Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

In the jungle near Linyin City, Gu Fei was running at top speed as he sent Sword Demon a message: “Hey. Don’t make any move yet. We came up with a plan!”

System notification: [The user you are trying to reach is not accepting any message at the moment.]

Gu Fei had no choice. He originally thought that Sword Demon would believe him based on his usual temperament, yet it turned out that the latter had decisively turned off his messaging.

“That guy…” Gu Fei sighed even as he ventured further into the jungle…

————————–

The jungle was poorly lit underneath the lush canopy, and the lack of light made it hard to make out anyone in the gloom. But Gu Fei was clear that while he could not see anyone, it did not mean that there was no one else around. He was already near Deep Freeze’s training grounds, so there might be players hiding within the shrubbery. Who knew when they would suddenly pop out and give him a fright?

Just as Gu Fei thought of this, he heard the rustling of the surrounding leaves.

Are they showing themselves? Gu Fei emotionlessly swept his gaze around him, and sure enough, he spotted several camouflaged members from Deep Freeze. All stared at him as they questioned, “What are you doing here?!”

“I’m looking for someone,” Gu Fei answered, his footsteps not stopping as he continued his way into the jungle. These men had not seen someone so belligerent and quickly drew their bows. “Stop right there! Who gave you permission to enter?!”

Gu Fei was not in the mood to bother with them right now, so he did not even turn around. Rather, he quickened his pace even more as he ventured deeper into the jungle. These men were all stunned, having not expected something like this to happen. Usually, in such cases, the other party would stop walking when asked such a question to properly explain themselves. This person, in contrast, treated them like air. As such, they were temporarily stumped on what to do.

“Quickly stop that man!” Someone finally reacted. As the team placed in the outermost area, they were naturally in charge of stopping outsiders from disturbing the training and level grinding of their guildmates. Many players, who came here to grind as well, would turn back once they learned that a big guild had staked their claim of the area. Who would be foolish enough to attempt KSing monsters from an entire guild, anyway? The current intruder acted differently, however. Everyone present quickly came to the conclusion that there was a very good chance this man was there to cause trouble.

The group yelled as they gave chase. These men had been spending months of their in-game time among these trees, so they were very used to running in such a terrain. Of course, the same could not be said about Gu Fei, who was currently experiencing a significant reduction in his movement speed. It was apparent that he was no match for them in their home turf. However, the greatest advantage this terrain provided was how easy a player could hide themselves here, so Gu Fei activated his Blink and materialized right behind a tree.

These men all halted their steps and rubbed their eyes furiously. All of them saw the intruder run and then suddenly disappear into thin air. They suspected that they had problems with their eyesight, but quickly realized that that was not the case from the bewildered look they shared.

“What happened?” they all asked.

“Did he disconnect?” someone guessed.

Blindsided by his action, that was the only plausible answer to the phenomenon that they could think of. These men proceeded to dash right up to where Gu Fei had disappeared and surrounded that spot.

“We’ll slay him immediately the moment he reappears!” the leader ordered.

“Roger that!” everyone copied.

Meanwhile, Gu Fei was long gone from the area. Coco managed to learn Broken Water Arrow’s location and quickly passed it over to Gu Fei. Although Sword Demon did not have this information, no matter what method he resorted, Gu Fei was sure that the man would eventually find his target. As such, he could only hope that Sword Demon would only bump into Broken Water Arrow after he did…

However, based on the commotion he had caused from his action, Gu Fei felt that he had acted too rashly and that there was a genuine necessity for him to disguise himself. With such a thought in mind, Gu Fei once more donned on his camouflage outfit. Although he had washed his face paint off, wearing a hat and tying a cloth to his face were acceptable disguises people often used, which he believed the other players should not make a fuss over it. More importantly, he made sure to pin the counterfeit emblem on his chest prominently. This had a remarkable effect when he mixed himself into another group of men. No one seemed to suspect a thing about him.

Having been successful in avoiding potential interruptions, Gu Fei no longer had any reservations as he sprinted toward Broken Water Arrow’s location, which Coco had told him of. Sure enough, the man was still there teaching a bunch of members; even Deep Waters was right beside him.

If Broken Water Arrow was seen as trash that people would find disgusting on sight, then Gu Fei considered Deep Waters to be a disobedient child, feeling the urgent need to give the man a good beating. Such matters could wait, though. At the very least, he should first follow Deep Waters until Sword Demon made contact…

————————–

Sword Demon had been going in and out of the jungle, and each time he had been accompanied by a different set of emotions, but never had it once been more complex than what he was feeling right now. After a few simple replies to Coco, he adjusted the settings of his account to reject all incoming messages. Having come to this stage, he no longer wavered in his decision. Glancing at the dagger in his hand, Sword Demon took a sharp breath and really wished he had a cigarette in hand…

Once he was relatively near Deep Freeze’s training grounds, Sword Demon entered Stealth and crept his way deeper into the trees, taking care of his footfalls while keeping an eye out for movement around him.

Everywhere around him seemed to be an area where some team might be using to train; Sword Demon was hoping to locate such a place right now. As long as he could find a team around, or anywhere with a trap formation set up, it would represent an area Broken Water Arrow would soon visit to give pointers. As long as he had his eye on any team and patiently waited, he was bound to cross paths with Broken Water Arrow.

While such a method was rather dull, it was sure to be successful. This was Sword Demon’s never changing style – doing things he had confidence in and saying words he was confident of.

Soon, he came across a team that was busy with their drills. What they were doing was akin to the sort of things Onesie and the others were doing back then.

“This should do…” Sword Demon muttered to himself as he began to take a closer look at the terrain in the area.

He trusted Gu Fei’s assessment that Broken Water Arrow was a difficult opponent to tangle with. To go up against such a foe, Sword Demon was convinced his over-level skill, Shadowmist Assault, was the key. Now that he could wield the attack power of Lasting Sentence and Dying Breath with his Dual-wielding Mastery, Sword Demon believed he would be able to insta-kill the man as long as his attack made contact.

He might have the power to insta-kill his target, but he must make sure to hit the target first. If the attack fell through, and Broken Water Arrow did have the deft and skillfulness that Gu Fei possessed, Sword Demon was well aware what would be the outcome he could end up facing.

Thus, he needed to closely examine and understand his surroundings. Sword Demon proceeded to conduct his observation and even went as far as to physically check the lay of the land.

There were obvious advantages and disadvantages to using his Shadowmist Assault in a jungle setting.

The way the trees prevented the sunlight from filtering through them made the surroundings very similar to an area with heavy fog. As such, the situation of Sword Demon’s shadow remaining even after turning invisible, which Gu Xian had previously observed, would not happen this time.

Meanwhile, the obvious disadvantage of the setting was the hodge-podge of hindrances on the ground, which would surely affect the speed at which the Shadowmist Assault could work.

He needed to survey this area properly to improve upon the strengths of the terrain while avoiding the shortcomings!

Besides that, Sword Demon was also considering how he could escape unscathed after slaying Broken Water Arrow. Once the latter was present, the team in this area would surely receive him accordingly, so Sword Demon was not necessarily be going against just the man himself, but he also had to wrestle with the problem of beating a retreat under the very noses of all those players. He was not exactly afraid of death, but being able to retain his level meant he would be able to preserve his combat strength, which would then let him kill Broken Water Arrow twice, thrice…

Perhaps I should wait until Broken Water Arrow departed, so the target would have a moment of being by himself, which I could take advantage of to strike?

Sword Demon mulled over this. While this would prevent him from being surrounded, he might lose the upper hand in terms of the location that they were in. Sword Demon gazed at the terrain he had previously been observing and calculated. Finally, he decided to stick to the original decision and stage his attack here. He was at least confident of having higher chances of success in his assassination attempt. As for how he could safely extricate himself, it would all depend on the reaction of these men. Maybe, if he was fast enough, they might not even realize what had happened before it was too late.

With every detail of the plan ironed out, Sword Demon chose a position to wait…

Sometime later, he saw the team of players before him lure monsters into their trap formation and kill them off wave after wave, but Broken Water Arrow was still nowhere to be seen. Sword Demon was not impatient, however. He believed that as long as Broken Water Arrow was online, he would eventually make his round over in this location.

What if he has gone offline, though? Such a possibility suddenly popped into his mind, causing him to scratch his head as he was overwhelmed by his notion. This was also a huge problem; how embarrassing would it be if it turned out that Broken Water Arrow was not even online despite all the planning and preparation he had done? With such a thought in mind, Sword Demon was about to allow messages to come through so he could contact Coco and confirm the status of his target when he spotted a figure moving toward this area from afar the moment he lifted his eyes.

Is that him? Sword Demon was not certain, but he had a sneaking suspicion about this man’s identity. In any case, even if it was the real Broken Water Arrow, Sword Demon had no way of confirming this since the man had his face paint on. That was why he had chosen this method to camp out like this. He wanted to make use of the others to identify Broken Water Arrow. If he were to go around searching for the man himself, he suspected that he might not even recognize Broken Water Arrow even if he walked right past him.

As the figure drew closer, he saw the team of players training in the area begin to appear one after another from their hiding places, as if they were ready to receive the person.

It’s him! Sword Demon confirmed to himself as he took note of the approaching figure. He started choosing the position he would be mounting his assault from. But just as the entire team revealed themselves out in the open, Sword Demon was abruptly left in a daze. That was because two players, instead of just one, came forward. While the other was also in disguise, Sword Demon still recognized the man to be Deep Waters.

This unforeseen factor had left Sword Demon at a loss on what to do. He was mentally prepared to assassinate Broken Water Arrow, yet never had he thought he would have to do it right in front of Deep Waters.

He had no regrets when he made his decision, but with Deep Waters standing right before him, he could not help but waver. If he were to attack now, he would be breaking things off in the presence of Deep Waters, and that was an entirely different matter altogether.