Chapter 140: Fierce Battle with the Calamity Knight

With everyone freed up, the last Death Knight leader was easier to take down, falling in just seven seconds of focused fire. At this point, the Plague Knight had yet to escape from the Astral Labyrinth.

"Quickly replenish your status. Don't hoard potions; if you're out of mana, drink your potions immediately," Leiming commanded, his voice rapid but clear as he assigned tasks. He then turned to Chu Cheng and Zhang Chaosheng, saying, "I'll be the primary tank, Zhang Chaosheng the secondary, and Chu Cheng the tertiary."

"The Plague Knight doesn't have many combat skills—only five in total—but they are devastating. Even with my items suppressing its attributes by 50%, non-tank classes can be killed in a single hit. So, at the start, other classes must not approach the battlefield. This isn't a game; its aggro isn't fixed. It will prioritize killing whoever it perceives as the biggest threat."

"Wait until we have held it for a few seconds before moving in. Remember, do not use high-damage spells or combat skills. Focus on crowd control and restrictions; your burst damage must not exceed that of us tanks."

After finishing his instructions in one breath, Leiming looked toward the spot where the Plague Knight was banished, its figure gradually emerging, and added, "Are there any questions? If so, speak up now."

"No issues here."

Just then, Fang Xi approached Chu Cheng and handed him several vials.

Two vials of special healing potions capable of restoring 8,000 health in total.
One vial of potent defensive potion, which adds 15 points to defense for 30 minutes.
One vial of potent magic blood potion, which increases health regeneration by 30 for 30 minutes.
One vial of potent necrotic protection potion, which absorbs 5,000 points of necrotic spell damage for 15 seconds.

"Alchemy is my primary specialty. I crafted these myself," she said.

Hearing this, Chu Cheng accepted them without hesitation. Taking on such a massive boss definitely required the support of potions.

Leiming shouted loudly, "The boss is emerging! Zhang Chaosheng and Chu Cheng, get into position."

Fang Xi immediately retreated, downing her own defensive and regenerative potions as she moved. The three tanks rushed to the point of banishment, where the towering figure of the Plague Knight could now be seen through the distortion, slowly becoming clear.

Transparent.
Translucent.

The moment it fully materialized, Leiming charged, slamming into the side of the Plague Knight and following up with a shield bash. Zhang Chaosheng immediately followed with his own charge and shield bash. Chu Cheng, lacking a charge or shield bash, slipped behind the knight and began stabbing fiercely at the hindquarters of its nightmare steed.

The awakened nightmare steed stomped the ground, sending a shockwave of green light that knocked the three back. The Plague Knight lowered its lance, ignored their attacks, and charged forward, knocking Leiming back before turning to swing its weapon in a wide arc.

Zhang Chaosheng was swept away, but Chu Cheng reacted with lightning speed, bracing his twin blades against the lance. Despite his defense, the immense power behind the strike still forced him backward. This was with its attributes suppressed by 50%; without such suppression, the situation would be dire. A strength gap of over twofold easily triggers critical hits, crushing blows, or pulverizing effects.

The Plague Knight seemed to sense the threat posed by Chu Cheng, or perhaps it recognized him as the one who had blocked it earlier. Its lance flickered, thrusting five times in rapid succession. Chu Cheng parried reflexively, but after blocking only one strike, the sheer force smashed his guard open. The subsequent four thrusts all landed, each dealing over 500 damage.

As the knight raised its lance, green light coalescing for a combat skill, Feng Lingxing decisively cast Chains of Ice. Frost quickly coated the Plague Knight, but it shattered the ice by force a second later.

This delay, however, interrupted the knight's skill. Chu Cheng rolled back, and Leiming rushed in to intercept, re-engaging the Plague Knight.

Three seconds later, Zhang Chaosheng began to exert pressure, and Leiming slowly fell back, the two rotating positions seamlessly.

The Plague Knight was highly intelligent and knew to focus on one target, but it couldn't handle the sheer number of opponents. A barrage of combat skills and spells disrupted its rhythm, with one person controlling it and another breaking its flow. Its anger flared, the green flames on its nightmare steed expanded, and it leveled its lance at Zhang Chaosheng.

Leiming yelled, "Zhang Chaosheng, pop your damage reduction and tank it! Everyone else, use your big burst skills!"

Feng Lingxing and the others, who had been waiting for over ten seconds, immediately began chanting, intense magical fluctuations radiating outward. Under normal circumstances, the Plague Knight would have reacted, but it had already committed to its charge and could not stop midway.

Just as it pierced through Zhang Chaosheng—shield and all—eleven powerful spells and skills slammed into it. The enraged Plague Knight’s lance erupted with a second burst of energy, the green flames on its body surging several meters high. It flung Zhang Chaosheng into the air and launched a second, lightning-fast charge.

Leiming reacted with a heroic combat skill, but to his shock, it failed to control the boss. "I missed the CC!" he shouted, alarmed.

Before the words had faded, Chu Cheng suddenly vanished. In that instant, a larger, spectral version of Chu Cheng appeared out of thin air before the Plague Knight. The moment the charging knight’s lance touched the spectral figure, it froze.

It was like a photograph, perfectly still.

-11,258.

The strike from "Time Wanderer" had triggered all its special effects, including Time Lock. This blow interrupted the Plague Knight’s lethal strike. As Zhang Chaosheng landed, he immediately swallowed a potion to recover, clutching his chest in lingering fear. Having just taken the knight's two-hit combo, his health had dropped below 1,000; another hit would have surely killed him.

"Boom!"

A fireball flew in, but the Plague Knight swiped it out of the air with its lance, then turned to sweep Leiming back before thrusting its lance at Chu Cheng.

With his mind highly focused, Chu Cheng reflexively held his sword horizontally to parry. As the lance grazed past, its power surged, pressing down on him. He turned his body with fluid grace to dodge, crossing his swords to catch the lance.

Unfortunately, his strength was insufficient. The knight flicked its lance, forcing his guard wide open, and the green-flamed tip thrust forward like lightning. Leiming prepared to cover him, but he saw Chu Cheng twist his body into an impossible arc to evade the strike.

The lance grazed him, but the shaft whipped around and struck his waist, sending him flying. He used the momentum to spring several meters away as Leiming rushed in to intercept the knight once more.

"That felt good!"

Perhaps because the quality of his recent opponents had been so high, Chu Cheng noticed that his proficiency in one-handed and two-handed weapon skills was rising rapidly. He could even trade blows head-on with an extraordinary-tier boss like the Plague Knight.

At this rate, he wasn't far from a skill upgrade.

He was currently at the Expert level; the next was Master, which was an exceptionally high rank. Normally, without specialized talent, most "Descenders" wouldn't even reach Master level in a single weapon skill by level 50.

Once his weapon skill reached Master, his combat effectiveness would take a massive leap. Against melee bosses like this, with high weapon skill and superior technique, most basic attacks could be blocked or parried, provided the strength gap wasn't too wide.