A white “aging” curse light appeared on top of the blue Udal beast’s head. Suddenly, its movement became so slow that no effective attack could be made. Abel knew as well. Even if the spiritual guardian knights had the support of Bruce’s spiritual qi light ring, it would still be impossible to block the chain of attacks of this blue Udal beast. So it was his priority to prevent as many attacks as possible.
Of course, since there were eleven spiritual guardian knights, they could barricade in front of the blue udal beast. The spiritual guardian knights could only block two directions. Since the remaining two had the grey bear and Bruce in the way, there was no point in worrying whatsoever.
After executing several rounds of the “vengeance” technique, Bruce committed a “shield attack” that made a blue Udal beast faint. Abel could only see the last two “bone walls” in his path. The hell creatures were much stronger than he was expecting. The blue Udal beast’s strength also far exceeded his expectations. From his experience, the beast should possess the “skin hardening” ability. Other than that, after having its attack rate severely reduced, the spiritual guardian knights, grey bear, and Bruce all generated more “damage deepening” curse on top of its head. The blue Udal beast had a special curse, from what it looked like. Also, since it was moving so fast, Abel assumed that it also possessed a special quickening.
The blue Udal beast possessed a minimum of three hell enhancement abilities. It was no wonder it could hold on for this long after enduring this kind of attack. But he couldn’t wait any longer. Once the number of combatants increased, his whole team would have suffered severe injuries. This was when he switched on the portal energy that was inside his own spirit. This was his most powerful singular attack. It was capable of ending one target with one hit.
Very quickly, the portal power followed his power of the Will and flew to the front of the blue Udal beast. There were enemies on all sides. The blue Udal beast had no ways of dodging, so the portal power just went through its front and flew from the attack. The hit was lethal. Soon, the beast stopped struggling and let its body fall to the ground.
Abel started to see a shallow, dark shadow and a golden sphere flying into the Horadric Cube in his right arm. He sighed long and hard, and at the same time, the last bone wall had just been broken through. At the front was the Udal beast that was extraordinarily fast. At the back were many, many hell creatures that were at least several hundred in numbers.
Abel made the decision just then. If he was to confront these hell creatures, there was no telling that many of his spiritual guardian knights and spiritual guardian wizards would be lost. Even his own safety couldn’t be guaranteed if he tried to do that. This was not the first and second area of the two continents. He had no ways of casting area attacks here with his spells. This was the third area. One bad move, one moment of complacency, was enough for him to drown in danger.
For his own safety, he decided that he couldn’t go into a melee attack. He couldn’t blend himself into a mob fight, either. These hell creatures were too alert. Just being discovered by the blue Udal beast was triggering all of them to start chasing after him.
His decision had to be quick. Abel wrapped his power of the Will around all the summon creatures and contract creatures. Then, with an “instantaneous movement” spell appearing in his hands, he brought his summons 400 meters towards the inferno furnace was. It wasn’t like he could move more than that. The environment here was just too harsh for him to carry all of his companions safely with him.
Once he stopped casting his “instantaneous movement,” Abel made decided to quickly scan the area with his power of Will. He wanted to find a spot so he could have his grey bear defending him at the front. Basically, he needed some protection to cast his long-range attacks from behind.
When the hell creatures were directing themselves to go after the combat team, Abel, again, wrapped his power of the Will around his summons. They appeared on the offering altar of the inferno furnace. The altar was a tall platform made of stones. There was lava drawn in the middle and a metal board standing at the very center. He didn’t know what this board was made of. On one side of the altar, there was a stone statue depicting images of hell. The other three sides were staircases. He could only reach the top by walking on these.
And so he did. As small as the altar was, it was enough to contain Abel and all his summons. He directed his grey bear, Bruce, and Frankenstein to defend each of the staircases. The grey bear was a meatshield himself, so it wouldn’t be that hard to defend the bottom spot. Bruce, too, was a mad knight proven to have defensive and offensive capabilities with his melee attacks. Frankenstein was a bit of a reluctant choice. He didn’t feel good having just one law-defying wizard guarding this staircase, but there wasn’t really another candidate for this. It wasn’t that bad, to be honest. Frankenstein had the body of a steel puppet, so if he were paying a bit more attention, maybe it would’ve just held on for more than he expected.
Abel was standing at the very center. Beside him were the spiritual guardian knight and the spiritual guardian wizard. By this point, the spiritual guardian knights had already changed into the bow “harmonious wind.” To increase the survivability of the combat team, he even went as far as to summon his “wise oak.”
Once everything was set up, the hell creatures came over to them. Apart from Hephastos, which was the most obvious one to spot, the Udal beast looked much stronger than the regular ones. The rest seemed to be just protectors of Hephastos. There were some wowheads the size of a sheep on the side, but he wasn’t so worried. This was a hell creature meant to engage in close-distance combat. The only thing he had to worry about was spawning miniature versions of themselves. As easy as it was to kill them, the number could get very overwhelming if left unchecked.
Abel was most concerned about the inferno knights with “white bone armor” on them. These were true long-distance casters. Both the range and the attack capability were impressive on their own.
Once the fight began, the Udal beasts made it as fast as possible to rush to the side of the altar. They were responsible for engaging in close-distance combat. With their giant arms, they charged towards the grey bear, Bruce, and Frankenstein at all three of the staircases.
Both the grey bear and Bruce guarded the wave quite well, but Frankenstein fainted immediately. Abel had no choice but to shake his head. There was just too much of a gap between close-range and long-range attackers. Even if the long-distance attackers had, in the case of Frankenstein, an indestructible body, there was still no way that it could last any time in close-range combat.
So Abel continued to throw the “aging” curse. He was slowing down all the curses of any nearby hell creatures. At the same time, the five inferno knights commenced their attacks. There were fireballs, iceballs, and poison balls flying in his direction.
The spiritual guardian knights were the first to blockade these attacks. What worried Abel was that each attack took more than half of the life points of the spiritual guardian knights. This meant that only two hits would be required to kill them. The spiritual guardian knights shouldn’t be that weak. There was just no way. With rank 29 “command skeleton” as the buff, and rank 29 “summon resistance” to boost elemental resistance, and the life force enhancement of the “wise oak,” this was already way beyond their supposed limits. They were still not as good as the grey bear and Bruce, but they were not to be underestimated in the vast majority of his fights.
Still, the druid spirit would never allow any spiritual guardian knights to die. As long as there was no one killing blow dealt, the “full recovery vitality potion” could always be supplied to boost them back. At this point, Abel no longer cherished the “full recovery vitality potion” as much as he was doing before. He had his own garden and free elven laborers to work on these. His potion ingredients were lacking, so he decided to use as many potions as he had when the situation required it.
Or so that was the idea. These five inferno knights were dealing way too much damage. He told his spiritual guardian knights to dodge, even withdraw to save up the number of potions required. After he did, the Udal beasts had already surrounded the entire altar. The five inferno knights had no longer any inferno creatures around them. The elven spiritual guardian knights disappeared from the altar and appeared right beside the inferno knights.
Suddenly, Bruce switched on his “faith” spiritual qi light ring and reduced the defense and elemental resistance of all surrounding hell creatures. Eleven streaks of “lightning chain” flew amidst them. Frankenstein cast a “blizzard” in front of his view. Every hell creature was supposed to be slowed down and sustain freezing damage.
Without the long-distance threat of the inferno knights, Abel made preparations to turn on his combat mode. Given that most hell creatures had extremely high resistance against fire, he went ahead and cast “ice sealing balls” with two of his hands. Constantly, there would be crystal blue spheres flying towards the inferno creatures and shooting outward in midair.
The first to fall was the Udal beast right in front of Bruce. After receiving too many spell hits, this particular beast fell on the ground after the three consecutive “vengeance” attacks.
Abel’s eyes were fixed on the Udal beast on the ground. Because of how sturdy these hell creatures were, they just became the perfect agent for activating “corpse explosion.” Very quickly, a “corpse explosion” spell rune appeared in his hand and transferred a death qi that was guided through. After that, the Udal beast’s body started undergoing extreme change, and the fire element continued to bounce around until there was eventually a loud, deafening bang.
Due to the influence of the explosion, many of the weaker hell creatures nearby were killed very quickly. However, Abel didn’t stop there. As long as there were more corpses, he could always continue with his rampage. Rank 29 corpse explosion was a terrifying thing to mess with. Because of how effective and easily replicable this method was, priests used them as the main offensive choice even when they reached an advanced stage.
For a quick estimate, the corpse explosion just then transformed 70 to 120 percent of the Udal beast’s life force into a combination of flame and physical damage. Thus, an entire area was being dealt collective damage. Furthermore, even though the hell creatures, as mentioned before, possessed high resistance to fire, Bruce had the “faith” spiritual qi light ring switched on, so the resistance of these hell creatures was pressed to a minimum.
Just like that, explosions continued to take place around the altar. One explosion would trigger the death of many hell creatures, which made it so that the explosions would only happen continuously. The smaller hybrid beasts weren’t that hurt, but the Udal beast and the wowheads killed more hell creatures every time their bodies detonated. This would trigger a chain reaction, a domino effect where one explosion would cause a multiplying of explosions.
Given his geographical advantage and the support of several classes, Abel could use more of his techniques to attack these hell creatures effectively. Once the several thousand hell creatures were about to fall, only the dark golden level Hephastos remained. Although it was still facing the grey bear, there was just no real way it could deal any real damage.
Somewhere afar, the spiritual guardian knights had yet to break through the “white bone armor” of the “inferno knights.” In other words, though, there was nothing but a layer of the white bone armor that was protecting them.