Chương 83: Healers Can’t Dodge

Meno explained the strategy he had made up twelve seconds ago.

"During vortex, everyone goes middle," he said.

"Nix and I grab healers when the shark charges. Ruinelle, you use your fire dodge if it aims at you. Fish phase, everyone grabs one corpse and keeps it away from the shark." perfect plan made up live shark soup no tank no problem"No tank is a problem," Meno said.

"We are pretending it isn't." They entered the second floor. [Hostile: Scorpola Ritualist Tamer | Type: Brine Scorpionkin | Threat: Moderate | Ability: Bloodbait Command] Unfortunately, the boss was no longer High threat for Meno, which did not make the fight easier. It only meant the reward had been lowered. Surviving the boss in a clean duel was not the problem. Hitting the damn thing while it treated the chamber like a racetrack was.

"Okay," Meno said.

"Get ready. Big damage at the start." Ruinelle and the healers went straight to the middle. Meno and Nix edged forward together. The shark appeared through the murk, huge and silent, with the Scorpola Ritualist strapped to its back. It had no intention of standing still for a fair fight. Meno triggered Panic Pump. [Compound Swing | Chain: 100 | Damage: +1000%] He hit Chain Madness and caught the shark's side as it passed. Nix struck from the other angle, daggers flashing against the ritualist's leg straps.

Ruinelle began casting from the center, but underwater warlock fire was not ideal. It worked, technically, but each spell bloomed into steam and glare that made the murk harder to read. The shark pulled away after only a few hits. Then the ring started moving. Water spun around the chamber, frothing as the ritualist raised its staff. Meno and Nix kicked back toward the center. Meno grabbed Orlaqt by the back of her robe while Nix took Morfoos by the arm.

"Watch the water," Meno snapped. They scanned the churn. The priests had no movement skills and no practice dodging fast targets. Ruinelle could briefly turn her body into fire to avoid a physical hit, which was strange underwater but still better than getting eaten. The shark emerged from behind Meno. Nix reacted first. Meno saw her move, kicked sideways with Orlaqt in hand, and Ruinelle turned into fire just as the shark streaked through the center. Its teeth passed through the space where Orlaqt had been.

The shark kept going, circling the chamber instead of stopping.

"That is the issue," Meno said. The charge itself was dodgeable with Bloodwake. The problem was that without a tank blocking it, the shark never stayed engaged. It did not pause for a damage window. It charged, missed, vanished into the ring, and forced melee to chase like idiots. Meno was still on his first Chain Madness and had not even gotten five real seconds of damage. Ruinelle was doing the best consistent damage, but the boss moved too fast to judge the HP cleanly.

Her burst windows kept arriving while the shark was halfway through the chamber, and Nix kept missing the clean openings rogues lived for. The shark aimed for the middle again.

"Spread!" The party broke outward the way they had discussed. The ritualist lifted its staff, and a red shield formed around shark and rider. Five dead fish rose from the murk, bloated and pale, drifting near different points around the chamber. Each player grabbed one and waited while the flesh peeled off the fish, leaving them skeletal. The shield lasted longer than Meno expected. Ruinelle threw a spell at the boss, but the red shield swallowed it. Nothing moved. Meno held his corpse awkwardly under one arm.

When the shield expired, the shark did not enrage, and the dead fish remained. Meno dropped his fish to test it. The flesh started reforming almost immediately, and he cursed as he grabbed it again before the shark could notice.

"Do not drop!" Orlaqt squeaked as the shark turned toward her. She fumbled her corpse, grabbed it again, and barely kicked aside before the shark clipped her legs. Morfoos threw a quick heal into her before she dipped too low. Meno tried to resume damage with the axe in one hand and a fish skeleton wedged under the other arm. It was awful. The axe wanted both hands. The skeleton wanted to drift away. Nix solved the problem by trapping her fish between her thighs and continuing to dual-wield. The fight dragged.

Healers were almost useless here. The shark occasionally clipped someone, but with Bloodwake, most charges were dodgeable. The ritualist did not throw direct damage. It only manifested annoying chamber effects, which meant Morfoos and Orlaqt mostly existed to hold fish and get rescued. The vortex returned before they had meaningful uptime. Everyone went middle again. Meno grabbed Orlaqt. Nix grabbed Morfoos. Ruinelle burned through another physical dodge.

The shark streaked past, the water calmed, and they tried to attack again. The red shield phase returned, bringing five more corpses with it.

"Oh, come on." They now had two fish each to manage. That was the wrong answer. It had to be. Meno could feel the fight becoming unmanageable before they reached even seventy percent. No party was meant to juggle twenty rotting fish while chasing a shark in a dark ring. He kicked toward the red shield and threw one skeleton at it, watching the bones strike the barrier and evaporate. Meno's brain snapped into place.

"Throw them at the shield!" Nix saw it and followed immediately. The others reacted too late. The phase ended with several corpses still active. Meno swam to Orlaqt, took one of hers, and had to kick her sideways as the shark charged her again. Nix stole one from Morfoos, leaving Ruinelle stuck with two. After that, the fight became repetition with teeth. Hit the shark when it passed. Vortex. Lose all Chain stacks. Dodge middle. Ritual. Throw fish into the red shield. Chase again.

Try to maintain damage through murk, steam, and the shark's refusal to cooperate. Bloodwake bypassed most of the intended difficulty with drowning and air pockets. It did not solve uptime. Meno's damage meant nothing when his axe spent half the fight waiting for the boss to come back. Nix had to babysit Morfoos too much, pushing and pulling him out of charge lines. Ruinelle stayed safe with her fire-body dodge, but every defensive use cost her damage, and her burst cycle kept landing at inconvenient moments.

At ten percent, the ritualist changed tactics. The shark dissolved into five smaller sharks. They split apart and descended on the party in a frenzy while the ritualist floated in the middle with its staff raised. Each shark was faster, weaker, and nearly impossible to avoid. With a tank, this would have been a clean taunt and AoE phase. For them, it was chaos. Morfoos went into full party heal mode.

Orlaqt focused mostly on Meno, her Crisis Only healing slamming his shield back up whenever the sharks tore chunks out of it. Nix stopped trying to look elegant and stabbed whatever swam near her. Ruinelle ignored the sharks and poured everything into the ritualist.

"Boss," Meno shouted.

"Ignore sharks. Kill rider." It was not pleasant, but it worked. The ritualist died after eighteen minutes of shark soup. [Boss Defeated: Scorpola Ritualist Tamer] Clear Time: 18: 04 Meno stared at the timer.

"Absolutely awful." timer sad first floor better solo better shark tax tank diff In the same time, he could solo the first floor seven times. Even with reduced threat, that would probably net him more XP because he would not split it five ways. The party made the mechanic possible. It also made the efficiency hurt. The loot did not improve his mood. [Rare III Brinechant Staff] Type: Healing Staff Manaflow III: Mana regeneration increased by 18% while underwater.

Fifth Prayer III: Every fifth healing spell is 100% stronger.

"Finally," Morfoos said.

"Something good."

"Congrats," Orlaqt said. Ruinelle looked at the fading corpse.

"That wasn't ideal. I think I did most of the damage."

"Yeah," Meno said. Nix pointed downward.

"Passage leading down. Shall we?" A circular drain had opened at the bottom of the chamber. They swam into it, descending through a narrow tunnel until the water ended in a shimmering membrane. Meno pushed one hand through. The other side was air.

"No water," he said.

"Bloodwake advantage ends unless I use Preypool." Morfoos gripped his new staff.

"Great."

"I go first," Meno said.

"There is probably water below. If not, I catch you one by one." Meno fell from the ceiling and dropped into a pool below with a splash. The others followed one at a time, landing beside him. The new area looked like a half-sunk library, dim and wide, with faint runic symbols glowing along stone pillars and book racks. Hundreds of enchanted books drifted between the aisles, flapping open and closed. Every one registered as Normal threat. Beyond the library, stairs led higher into a hallway.

This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

"Let's go quick and pull the whole thing," Meno said.

"I spam Hundredfold."

"We might wipe if they have anything special," Nix said, turning to him.

"Probably not," Meno said, already lying to himself. He used False Wings to jump onto the top of a book rack, then started cycling Panic Pump and Hundredfold Cleave with his daggers, skipping along the rack tops and tagging books across the library. The reaction was immediate. Books snapped open across the aisles and fired colored beams of light at him. Too many. Dodging became impossible after the first beam hit him and dropped his shield to fifteen percent.

Meno kicked down behind a rack, Orlaqt topped him up, and the entire library swarmed toward them. The fight became instant chaos.

"Okay," Meno said.

"They had something special." called it Nix right book wipe library hates you pull smaller Beams crossed the aisles. Meno and Nix bounced between rack tops and narrow paths while attacking. Nix empowered her stuns and disabled clusters of five at a time, but there were too many books. Ruinelle took several hits while casting and forced Morfoos to focus almost exclusively on her. The first book died in a burst of pages and released a dazed effect in a small radius. [Sleepless Grip resisted: Daze] Nix got hit.

Meno stopped attacking, breaking his Chain, and grabbed her before a second beam struck her in the head. He dragged her behind a rack and kept moving until the daze faded. Nix blinked hard, then shook her head.

"Book explodes," she said. After that, they stopped pretending it was a clean pull. They moved through the library maze, putting racks between themselves and as many books as possible. It helped, but not enough to feel safe. Beams still clipped shoulders, legs, and backs. Without two healers, the pull would have killed them. Before each book died, Nix disengaged and let Meno finish it. Ruinelle maintained her barrage when she could.

When her cooldowns aligned, she activated an ability that made her fire spells splash, turning groups of books into burning paper storms. Meno blew them up one by one, while Nix controlled the flanks with heavy stuns. It took fourteen minutes. Painful kiting, Sleepless Grip rotations, and too much healing later, the library finally went quiet. The reward was junk. [Waterlogged Runic Page acquired.] [Broken Brass Clasp acquired.] Nix looked at the empty aisles.

"Would have been faster with a smaller pull."

"My bad," Meno said.

"Tiny yikes," Orlaqt said.

"Almost ran out of Mana." Morfoos leaned on his staff.

"I am out. Need five minutes out of combat." Ruinelle flexed her fingers.

"By the end I had to skip going for area damage. Those beams delay casts." Meno was not happy. This dungeon was awful in a specific, time-wasting way. Preypool might have helped, but he did not see how. The books would not drown, speed was not the issue, and if the water let them float higher above the racks, they would be even harder to control. They rested long enough for Morfoos to recover, then passed the library and climbed the stairs.

The hallway ahead was narrow, barely two people wide, with square floor tiles stretching toward a distant doorway. Meno took one step, and the tile under his boot lit up. He bounced backward into Ruinelle and Morfoos, sending all three of them down in a mess as the tile fired a light beam into the ceiling. nice dodge team tackle trap hall Ruinelle cushion skill issue Meno got up.

"Great. Floor is trapped." He pointed down the hall.

"Stay back. Let me check safe spots." He advanced one tile at a time. The next tile did nothing. The third fired a horizontal beam straight down the passage, forcing everyone to drop prone. Morfoos reacted too slowly, but Ruinelle yanked him down before the beam took his head.

"Pay attention," Meno said.

"Expect any direction." They kept advancing slowly. Some beams came from the side with almost no warning. Others shot down from above and were hard to notice until the tile brightened. Every safe step had to be tested, and every unsafe step cost time or nearly cost a limb. Halfway through, Meno had enough.

"Any of you can force combat state for Preypool?"

"No," Nix said.

"Nope," Ruinelle said.

"Sadly no," Morfoos said.

"I can panic internally," Orlaqt offered.

"One use has to be enough," Meno said.

"I'll trigger it, and we swim through as fast as possible. Three seconds before collapse." He triggered Panic Pump and Preypool. Water engulfed the passage. They kicked forward without touching the floor, racing over tiles. Three seconds was not enough. The water collapsed short of the exit, and they slammed onto the floor in a wet heap. Two tiles lit immediately. One beam came from the front. One from the ceiling. Meno turned fast, grabbed Orlaqt and Ruinelle, and jumped backward.

False Wings kicked once, then twice, dragging both women out of the worst of it. The beams still clipped their legs, dropping both near ten percent. Orlaqt started healing before she finished gasping. Meno landed on another tile. It lit up.

"Of course." He had to keep moving all the way to the end while carrying two people, which made every jump terrible. Orlaqt did not resist, focusing on healing through the movement. Ruinelle gripped his shoulder and kept her legs tucked up after the first near loss. Behind him, Nix carried Morfoos through the same disaster. She had no False Wings, so every dodge happened on the ground. Tiles triggered under her feet, beams fired from side and ceiling, and the hall became a light show.

Both Nix and Morfoos got hit once, then again, surviving only because the healers kept pouring everything into them. They crashed past the final tile into the boss chamber. Meno dropped Orlaqt and Ruinelle carefully, then leaned forward with both hands on his knees.

"That was something." awful confirmed trap hallway raid boss healers MVP never pug this solo better Morfoos sat on the floor, breathing hard.

"Sorry. I'm really not used to dodging anything. Lower dungeons had nothing like this, and the tank usually handles the rest."

"You need practice," Nix said. Ruinelle gave her a flat look.

"Calm down. It's our first time doing this." Most of the party would have died without two healers. One limb hit was barely safe. A full body hit would have erased them. Nix could have handled the hallway alone, maybe, because she moved like someone used to personal danger. The casters moved like players who expected distance, tanks, and cast bars to solve problems. Caster brains were holding them back. Being a caster did not excuse skipping movement, but healers had it the worst.

They were used to watching health bars, not their own feet, and their classes rarely gave them clean mobility tools. Meno refocused on the task at hand as the boss chamber opened into something like a laboratory. Strange instruments stood on long stone worktables, some glowing, some turning slowly without anything touching them. In the middle, a humanoid being made of blue light bent over an open device, yellow eyes bright inside its head. It looked up as they entered.

[Hostile: Chief Researcher Zazzaza | Type: Luminant | Threat: Moderate | Ability: Prism Protocol] Meno looked at the tiled floor and did not trust it. A trapped hallway before a boss usually meant the boss would also be annoying.

"Watch the floor," Meno said.

"I am almost certain tiles light up in here too. Nix, if anything spawns, you are on the add. Control it." Nix nodded.

"Ranged spread out. Do not stack. If beams happen, spread gives space. I am going full damage on the boss." He glanced at the chamber.

"After you spread, trigger Preypool. It should cover most of this place and make dodging easier since you guys can barely jump." Orlaqt started hopping in place.

"That's rude. I am pretty bouncy." Meno ignored her.

"I attack first to hold aggro. Let's do this." He jumped and kicked twice with False Wings as the others spread. Meno triggered Panic Pump into Chain Madness and opened on the boss. [Compound Swing | Chain: 100 | Damage: +1000%] Zazzaza rounded on him and grabbed a long instrument from the nearest table. White fire lit along its length, turning it into a burning blade. The construct swung. Meno ducked under it. He still took chip damage from the heat.

laser sword researcher melee why does science have sword chip damage scam Zazzaza cute name"Of course the dodge still hurts." They activated Preypool, and water filled the chamber. The boss did not care. Its white-fire blade sizzled underwater and kept burning, because apparently Luminants were energy beings. Meno attacked and dodged, topped off by Orlaqt whenever chip damage dragged his shield low. Nix joined from behind and started building control power. Ruinelle's first heavy fireball hit the boss in the chest.

[Boss HP: 96%] [Boss HP: 94%] At ninety percent, the floor began to glow. Random tiles lit under the water.

"Move!" They navigated to dark tiles while keeping pressure on the boss. The glowing tiles erupted in vertical beams, evaporating the Preypool instantly. The beams did not vanish afterward. They remained as bars of light, stretching from floor to ceiling and slicing the chamber into tight paths. Meno had very little room to dodge. Zazzaza hit him anyway, dropping his shield from twenty-five percent to three.

Orlaqt shoved it back up with a sharp heal, and he felt the yo-yo begin: hit, heal, hit, heal, dodge, chip, heal. Every direct strike nearly flattened him. Every safe moment was borrowed from Orlaqt's Mana bar. At eighty percent, the remaining tiles lit up. The old light bars were still there.

"Where?"

"Corner!" Ruinelle shouted. Meno glanced across the chamber and saw a safe patch at the far side. He could not use False Wings because the light bars reached the ceiling. He had to backpedal through the maze while Zazzaza chopped at him and Nix moved with him from behind. He got hit twice, dodged the rest, and barely reached the corner with everyone else. Now they were all in front of the boss. Zazzaza swept sideways, catching everyone except Nix, who was behind it.

Orlaqt, Morfoos, and Ruinelle dropped to critical. Morfoos activated an oath, and light wrapped around him, lifting him slightly above the floor as he channeled a wide heal. He could not move, but white waves pushed the party back from the edge. When the tiles erupted again and replaced the old bars, Meno pulled the boss away as soon as a path opened. The fight continued. Meno's Chain rose, but not at full speed. He had to watch the boss, the tiles, the healers, Ruinelle's position, and Nix's angle all at once.

His class wanted ugly, single-minded repetition. The fight demanded babysitting with an axe. By the time the second Chain Madness expired, he had reached four hundred stacks. His daggers returned, and the damage drop was immediate, though dodging became easier. At sixty percent, Zazzaza ran straight through the light bars like they did not exist. Nix used shadowstep and appeared behind it instantly. Meno could not pass through the bars. He had to navigate the maze to catch up, and his Chain broke.

Break Surplus saved and he reached the boss. [Break Surplus Activated] Zazzaza grabbed an orb from a table and threw it into the middle of the chamber at Orlaqt's feet. A crackling blue mana construct erupted from it and attacked her. Surprisingly Orlaqt did not panic. She ran toward Meno through the maze, robes flashing between light bars.

"Nix, add!"

"On it." Her shadowstep was on cooldown, so she had to run. Nix reached the construct and stunned it. Her built-up control power discharged into the effect, turning the stun into heavy direct damage. The construct's HP dropped to ninety-five percent, which told Meno it was too durable to erase quickly. Ruinelle started to turn.

"Keep attacking boss," Meno said.

"Let Nix handle it. Morfoos, heal Nix only."

"Right!" Zazzaza resumed attacking with the sizzling blade. Meno began to ramp again. At five hundred Chain, he triggered Chain Madness, and the Rare III Ashwake Cleaver chewed through the boss hard. With Ruinelle supporting, the boss dropped to forty percent fast. Then the floor shuffled again. The safe zone was as far from Meno as possible.

"Move back," he snapped. He kited Zazzaza backward through the maze, attacking when he could and dodging when he had to. Nix dragged the mana construct after the party from another angle. The old light bars vanished, new ones erupted, and the safe square became packed with bodies. There was no room to dodge. Meno jumped and kicked with False Wings, slipping to the other side of the boss. The blade hit the casters once. The add struck at the same time.

Orlaqt, Morfoos, and Ruinelle all dropped to critical before Nix stunned the construct again. Meno pulled Zazzaza away.

"Mana," Morfoos shouted.

"The add aura drains my Mana. No big heal." Orlaqt tried to cover it. Her single-target clutch healing was strong, but her group healing was not Morfoos. The healers stumbled away from the add. Orlaqt nearly walked into a light bar while casting, and Morfoos grabbed her robe at the last moment, yanking her down.

"Tiny thanks," Orlaqt said from the floor. Ruinelle kept casting while Meno burned the boss down, and at twenty percent, Zazzaza broke for another table. This time, Meno was ready. The previous Break Surplus proc had already refreshed Panic Pump, so he triggered it before the Chain could fall. [Compound Swing | Chain: 740 | Damage: +7400%] [Chain Madness Activated] [Chain Break Immunity: Self-Control] The immunity let him navigate the maze without losing everything.

He caught Zazzaza at the table and started chunking it hard. The boss grabbed a cube-like device, pulled it apart into four corner pieces, and revealed a faintly glowing white orb inside. Then it threw the orb at Ruinelle's feet and flung the four corner pieces toward everyone else.

"Party mechanic!" The orb pulsed. Slow. Then faster. Nix shouted, "Gather the corners!" Meno stopped attacking to preserve the last few hits of Chain Madness. He grabbed his corner piece and tried to throw it toward Ruinelle. It struck a light bar and bounced back. He caught it against his chest.

"Great." Now he had to kite the boss, dodge the blade, not attack, and carry a cube corner through a light maze while Ruinelle tried not to step on the pulsing orb. Nix stunned the mana construct again. Everyone navigated toward Ruinelle. Morfoos tossed his piece first. Orlaqt slid hers along the floor. Nix handed one off while still fighting the add. Ruinelle fumbled with the pieces, trying to reassemble the device around the pulsing orb. She was too stressed for puzzles.

don't mess it up BOX BOX BOX Ruinelle please explosion inc rip 3 2 1 Meno resumed attacking. Chain Madness expired at eight hundred forty Chain, but the boss was almost dead, so he kept cutting with daggers as the orb pulsed faster. Ruinelle cursed, snapped the last corner into place, and closed the device around it. The box shook violently, flashed white, and vanished. Zazzaza died with it, the blue light collapsing inward with a high-pitched whine until the mana construct add vanished.

[Boss Defeated: Chief Researcher Zazzaza] [Dungeon Cleared: Sunken Spire] Clear Time: 50: 12 Meno stared at the XP. [Level 47: 36. 0%] The entire run had given him eleven percent in fifty minutes. Awful XP per hour. Orlaqt clapped once.

"We did it!"

"I barely did damage," Nix said, exhaling.

"Everything went into longer stuns and babysitting the add."

"You did well," Ruinelle said.

"That box was so annoying to put back together." Morfoos looked at where the construct had vanished.

"I wonder what would have happened if you failed."

"Explosion," Meno said.

"Probably wiped us." He checked the loot and found nothing for himself. Nix received the rare item. [Rare III Prismflow Ring] Type: Ring Actionflow III: Action Speed increased by 5%. Lightstep III: Movement impairment duration reduced by 30%. Meno almost crashed out. The ring was amazing. Five percent action speed on a ring was the kind of stat he would have paid stupid gold for, especially with his breastplate penalty. Nix saw his expression before he fixed it.

"Do you want it?" she asked. OH NO take it don't take it career test ring greed Meno wanted it. He wanted it with clean, ugly intensity, but it was her loot. She had controlled the add, saved Morfoos, carried half the hallway, and kept the boss from turning the party into a light-beam disaster.

"Of course not," Meno said.

"It's your loot. I'm not stealing it." career saved growth barely proud of him still wanted it Meno checked viewership. Viewers: 104, 277 Better than expected. The dungeon had been miserable for him in every practical way, which meant viewers were probably having the time of their lives. Pain was content. Inefficiency was content. Watching Meno try not to rob Nix on camera was definitely content. Morfoos lifted his staff.

"So what now?" Ruinelle looked toward the exit.

"We already wasted time figuring it out. It would be a shame to leave. The XP isn't great for Meno, but for us it's amazing. I think we all gained a level."

"Yep," Orlaqt said.

"Big promise, I'll jump better next time." Meno looked at the cleared laboratory, then at the timer, then at his XP bar. The efficient choice was probably something else. The available choice was this miserable dungeon with four players who had already paid the entrance fee in suffering. Meno sighed.

"Okay. I have six and a half hours. We farm this crappy dungeon until we pass out."