911 Beach Landing

The System noted an anomaly within one of the Nian Dungeon Instance and immediately checked up on the Elder Pandarens. It discovered that they happened to be the first group to encounter the Nian Boss despite many of the others still struggling to find it in their own dungeon instance.

"System wishes to query. Is that anomaly User's way of helping the Pandarens promote into Pandawans?" The System asked blatantly.

"You wanted them to rise, right?" Jin smirked as if he did not do much to their dungeons. "Obviously, I cannot do anything too direct since people are watching the live streams in the Cinema theatre shophouse. So I figured I'd just give their motorboat engine a nice little boost."

"Too bad that the axle to turn the handle was a little faulty because of seawater, you know? Probably the reason why it broke when the speed became too immense, leaving them no other choice but to move straight or wherever the boat brought them. Fortunately, their NPC was clever enough to put up a barrier, not bad for an AI, eh System." Jin narrated the event as he knew that it was not the usual protocol for the AIs to be creative enough and handle environmental objects. (Or at least not yet.)

A look into their settings had revealed to Jin that the Artificial Intelligences for those two individuals had been tweaked so that they would be more aware of the scenario they were in. (Was a certain crafty fox's behaviour be rubbing off on the two?)

While the three Elder Pandarens found themselves in direct confrontation with the boss of the dungeon, other cultivators were still fighting against the mini-bosses and minions within this Nian Dungeon Instance. The story of this particular dungeon instance was surprisingly simple when compared to the rest of Jin's dungeon instances. Following the compass, the cultivators should have reached an island village ravaged by Nian and its underlings.

On arrival, they would have to fend off the current attack against the village's remaining guards. Afterwards, the surviving guards would offer them side quests which would help them take on the main quest provided by the Village Leader which revolved around killing the Nian. This was the first even for dungeon instances as cultivators and dungeon suppliers knew how hard it was to create a main questline within an instance.

Much less the expectations of side quests accompanying the main questline.

However, Jin had the System taking care of the heavy work, so with his accumulated experience in creating dungeons, he was finally able to create the very first set of side quests. It entailed a fairly interesting story that would also explain the origins of Nian itself. And if the cultivators managed to pass the side quests, they had the chance to fight the Nian during these occasions, allowing them to injure the New Year Beast a little, before they would have a final showdown.

As long as they managed to crash it against Nian head-on with their boat which Jin believe that would be their current course of action, the damage they raked in on the boss would be comparable to the average amount of damage done in that series of side quests.

While Jing Yu was not privy of such understanding about the situation, she and her friends also understood that letting their boat crash into Nian might be their safest and best chance to score the first strike. After all, if they were to be left entrenched on the shore, the Nian might take the opportunity to hit them first when they were not even in a basic formation at all.

Still, if their plan succeeded, they might even have a chance to spread out and follow up on the attack. Nevertheless, it was a gamble as they had no idea of. The Pandarens had thoughts running through their head such as the NPC Guardian having problems fighting Nian on the unstable footing of the washed up beach. And it would be even worse if they were to lose any one of their members before the dungeon actually started.

Thus, with quick thinking, the Hungry Condor cultivator used her blades that were tied with high-quality fabrics. Those fabrics were capable of withstanding the strength of dozens of cultivators by utilising her chi. She then threw them towards Nian, but instead of flying straight towards it, they appeared to each miss their mark. However, just like a boomerang those cloth tied blades ended up returning, allowing Tanke and Zi Dan to grab hold of them.

The NPC Panda Guardian used its mouth to hold onto the cloth firmly while Zi Dan stabbed the blade into the boat. "No matter what! This boat is going to smash into you- You little fat ugly cat!" Xia Mao taunted it. The trio could see that Nian tried to remove the cloth that had surrounded its torso while being dragged closer to the shoreline.

Just like the Devil Santa, the Nian was a Boss monster designed with the capability of learning. When the cultivators would inevitably find one tactic and try to abuse it, it would only take a matter of time until the Nian would adapt to it forcing the cultivators to think of something else if they wanted a relatively ease clear. On the flip side, it meant that thinking out of the box would help the cultivators immensely.

The Nian had no concept of the physics of the boat speeding towards it. In fact, the Demon Lion mistook it for something similar to a living thing flying towards it skirting on the water's surface at top speeds.

Jing Yu's cloth continued to shrink in size, preventing the Nian from dodging out of the vehicle's path. Nian kept on roaring and producing soundwaves that would interrupt the dungeoneers' sense of hearing, but the boat continued to approach it like some sort of homing missile.

Although the trio was distraught by the deafening attack, they continued to hold until the boat finally got out of the sea and onto the beach. Now, Jing Yu pulled the cloth that wrapped around Nian towards her. She did not care if it broke during the process. As long as it could buy them a few precious seconds so that the boat could have a direct impact against Nian, it would be worth it.

*BAM!*

Not just the pointed edge, but the entire length of the boat smashed into Nian as it tried to escape from the wrapped cloth around it. At that point, Zi Dan, who was sent flying out of the boat, unsheathed his chain ball mace and used his chi to send it flying, aiming for one of its eyes.

After the boat had smashed onto Nian, it flinched for a moment, causing it to lower its guard and that allowed Zi Dan's attack to critically hit. The loss of an eye bought the rest of the team some additional time as they were sent flying all around the beachhead to regroup.

"Stay behind me! I will taunt the beast!" Tanke announced as he took his shield from his back and started to screech at Nian while banging his shield with a one-handed warhammer. 

The beast was furious after the injury it had just received and was out for revenge, but with a successful first hit, the trio picked themselves up and readied their weapons once more for the next part of the battle.