MMO: Pierce Heaven Til' It Breaks

The four women all rushed up at once, surrounding Li Yi and using their strongest moves on him. Little Elf from the Magical Realm and Fire Ice did not deal very much damage, so it was all on the sisters, Xu Man and Moonlight Ocean. In the end, they did not need all 10 seconds. The four girls killed Li Yi within 7 seconds.

When the 10-second countdown came to an end, the four women were instantly left with 1HP each. However, since Li Yi had died in the middle of the sacrifice, the ceremony failed and Nunnally was hit by the repercussions. Li Yi was resurrected with full health whereas another 10-second countdown appeared above Nunnally’s head instead.

“Forget healing, attack with all you got!”

Li Yi barked loudly and the four girls attacked at once, launching their assault on Nunnally.

They only had 10 seconds. If their DPS was not high enough, Nunnally would die automatically after 10 seconds, but the party would be caught in the blast as well, and they would all die with her. After that, the system would announce that Nunnally’s Life Sacrifice worked after all, and she would be revived with full health…

Right now, Nunnally had close to 200,000HP. Killing her within 10 seconds was going to be a tough trial indeed.

Li Yi dismissed the Violent Bear King and switched the Lightning Leopard in instead. He then used Eliminate, followed by Piercing Arrow! All his cards were on the table now.

9 seconds later!

Nunnally’s HP fell to zero. This time, her Life Sacrifice had well and truly failed.

Little Elf from the Magical Realm’s body shone with a golden glow. She had leveled up once with the EXP rewarded from killing the boss.

Li Yi checked the current progress of the dungeon and heaved a long sigh of relief. As of right now, only his party had managed to defeat the third boss. The other teams were still getting their butts handed to them.

[…Congratulations! You’ve unlocked the achievement, All on Your Own.]

None of them had used any potions, so they received the achievement as well.

“That’s a first kill in the bag!” Li Yi gave the four girls a huge thumbs-up.

“Don’t get too excited, there’s still one more boss left.” Little Elf from Magical Realm rolled her eyes at him.

“As long as we got past Nunnally, the last boss is basically a freebie.” Li Yi was brimming with confidence.

Moonlight Ocean went to loot the body. The Virtual Inventory Pane appeared, but there was one piece of equipment on it, a pair of gold-colored boots.

[Nunnally’s Ankle Boots (Mail)]

[Equipment Level: Level 50]

[AGI +50]

[END +50]

[SPD +10]

[Special effect: Increases Dark Resistance by 20 points.]

[Special effect: Increases EVA by 10%.]

…

“Not bad…” Li Yi could not help a word of praise.

It was better than expected. Li Yi had seen enough pairs of Nunnally’s Ankle Boots in his day, but this was his first time seeing one with such wonderful attributes. To put +10 SPD in perspective, it was basically the same as increasing a character’s SPD by 20%.

“I suggest we roll for this,” said Little Elf from the Magical Realm, raising her hand.

The other three girls exchanged a glance and nodded in unison. “Yes, let’s roll!”

Li Yi said angrily, “Roll my *ss! This is mail, can you girls even wear them?”

“We’ll sell them.” Xu Man rubbed her chin with a sinister smile.

“Fine, we’ll roll for it. Word of warning in advance, I’m super lucky with my rolls. Don’t you come crying to me after you lose.”

Li Yi harrumphed and was the first to roll.

The dice soon stopped at 1 point…

“Hahahaha…”

The four girls burst out laughing in unison and rolled their dice as well.

Fire Ice had 10 points, Xu Man 20, Moonlight Ocean 3, and Little Elf from the Magical Realm 38.

“Hmm, these shoes can be sold for at least a couple thousand Gold Coins, eh?”

“I’ll take ’em for 10,000.” Li Yi gave in with a tortured expression.

“I’ll sell them for 10,000 to everyone else, but you? I’ll take 1,000,000.” Little Elf from the Magical Realm giggled and tossed the shoes at Li Yi.

The shoes were mail, so they were meant for Li Yi anyway. The girls were just trying to pull his leg and tease him a little. Of course, Li Yi knew that very well too.

Li Yi took the shoes and grabbed Little Elf from the Magical Realm’s small hand as he said meaningfully, “Meet me at my house tonight for it. My bed is large and comfy, y’know.”

“Ptooey!” Little Elf from the Magical Realm’s face turned red again.

“C’mon, MILF lover!”

Xu Man could not bear to watch any longer, and she yelled at him to move.

“Let’s head out!” Li Yi said with a grand wave of his arm.

The group of five encountered another three waves of monsterlings along the way and dispatched them with ease. Finally, they arrived at the location of the last boss.

This was a corner of the Ancient Civilization Ruins. When Li Yi and the others reached this place, the storyline was automatically triggered. The number one Paladin of the Church of Holy Light, Highlord Mograine appeared before the players.

When the players met Mograine, he was fighting against a Jackalling Chief wielding a greataxe. The two of them fight back and forth, neck and neck. Just then, however, King of Souls appeared all of a sudden and cast a debuff called Blood Crazed on Mograine before drifting away.

[Blood Crazed: Inflicts damage every second. Automatically dispelled when HP is maxed.]

The jackallings were a race unique to Dragonbone Waste. As the Church of Holy Light and the Cursing Sect had encroached into their homeland, they rose in retaliation. Players would often see them around the Light and Darkness Instances.

“My life is leaving me like the wind…”

Damage numbers kept floating above Highlord Mograine’s head, taking [−1000] each time. The damage was dealt every second, and it grew faster as it went.

Mograine had 10,000,000HP, and the Jackalling Chief had 10,000,000HP as well. When the two of them duked it out initially, Mograine had the upper hand. Now that he had the Blood Crazed debuff on him, though, Mograine’s attributes were halved and he kept losing health. Although he was constantly healing himself with Holy Light, he was still on the brink of death.

That was when Li Yi and the others received a notification telling them how to pass this segment. All they had to do was ensure that Mograine did not die, and dispel the Blood Crazed effect on him. Those were the conditions for victory.

“How do we fight?” The four girls were lost.

“When the battle begins, the Jackalling Chief will summon an infinite number of Little Jackallings to surround and attack Mograine. The DPS will be in charge of clearing away the Little Jackallings, and you two healers heal Mograine to the max. Once the Blood Crazed debuff is dispelled, we pass this dungeon.”

“It’s that simple? Don’t we need to beat the Jackalling Chief?”

“We can’t fight the Jackalling Chief. Every time you hit him, he’ll go Berserk for 10 seconds. Sure, he won’t attack you, but Mograine would be done for. And if Mograine’s done for, we’ll be done for too. The Jackalling Chief’s attacks can instantly kill a Level 100 player, so there’s no way we can tank that.”

“How do you know so much?” said Xu Man, surprised.

Li Yi chuckled. “I’m a player who’s reliving this for the second time. Cool, eh?”

Xu Man sighed. “Looks like the rumors were true after all. So you really are a closed beta player.”

Li Yi sighed, too. “Sigh, no one believes me even if I tell the truth.

“So we just gotta double heal Mograine…”

This time, all four girls understood. This was why Li Yi said this dungeon required double healers.

“Go! The faster we get this done, the sooner we can head for the next first kill!”

“Young heroes, thank you for saving me. If it weren’t for you, I would never be able to escape from the King of Souls’ grasp.”

As soon as Li Yi and the others rushed forth, the High Cleric Nunnally appeared and bowed deeply at them. She then cast an hour-long buff, Evil God’s Light, that increased the players’ attributes by 20%.

[You have obtained the gratitude of the Light Priest Nunnally. Your Reputation with the Cursing Sect has been increased by 100 points.]

Right after Nunnally left, two Paladins riding gold-colored warhorses ran up to them as well.

“May the Holy Light bless you all. Thank you for saving me… Please accept Cardolan’s sincerest blessings.”

“Holy Light be with you! I, Uther, express my deepest gratitude to you.”

They were the first boss, Uther, and the second boss, Cardolan.

Just like Nunnally, their defeat meant that the King of Souls’ control of their minds had been broken. That was why Li Yi and the others had become their saviors. Unlike Nunnally, they did not leave immediately. Instead, after thanking Li Yi and the others, the two of them joined the healing ranks.

[You have obtained the gratitude of the Light Priest Cardolan. Your Reputation with the Church of Holy Light has been increased by 100 points.]

[You have obtained the gratitude of the Holy Paladin Uther. Your Reputation with the Church of Holy Light has been increased by 100 points.]

Both of the mini bosses were healers, and their only duty upon joining the battle was to heal Mograine. They could not care less about the players’ lives. The players’ job was very simple as well. The DPS were tasked with killing the little puppies summoned by the Jackalling Chief, and they just had to make sure that the healers could heal uninterrupted.

The two bosses were only decent healers. The outcome of this battle still depended fully on the potency of the players’ healing, because the longer the Blood Crazed skill lasted, the stronger it would become. Add that to the Jackalling Chief’s ridiculous ATK, and it meant that the battle was doomed for failure if they could not completely restore Mograine’s HP within 10 minutes.

“Come out, my sons, my grandsons, my youngest and older grandsons, my paternal and maternal grandsons…”

“Woof woof woof woof…”

As soon as the battle began, the Jackalling Chief threw his head back and howled loudly. More than 30 Little Jackallings rushed out from every direction, pouncing at the healers.

“Whoosh whoosh whoosh—”

Li Yi shot one with each arrow, making sure that not a single Little Jackalling could approach the healers. The Little Jackallings only had 3,000HP, which made them quite easy to kill. The only problem was that they were too sparsely scattered. If the players were not careful and allowed the monsters to reach the healers, these damned dogs would crawl onto the healers’ bodies and munch away, each bite dealing 300 to 500+ damage. If that went on for too long, forget the healer classes with their low HP, even main tanks would not be able to withstand it.

Melee DPS classes were not very ineffective in this battle, so it all depended on the ranged attackers. This was because it was much faster to just aim and attack without having to run up to the target first.

The two sisters’ performance was only average, but Li Yi’s pet, the Lightning Leopard, truly stole the spotlight. That ridiculous SPD meant that its attacks were no slower than Li Yi’s, and it moved randomly from left to right, leaving a trail of jackalling corpses in its wake.

The healers could safely heal without any worries, so they put their all into the healing. Mograine’s HP rose steadily, and everything was looking great.

The Holy Light Redemption Instance Dungeon was the easiest of the 5 Level 50 Small Instance Dungeons. Of course, that was only in comparison with the other 4 Small Instance Dungeons. Compared to other dungeons of the same level, the Holy Light Redemption dungeons were still relatively difficult, much more so than the previous 5 Level 40 easy dungeons.

The Jackalling Chief kept summoning more Little Jackallings, and their numbers kept adding up. At first, he could only summon 30 at a time, but in the end, he could summon 50. Finally, even Li Yi could not control them all, allowing some to reach Little Elf from the Magical Realm and Fire Ice. The situation was extremely precarious, but just then, the Divine Essence Potions proved their worth.

Little Elf from the Magical Realm and Fire Ice drank one bottle of Divine Essence each, and their HP was instantly fully restored. At the same time, Li Yi also hurried to finish off the Little Jackallings and regain control of the situation.

[9,510,000… 9,670,000… 9,650,000… 9,890,000…]

Mograine’s HP rose slowly. Finally, after Fire Ice cast Holy Light Echo and achieved a Critical Hit, Mograine’s HP returned to 1,000,000!

“I feel full of power!”

The Blood Crazed debuff vanished, and Mograine roared loudly. His entire body was enveloped in holy light and he raised his warhammer high above his head, bringing it down on the Jackalling Chief.

“Holy Light—Adjudication!”

[−9,999,999]

The Jackalling Chief was instantly killed…

…