The Great Thief

It appeared that Galford had forgotten Lu Li’s team during this meeting.

He was enjoying his time reading amongst his bookshelves that were filled with his book collections. As soon as he had heard footsteps, he instantly regained his focus and exclaimed, “Flames are terrifying, aren’t they? They can burn all hopes, but now, it is your turn to understand the depth of this utter despair!”

A large fireball instantly shot out towards the silly husky and hit it on the head. Who had let it walk at the front?

Galford’s range of aggro was terrifying. Lu Li was extremely fortunate in choosing not to enter the archive library by himself, despite his Enhanced Stealth.

Silly husky instantly yelled and ran but was killed on the spot.

Azure Sea Breeze raised his shield and blocked the second fireball.

This was a powerful skill called Pyroblast. It was similar to a Fireball, but dealt much more damage and applied a Burn effect as well. Those who could not deal with the Burn damage would have a miserable time.

Fortunately, Galford was not a difficult Boss. If Azure Sea Breeze could deflect his Pyroblasts with the correct timing, he would take minimal damage.

Instructor Galford’s ultimate skill was called Wind Burn, which had an AoE effect and also Stunned. However, it could be easily countered by forming a barrier of players at the front. This would prevent the winds from making contact with the ranged DPS and healers.

Because it did not have the potential to instantly kill players, they could simply dodge it by avoiding the areas that the wind was striking.

Galford was cleared on their first try. The only slight difficulty that they encountered was when Sakura Memories was Stunned in the flames. Her Badge had already been used, so she had to die. However, Lu Li had revived her anyway to give her the experience rewarded from the Boss.

After killing the Boss, they began to retrieve their spoils of war.

Tome of Knowledge, Mage off-hand weapon, Dark gold grade – this was instantly exchanged with Sesame Rice Ball’s guild points that he had gathered.

The secondary weapon slot was usually filled with either a Spell Sword, or a Magic-based Dagger. Weapons like Staves required two hands, so the player would not be able to equip a secondary weapon alongside. Secondary weapons usually had unique bonus effects when equipped, with weaker ones only providing one bonus skill. Decent weapons like the Tome of Knowledge had three, while the high-end ones like the Chronicle of Dark Secrets had five.

It was already clear that no one else wanted it, as both Lonesome Flower and March Rain both had exquisite Staffs already.

The second item that dropped was also Dark Gold grade – the Devout Gloves, which were part of an equipment set.

The Devout Set belonged to Priests, and March Rain already had a piece. Now that another has dropped, the set effect for two pieces would be activated after March Rain equipped it.

An Instance Dungeon dropping two pieces of set equipment was a rare occurrence.

Everyone else was staring with wide eyes and salivating. Lady Luck was definitely on their side.

The last equip was Gold grade armour – Ash Covered Boots. These were usually equipped by a Thief, but Druids could also wear them. However, Lu Li and Hachi Chan did not want them, so they were designated a place within the guild’s vault for exchange.

The final item was a Righteous Orb.

After looting everything, everyone remained for a while more.

Hachi Chan had taken on a quest from Light’s Hope Chapel, which included an NPC called Duke Nicholas Zverenhoff.

Duke Nicholas Zverenhoff was a highly regarded linguist whose homeland had been destroyed. Most of the quests that gave out regarded the killing of the fallen generals of the Scarlet Crusade. This was because his homeland was not merely wiped out by the Scourge, but also the Scarlet Crusade.

However, his focus was now on his old friend, Instructor Galford.

There were two types of people who would understand you the most. One was your friend and ally, while the other was an enemy. Instructor Galford had once been an old friend, but was now an enemy. As such, Duke Nicholas Zverenhoff sought for his destruction and torture.

Zverenhoff had asked Hachi Chan to burn and destroy all the data in the Archive. These remaining files were personally scribed by Galford after the originals were destroyed.

Even after becoming one of the Scourge himself, Galford still could not let go of his old occupation. This only went to show his dedication towards the Archive. It was purely because of his passion and dedication towards the Archive that Zverenhoff wanted to utterly destroy his hard work.

Although Zverenhoff had lost his homeland, he was still a rich man that gave out great rewards for his quests.

This quest had to be completed!

Everyone watched on as the flames engulfed and tore down the walls of the Archive. Lu Li knew that they were going to be rewarded generously by Zverenhoff.

Instance Dungeons usually were refreshed after every entry, but this one was different. The second party to enter this dungeon would be seeing the files that were copied after Lu Li and his party had burned everything down.

Zverenhoff’s rewards depended on the number of files that were destroyed. One could only imagine the rewards that they were going to receive for burning down an entire house.

Lu Li decided against participating in this quest to split the EXP given by Zverenhoff. High-levelled players like Lonesome Flower, Sakura Memories and Sesame Rice Ball chose not to participate either. This left players Remnant Dream, March Rain and Azure Sea Breeze. Being either students, healers or Main Tanks, training was generally harder for them.

As for Hachi Chan, she was a questing expert. Her level was not low either, but without her, the mission could not be completed.

Finally, it was time to tackle the final Boss, The Dreadlord Balnazzar.

Similar to before, the party had to clear out swarms of smaller monsters beforehand, which was a mind-numbing task. However, the items that dropped from them were valuable enough to make it worthwhile.

“Be more cautious if you don’t want to die,” Lu Li reminded as he tapped Azure Sea Breeze on the shoulder and signalled for everyone to retreat a little. This was a precautionary measure in case Azure Sea Breeze had pulled too many monsters.

“What’s up? I’ve been through much worse situations. Don’t worry about me,” Azure Sea Breeze assured as he pounded his chest.

The monsters here dropped many recipes and blueprints, but most of them were fairly common. Lu Li wanted an Engineering blueprint that produced mediocre items. He planned to use it to rapidly increase his Profession EXP, as the materials that were required would be much cheaper.