Chapter 96
96. The Upside of the Community
Most challengers of the current generation look at the strategies posted on the community and defeat bosses using standard methods.
Naturally, they aren't particularly good at figuring out how to tackle a boss they've never seen before.
But some of the top-tier, strategy-minded challengers who have stayed for a long time in pursuit of becoming high-ranking hunters, along with a handful of veteran challengers, are different.
The guild masters who remain behind to maintain order inside the Tower of Trials, and the highest-ranking challengers who have been holed up for ages in pursuit of S-rank.
They have accumulated experience nearly equal to that of first-generation challengers, and some of them actually climbed the Tower during the first or second generation.
- Jinhyeok was still alive lol. Is this a survival check-in?
- Is this guy still soloing? Still no newbies on 2661?
- ㄴ Seems so? Nobody has the 2661 tag on the community.
- What the hell is a World Boss? I've never seen anything like that before.
- What floor boss is that?
- ㄴ What the fuck, that's a World Boss? Why is it there???
My post, which still drew a great deal of attention on the community, quickly began receiving comments.
At first, naturally, they didn't offer anything useful; some even commented without looking at the screenshots I'd gone to the trouble of uploading.
But, one by one, they checked what the post contained and were horrified by the existence of the World Boss they'd only heard about through rumors.
- What the fuck is that?
- A World Boss?? That thing really exists?
- ㄴ What's a World Boss?
- ㄴ It's something like a hidden boss that requires dozens of people to form a raid and tackle it together.
- ㄴ What the fuck? But isn't Jinhyeok a solo player?
- This bastard's even faking things now just to get a featured post lol. Stop lying.
- ㄴ How the fuck could anyone fake that, you idiot lol
At that point, I uploaded another post. I attached a screenshot of the system message and included an explanation of the situation.
The comments were one thing, but I also received an incredible number of private-message notifications. A few of them were even from top-tier guilds.
As far as I knew, World Bosses had appeared in South Korea only three times in total.
Most of those who distinguished themselves in those three raids received Unique- or Epic-grade rewards and became top-tier hunters.
Naturally, members of the top-tier guilds had been keeping a close eye out for World Bosses.
Of course, unless they could cross over into our Tower, all that interest would be useless to them.
The information and tips they'd provide would clearly be a major help in planning the raid. I opened the community again.
In just a little while, the comments numbered in the hundreds, and my post instantly became a featured post after receiving hundreds of upvotes.
Once that happened, the community naturally shifted its focus here. Related posts kept filling the pages.
[How many times has a World Boss appeared?]
[But can that thing even be killed?]
[Are there 50 people on Server 2661?]
[There's only one person on the server, and it's a 50-man raid, what the fuck lol]
[It's 50 or more, not exactly 50]
[Is this guy the only one in a different universe?]
And amid all the random posts riding the wave, one post received a great many upvotes and shot up to become a featured post.
[Author: Kang Hyeok-jin#1421]
[Title: Elemental enhancement is the most important thing in a World Boss raid]
(Image)
Our party had the highest contribution during the Galtram raid. Proof above.
During the World Raid waiting period, lesser monsters spawn near the boss, and they have the same attribute as the boss.
So before the raid begins, you can enchant for each attribute type and test your damage.
Since it's only one run anyway, slap one-use elemental enhancements on every raid member and the damage boost will be insane.
Conversely, you can put on elemental resistance after taking a hit; it should make the tank line about 1.5 times as durable.
You can't kill it solo no matter what, but I'll go through all the old strategy records for now.
Please get this on the front page so Jinhyeok can see it.
- Oh, someone with experience. Upvote.
- Immediate upvote. This needs to go up.
- But where would Jinhyeok get raid members?
- Can one-use elemental enhancement actually be applied? They say Jinhyeok is still on the 9th floor.
- ㄴ Yep, buy elemental talismans at the auction house and apply them. They aren't expensive.
- ㄴ You fucking idiot, there's nobody on the server, and you're talking about the auction house lol
Once the community buzz got moving, a word from an experienced player or expert was bound to emerge.
Useful information was gradually piling up.
**
I uploaded screenshots of the World Boss's appearance and gave a detailed account of the progress of my faction quest.
I also explained the identity of the World Boss—the High Elf King—as well as the lore surrounding the World Tree and the fact that I was seeking cooperation from every faction.
After that, useful information began to pour in even faster than before. Everyone had gone through the faction quests on Floors 7 through 9.
There was information obtainable from the Kingdom army route I hadn't experienced, and information from the High Elf faction route.
There were even opinions based on lore from self-proclaimed historians who studied the various stories of the Tower of Trials.
[Author: Kim Hyeok-su#1421]
[Title: There are magic cannons among the Kingdom army's weapons]
If you persuade the NPCs properly, you should be able to bring them along. Since they're large targets, they should be easy to hit as well.
There should be around fifty magic cannons in total. They're originally for siege-war quests, but you can enhance them by putting in enhancement materials.
Up to +4, they're efficient. Beyond that, I wouldn't recommend it unless you have materials overflowing.
They might stubbornly refuse to lend you the magic cannons, but there should be a general NPC from the Fourth Unit among the commanders, right?
The details vary a little from Tower to Tower, but if you follow the quest line, you'll find out that he's involved in corruption related to the magic cannons.
Threaten him with that, and it should work. Get this on the front page too.
They were large-scale weapons used in siege events available through the quest lines. This was especially useful.
It didn't matter that enhancing them was inefficient. My inventory contained literally mountains of enhancement materials.
After that, following the information I'd acquired, I took several Dark Elf mages with me and began experimenting against the lesser monsters.
Then I informed the community that the most effective attribute was Light, followed by Spell-type attacks.
[Author: Go Hyeok-jun#1556]
[Title: Tips for maximizing Light attribute]
Ask an elite High Elf mage to cast Shining Charge on you.
Have a Kingdom army paladin apply Holy Charge as well, since it stacks with Shining Charge.
The Dark Elf alchemy shop has random crafting. You can make an Orb of Light there too.
The orb is single-use and its duration is short, so only use it when you've found your damage window.
Magic cannons can be imbued with attributes too, but the increase for Light is low, so go with Spell instead.
A high-ranking mage NPC from the Kingdom army can use an area-wide Spell attribute amplification buff called Land of Spells.
Make sure to use it when the magic cannon fires its first shot.
Once again, information quickly began pouring in.
The rarity of a major event like a World Boss raid, combined with the attention focused on the only solo player across all servers, produced a synergistic effect.
Even top-ranked challengers who rarely appeared on the community offered tips based on their own experiences.
There were more tips that could be applied in actual situations than I'd expected.
Countless strategies and tactics I hadn't known because I'd never experienced a conventional raid as a solo player.
Various rumors and rules of thumb passed down by word of mouth since the first generation.
Each one was insignificant on its own, but the value of this information, passed along by hundreds and thousands of people, was immense.
Yeah, this was the community's upside—the true collective intelligence.
**
I took in the information people brought from the community and completed a rough raid plan.
I simply followed the other challengers' suggestions and corrections to the plan I'd shared; by the end, it looked quite convincing.
The problem was whether we could actually carry it out as written.
The entire plan ultimately rested on the assumption that the three great powers would cooperate fully. If they couldn't cooperate, everything would be over.
The forces we could mobilize would be cut in half, and it would become difficult even to complete our preparations before the raid began.
As a token of gratitude to the community, which was buzzing with activity, I scattered a few suitably ‘good’ screenshots before closing the window.
The summit meeting was about to begin. This was the moment when each faction's willingness to cooperate would be decided, with the raid looming ahead.
With a few people, myself included, observing, representatives of each faction sat around a round table.
Mercedes sat as the High Elf representative, while the Kingdom army was represented not by its king but by someone known as a corps commander.
Judging by the commander's imposing bearing and stride, this was probably the Kingdom army's strongest combat NPC.
And naturally, the Dark Elf faction's representative should have been Queen Eleanor.
“Has the Dark Elf representative not arrived yet?”
Eleanor showed no sign of approaching. What was going on?
I gestured to a nearby Dark Elf to ask what was happening, but the Dark Elf only shook their head.
It was only several minutes later that the Dark Elf faction's representative entered the conference room.
“Good grief, just look at the big shots gathered here.”
The Dark Elf representative appeared wearing distinctive work clothes that were completely out of place here, with the smell of iron clinging to them.
The one seated at the round table wasn't Eleanor but a short Dark Elf blacksmith.
“Erwen?”
It was Erwen.