Under the assault of the Fire Dwarfs army, all party members were to survive for 5 minutes!
As the blazing red fronts appeared above the trio, the countdown began.
Li Yi issued an order, "Boundlessly summon the Water Spirits and heal!"
The second segment was not that hard, though nor was it easy. However, five minutes was not such a long or short of a period of time as well. The main concern was that the enemy was scattered in all directions. Even if they wanted to evacuate, there was no place to run.
He first had Fatty hold up the front with Water Spirits to race against time.
Then, Li Yi placed a Level 2 Freezing Trap in front of them and made a dash towards the Fire Dwarfs army.
He was going to pull aggro!
"F*ck! Are you planning to go one against ten thousand?" Chen Yang yelled out in exaggeration.
Fire Dwarfs were coming from all directions, so how could the numbers merely be at ten thousand? When Li Yi charged forward, he was like a moth to a flame.
Of course, he would not be as silly as to charge forward and go head to head with the Fire Dwarfs. Although, he did come close to the Fire Dwarfs before he swiftly moved to the right, and a group of Fire Dwarfs chased after him. He kept running in circles to reel in the Fire Dwarfs from all directions, guiding them to follow him from behind and join that circle.
Although the encirclement gradually shrunk, Li Yi had undoubtedly bought the longest time for the party.
Fire Ice said, "Your friend..."
"I taught him..."
Chen Yang and Fire Ice silently exchanged glances.
While running, Li Yi thanked his lucky stars for the shoes with SPD +2 obtained from the White Elf's gratitude quest. If not, he was bluntly seeking death for pulling a stunt like this.
Time flowed slowly and the distance between Li Yi and the Fire Dwarfs army was drawing close. His HP started to drop so drastically that even with Fire Ice's help, it could not keep up.
4 minutes and 40 seconds had passed, and Li Yi no longer ran in circles. Instead, he ran towards the Freezing Trap that he had installed.
Archers could learn many trap skills but they could only place one at a time that would last up to 5 minutes.
The Fire Dwarfs behind him were expectedly frozen, which once again bought Li Yi the most crucial moment.
The 5 minutes time limit was up!
The Fire Dwarfs had the trio tightly surrounded before they closed in with screams of murder.
It was at that time that the trio's sight turned white. When they opened them, they were teleported to a secret chamber.
System Notification: [You have entered Dwarf King, Vladimir's secret chamber.]
"Young brave ones, first please accept Vladimir's apology."
A semi-transparent dwarf, who was hung midair, bowed deeply at the trio.
"Wh-What the hell?" Chen Yang was flabbergasted.
This was the game's setting. After players resisted against the Fire Dwarfs' attack, Dwarf King, Vladimir's soul would appear, teleporting players into his underground secret chamber.
Vladimir nagged on. First, he displayed his utmost apology before he wailed in self-blame and finally, he begged the players to save his soul and his people.
"The Fire Dwarfs you saw are my people.
"They are under the control of Ivrit and have lost themselves...
"Ivrit's powers come from a magic crystal rock.
"If you collect enough magic crystal rocks, Ivrit will definitely appear to snatch it when advancing to Pinnacles of the Fire.
"Only... I have but one request.
"My soul is retained to this date by the safeguard of my people's divine weapon but my physical body is controlled by Ivrit.
"I seek your help to destroy my body so that I may rest in peace..."
Vladimir's speech ended here. When Li Yi's party received a quest to defeat the Dwarf King, Vladimir's physical body and release his soul. Quest reward was 50000 EXP, Reputation Value 300, and an unknown Class Skill Tome.
Then, Chen Yang came to a realization. "Brother Yi, are we up against the Dwarf King next?"
"I guess so. Wait up, I'll check some info on the official website."
Li Yi logged off and his figure gradually disappeared.
"F*ck, are you kidding me?"
...
Li Yi browsed the web to check on any information regarding Dwarf King.
He really could not remember...
It had been at least six years since he last defeated Dwarf King. He had forgotten most of the battling strategy, and only by glancing at the introduction on the website that he could recall.
Indeed, he had remembered it incorrectly...
After he went through it for half a day, Li Yi suddenly recalled.
Dwarf King, Vladimir was the second boss of Pinnacles of the Fire. He was second to Ivrit in terms of difficulty level. Moreover, his physical body wasn't in the Heart of the Fire dungeon but in it was in Death of a King, a Large-sized Party-level Instance Dungeon of 50 members.
They had passed the second segment by toughing through for five minutes. However, the next segment...
Li Yi's brow beaded with sweat as he quickly logged back into the game.
Chen Yang and Fire Ice were still waiting for him.
"Let's go," Li Yi called both of them.
Chen Yang and Fire Ice caught up.
The moment the trio stepped onto the exit of the secret chamber, Vladimir spoke again.
"Young brave ones, although my body is only left with 1% of my life's powers, defeating it won't be easy. I will teleport you to a place and as long as you're able to pass through it, I'll believe that you have the powers to challenge me."
System Notification: [Accept Dwarf King's Test?]
Non-acceptance of the test would get them nowhere as the door of the secret chamber was only for show.
The scenery changed once again and the trio appeared on a platform.
"Come out, my beloved mount, Tyrannosaurus King!"
Heeding the call of Dwarf King, Vladimir, the earth shook and a giant black tyrannosaurus walked up the platform.
It was humungous.
Towering at seven floors at least, the nail of its claw was as large as Li Yi's body.
"This is your opponent — my beloved mount, Tyrannosaurus King, Dardanelle!"
"Roar— Roar—"
Tyrannosaurus King let out two roars. The HP on top its head was showing at 66000000.
"M*th*rf*ck*r! Look at that HP, goddammit!" With just one look at the Tyrannosaurus's extreme HP, Chen Yang was in cursing mode.
An Instance Dungeon that was not even at Level 20 had a 66000000 HP super boss. How were they supposed to go on? Even if its ATK was zero, it could still take up ten days to half a month.
Chen Yang exclaimed, "Let's leave the dungeon. There's no point going on, and it's frustrating just looking at it."
"Yeah, this thing is just beyond us," Fire Ice added on.
Li Yi laughed out loud. "If you choose to leave now, we won't be able to receive any EXP."
The majority of Instance Dungeons in King of Pantheon was divided into a few segments. At each passed segment, they could freely choose to exit but if a selection to leave was made at the start of a segment, then the EXP accumulated from the previous segment would be null.
The bigger the danger, the higher the returns.
"Dardanelle, I hope you will put in your best effort when you attack!"
"Roar— Roar—" Tyrannosaurus King nodded.
"Alright, my soul can't leave the secret chamber for long. Young brave ones, the challenge begins."
Vladimir's soul disappeared. Tyrannosaurus King immediately let out a roar and extended his giant claw that slapped viciously at the trio.
System Notification: [You are faced with the powerful Tyrannosaurus King. Accept defeat and withdraw from battle?]