Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

“The White Mill? Okay. We’ll head over to take a look.” Gu Fei returned the message, hurrying over to White Mill with Eternal Dominion in tow.

“How about us? What do we do now?” the others asked.

“Just stay and watch. A good show might soon play out here,” Young Master Han answered lightly.

It was just as Young Master Han had said; Once the news began to spread, the number of players congregating in the Wilderness Camp rapidly increased. Perhaps there were still some who were a little skeptical regarding this efficient monster grinding method, but the moment they set foot on the Wilderness Camp and saw how crowded it was, every bit of doubt in their minds vanished.

The players pirating Gu Fei and gang’s routine were all smiles right now. Seeing waves after waves of potential students coming, they no longer worried about running out of business. Furthermore, when they saw how people were eager to pay but unable to find any available instructor, these bootleggers who were only concerned with their immediate profits all began to raise their prices. Now that the worry was with the supply of instructors for the routine rather than the number of students looking to be taught, these bootleggers were all emboldened; the fees they charged soared along with increasing waves. Forget the 20 gold coins price they had been touting before, even the 99-gold-coin price Gu Fei’s group had initially set could be deemed as cheap in the face of these inflated prices.

This was a situation which even Young Master Han had not expected could happen. They had only learnt of this when some of the players shopping around for prices passed by the 9527 rocky outcrop and suspiciously sized up the four silly-looking players standing atop it.

“Bro, what are you all doing?” someone asked out of curiosity.

“Efficient monster grinding routine. 99 gold coins per person,” Young Master Han casually answered, not even sparing the people below a glance. He had answered this question countless of times, and the players who had heard his answer all called him crazy for charging such a high price before turning to leave.

“99 gold coins! That’s so cheap!” someone below the outcrop shouted, alarming Young Master Han to the point that he nearly came sliding off the rock. Young Master Han quickly put down the spyglass in his hands to glimpse at the customers below. 99 gold coins is considered cheap? Just what’s going on…

There were five players below the rocky outcrop, and all of them showed excitement once they heard the price. Furthermore, with the player shouting it like that, another bunch of players came running over, yelling as they ran, “A cheap price of 99 gold coins! Where is this place?! Could this be a scam?!”

Young Master Han quickly made sense of what had happened! The bootleggers had probably gotten carried away and actually began raising the price when they saw the host of players descending on the Wilderness Camp.

“How much is it out there now?” Young Master Han asked, randomly pointing at a few other sites where players were being taught the routine.

“They have all priced it at over 200 gold coins!” a player below the outcrop answered.

“How ruthless,” Young Master Han commented. Since the players’ standard of living had improved, especially with this particular business venture targeting players level 40 and up, most could afford pulling out a few hundred gold coins like this. But for those unlucky players who had not managed to loot any decent drops throughout their time in Parallel World, their life savings could very well only amount to a total of several hundred god coins. Naturally, the alternative of a 99-gold-coin price tag was much easier for players to stomach than a one-time expenditure of 200 gold coins.

“With a 99 gold coins price tag, just what are you guys teaching?” Several players who had come by upon hearing the news about lessons being priced at 99 gold coins were still skeptical. They had no idea what had happened here in the Wilderness Camp the other day.

“Relax. No one else out there is more genuine than us,” Young Master Han assured.

“Can you first demonstrate it for us to see?” One of the potential customers suggested a test as clarification.

“Sorry, but we’re temporarily not starting up lesson until we reach the required number of participants,” Young Master Han said firmly.

“Required number?” A player looked around and saw that this location was among those deserted sites that lessons were being held. Speaking of which, the 9527 outcrop was considered as one of farther locations out here in the Wilderness Camp. Players who had no idea what was going on would usually end up streaming to places with more people, and very few would end up passing by this place. That was why it took quite some time before people discovered Young Master Han’s low price of 99 gold coins.

“How many do you need?” someone asked.

“1000 should do!” Young Master Han had quite the appetite.

“You’re insane!” someone objected. This person had been to several areas, and none had anywhere near a thousand students.

“For the space we got here, 1000 is already considered low.” Young Master Han pointed around the 9527 outcrop where they were the only ones present.

None of the average players was bothered by any of this. Their only concern was being able to learn the efficient monster grinding routine themselves, so the crowd clamored and demanded for the lesson to begin immediately.

Furthermore, the 9527 outcrop, which had always been deserted due to its remoteness. This sudden gathering of people only resulted in more to stream in as more players came by the moment they heard that lessons were being taught here for 99 gold coins each. Many quickly joined the crowd, rowdily demanding for the lesson to start.

Actually, Young Master Han had no need to stick to the 1000 players he claimed, but with neither Gu Fei nor Eternal Dominion around, there was no way that they could teach these players anything, was there? When these players exclaimed about how cheap the 99-gold-coin price tag was, Young Master Han easily understood what was about to happen and hastened to call Gu Fei and Eternal Dominion back. Now, all Young Master Han could do was stall for time.

“Everyone, please settle down. Since you guys have been around this place for some time now, I’m sure you all are aware about the existence of two types of fighting routine. Those interested in learning the no-Agility variant should stand on my left, whereas those interested in learning the Agility variant should stand on my right!” Young Master Han shouted.

In the end, there were those exceptional players who were new to everything, and with none of them having any clue about the two variants, they got a look of contempt once they asked about it, yet Young Master Han was more than happy to find more chances to stall for time. Slowly and steadily, he patiently explained everything to these players. The others were impatient, and it was almost to the point that every word Young Master Han uttered would be punctuated by a disdainful snort or a dissatisfied clicking of the tongue. Young Master Han was surprisingly patient about it; whenever these people made noise, he would instantly clam up and wait until their complaints were over before starting from the top. Everyone was on the verge of breaking when this happened, no longer daring to make a racket as they mutely listened to everything Young Master Han had to say as they learned what they had been told about all over again.

During this whole time, more and more players made their way over to the 9527 outcrop. Before Young Master Han could say anything to these newcomers, the other players swiftly explained to them. “It’s 99 gold coins; those with Agility should head to the left, and those without should go to the right. Hurry!”

The look on Sword Demon and the others slowly changed, no longer seeing these people below the rock as players but 99 gold coins, instead. There were so many 99s right now – so many that they struggled to count them all.

“Th-The…” War Without Wounds was a little agitated. “The collection of all the gold coins here is gonna be rather troublesome. There are too many people; how are we gonna remember who paid and who didn’t?”

“Brother Assist, how did you guys do it yesterday?” Sword Demon asked over the mercenary channel.

“Heh. We had registration forms yesterday, which doubled as tickets for this portion.” Brother Assist was delighted. After making a record of every registration form he received, he returned them to their owners as ticket stubs upon payment. Even though Brother Assist could not be certain that there were no free-riders that managed to mix in the crowd when the lessons began, he was at least able to collect fees from all those who had submitted forms to him, so he was not about to nitpick about the handful of players that were looking to fish in troubled waters. At the very least, it was much better than the current predicament that Sword Demon and the others found themselves in.

“With the situation at hand, we’ll just play it by ear! There aren’t too many people right now, and we’ve got quite a few pairs of hands here, so we should be able to manage. G*dd*mm*t, can you get your *ss here already, Miles?!” Young Master Han swept his eyes through the crowd and saw that there were already over hundreds of players gathered. It was still far from the 1000 players he had initially asked for, but if they really reached such a number, they would surely have a huge problem collecting money in this hubbub.

“Why aren’t we starting yet?!” The queries from below continued piling up.

“Are there anyone with any other questions?” Young Master Han asked with a genial smile.

“No!” the crowd called back.

In the end, Young Master Han pointed in a certain direction and asked, “Please speak freely.”

The crowd all turned, only to find a player with a raised hand. Apparently, he responded to Young Master Han’s question when they were asked about further questions. Everyone had the thought of tearing this man into shreds.

This person shrank back a little from the attention, but he still steeled himself and asked his question. “How much?”

“99 gold coins!” The bellow from the crowd drowned this man out almost instantly.

Meanwhile, Young Master Han continued to smile as he stood atop the outcrop, completely unaffected as he replied, “That’s right; it’s 99 a person.”

“Begin already!” Everyone continued to urge in unison.

“Since everyone is so passionate about this, fine. We’ll break our rule and begin lesson even though there are so few of you present!” Young Master Han was showing a very magnanimous expression as he addressed the crowd. “Could everyone please hand their money over?” With a quick glance at Sword Demon and the others, he watched them leap off the rocky outcrop. Young Master Han had already made prior arrangement on the mercenary channel to get these people to collect the money at a slower pace, believing that it should be enough to stall for time until Gu Fei arrive at the scene.

“What are we stalling for? Can’t we just tell these people that the instructor isn’t here yet?” Royal God Call asked.

“Didn’t you already see how suspicious they are of us with our 99-gold-coin fee, which they consider as a low price? If we were to also mention that the instructor isn’t here, would they still believe us?” Young Master Han asked.

“Yes, that’s right! The issue of trust is very important.” Brother Assist was no stranger to this. After all, he had spent ample time collecting money from players last night. At the end of the day, this was not a transaction completed with an exchange of goods. Plenty of players were so wary they incessantly radiated with the impulse to kill people.

Sure enough, the moment Young Master Han mentioned that they were collecting fees, someone was immediately ruffled and shouted, “Give us a demonstration first!”

It was entirely reasonable for clients to inspect the goods first; Young Master Han could not come up with any excuse so he nodded. “Alright. May I trouble someone to come and pull a monster over?”

There were bound to be proactive players regarding this sort of task, so someone ran out at once to do just that. Soon, this person was back with a monster in tow. Young Master Han nodded. “Get it up here…” He had witnessed this not too long ago and knew that the average gamer would be unable to accurately throw the monster up the rocky outcrop so easily, which meant that this would aid them in dragging things out a little more.

Young Master Han’s scheme succeeded once more. The whole lot of players tried everything they could to get the monster up, killing up to three during this whole time, and not one managed to make it even halfway up the rocky outcrop. Sword Demon and the others had a hard time watching this.

Finally, someone could no longer hold himself back and yelled, “Since you were the ones who had chosen this place, you guys should be responsible for getting the monster up!”

“Fine! We’ll do it!” Young Master Han briskly gave his answer, for he had already spotted Gu Fei’s black figure in the distance.

“Pull a monster over.” Young Master Han sent this message to Gu Fei and watched the man casually flick his sword at a monster he passed by even as he hurried over. Meanwhile, the crowd heard Young Master Han’s answer yet saw none of the men moving to do just that. They were about to ask again when someone saw Gu Fei running through with a monster in tow and Blinking right up the rocky outcrop. As Young Master Han moved himself to the side to make way for Gu Fei as he messaged him via the mercenary channel. “This is a demonstration. Make it a sight to behold but not to the point where others can learn it by looking.”

Once he sent that message, Young Master Han walked to the front and began leading the clapping. ” The demonstration is about to begin! Please give a round of applause!” The players were dazed as they all clapped, momentarily confused just why a black-robed Mage had come running out of nowhere.

Gu Fei very courteously gave a martial arts salute to the players gathered below the rocky outcrop and began his demonstration right away. He did not hold too much back, nor did he go overboard and used Twin Incineration. Gu Fei simply and swiftly followed the routine he had created until the monster was dead before turning to the crowd with a big smile.

“That… That doesn’t seem like it?” Someone expressed his doubts.

“Yeah… You moved so quickly, I bet you’ve got quite the Agility! Why would you be using the long weapon if you’ve got Agility?” Although these players had yet to learn a thing, they truly had quite a bit of understanding of what was happening.

Gu Fei smiled brightly. “This is a routine that we use solely for demonstration purposes. We’re all experts here, so we can see the technique within. Forget about the weapon type or Agility, I’m sure all you experts here have already noted just how efficient I was. If you guys decide to learn this, I’ll make sure to teach the two routines everybody requests accordingly.”

A number of players below were not exactly experts like what Gu Fei had pegged them to be, but hearing them being addressed as such made these people extremely elated and were more than satisfied to pay up for the lesson.

Sword Demon and the two others thought about how shameless Gu Fei was while they collected money. Young Master Han asked him not to put on a demonstration that prevented their audience from learn anything just from watching it, so the man simply pulled out a third routine: long weapon with Agility. While it might not sound like much, would anyone, who did not have a certain je ne sais quoi like Gu Fei, even dare to mess around like this?

In the end, the money they had been tasked to collect seemed endless because more and more players came streaming to them without any signs of stopping. The place was deserted before because no one was around, so more and more people began flocking over to this location now that there was a clear crowd gathered, and the newer players had come would ask about prices and many other such questions, it got to a point where those who had paid ended up waiting for a long time yet still did not learn a thing yet. Each of them was red with anxiety, looking behind them frequently. Rather than checking to see if more players were making their way over like before, they were all checking to see if they had stopped..

“Do we really have to wait till we hit 1000?!” someone cried out.

Gu Fei had a bird’s eye view of everything that was transpiring, and by the way things were going, he could tell that it would not just be 1000 players. Just like last night, it might snowball into a 2000 strong mob.

“Why don’t we do it like this?” Young Master Han came to Gu Fei’s side and spoke, “You keep teaching them and we keep collecting fees. The players in front will be asked to leave once they learn everything, and the ones behind can take over there spots right after.”

Gu Fei gave him the side-eye. “Are you asking me to keep instructing forever?”

“I’ll let you rest for ten minutes every 45 minutes. You’re a teacher; you should be used to this,” Young Master Han said.

“Do you believe I’ll immediately punch you down?” Gu Fei asked.

“Can’t you see it? Don’t you see how passionate this crowd is?” Young Master Han pointed to the players who continued to gather below the 9527 outcrop from a distance away.

“If this is going to be how it is all the time, I’m afraid that me and Eternal Dominion alone won’t be able to cope,” Gu Fei said.

“Which is why I suggested scaling up our operation as part of the plan, but the situation at hand now is an emergency. Do you know why? Because those bootleggers began raising the prices when they saw more and more people coming over to learn your routine. It has gotten to a point where 99 gold coins is considered as the lowest price out there,” Young Master Han said.

“How troublesome…” Gu Fei wrinkled his brows. This business venture looked to be far more complex than he had thought, and it was ultimately because the benefits that came from this were simply abundant.

“That is why you gotta work hard a bit!” Young Master Han said.

“But how am I supposed to swap between the two routines with this unending lesson plan you proposed?” Gu Fei pointed to the two clear masses of players gathered below them.

“Where’s Eternal Dominion?” Young Master Han asked.

“Still on the road. I have a faster movement speed,” Gu Fei answered.

“You’ll teach one type first, then you’ll swap accordingly,” Young Master Han said.

“Brother Assist can do this, too,” Gu Fei said. Eternal Dominion told him that Brother Assist had learned the no-Agility fighting routine previously; he even had the luxury of a one-to-one tutoring with Eternal Dominion for this.

“Quick, go call over Brother Assist as well,” Young Master Han said.

“You, too. I’ll be teaching the long weapon no-Agility fighting routine. You can learn it as well,” Gu Fei said.

“Fighting and killing…” Young Master Han showed a look of abhorrent disdain. “I’ll go get War Without Wounds.”

“They are still collecting fees,” Gu Fei reminded.

“Umm…”

This was when both men realized that just Young Master’s Elite’s seven men and Eternal Dominion might not be enough to handle everything in this business venture.

“Let’s get started on this first! We’ll think of solutions later.” Gu Fei was helpless.

“It’s time to begin.” Young Master Han was quick and to the point, instantly announcing this to the people gathered below the rocky outcrop.

A round of applause sounded.

“What are you declaring for? We haven’t even lured a monster yet!” Gu Fei scorned even as he leaped off to locate a monster.

With a monster in tow, Gu Fei Blinked atop the rock and took his time to point out to the group of players mainly comprised no-Agility Warriors while the monster was climbing up the rocky outcrop. “I’ll be teaching the no-Agility, long-weapon fighting routine now. Please take note!”

The respective group gave a thunderous cheer, while the other group was in low spirits.

“To make learning easier for everyone, I’ll intentionally be slowing down my tempo and reducing my damage,” Gu Fei said as disclaimer, or else someone just might end up asking where his efficiency went.

Soon, Gu Fei was able to vanquish the monster using his fighting routine, so he called out, “Alright, everyone can go grab their monsters and practice in their own for a bit. You can come back a little later. Next, I’ll be teaching you guys.” Gu Fei pointed to the short-weapon, Agility-based group of players mostly consisted of Thieves.

“F*CK! Don’t you mess around here! If people leave and return, there’s no way we will know those who have paid and not!” War Without Wounds and the others were bellowing their lungs out across the mercenary channel. They had been collecting so much money that their hands were sore from doing the task. With them already doing their best to memorize which players had and had not paid, Gu Fei saying such convoluted things from the rocky outcrop about a bunch of their customers going and returning later, mixing with those who had yet to pay, there was no way they would not have a strong reaction. How could they keep track of those who paid and those who did not if that truly happened?

Ultimately, even those players who had heard Gu Fei’s suggestion remained where they were. There were people piled up behind them right now, so being at the front, they were already fortunate enough. If they left now, nobody would save them their prime spots! Thus, absolutely nobody moved, and the crowd simply yelled, “Just do it! Give it all to us at one go!”

Gu Fei was stunned. Armed with this foreknowledge now, the other group of players, which mostly comprised of Thieves,waiting to learn the short weapon-Agility routine felt that Gu Fei’s approach of ‘a little column A and a little column B’ made it such that everyone suffered, so they nodded in agreement. “Teach them everything first! We’re in no rush!” Actually, these people had their intentions. Even though this was not the fighting routine that they were after, being able to watch like this meant that they could learn it as well, so even if it was useless, the fact that they would learn more made it feel as if they had gotten double the benefits. Besides, if they were to set up their classes and earn a little money on the side afterwards, it would be great if they could teach two sets of routine by themselves.

Gu Fei did not guess these people’s deep thoughts about the matter, so all he did was follow their wishes and taught them accordingly.

After teaching the left, teach the right. Once the right was done, he was back to teaching the left. The crowd that amassed right under the 9527 outcrop slowly went beyond the 2000-player threshold that they had seen last night, yet this number continued to climb steadily.