Annan’s pupils flashed once more with a dim light.
The Lazy Eye shimmered and vanished—instantly—but the muscular man only paused slightly before breaking free.
He swung his hammer at Annan, but Annan dodged it with ease.
In Annan’s vision... no, even out of Annan’s sight, his movements were undoubtedly in "slow motion."
His sluggish actions were akin to the monsters in Ultraman...
To wizards like Salvatore, who must stand and channel their spells, this indeed posed a threat.
But he couldn’t hit Annan... With just a two-step retreat, Annan could easily dodge his attacks.
"What do you call this guy?"
Annan even had the leisure to inquire, "Is there anything special I should be wary of?"
"No, you can just relax!"
Salvatore answered briskly, "This is a common Summon for those in the Strength domain, scientifically named ’Siege Hammer.’ We usually call it Big Fatty. Although it’s only a bronze-ranked Summon and quite dumb, it’s very useful... because it’s known for being thick-skinned and meaty, particularly tough to beat..."
"The thing to watch out for is not to clash head-on with its hammerhead—its strength isn’t that great, but the spikes on the hammerhead can amplify the force by seven times! So, every one of its attacks is equivalent to the impact of a Siege Hammer..."
Annan had an epiphany.
So you’re the legendary punching bag, huh...
It made sense, since wizards like Salvatore dealt too much damage. Against ordinary people, it was nearly impossible to measure the damage—it was mostly instant kills.
But Big Fatty could take more damage...
If there was someone else to distract it.
If he was alone, however...
"You attract his attention!"
Salvatore was full of confidence, "Let me handle this—"
His words were filled with the excitement of "I’ve done this kind of problem before."
Annan was initially planning to use the Frost Sword Technique, but seeing Salvatore so eager, he simply switched roles to the MT and began to pull the aggro.
It was a good opportunity to conserve some strength...
Salvatore then threw a potion from his shoulder.
In mid-air, it suddenly burst into flames and turned into a large ball of fire.
—Then, the flames instantly solidified into crystals and shattered upon hitting the ground.
But what exploded from the breakup were not red crystal fragments... but numerous dense metal needles.
About a hundred and twenty to thirty steel needles floated around Salvatore after the first round of "transformation," which lasted roughly three seconds.
Then, these steel needles flew out in batches and embedded into Big Fatty’s body, a process that took about twelve to thirty seconds.
But beyond Big Fatty’s terrifying muscles was an even thicker layer of fat.
The needles only penetrated halfway, not even piercing the fat layer, and hardly any blood flowed.
Big Fatty entirely ignored these needles—those needles were almost squeezed out by the mere action of him running towards Annan.
However, once all the steel needles were lodged into Big Fatty,
Salvatore began chanting softly:
"Walk on iron, flow through steel. Sparks scatter, storm surges—"
When Salvatore started his chant, every pair of needles emitted a strong magnetic force, drawing them closer together. This caused Big Fatty some pain and halted his chase.
He attempted to control his muscles and eject the needles from his body.
But after Salvatore completed his chant,
a tremendously intense burst of electricity suddenly exploded within him!
The fierce currents surged wildly within Big Fatty’s body, turning it nearly translucent as intense sparks burst out.
Just the sparks and unplanned lightning bolts spurting from his body forced Annan to back away repeatedly.
Big Fatty’s hair caught fire from the high temperature, and his whole body went numb, unable to move a muscle—
The crackling electricity persisted for over twenty seconds before Big Fatty finally burst into a spray of blood.
The air was still filled with a very strong scent of char.
Annan couldn’t help but feel a tingling in his teeth.
...Wasn’t this guy absurdly thick-skinned?
Annan was certain that if he were struck by electricity like Salvatore, he would probably pass out from shock in about two or three seconds...
He looked around and, seeing that nothing new was coming to kill them, walked over to Salvatore, looked up, and asked curiously, "Are you familiar with this, senior?"
"Ha... it was the subject of my graduation exam."
Salvatore chuckled dryly, "If you can’t kill Big Fatty alone, you can’t embark on the Transcendent path...so it left a deep impression on me."
"Then why were you running around all over the place being chased by him?"
"I–I was fifty meters away from him during the exam! I could kite and hit him while on the move."
Salvatore complained with a sense of grievance, "But just as I turned around and noticed there was another Big Fatty, he was already right next to me..."
...Is it an illusion?
Why does senior seem so... feeble?
Annan hesitated to speak.
There are residential houses right here—couldn’t you just throw a potion to block him, then use a spell to smash the door lock, enter the house and start casting?
Don’t you know what ’large body size, weak door’ means?
Maybe senior is more of a research talent. Annan couldn’t help but make excuses for him in his mind.
After all, Salvatore’s combat capability really did seem somewhat poor...
If you could pass the exam ... there must be a problem with Heath Tower of Black’s graduation exam content.
Lin Yiyi’s somewhat panicked voice rang out, "We’re not late, are we?!"
She and Delicious Goose hurriedly arrived from the other end of the street.
When she had just logged in and saw that the sky was red outside, she was immediately startled—
She thought the boss battle had already started, and they were late.
Lin Yiyi’s first reaction was, "I’m not present when the boss spawns; won’t I be blocked outside by an air wall?"
She immediately posted on the forum.
Fortunately, at Frostwater Harbor, there was a pioneering group that had stayed up all night trying to clear the fifth level of the Gallery Nightmare. They had logged in at night and continued until six in the morning when the sun rose, planning to wait for the players here to log in and watch the livestream here before logging off.
Seeing Lin Yiyi’s post, they quickly assigned someone to log off and gave Delicious Goose a dire wake-up call, forcefully summoning him from his midnight card game stream to the game.
After all, when they were playing in the Land of Mist, their bodies there were essentially asleep—this world was like another kind of nightmare to them. So the players weren’t "logging off to sleep" but "logging off to wake up."
When Delicious Goose urgently logged in, he was also startled.
The two immediately rushed to Clearwater Street No. 44—and then saw two fully armed people chatting here.
When they saw the hammer in Annan’s hand, they shuddered instinctively.
The number of times they had been killed by that hammer was not small...
"...It’s fine; you’re not late."
Annan glanced at them.
You’ve timed your arrival very precisely—are we just about to clear the minions and ready to fight the boss, and here you come?
Those who know think you’ve not logged in; those who don’t would think you were just idling nearby.
Annan’s gaze sharpened.
—I can let Big Fatty’s head go, but I must grab the Soul Devourer’s head!
As a silver-tier top-ranking dual-class Summon—just considering the difficulty, Annan felt that getting this head would allow him to soar...
Looking at Annan’s determined expression, even the somewhat fearful Salvatore couldn’t help but nod internally.
Tan Juan... no, Annan is still reliable.
Even when facing the fearsome Soul Devourer, he showed no hint of fear... not at all afraid.
—Just as if he was completely unaware of how dreadful the opponent was.
Suddenly, Salvatore realized that the temperature around them... seemed to have dropped without him noticing.
When he breathed, he faintly saw some white vapor.
But Annan had not cast Frost Nova—
Salvatore was taken aback.
"—Watch out, the Soul Devourer is coming!"