Chapter 62

[Cast: Adjusting Coefficient of Friction]

“Hmm, what are you doing?”

Even with my casting, the knight snorted dismissively and didn’t care.

So it turns out that this level of magic isn’t sufficient to knock him down.

Whether it’s good balance or the armor is well-treated with mana resistance, it didn’t matter much either way.

After all, I had cast in another place as well.

“Nyahhhhh!”

Adella broke free from the knight’s grasp and tumbled to the ground.

If I grab her ankle now, it would feel like trying to hold onto something slippery.

Once Adella crawled back towards me, she caught her breath.

“Heh… Heh. Are they really going to team up like this?”

As the knight raised his great sword from his waist, Adella swallowed hard.

It seemed she had already been hit by that sword swing once.

With her ankle twisted, Adella had no value as a combatant.

In the end, time was running out, and I found myself faced with the worst situation of having to deal with twenty on my own.

To make matters worse, Adella had even given the enemies time to regroup.

I quickly started to think.

Could I use the terrain to my advantage?

There wasn’t none, but the guards would likely be more accustomed to this area.

There were twenty of them, but an all-around attack was impossible.

I couldn’t rule out the possibility of skirmishers.

Although it was unreliable, I had to rely on Adella.

“You won’t survive even if you surrender.”

The knight spoke in a low tone.

“I didn’t expect to.”

I quickly thought of usable weapons around me.

‘A twig? No, that’s too weak. A rock? It’s useless if it gets blocked by armor.’

Just then, I noticed Adella’s necklace shining in the moonlight.

“I’ll borrow this.”

“Eh? No! That’s mine!”

I yanked her necklace and tossed all the beads to the ground.

If it’s made of this necklace’s thread, I should at least be able to subdue them.

“That witch is a magician! Don’t give her time to cast!”

The guards wouldn’t relinquish their first strike either.

The ground shook.

A gust of dirt swept through.

The knights charged in recklessly at a terrifying speed.

Two blades aimed diagonally at my shoulder.

I had deliberately shown a gap.

[Cast: Rapid Cooling]

The thread from the necklace stiffened.

I split the thread in half and shot it toward the knights’ helmets.

“Ah! My vision!”

Well-trained knights won’t change the sword path they set.

Bending one knee to lower his stance, he effortlessly evaded the two threads.

One thread successfully pierced an eye, taking a knight out of the battle, while the other merely obscured his vision.

However, even when pulling threads in this humid environment close to minus 150 degrees, I couldn’t clear the frost clinging to the knight’s helmet.

Fortunately, there was a sharp rock behind me.

Surrounding my foot with as much aura as possible, I kicked the knight, seized the sword from another moaning knight.

Just as I thought I would only get hurt by the rock, the guard staggered around and tumbled over the edge.

Are you stupid? What kind of AI is this?

[Remnant Observatory Guards (1/20)]

“…Alright, now it’s fair.”

Was there no spear? Thankfully, there wasn’t.

If the concepts from reality applied even in virtual reality games, then three swordsmen were not enough to take down one spearmen.

It’s a fact often overlooked because of games or movies, but reach was crucial in combat situations.

On the contrary, a magician wielding a sword becomes a dangerous entity even from close range, allowing for psychological warfare from this side.

I checked the priest’s skills.

[Beginner Heal lv.1: Restores 160 health over 4 seconds.]

[MP Cost: 30, Cooldown: 20 seconds]

[Acceleration lv.1: Grants 20% movement speed and 15% additional attack speed for 5 seconds.]

[MP Cost: 50, Cooldown: 15 seconds]

It was far too poor a skill to directly participate in combat.

[Please select a weapon suitable for your class.]

[Current Penalty: Attack Power -50%, Defense -50%]

When I picked up a sword, my penalties also activated.

I hadn’t looted a single weapon usable by a priest up to this point.

This must be due to the exploration difficulty being 10.

However, the loopholes in the system could be thought of creatively.

Separating the blade and hilt with aura, I then cut them vertically to make two pieces.

[Cast: Adjusting Thermal Conductivity]

[Cast: Soldering]

I fused the two blades onto the back of my hand.

[Penalty removed.]

As expected, the weapon’s criteria for holding disappeared.

It felt reminiscent of some warrior from an old game.

Using the blades affixed with aura, I fashioned a sword intent.

The health I dropped from my skin being damaged was manageable with the priest’s skills.

“It’s been a while, so I may not be able to move my body as I want.”

* * *

Just as there are normal strategy guides, it was natural to have nightmare-specific guides as well.

While their passion overflowed, their arena scores seemed to rise very slowly, the guides written by rankers offering them a glimmer of hope.

With thousands or hundreds of thousands of guides in the community, when asked what class is recommended for beginners, they would all say tankers in unison.

Just the benefit of being able to recover from mistakes was sufficient.

Even if they botched the strategy, it was a valuable class that could come back to life after defeat.

Shield knights, blood knights, dark knights, paladins, etc., were what one might call rice bowl characters — guaranteed at least tier 2 in any arena meta.

However, there was always a draw towards damage dealers over tankers.

Those who had become somewhat accustomed to nightmare began to seek out damage dealers.

While they guaranteed tremendous firepower in arenas, the difficulty of clearing grew exponentially, making mages and archers classes that only the chosen few could possess.

What about healers?

Healers didn’t need strategies.

At least up until now.

Due to balance issues with healers in the arena, the developers of “Multiverse of Arceria,” Weirsoft, ended up raising the single-player difficulty for healers.

As clears weren’t happening, the actual pick rate for healers fell, and with arena balance back to chaos, the opinions of a few users who had healers as their main were disregarded, making it a successful plan.

Due to longer game play times, no one had written strategies regarding changing boss patterns.

Only the complete strategy for the shaman (Nightmare 3/3/3) could be found in the highest score brackets.

But after ‘DaeSal’ raised the paladin (Nightmare 8/6/7) ranking, healers were divided into two classes.

Healers capable of physical attacks and those whose attacks were all magical.

The former broke through tier 1, achieving tier 0, while the latter settled at tier 5 through repeated patches.

Why did this change occur?

The answer lay in the infinite use of the second-circle spell ‘Tissue Regeneration’ through dimensional descent scrolls.

Using all MP for casting magic allowed maintaining the paladin’s health at maximum while defeating the boss mob one after another through countless thrust attacks that didn’t consume mana.

Thus emerged the ‘final character’ with combat power of 100,000.

Implying a character that no longer needed leveling up, those who had even one final character that worked in challenges were envied by everyone in the “Moon of Arceria.”

‘DaeSal’ had once wasted two weeks trying to clear the 8/6/7 difficulty in the paladin class to raise the score to 8/7/7.

This reckless challenge, in the hope of wanting to lead healers from the forefront even if it meant giving up on this arena score.

It was common knowledge that for the priest, lacking any physical offensive options, clearing 10/10/10 difficulty was impossible.

Moreover, since Noname was new to “Moon of Arceria,” I was about to advise that it would be better to create a new character.

However, the performance Noname displayed was unbelievably brilliant and original.

As she swiftly dispatched two knights, the eighteen comrades lost their rationality and charged in.

Noname did not retreat.

She didn’t respond to every swing of their swords.

She dodged the vertically coming strikes and redirected the horizontally approaching ones, crossing them with her allies’ charged paths.

As swords collided, the battlefield turned into chaos without distinction between friend and foe.

Even as the body of a guard killed by his own sword collapsed, another guard charged in aggressively.

They had lost their reason, driven solely by the instinct to tear Noname apart.

Even with two or three guards, or even when there were ten, this was something I hadn’t realized.

But Noname held her ground steadfastly.

She was someone capable of utilizing her small and agile frame.

She didn’t use [Acceleration] when evading attacks.

With movements akin to instinct, if not foresight, she countered the swords aiming to slice her.

Only at the precise moment her brutal sword intent pierced the guard did her skill activate, and the sword gained acceleration.

Not stopping there, during the cooldown of her skill, she swung her sword while flawlessly casting a magic circle with her other hand.

[1st Circle Advanced Casting: Granting Polar Coordinates]

At the moment it seemed she would be struck by a dreadful strike, Noname reversed the opponent’s sword path by 180 degrees.

It was the perfect timing to deal with a nimble prey, and the knight’s explosive aura on the sword became a blunder.

Boom!

With a loud explosion, thick smoke surged.

[Remnant Observatory Guards (20/20)]

[Perfect Clear!]

This is absurd!

Was the priest originally such a character?

Her play was far beyond mere creativity.

DaeSal couldn’t help but think that this fact needed to be shared in the community.

[World of Arceria Gallery – Healer Class]

[Challenging Nightmare 10/10/10 as a Nakzaks Priest]

Author: Save the Graduate Student

Just broke through the Observatory courtyard.

(Perfect Clear photo of Observatory Guard.jpg)

– If the viewer count is 500, then it’s not that easy to be a scrappy player.

“Nah, the viewers for “Moon of Arceria” are basically just me, right? This person originally played LoL (female).”

“If she’s a girl, then I gotta watch, haha!”

– What’s this? There’s no way she hacked, how did she make it through with full health?

“Damn it, you’ve gotta come watch!”

“Link point.”

“ipfs://www.twish.ch/noname”

– “DaeSal,” stop streaming and post your paladin guide!

“If you watch Nakzaks, I might consider it.”

[What is this guy?]

(Video of inserting a sword into the arm.mp4)

“Are you a zealot or something?”

– Hahaha! How was that even done?

– Hahaha! As soon as her health dropped, she instantly triaged it back up!

“Isn’t this insane? No matter how much of a game it is, it’s too brutal for me to follow along.”

“Naturally burning flesh without hesitation.”

– The character design is really pretty, is it homemade?”

[Adella, you did it again today]

0 Kills 0 Deaths 39 Assists

Simply GOAT.

“Must be Adella, I really want to smash her, haha!”

– Most didn’t even get an assist, though?

“Just think of it as such, I’m a regular contributor.”

– Where did she get her character design? It’s so pretty.

[I’ve never seen a priest clear 10/10/10 before]

Is the perfect clear of the observatory real?

“Seriously, the host has a brilliant fighting style, right?”

“What was she doing? She’s a crazy skilled player in “Moon of Arceria”!”

“When I went, I don’t even remember her doing that.”

“In terms of League of Legends, she’d be number one in Korea, having played over 50,000 games!”

– That casting speed of magic doesn’t seem human; am I the only one feeling this?

“The last part went by so fast that I have no idea what it was.”

“Casting two spells at the same time? This is not bearable.”

– The last part seemed like “shew…buel…” upper-level casting, the scroll and runes were the same…

“Elder, you can’t use the word scroll.”

“Notice it, you pathetic little bastard.”

– No, I’m asking where she got her character design; I also want to try and create one.