Chapter 72: Exchanging Cloaks

It would take at least another half an hour for everyone else to arrive. Bored, and with no monsters to farm nearby, he couldn’t just run off to another area to grind and then come back later. All he could do was urge them to hurry up.

“Hurry up, will you? I’ve been waiting so long the flowers have wilted.”

“How much faster can we go? We don’t have mounts. I feel like I’m already running faster than I can fly.”

“Yeah, Wild Wolf Slope is really far.”

“Six-Bar, why don’t you check if the boss is still there? Don’t let us run all this way just to find out it’s gone.”

“No way, right? I’ll go take a look.”

Zhang Shan entered the Wild Wolf Slope map again, took a quick glance at the Wolf King, and exited right away without the urge to test his luck.

“It’s still there. I just checked.”

“Artifact Bro, he was just messing with you. Bosses don’t just wander off. Once they spawn, they stay nearby. They’re not patrol monsters.”

“Damn it, so there are villains in our guild as well.”

Zhang Shan felt a bit vexed; he genuinely worried the boss might escape. On such a huge map, if it ran off, how would they ever find it?

“Heh, Artifact Bro, you’re still too pure.”

“Artifact Bro, make sure you shoot that villain dead later.”

“Isn’t that a bit much?”

Since the Wolf King wouldn’t run, Zhang Shan didn’t check again. He could only browse the forums and quietly wait for the others to arrive.

In less than half an hour, those living nearby started to trickle in.

“What does the Wolf King look like? Is it different from my Little Wolf? I’m going in for a look.”

Ever since taming his pet, Storm Cannon hadn’t stopped showing off. It had been two or three days, and he was still at it.

“Go ahead if you want. The Wolf King hit me for over nine thousand damage. If you’re unlucky and it uses a skill, who knows how much more.”

“Damn, really? Over nine thousand? I think I’ll pass. I’m a squishy with only green-grade cloak and just over five thousand health.”

After reaching level twenty, the weakness of low health for squishy classes became obvious. Previously, with a good cloak, their HP could even surpass a tank’s, but after level twenty, that was no longer possible. For example, Little Secretary had forty thousand HP—even without a cloak, he’d still have twenty or thirty thousand.

Zhang Shan, even with a purple cloak and higher level, couldn’t match the tanks in HP. Currently, almost all squishy classes had only four or five thousand health, while the strength-based classes, with proper gear, easily broke eight thousand. Clearly, squishies needed a good cloak even more; survival was essential for output. Otherwise, get charged by a warrior and you’d be down before you could do any damage.

Storm Cannon summoned his Little Wolf and said to Zhang Shan, “Artifact Bro, look at my Little Wolf. It’s level twenty now, and its attack is higher than mine, ha!”

Please, enough already. Zhang Shan didn’t bother responding. What’s so special about a pet with higher attack than its owner? His Panda Baby’s attack was way higher, but pets attacked so slowly that relying on them for DPS was wishful thinking.

Storm Cannon kept rambling, but no one paid him any attention. Maybe he realized it wasn’t fun anymore because he soon fell silent. Those who arrived early waited quietly for the rest.

Finally, Storm Under Heaven arrived with the last group, bringing their total to fifty, a full and tidy team.

“Everyone has enough large healing potions, right? The Wolf King’s third skill requires us to heal ourselves—there’s no way the supports can keep everyone topped up,” Storm Under Heaven reminded them.

“If you don’t have enough, ask someone else. Don’t end up playing dead after one skill from the Wolf King.”

Zhang Shan checked his bag—he had dozens of large healing potions. His boots also boosted his healing speed, so he should be fine. He walked over to Little Secretary and exchanged cloaks with him.

Little Secretary’s cloak was quite good—a level twenty blue one, adding eight thousand health, definitely top-tier. But compared to Zhang Shan’s purple Priest cloak, the difference was obvious. Especially for Guardian Warriors, with the Heart of the Guardian skill, each extra ten thousand HP on gear was like having twenty thousand more HP themselves. HP-boosting gear showed its true value on Guardian Warriors.

After swapping cloaks with Little Secretary, Storm Under Heaven said, “Everyone good? If so, let’s get ready to head in.”

“Let’s go. Finally, we have the chance to fight a red boss in the wild, and a level thirty one at that, haha!”

“Honestly, we should have planned better today and found a level thirty monster map. We could have hunted other red bosses too.”

“You’re dreaming. You can barely beat a few level thirty mobs, and you want to scour the map for bosses? You’d get mobbed to death.”

“All right, get ready to enter. Little Secretary goes in first, supports follow closely, everyone else enters afterward.”

There’s a slight pause when switching between maps. If too many people go in at once, the lag is worse. That’s why Storm Under Heaven had Little Secretary and the supports go in first—to stabilize aggro on the Wolf King. Once they had the boss under control, the rest could enter safely.

Little Secretary now had nearly sixty thousand health, and with his high defense, the Wolf King would need at least seven or eight hits to take him down, more than enough time for the supports to come in and heal him.

Little Secretary entered Wild Wolf Slope first, the supports right behind, and Zhang Shan’s group followed in turn.

“Whoa, this boss really crits with every hit. So fierce!”

Each time the Wolf King struck Little Secretary, it was a critical hit—there wasn’t a single normal attack, almost as if the crit rate was a hundred percent.

“Guys, did you notice? Not only is every hit a crit, but its attack speed is also way higher than any boss we’ve fought before.”

“No kidding. Hope Little Secretary can tank it. If he goes down, we’re done for.”

“Shut up and focus on your own DPS. Even if you fall, the tank won’t. Don’t tell me you doubt our supports’ healing skills?”

Wind Chime, annoyed, raised her hand and cast Enhanced Rejuvenation, instantly restoring Little Secretary’s health to full.

Enhanced Rejuvenation had an impressive healing capacity, tied directly to the support’s intelligence stat. In theory, as long as their intelligence was high enough, there was no upper limit to the healing. For example, with one hundred intelligence, Enhanced Rejuvenation healed a thousand HP per cast; with a thousand intelligence, it healed ten thousand. As the game progressed and everyone’s main stats increased, healing would only become stronger.

This skill had come at just the right time—Guardian Warriors’ health had grown higher and higher, and basic Rejuvenation could only heal around a thousand per cast. Against powerful bosses, even seven or eight supports couldn’t keep up with the damage.