Chapter 3162: "Romantic" Wedding Season (46)

The initial battle went smoothly. Helada's four Hydra heads were all occupied by summoned creatures with little attack power, neutralizing their otherwise strong trait of attacking twice each turn. Even with two attacks per turn, they could only deal a maximum of two points of damage—fortunately, there were cards in play with healing skills.

But, as Shiller had expected, the creature had a second phase. When its health dropped below 70%, the summon cards they used were put directly in front of them.

Everyone was stunned and turned to Dream Power Doctor Strange. With a wave of his hand, the description under Helada's event card changed. The rules they thought they knew were only on the first page; there was a second page.

When Helada's health reached a certain stage, it would trigger new skills, one of which allowed it to use its heads to block attacks.

There was nothing the others could do. If they didn't defeat the heads first, they'd never finish the event.

Stark gave Shiller a look that, despite Shiller's bad feeling, meant he had to go ahead. After all, his umbrella had high attack power, capable of taking out most of a head in one turn.

After several swift moves, the ashen heads were carried off, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. But unexpectedly, Helada possessed other skills. It stretched out a multitude of tentacles from the ashen mire and slapped everything on the field.

Shocked by the impressive damage numbers, everyone froze.

"Are you serious?" Stark asked Dream Power Doctor Strange. "20 damage?!"

The situation seemed dire—a group damage of 20 meant there were few cards that could withstand it.

However, they had been in battle for several rounds and almost every card was shielded. Still, this left many weakened with Shiller's several morbid cards barely hanging on. The most vulnerable one was saved from being taken away only by Spider Man's protective ability.

Gathering around the event, everyone leaned on the table, their looks heavy with concern, watching the situation on the field unfold.

"This is bad," Stark said, furrowing his brow. "This skill activates every four turns, but our healing and shield skills have just entered cooldown. We definitely can't recover in time. If it hits us again, we're all doomed."

The slightly good news was that Steve, boosted by The Hulk's area damage, was close to finishing off the Hydra on his side. They could only hope his group would finish quickly and come to deal with this threat.

Nick held the strongest support card, Hill—a group healing card. If she could enter the field within four turns and raise their health, they might turn the tide.

Everyone consented that they couldn't fall here. They were all upgraded superhero identities—if they were defeated by some unknown Outer God, they'd become a laughingstock.

Shiller certainly didn't want Nya to have the last laugh.

Just as the situation turned grim, more bad news arrived—all the characters eliminated by the slap had been resurrected as heads.

Watching Dream Power Doctor Strange take the cards and turn them ashen, Stark cursed. Pepper Potts had just been killed, and War Machine barely survived.

As four new heads emerged, everyone despaired.

These Skull cards weren't weak summoned creatures like before. Pepper's card was the weakest amongst them yet still had an attack power of 5. Attacking twice per turn meant 10 points, and together, the four creatures could deal over 50 points of damage in a single round.

They could have endured if they were at full health, but now, all weakened, the next round would surely take them out.

All eyes turned to Shiller.

Shiller observed the table, took a deep breath, and carefully let it out, saying, "Don't panic, I still have a trump card."

He turned to Dream Power Doctor Strange. "The turn for Art's creation should be up, right?"

Dream Power Doctor Strange nodded, replying, "Yes, you'll draw a card at the start of the next turn. But remember, no character in the event can draw cards, and that includes summoned creatures."

Dream Power Doctor Strange meant the heads couldn't draw cards, and it wasn't possible to bypass them to directly attack Helada.

"I'm not intending for them to draw cards," Shiller said.

"What are you planning? Shiller, don't mess this up," Stark said with a frown, remembering that Art had chosen him initially.

Though worried, he wasn't overly anxious, as Art's card replacement due to creating negative statuses could be dispelled, and he had a Mecha with dispelling skills that could revert any transformations, such as turning into a Red Fish.

Unfazed, Shiller calmly explained: "Remember the three cards of Art's creation. The first reduces health by 30% for all, which means percentage damage to health. So, both the heads and Helada lose 30% of their maximum health."

"The second summons a Blood Card each turn, which uses its action to heal characters and can also take hits for the front line."

"The third directly draws cards, and while those cards can't attack others, the event monsters can't harm them. At least a Stark can be saved."

Everyone looked to Dream Power Doctor Strange for confirmation, who nodded, confirming Shiller's words: "Yes, players can attack those who draw cards, but event monsters cannot. In the event, drawing means being untargetable."

Stark exhaled, his gaze still fixed on the table, pondering. "This means whatever we draw next turn will be advantageous."

"The best would be the Blood Card," Wanda spoke. "It's the ideal solution of the three, but how to ensure we draw it? Do any of you have skills to increase luck?"

Everyone shook their heads. Luck was a late-game skill, accumulated bit by bit, allowing players to choose a card outright instead of drawing when at 100%.

But they clearly lacked the time to gradually increase their Luck Value, and it seemed like they'd have to leave this to chance.

But Shiller's luck...

"Can someone else draw a card for me?" Stark immediately looked at Dream Power Doctor Strange and asked.

Dream Power Doctor Strange shook his head and said, "No."

Everyone sighed.

"What do you mean by that?" Shiller was displeased, he said, "Though my luck isn't that great, it's not bad either, right?"

The others stared at him without speaking.

"Not... not bad..." Shiller's voice grew quieter and quieter.

"Or we do this." Wanda seemed well-versed in the matter, she said, "Just keep thinking about the worst possible outcome in your mind, that way you might actually end up drawing the best possible result."

Jarvis nudged her with his elbow, clearly not buying this mysticism.

Greed thought for a moment, his luck really wasn't great, Shiller was actually one of the few with poor luck. Otherwise, why would he have encountered Lucifer on the first day of his descent?

"Forget it, either way, it's beneficial for us, Tony, just decide on which Mecha you want to buy, you've saved up quite a bit of points." Shiller said.

Stark began to ponder as well, indeed, he had a significant number of points at his disposal, enough to assemble a Mecha with a serial number past 30. Those Mechas were mostly Nano Armor, not only did they have high-standing panels, but they also possessed various skills.

"Let's move on to the next round." Wanda turned to Steve and asked, "Captain, how much longer do you need on your side?"

"I should be able to finish in the next round," Steve thought for a moment and, looking at the two cards in his hand, said, "I'm planning to snipe Red Skull directly with Hawkeye, but the damage Hawkeye does is variable, I'm not too certain..."

At that moment, an idea struck Shiller, he looked at Dream Power Doctor Strange and asked, "Matt's Sniping disregards barriers, does it ignore the obstacles created by events too?"

With that, everyone's focus shifted to the card representing Matt, his sniping skills could be used again.

Dream Power Doctor Strange was silent for a long time. Clearly, the rules didn't specify, and theoretically, causing damage without participating in the event seemed impossible, but Matt's card explicitly stated it disregarded all obstructions. Now he could only judge based on the current situation at the table.

After pondering for a while, he nodded and said, "Yes."

Steve's face immediately lit up with joy. Although if Matt and Hawkeye both sniped Red Skull it would definitely finish him, if now they could directly take out a Skull across an event, it would greatly reduce the pressure from the other event, effectively achieving their goal.

The next round began.

Shiller prepared to draw an Art Card, uncertain of its usefulness, but in his mind, he still repeated the word "failure" a few times, hoping this would help him draw one of the other two cards against the odds.

Three cards floated in front of him and unfolded in sequence. Shiller closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and chose the middle one.

As the card flipped open, everyone breathed a sigh of relief; they had actually drawn the Red Fish card—a rare moment of good luck for Shiller.

Immediately, the card in front of Stark was covered by a card with a red fish drawn on it, and it promptly produced a Blood Card in the front row.

The card was very useful for the situation at hand, but not so good for Stark's mental state, as he suddenly noticed that the strange red bass drawn on the card seemed to have twenty-four ribs.

Stark pursed his lips.

Wanda, who was sitting nearby, noticed Stark's change in expression, but not knowing what it was about, didn't dwell on it.

The Blood Card was actionable, a powerful individual healing card that could completely heal a character's health line in one go.

Moreover, in this game, who stood in the front row was up to the players themselves; any character could stand as a front row card, but if they didn't have a Taunt Skill, players could choose not to attack the front card.

But the monsters within the event weren't as intelligent, typically targeting the character who stood at the forefront, thus a Blood Card could easily be used to heal several characters with higher health to stand in the front.

Stark sent out War Machine directly.

At that point, Steve's support also arrived, and a single shot from Matt directly took out a Skull, meaning that they had alleviated at least one fourth of the damage they would've taken from the Skulls.

Spider Man's Spider Silk Launcher and Venom were also confirmed as being able to control the Skulls, successfully immobilizing two of the remaining three.

This greatly reduced their pressure.

Shiller was the main attacker, and although his morbid card-playing tactics couldn't be used in the event, his umbrella hit whoever it targeted and broke their defense. Once defense was breached, even regular damage was high.

Shiller first applied a defense break to the only Skull that could move, followed by two normal attacks leaving it hanging by a thread. His teammates had other cards to use for normal attacks and were definitely able to finish it off before its turn came.

He saved an action for later, preparing to put down the Bishop because he was worried that if in four rounds they couldn't kill this monster, he could use the Bishop to hold back that final fatal blow from the enemy.

Shiller pulled out a card from his hand and placed it on the table, only to realize he had not laid down the Bishop but Mediocre.

And now things had gone south.