This cave differed from the others. Its layout was flat when the other caves had been multi-layered.
This meant that the party’s fighting formation would have to be different. They couldn’t form a choke point and have I’die, Athena, and Phoenix bombard from a distance.
Astaroth and Gulnur would have to fight as vanguards, making sure they didn’t get bypassed. It would not be simple, since the terrain was so open.
As they advanced into the cavern, the wolves resting at the edge finally discovered them, howling to alert the others.
“Alright, here it goes!” Astaroth shouted.
He and Gulnur fanned out a little, with White death taking the center, and cleaning up any enemy that tried going around them. Astaroth forwent his spirit melding for the beginning since that would leave Gulnur alone to deal with lots of pressure.
He would use it after his summon timed out, but for now, splitting the pressure was more important, as to protect his back line. As the first wave of wolves crashed into them, Gulnur used a taunting skill to grab as much aggro as he could.
Astaroth on his side used Intimidation Shout, maximizing the aggro pull on himself from the other side and causing many monsters to get feared.
This would let him deal with the first wave efficiently for the first few seconds since the feared monsters were backing away. Astaroth didn’t forget to cast Mana Skin, to bolster his defense.
He also used his short sword and shield, acting like an off-tank. He blocked most of the remaining wolves that charged at them, leaving the last few to White.
To give White a better fighting chance, he boosted his Constitution stat with three points he had from leveling up. His health bar jumped to close to eight thousand health, making him almost tankier than Gulnur.
Then he did the same with his own free points, dumping all eight of them into Constitution. That took his health from forty-one hundred to fifty-three hundred points.
That might look negligible, but that put him at equal health levels as full brawler classes. To give a good comparison, Gulnur, a full tank, had almost eight thousand health.
The boost let him tank better, but this would still just be a temporary solution. He could never tank a mob of monsters for long unless he started boosting only his Constitution stat.
That was not his intention, of course, as he was trying to go for a full damage build. His next best option would be to find a soul to contract that had a tank predisposition.
But that would not be an easy feat. Astaroth got his shoulder bit because he was in his thoughts, and he snapped back to the now.
He stabbed the wolf in the eye with his short sword, forcing it off of him, before kicking it in the chest to push it back. A soothing green energy, with petals swirling through, washed over him, bringing his health back up, and closing the wound.
He turned his head over to I’die and thanked him with a nod. I’die answered him with a smile, before going back to attacking the wolves.
He waved his staff, and a wave of stalagmites grew in front of Gulnur, impaling the wolves it hit.
‘Such a troublesome class to deal with.’ Astaroth thought to himself.
A class that could attack and heal, would be a terror on the battlefield. Of course, he was also an aberration to other players, but that thought never crossed his mind.
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Gulnur was doing an excellent job keeping most of the wolves locked on him, using one taunt after another, and using so many defense skills, it was scary.
Astaroth watched him from the corner of his eye and was incredibly impressed. The dwarf had not once yet been in a position where he was in actual danger.
There was always a defense skill active on him, and his spatial awareness was impressive. Nothing went past him without his knowledge, it appeared, as whatever did, either got taunted by him or ended in White Death’s jaws.
To the players inside the tournament, this scene would already be impressive. But to the players watching the broadcasts, it was outright inhuman.
No one in the tournament knew they broadcast it outside of the game, since chairwoman Constantine had said nothing about it.
But, at the moment, the eyes of almost all the players in the game, and even the non-players outside of the game, were glued to their screens.
The broadcast would switch between points of interest, trying to keep its audience entertained. But for the last few minutes, except for a quick interlude to the pyramid and Khalor, the cameras had been on Astaroth and his group.
Even Constantine was watching the broadcasts, from her cozy office. It slightly angered her, though, because there shouldn’t be any player in the under zone they had designed.
They had designed that complete zone simply as a gigantic holding cell for the monsters. Those monsters were to be used if the players tried to stale the phase too much.
But with what was happening right now, there would be no monster left to do that. This little group of misfits was driving a wrench into her planning.
“Their teamwork is sloppy, but their power is nothing to look down on.” Constantine muttered as she watched the party mow down wolf after wolf.
Currently, the entire world was wondering if the monsters were too weak, or if the players were too strong. Some nincompoop players had already tried repeating the feat.
Little needed to be said about how that ended. Many of those simple-minded players were currently trying to defend their deaths by saying the wolves they fought were stronger.
Of course, the broadcasts showed the levels of the monsters, just as much as the ones of the players. So no one believed their stupid claims.
Back in the cave, around two hundred wolves had already been slain, in a little under ten minutes. There was just one minute left to White Death’s summon timer, and Astaroth was getting mentally ready to dive into the mob.
The situation had already devolved into a game of catch at this point. The party was circling the room, keeping their formation, as they kept a wall at their back, but never staying in the same spot.
This maneuver was the only reason they had not yet been overwhelmed. Most of this was thanks to Phoenix, whose leading skills were a grade above.
No one ever doubted her commands, and that had yet to fail them. Astaroth called to her.
“Phoenix! My summon is almost done. I’m going in!” He said, getting ready.
“Understood!” She answered back.
Her mind went into overload, trying to see what would be the best move here. She thought of a plan and quickly shared it in the group chat, through thought.
She knew they had no time to go over it, so she let Astaroth read it and execute it in his own way. When Astaroth saw the message, he grinned widely.
Phoenix had asked him to pull as many enemies as he could off of them, after his transformation, and fight in guerilla tactics. Since his speed was higher than the monsters’ speed, he could do hit-and-run tactics.
“Ten-four, Phoenix!” He shouted as White Death faded away, his timer reaching zero.
“Spirit Melding.” He then muttered.
Again, his hair turned white, his eyes went deep blue, and his arms grew some fur, as he transformed. He howled loudly to the skies, or ceiling in this case, and madly dashed away.
He moved in a straight line, through the wolves, making it to the center of the mob. Once he was there, he used one of his acquired skills, Alpha’s Howl.
The howl pulled so much aggro in its fifty-meter radius, that most of the pressure was taken off of Gulnur. The fear effect also kicked in, sending almost three-quarters of the wolves into ingrained terror.
This was his queue to start guerilla tactics. He dived back out of the mob and started doing hit-and-runs, making sure he kept aggro as much as possible.
What little wolves he hadn’t hit, kept going at the rest of the party. But Phoenix had ordered them to hunker down, going for a defensive fight for now.
Astaroth had pulled out his two daggers, and he was zooming in and out of the wolves following him, claiming lives every few strikes. When he left a wolf with little health but couldn’t finish it, he tagged coordinates in the chat.
Soon after, an arrow would fly in, finishing the beast off before it could even move. Athena’s precision, even when she had no sight of her target, was terrifying.
The fight went on for the next nine minutes, with Astaroth running loops around the wolves and the rest of the party defending themselves in a corner. Gulnur was doing a beautiful job, but he still needed to be healed very often.
When Astaroth’s melding was almost done, he received a command through the chat from Phoenix. She asked him to round up the wolves in the center of the room.
“All of them?” Astaroth asked.
“Yes. All of them.” She responded.
“On it.” He replied.
He knew she had a plan, otherwise, she wouldn’t be giving him that order. So he asked questions no more and did what she asked.
He ran the cave full circle again, grabbing aggro on the group of wolves in front of Gulnur on the way, and rounded the wolves up like sheep.
Once he was done, he ran back to the group, as he heard Phoenix chant.
“Cataclysmic Event: Fire Tornado!”