Chapter 17: Chapter 17

The nine-millimeter bullets of assault rifles did not have a massive effect on the orcs—it could only temporarily slow them.

On the other hand, the 12.7mm bullets of a light machinegun was a completely different story.

At the same time, newly-arrived soldiers getting off the armored transport trucks were loaded for bear. Lin Xi could feel the cool breeze from behind even as the orcs in front of him were dropping by the dozens under the rain of 12.7mm bullets.

Lin Xi could see damage digits of [-123], [-162], and [-156] popping up wildly over the heads of those orcs, with the occasional [-367] damage value from headshots.

“Good job!” Lin Xi gave the soldiers behind him a huge thumbs-up, but it turns out that he was a target too.

Still, their bullets harmless passed through his body to hit the orcs some distance away.

The no-friendly fire setting was definitely a fine one… but the archer of the Fallen Legion had released another arrow at him, cutting Lin Xi’s HP down to a tenth.

He quickly downed a healing potion, and started to become serious, no longer letting down his guard.

***

Meanwhile, Jiang Qiao was tangled with the most troublesome Boss in this Abyssal Hunt.

“He only has five percent HP left!” Jiang Qiao shouted at the players beside him.

The steel armor of the Fallen Legion elite had already cracked and shattered, exposing his body which was full of magic circuits.

“Damned humans!”

Arek raised the runic longsword bestowed upon him by his masters, intent on casting an AOE spell… only to have an antitank rocket abruptly hit him from the back.

The sudden explosion left him staggering a small step forward. The sharp fiery pain from his back left him extraordinarily humiliated!

“The Boss doesn’t have immunity when attacking!”

“Could there be a second phase?”

The gamers’ whispers from around Arek streamed into his ears, while his entire body was left with all sorts of fearsome wounds.

It had almost been an hour since Arek started fighting with those bizarre… whatever else they could be described, as long as it was not ‘humans.’

His longsword simply could not deal any critical damage upon them, but he kept fighting because he could kill them!

Still, it was not really ‘killing’… it was just that there was a chance he could turn those bastards into tombstones when his blade cut them down.

But so what if they die?”

“I’m coming, Elizabeth!”

“Need healing! Are there any healers? I’m bleeding all over the place—I’m dying!”

“One silver for one revive! I’ll cast the spell when I get my money!”

Arek looked up to find that one of the players he had just cut down with his own hands whose HP bar had been reduced to zero turned into a tombstone…

However, that tombstone was still yelling away without stopping.

Then, one of the ‘humans’ who was dressed like a priest ran towards the tombstone.

Seeing an opportunity, Arek brought his sword to bear, ready to unleash dark purple flames and burn the priest, only to have another warrior holding an enormous shield parrying the fire.

“Son! Look here!”

But even as the warrior yelled, Arek had angrily slammed his longsword into his shield.

The warrior was unable to withstand Arek’s tremendous power—even the ground beneath his feet was starting to crack.

Be that as it may, Arek’s rage rose to boiling point when he found that the priest had already cast revive, bringing back one of the gamers he killed with tremendous difficulty. In his anger, he once again smashed his sword heavily into the warrior’s shield.

The warrior’s shield was actually dented then.

“Warrior’s Taunt worked!”

“Warrior is instant-killed! That Boss’s attack is out of this world!”

Arek was left miserable beyond words, but the players were no different—especially mages like Jiang Qiao.

After all, Arek was immune to the Taunt skill of warriors and did not have any Grudge value—he was a battle-hardened warrior with his personal combat experience and ideas.

That was why Arek could determine the vital importance of the Priest class from their hour-long battle and the players’ infinite revivals.

Against a mob, he has to kill the healers first!

Arek had learned all the skills needed for any Boss in a game, which was why he had been chasing FreeMilk, the chief healer of the group, and she effectively bore all his Grudge.

In fact, he succeeded twice.

He had definitely killed her two times.

But although he thought that doing so would seal the bastards’ extreme capacity for recovery and revival, there was another problem…

There were other Priest players amongst them.

Most despairingly, the special dungeon that was the Abyssal Hunt allows player quick respawns in the first place.

As Arek watched the player whom he had just killed was revived beneath the holy light released by FreeMilk, a feeling of jadedness arose within him.

“All of you must die!” He was completely out of control—or indeed in a state of madness.

He raised his runic sword again. Purple flames gather over its blade as he prepared to unleash the final skill in his life.

However, he forgot one thing: the best timing for the players to increase their attack output is when the Boss is charging his skill.

Dozens of skills once against bombarded Arek’s body. This time, he completely lost his balance and fell to his knees, the flames gathering over his runic longsword gone like the wind.

The players’ attacks would no longer be effective against him now.

Still, Jiang Qiao walked to the Overlord-class Boss who was trying to push himself up.

Even so, Arek’s body was a collection of bleeding wounds from blade cuts, gunshots, and hits from blunt instruments, along with a long list of other damage such as burns and curses.

Not even that Level 35 body could withstand a stacking of so many horrific injuries.

[Arek, Fallen Legion Vanguard]

[Abyssal Boss, Overlord-class]

[Level: 35]

[HP: 2/433150]

That was the stat Jiang Qiao made out.

Seemingly feeling something, Arek looked up to find Jiang Qiao’s cold face and abruptly started to laughed manically.

Then, he glared at Jiang Qiao.

“What are you?” He asked.

“Didn’t I tell you before? Just a bunch of gamers in a dungeon.” Jiang Qiao raised his staff and swung it like a baseball bat, hitting the Boss on the face with its sharp edge.

He could see the Boss’s two front teeth flying out from the heavy blow.

[-2, critical hit]

[Your normal staff attack has dealt critical hit on Arek, Vanguard of the Fallen Legion]

With that heavy blow, Arek dropped to the ground, his consciousness blurring even though he never stopped laughing madly.

“All of you can’t protect this weak world,” he mocked, spitting blood even as his body was becoming transparent.

“Protect? No. There are two simple reasons why we are taking your head: one, you have a HP bar, and two, you have a chance of dropping epic-grade or unique-grade items.” Jiang Qiao said quietly as he half-crouched in front of the Overlord-class Boss. “And those two reasons are reason enough.”

HP bar? Drop epic and unique items? What were those even?

Arek was unable to comprehend as his life ended, and his entire body vanished in a puff of dust.