Chapter 977 Eldrian's First Official Dungeon (4) - The Stronghold



Not wanting to let his embarrassment show, Eldrian asked, "Well, shall we continue on? I didn't kill all the undead, you know?"

His attack had been flashy, incredibly so. It had also halved the number of the undead, but Eldrian hadn't been able to actually kill them all. 

The Cage ability was strong, but it wasn't the most powerful AOE ability he could call upon. TempestChase, Crystoi's AOE ability, was better for sheer area slaying. After all, it was a movable tornado with a massive inherent area of effect. 

Incinerate might also have been better, in fact, with all Eldrian's training, it might have been far better to use it. However, there were risks to tapping into lifeforce spells. As Eldrian had learned over the past months. 

Still, in terms of mana efficiency, Cage was unbeatable. Each beam costs only 250MP to summon and 250MP to jump. And each jump also recharged the energy in the attack.

While the attack didn't consume mana per undead killed, that didn't mean the beams could kill all undead in its path. 

The beam was able to dish out 3k holy damage in total per charge. However, since the holy element deals 5x damage to all undead, that number jumps to 15k. And with most lower undead having 500HP or less, very few beams didn't complete their journey. 

Basically, at minimum, each beam could kill 30 higher-tier lower undead or just under 100 lower-tiered ones. 

However, Eldrian had focused on the more troublesome enemies. Flaming Reanimates, ghouls, revenants, and so forth. As a result, the beams had periodically ran out of mana and disappeared mid-journey. 

Which highlighted one massive downside of the ability. Eldrian couldn't make the jumps between the focal points too large, or his attack wouldn't complete its journey and it wouldn't make a proper cage.

The beams also traveled in a straight line, meaning it was relatively easy to avoid if you were fast enough. 

Sure, Eldrian could shift the focal point to make them a curve. But that was harder said than done, considering there were 6 focal points and Eldrian had kept 12 beams jumping between them at all times. 

Still, he had killed all the dense pockets of undead, most of the higher-grade undead, and also all the ones who had been manning the siege weapons. Honestly, the range of his attack was the most impressive part. 

"Did you all hear that!?" Therdul shouted, he was the first to recover from the shock. "Time to show everyone what we're made of!"

Naturally, the guild was streaming their dungeon attempt. And, as they had expected, they had millions of viewers. After all, this was the first attempt (with any chance of success) at an Epic difficulty dungeon. 

While Therdul shouted this and got the players to charge the disorganized undead survivors, he turned to Eldrian and asked, "Why didn't you kill them all?"

"Look, I wanted to," Eldrian said, sighing and shaking his head as he did. "But it isn't that easy. I ran out of mana, actually."

"Seriously? You?" Therdul hadn't expected that answer. 

"Yeah, but I killed over 1k skeletons and zombies, and like 300 Unwilling. There were several revenants too."

Hearing that, Therdul grimaced. Revenants were a pain to fight. They were super sturdy, took hardly any damage from physical attacks and a half from magical ones, and had a ton of HP. 

That Eldrian could add such a monster to his list was impressive.  "So, what now?"

"Ah, no worries. I'll recover my mana quickly, and if need be, I have some mana crystals on me." Eldrian replied.

Willo could also give Eldrian a boost of mana. It wasn't listed as one of its main abilities, but it did have a magic crystal (artificial) as its core. Though it was hidden from view in mace form.

The magic crystal was why Willo's abilities were so mana efficient. And it also meant Eldrian had like a 100k MP battery in hand. 

The cleanup went smoothly. Everyone in the guild was efficient at taking down undead monsters by this point. Not to mention almost everyone in this raiding party was Tier 5.

Those who couldn't use holy magic simply used healing spells or fire. While they were less effective than the holy element, they still dealt 2x or 2,5x damage. 

Very few players actually attempted to kill zombies and skeletons with their weapons outright. 

"Right, how long until the next wave?" Eldrian asked once the cleanup was done. 

"Normally, they come every 2 or 4 hours," Elizabeth answered. They and around 50 of the most elite players were moving into the forest. The rest were left behind at the fort to ensure it didn't fall. After all, if it did, their dungeon attempt would be considered a failure. 

"Normally?" Judith asked. 

"Yeah. Normally it takes over an hour to kill the horde and defend the fort. Us taking only 10 minutes might change things around."

"Oh..."

"Do we know where the undead stronghold is?" Eldrian asked. 

"Yeah, it isn't as far as it was in... the past?" Nikki replied. "It should take us just half an hour if we keep our current pace."

Naturally, the group wasn't walking. They weren't sprinting either, but rather jogging at a relative pace. Which, was still faster than normal people could sprint.

Even those who specialized only in a single class, be it mage or warrior, had an agility value of 250 at the minimum. 

Sadly, on their way, they had to kill a few dozen hordes of about half a thousand undead. While those fights went quickly, it still slowed them down significantly.

Eldrian used Willo to dispatch any undead in a single hit. Flaming Reanimates and ghouls included.  The only ones who managed to survive the first hit were the revenants. But their armor would be dented and a second attack would bring forth their deaths.

Thus, even hordes with several revenants didn't stand much chance before them. 

It was as the group neared the stronghold that they had to pause. Apparently, a proper horde had been on their way to the fort. Several thousand undead had rushed fort from the gates. 

Why there was a fort for the undead to use, no one in the party knew.

It didn't match what had happened in reality, but there it was. Though it did match the description of a stronghold pretty well. A black-walled fort about half the size of Fort Pyknos.

It had a nice classic evil look to it; what with the sharp-triangle-shaped crenellations and so forth. 

"Oh, seems the devils are also closing in on us," Eldrian commented casually. Upon his mumbling, the others looked around warily. 

Sadly, the map search functions didn't work in dungeons. So players had to rely on their normal scouting abilities. 

"How do you know?" Elizabeth asked. 

"Sensed them," Eldrian replied. It would take too long to explain, but he had gotten several titles and some of them allowed him to sense the corruption that made devils, well... devils. 

If he really tried, he could sort of see their corrupted souls. But even if he didn't, he could tell that whatever they were masquerading as wasn't their true selves. 

When they tried to mimic the undead, they felt far too corrupt. The feeling they gave Eldrian was closer to a revenant or some other higher undead, even though they tried to show themselves as a skeleton or zombie. 

"Yeah, that one. That one, that one..." Eldrian said, pointing out all the undead in the horde who were devils in disguise. 

Normally, these devils would wait and try to trick players within the fort as NPCs or other players. But, well, their group had made it to the undead stronghold in less than an hour.