Skadi's Blessing
Albion Subjugation (2) [Lene] [Viewer Participation Content] [New Dimension | 16 viewers | 10:48:32]
—Another chat saying “Left alone again” flashed past, but there was no time to reply. Just as he said, I was the only one left in the field. And Albion’s remaining health was roughly 90%. …There was no chance of victory. No matter how desperately I struggled, it wouldn’t mean a thing. But I refused to give up. I would hold on as long as possible and observe every pattern I could. Anything to make the next attempt even slightly easier.
Yet even with that resolve—
[Pierce Through!]
A translucent circle appeared beneath my feet. Standing inside it meant being impaled by ice spears rising from below. I tried to find safe ground to escape the circle, but—
“…Tch.”
The entire floor was already covered in translucent circles. Not a single gap remained. It was an utterly unreasonable pattern. Still, I threw myself forward with everything I had, yet I never reached the clean patch of floor in the distance. In the end, a sickening crack echoed through my body. The ice spear ignored my full-body armor and pierced straight through my torso.
But my HP was still there. Which meant I could keep fighting. …If only I could move.
The freeze inflicted by the ice spear was a status ailment that completely immobilized the target. Its duration was fifteen seconds. It looked short, but in a raid that was more than enough time to die five times over.
The dragon’s massive right hand came crashing down. No dialogue, no special pattern—just an ordinary attack that crushed my body flat.
〔DEATH〕 ★
“…How many patterns have we seen so far?”
“I think around six…”
“Those were normal attack patterns, not special ones, right?”
“Yeah.”
“The only special pattern we’ve seen is the ice-spear one that triggers when you’re the last one standing.”
Right after the fifteenth attempt at the Albion raid ended, the raid group was discussing the boss’s patterns, but the earlier lively atmosphere was gone. Everyone looked visibly deflated. It was only natural. Fifteen attempts over two and a half hours, and Albion’s HP had never once dropped below 90%. The patterns themselves weren’t particularly difficult—actually easier than Tagirion’s if anything. They were simple and not especially fast. But Albion was absurdly tanky. Even when everyone poured out maximum damage during the DPS window, the health bar only shrank by about 1% at most.
Even though it was the weekend, the clock had already passed morning, and that fact alone brought a crushing sense of helplessness. The knowledge that the raid boss’s signature special patterns hadn’t even begun yet delivered a second wave of despair. It was no wonder their focus kept slipping and they kept dying to simple attacks.
“No matter how I look at it… right?”
No one answered, but they were all certain.
This is a raid that can’t be cleared.
They had started with fewer than half the maximum party size of thirty-five. With so few people, holding the line was impossible and both damage and support were obviously lacking. Everyone present thought the same—except one.
“Um, Lene?”
The berserker in charge of the frontline called out to the silent woman, but received no reply. Lene simply kept her gaze lowered without a word.
Is she tired? Even while wondering that, he called her name again.
“Lene, maybe we should give up here—”
“Just a moment. I’m thinking about something…”
★
There was no way to clear the Albion raid like this. That was the conclusion I reached after long deliberation. Well, clearing it was technically possible. If we prepared properly—optimal party composition, perfect condition—rather than jumping in on a whim, it was a raid we could definitely beat. But did that mean we could never clear it in our current situation?
“That can’t be right…”
“Pardon?”
“Ah, it’s nothing…”
My guess was that the activation condition for Albion Subjugation required a certain number of people to form a party and reach the summit of Ribagar. Plenty of people had reached the summit before, but never this many at once in a single party. And the fact that the raid activated immediately upon reaching the summit with that party suggested the developers intended for the raid to be clearable with the minimum required headcount. Our current party composition had issues, of course, but would simply changing the members really shift the overall flow that much? Probably not. It might become slightly easier, but the fundamental problem would remain. Our biggest issue right now was insufficient damage, and that wouldn’t change unless the number of people increased.
So we would keep dying the moment our focus slipped. Unless we could somehow maintain perfect concentration the entire time—which was impossible. Losing focus was inevitable. It was only natural. The truly strange thing would be not getting discouraged while watching a health bar that barely moved no matter how much damage you dealt.
In other words, the standard approach wasn’t going to work. We had to find another way.
“…Everyone. During the raid, did anything seem strange to you?”
“Hmm. Not really.”
“If I had to point something out, it’s that our damage is way too low… but that’s because we don’t have enough party members.”
I agreed with that. The lack of damage was entirely our fault for having too few people.
“Hmm…”
Nothing else about the patterns stood out either. There was the new freeze status ailment, but that was just a typical raid-boss skill… Wait.
“Tanks.”
“Yes?”
“We’ve never used Skadi’s Tear while frozen, have we…?”
“R-right? You can’t use consumables while frozen.”
“Besides, Skadi’s Tear only cures frostbite, so we figured it wouldn’t help at first…”
That was correct. Skadi’s Tear had no effect other than curing frostbite and granting immunity to it. So of course it wouldn’t help against the new freeze ailment. We had all reached that conclusion right after the second attempt. But what if that assumption was wrong?
“Then… has anyone here actually gotten frostbite during the raid even once?”
No one raised their hand. Was it really possible to avoid frostbite for over two hours on Ribagar? Of course not—unless the system was deliberately preventing it.
A growing certainty. To confirm it, I took out Skadi’s Tear and read the description.
《Skadi’s Tear》
《A potion made from the tears of Skadi, the goddess forgotten by the people.》
《Cures the Frostbite status ailment on use and grants immunity to Frostbite for 30 minutes.》
“…I knew it.”
The keywords “forgotten goddess” and the name Skadi. The answer had been right in front of us the whole time.
★
“Everyone, drink it now…!”
Skadi. The goddess of the hunt who appeared in Norse mythology… and also the goddess of winter. Niblord’s epithet was the Land of Eternal Winter.
〔Skadi’s blessing has settled upon you.〕
〔Immunity to Freeze | Increased damage against Albion〕
〔Albion senses the power of its nemesis, Skadi, and grows more ferocious!〕
—This is actually real lol
Just as expected. The story was probably that Skadi, the goddess of Niblord, had once been defeated by Albion. But that didn’t matter right now. I was curious, sure, but what mattered was clearing the raid.
“It says it got more ferocious—will we be okay?!”
“…We’ll find out soon enough.”
[How dare that goddess—!]
“Ugh?!”
Albion’s first pattern was to charge into the ground, create a shockwave, then sweep with its tail. That part hadn’t changed. But—
[Insolent!]
Its speed had increased dramatically.
“It’s really angry…”
“Well, it did call us its nemesis!”
Still, the experience from fifteen previous attempts wasn’t wasted. Even though I froze up and failed to give any orders, the raid members moved on their own just like they had been doing. Brilliant multicolored light shot toward the sky, and the blood-red barrier regained its original form. The tanks that had been pushed back finally halted Albion’s attack, and just before the DPS window opened—
“Three seconds!”
I shouted with all my strength.
BOOM!
A thunderous roar shook the ground. Magic rained from the sky while swords and spears ravaged Albion’s tail. And Albion’s health bar visibly decreased. If our combined damage during this pattern had never even reduced 1% before, this single attack had taken nearly 5%.
[GRAAAAAAAAAAH!!!]
As I predicted, the faster the pattern became, the shorter the DPS window grew. Albion spread its wings wide with a roar. Once again, translucent circles appeared beneath our feet. The ice spears were annoying because of the freeze ailment, but thanks to Skadi’s Tear we were immune. The real problem was their sheer power—enough to instantly kill any DPS who got hit.
So we could only hope the DPS members would dodge on their own.
〔Skadi bestows her blessing once more!〕
The moment I thought that, the circles beneath our feet vanished along with a system message.
[How dare you!!!]
Albion’s health bar dropped to 80%.
[Very well. I shall tear apart every last one of the insignificant insects you cherish!!!]
A sudden blizzard swept in—an obvious raid-boss special pattern. In other words, the real raid had only just begun.
This really does bring back old memories…