[MA] 99. Safety Hazard (Patreon)

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Tutorial - Final Stage - Final Boss

You've reached the first of two HP thresholds.

The boss will go through the following changes it kills everyone or dies:

- Some weapons unlocked

- HP regeneration doubled

- Damage from weak spots halved

- All stats can deal damage anywhere for weak spot damage

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A moment after Shen got the system message, the boss looked up and roared without moving its mouth.

The roar was deafening and released a powerful shock wave that crushed the top five rows of floating steps. Most agility fighters had been there and suffered injuries, too, though it wasn't enough to kill anyone. Shen had been mid-air, jumping over a fist, and was thus closer to the roar. He had it the worst.

It felt like Scott had punched him, except it was stronger and went through his entire body. Some organs ruptured, and fissures appeared on some bones. It also messed with his brain, and the strong dizziness that hit him made him just stop doing anything and start falling.

Meanwhile, dozens of lightning balls appeared on the skies, and a second later, lightning bolts came from each to hit the ground directly beneath.

Six people were below some balls. One was a resistance fighter, so he survived—for two seconds. They all turned into motes of light.

About a dozen others were nearby when the bolts hit the ground. They exploded in a blast that threw everyone not directly hit away. It dealt up to fifty points of damage to each, but at least they didn't die.

The lightning didn't just disappear. A constant stream of electricity kept coming from each ball to the ground below, and the balls started moving around. It wasn't much faster than someone with E- agility, but it still meant people had to keep moving. The worst part was that some fighters, especially mages, did not have even E- agility and couldn't escape. A third died because they were too slow.

As if that wasn't enough, like billions of bolts started coming from and to the golem itself, creating a sort of five-foot-wide layer of electricity around it. At least a third of the strength fighters got electrocuted; they were retreating after an attack or advancing to attack the golem. They died in seconds, together with at least half defenders, who tried to save them.

That first barrage alone was enough to halt all offense. Everyone ran away for their lives, except the agility fighters. The latter could avoid the few balls of electricity floating above the floating steps, and since the boss was all weak spots now, they could just keep throwing their weapons against the golem.

Unfortunately, the electricity around it didn't just protect it from people nearby. The bolts around the golem moved quickly and randomly. Whenever something was nearby, all bots of a region concentrated on it. All F- weapons or weaker just exploded. F weapons or stronger resisted, but they lost momentum before hitting the boss and dealt lower damage. Half the agility fighters found themselves lacking a weapon.

Despite its double regeneration, the golem's HP still decreased. There were still around fifteen agility fighters damaging it once every two seconds or so, the time for an attack to hit and the weapon to return to their hands, for an average of mere 20 points of damage. The golem regenerated 100 HP per second, and their damage stayed just above that.

The boss had 10,000 HP. It was taking around twenty points of non-regenerated damage every second. It would die in less than ten minutes if nothing changed.

Unfortunately, it had one last trick, a simple and effective one. It lowered both arms and started rotating its upper body quickly, raising the arms as it did so. It was so fast that in less than a second, all islands had been destroyed. Five agility fighters, not a single one more, were fast enough to escape; the others were struck and died.

It took but a few moments for the two hundred elites to be reduced to a little over a hundred.

On the bright side, the surviving mages and agility fighters had better overall stats and better reaction times. On the other hand, the remaining strength fighters had just been lucky not to be too close to the golem, and the defenders were the cowards who didn't try to help the warriors. Well, maybe some defenders were just smart to avoid the obvious greater danger.

Those were the first things Shen thought while he recovered from his daze.

He was free-falling straight to the ground and had avoided the rotating arms by a hair's breadth. He had had to jump exceptionally high to avoid the fist he had dodged, and while it made him more vulnerable to the roar, it let him avoid the arms. Of course, if he hadn't been stunned, he would be one of those who had managed to escape the rotating attack.

New floating steps were coming from the ground. Shen wasn't directly above any, but he pulled his spear, and it gave him enough reach to touch a step. With that, he made a lever movement that put him on top of another step.

The tiny island was too low, and he hit it hard. His legs complained, and something ruptured on his knees. The step broke down, and he kept falling until he reached the ground.

| Feng Shen (E) | 62 / 200 HP

He would've died without the extra HP from being at the Fate Origin realm.

"Buy HP potion," he said, and a small crystal pyramid-looking container with a red liquid appeared on his hand. He drank it fast while crushing the minor healing crystal on his belt. "Buy stamina potion," he said and drank the yellow liquid. Finally, he said, "Buy healing crystal," and put it on his belt, to replace the one he had just used.

| Purchased: Minor Healing Potion | -200 AP

| Purchased: Minor Refreshing Potion | -100 AP

| Purchased: Minor Healing Crystal | -1,000 AP

| Remaining AP: 107,902

Shen used the healing crystal to take him from immediate danger, as it instantly gave him 100 HP. The potion, which recovered 100 HP over 10 minutes, would recover the remaining HP over four minutes for much cheaper. The stamina potion was only a precaution. He still had over half his stamina points remaining, and it was unlikely for it to drop down to zero before the golem either died or killed them all. Still, better safe than sorry, or so Alicia had taught him.

"Don't stop attacking!" he said using his Lion's Roar. The golem was regenerating HP fast. "Strength and resistance fighters, throw weapons against the golem too! Agility fighters, stay on the ground now that you can attack any place!"

Shen still needed to stay on the floating steps. The mere instant he had remained on the ground had already made the golem move and almost stomp him. Only on the steps could he keep dodging it.

He could avoid getting roared at again by not climbing so high, and there was no chance he would get hit by the "arm typhoon" now that he was aware of that. As soon as the boss lowered its arm to do it again, he ran away, then reclimbed the steps as soon as they reappeared.

The mages' damage output decreased considerably. They couldn't just stay put throwing spells, they had to keep on the move, and it affected their focus. Still, as everyone got used to the new golem's attack pattern, their output increased slightly. The boss's HP started dropping again despite its double regeneration, slowly and steadily.

Though Shen worried about the second threshold the system had talked about, he was confident they would succeed, and he could tell the general mood was positive too.

Shen climbed—

Gravity affected him, slowing him down as a slap came his way. He almost thought it was the boss, but he swore he felt a pull on his consciousness and looked straight at a middle-aged man who was a known gravity mage. The mage was staring at Shen and couldn't hide his surprise when Shen stared back.

Shen always kept an optimal speed to climb and dodge while spending as little qi as possible. In a split second, he increased his qi to the max, pushing Boundlessness through his body, and became quick enough to avoid the slap.

While jumping, he twisted his body and threw his spear at the traitor.

The man wasn't alone. Of the hundred or so survivors, ten were near him, five of whom were mages that intercepted his spear. The other five were defenders who had been ready to jump on the spear path.

After the tribulation, Shen felt confident in his willpower to overcome anyone there, maybe even a couple of people, but five was too much for him. He pulled his spear rather than fight their will and risk getting the weapon out of qi, thus falling on the ground. They weren't stupid either; they knew just how fast Shen was and had paid attention to him when he said he couldn't run from the boss forever. They stayed just far enough that Shen wouldn't be able to get there, waste time killing them—especially not with five defenders—then go back to the steps.

Good thing he had kept a trump card.

He hadn't wanted to use it because deep down, he still hoped he could get a higher-tiered Skill on a hidden reward or something. Yet, he had no alternative. Shen could keep dodging the boss even like that, but his qi expenditure would be too high to counter the gravity pull, and there were no qi potions or crystals in the system.

So, he said, "Use free level up on my footwork Skill."

He had gotten the free level up as the reward for surviving the third stage's final boss without dying.

| Level up denied. This Skill's level 6 is exclusive for D-ranks.

| System rewards in a Pioneer Tutorial have precedence over rank limitations. Bypassing exclusiveness.

| SAFETY HAZARD DETECTED! THE KNOWLEDGE CONTAINED IN THE NEW LEVEL CAN KILL SOMEONE BELOW D-RANK!

| Bypass stopped. Checking requirements.

| Prioritary requirement not met: D-rank expanded mind

| Alternative requirement met: E-rank Learning Ability

| Skill Level Up — Zephyr-Gale Footwork (D+) — Level 6

As information flooded Shen's mind, he immediately understood why it was exclusive for D-ranks. A lot of it required him to master a Concept related to the Laws of Wind, and some even needed him to have developed an aura. And since it expected those things, which he had never touched before, it assumed he had information and knowledge he hadn't. Information that was also pushed into his mind and burned into his brain, and was way more advanced than anything he had ever thought about before.

War gave him an impressive level of awareness of everything around him. Shen even suspected that's what had let him find the source of the gravity spell at once despite not looking that way. But it was still nowhere close to the mysteries of Concept mastering and aura.

Those things dealt with secrets of Reality. What was aura? How could it manifest from one's Path? Why was it important? How was it related to a mastered Concept?

He hadn't known before. Now he did, and he only survived the knowledge that was way beyond him because his E-tier learning ability let him quickly analyze, categorize, and break down everything into simpler ways to understand them.

He almost got hit a few times as his brain struggled not to blow up while leading him to avoid attacks that could blow his entire body too.

| Skill Sync Complete — Zephyr-Gale Footwork (D+) — Level 6

In the end, Shen survived. Then he turned to the gravity mage and leaped straight at him.

Shen was high enough that falling would hurt him. But every time he approached a quick fall speed, he pushed himself upwards with Zephyr. His mind hurt when he did that. He wasn't supposed to do that without a mastered Concept, but his learning ability had let them break down the things he had learned enough to accomplish it. Moreover, the Skill level up also gave him muscle memory about something he couldn't even do, which helped with his trick.

Shen shot toward the traitor like an arrow.

The man tried to use gravity to stop or affect Shen's approach. The knowledge about aura had him know that it was the best way to counter attacks that affected an area rather than one's enemy directly. Unfortunately, to develop an aura, he needed to at least master a Concept.

So he just used Boundless Qi and his innate soul defense to the utmost.

That was enough.

Shen arrived at the traitor's group and started the slaughter.

[A/N: Who still remembered the free level up he received on chapter 71. Overdue Wisdom?]

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