Chapter 282: Primordial Wyvern's Second Form — Rocky Earth Dragon
The existence of the Gold Digger and the Bomber Man can be described as a love-hate relationship.
In the game "Gold Digger", the robots responsible for chasing the player's character only need to change their vest color from green to blue to become the "Bomber Man".
This isn't just simple asset reuse; in terms of background settings, the two are deeply connected.
When the only Bomber Man robot to awaken self-awareness finally climbs 50 floors and reaches the surface, he transforms into a Gold Digger. Players who complete Bomber Man can see him transform into a Gold Digger in the ending.
However, once he becomes a Gold Digger, he will continue to be hunted by other Bomber Man robots who lack self-awareness.
Bomber Man, as the name suggests, is an entity capable of planting bombs. His bombs can destroy ordinary rocks and blast open steel doors.
Upon becoming a Gold Digger, he loses the ability to plant bombs. Instead, he gains the ability to dig a two-meter square pit, just large enough to fit a person, anywhere on rocky or sandy ground. However, these excavated pits automatically revert after a few seconds, and the restoring earth and sand inflict indiscriminate, significant damage on both friendly and enemy units caught within the pit.
Its damage is incredibly high, but the drawback is that if it completely buries and instantly kills a target, the opponent's drops will also be swallowed… This drawback, however, disappears when facing large creatures.
What the Gold Digger did was dig away the sand around the nearby roots of the Hungry Rocky Monstrosity in the tunnel excavated by Digo, making space for the Bomber Man's bombs. When the sand restored itself, it would bury both the roots and the bombs together.
Even if the Hungry Rocky Monstrosity discovered the problem, it couldn't shake off the bombs sealed inside. The sealed bombs, due to their limited explosion range, concentrated all their force, which would otherwise have been dispersed, onto the Hungry Rocky Monstrosity's roots. Furthermore, this attack method specializes in rock demolition, giving the bombs an excessive boost in final damage!
Boom!
With just one bomb, the Hungry Rocky Monstrosity let out a pained shriek, characteristic of a creature suffering a severe blow. Its entire body trembled, and the five rock-bone petals that always covered its weak point, the Demonic Eye, involuntarily opened.
And what awaited this weak point, the Demonic Eye, was the fiery combination of Bazett and the Skeleton Kicker: the X-Type Double Knight Kick!
As a boss-level monster unit, and one in the form of a building-like entity, the Hungry Rocky Monstrosity's health bar was terrifyingly long, comparable to the underground Martian spaceship "Mara's Ten Commandments" that Cheng Tian encountered in the Metal Slug instance.
However, when faced with highly targeted player tactics—an endless cycle of bombing below and drilling above—it ultimately dissolved into a sky full of soul fragments.
It's worth noting, however, that the final blow to the Hungry Rocky Monstrosity wasn't delivered by Bazett and the others, but its fallen corpse was instantly disintegrated and teleported into the White Tower.
"Who should be strengthened?"
Fina, one of the Twin Goddesses, asked Cheng Tian, holding her hands in a gentle embrace.
Cheng Tian, who was participating in the core component construction, heard this and directly shook the reins that appeared out of thin air in his hand. Then, the Primordial Wyvern, which had not had a chance to participate in the battle due to the no-fly zone after entering the instance, was released.
As the monster's corpse was dissected and power was infused, the Primordial Wyvern's form began to undergo significant changes.
The wyvern's wings began to mutate into forelimbs, and rock-like flowers, similar to a Venusaur's, grew on its back. It transformed directly from a swift flying dragon into a four-legged earth dragon.
Even its roar became a bit deeper than before.
[The Primordial Wyvern has accepted the transplant of "Rocky Rafflesia", and its form is changing—]
[The Primordial Wyvern's bloodline has undergone mutation, acquiring a ground form called "Rocky Earth Dragon".]
[Rocky Earth Dragon — By transplanting the Rocky Rafflesia of the "Hungry Rocky Monstrosity", its bloodline essence is temporarily altered. While losing the ability to fly, it gains a special ground form that allows it to move freely on the ground and in sand.
The Primordial Wyvern can switch its form at any time according to your or its own will. When switching to the "Rocky Earth Dragon" form, its Strength and Agility attributes will swap, meaning Strength 46 points, Agility 24 points.
In Rocky Earth Dragon form, the talent "Oppressive Presence" and active skill "Continuous Rockslide" remain unchanged, but "Primordial Power" and "Dual Scorching Fangs" will be replaced by new skills "Sandification Fortress" and "Rocky Demonic Flower" respectively.
Sandification Fortress — The Rocky Earth Dragon stations itself at the current ground location and initiates sandification erosion of the surrounding ground. The radius of sandification erosion increases by 1 meter every 1 second, up to a maximum of 18 meters. In sandy terrain, it gains a 1% maximum HP recovery bonus per second, and its skill casting range is doubled, but it cannot move. Entering and exiting Sandification Fortress form each consume 25 MP, with no cooldown.
Rocky Demonic Flower — The Rocky Earth Dragon can summon up to 2 derivatives constructed from rock flowers and demonic eyes on the ground. These derivatives possess 10% of the main body's HP and share its vision. If destroyed, they will deal 50 points of explosive damage and scatter up to 5 Rocky Spores; if these spores parasitize the ground, they can form temporary small Rocky Demonic Flowers with 5% of the main body's HP and 25 points of explosive damage, but they cannot scatter new spores; if these spores parasitize a living creature, they will drain 5% of its maximum HP and forcibly explode when removed. Creating 1 Rocky Demonic Flower costs 5 MP, with no cooldown.]
[Additional comment: Why is your Venusaur Rock + Ground type?]
The transformed ground-form wyvern… no, the big fellow, now an earth dragon, thumped its way towards Cheng Tian, showing him the Rafflesia on its back.
How to describe it? It was quite SAN-dropping.
It was like a lamprey and a Rafflesia combined, their throat-mouth poked in front of Cheng Tian.
But without a doubt, the earth dragon with its new form also regained the ability to participate in combat, and Cheng Tian decisively sent it out, stationing it directly at the main entrance of the White Tower, transforming it into a tower-defending structure.
Players can bypass and sneak attack the tower, and the Dark Clan can certainly do the same. Just because it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean it won't happen in the future.
Especially now that the Hungry Rocky Monstrosity had tied up and delayed the main force for a long time… "Orange! Get out here!"
Sure enough, just as Cheng Tian finished setting up the new tower-defending structure, Sabba's voice, full of resentment, came from outside.
Sabba, the Dark Mage, had taken a long detour, bypassing the White Tower's front lines to sneak attack the tower.
She not only brought her two Ice and Fire Twin-Headed Companion Familiars but also the seemingly quiet Magic Swordsman siblings, and temporarily summoned two champion-level monsters—
Valcurian, a Winged Demon with bat and demon characteristics.
Genocres, a Clown Demon with clown and chimera characteristics.
However, when she saw the entity emerging from within the tower, she couldn't help but freeze.
Because it wasn't Cheng Tian, whom she hated to the bone, but the combination of the two old geezers: Saurthoppa, the Captain of the Temple Knights, and Shion, the Chief Temple Priest, who were supposed to have "died in battle" amidst the monster army!
Kishugar, who had originally seemed somewhat distracted, instantly came back to life!