The Almighty Ring

Those that were baited into charging forward had realized it too late. They were already within the attack range of the Empyreal Dragon’s defenders. Unfortunately, they could not retreat as there were too many players were behind them blocking their way. On the one hand, they could go forward to attack, on the other, they could just run sideways, still be within the attack range of the Empyreal Dragon, and get themselves killed.

“Cataclysm Nova. I shall hold this against you. Mark my works, I shall have my revenge,” said the poor guild master that was baited into charge first. With no choice in hand, he had chosen to proceed to fight until the last member of their guild dies.

“Heh. You can bark all you want. You had only gotten what you deserve for trying to take advantage of me. I’m only serving you the same treatment that you tried on me,” said Cataclysm Nova to the baited guild master that was trapped in between Cataclysm Nova’s guild and Jiang Fei’s.

“Ignore the fraud! We shall proceed!” cried the unfortunate guild master as he led his guild to their death under the attacks of Jiang Fei’s Empyreal Dragon. At the same time, Cataclysm Nova had led his guild members to follow loosely from behind. With someone taking all the damage for him, Cataclysm Nova’s guild will suffer minimal damage. Since he was charging in second, Cataclysm Nova was not worried about reaping the rewards.

“Tanks! Hold them off! Healers, focus only on the tanks. DPS, if you take damage, run back and heal yourself using potions! Do not demand heals from the healers!” Billy Boy roared. He was at his best in such a war. Although defensive warfare was not his forte, he had still done a good job at commanding the entire guild. At this point, due to the sheer number of players and NPC soldiers, the Empyreal Dragon was forced to focus on a passive defensive tactic.

All the tanks had their shield held in front to form an unmoving barricade. All their movements were rigid and instantaneous. Every time Billy Boy gave out an order, everyone, including the Healers will move instantaneously. At the second when the buff on the tanks had expired, the supporter and healers will instantly recast the buffs to support the tanks! The cooperative level for Empyreal Dragon could be said to be at the maximum. Compared to the messy, uncoordinated formation of the enemy, Empyreal Dragon was rock solid.

Attacks from the Empyreal Dragon had never stopped since the start of the fight. The death per second was by the thousands! Anyone who dared to come closer to the tanks will be killed! That is for certain. Another certainty was the fact that thousands of death per second were insignificant since the enemy had over 300,000 head!

If it was a guild, thousands of death per second was a serious matter. Especially the one of the guilds that had, unfortunately, be baited to charge head first. As soon as they reached within attack range, they had already lost more than 40,000 players out of 60,000 members. By the time they had reached the front of the tanks of Empyreal Dragon, all of the guilds were killed.

Despite being able to attack and be attacked, players and NPC differs greatly in many factors. While players can inflict very powerful damage, NPCs had an incredible higher Health Points. The NPC soldiers that Jiang Fei was fighting against were at Level 70 Elite tier. At the same time, he was dealing with many players, coming from all sorts of guilds; small or big, it matters not if they were only Level 65 and equipped with extremely weak equipment. Their Health Points was so low that they had only one-third of the NPC soldier’s Health Points. Put Jiang Fei aside and stop attacking, members of the Empyreal Dragon would still be able to one-hit-kill any random enemy player.

The lost of combatants of the Light Faction was not small. One mid-size guild was entirely decimated almost less than 30 seconds as they tried to attack the tanks. Even so, the number of enemies was still somewhat the same. Thanks to the “sacrifice” of the unfortunate guild, players that came from behind had formed a buffer that will never be going away for some time unless Empyreal Dragon could increase the number of attackers.

Two sides of the faction had clashed. With melee attacks coming in from the Light Faction, the number of casualties had only increased for the Shadow Faction. As soon as the first tank falls, more followed. Even though Billy Boy was extremely efficient in monitoring gaps in the front line, and replaced the gap with a warrior or a melee class with higher Health Points, he could not prevent the speedily increasing death rate.

Unlike the enemy, with every death for the Empyreal Dragon, the stronger would the enemy be.

“Rain! ETA!” Billy Boy roared. At this point, the front line was getting incredibly unstable. Desperate for a solution, Billy Boy turned to Little Rain for hope.

“7 minutes! 7 more minutes!” Little Rain cried back.

“Sh*t! We need to hold on! Healers, you’re the last hope we’ve got!” cried Seven Star Warrior as he rushed to the front line to replace one of the fallen tanks.

As a player that had an undefeated record in PvP battles, Seven Star Warrior was killing like a machine as soon as he got into the front line. Seven Star Warrior had the privilege to be one of the top deck in the guild. He had his own personal healers with him all the time. With high Health Points and attack, unless he was facing an equally strong opponent, no one could bring him down. Not by a long shot.

“I need five groups of warriors in the right wing defense line!” said Billy Boy.

Both Billy Boy and Seven Star Warrior were both higher officials in the guild. Even so, there was a difference in authority. Seven Star Warrior had always been leading PvE groups into dungeons and open field boss. Billy Boy, on the other hand, was a meister when it comes to coordinating PvP battles, small or large. For this escort mission, Jiang Fei had given Billy Boy the highest level of authority, second only to him.

Is 7 minute long? Depends on the context. Enjoying a cup of noodle, not long enough. Waiting for Little Rain to cast Forbidden Spell in such a dire situation? Too long. The number of tanks defending the front was dropping faster than flies. At this point, all of the tank remaining had grown extremely tired.

Jiang Fei and a large portion of the front line were tanking and defending against both players and NPC soldiers. Having to divide their entire troops to fight against two sides was extremely taxing to the Empyreal Dragon.

“Just hold a little long! It’s about time for us to strike back!” said Billy Boy in the party channel.

“Left-wing! Requesting three groups of healers in the left wing!” cried Seven Star Warrior to Billy Boy. He was fighting against players. Even though the defense line against them was still going strong, the healers that were posted there were running dry of mana! Once a healer runs out of mana, they would be less useful than rocks in the roadside. Worse, without a healer, tanks will be sitting ducks that will be skewer alive!

“Not much longer! Not much longer!” Billy Boy muttered to himself. Members of the Empyreal Dragon were dropping like flies. At this point, almost everyone was fighting and not a single one was resting. Even those that were supposed to restoring their mana had joined the fight, simply by whacking with normal attacks whilst chugging on mana potions. Even so! The pressure in the defense line was growing greater by the second!

“No more! We cannot hold on any longer! Little Rain, use your Mana Crystal!” cried Billy Boy. The right-wing defense line was breaking and the left wing was losing their tanks as they speak, if either one of the defense lines was broken through, the entire convoy will fall!

“Alright,” said Little Rain.

Mana Crystal is a kind of last resort when a magician runs out of mana. Upon use, Mana Crystal will instantly restore 20% of a magician’s Mana Point. However, creating such an item was extremely costly and complicated. Moreover, the item was limited to only one per magician at a time. Using one now means he would not have any trump card left.

Even though he felt a little waste for using it now, the situation had called for it. Even though he could wait for just another 5 minutes to have enough mana to cast the Forbidden Spell, waiting until then would only expose the entire guild to imminent danger.

Crack!

Little Rain took out the Mana Crystal and break it. In that instant, Little Rain had instantly recovered over 60,000 points of mana. Without wasting any more precious time, Little Rain started to cast the Forbidden Spell.

As soon as he did, fire magic had started to flow towards his character. That made all other magicians, friend or foe, within 1,000 meters to know that someone was casting a powerful fire-based spell.

“Oh no! Someone is casting a Forbidden Spell!” cried one of the magicians from the Light Faction.

“Charge in now! We cannot let him cast the Forbidden Spell!”

“Find him! Stop him!”

…

The news got out quick that someone in the convoy was casting a Forbidden Spell. As soon as it did, everyone in the Light Faction panicked. Even the guilds master had started to figure out ways to break past the defense line in order to stop the caster. If Little Rain was allowed to cast the Forbidden Spell, everyone will be killed!