Chapter 79 -79-Dark Palace Dungeon
The gains from this auction far exceeded John’s expectations.
At the same time, this was also the final item of the auction.
Mystic Merchant Harun promptly announced the end of the event.
"Thank you all for honoring this auction with your presence.
As a token of appreciation, all of you will once again receive priority invitations to the next auction.
I hope that before then, you will have saved up enough funds.
After all, the items in the next auction will be of even higher quality than those in this one.
Thank you all for participating. See you next time."
As soon as his words fell, all the players at the venue were enveloped by a beam of white light.
Each of them was teleported back to their own zone.
...
Zone 5
John returned to the City Lord Mansion.
The moment he got back to Zone 5, he impatiently took out the Dungeon Creation Scroll.
[Do you wish to use the Dungeon Creation Scroll?]
"Yes!"
The Dungeon Creation Scroll did not have many restrictions.
Even if it was used right inside the City Lord Mansion, it would not affect anything in the outside world.
Since John wanted to obtain the Codex of Assassin as quickly as possible, he could not be bothered to choose another location.
Besides, once he cleared the dungeon, it would disappear on its own anyway.
The instant he chose to enter the dungeon, the surrounding terrain began to shift rapidly.
A gigantic archway appeared above the entire City Lord Mansion.
It instantly drew the attention of many people in Overlord Main City.
"What’s that?"
"According to the info, it looks like a platinum-grade dungeon."
"How did a dungeon suddenly appear inside the main city?"
"It was probably created by the guild leader. I saw in the dungeon info that it’s exclusive to Boss John."
"This is getting more and more unbelievable. He can pull out anything at this point. Boss John is terrifying."
...
John looked at the enormous archway before him.
Endless white light was pouring out from within it.
"They really made it look quite mysterious."
He smiled faintly and stepped straight inside.
In the blink of an eye, John found himself inside a royal city.
But this royal city was eerily strange.
The entire place was built from black obsidian bricks.
From a distance, it looked like a bottomless abyss of darkness.
Even the light sources were ghostly blue candles.
[Welcome to your exclusive platinum-grade dungeon, "Dark Palace"!]
[Your objective for this mission is to kill the platinum-grade BOSS: Dark Lord!]
[Dark Palace is inhabited by countless dark creatures who delight in capturing humans as prey.
Over the centuries, who knows how many innocents have been reduced to piles of white bones within this palace.
As a hero summoned here, use the blade in your hand to utterly destroy this city of sin!
Good luck, brave adventurer!]
The moment John saw this Dark Palace, he immediately understood.
"So I need to bulldoze the entire dungeon flat."
For any other player, this level of difficulty would probably have made their legs go weak with fear.
After all, a platinum-grade Boss started at level 60.
The monsters under its command would certainly be no lower than level 40.
Trying to steamroll the whole place alone would be as hard as ascending to heaven.
But to John, it was as easy as crushing an ant between his fingers.
He strolled leisurely toward the Dark Palace.
The moment he drew near, the Skeleton Archers atop the palace walls spotted him.
[Skeleton Archer] Lv.40
[HP]: 42,000
[Attack]: 12,000
[Defense]: 3,000
[Skills]: Death Gaze, Skeleton Arrow Rain...
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
A rain of pale bone arrows shot toward him.
John neither dodged nor blocked, allowing the arrows to strike his body.
[-1] (Forced Damage)!
[-1] (Forced Damage)!
[-1] (Forced Damage)!
...
Against John’s current terrifying defense, this bit of damage was no different from a light scratch.
He advanced step by step beneath the arrow storm.
John’s HP did not drop at all.
Instead, the skeletons on the city wall began collapsing one after another into piles of bone dust.
Because his damage reflection effect had already kicked in.
[-400,000!] (Reflect Damage)
[-400,000!] (Reflect Damage)
[-400,000!] (Reflect Damage)
Bright red numbers continuously flashed across the top of the wall.
By the time John reached the gates of the dark palace, every single Skeleton Archer had already been wiped out.
[You killed Skeleton Archer Lv.40. EXP +1,000,000, gold coin +100,000, Fame +10,000!]
[You plundered B-rank skill: "Skeleton Arrow Rain"!]
[You killed...]
As monsters created by the Dungeon Creation Scroll, these skeleton archers provided far more EXP and gold coins than ordinary monsters outside.
There were nearly a hundred Skeleton Archers on the wall.
They directly provided John with over ten million EXP and several million gold coins in income.
Making money and gaining EXP was as easy as breathing for him.
[Dark Palace Barrier]
[Level]: 50
[Durability]: 9,000,000 / 9,000,000
[Description]: The barrier protecting Dark Palace also serves as an alarm. Once it is broken, all dark creatures will go berserk and attack the intruder!]
...
The moment John broke this gate, every dark creature inside would swarm him at once.
But he felt no fear at all.
He simply drew his dagger and thrust it forward.
[-5,000,000!]
An absurd damage number popped up.
After reaching level 70, on top of numerical modifications, pet sharing, and stat allocation, John was already capable of casually dealing five million DPS.
Expressionless, he struck a second time and shattered the heavily damaged Dark Gate.
At once, a warning rang in his ears.
[Warning: Your actions have enraged the Dark Lord!]
[All dark creatures will launch relentless attacks against you until death!]
The instant the warning ended, countless eerie green and red glows suddenly lit up inside Dark Palace!
Aaaaah!!!
A shrill scream rang out, followed by a foul gust of wind reeking of blood and decay.
A large number of vampires emerged first.
Flapping their rotting wings, they lunged out with twisted, savage faces.
Chunks of thick, putrid blood sprayed from their chests and crashed toward John like cannonballs.
John locked his gaze onto one of the vampires, and its information appeared before him.
[Dark Vampire] Lv.50
[HP]: 70,000 / 70,000
[Attack]: 50,000
[Defense]: 30,000
[Skills]: Foul Blood Spit, Blood Mist Domain, Life Drain...
At a glance, there were more than fifty vampires in total.
They fired their filthy blood projectiles all at once.
Anyone stained by that foul blood would be cursed, even if it dealt no damage.
But unfortunately for them, John just so happened to possess Curse Immunity.
Splurt!
The foul blood splashed across his body—
only to be blocked by an invisible barrier and spill harmlessly onto the ground around him.
[-1] (Curse Immunity)!
[-1] (Curse Immunity)!
[-1] (Curse Immunity)!
John’s Curse Immunity trait activated continuously, blocking all of the filthy blood.
"Aaaagh!"
The vampires were soon struck by backlash damage.
But unlike the Skeleton Archers, they were not instantly killed.
Instead, they transformed into clouds of blood mist.
In blood mist form, the damage they took would be delayed by three seconds before being calculated.
Moreover, the damage was halved.
They could endure up to twice their own HP in total damage.
That was the very reason they dared to charge in as the vanguard.
But this batch of vampires had still underestimated the terror of John’s reflect damage.