The Great Thief

Lu Li promised that he would go and help Her Tears out at Arathi, but now, he had to focus on the Boss in front of him.

Previously in the Second War, War Master Voone brought his small squad and infiltrated deep within Elven territory. The reason that this cunning Troll decided to join the losing Horde side was because he wanted to be a Military Strategist and win Blackhand’s approval. In Voone’s eyes, this Elven camp, although seemingly weak, hid lots of powerful opponents. Voone looked forward to unsurmountable challenges, because the feeling of conquering them was incomparable.

After losing in the Second War, he retreated into the Blackrock Spires and recuperated there. Occasionally, Vosh’gajin would even harass him a little.

War Master Voone hoped to return to the battlefield as dying there would be much more honourable.

Today, he felt a slight disturbance from Vosh’gajin’s direction, but he didn’t want to help him out. The Smolderthorn tribe already had no future, so he did not want to fight a pointless battle.

The footsteps from outside grew nearer and nearer. Had Vosh’gajin already been killed by outsiders?

Well, it was his turn now. He thought that he was already used to the concept of life and death, but suddenly, he felt his body tremble with fear.

He realised that he did not want to die. Well, it would be more accurate to say that he did not want to die in a place like the Blackrock Spires.

After clearing out all the smaller monsters on the way to War Master Voone, they were now in front of the Boss. Lu Li warned everyone to keep their distance from the Boss, because Voone had an impressively large aggro range which could be triggered after entering the doorway to his room.

Lu Li ensured that all the preparations were made before they began.

“You must’ve not heard of my name before. I will teach you the meaning of regret,” the War Master boomed.

He was a Troll Axe Thrower, which players could not choose as a class. This class was not only strong in their ranged attacks, but they were also extremely capable in melee combat. It was said that most of the Troll Axe Throwers were powerful combat specialists.

“Let’s have a try first.”

Lu Li knew that this Boss would be more difficult than the Shadow Hunter.

The War Master had many skills up his sleeves, especially crowd-control abilities. Once the skills are activated, the aggro would move from player to player, which meant that the Main Tank would find it difficult to maintain aggro and pull the Boss.

This Boss tested the Main Tank’s ability to pull aggro, as well as the survivability of the players present.

Azure Sea Breeze took up his shield and charged, but was struck by a flying axe and was stunned.

War Master Voone was capable of instantly changing stances to throw an Axe, which would damage the player for 3000 nature-elemental damage and stun them for 3 seconds.

This was War Master Voone’s signature skill. An Axe would materialise, then be at a nearly unavoidable speed. After landing the strike, the target would be stunned. According to Lu Li’s estimation, the stun time was 3 seconds. In phase one, only one of these Axes would be thrown at a time. In phase two, there would be two. Similarly, in the most difficult stage phase three, three of these Axes would be thrown simultaneously.

As for how to deal with this skill, it was actually quite simple. They just needed to be able to tank it, then stay still for 3 seconds until the stun effect was dispelled.

Although they were aimed at the players, it was not a homing-type of attack. Furthermore, two axes were thrown, it would be slower than a singular Axe. As such, a player’s reaction time was key to dodging them. Dodging would be the best way to avoid this skill, because the Axes’ damage increased when there were more thrown. The damage would definitely be higher than phase one’s Axe.

The same could be said for the three Axes. As long as the players could read their trajectory and direction, this skill would not cause much trouble.

Of course, to reach the end of the fight, many wipes would take place.

After Azure Sea Breeze was stunned, Wandering immediately went and took over the aggro. These

two had great chemistry, which usually prevented the squad from wiping in dangerous situations.

Cleave – War Master Voone deals nature-elemental AoE damage to a maximum of three targets.

If Wandering had not pulled the aggro to him, the War Master might have used this skill. The damage of this skill scaled from the number of people it hit. Therefore, if three players were struck, it would be a case of instant death.

However, now that Wandering had the aggro, Cleave would only hit him alone, so he wouldn’t die.

This was the most difficult part of phase one. Now that they had passed this successfully, they would soon enter phase two. When the War Master reached 65% HP, he would change his stance and attack even more ferociously. He would also start throwing two Axes.

The damage dealt from these Axes increased from 3000 to 4000.

Furthermore, in this stage, the Boss had greater resistance to Taunt, which meant that he would wander around the map and kill players.

Pummel, Uppercut and Kick – these three skills would be used consecutively. Pummel would deal nature-elemental damage and silence the target for 4 seconds. During this time, if the target that was hit by Pummel could not escape, then there was a chance for an Uppercut to occur. Uppercut would deal natural-elemental damage to the target and cause a knockback effect.

This was not the end of the barrage. If the player still didn’t make an attempt to escape, then the War Master would use Kick. Kick would deal nature-elemental damage to the target and stun them for 2 seconds.

Anyone who was struck by all three skills would instantly die.

The first one to get hit by this combo was Fat Monkey. He accidentally walked into it, then could not react in time to escape and was killed immediately.

After this, everyone quickly learned. With Lu Li’s reminder, they knew that they had to run the moment they got struck by Pummel.

However, the real problem was the throwing of the two Axes. One of the Axes struck Hachi Chan, while the other hit Kitty Likes Meat. These two could not react in time and was killed instantly.

There was no way for them to keep fighting. Even if they could enter phase three, it was impossible for them to be able to clear the Boss.

Lu Li did not give up immediately but chose to use this opportunity to teach.

“Hold on for a bit longer. I’ll demonstrate how to dodge the Axes.”

The War Master immediately threw an Axe towards Lu Li, and the other towards Azure Sea Breeze.

Azure Sea Breeze was planning on demonstrating his dodging abilities, but his body was too slow for his brain, so he was still struck by it in the end. It was fortunate that he was extremely bulky with a tremendous amount of HP, so he could tank 4000 damage without any problems.

If Lu Li was struck by the axe, he would definitely die instantly. After all, a little scratch from before already left him with around 1000 HP.

The healers were going to heal him, but he rejected the offer. It was clear that Lu Li was extremely confident in his dodging ability.

As soon as the Axe left Voone’s hands, Lu Li had already begun to move. First, he stepped to his left, then exploded to the right. The Axe zoomed past his shoulders, but dealt no damage.

“How’d you do that? That was incredible!” Everyone was shocked.

“Heal me a little. The one who is going to be aimed at next time, listen to me.”

Lu Li never wanted to play the role of the hero. He wasn’t going to risk dying just to look good. After his HP was back to 100%, the next two being targeted were Moonlight and Sesame Rice Ball.

“Rice Ball, walk a half-step to your left, then immediately return to your original position!” Lu Li yelled.

Moonlight thought he could dodge it himself, so Lu Li just gave Sesame Rice Ball instructions. Unfortunately, Rice Ball was still a little late after hearing what Lu Li said, so he was instantly killed. The surprising death was not Rice Ball, but Moonlight.

“Rice Ball moved too slowly, while Moonlight moved too quickly,” Lu Li said, giving feedback on their movements.

“Why did that happen? I thought I could dodge it successfully.”

Moonlight was feeling a little gloomy. After all, his reaction time and mechanics were not much worse than Lu Li’s. Furthermore, after observing Lu Li’s own movements, he thought that he would dodge successfully.

“Throw Axe is difficult to dodge. Why? It’s because the instant that the Axe leaves the Boss’ hands the Boss can still control the direction of the Axe. If you dodge too quickly, then the Boss simply needs to readjust, which means that you’ll get hit and die. Rice Ball was the complete opposite. By dodging too slowly, Boss didn’t even need to readjust to hit you.”