The Era of Gods

Chapter 511: Chapter 511: The Clash between Humans and the Children of Nightmare

Of course, the primary function of the dungeon was still to gather popularity, attracting a large number of players to the Fortress for activities and resupply.

With the increase in player traffic, various benefits naturally emerged, accumulating over time.

The newly opened dungeon was named Demon Camp, a level 70 five-man dungeon. Given the materials on hand, the number of monsters inside was not as many as before, only about two hundred, with all the others being unattackable backdrops.

The monsters consisted of five types, the most numerous being the Demon Soldiers with about twenty-four thousand health each, equivalent to warriors, possessing Charge, Thunder Strike, and a slashing Skill.

The less numerous Demon Magicians, with about twenty-two thousand health each, had three Spells—summoning an elite Hellfire of the same level, Soul Chain linking players so that if any linked player suffers damage, other linked players also take an additional twenty percent damage, and a group Shadow spell dealing around two thousand damage.

There were about as many Demon Wizards as Demon Magicians, also with twenty-two thousand health, and three Skills of their own—a group Rain of Fire technique, a single-target Fel energy fireball dealing around three thousand damage, and a Mind Control holding a player for fifteen seconds.

Not as numerous and usually guarding the entrance were the Demon Guards, colloquially known as “door gods,” with about thirty-five thousand health each, a stronger version of the Demon Soldiers in both attributes and skills, with an additional Intimidating Shout Skill that fears nearby players for five seconds.

And then there were the very rare Demon Centurions, using an enhanced elite template with around one hundred and eleven thousand health, an enhanced version of the Demon Guard, with the ability to command nearby demons.

That is to say, if a Demon Centurion was attacked prematurely, it would call all the demons in the room to swarm the player.

Then Lin Xiao adjusted the distribution of these monsters. There were actually no requirements for the dungeon layout—you theoretically could place all the monsters right at the entrance and have players smacked to pieces as soon as they walked in.

But in reality, that wasn’t feasible. The main purpose of the player’s Fortress dungeon was to gather popularity, and while attracting players, it also had to maintain a certain level of difficulty. Balancing this out was a significant challenge.

Like most five-man dungeons, there were very few bosses in this one—only four in total.

The first was an enhanced version of a regular at the door, the Centurion.

The second and third were a pair—a Demon Magician and a Demon Wizard.

The final boss was the Demon Overlord.

In terms of dungeon loot, Lin Xiao consulted Lonely City and Biggs and joined a mutual aid group chat obtained from them to ask other players from the Legion Fortress community.

Since Human Forces had not yet arrived in this Void, the area channel could not be opened, so they had to use individual private channels for communication.

This private channel could only connect players in this particular region and could not contact players over in the Hellfire Plains—it was dedicated for mutual assistance among the players.

To Lin Xiao’s surprise, the channel had over a hundred members, nearly all of whom were players who followed the Legion Fortress approach; the vast majority had established their own Fortresses, with many having their own dungeons, although most were discovered locally rather than created by the players. This provided real benchmarks for reference. After obtaining first-hand dungeon data from them, Lin Xiao readjusted his dungeon, particularly making the mechanism more lenient and weakening the skills of the Demon Magicians and Demon Wizards.

The original version seemed a bit too nasty. With the Demon Magician’s Soul Link followed by a Hellfire summon and then a group Shadow spell, plus the Demon Wizard mind-controlling a player—preferably a healer first, who would then cast Rain of Fire—the combination was more disgusting than the bosses themselves.

Now, not only was the power reduced, but the Mind Control no longer targeted healers first; it was random, with the healer’s priority in the first round of control reduced to zero. This change was meant to give players a sense of urgency without feeling impossible to defeat.

The dungeon’s trash mobs would only drop some basic materials, with a very slim chance of dropping green gear. Only the few bosses would drop level 70 blue gear—one piece from the first three bosses and two pieces from the final boss.

With a decrease in difficulty, the rewards were naturally lower, making the blue gear perfect for lower-tier players.

Beyond that, Lin Xiao was planning to open Heroic and Epic difficulty levels for the dungeon in the future.

The Heroic difficulty would be set to his original nasty version, with the first three bosses each dropping a piece of higher-quality blue gear and the final boss guaranteed to drop one piece of Epic gear and one piece of blue gear, with a chance for an additional piece of blue gear.

As for the Epic difficulty, Lin Xiao hadn’t thought about how to design it yet. At this stage, there wasn’t even a player in sight, so it was pointless to overthink.

One thing was for sure, however: the more difficult and disgusting it was, the better. But the rewards had to be enticing, making the player desperately want it, almost to the point of madness.

After establishing the Fortress, Lin Xiao took his newly recruited subordinates out for leveling every day, working to increase their levels, and transferring a Bloodline Essence through the Creation Rubik’s Cube once a month.

He also sent a note to his True Body, telling it to prepare the materials for his ascension template in advance.

As his subordinates grew stronger and they faced increasingly formidable enemies, especially with reports from Lonely City about their joint battles with groups of Children of Nightmare, an increasing sense of urgency built inside him.

Almost daily, the private channel was abuzz with fights between Humans and Children of Nightmare. Most encounters were one-on-one duels, with occasional large-scale wars. Especially in Bunal Floating Land and a neighboring Floating Land named Ailen, several Children of Nightmare had established Fortresses. Two Human Fortresses had been breached already, while the Humans had taken down one of the Children of Nightmare’s Fortresses.

Biggs’ Fortress was on Bunal Floating Land, where there was a Teleportation Array to the Human’s heartlands. It was a strategically crucial location, currently the scene of fierce battles.

After resting for several months and observing the increasingly tense situation, Lin Xiao could no longer remain indifferent. He instructed his girlfriend to guard the Fortress and continue training troops while he took a small group of subordinates to leave the Fortress and head to support the Bunal Floating Land.

Anyway, his girlfriend now had the second-highest authority over the Fortress, and apart from not being able to dissolve the Fortress, she had all other privileges. Even if he were away for a long time, she could control the Fortress completely, including upgrading it.

After several node transfers by the Star Domain Consortium, Lin Xiao returned to the node town on Bunal Floating Land. Stepping out of the Teleportation Array, he saw several groups of Children of Nightmare within the town. There were three to four groups outside the town, each varying from about three hundred to roughly five hundred members of the Children of Nightmare. He immediately asked in the group chat, and a player named Bloodthirsty Keller promptly replied:

“Retreat immediately, or just stay in the town and don’t come out. Even if they provoke you, ignore them.”

At this time, Lonely City also responded:

“Recently, there might be a big battle between us and the Children of Nightmare. In the next few days, even more of the Children of Nightmare will arrive. You must not go out. Just stay in the node town; they can’t touch you there.”

“Right, since you are there, keep an eye on the Children of Nightmare’s movements. Let us know if new Children of Nightmare arrive.”

After reading the messages, Lin Xiao glanced at the armies of the Children of Nightmare outside the town. After some consideration, he decided to listen to them.

Although he didn’t think these groups of the Children of Nightmare could be that strong.

But now the situation was unclear, and it wouldn’t hurt to lay low for a while. After all, the town was on neutral territory owned by the Star Domain Consortium. As long as the Children of Nightmare didn’t want to offend the Consortium, and still wanted to use the Consortium’s teleportation services, they had to abide by the rules.

Less than half a day later, two more groups of Children of Nightmare arrived with their troops and merged with the ones already inside the town and didn’t leave.

The Children of Nightmare initially provoked and taunted Lin Xiao, who remained in the town and did not leave. After realizing he was completely ignoring them, they stopped, but they kept someone watching him continuously.

This standoff lasted four or five days, and the number of Children of Nightmare in the town kept increasing, eventually surpassing sixty.

These Children of Nightmare had subordinates ranging from over two hundred to five or six hundred, with the largest group boasting up to eight hundred. Although most of the followers were normal cannon fodder, numbers mattered, and there were elites among them. At one point, Lin Xiao saw a group of Children of Nightmare where all the subordinates were of elite templates, including several powerful leaders about ten meters tall. He guessed that they were likely among the top elites of the Children of Nightmare, similar to the paragons or peerless figures among humans.

Once all the Children of Nightmare had arrived, there were over thirty-five thousand NPC soldiers stationed outside the town, with enough strength to forcefully take over this node town of the Star Domain Consortium.

But still, they didn’t dare.

By now, Lin Xiao had no way to run.

Well, except for using Hearthstone to return home.

In this place, there was no such thing as random teleportation. This group of Broken Floating Lands, known as the Void Storm, was in chaotic space, and the only outcome of random teleportation would be to get sucked into the Void maelstrom and torn to pieces.

Every morning when he woke up, he would see several Children of Nightmare staring at him provocatively. He’d rest his chin on his hand and look back at them, both sides eyeing each other but unable to do anything.

Then, after about a week, the nearly seventy Children of Nightmare stopped paying attention to him. Their massive army left the node and headed in a certain direction.

Lin Xiao immediately relayed the news to the others. Soon the light of the teleportation array in the town brightened, and more than twenty human players teleported in from elsewhere. Lonely City was among them. Once the twenty-odd people gathered, Lonely City said:

“Unless I’m mistaken, they’re probably going to attack Biggs’s Fortress. They want to seize the ancient Teleportation Array in the Undead Crypt to cut off our escape route.”n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Bloodthirsty Keller said:

“There are already more than a dozen people at Biggs’s place. They should be able to hold them off for a while. We’ll wait a few more hours and then set off. We’ll pincer them with cooperation from the inside and the outside.”

“What if they’re not attacking Biggs’s Fortress and are lying in wait for us on the way?”

Lin Xiao voiced his doubt.

Lonely City nodded and said:

“There’s that possibility, but we’ve got aerial units. When the time comes, we’ll expand the search area and should be able to detect them earlier.”

“But what if they have items that can conceal their presence, making them undetectable by normal scouting?”

“Don’t worry about that. While there are items that can hide one’s presence, there definitely aren’t any that can hide so many subordinates. If there were, it would be a Divine Artifact, which is impossible at the current stage.”

“Then let’s go for it!”

Lin Xiao was quite eager. He hadn’t accumulated many honor points for a long time, and this was a good opportunity.