Part-Time BOSS

PTB Ch.4 – Wildfire Riddle

At this point, the army of adventurers had suffered over 100 casualties, and dozens of individuals had fled in all directions.
Only a core force of about 150 people remained, and they made final formation adjustments while protected by the flame protection barrier.

  When the black dragon dove down again, the opponent launched an effective counterattack.

  ”Gravity!”
  ”Aging!”
  ”Fatigue Ray!”
  ”Lysis!”
  Several curse spells struck the black dragon one after another, most of which were nullified by its powerful vitality.
However, a gravity spell successfully slowed the dragon down for a moment.

  And that brief moment was enough to cause fatal consequences.
The disintegration technique weakened the dragon’s scale armor, and a dense rain of arrows fell upon its body, dealing significant double-digit damage: -17, -33, -25…

Despite enduring two rounds of arrow rain, Murphy only lost 3,000 health points.
He was about to ascend to a higher altitude when he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his left chest.
“-572!” A bright red number stood out among a sea of double-digit injuries.

’

  ”Ow! That hurts!” Murphy spiraled upward to gain height and reluctantly bit the arrow shaft to pull it out.
A quick glance revealed that it was a mithril arrow enchanted with advanced armor piercing—only a wealthy individual could afford such a weapon.

  If the arrow had hit a vital point, it could have been disastrous.
Given its high damage, was it a hero player who fired it?

  Murphy scanned the crowd and saw an elf ranger wearing a hood and cloak, slowly bending his bow and aiming another arrow.

  ”Is he just an adventurer?” Murphy was a little surprised.
It was unexpected that an adventurer could deal such high damage.
If the power of the shot were greater, it might have been a fatal blow.

In the sky world, monsters have a blood bar system that affects gameplay, but to enhance authenticity, a “fatal blow” feature was added.
Once a fatal blow is landed, the blood bar becomes meaningless and even creatures with high health can be defeated in a single hit.

However, landing a fatal blow is no easy feat.
Humanoid creatures can be dispatched by decapitation or piercing their hearts, but for larger creatures like black dragons, it’s much more challenging.

Even with Morpheus’s impressive size, decapitating a ten-meter-long dragon with a knife is a daunting task.
Moreover, a dragon’s heart is hidden beneath thick scales, not where most people assume it to be located.
Unlike what one might expect, the heart is actually situated below the neck, the toughest part of a dragon’s scales, and does not increase in proportion to the creature’s size.
Despite Morpheus’s enormous wingspan of over 100 meters, a dragon’s heart is only slightly larger than a human’s.

But even with the difficulty of landing a fatal blow, Murphy was not willing to take the risk.

’

“Stupid mortals,” taunted the dragon.
“Do you think that hiding behind magic and arming yourselves with weapons and blades is enough to challenge the great Black Dragon Lord Morpheus? Witness the power of the Black Dragon Legion! My minions, use your claws and blades to tear apart my enemies!”

In an instant, the ground around them collapsed, revealing over a dozen dark tunnels.
Crowds of goblins, kobolds, gnolls, and even a few towering ogres surged forth, driven by dragon-man vanguards to launch a frenzied attack on the adventurers.

The players were taken completely by surprise.
Their formation was designed for aerial defense, with marksmen, hunters, and other long-range specialists positioned at the outer edge.
Now, they found themselves directly confronted with hordes of monsters.

Qingfeng called out, “Melee team, charge and take down the mobs!”

Several thieves and assassins appeared, ready for battle.

Zhu Youlei sighed.
“We’re the only ones left.
We’re in trouble.”

It was only at that moment that Qingfeng Lanhuai snapped back to reality.
He had focused solely on air defense and had sacrificed all the melee professions, particularly the soldiers.
The casualties were heavy, and few remained.
There were a handful of thieves, assassins, and shadow dancers who had survived by hiding in the shadows, but their ability to withstand direct combat was lacking.
It was too much to rely on them to hold the line.

’

There were also a few paladins who had survived thus far, thanks to the Holy Shield, but it wasn’t enough.

In the blink of an eye, the monsters had stormed into the adventurers’ formation, slaughtering and butchering their way through.
Several spellcasters on the periphery were killed instantly.

Several thieves and assassins were quickly overwhelmed.
Qingfeng stowed his longbow and drew two scimitars, using them to slash through a few goblins.
“Damn it! Summon all the creatures you can! Little monsters!”

He whistled and summoned his own wolf first.

The players from Dragon’s War displayed remarkable reflexes and quick thinking in response to the sudden attack.
The elementalists summoned rock puppets to create a loose defensive formation, while hunters and rangers utilized their beast pets, and necromancers used bone guards to fend off the enemy.
Arcanists summoned phantom dogs, and druids teamed up to summon a massive tree vine monster that entangled a large group of gnolls, slowing down the monster army’s offensive.

  With the formation stabilized, the casting professions were able to unleash their powerful damage abilities.
Fire storms and chain lightning spells decimated the goblin group, while alchemy bombs inflicted heavy casualties on the fleeing kobolds.

  Although the ogres managed to cause some damage and create gaps in the formation, they were easily taken care of by the skilled hunters and rangers.
The players made quick work of the enemy’s minions, causing Murphy to shake his head in disappointment.

These monsters given out by the system for free are nothing but useless trash.
Even with them, you can’t take down an opponent who has no formation at all.

’

It’s unfortunate that he doesn’t have enough dragonmen under his command.
If he had a hundred dragonman vanguards, fifty dragonman wizards, and a few dragonman warlords with halos to supervise the battle, they would easily break through the opposing formation.

Building a Dragonoid Incubation Room would cost him half a million RMB, which he couldn’t afford.
He was used to living a hard life and was reluctant to spend such extravagant money.
Therefore, he had to make do with the rubbish on the battlefield.

Fortunately, using these monsters doesn’t cost any money, and they don’t mind dying.
Besides, as long as the notoriety value is high enough, they can pull up a lot of votes at any time.
These monsters can even achieve the effect of disrupting the enemy’s formation.

At this moment, the adventurer’s formation had been broken up in order to handle the monster army’s surprise attack.
Even several flame protection barriers had vanished.

The black dragon found a suitable angle and swooped down again.

After taking a deep breath and going through three stages of recharge, the dragon breathed out a wildfire! The cloud of dragon’s breath sprayed from one end of the battlefield to the other, burning both adventurers and monsters to ashes wherever the flame passed.
There is no such thing as friendly fire immunity in this game.

This dragon’s breath was responsible for the deaths of at least fifty or sixty adventurers, as well as the elimination of a hundred goblins, gnolls, and ogres.

The air above the battlefield was now filled with the smell of burning flesh.