The Great Thief

There was an old story that went something like this:

There were two Bosses outside an old man’s house. Every time he wanted to leave his home, he would have to go around the Bosses and through another path. One day, the old man decided to push the monsters away, so he gathered his whole family and they began to push together. Then, a goddess asked, “Old man, how can you push it away?” The old man replied, “If I cannot, then my son will. If my son cannot, then my grandson will! As long as the Boss doesn’t leave its post, this method will surely work eventually!”

The goddess was extremely moved, so she killed the Boss.

The meaning behind this story was this: the resolution to die was required if they were going to tackle the Door Gods.

There were two problems for Azure Sea Breeze – knock-ups and critical hits. Knock-ups disabled him, since he would be in the air. He couldn’t even use mitigation, and he had to tank the two Giants’ Ignite and Spitfire.

Lu Li suspected that not being able to use mitigation was not the only effect. He reasoned that perhaps even Armor was being ignored during the knock-up duration.

Facing one of these monsters without Armor was guaranteed death, let alone two of them.

Azure Sea Breeze recalled his past failures and realised that his mistakes came from him underestimating the enemies. He had to admit that he couldn’t hold these two small monsters.

“Cough…I think it’ll be better if two people hold aggro.”

Was that unexpected? Was that surprising?

His whole perspective was changed after this experience. However, he was already quite well-versed in adapting to the battle, so he wouldn’t rush in like he did before.

“Wandering, go with Azure Sea Breeze. Have a Paladin healer and Priest heal him. Everyone else, focus on the one that Breezy is pulling. World’s Best Friend, hang around the middle of the two monsters. Help out when either side is struggling with the aggro.”

After the first wipe, Lu Li decided that it was enough as a warning. He didn’t plan to keep dying here.

Many teams would be stuck in this place for hours with the Door Gods. Even a day or two wouldn’t be surprising.

“Boom!”

The Magma Giant’s large feet stomped heavily on the ground. When it lifted its foot, a large crevice was left behind. This was why there were many lines running throughout the fighting area. This one attack seemed to be more powerful than any other Boss from before.

The effects were also quite strong. A group of people were stunned, including Azure Sea Breeze, who had just built up his aggro.

“What the hell? There are only two guards. Do they need to be this powerful?”

When Wandering saw the other Giant raise its leg, he immediately took off and ran. He was fortunate since he didn’t get hit, but the ones who were in charge of healing him were closer to the Boss than he was, so they were stunned.

This stun from the stomp was not merely a stun.

The Giant would move and stomp the ones who were stunned, one after another. It was like shooting fish in a barrel.

Fortunately, World’s Best Friend rushed in just in time and taunted the Boss to him. Otherwise, the losses would have been even greater.

As for Wandering, he was quite alert and fast to react, so he quickly returned to his post and regained aggro. In the end, the losses there were quite minimal. Wandering was actually quite capable and had great potential, but he just wasn’t willing to put in the work most of the time.

They could all see the power of the Molten Core, just from the Door Gods.

This was the first proper Level 60 Raid and it came with the introduction of a new mechanic – Crush. It wasn’t players who were ‘crushing’ the Instance Dungeons, but rather the monsters in the dungeons ‘crushing’ the players. When the levels of the monsters exceeded the players’ level by 3, the damage received by the players was multiplied by 1.5 times.

To counter this, Main Tank items would have an Armor level.

The higher the Armor level, the less ‘Crush’ damage they would receive. After reaching a sufficient Armor level, the Main Tank wouldn’t receive the extra damage from Crush.

Currently, Azure Sea Breeze and Wandering didn’t have anywhere near enough Armor level, so the damage that they were receiving was extremely high. They were susceptible to instant kills when they were knocked back, which lowered their Armor to zero.

Lu Li brought along two Paladins that were focused on healing. They proved to have great benefits to the team.

“Pull it! Crap. Hunters, use Misdirection then Feign Death!” Lu Li yelled at the top of his lungs.

On one side, the Giant resisted Azure Sea Breeze’s Taunt, while on the other side, World’s Best Friend was struck and knocked up. While in the air, his HP was decreasing rapidly. Since both sides couldn’t do much about their situations, Lu Li could only call the Hunters to help them regain their aggro.

Although the concept of resisting already existed before Molten Core, the only ones who could resist Taunt were only Bosses.

Remnant Dream didn’t hesitate at all. Whatever Lu Li wanted her to do, she did it. She used Misdirection on Azure Sea Breeze first, then shot at the Giant. After confirming that her attack dealt damage, she immediately fell on the ground and used Feign Death. After this, the Giant’s aggro was back on the Main Tank.

The problem was that the other Hunter, Bearded Zaza, was unable to bring the other Giant’s aggro back to Wandering.

As such, the healers in charge of healing Wandering were instantly killed.

“Star Baby!”

Lu Li panicked a little and sighed. He really wanted to scold Bearded Zaza, but it was not the right time. Furthermore, Bearded Zaza had not intended for that to happen anyway, so the effects of reprimanding him would not be positive.

Since they had rarely worked together in dungeons, these issues were bound to happen eventually.

Fortunately, Star Baby was a professional player. Her alertness aside, when Lu Li called her name, she immediately looked around at the situation and did what she had to do without his instructions.

This was the value of having a professional player. At the very least, their reaction time far exceeded that of ordinary players.

Being good at clearing Instance Dungeons did necessarily translate to a PVP battle. However, PVP players, especially professional players, would always perform well in Instance Dungeons.

Azure Sea Breeze couldn’t hold back and yelled out what everyone else was thinking.

“Crap, just two monsters? How are they this strong? We already have more than ten casualties.”

They were all elite players. In a normal guild, these players would all be the highest-ranking members. No one thought that these two door guards would kill more than 10 of them. Not even a single Giant had been killed for the sea of corpses on the ground.

“Calm down. Do you want to wipe a second time?” Lu Li calmly asked.

“I don’t think we can. How about waiting until we’re all level 60?” Azure Sea Breeze suggested. From just observing the Giants, this dungeon clearly was much harder than they thought.

The highest level was 59 in this team. No one was level 60.

“Well, we still have to try. If we really wait until we’re level 60, then this Instance Dungeon might have already been cleared by other people.”

They couldn’t wait until they had everything ready and prepared if they wanted the First Clear. In theory, a level 59 team could clear the Molten Core. Since it could work theoretically, Ruling Sword had to make the first move. Otherwise, they would fall behind the other guilds.

Dawn was made for people to have fun. Even if Lu Li wasn’t reborn, everyone would still be able to clear this eventually.

The only difference was how many squad wipes it would take to get there. If they made progress after every attempt, they would eventually be able to clear it. When that day came, they would be overjoyed to the point of tears.

“Alright. Everyone, prepare yourselves. This time, it will be us on TV!”

As soon as Azure Sea Breeze thought about appearing on TV, he immediately became excited. He thought that what Lu Li said was right. If they wanted a chance to be rightfully arrogant, then they needed to do things that others couldn’t.

“Don’t care about the ones who are dead. Gather yourselves and focus on the task at hand.” Lu Li’s voice was like a bucket of cold water that had been splashed over all their heads.

There was no need to be overly excited about an Instance Dungeon.

In the Molten Core, the key thing was for everyone to listen to instructions. They needed to focus and completely obey Lu Li’s every instruction to each letter.

Instance Dungeons would be simple if they all listened to the commander’s instructions, but this was practically impossible. This was a 40-man raid; Lu Li didn’t have complete control over everyone. In his previous life, he didn’t do much commanding, let alone over a 40-man team. In this life, he relied on his previous knowledge. With a brain full of strategies, he slowly accumulated his knowledge of the game over time.

Even Lu Li didn’t have confidence in himself to command a 40-man team.

It was even more difficult for the team to listen to the commander’s instructions perfectly without a mistake.

“Wandering, pull the Giant slightly to the right. Breezy, pull it to the left a little. Darkshire, retreat a little. Use your longest ranged healing ability and kill this monster in one burst.”

After a few minutes of battle and more than 10 players dead, the first Door God was finally near the end of its life.

It was said that there was a team that had once attempted the Molten Core. They wiped here, at the Door Gods, countless times. There was one time where they were extremely close to clearing one of the Giants. Unfortunately, the overexcited Main Tank suddenly had a heart-attack and instantly disconnected. The team disbanded the next day.

The Door Gods were not to be underestimated, even on the brink of death. A squad wipe was not a problem at all.

One of the Giants were finally killed and Lu Li breathed a sigh of relief. Only one more remained. Although a squad wipe was still possible, as long as no one made a mistake, they would be able to clear it. After all, there were three Main Tanks in rotation, so it wouldn’t be that easy for them to wipe.

Lu Li was right.

This time, they used even less time to clear the second Door Good.

After the end of the first battle, Wandering sounded out his own opinion.

“Although it wasn’t easy, I feel that we can keep going.”

Lu Li nodded his head. Although the Door Gods were strong, they were only small monsters. Their HP was their weak point. Lu Li and this team was much stronger than a normal squad. Everyone had a majority of either Legendary or Dark Gold items.

They completed this fight at the cost of the deaths of half their team. For a normal guild, it would be completely normal for them to wipe here for a few days.