Castlevania I allows difficulty selection, offering two options: "NORMAL" and "EASY."
However, counterintuitively, the default difficulty on the game's selection screen is Normal, not Easy!
For children who couldn't even recognize all 26 letters back then, they naturally mashed the "START" button upon entering the Yugi, resulting in nine out of ten starting on Normal difficulty, under which the Player controlling Simon Belmont gains the Functionality of this 『Hit Dodge』.
Once hit, the character uncontrollably jumps backward, and the Player cannot interfere even if they wear out the Controller during this time.
If Easy difficulty is chosen, getting hit does not cause a backward jump but keeps the character standing in place, while the Phase Shift Effect still triggers, allowing the Player to swim freely among the Monsters.
If on flat ground, getting hit and jumping back is fine, but the problem is that Castlevania features many Terrain mechanisms like stairs, Pits, and Jumping Platforms, and once the Hit Dodge Effect is triggered, it most likely results in an immediate fall into the Abyss.
If one encounters the Skeleton's parabolic Bone Club, the S-shaped flying Medusa Head, or the scurrying Flea Man on this already Fatal terrain, the feeling is simply unparalleled!
Some of James the Angry Video Game Nerd's reactions while playing the first installment are not exaggerated at all; Players hearing the Death sound effect react like this.
It must be said that this kid Cheng Tian gambles quite heavily, truly worthy of someone who likes stuffing his deck with the trump card Holy Grail and the Time Magician; this time, he was betting that the Phase Shift Effect triggered by getting hit would allow him to dodge the attack from the Vampire Magician.
But the fact is, his gamble paid off.
Polymorph failed to hit him while he was in the Phase Shift state, and his body being forcibly thrown backward actually produced an effect commonly known as "Nitrogen Acceleration."
This incident is also recorded in the original Yugi.
Many speedrunners utilize this forced backward jump mechanic upon being hit to forcibly skip obstacles that are normally impassable in the Normal Process, thereby skipping an entire Map to save time.
Going all-in is awesome! Going all-in constantly is awesome!
At this moment, Cheng Mouren's expression of elation from successfully going all-in must have appeared nothing short of "ferocious" in the eyes of the Vampire Magician.
The Magician wanted to Blink to evade Cheng Tian's pounce, but the sluggish Magic Power operation had already provided the answer.
The Skill was on Cooldown and could not be used.
However, just as the Magician prepared to meet the Physical Attack of the frail Human with his powerful Blood Clan body, the bare-chested Cheng Tian actually passed straight through the Magician's body, as smoothly as if they weren't even on the same layer!
Clearly, the Phase Shift Effect resulting from the Hit Dodge had not yet ended, and there was no collision volume between Cheng Tian and the Magician at that moment.
The Magician never expected Cheng Tian's Phase Shift to last this long, capable of passing through Spells and people alike; it could be said that every step of his judgment was wrong—one mistake led to another. The Magician, having been passed through by the Phase Shift, was just about to counterattack the Human behind him with his staff when a strong sense of suffocation and a terrifying Burn enveloped him.
Cheng Tian's Demon Breaking Whip Vampire Killer had successfully coiled around the Vampire Magician's neck!
Here, Cheng Tian exploited a bug that wasn't quite a bug: even while in the Phase Shift state, his attacks could hit Enemies, and the act of strangling also counted as a valid attack.
Although only the initial moment of the strangulation satisfied the Weapon Effect judgment, that alone delivered a full 20 points of Holy Damage with no attenuation. Using such a Holy artifact specialized against Vampires for strangulation—this Vampire's life was over.
"Axe! Block the Zombie for me!"
Cheng Tian, afraid of not strangling this Vampire to death, pulled with a force that could nearly snap the whip, while simultaneously shouting for One-Ear to help.
"Coming!!!"
One-Ear, knowing Cheng Tian was calling him, did not let the complex Scene situation cloud his judgment.
In terms of camaraderie, One-Ear was naturally closer to his roommate, but reason told him that his foolish roommate, who was currently Death-Seeking, was completely unreliable.
So, he decisively chose to support Cheng Tian, leaving his foolish roommate to fend for himself.
After fiercely engaging with the Zombie Horde for a while—although most of the time Cheng Tian was picking them off with minimal Stamina Losses, and One-Ear only occasionally swapped in to block—this did not prevent him from observing and summarizing certain patterns.
He first swept low, using the hammer face of his One-handed Axe to smash directly into the Zombie's Knee, shattering it in one blow. As the Zombie lost its balance, he followed up with an upward side-shoulder bump, knocking the Zombie aside.
Not choosing to finish it off, he immediately turned, charged forward quickly, jumped, and delivered a crooked Knight Kick to the back of the Zombie... the Zombie Duck—the one that had slapped Cheng Tian and was trying to pursue further.
You could call it a Flying Big Kick too.
Believe it or not, this Flying Big Kick, despite looking somewhat awkward, successfully struck the shriveled torso of the Zombie Duck. This completely desiccated Zombie Duck rolled down the dirt slope.
Among the many Blueprint Instances in the Chosen Space, there must be all-around Monsters with six-sided attributes, but the Zombies from Demon World Village are definitely not among them.
In terms of straight-line movement speed, the Zombies here are already top-tier among their kind, which means they must have weaknesses in other aspects, but here, one word summarizes it all—
Paper Defense.
The Paper Defense here doesn't just mean their HP is generally only 10; their Strength is also far below the normal level of an adult Human male.
In the Chosen Space, both Players and Monsters have their physical Attributes fully quantified by the four dimensions: Strength, Agility, Spirit, and Charisma. Among these, the Strength Attribute directly corresponds to data related to Physical Attack, Max HP, self-healing ability, carrying capacity, and resistance to being hit.
A similar setting can be seen in 《Warcraft》《Dota》, where increased Strength also increases HP.
Strength and Constitution should be complementary physical Attributes; having high Strength but low Constitution, or low Strength but high Constitution, seems somewhat illogical.
Since the Demon World Village Zombies are driven by Magic Power, and their own Material is a corpse that has decayed to a certain extent in a grave—not the lively parkour Zombies whose Strength Attribute increases after biological virus or rabies infection unlocks muscle restraints—Strength is actually their weak point.
The reason they could shatter the Heavy Drinking Old Brother's arm in one blow is entirely due to the Old Brother's osteoporosis caused by heavy drinking and staying up day and night without sunlight, combined with the Dark Magic within the Zombie's body acting up.
Every seemingly perilous Scene mission actually has a correct solution, it just requires a higher degree of Courage, Knowledge, and Teamwork.
It is worth mentioning that different units have different HP conversion ratios.
As ordinary Earth Humans, the Strength-to-HP conversion ratio for Cheng Tian and his group is 1:10; 10 points of Strength naturally convert to 100 HP/Health Points.
As for the Demon World Village Zombies, although their average Strength is around 5 points, their decaying bodies result in a pitiful HP conversion ratio of only 1:2, topping out at 10 HP. It's no wonder Cheng Tian could blow one apart with a single whip strike.
As a "Mimic," the Vampire Magician can teleport, Turn into a Duck, and possesses racial Talents related to the Vampire race. Its Strength, Agility, and Spirit are not weak; looking at its four-dimensional data alone, it is brushing against the threshold of a "Boss" unit. However, it is facing someone like Cheng Tian, who treats precious Holy Artifacts like bicycles and rides them relentlessly.
The Vampire Killer slowly strangled the Magician's neck, much like slicing butter with a heated dinner knife. As the top hat and head rolled onto the ground, the Magician's headless corpse completely ceased struggling.
Simultaneously, the gentleman's cane still tightly held in the headless corpse's hand began to glow with a radiance indicating that it was "Pick Up"-able.