The Great Thief

What stood in front of Lu Li was a stockade-like structure. Lu Li expected the walls to be made out of wood, but the walls were made out of stone instead. In the updated version of the game from Lu Li’s previous life, they were made out of wood. However, this was probably the first version, so they hadn’t been updated yet. It was fortunate that he’d bought eight Chariot, it might’ve been nearly impossible to enter the Stronghold otherwise.

On top of the walls stood rows and rows of Satyr archers. There were probably more within the walls. There was probably also a Boss inside the Stronghold, but no one knew of its power. It probably wouldn’t be easy to deal with, but the Boss couldn’t exceed the players’ levels at least.

“I don’t see the door. It doesn’t look like there is one,” Lu Li examined, observing the surroundings. Even he was a little frustrated at the unorthodox architecture of the structure.

“How do we fight without a door?” someone asked.

“Simple – create our own door,” Lu Li calmly asserted.

However, the archers wouldn’t just ignore Lu Li and his team while they tried to break down the Stronghold’s stone walls. They needed to clear all the archers on the walls before they could breach it. The winds roared as silence fell upon the battlefield— an ominous battle loomed ahead. Lu Li took out the angel statue and placed it gently on the ground, upon which a pure white light emanated from it. It was a fairly weak light, but it gradually became brighter and stronger, until it was like a fog of light. The fog then surrounded and masked the original statue, giving it the appearance of an angel.

This statue respawned the players here after they die. “Let’s begin.” Lu Li took out a flag and placed it in the ground. Vol’jin’s Battle Standard (Special): Places a Vol’Jin Battle Standard on the ground. Players within 100 metres are given 50% increase in Attack and Defence. Duration: 60 seconds. Heal 5% of players’ Max HP every 2 seconds. Duration 30 seconds. Cooldown: 6 hours. Dropped upon death.

“Charge!” Azure Sea Breeze exclaimed, then picked up his shield and charged ahead. The other defensive classes weren’t far behind. They immediately stood in a row and took the hits from the archers.

After the archers decided to focus the tanks, the remaining ranged attackers from Ruling Sword quickly advanced towards the walls. The defensive classes only had to tank the archers’ damage. They couldn’t hit them, but the ranged classes could.

“Attack the first archer,” Lu Li instructed.

They had to plan out the ranged classes’ attack because the defensive classes wouldn’t be able to keep the archers’ aggro on them. As soon as the archers were attacked, they would retaliate at whoever attacked them.

According to Lu Li’s plan, everyone would focus on one archer at a time. Therefore, only a single archer’s aggro would be transferred from the tanks to the ranged damage dealers. The first target was completely blindsided by the barrage of attacks from the ranged classes. He roared in rage and pain as he switched focus from the tanks. One arrow alone dropped a Mage’s HP by 1000 points; this was only a normal attack. In the siege of the Stronghold, archers had a significant advantage over Mages.

In Dawn, the altitude of attack was factored into the damage of the attack. For example, if the attackers were on the ground and attacked upwards, they would deal reduced damage. Attackers on higher ground would naturally deal higher damage. The Satyr archers on top of the walls often dealt critical hits if their arrows landed. A normal hit typically dealt 1000 damage, so a critical hit dealing double or triple the damage would have instantly killed a Mage.

“Healers, heal accordingly. Let’s begin attacking the next archer,” Lu Li said, directing everyone’s attention onto another target. The first archer was already dead. A focused barrage of damage from a whole party meant that it only took seconds before an archer died. Lu Li looked at the time, then directed the Chariot pullers to prepare the Chariots for firing. It was too time-consuming for them to wait until all the archers were cleared before pushing forward. They faced a difficult situation where they needed to sacrifice a few Chariots for the sake of time.

The archers were originally only focused on the defensive classes, but as soon as the Chariots began firing at the walls, they were suddenly alarmed. “Warriors, raise your shields,” Lu Li commanded. Earlier, Lu Li designated the Paladins as the Chariot pullers. It didn’t matter what classes the other warriors were. They all suited up in heavy armour with large defensive shields; the properties were all irrelevant. The main focus was acquiring high levels of armour. The warriors began to march together towards the Stronghold walls with the Chariots behind them. The majority of archers’ arrows landed on the shields, but some still landed on the Chariots.

The Chariot used cannonballs as ammo, which were not ideal at fighting against monsters. However, against structures, they were immensely effective. Each hit thundered heavily against the walls. After numerous barrages, cracks and holes began to show on the walls.

Lu Li called Wandering over to replace him as commander. There wasn’t much left to command here.

An extremely powerful Thief would be wasted if he just sat idly by.

Transform – Crow!

A blood-red Crow spread its wings and flew higher and higher. Following closely behind was Hachi Chan. In this situation where there was a navigator, there was no worry that she might get lost.

Half of the archers on the walls were already dead. However, these archers had also spread around the walls evenly. They used effective angles to attack the Chariots, ignoring the defensive classes who couldn’t Taunt them. The Chariots had the aggro while the ranged attackers were attacking the archers.

“Follow me when I go down. Don’t wait any longer. You don’t need to heal me either,” Lu Li instructed. Lu Li flapped his wings and dived downwards. The butterfly that was beside him was sent spiralling into a backflip due to the force of Lu Li’s flapping. Hachi Chan’s flight skills hadn’t improved at all. The Satyrs ignored him completely, as there were many bird species in Nightsong Forest and Crows were the least prominent. However, they had forgotten about one thing – a normal crow would wait until the battle was over, then descend, but this one was different.

As soon as the crow landed on the ground, it immediately disappeared.

“THIEF!” A Satyr witnessed this and immediately thought to sound out an alarm. Satyrs were complicated, but there were many Thieves and archers within their ranks. Therefore, they were familiar with a Thief’s movements. Unfortunately, he was too late as Lu Li quickly got close to him and silenced his voice. Lu Li’s actions were risky because if the archers on the wall were alarmed and focused their attention on him, he would be dead in seconds.

However, considering Lu Li and the Chariots, the archers would naturally continue to attack their original targets. The Satyr that was attacked by Lu Li couldn’t do anything; Lu Li had successfully disabled him. Even so, Lu Li wasn’t satisfied. He paused for a split second, then immediately used Blind on another Satyr.

Kidney Shot!

After stunning the target in front of him, Lu Li didn’t continue attacking. Instead, he jumped onto another Satyr.

Gouge!

His goal wasn’t to kill the Satyrs, because that was a waste of time. Instead, his aim was to disrupt the Satyrs on the walls.