Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

Over by the shore near Linshui City, the men from Forever in flowers were currently picking through the bushes and tall grass. The Hunters all moved at incredible speed, and looking for something as big as boat was very easy, so their search efficiency was quite high. Over thirty of them went down the shoreline and worked in a clockwise motion. Soon, someone reported that they discovered a boat over at a set of coordinates.

“Just the one?” Sakurazaka Moony replied. “Look carefully.”

“What b*llsh*t. Would I miss it if there were two there?” Sakurazaka Moony was not exactly a respected figure despite holding the position of leader of the mercenary group.

“Guard it,” Sakurazaka Moony said.

They had specially inquired into how the private boat hire worked in Linshui City as they made their way here, and they confirmed that most of the boats shared the same model. However, this was not because the players were not interested in trying to be unique, but that the average player had no idea how to make a boat in the first place, so these boats were all made by the same shipwright company.

This company was actually a mercenary group, and they shared the same name. It was said that the group was formed by players who were all knowledgeable about shipbuilding. They were a group of players from Linshui City that quickly realized it was a great business opportunity, and thus formed the company. As the game developed, their membership grew as well. People had no idea how skilled they were when it came to gaming, but the people who formed this company were fairly well off, since they had a monopoly here in Linshui City when it came to building boats.

In shipwright terms, this sort of boat that had a maximum occupancy of five players was essentially the current limit that could be made, given the tools and materials available in the game. As such, the private boats that players could own might be smaller than this, but nothing larger was possible.

That meant that if Southern Lone Blade and his men intended to leave Linshui City and steer the boat on their own, they would need a total of two boats, since one would not be sufficient. This was why Sakurazaka Moony had wanted to confirm if there was only a single boat present when that Hunter reported in just now.

But even though they knew that Southern Lone Blade and the squad would need two boats to leave together, there was no guarantees that they would have hidden both of the boats they intended to use together. Thus, all they could do was leave some men over by the place where they had discovered the boat.

---

In the end, the second, third and fourth message came soon after, and Gu Fei and the others came to realize that they might not have enough manpower for this plan of theirs.

At the moment, the many cities in Parallel World each had populations of hundreds of thousands of players. Owning a private boat like this could be seen as a status item in Linshui city. It was something some experts, criminals acting all pompous, or wealthy players would seek to own in order to keep up appearances. It was said that commandeering one of their own little boats out into the water was the highest level of play when it came to courting the ladies This logic was no different from anyone trying to pick up chicks by flaunting a sports car they privately owned in real life. Mentioning that the boat was borrowed or even rented would be no different from taking the system-operated ferry service, which would very likely reduce their chance of scoring with the ladies.

As such, this translated into the reality that the amount of players that owned a private boat was not particularly common or even uncommon. Sakurazaka Moony and the thirty-odd men he sent out had quickly realized they were about to be used up if they left someone to keep watch on every boat they had found. At the moment, there was still a huge area around the shore that they had yet to search through.

“So how are we going to do this?” Sakurazaka Moony was worried, gazing over at the two people that had come up with this idea, Gu Fei and Vast Lushness.

Gu Fei thought for a while and said, “Get your guys to keep looking for boats. Perhaps someone would leave some sort of mark or emblem on their own boats. There’s no need to guard any of those that is not theirs.”

“What are the names for Southern Lone Blade and his bunch?” Sakurazaka Moony asked.

This question stumped Gu Fei. He only recognized and knew of Southern Lone Blade alone, so he quickly sought out Brother Assist to get more information. As the expert when it came to information gathering, after identifying that the other members in his squad were the most recent names that had disappeared from the top Ten Great Adept list of the job classes, the man immediately copied down the list of names that made up the Ten Great Adepts before checking up and going through them in greater detail.

The members of the seven-man squad were:

The Warrior Southern Lone Blade, Thief Blackwater, Mage Fire Singed Clothes, Archer Glue, Priest PSP, and the Knight Unrivalled Lucky Star. The other Priest did not make it to the list as one of the Ten Great Adepts, so his identity was currently unknown.

Gu Fei ended up telling this to Sakurazaka Moony, who was rather dejected after hearing it as well, “There’s still one we don’t know… Oh well, can’t be helped. Let’s just get the guys to search with this!”

------

Sakurazaka Moony passed on the news and the thirty-odd Hunters got to work once more. Upon closer scrutiny, the found out that indeed plenty of players had carved their own names onto the boats, and those whose names were not any of the six were instantly ignored. Unfortunately, only half of the players had actually carved their own names onto the boats. While the remaining half had also made personalized markings on their boats, they had instead drew imprints rather than etched out words. It was impossible to tell them apart, so they would have to remain and keep watch.

Nevertheless, they were at least able to free some of these men to continue the search. The players that remained could still try and keep looking as best as they could, as long as they were able to keep the boats they had previous uncovered within their line of sight.

“Let’s hurry up ourselves!” Vast Lushness said. “Every bit counts.”

“Drunk bro, you can’t ignore my plight and ditch me!” Fireball cried. There really were players that had picked up his bounty mission and came to hunt after his head as they were making their way around. Thankfully, Gu Fei was around to come to his rescue, forcing these players into a retreat after a short exchange once they realized they were not up to par. Had Gu Fei not been around, Fireball would have already found himself locked up in Linshui City’s Dungeon by now.

“Mhmm, just follow me!” Gu Fei said.

They had finally made it to the city after chatting all this while, yet they suddenly saw that there were not many guilds holding fort, which left them quite surprised.

“Looks like Southern Lone Blade has already escaped!”

“We gotta act quickly!” Gu Fei said.

Fire saw this scene, and felt he would be somewhat at fault if he continue to be a burden and slow down Gu Fei’s movement. Thus, he finally gritted his teeth and said, “Drunk bro, you should hurry up and catch up to them. I’ll make my way over on my own.”

“Alright, but take care of yourself. The way I see it, why don’t you head over to the bar by the beach and get yourself a drink. Bounty hunters would not dare to touch you if you were there.” Gu Fei patted him on his back and nodded to Sakurazaka Moony and Vast Lushness to make their way out of the city at their fastest speed.

“Drunk bro, you’re too much of a realist. Can’t you be at least a little bit more courteous with me,” Fireball was in tears as his swore in his heart that he would no longer play around with top-tier equipment anymore.

“In that case, Fireball should leave and get yourself a drink or two. We’ll try and do what we can and hurry as best as we can,” the other two bade farewell thusly. At such a crucial moment, Sakurazaka Moony at least showed the bearings of a gentleman and did not leave the lady behind as he began searching over to his side with his fastest speed. Vast Lushness had also randomly chosen a side and began slowly making her way over.

Gu Fei went sprinting down the beach right outside the city and found it strange that it was all quiet around him.

Since Southern Lone Blade had already left the city, the other guilds should be able to guess his intentions and should be sending players out to station them by the beach as well. Even if they did not have time to set up proper positioning, there should at least be a bit of people around! Take, for example, those people who were assigned to guard the gates; how could their targets vanish so soon after leaving the city gates? Gu Fei looked to his left and right. There was essentially no one else aside from Sakurazaka Moony and Vast Lushness, who had both just stepped out of the city, just like him.

------

Gu Fei obviously had no idea what was happening over by the west gate, which had already changed the set up of this entire incident.

After the intense few minutes of struggle, someone finally found the perfect moment to strike and gotten a hold on that magic staff. Even though he was quickly butchered under the exclamations from the crowd, he was still gratified since he was able to snatch that top tier staff for his guild.

This man was a Warrior, so he was still holding onto the staff the moment he respawned in the Warriors’ encampment. He could not wait to admire the stats of the magic staff he held when he instantly became petrified.

His guild leader had already received his happy message about successfully snatching the magic staff from everyone, and had instantly sent a congratulations his way. In the end, he instead received a reply of great anguish, “Guild leader, we got tricked!!!” as that player linked the stats of the magic staff to his guild leader.

It was an extremely ordinary magic staff, so anybody could instantly understand how they had been duped. This guild leader immediately sent down orders to the guild members, “Head out of the city and chase after them!”

Just as he was about to inform the other guild leaders of the situation, he suddenly stopped himself.

“Why must I tell the rest about this?” he suddenly asked himself.

The others have no clue that the magic staff was a fake; they may be dissatisfied if they see that my men have gotten hold of the item, so they are sure to be making their way over to the Warriors’ Encampment. Since their attention is conveniently diverted, wouldn’t that leave just our guild as the only people who know the real location of the magic staff?

Whew. I nearly did something really stupid. That man cleared out the message he had typed out and spoke to the Warrior that had sacrificed himself and picked up the staff.

“Ah? Why?” The Warrior was perplexed.

The guild leader did not attempt to hide his thought process and gave him a simple explanation. Props were due for the Warrior, who hardly complained, nodding and logging off, all for the sake of the guild.

Just like this guild leader expected, the rest of the men from the other guilds had indeed kept note of who the magic staff ended up with despite having not gotten hold of said staff. After reporting accordingly, all the various guilds began to move towards the Warriors’ Encampment, preparing to physically hash it out properly.

In the end, before they could even do anything of that sort, their comrades that were barricading the Warriors’ Encampment quickly sent a message, “That Warrior logged off shortly after he respawned.”

“G*dd*mn, that was quick!” The other guild leaders could feel anger filling up their hearts. No matter how strong someone was, or how much work a guild put in, everybody was equally helpless towards the insurmountable obstacle called logging out.

“G*dd*mm*t, guard the Warrior Encampment for the next twenty-four hours. Anyone who comes into contact with that man, do not even let a single one of them off!!” Some leaders had already sent out this order to their men in a fit of rage.

------

As one of the first to begin this operation, Tanzanite Shade was obviously feeling very irate. He made an attempt to reach out to the other leaders of their large guilds and wanted to vent his own frustrations.

“It's rare that so many of us have nothing to do. Let’s head over to my beachside bar and have a drink or two. My treat,” Tanzanite Shade sent out an invitation.

There were guild leaders who agreed due to their love of venting their emotions through the use of alcohol, and there were some that felt Tanzanite Shade’s invitation seemed to have a deeper meaning to things and agreed to the proposal, as well. In the end, not a single one of them rejected his offer.

“That’s great. I’ll be waiting for all of you by the bar then. See everyone then!” Tanzanite Shade sent out this message and began making his way to the bar. A slight smile hung on the corners of his mouth, entirely different from the anger he had shown in his messages.