Chapter 571: Blackflame Ice Flower
Marcus checked the Iceflame Black Serpent Man’s HP: 240,000 remaining.
Thank God the ambush had worked. It had stripped 360,000 HP from the serpent right from the start, and without that opening advantage, Marcus doubted he would have lasted long. His ordinary damage was pitiful compared to the monster’s defenses, while the serpent’s attacks were powerful enough to tear through his health in only a handful of hits. If he hadn’t caught it off guard, running for his life might have been his only option.
"Go!" Marcus barked the command, urging Blackie toward the serpent as he loosed another Mountain Fang Shot. At the same time, he began changing his equipment.
The Iceflame Black Serpent Man hit far too hard. Marcus had three choices: kill it before it could kill him, switch to the Adamant Shield and try to survive, or give up and run.
He chose to fight. There was no point holding anything back now. He would throw everything he had at the creature and bring it down before it had the chance to do the same to him.
Blackie covered the twenty-meter gap in only a few seconds. When Marcus was roughly ten meters from the serpent, he switched weapons. The Twin-Winged Ice Owl Bow vanished from his hands, replaced by the seemingly unremarkable Mist-Tear Spear of Purity.
"Mistform Illusion!" The spear’s active skill immediately took effect. A shimmer of blue light gathered beside Marcus, rapidly taking shape until it became a perfect copy of him. The clone possessed 80% of his stats, and for a brief moment, Marcus found himself fighting alongside his own double.
Marcus, Pebble, and the clone were now less than ten meters from the serpent. Perfect timing.
"Desperate Strike!" All three attacked at once, hurling their spears like javelins.
Whoosh! The Mist-Tear Spears tore through the air and slammed into the Iceflame Black Serpent Man. -11,000. -10,000. -5,000.
Now that was more like it. Both Marcus and Pebble had landed critical hits. Desperate Strike dealt five times the weapon’s base damage, and a critical hit doubled that result, effectively giving them ten times their normal damage. That was why their attacks were finally breaking past the ten-thousand mark. The Sea Demon Souls’ debuff was helping as well, reducing the serpent’s defense by 20%. Without that reduction, Marcus would probably still be staring at those miserable 800-damage hits.
Between Desperate Strike, Mountain Fang Shot, and the Royal Sorcerers’ continuous barrage of magic, the Iceflame Black Serpent Man’s HP had already fallen below 200,000.
’Not bad. Keep it coming.’
Marcus immediately reached into his bag and pulled out the Ice-Fire Twin Dragon Hoe, equipping it in place of the Mist-Tear Spear. But just as he expected the clone to disappear, something completely unexpected happened. It remained.
Marcus froze for half a second. The clone from Mist-Tear Spear didn’t vanish simply because he had switched weapons. A flash of blue light passed through its hands, and another Mist-Tear Spear materialized in its grip. The clone then spurred its own copy of Blackie forward and charged the serpent, preparing to use the spear’s debuff skill, Mist Vortex.
’Wait... what?’ Marcus distinctly remembered that during the trial, switching weapons had caused the clone to disappear. This time, however, the situation was different.
His eyes immediately landed on the Mist-Tear Spear he had thrown earlier. It was still embedded in the ground a short distance away, and the weapon was technically still participating in the battle.
So that was it. As long as the Mist-Tear Spear remained in active combat, the clone it had created would remain as well. The clone itself, however, was bound to that weapon. Unlike Pebble, it couldn’t freely change equipment whenever Marcus switched his own gear.
’Still, that was an incredible discovery. Mythic gear really is something else.’
A grin spread across Marcus’s face as he tightened his grip on the Ice-Fire Twin Dragon Hoe. "Ice-Fire Dragon Breath!" For the first time, Marcus and Pebble unleashed the ultimate skill of the Ice-Fire Twin Dragon Hoe.
The weapon erupted with power. Two torrents of energy burst from its surface, one carrying the cold blue radiance of water magic and the other blazing with the fierce red light of fire magic. The two energies twisted and coiled through the air, rapidly taking the forms of two enormous dragons, one azure and the other crimson.
"ROAR!" A phantom dragon’s roar shook the battlefield as the twin dragons shot toward the Iceflame Black Serpent Man.
Boom! Boom! Boom! The two dragons engulfed the serpent in a violent explosion of blue and red energy, almost completely obscuring its enormous body. -11,000. -20,000.
Two critical hits. The crimson dragon, carrying the fire element, had detonated for an enormous 20,000 damage.
’Now that’s what I call a finisher.’ And right on cue, the clone created by the Mist-Tear Spear reached the serpent and thrust its weapon forward.
"Mist Vortex!" A swirling blue vortex suddenly formed around the Iceflame Black Serpent Man. The attack itself didn’t deal much damage, but Marcus wasn’t interested in its damage. He was waiting for its secondary effect.
The vortex disappeared. The serpent’s enormous body suddenly went rigid. A dizzy spiral appeared above its head. Stunned. Three precious seconds of helplessness.
No way. The Mist-Tear Spear was a Mythic artifact, after all. Of course its abilities were ridiculous. Its Mist Vortex had an 80% chance of inflicting Stun.
A shame the cooldown was a full minute. If he could chain that effect repeatedly, this fight would already be over.
"Push!" Marcus gave the order, and Pebble immediately spurred Blackie forward while activating Roar of the Dragon-Steed. At the same time, he swung the Ice-Fire Twin Dragon Hoe with all his strength.
Crit after crit exploded across the serpent’s body. With the triple-damage effect combined with critical hits, each swing was dealing close to 10,000 damage. Compared to that, Marcus’s other attacks suddenly felt almost pathetic.
The Royal Sorcerers continued their relentless barrage of magic from behind, while the Mist-Tear Spear clone joined the assault as well, repeatedly driving its spear into the serpent whenever it found an opening.
Everyone was fighting with everything they had. Marcus, however, suddenly stopped attacking. Instead, he urged Blackie past the serpent and galloped straight toward the pool where the creature had been meditating earlier. His five Mythic arrows, the Blazing Explosive Arrows, were still embedded in the ground over there.
He needed them back. Marcus reached the pool and quickly scooped up the five arrows just as the Iceflame Black Serpent Man finally recovered from the stun.
"Ice Venom World!" The serpent’s trident spun once more. The familiar storm of frost-tipped attacks exploded across the battlefield, and everyone’s HP bars plunged as the attack swept over them.
Marcus quickly checked the serpent’s health: 123,000 HP remaining. ’Almost there. But don’t get cocky.’
Half of his forces’ HP had already been wiped away, and the battle had been far more brutal than Marcus had expected. The serpent was weakened, but it was still a Level 80 Silver-tier boss, and that distinction mattered.
He pressed the attack. Instead of switching back to the Twin-Winged Ice Owl Bow, however, Marcus kept the Ice-Fire Twin Dragon Hoe in his hands.
"Corpse Demon Shatters Heaven!" Marcus and Pebble activated the Corpse Demon set skill simultaneously.
Six enormous thousand-year Corpse Demons suddenly materialized in the air above them. Each raised its weapon and slashed twice, sending twelve enormous black sword beams crashing down from the sky.
The attacks descended one after another. Crash! Crash! Crash! Each sword beam dealt roughly 3,000 damage, and several of them landed critical hits. By the time all twelve strikes had finished, more than 40,000 HP had been torn from the serpent.
The Iceflame Black Serpent Man’s HP fell to 80,000. ’Yes.’
Marcus immediately switched back to the Twin-Winged Ice Owl Bow. This was it. With the Blazing Explosive Arrows back in his possession, he could finish the fight.
There was just one thing he regretted. Corpse Demon Shatters Heaven had a secondary effect called Dark Soul Entanglement. If it activated, the target would become Confused for five seconds, and its Luck would be reduced by half. That effect would have been incredibly useful. Unfortunately, the level difference was simply too large. The secondary effect didn’t activate.
As Marcus equipped the bow, the Iceflame Black Serpent Man suddenly lifted its head. Its gaze swept across the battlefield: Marcus, Pebble, the clone. All three were within ten meters of it.
The serpent’s eyes burned with fury. "DIE!" Its voice came out as a deep, guttural roar.
The blue flames surrounding its body suddenly surged violently, expanding outward with such force that the air itself seemed to tremble.
Marcus’s heart sank. ’Oh no.’ He recognized that look. The serpent was about to use its ultimate skill. Blackflame Ice Flower.
Marcus had kept the creature under relentless pressure from the moment the battle began. The initial ambush had caught it completely off guard, and after that, Marcus and his companions had chained one attack after another, giving the monster almost no chance to recover, let alone gather the opportunity to use its trump card.
But now, they had given it an opening. And the serpent intended to use it.
"BLACKFLAME ICE FLOWER!"
The Iceflame Black Serpent Man spun its trident with both hands. The blue energy surging around its body suddenly condensed, transforming into layer upon layer of enormous ice-blue petals. The petals bloomed outward, one after another, until the entire ten-meter area around the serpent was covered in a sea of freezing flowers.
The first wave of petals swept across the battlefield: -5,000. Another wave followed: -5,000. Then another: -5,000. Marcus, Pebble, and the clone were all struck by each successive wave, each hit tearing away another 5,000 HP.
Three waves were enough. Pebble’s HP dropped to zero. The clone’s HP vanished as well, its body collapsing beneath the relentless assault. Marcus was left with barely more than 3,000 HP.
But the Blackflame Ice Flower hadn’t stopped. The ice-blue petals continued blooming around the serpent, and another deadly wave was already forming.
Marcus’s pupils contracted. "Soul Shield!"
A Sea Demon Soul that had been roughly twenty meters away suddenly activated its guardian skill. In the blink of an eye, it teleported directly in front of Marcus and took the incoming attack for him. -5,000. The damage flashed above the Sea Demon Soul’s head.
Then the Blackflame Ice Flower reached its final stage. The countless ice-blue petals suddenly contracted toward the center before erupting outward in a tremendous explosion. A roaring wave of freezing energy swept across the battlefield, consuming everything in its path.