Chương 120: Titan’s Gambit

[Wave 4: Defeat the Swing Master] The Swing Master gains Chain whenever it lands a hit. The Swing Master loses all Chain when one of its attacks misses. The fourth wave began with a human-sized knight standing at the center of the arena. Black plate covered its entire body, with spikes rising from its shoulders, elbows, knees, and the crown of its closed helmet. Even still, it looked like a weapon. In one hand, it carried a narrow spire sword with a blade almost three times as long as Vervenzal's Verdict.

Meno recognized the sword immediately. The knight stood with its weight slightly forward and the sword held behind one hip, already prepared to turn the first jump into an attack. It was not merely using Swing Master. It was like Meno before Infernal.

"You got to be kidding me," Thorn said.

"That looks exactly like my Uncommon II Spire Sword," Meno said as the knight bent its knees.

"Damage should be low, but if we can't stop it ramping, we're dead."

"Your key. You're the final boss. Makes sense." The Swing Master jumped. A dark shield formed around it in midair, covering the armored body with a barrier equal to 20% of its maximum HP. It kicked with both legs through False Wings and launched directly at Meno, the spire sword beginning its first attack before the boss had crossed half the arena. Meno planted Dominion beneath himself and used Stun into the approach. The cone struck cleanly.

[Status Immune] The Swing Master flew through the disabling effect without slowing and began attacking at three strikes per second. Meno raised the shield. The first strike hit the center of the guard. The second scraped along the upper edge, and the third reversed before the shield had fully recovered. Meno blocked the entire opening sequence without losing HP, but each impact produced the same faint metallic pulse around the boss. Blocking stopped the damage for now, but contact still counted as a successful hit.

Compound Swing was building. Thorn stored a Detonation with Pump then used Pursuit to get beneath the boss's aerial path. The transformed projectile hit the jump shield and charged him into range, where the double-strike effect helped him reach 66 Chain fast enough to test one normal Chain Detonation. Black fire swallowed the Swing Master. The jump shield barely moved. The Detonation removed only about 5% of it before the boss landed, making the damaged shield disappear immediately.

Then it jumped again and gained a completely fresh 20% shield. PBG final boss THAT IS HIS OLD BUILD if it has Chain Madness they are dead ofc AI revenge INFINITE JUMP SHIELDS"We are on a timer," Meno said.

"Store Detonations for a one-shot."

"Yes. Normal Chain Detonation is useless. That shield effect is broken." The boss crossed above Meno, and he waited until its armored body entered the center of Dominion. At 100 Anchor, he spent the full bar on Shockwave. The medium-range burst struck the Swing Master in midair. It should have knocked an airborne target down. Instead, the boss flew through the wave without losing height, changing direction, or interrupting its attack sequence.

The current jump shield took minor damage, but the spire sword continued hammering against Meno's guard as if Shockwave had been nothing more than wind. Spending the Anchor left Meno without the passive 50% damage reduction or the 100% damage bonus. Inside Dominion, rebuilding took 2 stationary seconds, and the Swing Master attacked six times during that interval. Meno blocked the first two. The third attack curled around the outside of his shield and scraped across his plate.

He caught the fourth and fifth, but the sixth reached his opposite shoulder before he could turn, leaving him at 96% HP after the two small hits. It was too damn fast. The damage itself meant little. The hits did not. Meno tried stepping underneath the boss's descent, but the spire sword's reach allowed it to attack before passing over him. He waited until the final instant to turn, only for a one-legged False Wings correction to change the boss's direction with him.

He moved inside Dominion, offered only the far edge of the shield, and attempted to redirect the weapon rather than stopping it directly. Every attempt ended with metal touching metal. The Swing Master did not need to injure him. It only needed the attack to connect with either Meno or his shield. [Compound Swing | Chain: 100 | Damage: +1000%] The notification appeared while the boss rebounded off another midair correction. Meno stopped trying to make the boss miss completely.

He remained inside Dominion, accepted its attention, and limited himself to small rotational adjustments that kept the shield between his body and the spire sword. Thorn had not reached the same conclusion about movement. The Swing Master crossed the arena with a double-legged launch, and Thorn copied it. Both armored figures shot above Meno from opposite directions, crossed paths, corrected, and immediately flew apart again. The boss attacked through the entire movement, and Thorn could not.

His first oversized correction carried him beyond his sword's reach. His next sword attack missed, breaking the Chain he had been preparing to spend on Madness Infernal. He tried another broad launch to recover, overshot the boss's landing point, and lost a second storage attempt when his next attack cut through empty air. From the ground, they resembled two furious insects above Meno's head.

angry fly pvp the boss has aim assist PBG target dummy thorn can't hit it Meno knew the movements because they belonged to him. A double-legged launch meant commitment. Once both kicks fired, the boss intended to cross Meno's entire position unless another effect changed its path. A late one-legged kick meant it wanted to arrest momentum and remain on the same side. When the inner leg corrected first, the boss usually intended to turn behind the shield.

"Left leg," Meno called as the Swing Master approached.

"Staying," Thorn answered. The boss kicked late, stopped above Meno's left shoulder, and attacked from the same side. Thorn used only one small correction, reached its destination without copying the full movement, and landed several clean attacks against the jump shield.

"Both legs."

"Crossing." The boss launched over Meno. He began turning before it passed, and Thorn cut beneath the flight path with a controlled one-legged False Wings adjustment instead of another uncontrolled burst. The boss still connected with the shield, but Thorn no longer lost the target every time it moved. [Compound Swing | Chain: 200 | Damage: +2000%] The spire sword descended from above Meno's guard, then reversed halfway through the swing.

Meno caught the first angle, but the returning blade reached his side and removed 4%, leaving him near 92% HP. Thorn continued cycling Pump Infernal whenever its 9-second cooldown returned. Each activation was spent on Madness Infernal to store another Detonation. Whenever that emptied Chain outside an existing Break Infernal window, he landed a harmless attack for Chain and intentionally broke it before rebuilding. He also began storing Detonations through natural attack sequences. Those were harder.

Thorn had to remain attached long enough to reach 66 Chain, spend it on Madness Infernal, restart the resource, and leave before the boss's next movement dragged him into a miss. Meno's callouts made the attempts possible. The boss launched with both legs, and Meno called the crossing before its body moved. Thorn cut toward the destination, not the current position. When the boss used its inner leg, Meno turned the shield while warning Thorn that it intended to change sides.

[Compound Swing | Chain: 300 | Damage: +3000%] The boss passed over Meno, arrested its momentum with one leg, and attacked from the left. Before he could finish bringing the shield across, it kicked with the inner leg and curved behind him. Two attacks landed during the same aerial pass. Each removed 6%, dropping Meno to 80% HP. He activated Regen, restoring 50% of his maximum HP over 1 second and returning to 100% HP. By 1: 40, Thorn had accumulated around 14 stored Detonations.

More importantly, he could now follow the boss without automatically ruining every natural Chain attempt. If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. The first Shockwave had proved the trade was worthless. Any damage dealt to the current shield vanished the moment the boss landed and jumped again, while spending the Anchor forced Meno to endure six attacks before rebuilding full protection. At 100 Chain, that exchange had been irritating.

At 300 Chain, it was already dangerous. Meno lowered the sword and kept the shield raised. The boss had no interest in attacking Thorn, probably because Thorn was fast enough to dodge with the Action Speed buff and break its Chain. Meno, meanwhile, was a glorified training dummy. Thorn used Pursuit during the grounded interval, charged beside the boss, and tried to punish it with a full maximum-speed sequence. The Swing Master jumped before he could complete it. Thorn adjusted again.

He stopped treating every opening as permission to attack until something failed. He entered through short Pursuit or Break Infernal windows, landed only the strikes he could place precisely, converted full Chain into stored Madness Infernal when possible, and disengaged before an uncertain follow-up erased the attempt. [Compound Swing | Chain: 400 | Damage: +4000%] The boss used a short correction above Meno's right shoulder.

The spire sword reached around the edge of his guard and removed 8%, leaving him near 92% HP. At 2: 14, the next threshold appeared. [Compound Swing | Chain: 500 | Damage: +5000%] The Swing Master used a broad double-legged launch to cross Meno's shield. He turned early and blocked the first sequence, but the boss alternated sides before his slowed guard could finish traveling. Two attacks reached him, dropping Meno to 72% HP. one hit deletes Thorn now PBG is tanking a nuke blender is this even possible?

scam trial Meno activated Regen as soon as it returned, restoring himself to 100% HP. The ability was no longer correcting incidental damage. Every use now purchased another section of the fight. Thorn stayed entirely outside the boss's attack line. He waited for Pursuit, entered beside the Swing Master, landed only the attacks he could guarantee, stored another Detonation, and left before the spire sword could catch him during a correction. His bank reached 22.

"Send it," Meno said.

"No."

"Twenty-two is enough damage."

"Trust my math," Thorn said.

"It is not."

"You can do math?"

"Can count your braincells on one hand." At 22 stacks, Release would last 2. 2 seconds. The bank was already powerful, but every jump supplied another barrier equal to 20% of the boss's maxHP, and they still had no reliable estimate for its underlying mitigation. At 2: 48, Meno activated Sacrificial Dominion and used the 50% Movement Speed bonus to test every remaining way of forcing the boss to miss.

He stepped across its approach, reversed beneath its descent, rotated late, and briefly left the center of Dominion to change the angle more sharply. None of it worked. The spire sword could begin attacking before Meno finished changing direction, and False Wings allowed the Swing Master to correct after he committed. Even when the weapon struck only the outside rim of the shield, the faint metallic pulse confirmed that Compound Swing had increased again.

[Compound Swing | Chain: 600 | Damage: +6000%] One attack passed Meno's guard and removed 12%, leaving him near 88% HP. Thorn stayed attached longer, allowing Vervenzal's Verdict to strike repeatedly as he built Chain without spending the stored Detonations. The boss did not look at him. The final Release would be different. If it failed to kill the boss, the accumulated damage might pull the Swing Master away from Meno, forcing Thorn to take the next attacks in Meno's much lighter build.

He would have to dodge perfectly. There would be no room for mistakes. [Compound Swing | Chain: 700 | Damage: +7000%] Another attack leaked around Meno's shield and removed 14%, dropping him to 74% HP. Thorn reached around 30 stored Detonations.

"Thirty," Meno said.

"Use them."

"Thirty works if it stops jumping. Does that look like it plans to stop?" Thirty stored bursts meant 105 ordinary Chain Detonations, but the Release itself would still take 3 seconds, with each burst landing 0. 1 seconds apart. At the Swing Master's current jump cadence, that was enough time for several fresh 20% shields. The barriers alone could consume most of the bank before boss mitigation and actual HP entered the calculation. They stopped trying to reset Compound Swing.

There was no control solution, no missed attack to force, and no hidden interaction waiting to save them. Their only remaining strategy was to survive the scaling long enough for Thorn's bank to become unreasonable. By 3: 54, the split finally looked controlled. Meno called the launching leg before each major movement. Thorn answered with either "crossing" or "staying," confirming the same read, then used short False Wings corrections to remain in the boss's aerial lane without copying its wild acceleration.

"Inner leg."

"Crossing behind." Meno turned before the Swing Master changed direction. Thorn passed beneath the boss, reached the new side, and stored another detonation without missing.

"Both legs."

"Full crossing." The boss launched over Dominion. Thorn saved his double-legged kick for the genuine gap, followed with one small correction, and remained within attack range. Their execution had improved, but the timer had improved faster. [Compound Swing | Chain: 800 | Damage: +8000%] The Swing Master rebounded above Meno and attacked from his left. Meno blocked the first hit, but the boss used one leg to reverse across his shoulders before the shield finished moving.

Two attacks landed for 16% each, dropping Meno to 42% HP. Regen returned, raising him to 92% HP. Thorn had called the crossing correctly, and Meno had blocked in the correct direction. The second angle had still reached him. Neither of them commented on it. Thorn's bank reached 34 stored Detonations as the boss continued attacking. [Compound Swing | Chain: 900 | Damage: +9000%] One spire-sword strike reached Meno's ribs leaving him at 74% HP.

Thorn stored another natural Detonation, disengaged, and waited for the next controlled entry. By the time his bank reached 38, Meno's patience had become indistinguishable from panic.

"Release."

"No."

"Thirty-eight is enough."

"At this cadence, it makes around four shields during the channel." The 38-stack bank represented 163 normal-Detonations. On paper, the number sounded absurd. In practice, a 3. 8-second Release could encounter four new jump shields, consuming around 80% of boss-maximum-HP raw damage before the stored bursts reached actual health. The longer the Release window got, the worse the jump shield problem got, in a way Meno had no hope of figuring out mid-fight.

Hopefully Thorn was not messing around about his ability to math it out. Thorn kept banking Detonations as the fight grew rougher. Meno swayed under the shield's weight, batting away most attacks like he was using a fly swatter against a knife storm. [Compound Swing | Chain: 1000 | Damage: +10000%] An unblocked attack dropped Meno to 54% HP. He activated Regen and returned to 100% HP. Thorn's bank had reached 42.

"Release it," Meno said through gritted teeth, forced from one block into the next with no room to breathe.

"Soon."

"Now!"

"Chill." Meno saw a shrinking number of survivable mistakes. Thorn saw one chance to release a bank that had taken most of the fight to build. If he spent it early and the boss survived, there would be no second attempt. By 5: 34, Meno was running out of calm. Every missed block looked like the start of a death sequence, and every action became a compromise: turn, brace, correct, preserve Dominion, keep Anchor active.

[Compound Swing | Chain: 1100 | Damage: +11000%] The Swing Master zipped across the Dominion area twice in separate aerial passes. Meno caught most of each sequence on the shield, but one strike reached his hip during the first crossing, and another slipped over his shoulder during the second. Each removed 22%, dropping him to 56% HP. Regen was still cooling down. Thorn had learned the boss's movement well enough that he rarely missed once attached. Those natural storage attempts had become essential.

Pump Infernal alone was not building the bank quickly enough to make continued waiting safe. Thorn used Pursuit to charge beneath a landing point Meno had called in advance, stored another Detonation, landed one extra hit, and manually broke Chain. The resulting Break Infernal window carried him out of the next crossing. [Compound Swing | Chain: 1200 | Damage: +12000%] The next unblocked hit removed 24%, dropping Meno to 32% HP. Regen returned and restored him to 82% HP.

Thorn's bank reached around 49 stored Detonations. Viewers: 12, 011, 382"Maybe one more Regen," Meno said.

"Then I am going to die." Thorn watched the Swing Master cross above the shield.

"Start using Diamond."

"It is attacking too fast, and Diamond only eats one hit," Meno said.

"Your skill is trash. It burns all my Anchor, then I need two sec before full reduction comes back." At 6: 41, Meno activated Sacrificial Dominion for the final defensive stretch. The increased Movement Speed sharpened his shield corrections enough to block most of the next hundred attacks. The Swing Master attacked from the right, corrected above his helmet, and crossed left. Meno tracked the spire sword rather than the body, moving the shield only as far as each angle required.

A strike slipped through when Compound Swing sat near 1, 240 Chain and left Meno at 58% HP. Two unblocked attacks in a row would kill him. [Compound Swing | Chain: 1300 | Damage: +13000%] Thorn had reached 52 stored Detonations.

"DO IT!"

"I know." Thorn activated Release. VEYRATH ABOUT TO BLOW BOOM BOOM BOOM RELEASE EVERYTHING THIS HAS TO KILL The first stored Detonation erupted. At 52 stacks, each burst was worth almost 6 normal Chain Detonations. Altogether, the Release equaled about 296 normal Detonations across 5. 2 seconds. The opening bursts tore into the Swing Master's jump shield.

Black force hammered the barrier until it shattered around the airborne boss, turning the entire medium-range area into a pulsing black cloud that flashed every 0. 1 seconds and made blocking a nightmare. The Swing Master landed, shed whatever remained of the broken shield, and jumped again with a fresh 20% barrier. When the boss made short jumps, Thorn used one-legged corrections and stayed beside it.

When it crossed Dominion, he committed to one double-legged launch, then killed his momentum with a single precise kick instead of adding the unnecessary third correction that had ruined so many earlier attempts. The stored bursts continued whether Thorn swung or not. The next barrier cracked under the explosions. The Swing Master landed and jumped again.

"Fresh shield."

"Thirty-nine left." Another 20% barrier formed and vanished beneath the continuous barrage. The boss's actual HP finally began moving, crossing 80%, then 60%, while Release kept chewing through fresh shields. The Swing Master remained focused on Meno, attacking relentlessly through the explosions. One strike reached around his block and dropped him to 29% HP. Regen had just returned.

He activated it immediately and rose to 79% HP, but a second hit reached him during the next aerial correction and pushed him back to 53% HP.

"Health at forty," Meno said.

"Twenty-one remaining." The Swing Master jumped again. Another shield formed. Thorn corrected with one leg, refusing the temptation to attack.

"New shield."

"Seventeen." Meno blocked. The spire sword struck the center of the guard, reversed, and hit the lower edge. He turned with the next crossing, caught an attack above his helmet, then brought the shield down before the following thrust reached his side. The damage pushed past the block cap and seeped through, dropping Meno to 43% HP. The Swing Master's HP passed below 20%. Final Decree activated on Vervenzal's Verdict, amplifying the remaining stored Detonations.

"Finishing range," Meno called.

"Eight." The current jump shield shattered while the boss remained airborne. It could not refresh the barrier until it landed. The next stored burst struck exposed HP.

"Five."

"Three." The Swing Master corrected above Meno and kept attacking through every explosion. Meno's HP fell from 32% to 20%, then to 7%. Another black eruption removed almost everything left in its health bar.

"One." The final stored Detonation struck. The Swing Master remained airborne with less than 1% HP. Its shield was gone, but it had not landed and could not create another one yet. Release ended. BOSS AT ONE PIXEL OH NOOO FINISH IT FAST WHY IS IT TURNING The boss turned in midair.

"It turned—" The blade punched through Thorn's chest. [Thorn has died.] It erased Thorn's 100% HP in one hit and killed him before his body reached the ground. NOOOOOOO BUGGED? TOTAL BS AGGRO SWAP CHEAT DEATH?! IT SWITCHED AGGRO REVENGE TRIGGER CHARACTER DELETION RIP STORMHOLD Meno spent all his Anchor on Shockwave. The remaining fraction of the Swing Master's HP disappeared. Black armor split apart in the middle of the air, the spire sword disintegrated, and the boss vanished. Thorn hit the arena floor.

"DAMN IT! DAMN IT, DAMN IT, DAMN IT!" Meno yelled, slamming the shield against the ground with each word. On the fifth hit, the shield vanished. Thorn's armor disappeared from Meno's body, and his own gear returned as Swing Master Infernal snapped back into place. [Titan Trial Complete] Trial partner has fallen. Choose: Claim reward or invoke Titan's Gambit. Titan's Gambit: One additional wave. Solo. Difficulty: Impossible. Victory restores fallen partner and grants both Titan rewards.

Defeat deletes user account and bars new account creation for one month. Exit impossible. Refusal final.