The Great Thief

There was a match in the afternoon, but there wasn’t too much pressure, so Lu Li didn’t bother resting and continued on with the next Boss.

The Undead Plague dog Gluth was obediently sitting in Naxxramas, waiting for his master’s orders.

He was a mutated, sutured monster and was known as ‘two-dog’. This Undead guard dog was protecting the last door in the Abomination Zone. His appetite couldn’t be satisfied with some pet biscuits, as it was unusual like his huge body. Rumour had it that Gluth could swallow an Undead army and the rotten flesh to repair its own.

In their battle with him, the adventurers were about to experience the ‘appetite’ of two-dog.

The Cursed Church were the representatives of the Scourge in the living world. These slaves retained the appearance of living beings, but their hearts were completely corrupted as Undead. If it weren’t for Kel’Thuzad ordering them to live in the living world, these guys would definitely commit suicide in exchange for eternal immortality.

Members of the Cursed Church didn’t just exist among the humans. They were in Orgrimmar, Darnassus and Steel Stove Castle too. They were among the merchants, the officials, the military and the mercenaries, quietly awaiting the arrival of the Lich King Arthas.

Arthas had absorbed all the memories of Ner’zhul and knew of Azeroth’s past. Acquiring Ragnaros the Firelord’s strength was one of his top priorities. However, to acquire the strength of the elements, you had to first understand them. As such, Kel’Thuzad instructed his Cursed Disciples to live among the mercenaries. When a Mercenary Group defeated the Molten Core, they were to steal as much knowledge of the elementals as possible. They had infiltrated Nefarian’s Lair and even got the secrets of Chromaggus and Broodlord Lashlayer.

When Kel’Thuzad saw the molten cub and Nefarian’s gene fusion technology, a brilliant idea popped into his evil mind.

He used Grobbulus to synthesise a new plague and injected it into the poor molten cub. After a week of mutation, an incomparably big and fierce Undead dog was born.

However, this new creature had a fatal weakness because the mutation had caused its bones and muscles to be quite fragile. As such, it couldn’t be used on the battlefield as a weapon. So, Kel’Thuzad gave it a new ability so that its appetite would never be satisfied and kept it as the Naxxramas’ famous Scourge gatekeeper.

Fighting two-dog was not easy, as its normal attacks were quite strong and it had very unusual skills.

The skill that it used most often was a debuff that reduced healing effects by 10%, and could be stacked. This was similar to the first Boss of the Ahn’Qiraj Ruins. Because of this, Lu Li arranged to have two Main Tanks take the debuff in turns. If they only had one tank, then they would definitely lose.

If you assumed that going Berserk was every Boss’ trump card, then Gluth would prove you wrong.

This Boss would go Berserk once every 10 seconds.

Fortunately, this Berserk could be dispelled by a Hunter’s Tranquilizing Shot. As long as there were Hunters on the team, there wouldn’t be many issues. Lu Li’s team had three Hunters – Remnant Dream, Bearded Zaza and Peerless City’s Vegetarian Mosquito.

Vegetarian Mosquito had been on standby for a long time and now finally had the chance to enter the Instance Dungeon.

Lu Li couldn’t just leave people on standby forever either, even if their PVE damage output was a little worse. Even if Vegetarian Mosquito and the other players weren’t needed, he would occasionally bring them in so they would have an opportunity to gain some equipment.

The third skill was a summoning skill. Two-dog would summon zombies in three areas.

The zombies had a debuff that was applied when they attacked. This debuff increased physical damage taken by 100 and could be stacked.

Lu Li’s team had been wiped several times because of these zombies. If it was just one debuff, it would have only been 100 extra damage. However, if they were stacked, then the damage would quickly start adding up.

“Don’t bother killing the zombies. Mosquito, can you kite them around?” Lu Li asked.

At this time, the usefulness of a PVP Hunter could be demonstrated. Neither Remnant Dream nor Bearded Zaza were particularly skilled at kiting, at least not compared to a professional player. Vegetarian Mosquito nodded confidently, but he did have some concerns.

“If they are attacked while I am kiting them, I won’t be able to hold onto them.”

“Here is a potion that can increase your aggro. Just drink that,” Lu Li said as he took out a new potion. This wasn’t something he had purchased from the Exchange Hall, but was one of Cold Chill’s new works. It was intended to reinforce the Main Tank’s aggro so that the other players wouldn’t steal it away.

With this potion, Vegetarian Mosquito’s job was made much simpler.

However, the mobs weren’t always being pulled away. As the number of monsters kept increasing, there was a greater chance that Vegetarian Mosquito would make a mistake.

Two-dog’s fourth skill was called Decimate and was cast once every two minutes. All the players and monsters in the room would have their HP set to 5% and all Aggro would be reset, even those being pulled by Vegetarian Mosquito. The monsters had to be killed quickly, otherwise, they would run to the Boss and be devoured by him. Each monster that two-dog swallowed would grant him 5% HP.

At least this still was balanced, and eating the monsters didn’t grant him full HP.

The last skill was an area-of-effect Fear, which was cast once everyone 20 seconds. It had a 20-yard range, but a Shaman’s Tremor Totem or a Priest’s Dispel could deal with it.

These skills seemed to be manageable, but when they actually faced them, they realized it wasn’t so simple. They were wiped quite a few times, and it took them until noon before they finally killed two-dog.

“Quickly distribute the items so you can take a break before the competition,” Lu Li instructed, breathing a sigh of relief.

“Can we watch the competition together?” Azure Sea Breeze asked. The reason he didn’t participate in PVP wasn’t because he didn’t enjoy it, but because he wasn’t good at it. Even so, he still liked spectating the matches.

“What do you mean? There is nothing for you to watch. We’ll keep going with the Instance Dungeon. Sky Moon, you can be the commander. I hope that you’ll be able to defeat the next Boss while we fight this match.”

They were trying to get the First Clear, so there was no time to watch the match.

The match wasn’t even between the top 100 yet, so there was nothing to see.

“Shameless Lu…” Azure Sea Breeze muttered, but didn’t oppose it.

Remnant Dream quickly looted the equipment. There was one valuable gem among the two – it increased physical attack and had Life-Steal properties. This was taken by Moonlight. The other gem was a Shadow Damage gem for Magic professions. Sesame Rice Ball negotiated with Kitty Likes Meat and took it for himself.

The equipment was actually decent. The first Epic equipment was Gluth’s Missing Collar. It was an exquisite defensive necklace and would increase Azure Sea Breeze’s defense by one point overall.

In fact, this could also be used in PVP, as its damage reduction effect was quite powerful.

Berserkers dealt more damage when they were on lower HP. If a Berserker had this necklace, they would be able to deal high damage for a longer period of time, which had the potential to turn matches around.