Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

Chapter 227 - The Tenacious Uncle Wounds

All were quiet in the forest as War Without Wounds clumsily shifted himself atop the tree. Parallel World was mainly designed to follow the laws of physics and logic, so any branch that could normally bear a person with average weight would simply splinter with War Without Wounds on it.

They did not really care if War Without Wounds died by falling from the tree; what everyone was worried of was that the loud sound of his fall would attract Brave Surge and his men over.

“Since this is a trap, why don’t we have someone lure them over?” one of them asked Young Master Han.

“The later they come, the better for us. If they assume that we are not planning to ambush them but are merely hiding from them, they’ll be less vigilant. Our plan will be evident if we try to lure them here,” Young Master Han explained.

Thus, the six men of Young Master’s Elite continued to camp atop the tree.

Outside the forest, Brave Surge was currently leading his men to look for any traces of Young Master’s Elite. After asking the other mercenary groups that had lost to Young Master’s Elite previously, Brave Surge learned that the key to defeating this team was not to divide their manpower!

The six men were elites of the elites, so none of the players of Water Flower knew exactly how great the catalytic reaction they would get when the entire group was gathered together. Since Brave Surge had no wish to use his men to gauge this, this was the only choice left for him.

All seventy-two members of Water Flower maintained a tight formation as they searched through the map for their opponents. Seventy-two versus six... The size of this map was about the same as that map when Young Master’s Elite had gone up against Cloud Herder. And yet, Brave Surge could not find even a shadow of the six enemies when he brought his seventy-one men to the highest vantage point of the map.

Blind spots, such as ditches, depressions, forests, and back of hills, existed from where he stood. Brave Surge could only leave a mercenary on the high ground to be their lookout as he brought the other members to search all these aforementioned blind spots for their enemies.

Following along the ditches, looking inside the land depressions, and traversing through hills and forests... Water Flower searched everywhere but still could find any member of Young Master’s Elite. Twenty-one minutes had passed since the beginning of this match and there were only forty-seven minutes left.

Being unable to locate the enemies left Brave Surge feeling anxious. Brave Surge’s Carouse Guild had once lost a match due to the Grand Kiting strategy, and it was a ridiculous loss, too. Despite having over six hundred men at his disposal at the time, they had not been able to catch Svelte Dancer. Therefore, he was really wary of the said strategy to the point of not wanting to leave that one man atop that hill. He kept looking back at that single man as they left the vantage point for fear of the man getting killed. He was deathly afraid of losing the match with a score of 0 against 1.

That fortunately did not happen, yet Brave Surge remained anxious of not finding any member of Young Master’s Elite. He could almost perceive the opponents’ intention: They were intentionally stalling for time. The Grand Kiting strategy was more effective near the end of the match, so the later the fighting occurred, the better it was for the opposing side. Perhaps, they would only reveal themselves in the final five minutes of the match, letting their Archer insta-kill one of his men. How bitter would such a loss be?!

No. This can’t continue like this! Brave Surge was well aware of this fact, yet he just could not locate the enemies. His lookout by the vantage point confidently stated that he saw no movement from the opposing team, and they also found no one in the blind spots that they had gone to, so where were those six men?

Brave Surge and the other seventy-one members of Water Flower racked their brains. Compared to just one man thinking, the idea that could be generated with seventy-men putting their heads together was truly amazing. Finally, someone thought of something, “Up in the trees! That’s the only place we have yet to check!”

The others immediately regarded that idea in earnest. Indeed, they must be up the trees.

There were forests and trees all over this PvP arena, so they could literally be hiding anywhere. Without sparing another moment, Brave Surge immediately brought his men to comb through the map together.

The six members of Young Master’s Elite hiding between the leaves and branches of a tree had previously seen Water Flower’s men pass by them. Some enemy players had even lifted their heads, yet they had done it so casually that they were unable to spot the well hidden members of Young Master’s Elite. Adding the fact that there was poor lighting within the trees and looking up the treetops would often face the glare of the sun, none of them was able to spot anything strange.

After the enemies left the first time, Young Master Han warned everyone, “The next time they come by, they are surely aware of the fact that we are atop a tree.”

The second round of searching came not too long after. Brave Surge and his men were pretty lucky, as they managed to stumble upon the forest that the six men of Young Master’s Elite were hiding. It was the second out of the five forests in the map that they had searched out.

They had already established a search method in the first forest; once they entered the second forest, the Water Flower’s Mages and Archers relentlessly unleashed their spells and arrows on the trees, Warriors slammed themselves against the trees, and the other job classes prepared for a fight to begin once any enemies fell down.

That was when Young Master Han sent out a message on the mercenary channel: “Hold fast!” Following this, he sent Gu Fei a private message: “Prepare to attack using your AOE spell, Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno.”

“Where at?” Gu Fei asked.

“Just drop it wherever someone falls down!” Young Master Han replied.

Gu Fei’s heart shuddered. Would Young Master Han’s habit of using his men as bait ever change?

Young Master Han quickly sent out this follow-up message: “Even if I fall, don’t you dare show mercy!”

“Don’t worry; I’ll be even more vicious!” Gu Fei answered helplessly. This was but a game, after all, so sacrificing even himself was fair game here. No matter how others criticized him for his vicious method, Gu Fei knew that Young Master Han was absolutely remorseless about it deep inside. This narcissistic person was probably thinking right now: If even my mighty self can be sacrificed, then any of you inferior beings can be, too.

Affairs of the human heart were never that easy to figure out as all always valued themselves the most! People would naturally hail someone for sacrificing himself or herself for others, but it would be hard to justify and understand the necessity of such sacrificial act if others were unwillingly dragged along to die as well.

Whatever the case might be, this was how Young Master Han had intended to fight in this match. Gu Fei could not help but admit that this callous tactic was effective.

“Hold fast!” Young Master Han told everyone this.

Gu Fei knew that the others would understand his reasoning if Young Master Han explained it to them, so why must he do it in a hurtful way? Young Master Han’s personality was truly very unpleasant. As he sighed, he heard the sound of a human falling from a tree on his left side. War Without Wounds tried so hard to remain steady in his position, yet he was still the first to fall to the ground.

“Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno! Arise!” Gu Fei quickly chanted as he pointed to where War Without Wounds had fallen, feeling discomfited the entire time.

This was one example of the usefulness of Gu Fei’s long casting time. When War Without Wounds fell from the tree, the men of Water Flower naturally went to surround him, so if the spell had a short casting time, it would erupt even before the enemies arrived by War Without Wounds’ side, essentially wasting his effort and mana. Due to the spell delay, plenty of men who had gathered by War Without Wounds’ vicinity were implicated in the spell’s eruption.

BOOM! Amid the flames, Gu Fei saw War Without Wounds stand up and unleash his Cyclone. Although War Without Wounds was just a typically immoral uncle, he was never passive in a fight. Proof of this was that he always made sure to have enough Rage points to unleash Cyclone.

When War Without Wounds started Cyclone, the flames in the surrounding area seemed to ignite even faster with the skill’s force. Even War Without Wounds himself was heartlessly engulfed by the raging inferno.

The unsuspecting men of Water Flower, who were in the midst of celebrating the fact that they had finally found a foe, were soon turned into streams of white light by the raging inferno. Some were able to survive this attack due to having better equipment at level 40. Although Gu Fei was holding on to the level 70 Moonlit Nightfalls, his low Intelligence prevented him from unleashing the sword’s full Spell Damage. Moreover, the weapon’s dual attributes of physical damage and magic damage meant either of those was limited to the level 60 standard. With such stats, he would even be unable to insta-kill those job classes with low HP were it not for the fact that Gu Fei was wearing Midnight Spirit Robe that increased his Magic Attack Power by a lot.

Water Flower mercenary group was filled with the skilled players of Carouse Guild. There were even some low HP players that had top-grade equipment among them, so they were able to survive Gu Fei’s spell, albeit their faces went pale when they saw how low their HP had dipped. Among those that survived was War Without Wounds.

War Without Wounds had also not fallen despite suffering the full might of Gu Fei’s AOE spell, so he had not given up either. Those that had rushed toward him were players with fast speed but low HP, so plenty of them were killed off by Gu Fei’s spell. War Without Wounds stopped his Cyclone and charged toward a nearby Warrior with a mighty bellow.

This Warrior had just taken damage from Gu Fei’s spell, so he had lost quite a chunk of HP. With the ensuing Burn effect of the raging inferno, he hurriedly attempted to retreat from the spell’s AOE. Unfortunately for the enemy Warrior, War Without Wounds canceled Cyclone and activated Charge toward him to also escape the still burning flames that sought to consume the players within the spell’s AOE. War Without Wounds’ Charge hit the man and the latter was flung out with his butt still on fire, turning into a beam of white light before he even landed on the ground. War Without Wounds roared once more as he brandished his claymores and cleaved hard at another enemy player that had yet to die, sending the latter hurtling toward a tree. He did not use a skill for this strike, so the damage was low. The player who had just been thrown into the tree blankly stared at the now fleeing War Without Wounds.

War Without Wounds proved his awareness of his current situation of being dealt continuous damage by Gu Fei’s spell by quickly leaping away from its AOE once he cleared the two enemy players blocking his path.

However, the men of Water Flower had once more surrounded him. War Without Wounds no longer had much HP after taking the brunt of Gu Fei’s spell, yet he maintained his tenacious resistance.

“Chance!” Young Master Han quickly sent Gu Fei this message: “Cast another one.”

Gu Fei, who had been expecting his message, readied his sword as he typed: “Roger!” He then shouted, “Descending Wheel of Flames!”

Young Master Han was angered by his action and fired off another message: “What are you yelling for?”

Gu Fei did not reply to him this time. This was because he had gracefully leaped off the tree after saying the incantation.