MMORPG: Rebirth of the Legendary Guardian

Water – the habitat of the merfolk. Dolmian’s speed underwater was much faster in comparison to Zhang Yang’s when they were on land. In the blink of an eye, Dolmian lunged at Zhang Yang, with his trident aimed at Zhang Yang’s chest.

{Block}!

Zhang Yang blocked the attack with sparks flashing out from the waters. Water bubbles sparkled on him, causing him to be knocked a few meters behind. Despite Dolmian’s strength and power underwater, Zhang Yang was barely fazed. In a split second, Zhang Yang took the inertia of the blast and torqued it into a quick 360-degree pivot to hit the boss with his axe and dealt more than 80,000 damage.

”Weakling. The ocean is not for the likes of you! You land beings are so pathetic here! Beings that would succumb to mere water! You dare attack my lair? I will grant you your death wish here!” The Boss chased after Zhang Yang and thrust his trident at him.

”Heavy Pierce!” roared Dolmian as he pierced Zhang Yang’s chest with his trident. As the skill suggested, the attack penetrated through Zhang Yang’s armor, and the trident had literally broken through Zhang Yang’s thick metal cuirass and plunged directly into his chest. The blue sea water was clouded red with the overflowing blood that was gushing out of Zhang Yang’s wounds.

”Dummy!” shrieked Han Ying Xue in horror from afar. Although it was just a game, sometimes the human mind will shape it as reality. Especially with the current scene of Zhang Yang’s armor being skewered like a wiener by a fork-like weapon. It felt so real for Han Ying Xue who was watching from the sidelines.

”D*mn you, fish-*ss!” Zhang Yang grabbed the trident and forcefully pushed himself off the forks of the trident. Whether it was real or not, the game developers had done well in programming the sensory system. Zhang Yang could feel the edges of the fork moving through his lungs and windpipe as he pulled out the metal edges.

His Rage gauge was filled instantly and was ready to be used. Zhang Yang landed one clean strike of {Cripple Defense}.

At his current level, {Eagle Eye} was already at the level that grants Zhang Yang a permanent 85% Defense ignore effect. Alone, Zhang Yang would not have to even inflict five counts of {Cripple Defense}. Two of those were more than enough to have all 100% of the boss’ defense ignored.

After 1 second of global cooldown, Han Ying Xue casted a healing spell on Zhang Yang. Zhang Yang resumed the fight promptly after his HP was out of the red zone, i.e having enough HP that could prevent a one-hit-kill situation. Zhang Yang struck the boss with the skill - {God of War Heavy Axe} and dealt 254,340 damage. The damage was so strong that it was nearly close to 1% of the boss’ total HP.

Well, no reason to stop there.

{God of War Devastation}!

{Frost Strike}!

{Horizontal Swipe}!

All skills from the 300% melee attacks, to the 200% AoE attacks were thrown at the boss, dealing powerful damage that sent the boss reeling with pain. When all the skills had been expanded, Zhang Yang used {Cripple Defense} to fill in the empty gap in between normal attacks and the cooldown of the other skills.

Event though {Cripple Defense} could only deal 50% melee physical attack, it was close to 40,000 damage. Secondly, the effect of {Eagle Eye} could only be applied to Zhang Yang’s own attacks. Using {Cripple Defense} was to increase the outclassed Mythical Turtle’s attack. Be it insignificant, it was still an attack! Stack them up altogether as a whole and you’ll get a mountain!

”Bastard! I’ll cut you up and eat you raw! You’ll taste fine with blood, what do you landwalkers call it again…steak?!” Dolmian bellowed as he flailed about.

Zhang Yang responded with laughter. ”Hmm. I’ve never eaten raw fish before. Then again, I don’t think your flesh would taste good. I’d save time rather than waste time gurgling my mouth later!”

”Spearing Barrage!” the Boss roared. The trident within the grip of his slimy hands glowed with an intense radiance as it hovers off his hands and multiplied itself in multiple directions. The Boss twirled out the multiplied spears into a fan-like trajectory.

‘-14,329!’

One of the projected spears hit Zheng Yang, causing Zhang Yang received a little tick on his chest. The damage was not deemed powerful as Zhang Yang had been 20 meters away from the Boss. Hence, Zhang Yang had only felt a tiny prick. The ”Spearing Barrage” skill had only traveled as far as 20 meters away from him before dissolving in the water. Han Ying Xue, who was standing 30 meters away had not received any damage at all.

”Did you just attack? Hah! I could not feel anything! As expected of a fish, you can’t do sh*t!” Zhang Yang mocked. He laughed at the Boss, provoking the character to shreds.

”I am the Death Moon Pirates Captain! To mock me is to seek death! I shall grant your deathwish!” The boss started to ramble on about how he would kill and torture Zhang Yang if he refuses to die. It was paradoxical, but Zhang Yang did not care about it. The bosses in the game would say the exact same thing over and over again. Although the words quipped were different, the meaning in their utterances would carry the same semantics.

The battle dragged on. No sooner, neither of them verbally spoke anymore but just concentrated on throwing blows at each other. Zhang Yang had lost the powerful DPS of Felice and the Phoenix pet, yet his DPS alone had reached close to 90,000. It would take roughly 8 minutes for Zhang Yang to kill the boss. It was not a tough battle, since Han Ying Xue was there to support him. In fact, if he uses all his ultimate skills, he could still fight the boss alone, even without using his Inheritance Transformation skill.

Dolmian’s HP was whacked down by Zhang Yang like a poor dog. The match was completely leaning toward Zhang Yang.

”Impossible…A mere human… how could I lose to a mere human?!” When the boss’ HP approached the 20% threshold, the boss speech had changed from threatening to self-doubting, though yet he remained as vigorous in his attacks.

In the map, a mere Mythical tier boss would not be difficult to defeat, since the real deals were the Ethereal tier bosses. Dolmain had no powerful killing skills nor healing capabilities. It was unfortunate for him to be Zhang Yang’s target for he could not put up a real against with him.

Dolmain was so weak that Zhang Yang had not needed to use {Glare of the Death God}. The {Glare of the Death God} was a circumstantial skill. Even if the skill is not resisted by the boss, it would be fortunate if Zhang Yang is able to proc 3 to 4 hits to trigger the damage tick. Then again, 1% is nothing, since the boss’ total HP was low, to begin with. Zhang Yang activated {Indiscriminate} and struck the boss with a full Rage of {Killing Cleave}.

‘-745,680!’

With a clean drop of his axe, Zhang Yang dealt enough damage to take way 2% of the boss’ HP. The boss squirmed around, wailing as he bled out profusely, clouding the ocean waters with red blood.

”No! It can never be! A strong merfolk will not fall to a mere human!” cried Dolmain again. His attack speed gained a frenzied buff and the skill - {Spearing Barrage} was used more frequently.

15%...10%...5%...

Not long later, the boss was killed and his body was left alone to float upwards.

”Huh. Not bad. 20 million experience points for an 8 minute boss fight! I’ll do this any day!” said Han Ying Xue happily as she skipped her way to pick up the boss loot.

Sadly, the loot obtained from the Mythical tier boss was scrap if compared to the drops of the Mythical tier boss in the Tibanya Wasteland! Still, the equipment found then were not powerful as they do not have the special effect to reduce the Level Requirement! Furthermore, its statistics were either leaning toward offense or defense. Neither one of them had both! Han Ying Xue was extremely disgruntled and almost had broken down if Zhang Yang had not stopped her by stating their value in gold coins.

Any quest item can only be interacted with the quest holder. While Han Ying Xue was picking up the equipment, Zhang Yang went ahead and picked up a bottle of water, and the quest helper had indicated that it was the ”authentic” Mythical Dense Water. What was left was the [Specter of Fate].

After picking up the required items, Han Ying Xue and Zhang Yang. The two of them swam up to shore and flew their way towards the next destination - The Maanya Castle. When Zhang Yang flew across the land, he made a detour on purpose to stop by the Forest of Gilstein. Zhang Yang descended downward and landed next to the statue of the Goddess of War. Zhang Yang sat down beside the statue and ”talked” to Felice. While the statue continued to radiate with beautiful rays of light, Felice’s voice was nowhere to be heard. Zhang Yang left after a little while.

Ten hours later, Zhang Yang and Han Ying Xue arrived at Kandiya Grasslands, where he continued his journey towards the east. Along the way, Han Ying Xue, being a pesky little minx, had continuously tingled and jiggled his little dong, teasing him as she pleased. Zhang Yang was not enjoying it one bit, and he had threatened her by saying if she continued teasing him unreasonably like that, he might get in the mood for some secretary office action on the table.

Maanya Castle was situated right at the edge of a cliff and was surrounded by strong walls. The only entrance to the castle was the gates. Even that was protected by a man-made trench and could only be crossed over if the castle guards lowered the drawbridge.

This strong defense also implicated a huge drawback. Neither could the enemies enter, nor could the defenders attack. If they are surrounded, the only means of attacking, other than siege engines, would be coming out from the only way that they could come in. It would be bottle-necking both sides.

Then again, such a defense could easily be infiltrated by flying mounts. Since most cities banned the usage of flying mounts, Zhang Yang came down to the earth and requested to enter to the castle via the traditional means. Zhang Yang paid the 30 gold coins entrance fee and gained access to the castle.

The interior of the castle behind the huge monstrous walls was surprisingly medieval. At the center of the entire place was a beautiful castle that stood tall as it watched over the entire castle compound. The castle was situated on a higher ground, while the other clay houses and stone buildings were built on lower grounds, closer to the gates. Like any other castle, the region was filled with many civilians, peasants, merchants, and even NPC adventurers.

Han Ying Xue and Zhang Yang entered the area and came to the central plaza. There, they found a public bulletin board and with a large poster and they were both attracted to read it.

The poster contained news about Sheeny who had been plunged into a deep sleep by an evil magician named Brosh using dark magic. Sheeny is the daughter of the castle baron, Count Ropolly, Unless the count agrees to let the evil magician marry his only daughter, the magician will continue to use his magic to prevent anyone from waking the little girl up.

With such a threat looming over him, Count Ropolly had offered a large sum of reward to those who could kill Brosh and remove the magic on Sheeny. He would even allow the Hero to enter his treasure vault to choose to his liking.

Zhang Yang took down the poster with his hands and flashed a smile, saying, ”Let’s kill the horny magician.”

”Please….. You are not much different from that villain.” Han Ying Xue said, rolling her eyes.

”Hey! You there!” A voice called out to them. It was a middle-aged man.

”Are you planning to take the quest to kill the evil magician?” the man said.

Zhang Yang nodded.

”I urge you to think twice, young man. Do not think over your head. Justice, honor, bravery. All those virtues mean nothing in the face of the evil Brosh! Don’t you know how powerful he is? He could easily decimate an entire army with the flick of his staff! How else would even the count himself not kill the perpetrator when he owns an army of soldiers, himself?”

Another character appeared out of nowhere and interjected their conversation.

”I remember a while back when the magician appeared in the castle. He was riding a Ghastly Dragon! Oh my god. May the Lord have mercy upon us all. The count should have let the magician to his daughter! The magician could use the evil dragon and kill us all off if he wanted to!”

According to the western legends, dragons were the source of evil. Hence, Dragon Knights or Dragon Slayers were those who were worshipped as saviors. However, in the game, it would depend on the lore of the location. For example, White Jade Empire uses Dragon Riders as guardians of the castle. As for Maanya Castle, dragons were evil.

At that moment, a group of guards came in and expressed that the count himself had requested for their presence in the castle itself.

Zhang Yang and Han Ying Xue followed the group and went into the castle to meet the baron. He was a man roughly at the age of 30. He was handsome but was only a normal tier entity. His battle strength was only 5! Then again, it was for the lore’s purpose, if he was someone like Queen Serena, the baron would have walked to the magician’s lair and kicked his *ss.

Zhang Yang frowned intensely when he noticed the baron’s age. If he had a daughter that was kidnapped to be married, that would put her in the age of between 15 to 20. In that case, the baron must have bore the child at the age of 15 or 16!?