, he flew onto the roof and began to lob attacks at Happy with the other thieves. Yet, this Snow Eagle’s offensive ability really didn’t live up to his title of boss. He wasn’t much more of a threat than the individual thieves. However, a Boss definitely would have far more health than these normal monsters, so everyone put Snow Eagle to the side for now , focusing on clearing out the normal monsters.
Seeing Snow Eagle’s appalling strength, everyone relaxed. The 12 Sealed Mountain Thieves were quickly dealt with, being just normal monsters with a little more health than usual. There wasn’t much to it. After a chaotic battle, all 12 of the Sealed Mountain Thieves were killed. Everyone was prepared to turn their attacks on Snow Eagle, who was still perched on the roof, but then they heard the Tactician yell out again. Everyone could clearly hear that the Tactician had yelled out a title: Vice Chief.
Then, they saw the doors to the large room facing the main entrance to the courtyard open, and a burly man walked out, stretching. It was another Boss, Vice Chief Brown Bear*.
The progression of events was more than shocking for everyone present. If this Tactician had called another few waves of mobs, it would be much better than just directly calling for a Boss. This strapping man, who held the position of Vice Chief, was evidently not a weakling like Snow Eagle. Having experienced five battles without break, and now directly going up against two bosses, this battle seemed to be a grim one for their little team.
Ye Xiu clicked with his mouse, bringing up Brown Bear’s health. It became clear that they wouldn’t be able to finish this quickly; they couldn’t afford the consumption. They had to slow the pace down and forcefully drag the battle out. But what was this Brown Bear’s fighting style? Could they afford to draw out the match into one of endurance? Looking at his burly figure, he probably wasn’t a defense-oriented Boss like Boss number two, Sand Leopard. If he was an offense oriented boss, then a slow paced match would be far more dangerous. This was especially true with their opponents being not one, but two bosses working together. Though Snow Eagle was rather weak, this was only in comparison to what should be expected from a boss. With his health bar, defeating him wouldn’t be a swift job either. With a slippery guy like that causing chaos at the side, this would be frustrating to deal with, indeed….
Brown Bear’s appearance was very unexpected. Everyone was still inside the courtyard, not having the time to retreat so that Ye Xiu’s Lord Grim would have the chance to figure the Boss out.
By the time everyone had managed to process their current situation, Brown Bear had snapped out of his sleepy state and reached behind the door next to him, pulling out a spiked steel club**.
That’s right, a spiked club… A weapon that didn’t exist among any of the 24 classes. It was impossible to figure out this guy’s possible skills using his weapon. Using a heavy weapon like this to do sword techniques wasn’t beyond the shamelessness of bosses.
“Keep your distance, everyone!” Same strategy as ever, Ye Xiu would test out the boss’ abilities first.
However, this time everyone was in combat already, so if they could retreat or not wasn’t up to them. Snow Eagle, who was still on the roof, had finally stopped his wretched behavior of hiding his broom between his legs. Now he held it in his hands, finally looking ready for battle. Using his advantage of the higher ground, he waved his arm and threw a Lava Flask at them.
Ye Xiu’s eyes were sharp and his hands were quick; Lord Grim raised his Myriad Manifestation Umbrella and with a bang, destroyed the flask in midair. The lava in the flask sprayed out, like it was raining fire. Though everyone still had to scatter to avoid it, it was better than if the flask shattered on the floor and turned the courtyard into a sea of flame.
Wu Chen couldn’t help but admire Ye Xiu’s skill. When the Lava Flask had been thrown, he had the awareness to try and shoot it down as well, but by the time he was aiming, a gunshot had already rung out.
As for Chen Guo, there wasn’t much to say. When she saw the Lava Flask, she had wanted to get Chasing Haze to jump up and run for it. The Lava Flask had been destroyed, but Snow Eagle swept his broom again and swept out a cloud. The Boss was too fast and everyone was too far from him to interrupt the skill. This time, he managed to complete a Hail. Blue drops and snowflakes fell from above and everyone hurried to rush out from under the cloud.
“Be careful, everyone!” Ye Xiu yelled.
Brown Bear finally struck, roaring wildly. He raised his club up and behind his head, jumping into the courtyard from the room and swinging his arms up in a 180 degrees arc. With a massive thud, the club smashed into the ground and the tremors from it caused everyone’s view to shake. Those who were unlucky enough to still be within range of the attack had been knocked to the ground, rolling.
“It’s a Collapsing Mountain!” Wei Chen cried out.
“Or it might be an Earth-Shattering Slash,” Ye Xiu suggested.
“Just as low as expected!” Wei Chen shouted.
“That’s right!” Ye Xiu agreed. Using a sword skill with a club… that was definitely a new low for swordsmen.
“Whirlwind Strike!! Everyone get out of the courtyard!” Seeing Brown Bear’s movement, he made a quick judgement. Everyone had their characters run for the door, or flip over the wall, instantly escaping from the courtyard like wild animals. Then, Brown Bear returned to his room and Snow Eagle looked around before jumping from the roof and disappearing.
“Whoops…” Wei Chen was a little embarrassed. It was evident that they had escaped combat. That battle seemed to be limited to the courtyard. With all of them fleeing from the courtyard, they had left the combat zone and the system judged that as escaping from combat. So, everything was returned to its prior state and the trouble they had just gone through was all for naught.
“At least we know what’s going to happen now.” Wei Chen attempted to gain everyone’s forgiveness with a smile full of cheek. He hadn’t thought of this possibility just now, so he had given the order to get out of the courtyard. In the end, everyone had charged out and the system didn’t give them any chance to regret, directly viewing them as escaping from combat.
“Well, this isn’t bad. When we do this again, everyone should keep in mind that what awaits us at the end are two bosses. We need to keep an eye on our mana consumption,” Ye Xiu said.
Everyone nodded. Five waves, each with a large number of normal monsters, ending in two bosses and not given a break, that was something only a team like them could handle.
“Or maybe we can just ignore these two and see if we can skip to directly take on the final boss?” Wei Chen suggested. In some dungeons, you didn’t necessarily need to kill every Boss before the final one. When breaking dungeon records, people would definitely skip every skippable Boss. In this Sealed Mountain Thieves’ Hideout, it seemed that they might even be able to skip this Tactician and Vice Chief, so Wei Chen had come up with such a suggestion.
“I don’t think that’s necessary! After all, these two have First Kills that need to be taken, which will give us better rewards!” Ye Xiu said.
“In reality… I think this battle is pretty tough. I mean, we have to deal with all these ambushes and we might not be able to endure to the end with the amount of mana and whatnot it might consume,” Wei Chen said.
“Let’s give it a try first,” Ye Xiu said, “If the situation goes south, then we’ll escape combat to stay alive. I noticed that we only left combat when five people had left the courtyard. It seems like it’s necessary for only half or more party members to stay inside.
“Yeah, I noticed that, too,” Wei Chen said.
“Heh,” Ye Xiu laughed lightly, not bothering to continue the conversation and turned to address everyone, “Ok, everyone, let’s head back and try again. This time, keep the pace slow to minimize consumption.”
The ten player party then returned to where Snow Eagle had first appeared. As expected, the boss had returned to its original position.
“Hey, how’s about we try and see if we can prevent this guy from running and kill him here?” Wei Chen came up with a new idea.
“We can try. Everyone scatter, surround him,” Ye Xiu ordered, making everyone stand around in a circle just out of aggro range, encircling Snow Eagle.
“Attack together, including the ranged characters, siege him to death!” With Ye Xiu’s order, everyone lunged for the Boss. Snow Eagle was very decisive. Before, when only Lord Grim had charged forwards, he had sent out a Magic Ray. Now, seeing how many people were targeting him, he didn’t bother to do anything and simply got on his broom and shot into the sky.
“F*ck, so shameless!” Everyone could do nothing but watch as Snow Eagle flew off. This was because the height at which Snow Eagle was flying was one set by the system that players couldn’t reach, no matter if it was with a Witch’s broom or a Mechanic’s Rotor Wing. This was obviously the system wanting Snow Eagle to get away successfully. Wu Chen and Chen Guo’s Launchers fired a few unfruitful blasts.
“Let’s give chase!” Ye Xiu didn’t reveal any sort of disappointment; he just once again led everyone in a chase after Snow Eagle.
T/N: *Brown Bear is written as 人熊 here in Chinese, which can be translated by each character to Man Bear, but refers to just a brown bear.**Literally “wolf fang club,” 狼牙棒 is an ancient weapon made from a long, wooden hilt and a cylindrical metal head with spikes like a wolf’s fangs on it, having a total length of four to five feet, usually. One can liken it to a spiked mace or spiked club.These bosses are annoying ;-; forcing me to write so many translator’s notes and do so much research…
