060 The Shield of Darkness!

System: You have discovered the Lightless Cavern.

When Morning Wind burst into the cave behind the waterfall, he tumbled violently to the ground, utterly paralyzed and unable to move. Never since entering the game had he been so battered. If not for the cave hidden behind the falls, he surely would have met his end here.

“Born of adversity, destroyed by comfort!” Morning Wind finally understood the true meaning of those words. Ever since becoming a Blood Dragon, he had been invincible for a time. His Shapeshifter alt granted him multiple forms and remarkable survivability. As a pure Berserker, his bursts were formidable, but if surrounded by several professional players, he was doomed. This time, a moment’s carelessness had led to a catastrophe.

To outsiders, his ability to last so long against so many would have seemed miraculous. It had taken seven pro players from the Windchaser team to force him into such dire straits—a feat few in the gaming world could achieve. After all, Windchaser were the reigning league champions. Only they could push Morning Wind this far; his fame was now secure. Yet, Morning Wind had never seen himself as ordinary; to him, professional players were nothing special.

“Just wait till I get out of Green Dragon Hills, I’ll make you pay for this!” There were no grudges overnight in the game, but if he managed to escape, the Windchaser team would surely pay the price.

He had no idea how many times he’d been battered in the rapids. Had he not activated Desperate Gambit to boost his health, or relied on Wind of Renewal to keep regenerating, he would have died for sure. Using his sword to prop himself up, he felt pain radiate through every muscle. Once he’d recovered a little, he finally noticed how vast the cave was—it looked like a grand limestone cavern.

[Ghost Stag]: Ghost Lord. Level 30, HP: 80,000.

In the dim cave wandered a gigantic ghostly stag, larger than an elephant, with a pair of antlers a full meter high, resembling a crown. Behind this boss stood a dark-gold chest, and further back, an irregular mural resembling a sliding puzzle, its pieces movable to restore the original image.

A ghost boss! Unlike humanoid ghost rhinos, these bosses were entirely immune to physical attacks—tanking them traditionally was impossible. Before his race upgrade, Morning Wind would have been helpless, but now his damage converted to thunder damage, making him effective against the Ghost Stag.

System: The Lightless Cavern can hold only one person, and outside communication is disabled.

Just as Morning Wind tried to contact Monk and the others, a system message popped up, cutting him off. How could one person possibly kill a boss? And a level 30 boss at that! If he were level 40, maybe, but at 25, the odds seemed slim.

Eighty thousand health?

For a level 30 lord boss, that was unusually low. Was this boss designed for solo play? Since it was immune to physical attacks, only a magic-user could theoretically defeat it, but magic-users were notoriously fragile, so the boss’s health was set at 80,000. Yet Morning Wind could tank and deal thunder damage, so he had a real shot at victory.

Perhaps fortune truly follows disaster.

He’d been forced into the rapids, survived by a hair’s breadth, stumbled into this cave, and now found an unexpectedly vulnerable boss.

Charge!

Battle Roar!

After activating Stealth and approaching, Morning Wind dashed in as the boss turned, unleashing Bloodlust to store 55 rage, then landed a Heroic Strike. With Berserk Fury, he earned three Slashing Anger attacks, which he hurled at the boss. In a single explosive combo, he knocked over 8,000 health off the boss—this was going better than expected. But the boss turned, its antlers shooting a bolt of lightning that crashed into him, instantly taking away 2,000 health. One more attack like that and he’d be finished.

“Magic damage is this brutal?” Morning Wind switched to his shield, activating Shield Reflect to repel the next attack. Then, with Desperate Gambit, he boosted his health by 30%, hoping to withstand two more lightning strikes. After the reflection, he swapped his shield back, taking the Brotherhood Sword in his off-hand and conjuring the Arcanite Axe in his main.

Recklessness, Skeletal Battle Standard, Divine Descent!

Morning Wind knew he had to go all out—this was now a damage race. He had to bring the boss down before it killed him. In God Mode, every critical hit triggered a Slashing Anger, maximizing his burst.

–1023

When the Ghost Stag attacked with lightning again, Morning Wind turned his back to it, reducing the damage by half thanks to his Nightbat Cloak and Steelback Hero Skill. He could now withstand several more attacks. He tried to interrupt the boss’s casting with a punch, but it was useless; all he could do was attack as fiercely as possible.

By the fourth lightning strike, his health was down to just 240. Wind of Renewal kicked in, restoring 3% of his max health per second. But even this wouldn’t keep pace with the boss’s lightning assault.

[Temporal Shift]: Spacetime skill. Slip into the spacetime stream, instantly move within 100 meters, every attack is a guaranteed critical, lasts 8 seconds, up to five instant moves. Cooldown: 10 minutes. Cost: None.

Thanks to the Nightbat Cloak and Steelback skills, Morning Wind was immune to 50% of spell damage, so he didn’t need to use Shield Wall, which would sacrifice too much offense. With his health unable to take even one more hit, he activated Temporal Shift, dodging five of the Ghost Stag’s attacks while unleashing five guaranteed criticals. Four consecutive Slashing Angers, each a critical, would deal immense damage.

–6823

–3565

Critical Slashing Anger, each blow nearly 10,000 damage—the Ghost Stag’s 80,000 health was nothing. After four strikes, the boss was down to 30%, and with Slashing Anger’s 3.2x critical, the damage soared even higher. Meanwhile, Wind of Renewal helped him recover over 1,000 health in 8 seconds, enough to survive another attack. The Ghost Stag couldn’t withstand two more of his strikes.

“So close…” After slaying the Ghost Stag Lord, Morning Wind collapsed to the ground—one more hit and he would have died. The cursed lifesteal effect hadn’t triggered even once, leaving him with only a few dozen health points.

[Ghost Antlers]: Special material, Grade: Dark Gold. The Ghost Stag’s conduit for gathering thunder elements, imbued with ghost, thunder gathering, and spell acceleration effects.

Dark Gold material? Looting the corpse, Morning Wind found a pair of ghostly antlers—he hadn’t expected such a rare material. Epic materials were already extremely scarce in the game, but dark gold materials were almost legendary. They could forge an epic, even a legendary item. In the past, teams had gone to war over a single piece, even causing a national war, so precious were they.

“Ghost, thunder gathering, spell acceleration?” These traits were useless to him, but if the antlers were crafted into a staff with spell acceleration, it would be extraordinary. Since they weren’t suitable for his use, he’d stash them away for future trading.

After looting the corpse, Morning Wind walked to the dark gold chest and opened it—surely a reward for soloing the boss. Given the boss’s strength, only a level 40 magic class could hope to survive its lightning; at level 30, it was nearly impossible.

[Shield of Darkness]

Damaged, shield, soulbound on equip

Requirement: Warrior

Defense: 55

+1% block chance

+12 block value

+1 constitution

Effect: On a successful block, a 3% chance to block an extra 10 damage

Repair: First phase requires 30 Mithril Ore

Description: Said to be a legendary shield of warriors, capable of withstanding any attack. Sadly, it is damaged.

“A damaged shield from a dark gold chest? With so little defense, so little block value, and so little constitution?” Morning Wind’s heart sank at the stats. Shields were supposed to offer the highest defense, yet this one had only 55—his iron boots had 62! Even the block chance was negligible. Block value was just 12; at most, he’d reduce 12 damage on a block. What was the point?

Its additional effect was paltry as well…

Thinking it over, this dark gray shield could be repaired. If fully restored, could it become a divine artifact? Still, the first phase alone required 30 pieces of Mithril Ore. That was painful. One piece now sold for 200 gold, and was extremely rare. Thirty pieces came to 6,000 gold. He’d struck it rich for a moment, but money didn’t grow on trees.

“I’ll repair it when Mithril is plentiful and gold is worthless!” With a helpless sigh, Morning Wind tossed the shield into his backpack—he couldn’t bear to waste so much money on it now.

As the dark gold chest vanished, he turned to the cavern wall. There, he found a puzzle—a two-meter square with ten rows of ten tiles each, and the 100th slot left empty for moving tiles. He checked his inventory: the Ghost Stag had dropped the 100th tile, the final piece.

The puzzle tiles bore only numbers from 1 to 99, arranged chaotically, not in order. He’d have to arrange them correctly, then place the last tile to complete the puzzle. He’d never encountered such gameplay before, but could guess how it worked.

“My intelligence isn’t up to this…” The jumbled numbers made his head spin. Arranging them from 1 to 99 seemed impossible. He’d sooner fight two Ghost Stags; at least then he could devise a strategy to defeat them one by one. This puzzle was for geniuses, not him—he knew his limits.

This was a job for the forums. While he was stumped, the forums were full of talent. He could post a screenshot, explain the mechanics, and let the experts solve it. After making a post with images and his forum contact, he promised whoever solved it first any skill book—except warrior ones—including rare ones.

He explored the Lightless Cavern for treasure but found nothing. Returning to the puzzle, the system notified him of new mail in his forum inbox.

“Genius!” Checking the inbox, he saw a message from a player named “Data King,” who explained step by step how to solve the complex puzzle—over two thousand instructions. How had he figured it out? It had only been about twenty minutes.

“In-game contact is unavailable for now. See you at the city warehouse at 7 p.m.” Morning Wind replied, then followed the directions, moving the tiles to arrange the numbers from 1 to 99.

It took him a full twenty minutes to arrange the numbers in order. As he placed the final tile, he felt a surge of excitement, wondering what would happen next…