Chapter 242: Finished in an Instant

The Wraith-Bird’s real strength did not lie in overwhelming attack power. It was a debuff monster, a creature designed to weaken its enemies and slowly dismantle them piece by piece. In a typical encounter it would fight alongside Undead Ghost-Faced Warriors, layering curses and status effects while its allies tore apart whatever victims had been crippled by its abilities.

That reliance on teamwork was the only reason Marcus’s squad, most of them still under Level 25, had managed to survive their earlier attempts against it.

For Marcus, though, the situation was slightly frustrating. Looking over the bird’s skill set, it was obvious that the creature excelled at mobility and harassment. It was built for quick strikes, debuffs, and strategic retreats rather than standing its ground.

He had already prepared himself for a drawn out battle.

The moment Marcus closed to within ten meters, the Wraith-Bird’s hollow eyes snapped toward him. Just as he finished scanning it with Insight and his summons began advancing, the creature reacted instantly.

“Screee!”

Necrotic energy ignited inside its empty eye sockets as it unleashed a shrill, piercing cry and began casting its abilities in rapid succession.

“Wraith’s Lament!”

Marcus felt the oppressive weight of the debuff settle over his body. Fortunately, the Divine Dragon’s Crest granted him a thirty percent resistance to negative status effects, so the impact was not nearly as severe as it could have been. The creeping aura of Necrotic Miasma barely bothered him.

A quick glance to the side, however, showed that the same could not be said for the others. DragonBlade and Blaze were already surrounded by faint clouds of dark energy as the debuff began to drag down their stats.

“Wraith’s Phantasm!”

The Wraith-Bird completed its casting and immediately accelerated. Its speed surged by fifty percent in an instant.

Instead of attacking the players, the bird ignored them entirely and dove straight toward the Ghost-Bamboo tree.

He who strikes first wins. He who hesitates loses.

The old saying echoed in Marcus’s mind.

He clicked his tongue in annoyance. He should never have wasted those few seconds using Insight. If he had opened the fight with Desperate Strike from both himself and Pebble, the bird’s health would have been cut in half before it even had time to react.

With the Dragon’s Crest and the Sea Soul Necklace boosting him, Marcus’s strength was on an entirely different level compared to his earlier battles in the Mist Veil Palace. At this point he was practically a walking catastrophe on the battlefield.

Yet he had hesitated.

Now, with his attack power reduced by thirty percent under Wraith’s Lament, he could not help feeling slightly irritated with himself.

’Slow hands get you hit. Remember that.’

“Desperate Strike!”

There was no point holding back now.

Marcus leaned forward in the saddle of the Violet Thunderwing Steed. Pebble mirrored his movement perfectly. In one smooth motion, the two of them hurled their longswords forward like professional javelin throwers, sending the weapons streaking toward the descending Wraith-Bird.

-6,500!

-2,500!

“Screee!”

Marcus’s strike had landed as a critical hit.

Since Desperate Strike already multiplied his normal damage fivefold, the critical doubled that result again, bringing the final output to ten times his base attack. The result was exactly what Marcus had expected.

Six thousand five hundred damage. The extra two thousand five hundred came from Pebble.

It was a shame the thirty percent attack reduction from Wraith’s Lament had been active. Without that debuff, Marcus was fairly certain the bird would have died instantly.

Even so, the force of the impact was overwhelming.

The Wraith-Bird released a long, agonized scream as the attack tore through it, the sound so harsh it almost made Marcus wince.

’Yikes.’

For a brief moment he felt a flicker of sympathy.

’That might have been a little excessive. Sorry about that, bird.’

Still, he could not deny how satisfying the display of power felt.

The rest of the squad had been readying themselves for a difficult fight. They had watched the descending bird with tense expressions, preparing for a drawn out struggle like the ones they had faced before.

Instead, Marcus’s attack fell from the sky like divine judgment.

One moment the Wraith-Bird had been diving confidently toward the ground. The next, a sword pierced its body and two enormous damage numbers exploded above its head.

A golden 6,500.

A crimson 2,500.

In a single move, Marcus had removed nine thousand health from the boss.

Only one thousand remained.

His bros stood frozen where they were, their mouths hanging open as they stared upward in disbelief.

The Wraith-Bird was no ordinary monster. As a high tier boss, it possessed a degree of intelligence and instinct. Under normal circumstances, the moment its health dropped below one thousand it would have immediately abandoned the fight and fled.

But today there was something more important. The Ghost-Bamboo fruit was right in front of it.

Even after taking a devastating blow, hunger overpowered its survival instincts. With a pained shriek it forced its damaged wings to flap again, continuing its desperate dive toward the tree.

“So that’s the Desperate Strike Stone told us about…” Drunkard muttered.

Marcus had mentioned that the skill dealt five times normal damage, but hearing the numbers explained and seeing the result were two entirely different things.

Every face in the squad reflected the same stunned expression.

Drunkard and Strong could only stare at Marcus as though they were looking at some kind of divine being.

DragonBlade and Blaze recovered first. Seeing that the bird was still moving toward the tree, they immediately rushed forward without hesitation.

Thunderstorm, Fate’s Trial, and Gloomy Arrow unleashed a barrage of spells and arrows. After Marcus had already removed ninety percent of the boss’s health in a single strike, there was no way they would allow it to escape now.

’Desperate Strike really is a boss killer,’ Marcus thought.

A slightly vain thought crossed his mind.

It was a shame his girls were not around to witness that attack. A perfectly timed move like that against a boss would have looked incredibly impressive.

Guess I’ll have to settle for the guys screaming instead.

Marcus urged the Violet Thunderwing Steed forward while swapping to his Mythic Bat Dragon Cloud Sword. He intended to close the distance and deliver the finishing blow himself.

Unfortunately, the Wraith-Bird was still faster.

With Wraith’s Phantasm active, its fifty percent speed boost allowed it to outpace even Marcus’s Mythic mount.

He simply could not reach it in time.

“It’s up to you guys!” he shouted.

Even with its boosted speed, the bird still had to pass directly over the rest of the squad in order to reach the Ghost-Bamboo tree.

It swooped past them and snatched the final fruit in its beak, but its health had already dropped to a dangerously low level.

Less than three hundred HP remained. At that point it was little more than a moving target.

As the Wraith-Bird tried to rise into the air with its prize, Thunderstorm’s lightning and Fate’s blazing fire magic slammed into its skeletal body.

“Screee…”

The creature convulsed midair.

The last three hundred health disappeared instantly.

With one final mournful cry that echoed across the clearing, the Wraith-Bird’s body went limp and crashed to the ground.

The entire battle had lasted less than thirty seconds, and for several seconds, no one spoke.

In their previous attempts, the group had spent more than ten exhausting minutes battling the creature just to remove sixty percent of its health, only to watch it escape into the sky every single time.

But today? It took just thirty seconds and a Level 30 Golden boss had been erased from existence.

No one had taken damage. No potions had been used. The only inconvenience had been a minor debuff that barely mattered.

All because of the Knight riding the violet red steed. Because of that impossible, reality bending Desperate Strike.

There was an old saying that a single hero could decide the outcome of a war, and as they looked at Marcus, the squad finally understood exactly what that meant.

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