Chapter 128 – Rookie
Chapter 128 – Rookie
After throwing down these orders, Wang Jiexi left first. With him gone, there was nothing to discuss. Among the five players, Gao Yingjie was the youngest, but the other four players weren’t much older. They were all subs in Club Tiny Herb. Of them, three of the players had come out in an official match as subs.
However, the Alliance had its rules. Players and the characters that would be used had to be reported to the Alliance before the season started. Afterwards, the list could not be changed unless there were transfer deals or waivings. Moreover, the Alliance had to approve the sub in. The rules stated that during the match, players and characters were not allowed to be casually switched around.
For example, if Wang Jiexi wasn’t prepared to go on stage next match and have Gao Yingjie sub in for him, then even though no one was using Vaccaria, Gao Yingjie would not be allowed to use it. Gao Yingjie would only be allowed to use the character that was reported to the Alliance before the season started, a different Witch, Kind Tree.
Gao Yingjie never had any experience in an official match. The other player who had never went out on stage either was called Qiao Yifan, who was currently using the Assassin Ashen Moon. These two were very young. However, Gao Yingjie was already the decided sub for Wang Jiexi and the future successor for Vaccaria. As a result, Qiao Yifan could only be considered a fairly talented new player. Even though he had been signed up to be a part of this match, he was just barely hanging on and might not be in the next match. For new players like him, they had no way of controlling their fate. After all, he was still only a youth and nothing more.
There was a large gap between their statuses, but neither of them thought anything of it. They were actually on extremely good terms and loved to hang around each other. Right when Wang Jiexi left, Qiao Yifan was just about to talk to Gao Yingjie about something when he heard someone yell: “Yifan, go fetch some drinks for us.”
“Oh!” Qiao Yifan helplessly replied. The person who had yelled was called Xiao Yun, coincidentally getting the Battle Mage Cloudy Heavens (Yun Xiao) this time. He was the sub who had come out on stage the most. He could even be considered half-main roster half-sub, so he was naturally the senior among the subs.
However, he didn’t dare order around Gao Yingjie, who would be a part of the main roster in the future. Though he did order around Qiao Yifan very impolitely. This type of situation didn’t only occur in Tiny Herb. All of the Club’s rookies were in a similar situation. Fetching them drinks for the main roster and so on were common occurrences, unless they were important targets of care like Gao Yingjie or a super rookie like the previous year’s Sun Xiang.
“What would you like to drink?” Qiao Yifan said that he would go grab drinks, but didn’t forget to ask his good friend.
In the end, the person he was asking hadn’t yet answered, when the three other players all came up very impolitely.
“Get me a bottle of green tea.” This was Xiao Yun.
“I want Cola.”
“I want Cola too.”
These two were Zhou Yebai and Liu Fei. They were respectively given the Ghostblade White Night Black Day and the Sharpshooter Fallen Angel. These two had been in the Club for two years and were prepared to sub in at any time. Although they couldn’t compare to Xiao Yun as of now, they were still in a much better spot than Qiao Yifan.
“It doesn’t matter for me!” Gao Yingjie said softly at the end.
Qiao Yifan ran to fetch the drinks for everyone. The three veteran subs didn’t say a word of thanks and were already discussing amongst themselves.
“Who is this Lord Grim? How did he offend our captain?” Liu Fei asked. Girls were always slightly more gossipy than guys.
“Who knows.” Xiao Yun wasn’t too interested in discussing that issue. He didn’t dare talk about things behind their team captain’s back.
“Yebai, do you know?” Liu Fei asked Zhou Yebai.
“How would I know!” Zhou Yebai said while drinking his Coca Cola and asked for seemingly no reason: “Didn’t Little Jie get these cards?”
Sure enough, Liu Fei immediately turned her head to ask Gao Yingjie: “Little Jie, do you know?”
“I don’t know either, Sister Liu.” Gao Yingjie hastily said.
“I guess there’s no way Yifan would know?” When she asked Qiao Yifan, her tone was very disdainful.
“Ha ha……” Qiao Yifan could only foolishly laugh. How could he be the first person to know about things regarding the Club!
“It doesn’t matter. Let’s hurry up and kill this guy, so we can go to bed early!” Xiao Yun said.
“Exactly.” Zhou Yebai looked at the time.
“Who’s the guild leader over here?” Xiao Yun asked.
“Plantago Seed.” The person who replied was Gao Yingjie. Even though he and Plantago Seed hadn’t introduced each other, Gao Yingjie had still asked who he was going to meet beforehand.
“Oh, he should be in the friends list! I’ll go ask him.” Xiao Yun said.
To these normal players in the new server, Xiao Yun was even more impolite. He directly asked: “Hello? Do you know where Lord Grim is?”
When Plantago Seed saw these five characters go online, he silently paid attention to them. He quickly read the message, but seeing that it was asking for where Lord Grim was, his heart froze and he immediately replied: “I don’t know!”
“Go find out.” Xiao Yun said.
“Oh……” Plantago Seed had been ordered and immediately had a bad impression of Xiao Yun. Plantago Seed was very familiar with everyone in Team Tiny Herb. He obviously knew which member used a Battle Mage if he was from Tiny Herb. An image of Xiao Yun appeared in his mind, which made him in a somewhat bad mood. However, he could only do as he was ordered to do and tell everyone in the guild to pay attention to Lord Grim’s movements.
“I saw Lord Grim and the others heading towards Boneyard.” Someone in the guild immediately replied. The current guild was growing larger and larger. The members were all at different levels, so they were all spread out in different leveling areas. As long as Lord Grim was online, with such a large scouting range, it was quite easy to find him.
‘How many? Where are they headed towards?” Plantago Seed asked.
“Five players. They should be going to Boneyard I think?” The guild member said.
Plantago Seed immediately reported back to Xiao Yun’s Cloudy Heavens.
Xiao Yun looked and then promptly told everyone else: “Lord Grim is bringing a party to Boneyard. Let’s all separate and intercept him. If they enter the dungeon, then we’ll have to wait a long time.”
“Oh.” The other players replied. The Boneyard dungeon could be considered a cave. But with so many players running the dungeon, the lines would be extremely long if there was only one entrance. Similar to how players could enter the Frost Forest dungeon anywhere around the Forest, Boneyard had several entrances around the circumference. When fighting monsters in the area, accidentally dropping in a hole and into the dungeon was a common occurrence.
Xiao Yun asked clearly where Lord Grim was and then the five players separated and headed towards Desolate Land to intercept. Not long after, Qiao Yifan was the first to find the target: “I’ve found them. Lord Grim, five players!!!”
“Coordinates.” Xiao Yun hastily said.
Qiao Yifan sent the coordinates and the four others immediately headed towards it.
“Go intercept him!” Xiao Yun ordered in fear that their efforts would be wasted if Lord Grim went and entered the dungeon. If it did happen, then they’d have to wait awhile for him to come out.
“I…….” Qiao Yifan stared blankly.
“Hurry up!” Xiao Yun urged.
Qiao Yifan didn’t have much confidence. But under Xiao Yun’s urge, he had his Level 25 Ashen Moon rush forward.
The other side had five players. To be able to enter the pro-scene meant that Qiao Yifan was extremely skilled. In normal circumstances, if he was against five random players, then he wouldn’t be scared at all. But the problem was that these five were the ones that set a record that they couldn’t even come close to. Even though God Jiexi had said that it was due to the difference in strategies, no matter how different the strategy was, it would still need a high level of skill to carry out. These players’ skill levels couldn’t be too different from theirs, right?
After Ashen Moon advanced a bit, Qiao Yifan saw who the other four players were. Two of them were characters on the record leaderboards, though he didn’t recognize the other two. At this moment, Qiao Yifan wasn’t able to plan anything. Ashen Moon rushed up and then a sudden Shining Cut headed straight for Lord Grim.
In these leveling areas, players come and go, so no one was very cautious. Shining Cut was an extremely quick skill. It launched quickly and no one except the user would know where it was aimed at. However, this Lord Grim had unexpectedly reacted in an instant, drawing out his sword, and using a Guard to block this Shining Cut.
This one move already made Qiao Yifan lose confidence. He was a new player through and through and hadn’t had any experience in an official match. He was also unlike Gao Yingjie in the fact that the team captain would occasionally come to spar with him personally. In this sort of environment, everything he did was extremely careful. He hoped not to make any mistakes, but didn’t hope for anything more. At this moment, seeing Lord Grim’s reaction, he immediately felt that this was a difficult opponent. After the Shining Cut, he didn’t execute any other attacks and immediately jumped back in an attempt to widen the distance between them.
A sword light flashed. Lord Grim chased with a Sword Draw.
He had already taken back the Vampiric Lightsaber from Huang Shaotian awhile ago and obviously wasn’t an equipment for Ye Xiu to use. It was used as a material to upgrade the Thousand Chance Umbrella. For the current Thousand Chance Umbrella, in addition to the Lance form, the Sword form was also Level 25. It had an Attack Speed of 5, a Weight of 2.3 kg, a Durability of 23, Physical Attack: 320, Magic Attack: 340, equivalent to a level 35 Purple Tachi. This was why recently, when Ye Xiu battled, besides the Lance form, he would also use the Sword Form frequently. The two forms’ damage was quite scary.
This Sword Draw was extremely quick and accurate just as Ashen Moon was coming down from his leap backwards. Right when it seemed like Ashen Moon would be hit, Ashen Moon suddenly leaped again and dodged to the side, narrowly avoiding the sword.
Air Jump!
This was a level 15 Assassin skill, which allowed the user to jump again in midair. To put it simply, Assassins could double jump.
Relying on this, Ashen Moon dodged the originally unavoidable blade. But because of this, he became even more terrified of Lord Grim. Just as he was figuring out how to stall for more time, Steamed Bun Invasion had already grabbed a Brick and rushed forward, yelling: “Who are you! You’re looking to die!”
Qiao Yifan hastily had Ashen Moon dodge to the side, avoiding this Brick. But on his other side, Soft Mist’s battle lance had already arrived like a viper. Qiao Yifan once again had Ashen Moon dodge and was already somewhat panicked.
Seven Fields and Sleeping Moon felt a bit embarrassed always being spectators. With an opening, they also went to attack. The two rushed forward and each used their respective skills.
Qiao Yifan’s hands were rushed and muddled. He already lost his rhythm was now subconsciously trying to dodge attack after attack now. To him, he was no longer paying attention to whether there was a chance to counterattack and had no idea how to escape.
Gao Yingjie, who was sitting next to him, saw that the situation wasn’t looking good for him and was even panicking on his behalf. He hurriedly yelled: “Hang in there. I’m almost there.”
“What? Yifan’s not a match?” Zhou Yebai and Liu Fei both turned their heads to look at Qiao Yifan’s screen.