Occasionally, when Ignore Level proc'd, Tang Yao's spells would deal over 100 damage, but they usually didn't exceed 10. Even then, his DPM (damage per minute) was still quite significant because he was making up for the low damage per hit with the sheer number of spells he was outputting.
The Lord-class Scaled Frog's health fell at a constant pace. Even though it wasn't by much, it still gave Nie Yan and Tang Yao hope of seeing an eventual end.
This was a Level 30 Lord!
It couldn't be compared to an Elite!
In his past life, when a player encountered a Lord-class monster in the wilderness, they would immediately notify their guild. Hundreds of members would then be mobilized to deal with it because Lords were often the sparks for many major guild battles. Lords would usually drop Dark Gold-grade equipment upon death. However, if the player was lucky, then Legendary-grade equipment fragments might drop. Even with terrible luck, they were guaranteed equipment of at least Gold-grade which could be sold for quite a bit of money.
Now, under Tang Yao's intense barrage of spells, the Lord-class Scaled Frog's health was being gradually chipped away, 99.9%, 99.8%...
Even though the battle was progressing at a snail's pace, Tang Yao and Nie Yan were nonetheless in high spirits.
If they successfully killed it, then everything would be divided between just the two of them. Just how much experience would they receive?
For the time being, Nie Yan wouldn't know the answer to that question. Even back in his prime, he had never killed an equal level Lord-class monster with just two people, let alone one that was of a much higher level than him. Now, however, he was accomplishing feats that he would have never dared to attempt or imagine were possible in his past life!
"Nie Yan, do you know how much experience a Lord-class monster will give? This guy is so tanky. He has more than ten times the health of an Elite," Tang Yao asked, his mind trembling from excitement. He just couldn't imagine it.
Would he level up once, twice, or maybe even more?
"You'll probably go up two or three levels. Focus on attacking. If you slow down, its health will start recovering," Nie Yan answered. Thankfully, Tang Yao's magic power was high enough. Adding the Ignore Level Difference procs, his damage was quite impressive. If it were any other Mage, they probably wouldn't even leave so much as a scratch on this Lord-class Scaled Frog's health.
"Don't worry. My damage output won't stop."
Compared to before, Tang Yao had shown remarkable improvement. As for a relatively mindless task like this, he absolutely wouldn't make any mistakes.
I should prepare some Magic Power Potions for next time, Nie Yan thought. If Tang Yao's Magic Power was increased, hunting monsters would go by much faster. However, they were relatively expensive. A batch of potions with Magic Power +20 would sell for at least 3 silver per bottle. If their effects were more potent, they would fetch an even higher price. For him, though, money was not the issue. It was the fact that, at this point in time, they were rare and thus difficult to obtain from the marketplace.
While contemplating, he continued to carefully monitor the movements of the Lord-class Scaled Frog. Thanks to Tang Yao casting spells from higher ground, it was currently still in a state of confusion with no idea of where the attacks were coming from, leaving it with no choice but to blindly move around in the hopes of spotting its aggressor. He had a higher attack range than Tang Yao with the crossbow, being able to shoot from almost 40 meters away, so if it wandered out of Tang Yao's cast range or approached too closely to Tang Yao's position, he would be able to immediately fire at it from a safe distance and lure it back. His crossbow bolts were shot from level ground, so the Scaled Frog would always move toward whichever direction he fired from. However, since there were no follow-up shots, it would eventually stop investigating after moving several steps. As a result, the Scaled Frog was never able to wander off too far or too close.
While they were still chipping away at the boss' health, Nie Yan suddenly received a call from Hao Cheng.
「Hey, how are things over at your side? How long till Tang Yao reaches Level 15?」Hao Cheng asked.
「If I were to give an estimate, probably in around three hours.」
「Really, it's still going to take that long? Well, I guess that makes sense. At your levels, you guys probably need a lot of experience to level up. Anyway, we've finished establishing the guild. We're just recruiting by the auction house right now. We've already brought in over a thousand members, and there's still a steady stream of players coming in, but the treasury is still completely empty, so some of them are already starting to worry. I've assured them that it's going to be filled up soon, so they're all waiting to see... but if nothing changes, I'm worried a lot of them are going to start leaving over the next few days,」Hao Cheng explained. The first batch of members were extremely important. If they felt the guild was worth being a part of, they would recruit their friends to join them. After all, even though having strong elites was an important factor, the foundation of a guild was laid through the efforts of its ordinary members.
Nie Yan thought for a moment before replying,「You can tell them they'll be seeing more benefits soon, and right now, they can go to the Starry Night Potion Shop to receive a discount. Members with up to 100 merit points will get 5% off purchases with a 30 copper limit. Members with up to 500 merit points will get 5% off purchases with a 1 silver and 50 copper limit...」In this fashion, he would be driving business to his potion shop, and by limiting how much they could purchase with the discount, he would prevent other guilds from buying large quantities of goods through proxy, but above all, he would be incentivising the members of his guild to increase their contribution.
「You know the owner there?」
「That's the explanation you can give to our guild members.」
「Alright, this should convince a lot of people to stay,」Hao Cheng excitedly said. Getting a discount from the Starry Night Potion Shop was an incredible boon for their guild. Right now, it was the most influential potion shop in all of Calore. With over a hundred Junior Alchemists and several hundred Apprentice Alchemists working there, it produced more than 60% of the concoctions circulating in Calore's market. This building that towered over its surroundings had in a short time become a holy place for Alchemy. Any Alchemist with half a brain would apply there, and some contracted Alchemists would leave their guilds to join through a recommendation from a friend. Hao Cheng had never once heard of the Starry Night Potion Shop offering a 5% discount to any guild. This move would undoubtedly inform all their members that they had the Starry Night Potion Shop supporting them from behind-the-scenes. With such a powerful backer, who would dare doubt their guild's ability to provide?
Hao Cheng quickly notified the others of the good news.
Back in the forest, Nie Yan and Tang Yao were still busy wearing down the Lord-class Scaled Frog.
Elsewhere, Heaven Breaker had just returned to Victorious Return guild headquarters after finishing a dungeon run.
"How's the progress? Did you find out more about Young Sparrow Hawk?" Heaven Breaker asked Tangerine who stood beside him.
"Yes, he's a member of a pretty mediocre team. They haven't even run Black Flame Forest yet. He was last spotted in that team two days ago. Recently, he's been nowhere to be found, so we still don't know how he's been levelling so quickly."
"I see, then he's probably just an ordinary player who got lucky. When you find him, force him to reveal where he's been levelling."
"We also received another interesting piece of information from a player named Chen Bo[1]. Apparently, Nirvana Flame and Young Sparrow Hawk are close friends."
"Nirvana Flame..." Heaven Breaker's expression turned icy upon hearing this name.
"According to the reports, Young Sparrow Hawk had also come into conflict with members of Radiant Sacred Flame in the past."
"Eh? What was the outcome?"
"Radiant Sacred Flame had several dozen members blockading Young Sparrow Hawk and his party members inside Levin Hills. All of his party members were killed, but he somehow managed to escape. Later on, Nirvana Flame emerged and rescued him. In the process, he killed six or seven of their members, including Dian Cang who lost his Fire Chaser Set," Tangerine replied with trepidation. It seemed her party wasn't the first to fall by his hand.
"All by himself?" Heaven Breaker asked with a look of surprise. His guild had some degree of friendship with Radiant Sacred Flame, so he had learned of this incident before. However, back then, he had only heard that Dian Cang died to a player and lost all his gear. Who would have thought that that player was actually Nirvana Flame?
"Yes, all by himself. At that time, Radiant Sacred Flame had no way of dealing with him, so they had no choice but to call off their manhunt."
Heaven Breaker sank into deep thought. If this was all truly related to Nirvana Flame, then he would need to pay serious attention to this Young Sparrow Hawk from now on.
As Tangerine was about to speak, she suddenly hesitated.
"If you have something to say, just say it." Heaven Breaker shot her a glance.
"I think it's best if we withdraw the internal bounty on Nirvana Flame. If our guild members encounter him, I'm afraid they won't be his match."
Tangerine felt frightened when Heaven Breaker's expression darkened in response to her words.
"Erm… Also, I believe Young Sparrow Hawk is with Nirvana Flame right now."
"Tell me, do you think their levels are about the same?" Heaven Breaker asked. After hearing her words, he knew exactly what she was about to say.
"Y-yes. I think the only reason he hasn't shown up on the leaderboards is because he's hiding himself. When we met him last time, he was already Level 11."
Heaven Breaker fell silent for a short period of time, then said, "Withdraw the internal bounty on Nirvana Flame. After that, go find me that player named Chen Bo."
"Find him? For what reason?"
"You don't need to know."
"Understood."
At a muddy meadow deep within a remote forest, Nie Yan and Tang Yao were arduously working on the same repetitive task. The Lord-class Scaled Frog was being worn down extremely slowly. It was so slow they felt like an eternity was passing them by as they waited for its health bar to fall by the tiniest of a fraction.
Lord-class monsters were formidable to a degree that many players couldn't imagine. With the normal method of hunting mobs, even if there were over several thousand Level 10 players, they still wouldn't necessarily be able to kill a Level 30 Lord.
Almost ten hours later, Nie Yan had exhausted pouch after pouch of Smoke Powder and the arm Tang Yao used to raise his staff felt like it was about to fall off, but the end was almost in sight. The Lord-class Scaled Frog had only a sliver of health remaining.
「Oh my god... we've been at this for almost ten hours now and this bastard still hasn't croaked. If he doesn't die soon, then I will!」Tang Yao wore a bitter expression on his face.
「It still has 2% left. Come on, we're at the final stretch.」
When the Scaled Frog's health had fallen below 20%, it had entered a berserk state and unleashed several large-scale area of effect spells. However, aside from the trees, none of them hit their intended targets. In fact, since the start of the battle, it had never even been able to spot where the enemy was.
Hearing Nie Yan's words, Tang Yao accelerated his pace, his heart beating rapidly and his mind focused on only one thing. Let me level… Let me level… Let me level...
With a final Arcane Flame Burst, the Lord-class Scaled Frog finally lost its last bit of health. It let out a mournful croak before collapsing, dying the ground in crimson.
A gorgeous radiance enveloped Nie Yan and Tang Yao.
「Ding dong!」
「Ding dong!」
Nie Yan heard two jingling sounds, signifying that he had levelled up twice. The Lord-class Scaled Frog gave him enough experience to go from Level 14 directly to level 16. As for Tang Yao, since he had contributed the most, he received even more experience and directly rose to Level 17.
Seeing how much he had levelled, Tang Yao was struck in a daze.
Thinking he had misread his own level, he asked,「Nie Yan… am I really Level 17?」
「Yep.」 Nie Yan faintly smiled before walking over to the Scaled Frog's corpse. A Level 30 Lord-class monster, who knew what sort of items it would drop. After poking around the corpse, he found a ring, some leather armour, a recipe, and 2 gold.
[1] Just in case you forgot him, Chen Bo is first mentioned in Chapter 17. He makes his first real appearance in Chapter 42.