Chapter 296: Coming from Behind (1/2)

With their past success of bringing down the Dead Red Dragon, the Players underestimated and misjudged the Night Tide Dragon to a certain extent.

After all, the Dead Red Dragon was an undead creature, and was a true dragon before it died. On the other hand, the Night Tide Dragon was a pseudo dragon like the drake of the Trinia Forest, which was why the Players weren’t that worried about it and simply considered it a Boss that was a little more powerful than the average Boss.

That was exactly why the Players were taking casualties beyond what they expected.

As if mocking the Players’ shortcomings, the Night Tide Dragon would swim around the fishmen island and ambush the contestants near the shores, even obstructing them from assembling-after all, the Players were familiar with the landscape of the island and knew that it was easier to gather on the shores than the interior of the island, therefore becoming the primary victims of the Night Tide Dragon’s sneak attacks.

At the same time, the fishmen were maintaining their usual every fishman for himself tactic, putting the fear into the contestants as they killed away rampantly, slowly learning in the process and planning strategic ambushes against the contestants.

With high-level fishman elites hidden in each ambush, the contestants were suffering heavy losses-apart from the Players who could prepare themselves, since they could see the monsters’ name and level.

One way or another, one day had only passed in the second round of the tourney but things proved so horrible that Xi Wei was considering interfering to help—the Ocean Goddess would suspect something if the Players and the members of the other churches were wiped out.

It was therefore fortunate that he underestimated the Players’ durability.

In fact, it might be more appropriate to say that the Players were used to horrific failures in their early days of exploration. They would only become more excited against a powerful foe as long as it didn’t prove unbeatable, since according to their experience, the stronger the foe, the better the item drop!

Moreover, the elites of other churches were not all-talk even though they were second-rate (why would a church send their trump card or secret weapon to a tourney after all?). Each of them represented their own church’s cutting-edge fighting force and reputation, and their mentality had also improved after learning that they wouldn’t really die after the first round, with morale not crumbling as easily as it had then.

Therefore, things were turning for the better on the second day.

First and foremost, the monks of the Brilliant White Church used their position to rein in some bootlickers and neutral churches as they worked together to wipe out the fishmen.

And when the monks’ second-in-command (their previous leader was eaten by the Night Tide Dragon) saw that the fishmen’s attacks had become orderly, he knew that there was a liege-level of existence had appeared amongst their ranks.

Hence, the monks used the wyvern knights to bait the fishmen’s assault, diverting the main force of the fishmen away from their lair and have the wyvern knights fight them while the monks search for their liege. Then, when they found their quarry, the monks unleashed an AoE holy chorus that blasted the main force of the fishmen, the fishman liege and most of the wyvern knights sky-high, sealing their place in the top-ten of the second round!

On the other hand, the Players finally assembled and began to track and attempt to slay the Night Tide Dragon.

The creature had repeated its gimmick of attempting to snag and devour Players on the beach, only to have the Players turn the tables and encircle it twice.

Even though it had managed to escape with its life, the Players didn’t give up and instead use both occasions to ascertain its movements, almost uncovering each of its abilities and attack patterns.

Sensing the realistic threat that the Players posed, the Night Tide Dragon attempted to flee and hide for a while at the depths since it wasn’t under the Ocean Goddess’s influence anyway.

But just as it was about to arrive at the deep, it slammed firmly into an unseen wall—Xi Wei had actually enveloped the fishmen island with his divine power, and the creature was unable to distant itself from the island!