Chương 181: Mourner of the Frozen Road

The frozen road continued toward the distant fort, cutting through a valley boxed in by ice and black stone. Snow blew hard enough across the path to hide sections of the ground, and after the boulder trap, Meno expected the road itself to become the next mechanic. Instead, the snow stood up. Twenty shapes burst from the drifts around them, rough humanoid bodies formed from packed ice and windblown powder.

Before anyone could inspect them properly, every elemental tore off a chunk of itself, packed it into a snowball, and threw. One crossed the road and hit Kestrel directly in the face. He died on impact, but golden light erupted around his body as Meno's Last Word triggered and restored him where he had fallen.

"Damn it," Kestrel said.

"I wasn't paying attention." Meno and Karmabeast were already moving. They activated Mush, expanded into their Divine forms, and tore into the nearest elemental before the pack could launch another volley. Meno watched its health collapse, then landed the killing blow with Xenocide. The remaining nineteen elementals vanished at once.

KESTREL DIED TO A SNOWBALL MYTHIC ORB ALREADY PAYING RENT CROWNFALL RISING PUBLIC SERVICE TANKED BY WEATHER The road stayed quiet for another 20 seconds before the ice beneath their feet began turning red. Dark patches spread under the snow, then erupted into narrow pillars of heat that forced the group into a constant zigzag toward the fort. The warning was generous enough that nobody got caught once they understood the pattern.

Meno ran through the safe gaps and used short False Wings kicks whenever two eruptions overlapped, while Arayu blinked between openings. Kestrel and Karmabeast used their own movement skills farther back. BrineSaint simply followed the safe path without making the mechanic more complicated than necessary. Eventually, the road opened into a huge circular clearing, with a ghost waiting in the middle. [Velmorath, Mourner of the Frozen Road | Raid Boss | Level 98] Velmorath was Mush sized.

Torn grey cloth hung around her body, twisting in directions that did not match the wind, while long silver hair streamed around a face that looked carved from ice instead of alive. Her arms hung so low that her hands nearly brushed the snow beside her feet. Kestrel stepped forward and surveyed the arena.

"I'll raid lead. Keep comms clear during the fight."

"What's the point?" Meno asked.

"We don't know anything."

"The point is that you can focus on damage and staying alive while I track everyone else. I have more raid-leading experience than anyone here."

"I can't speak?" Karmabeast asked.

"I just made up this nice song for Arayu. It goes like, Arayuuuu, oh Arayuuu, my love for youuuu—" NO RAID COMMS PRIVILEGES REVOKED ARAYU LOG OUT NOW MAGICIAN SUBCLASS HAS GONE TOO FAR"SHUT UP!" Arayu snapped.

"PBG, please help."

"Karma, that was awful. Don't speak until you come up with a better song," Meno said.

"Spare me your songs. Just, just stop," Arayu pleaded.

"Please focus," BrineSaint said.

"Okay, Kestrel, you're the lead," Meno said.

"We'll shut up and hit the boss."

"Don't just hit the boss. Listen to what I'm saying." Once everything came off cooldown, they pulled. Meno rushed straight into melee and activated Mush on contact, tripling in size beside Velmorath while Karmabeast attacked just off his flank. Karmabeast kept his own Divine skill unused so Fatebreaker could keep cycling the shorter parts of his kit, while BrineSaint, Kestrel, and Arayu spread out behind them along the road. Two black projectiles formed beside Velmorath every second.

The first pair answered one question immediately. One Gravebolt formed almost inside Meno and hit him point-blank, while the second curved toward Karmabeast. He caught it against one of his linked Massive blades and deflected most of the impact, though black energy still splashed through him. Meno had taken the full hit for 9% HP, proving the Conqueror damage-halving effect was already worth it.

A dark stain spread across his chest and reduced incoming healing, but he purged it with Crownmind and kept swinging to restore himself through Lifesteal. Meno didn't understand why, but Sleepless Grip wasn't doing anything. Had the effect finally hit some hidden raid-level limit? It was only Legendary I, after all. Had it even worked against Varkesh back in the dungeon? Meno honestly couldn't remember. There had been way too many damn things to focus on.

Five seconds later, ghostly blue fire crawled across his back. Meno tried to purge that too, but nothing happened. Sleepless Grip remained useless.

"Tank swap mechanic," Kestrel called.

"Brine, go!" BrineSaint used Taunt, and the fire vanished from Meno the instant Velmorath turned toward him.

"Fire cleared," Kestrel said.

"Meno, take it back. Two bolts. Closest targets." Meno kept attacking until Threat pulled Velmorath back. Kestrel had already figured out the split: Gravebolts targeted the two nearest players, while the fire followed the current Threat holder and had to be Taunted away by someone else. They understood the rules, but their formation still needed to handle both at once. Meno and Karmabeast had to handle the Gravebolts. Everyone else was too low level and lacked the sustain to survive them.

At least Velmorath did not use melee attacks, instead casting one pair of Gravebolts every second. Then the sky became a second fight. Ten long ice shards formed above the clearing and began descending point-first while pale mourner ghosts appeared around the edges, drifting toward Velmorath with their arms stretched ahead. Kestrel sent arrows curving around the lowest cluster. Prisms formed along their paths, then burst into multiplying projectiles that tore through several shards at once.

Arayu burned down an isolated shard with repeated fireballs, while BrineSaint threw his glowing weapon into another cluster and cracked several apart. White frost marks appeared on everyone except Meno. BrineSaint backed away from Velmorath and passed through one of the approaching mourners. The ghost dispersed around him, taking his frost mark with it, and another mourner appeared farther out almost immediately. A different ghost reached Velmorath and restored a visible chunk of her HP.

"Marks clear on contact. Ghosts heal her. Keep shooting the sky." Karmabeast launched after a shard that had escaped the main volley. For less than a second, Kestrel became the second-closest player to Velmorath. The next Gravebolt crossed the clearing and killed him before he could correct. Meno's Last Word flashed and restored Kestrel for the second time that day.

"Karma, down," Kestrel said.

"Ranged, farther back." They recovered their positions, but at the 30-second mark, Velmorath added another layer. BrineSaint, Kestrel, and Arayu all turned translucent, their bodies shifting into the same pale ghost material as the mourners. With no plan in place, all three moved toward Velmorath from different angles. Karmabeast tried to protect their routes while holding the second Gravebolt position, but the formation immediately fell apart. Kestrel reached the boss first.

On the way in, he crossed inside Karmabeast's distance and became one of the two closest players. A Gravebolt selected him and killed him before he could reach Velmorath. Meno's Last Word had already revived him once this combat, so nothing happened. Arayu reached Velmorath from the opposite side and became solid again, but her path briefly pushed Karmabeast out of the two closest positions. The next Gravebolt struck her, killing the player carrying the Orb before she could get back out.

The ranged formation collapsed with her. Several unattended ice shards slammed into the road one after another. The raid-wide damage killed BrineSaint, while Karmabeast survived the first impact only to die to the Gravebolt that followed. Meno stayed in melee and tried to Lifesteal through the damage, but ghostly fire still burned across his back with nobody left to Taunt it away. Another shard hit the road, and Meno died with the rest of them.

WELP THE ORB CANNOT CARRY BAD GEOMETRY KESTREL USED BOTH LIVES IN THIRTY SECONDS THIS BOSS HAS HOMEWORK They resurrected outside the raid.

"Noooo, my gold," Karmabeast complained.

"Arayu, I wanted to buy you a nice staff. Would you settle for a wand?"

"I don't want your wand," Arayu said without looking at him. LMAOOOO bro is getting annihilated Karmabeast double wipe he needs to just give up someone call Thorn [Death Penalty (Level 100): 50, 000g] That was brutal. At Level 70+, the penalty had only been 10, 000g. Meno really hoped they were not about to wipe enough times to bankrupt him. The 10 million bounty was still active too. Someone could try to snipe him after a wipe, although that seemed unlikely now that he was so much higher level.

With Karmabeast beside him, they could probably delete anyone who tried. Still, Meno needed to pay attention. The first two bosses remained dead, which made the walk back merely annoying instead of tragic. Kestrel spent the return trip rebuilding the plan around what they had learned.

"Bolts follow proximity to the boss, not Threat. Nobody crosses inside the front pair. Ghost returns need coordination. Icefall stays priority." The second attempt began with actual positions. Kestrel and Arayu stayed much farther down the road, giving Karmabeast enough room to move without accidentally putting either ranged player closer to Velmorath than him. BrineSaint worked from the right flank, while Meno opened with Mush again and planted himself at Velmorath's feet.

The Gravebolts started immediately, with Meno taking the first and Karmabeast handling the second. When ghostly fire appeared, BrineSaint advanced from the right to Taunt while Karmabeast shifted across to protect his approach. Velmorath turned toward BrineSaint, and the next Gravebolt selected him during the exchange. Karmabeast cut across its path and deflected the projectile, but the Gravebolt still burst against his face for half damage. Meno never stopped attacking.

Threat returned to him, BrineSaint withdrew along the same flank, and Karmabeast reclaimed the second-nearest position.

"Brine, take. Karma, screen. Meno, hold. Brine, back." The exchange worked. Everything else remained messy. This time, they handled the mourner ghosts instead of letting them reach Velmorath and heal her. Whenever frost marks appeared, Karmabeast cleared his without giving up the inside position, while Kestrel, Arayu, and BrineSaint ran through nearby ghosts to remove their own. Every successful contact erased a mourner, but every trip away from formation cost time.

The next ice wave descended while Kestrel was still returning from a ghost. His prism burst remained better than anything else in the group at clearing clustered shards, but by the time he reached his firing position, the formation overhead had already spread apart. Arayu handled more of the isolated shards herself by launching fireballs overhead and zapping them with lightning magic.

The fireballs burst apart and sprayed arcs of electricity across the surrounding ice shards, while BrineSaint's thrown weapon cracked another cluster but left several pieces intact.

"Arayu, low left. Brine, finish right. Leave that ghost. Sky first." Velmorath kept healing from whichever mourners slipped through, and Karmabeast had to help with cleanup whenever a falling shard escaped the ranged players. He had the mobility to save those mistakes, but every rescue disrupted the Gravebolt formation. They reached the next ghost transformation in much better shape. Kestrel cleared the lowest ice before it started and called Karmabeast back beside Meno.

BrineSaint, Kestrel, and Arayu turned translucent again. This time, they had an order.

"Inside pair, hold. Brine first. Touch and clear. Me next. Arayu, follow." BrineSaint approached behind Meno along the outside of Velmorath's right arm, touched the boss, and became solid again. As he withdrew through the same flank, Meno stepped right back in front to reclaim the inside position. Kestrel followed, with Arayu coming last. Meno and Karmabeast stayed closer to Velmorath than any of them, keeping both Gravebolts locked onto the intended pair until all three returned safely.

Then the next frost marks appeared. Apparently, the ghost transformation and the mourner add mechanic were completely separate. This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. Their marks had not disappeared. The ranged players had to spread outward again just as another ice wave began descending, immediately undoing the clean return they had worked so hard to establish. By the second transformation, the workload finally overwhelmed them.

Kestrel got caught between finishing a low shard and reaching a mourner before his frost mark expired. Arayu switched targets to cover the shard he abandoned, BrineSaint missed part of his return route, and Karmabeast had to choose between screening Brine's next Taunt and reaching the opposite side of the sky. Meno spotted another shard falling untouched and broke away from Velmorath to help. The instant nobody remained in melee range, Velmorath changed.

Her ghostly body flared, and the next pair of Gravebolts hit much harder. The shard landed anyway, killing Arayu first. With the Orb wielder dead, there was no recovery, and the rest of the group followed shortly afterward. [Death Penalty (Level 100): 50, 000g] MELEE CHECK THE BOSS SAID COME BACK HERE TANK CANT LEAVE BOSS ROOKIE MISTAKE STOP HELPING PBG On the walk back, Kestrel cut an entire part of the strategy.

"We are servicing too many targets. Leave the healing ghosts. Purge your marks with skills and focus on the falling shards. Meno never leaves melee." The third pull became calmer the moment they stopped pretending every mourner needed to be stopped. Kestrel focused on the sky. Arayu finished isolated shards, BrineSaint repeated the Taunt exchange whenever ghostly fire appeared, and Karmabeast protected BrineSaint while covering whatever gap opened overhead.

Marked players cleared their frost whenever a mourner crossed a useful route and used their own purge skills when none were nearby. Nobody chased ghosts just to stop Velmorath from healing. She repeatedly returned to full HP. Meno did not care. His Chain kept climbing.

"Ignore the health bar. Hold positions. Marks only." The difference was immediate. Everyone had less to do because they had finally accepted that one mechanic could simply go through. Before each 30-second transformation, Kestrel prepared the arena. He used his prism burst early on the lowest shards, sent Arayu after anything stranded outside the main cluster, and called Karmabeast back before Velmorath selected the two nearest players.

When the outer three transformed, they used the same return order every time: BrineSaint first, Kestrel second, Arayu last. If frost marks and ghostly fire appeared close together, BrineSaint waited for the marks to select their targets before Taunting. That kept Meno from picking up another job in the middle of the exchange.

"Marks first. Take. Inside pair locked. Return in order." Meno activated Mush every time it returned and never gave up his position. Velmorath healed through the burst afterward, but his Chain kept climbing, which meant the strategy would eventually work even if her HP bar refused to cooperate. Then Arayu showed them why frost marks still had to be cleared. A bad ice wave left her without a purge and too far from the nearest mourner to reach it without abandoning a falling shard. She chose the shard.

When the mark expired, a small hit landed first before the instant-kill effect triggered. Conqueror stopped the execution and left her at 1 HP. For a few seconds, that looked exploitable. Then another frost mark appeared while Arayu was still at 1 HP. She immediately ran for the nearest mourner, but it was too far away and the timer expired before she reached it. The initial damage killed her outright, so Conqueror never even got the chance to catch the execution.

Meno's Last Word could not resurrect its own wielder. conqueror saved the execute not the chip ONE HP TECH REJECTED MARKS ARE NOT OPTIONAL mage dispel cd too long crownmind is broken with its short cd Arayu needs to stay near mourners Losing Arayu cost them both a sky-clearing player and their resurrection protection. Kestrel stretched his prism volleys too far trying to cover her side, while Karmabeast stayed airborne longer to clean up the shards that slipped through.

During the next Taunt exchange, BrineSaint took a Gravebolt with Karmabeast out of position to screen it and died. Nobody remained to Taunt the ghostly fire away from Meno, and the attempt collapsed from there. The third wipe brought Meno and Karmabeast's total death penalty to 150, 000 gold each, while the others got off cheaper thanks to their lower levels. Kestrel settled the discussion during the walk back.

"Ghost healing is optional. Marks aren't. No purge means move immediately. Call the gap. Someone else covers your shard." The fourth pull started with positioning before anyone touched Velmorath.

"Meno, center. Karma, inside. Brine, right. Arayu, road. Keep the return lane clear." Meno took the space near Velmorath's feet where he could keep swinging without chasing every turn. Karmabeast settled just outside him, close enough to remain the second Gravebolt target but with enough room to angle each projectile away before it reached him.

BrineSaint waited on the right flank, while Kestrel and Arayu stayed well down the road, farther from Velmorath than Karmabeast would travel during his planned airborne work. Their ghost-return lane ran past the outside of Velmorath's hanging arm instead of cutting between her feet. The pale mourners began appearing around the clearing. Nobody cared. Meno attacked and activated Mush immediately. His enlarged glaive tore through Velmorath at full speed while he held his position in melee.

Karmabeast deliberately kept his own Mush unused and focused on the second Gravebolt. One black projectile hit Meno, while Karmabeast caught the other against his angled blade and activated Venom Cloak, letting the dark energy burst past his shoulder without dealing damage. Meno's bolt applied the healing penalty again. He left it active until his HP actually needed recovery, then used Crownmind to open a clean Lifesteal window, knowing the next Gravebolt could simply reapply it.

Above them, the first ice wave formed.

"Low cluster mine. Arayu, far right. Brine, left fragment." Kestrel sent arrows spiraling around the lowest group. Prisms formed along their paths and exploded into a spreading volley that shredded most of the cluster, while Arayu burned down the isolated shard on the far right. BrineSaint's glowing weapon smashed through the left fragment and cracked it apart. Five seconds into the fight, ghostly fire climbed across Meno's back.

"Fire. Brine, take. Karma, cover." BrineSaint advanced from the right while Karmabeast shifted across his approach. Taunt cleared the fire from Meno immediately, turning Velmorath toward Brine while Meno stayed planted at her feet. A Gravebolt selected Brine during the exchange, but Karmabeast deflected it before impact. Brine started backing out as Meno kept attacking until Threat returned to him.

"Meno has it. Brine, clear." During the retreat, Brine threw his glowing weapon into a damaged ice shard, and Arayu finished it with one fireball. The same rotation had handled both jobs. Then the frost marks appeared, spreading white across Karmabeast, Kestrel, Brine, and Arayu. Karmabeast cleared his and stayed inside. Kestrel removed his while lining up another arrow orbit, but Arayu had no purge ready.

"Arayu, mark out. I have your sky. Brine, stay right." She moved immediately. A mourner approached from her side of the road, and Arayu ran through it to disperse the ghost and clear her frost before returning along the same outer route. A replacement mourner appeared farther away while several others reached Velmorath, surging the boss's HP upward until Meno's visible progress disappeared. Nobody changed assignments. Meno kept swinging. The next ice wave spread too widely for one prism burst.

Karmabeast redirected his Gravebolt, teleported toward the lowest isolated shard, and cut into it while Kestrel erased the central cluster. BrineSaint started advancing for the next fire exchange.

"Karma, single high. Brine, advance. Return now. Take." The instant his shard was handled, Karmabeast shot back toward the boss and intercepted the Gravebolt before it could reach Brine. BrineSaint Taunted, clearing the fire from Meno, and everyone returned to their positions. As the 30-second transformation approached, Kestrel spent his next prism burst early on the lowest ice instead of waiting for a denser cluster.

Arayu overloaded a fireball, making it swell in size mid-flight as it streaked toward a lone shard over the right flank, while Karmabeast abandoned another airborne target to return beside Meno. Then BrineSaint, Kestrel, and Arayu turned translucent.

"Inside pair, hold. Brine first. Taunt on touch." BrineSaint followed the established lane and brushed against Velmorath's outer arm. His body became solid, then withdrew along the right side. Kestrel followed. The moment he returned to flesh, he turned his bow upward and started another attack while still moving back toward the road. Arayu came last. Throughout the entire return, Meno and Karmabeast stayed farther inward than all three ghosted players, keeping both Gravebolts locked onto them.

The sequence cost some ranged uptime, but clearing the ice early had bought enough room to absorb it. The next rotation tested the plan from another angle. Kestrel received a frost mark and had to leave his firing position for a mourner. He sent his arrows into orbit before moving, then detonated the prisms while running, clearing the main ice cluster without needing to stay underneath it.

"Arayu, low pair. Karma, opposite high. Brine, next fire is yours." Arayu took the low shards Kestrel would normally finish. Karmabeast handled one over the opposite edge, returned in time to deflect his Gravebolt and refresh his movement, then used Venom Step to move back out for the final straggler. He kept Mush unused. Activating Fatebreaker while the Divine skill was on cooldown would make its own cooldown inherit the longer recharge.

By leaving Mush available, Karmabeast could keep recycling the shorter movement and defensive tools instead. Kestrel cleared his mark and returned before the temporary assignments turned into permanent confusion. The minutes began stacking, and the fight settled into a repeatable pattern. Gravebolts crossed the inner space toward Meno and Karmabeast while ice formed overhead and shattered under prisms, fireballs, holy throws, and short bursts of rogue movement.

Ghostly fire appeared on Meno and disappeared whenever BrineSaint completed the Taunt exchange. Pale mourners continued walking into Velmorath, and the boss kept healing. Meno kept hitting. Around 3 minutes in, his Chain had climbed into the thirty-thousands without a single reset. Mush returned.

"Burn now. Positions unchanged. Leave the mourners." Meno activated Mush exactly where he stood. His body and weapon tripled in size, and the 6-second burst carved a visible section out of Velmorath's HP. Several mourners reached her afterward, and green healing swallowed most of the damage. The health bar made their effort look pointless, but the Chain counter told a different story. That was the clearest proof yet that the strategy would eventually work.

At 6 minutes, an ice wave left two damaged shards falling on opposite sides of the clearing. Kestrel committed his prism volley to the larger cluster, Arayu burned down the closer shard, and Karmabeast went for the distant one. The last fragment survived his first attack, delaying his return into Brine's next Taunt window.

"Brine, hold one beat. Meno, hold center. Karma, back." Ghostly fire kept burning across Meno's shoulders, overwhelming his Lifesteal, but he held his position in melee while Karmabeast finished the shard and shot back toward the boss. Only then did BrineSaint advance. Karmabeast covered his approach, and Taunt cleared the fire from Meno. Mush returned around the same time with Chain already in the high-fifty-thousands.

The next Divine burst cut much deeper into Velmorath's HP, although she still recovered whenever enough mourners reached her. Nobody changed the strategy. Later, one exchange finally went wrong. Karmabeast was still finishing another ice shard when BrineSaint advanced, and the Gravebolt reached Brine before Karmabeast could return. BrineSaint died on the right flank. Meno's Last Word flashed from the Orb in Arayu's hands and restored him where he fell with everything recovered.

His extra life was gone, but the ghostly fire remained on Meno because the Taunt had never happened.

"Brine, Taunt now. Karma, screen the return. Arayu, stay out." BrineSaint recovered fast enough to finish the exchange while Karmabeast intercepted the next Gravebolt. Meno never stopped attacking, and the formation survived. Another missed interception on Brine would not end as cleanly. At 9 minutes, the ghost transformation arrived during a badly spread ice wave. Kestrel broke the lowest cluster before turning translucent, but three shards remained on separate paths.

BrineSaint returned first, touched Velmorath, became solid, and retreated through the same lane. Kestrel reached her second and started another arrow orbit while backing away. Arayu came last with a frost mark already spreading across her translucent body. Touching Velmorath restored her physical form, but the mark remained.

"Arayu, clear your mark. Road-side mourner. Karma, inside. Brine, throw high left." Arayu moved out along the outer lane while BrineSaint's glowing weapon exploded through the high-left shard, buying Kestrel enough time to finish the others. She reached the mourner, dispersed it, and cleared her mark without entering the Gravebolt zone. Meno activated Mush during the crossing and kept swinging through the entire burst.

With Chain this high, every hit mattered, and a miss was unacceptable while the rest of the group worked to protect his position. By 12 minutes, the pattern no longer looked chaotic. It still was not easy. BrineSaint advanced whenever ghostly fire appeared and Karmabeast screened him. Kestrel carved openings through the descending ice while Arayu moved for frost marks before they became emergencies. Meno remained at the center of it all with Chain approaching 120, 000. Mush returned again.

This time, the burst drove Velmorath low enough that one mourner restored 10% HP without bringing her back to full. Two more reached her afterward, and even that was not enough.

"Healing is falling behind. No changes. Do not chase ghosts." Several more mourners eventually dragged Velmorath's HP higher, but Meno immediately started cutting it back down. The balance had changed. For the first 12 minutes, the party had been buying Meno time while Velmorath erased almost everything he did. Now his damage was finally starting to outpace the healing. That success created its own temptation.

Kestrel's next firing angle brought him close enough to dump extra shots into Velmorath, while Karmabeast had a clean melee opening at the same time. Neither took it. Another ice wave was already forming, BrineSaint's next Taunt was approaching, and Arayu needed to leave for another mourner.

"No boss damage. Clear the sky. Karma, protect Brine." Karmabeast redirected another Gravebolt instead of swinging at Velmorath, then teleported upward to finish the shard Arayu could not cover. Meno rotated only enough to keep Velmorath within glaive range as she turned. Nothing else changed, and that discipline kept the attempt alive. As 15 minutes approached, Velmorath was finally losing large sections of HP between mourner arrivals, but the next ghost transformation was lining up with Meno's Divine burst.

Kestrel prepared early. He spent a less efficient prism detonation clearing the lowest ice instead of waiting for the perfect cluster, while Arayu went after the remaining outside shard. Karmabeast returned to the boss early rather than greed another airborne kill, and BrineSaint moved into position with his resurrection already spent.

"Ghosts next. Clear low ice. Inside pair locked. Brine leads. Same order." Meno's Chain approached 150, 000, and Velmorath's HP was already low enough that nobody cared about squeezing in extra damage before the rotation. Mush became available. Meno activated it immediately without leaving his position. His body expanded and Quadrillionator became enormous in his hands just as BrineSaint, Kestrel, and Arayu turned into ghosts.

BrineSaint moved first, touching Velmorath's outer arm, becoming solid, and Taunting away the fresh ghostly fire. Karmabeast intercepted the Gravebolt aimed at him during the retreat. Kestrel touched second, and before he had even made it back down the road, arrows were already rising around the next falling ice wave. Arayu touched last, with a frost mark appearing before she finished withdrawing.

"Arayu, mark first. I have the cluster. Karma, single right. Brine, stay outside." Arayu diverted toward a mourner while Kestrel handled the main ice cluster himself. Karmabeast made one short airborne trip to the right shard, destroyed it, and returned before the next Taunt exchange. Meno kept swinging through all of it. The mourners were still reaching Velmorath. One restored 10% HP, but Meno removed it before the next ghost could cross the remaining distance.

Another heal landed, and the next few Massive attacks erased that too. Above 150, 000 Chain, the fight stopped being a healing race. It became a countdown. Kestrel kept shooting the sky instead of watching the boss's HP. Arayu returned with her mark cleared, BrineSaint prepared for another fire exchange, and Karmabeast caught the next Gravebolt.

"Hold positions. Finish." Meno's glaive drove Velmorath below 10%. He stepped in and kicked. Titan triggered, killing Velmorath before the next mourner could reach her. [Raid Boss Defeated: Velmorath, Mourner of the Frozen Road]"YES!" BrineSaint shouted, making everyone jump at the unexpected outburst.

CONQUEROR OP LETS GOOO THEY DID IT SMOOTH SWAPS BOSS HEALING WAS CRAZY SWING MASTER CHEESE AGAIN IGNORE MECHANIC PROFIT NERF NERF NERF SHOW LOOT Every ghost around the clearing dispersed at once, while the remaining ice overhead cracked into harmless white fragments and vanished into the falling snow.

"Man, these bosses take so long. Can we go back to deleting them in a second? I prefer a fast finish," Karmabeast said.

"Who would have guessed," Arayu said, sneering at him.

"Good job, team," Kestrel said.

"Master Loot. Give me everything, then I'll distribute it."

"Let's not do that," Meno said. All five were alive, and Meno's Chain had never broken during the successful attempt. Neither he nor Karmabeast gained a level. The others had done much better. BrineSaint jumped from Level 83 to Level 88, Kestrel reached Level 88, and Arayu climbed from Level 80 to Level 85, each gaining the maximum XP possible. Loot beams began rising from Velmorath's corpse through the snow. BrineSaint looted a pair of Cloth gloves and immediately handed them to Arayu without being asked.

Her eyes lit up as she equipped them, then crouched down and stared at her hands like she had just dug up an old coin worth a million credits. [Legendary V | Velmorath's Convergence] Type: Cloth Gloves Defense: Low Durability: Indestructible Cloth Bonus: +10% Crowd Control Recovery Speed [1] When a damaging Spell Projectile hits, refund 50% of its Mana Cost if another Spell Projectile was cast after it was launched but before impact. [2] Spell Projectiles travel at half speed.

[3] If a Spell Projectile collides with another Spell Projectile midflight, the first projectile absorbs the second and deals triple Damage. [4] Every third Spell cast is Instant. Karmabeast looted a Plate chest that was better than anything Meno owned, but completely wrong for his build. He shared the item with the group, looked it over one more time, then dropped it into his inventory.

[Legendary V | Velmorath's Redoubt] Type: Plate Chest Defense: Very High Durability: Indestructible Plate Penalty: -5% Action Speed [1] Boost two of your lowest Defense modifiers on equipped armor to Very High. [2] On Block, restore 5% Maximum HP or Maximum Mana, whichever is at the lower percentage. [3] Gain +10% Damage Reduction for every +10% Maximum HP granted by equipped items. [4] When your Block is ineffective, become Immobilized for 3 seconds and gain Absorption equal to 33% Maximum HP.

[5] Infuse 10, 000 Gold into this item to add Empowered to its Durability for 24 hours, increasing its Defense by 10%. BrineSaint wandered over and stopped beside him. Karmabeast glanced sideways, then looked away when BrineSaint said nothing. BrineSaint stayed there. A few seconds passed before Karmabeast sighed.

"Fine. But if you get anything Rogue, I want it."

"That is a given. Thank you," BrineSaint said. Kestrel looted an insane healer ring. Nobody wanted it, so he put it away, already making back some of his Mythic I investment. [Legendary V | Velmorath's Soteria] Type: Ring [1] Healing done to Friendly targets within Melee Range of you is tripled. [2] When a Healing Spell affects a Friendly target at Medium Range or farther, it also dispels 1 Debuff. [3] While at least 1 Hostile is within Melee Range, your Mana Regeneration is doubled.

Three bosses had remained when they entered. Now there were two.