Chapter 54: Momentary Thoughts Part 2 Part 2

The following pages listed a fair number of special attacks at his disposal:

● Gust Wind

An attack that takes approximately less than one second to perform. A high level iai strike. You get hit by it, you die.

Need to avoid at all cost. But since the cast time is so short, it is almost impossible to do. May need some meat shield for that?

● Lightning Cloud

An attack carried out in a sweeping motion, covering the arena with a clouds filled with lightning. You get hit by it, you die.

It may be possible to avoid the clouds or dodge them if you have high enough Agility.

● Augment Thunder

An attack covering the sword with lightning and then discharging it over a vast area. You get hit by it, you die.

The lightning bolts have homing to some extent and can overlap with each other, so if the players crowd together, they are certainly going to die.

Oi, oi, what the fuck is this? Basically, you get hit by anything, you die instantly! Aren’t his attacks way too broken or something? Is it even possible to defeat this guy?

「Attacks like that that cover a wide area…… I’m not all that good with them……」

「Aren’t the attacks that cover the whole screen a little bit of an overkill?」

「For a Full Dive game the attacks that cover the whole screen are a little much, I admit it. Even “Crap” was devoid of such underhanded tactics.」

Full-screen attacks were now relics of the past. They were quite popular during the 2D gaming era but disappeared shortly after the transition into 3D was made. With Full Dive technology it would be extremely difficult to implement such attacks and made the players avoid them, so they were gradually being downscaled to just your standard long range attacks.

The normal attacks of the boss won’t be that much of a problem. The problem will be his skills, which will be almost impossible to dodge or evade properly. Even if there were some safety ones from them, it would surely be hard for a big group of players to fit into them. We would get wiped out sooner rather than later.

「That’s not all. We also tried to measure the power of his regular attacks and his armor and resistances. It was to no use. We couldn’t even scratch him and we got decimated in an instant……」

「Tactical-Level Special Mechanism “KIRIN”?」

It seems that if enough time has passed since the beginning of the battle, the Gravekeeper would call for an additional weapon to aid him in the fight.

The Tactical-Level Special Mechanism “KIRIN” was a horse-shaped machine that would attack in a way that no normal horse would ever be able to attack: by firing missiles and lasers and its opponents, only to blow up the entire area as its ultimate trump card.

If left alone for long enough, it would eventually merge with the Gravekeeper and then it would be virtually unstoppable.

Fortunately, there was a countermeasure to this merging: if a player jumped on top of the “KIRIN”, it would prioritize shaking that player off and forget about any other processes that would be otherwise happening.

Missiles and lasers…… things that you should never see in any high-fantasy title. Not to mention that the description if this thing was just downright awkward. What do you mean, it can merge with Gravekeeper’s body?

I see…… Hmm, so that would be our strategy, huh?

「Together with Katsu we will take on the Gravekeeper while you keep on stalling the “KIRIN”, right?」

「I concluded that the two of you should be more than adequate at fighting the boss and dodging its attacks. At the very least, your reaction speed is far better than mine.」

「I can understand Sanraku, but why would you want me on the wagon as well?」

「Katsu-kun, surely you are familiar with KabaKura, right?」

「Kabakura?」

Surely he couldn’t have meant a Cabaret Club…… So maybe it was an abbreviation of the game title that was unknown to me? …… I see, so it must be something other than the sh*tty game.

When it comes to being a professional gamer, it is something that anyone can try to do and achieve some results at it, as opposed to boxers or athletes. Not to mention that people from all around the world could give it a go, with games being released all over the world as well.

Among pro gamers, I am fairly sure that sh*tty games were not something you would want to waste your precious time on, the same with your normal, ordinary games. The only thing that counts are those highly competitive games that can be cashed in by the gaming companies.

「I am familiar with it to some extent…… I understand, leave that to me.」

Says Katsu while munching on some sweets and drinking his tea, then assuming a fully ready position.

「But still, aren’t we a little short on people? Why can’t we have at least five people?」

Specifically, I would like to have a magic caster on our team, as well as someone who would be supporting us all. Cleansing the debuffs and casting buffs would be ideal here. But Pencilgton answered me with a bitter smile.

「I can’t blame you for wanting to have someone who would handle both buffs and debuffs. I once tried to beat it with ten people backing me up, but it was another defeat…… No, it was a total defeat.」

Level restrictions, unreasonable boss buffs, additional mobs, insta kills…… There were simply too many factors that were working against the players. There were some special win conditions, but if we were unable to discover what they are, that knowledge was giving us nothing.

「So that leaves me to deal with the boss himself.」

「I will assist you at every occasion, so that our formation won’t collapse. But sadly, I won’t be able to take it on myself.」

Two people frontline sounded like idea of a madman, but if that frontline was to collapse, it would be a total disaster.

「Right, so now that we’ve got that out of the way, let me bring you in on the details……」

「…… That is the basic premise of what we are going to do. With the assumption that the “passage of time” is the victory condition here.」

The Gravekeeper’s attack pattern, characteristics of the field, special attacks and skills…… As we kept on discussing all of those things, the time just passed by.

A specific object from the graveyard’s premises…… We also discussed that maybe something in the graveyard’s mausoleum would be the target, or a specific grave. But at the end of that discussion we dismissed that possibility, since none of us would have the endurance needed to run all the way there while dodging the Gravekeeper’s attacks. And then I suddenly remembered something.

「Ahh, that’s right. Right now I am in a party with an NPC. What should I do about that?」

「You mean that bunny that SF-Zoo lass was so obsessed about?」

「It must be nice to have something as nice and unique like that. I would like to have something like that as well.」

Katsu says while looking into his Player’s Book again.

「Hmm…… Yup, it will be better if I temporarily remove him from the party.」

NPCs do not respawn.

Even though I thought that those words had some hidden meaning behind them, Pencilgton’s words managed to leave a lasting impression on me.