[Dark Shackles] It only took Liam a second to recognize the familiar skill of summoners. There were other players here! And they clearly did not have any friendly intentions! As he was stumbling forward, he instantly steadied his body enough to fall into the stream, rather than on the rock. The [Dark Shackles] spell completely binds a person with dark chains and this was already the best he could do in this situation. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎 "The active time for this spell is only 10 seconds. If I can hold on for 10 seconds…" Liam closed his mouth, holding his breath as his body sank lower into the water. Thankfully, because of all the blood and the ape corpses, he was able to get some sort of cover. The water was extremely dirty and muddy so once he was inside it, he was no longer visible. Also, the rampaging ape in its frenzied state was doing its part in distracting this newly arrived intruder who had successfully managed to attack him on the sly. "Hmm… I doubt that there is only one. If they are coming here all this way, then they should have made some preparations." Liam had only come to this spot by accident but he did not think that the same applied for the others as well. This was probably a distance location mentioned by some rare quest He tried to see what was happening above him but nothing was visible. The water had become too muddy and stagnant. He could only feel the vibrations coming from the ape as it repeatedly moved its legs, stomping angrily and from the looks of it attacking someone. However, the next second, this set of vibrations started becoming bigger and bigger. "Shit." Liam did not have to think about the reason for that. He already knew what this was. The ape was coming! It was probably bounding towards its new targets and since he was on the way, he could feel the waves created in the turbulent stream because of the ape's movements. But even though he knew it, he still couldn't move because the shackles were active. 3 more seconds. "There is so much space around, it won't step on me, right?" "Fuck." "Fuckkkkk." Just as the last second of the [Dark Shackles] was about to tick off, the ape's giant legs thundered and simultaneously both its hind legs stepped right onto Liam's body, producing a loud breaking noise. CRACK About half of Liam's health dropped as the beast inadvertently managed to land the most perfect kick without intending to. The ape had used him as a spring and bounced away towards the other people surrounding it. Liam did not know whether to laugh or cry. The attack at least bought him enough time to recover and get back on his feet. He activated [Stealth] and quickly swam back to the surface hiding behind a pile of corpses. He then saw Luna as well hiding in the same spot. "You did well. Hide here." Liam smiled and sent her a mental message. The fox turned around anxiously but it was not able to see him. The beast looked very confused when it went back to watching the ape. Liam as well watched the giant ape thrashing away the dozen players on the front line. With its eyes an even deeper shade of red, it looked around and locked on to all the players who had newly arrived. Since Liam was no longer attacking it, its aggro had shifted and it now was furious at the other people standing in front of it. "What the hell? How is its health already back up?" "Come on. Come on. Keep attacking. Move it." "It just took out all the tanks. How is this thing so strong?" Several shouts sounded, amidst the terrorizing roars of the ape. There were about twenty players, some of them already on the red, attacking the ape with everything they had. And yet they seemed to be struggling. Liam calmly watched this from the back. Or rather he was calm until his gaze fell on a player standing at the back and shouting instructions. He might not recognize the others but this one he was very very familiar with. This was the head lackey of his so-called 'Master'. And this entire team was probably from members of the Gu family guild, Jade Mountain, the people whom he harbored the most hatred for. And today, these people have somehow walked over to him all on their own in this isolated place and even took the initiative to pick a fight with him by kill stealing his boss? "Heh." Liam grinned. "So I have no other choice huh. Fine by me." "Sometimes, you have got to love fate." Liam did not idly stay back and watch anymore. He moved. It was time to return the favor. They attacked when he was right about to kill the ape, so why couldn't he do the same. In fact, it was much easier to wreak havoc in a bigger group and he was going to show them how. With his [Stealth] still active he circled around the fight moving to the backline where the casters were located. Liam tactically hid behind a pile of corpses and then started his work. He topped off his health and mana, gulping down potions and rotated the energy in his body, conjuring a big ball of flame. This effectively canceled his [Stealth] but he was already well hidden so it didn't announce his presence. The small ball of flame in his hand grew bigger and bigger and Liam compressed it as much as he could before sending it forward towards one of the healers. Just when he was in the middle of it, because he was extremely focused wanting to one-shot the healer, he suddenly noticed the sound of the gushing waterfalls. The water falling into the stream resounded loudly, as a dull roar in the background and he unexpectedly got an idea. He tried to visualize the fireball like a stream and split it into multiple streams just like the strands of water pouring down onto the stream. Obeying his command, his originally single huge-sized fireball split apart into several blasts, some weaker and some strangers and some just wisps of fire. This was his first try and he was already in the middle of casting the spell, so there was only so much he could control. But still, Liam grinned in excitement. He watched curiously as these individual blasts of fire shot towards the group of casters and healers standing at the back. BAM. BAM. BAM. BAM. Different damage numbers floated on different players' heads and the group was dumbfounded. Who was throwing fire at them? As far as they could see, the ape was only capable of doing physical-type attacks. Moreover, the fire attack seemed to come from a different spot. What the hell was happening? Since the attack was completely unexpected, it threw them off of their rhythm, resulting in the offset of heal and attack spells. So this in turn ended up affecting the whole raid group that was fighting with the ape. Moreover, this elite ape was also an intelligent beast. How could it let go of this distraction? Using this as a chance, the ape roared loudly and swung its arm, wiping out the melee players who were already only hanging on by a thread. The ape's strength was formidable and these players didn't have the advantage which Liam had when he was fighting with the beast. They were in fact in a much more unfavorable position as their levels were lower than the ape. So it was inevitable that they are fighting an uphill battle even though the ape's health was close to bottoming out. While these bunch of players continued suffering, Liam on the other hand, was in his own world. "Damn. Not bad." He muttered, eying the trajectory of the attack. He was surprised that he thought of something like this, despite the situation he was in. He had been thinking about this concept for a while and now in the midst of all of this commotion, it just suddenly struck him. Liam had always been a self-taught person, so he quickly grasped hold of this feeling and tried to imitate it again. He sent out another two consecutive similar attacks to memorize it. It was inconvenient to do this in the middle of this chaos but he couldn't let this precious opportunity pass by. Besides, it seemed to be doing its job very well. With the added bonus for his fire magic spells, and with Liam refining the attack every single time, almost compressing them into bullets, he was raining down terror on the casters. The healers couldn't keep up with both refreshing their own health and the ape's assault and soon, the entire group fell apart. Liam watched in amusement as his previous life friends were slaughtered without any exception. He did not even have to lift his finger. The ape took care of everything. And when the last one fell down, he quickly started barraging the ape with a volley of attacks, finally bringing down its health to 0. [Ding. Congratulations.. You have killed the Super Elite Golden Purple Ape. You have gained 20000 experience points]