The raid group looked on in disbelief as they witnessed the confrontation between Izroth and Ooudamu—if one could even call it that. To be more precise, it was a completely one-sided slaughter!
Even though Halls tried his best to maintain aggro, Izroth's damage output was simply too much. Naturally, Halls became frustrated at his own lack of ability. But, it was not his fault. After all, there was probably not a single tank within all of RML who would be able to hold aggro after such a vicious spike of damage output!
The members of Sleeping Gardenia were left speechless. For a split second, they forgot about the fact that they were fighting against a raid boss.
Mariposa had a weary expression on her face as she shook her head. Although Izroth showed no interest in joining Sleeping Gardenia, she still held out a tiny strand of hope. She was even willing to use her connections in the real world to win him over! However, she felt that it was too late. Someone like this—how could they be tied down?
"It looks like I made the right call becoming allies with him. Blue Oasis, do you have any idea what you have thrown away?" Mariposa sighed. She pitied Blue Oasis and the choice they made to abandon their friendship with Izroth.
Mariposa could not help but wonder what would have happened back then if she never tore up that contract. When she thought about that moment, Mariposa was relieved that she was not short-sighted. If she had tried to force matters, then it may very well be her Sleeping Gardenia in a similar position to Blue Oasis!
"What are you all doing slacking off? Do you want to embarrass our Sleeping Gardenia?! Attack with everything you have!" Mariposa stated as she waved her magic staff, creating a horizontal 3-meter tear in space.
At the same time, a similar tear in space appeared at Ooudamu's location over her torso. The tear before Mariposa vanished before reappearing vertically in front of the spatial tear at Ooudamu's position.
"Spatial Rive." Mariposa made a cutting motion with her staff as the spatial tears collapsed into itself and generated a violent force that acted as if it wanted to tear Ooudamu apart!
When the players from Sleeping Gardenia heard Mariposa's words and saw her take action, they snapped out of it and continued with their assault. To be honest, the damage dealers were disheartened after seeing Izroth's destructive capabilities. How were they supposed to compete with a monster like that?! Or rather, was there anyone capable of competing against him? Perhaps only those monsters from Heaven's Law had a chance, but even regarding them, they had their doubts.
Zi Yi tightly clenched the bow in her hand in frustration. She thought that, even if it was just a bit, she had moved closer to Izroth. However, it appeared that there was still a gap that she was not even aware existed!
But, Zi Yi was not the only one frustrated. Guan Yu, Halls, Valentine—they all experienced the same feeling as Zi Yi. If things continued like this, then wouldn't they eventually become a burden to Izroth? Stronger! Somehow, they had to become stronger!
As for Luna, since she was a healer, her level of frustration was not as strong as the others. Nevertheless, for some reason, there was this emptiness in her stomach as she looked at the countless arms of purple lightning behind Izroth. If he was already this strong, would a day come when they were simply holding him back, and he no longer needed them? When this thought entered Luna's mind, it only fed the emptiness she experienced. However, she kept a calm and collected outer appearance as she continued to perform her role as a healer without flaw.
Izroth, who was currently oblivious to how much he had affected everyone with his new display of power, improved the speed of his assault. Whenever he performed an attack or skill, the arms of purple lightning at his back would copy him and execute the same move. There was a 0.1-second delay between every arm's attack and a total of 100 arms of lightning. But, no two arms ever attacked at the same time. This meant that over the span of 10 seconds, one would be faced with a seemingly endless barrage of continuous attacks that left them with little to no breathing room. This was the ruthlessness of the Call of the Thunder God's Third State: Heavenly Arms!
Skill Name: Call of the Thunder God
Skill Level: 2/5 -> 3/5
Skill Rank: S -> SS
Requirements: None
...
*New -> «Third State: Heavenly Arms»
Mana Cost: 1,200
Active: As long as «Third State: Heavenly Arms» is active, the user acquires the passive skills «Heavenly Arms of the Thunder God» and «Lightning Mimicry: 100 Arms of Lightning». Upon activation, the user gains 2 stacks of «Arm of Lightning». This skill lasts for 5 minutes.
Cooldown: 168 hours
Passive: When the user is out of combat for 10 seconds, «Third State: Heavenly Arms» enters into a dormant state. While in its dormant state, all arms are retracted, and the user losses any temporary stat increase. During this time, the active duration of «Third State: Heavenly Arms» is halted until the skill is once again active. Resuming combat automatically reactivates the active of «Third State: Heavenly Arms».
«Heavenly Arms of the Thunder God»: When this skill first becomes active, the user's attack is increased by 100% for 8 seconds. Each kill that the user achieves while «Third State: Heavenly Arms» is active increases the duration of «Third State: Heavenly Arms» by 15 seconds (MAX: 1,500/s), temporarily increases the user's attack by 5% (MAX: 500%), and grants the user 1 stack of «Arm of Lightning» (MAX: 100).
«Lightning Mimicry: 100 Arms of Lightning»: For every «Arm of Lightning» stack, an arm made of pure lightning element forms at the user's back. This arm of lightning mimics the user's every attack and skill dealing 10% of the mimicked attack's damage as lightning damage that ignores all defenses. Each arm of lightning has a 0.1-second attack delay. Crowd control and other effects of the mimicked attack or skill does not apply. No other attack can be used until the final «Arm of Lightning» completes its attack.
Special Note: This skill cannot be leveled up using skill points and the user must experience many battles to further advance. Activating another state while one is already active multiplies the mana cost by 1+(The Number of states currently active). The rank of this skill is upgraded as the user unlocks more states. This skill once belonged to a certain individual who fought single-handedly against a powerful empire and prevailed!
After his numerous intense fight at Zushuatri's Sky Palace, Izroth had gained a considerable chunk of battle experience with his Call of the Thunder God! Though it was not until his battle against Sage that he unlocked the Call of Thunder God's third state. In addition, the skill moved up one grade from S-ranked to SS-ranked!
How many SS-ranked skills were there in RML? This much was unknown; however, it could probably be counted on one's fingers!
If the gap between A-ranked and S-ranked skills was considered large, then the gap that existed between that of an S-ranked and SS-ranked skill was like that of heaven and earth—they were in two completely different leagues! The power of the two could not be compared! The most frightening thing, however, was that the skill was not yet at its full potential.
'I can see how the original owner of this skill was able to fight single-handedly against an entire empire.'
If the "powerful empire" mentioned in the special note of the skill was similar to Amaharpe or Proximus, then surely they had characters like Gear or The Wiseman of Everpeak. Therefore, for a single individual to face off against those kinds of foes and emerge victorious spoke volumes of the true strength stored within the Call of the Thunder God, after all, the system always granted players watered-down versions of the original skill—as with Gear's Flickering Steps. Therefore, one could only imagine the overwhelming power of the original Call of the Thunder God!
With the Third State: Heavenly Arms active, and the added damage of the raid group, Ooudamu's HP fell at an unbelievable pace.
70%...
40%...
10%..!
〈Battle Alert: Raid Boss Ooudamu has become enraged!〉
The moment she entered into an enraged state, Ooudamu summoned the 36 pillars of water. But, before she could make her move, the sound of clapping thunder descended at her in the form of a sword strike.
'Third Sword Form: Collapsing Thunder.'
Bzzzzt! Boooom!
Izroth's Sword of The Storm connected to the enraged Ooudamu, and at the last moment, he shifted his sword stance to that of the First Sword Form: Converging Paths. This made it so that his attack was guaranteed to be a critical hit—and the damage was not light.
«Critical Hit»
-109,752
-14,445
...
-14,445
The arms of lightning unleashed a relentless barrage of attacks shaving off what little was left of Ooudamu's health. Along with the accumulated damage from the other raid members, Ooudamu had fallen before the first Aquatic Fever could even take effect!
A player who was capable of hitting over 100,000 damage with a single strike? Even if news of this escaped—would anyone believe it to be true?
A few moments later, Shao Qingge's physical appearances reverted to its normal state as the raid group received a stream of system alerts.
〈System Alert: Raid Boss Ooudamu has been defeated!〉
〈System Alert...
A pile of loot that contained several rare items and crafting materials dropped from Ooudamu. However, there was no epic-quality item. Though this was to be expected, after all, it was common knowledge that the best loot drop rates were given when a boss was defeated for the very first time. Therefore, it was only natural that the Blue Oasis raid group obtained better overall items. But, this did not mean that the items that dropped were useless.
As for Mariposa and the members of Sleeping Gardenia, they had mixed feeling about Ooudamu's defeat. Of course, everyone was ecstatic that they were a part of the raid's boss defeat, but it was evident that Izroth pulled the vast majority of the weight. It would be a lie if they said their pride as a top guild was not affected after what they had just witnessed!
Mariposa gave a helpless smile. 18 minutes and 26 seconds—this was how long it took for them to enter the Great Sea Palace raid, complete phase one, conquer the Sprite Dwellings, and defeat Ooudamu to finish phase two. This was a feat that took Blue Oasis hours, and yet they had done it in under 20 minutes!
Initially, Mariposa believed that Izroth was just attempting to motivate them after he mentioned that he wanted to defeat the first raid boss within 20 minutes. But, who would have thought that he was serious?!
"Could he be one of the game developers posing as a player?" This was the only reasonable explanation behind Izroth's strength that Mariposa could think of right now. However, she quickly dismissed this thought. After all, there would be an uproar among players if it was discovered that one of the game developers was unfairly abusing his power. Not to mention, there were strict rules in place when it came to game developers who played RML. For one, they could not hold any influence whatsoever within RML, no matter how small.
As the owner of the Mystical Realm Palace, Izroth's influence had soared to new heights. Therefore, if he truly were a game developer, he would have been found out a long time ago!
While everyone was lost in their thoughts, Izroth picked up all the loot without hesitation. When those of Sleeping Gardenia observed this, they could not help but feel a stinging sensation in their chest. However, no one dared to protest his actions.
But, how could those of Sleeping Gardenia know that the loot was not even on Izroth's mind right now? He simply picked all of it up because he did not want to waste time dividing it. At the moment, he had his sights set on something else entirely!