Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

“This place isn’t safe. We shouldn’t stay here for too long.” Broken Water Arrow was not just anyone, and vigilance had already been ingrained in him, so he easily sensed that the players here in the Wilderness Camp were hostile to one another. Those spectators, who had come before them and were initially unsure of what was happening, already adapted to the locals’ actions and successfully integrated themselves with the endless fighting here. At the moment, finding a peaceful spot in this grinding map to observe everything was not easy, as anyone could very well find themselves ambushed by another player at any given time.

“Let’s go!” Ye Xiaowu told the others. The situation here was clear for all to see, and experienced players could tell what was going and could even infer what the place would become. Even though Silver Moon and No Smile coveted the efficient monster grinding routine, neither dared to stick around for long. This was especially true for Silver Moon; hanging around somewhere with a dense crowd gathered was tremendously dangerous, which explained why he had been keeping his face covered this whole time.

As the group left the Wilderness Camp, the two’s minds were working nonstop. They had been following Ye Xiaowu for a week now, always waiting to see if the man had some trenchant means or if they could gain benefits from him, but they had nothing to show for in the end. Ye Xiaowu was just like the average players, doing the same things every day when he logged on; Sometimes, Silver Moon and No Smile even tried finding excuses to stick to him like glue, yet they never saw him do anything out of the ordinary. Until now, the one time they found the Priest arresting was when he displayed his Alchemy proficiency. Aside from that, he was just a normal player who had yet to reach level 40.

The two men also spent this period very unhappy; Originally, they thought that they had found themselves an amazing supporter whom would usher them into a new amazing future in Fleeting Smile. However, this turned out not to be the case after they spent time interacting with him. Had he been truly capable, forget about a guild, the man should have at least formed a mercenary group by now.

They continued to follow the man quietly, but that was all thanks to the incident days ago when he said that he would use 20,000 gold coins to hire Southern Lone Blade. That incident had left Silver Moon and No Smile rather excited, thinking that Ye Xiaowu was foolish yet loaded, so it was a matter of time before they could take advantage of his fortune. But they were puzzled after reading about the news in the forums this morning about Thousand Miles Drunk’s bunch forming a workshop in partnership with Southern Lone Blade’s lot. The person who had first stumbled on this information was No Smile, and he quickly contacted Silver Moon about it before they reported it to Ye Xiaowu.

Silver Moon indignantly accused Southern Lone Blade’s lot of lacking integrity; he was waiting to see how Ye Xiaowu would react to this revelation, but in the end, the man merely answered, “I know.”

It turned out that when Southern Lone Blade decided to work with Gu Fei, ready to bury the hatchet between them, he informed Ye Xiaowu of his decision at once, and broke off their deal. At that time, Southern Lone Blade was rejoicing that he had not taken a deposit for the deal; otherwise, he would surely have a very painful time reimbursing the man.

Silver Moon and No Smile were very surprised to learn this, completely at a loss over what this strange Priest Fleeting Smile was planning. Afterward, Silver Moon casually mentioned about those people forming a workshop again, of how they were seeking to sell something called ‘efficient monster grinding routines’. He originally wanted to see if Ye Xiaowu had anything up his sleeve to deal with Thousand Miles Drunk’s bunch, who were getting stronger as time went by. Who would have expected the man to have such a sudden and strong reaction to the ‘efficient monster grinding routines’, though? After thoroughly inquiring about the matter, he decided to head over to Baishi City’s Wilderness Camp with them in tow to take a look at it personally.

Actually, after the Utopian Magic Staff got sold off, Ye Xiaowu and the others had immediately went back to Linyin City. They did say that they wanted to deal with Thousand Miles Drunk, but they did not stay around Baishi City and, instead, went back to Linyin City, instead; this left Silver Moon and the others a little confused, but because Baishi City happened to be very dangerous for Silver Moon, he actually found the decision to be rather favorable. Glue and the others’ failure to catch any traces of Silver Moon that day was entirely because he was no longer in Baishi City.

Heading back to this city this time, Silver Moon changed his outfit and kept his face covered as he still considered himself a wanted criminal, but why would those from this city bother who he was. Everyone only had four words on their lips: efficient monster grinding routine.

Once they finished watching, as veteran gamers of a certain caliber, the shrewd Silver Moon and No Smile could tell at a glance the inherent value of this grinding routine, but they could also tell that depending on this to level in the Wilderness Camp was not practical anymore. The place was just overpopulated; if they wished to continue developing, they would ultimately need to have a powerful guild party backing them. There was no way any private individual would be able to take advantage of this.

No matter the case, anybody could tell that this leveling method was a huge business. Silver Moon and No Smile were extremely jealous, especially since both of them felt very dissatisfied with how it greatly contrasted their present destitution. Upon seeing just how much Ye Xiaowu disliked this efficient monster grinding routine, they quickly continued to fuss about the matter and added fuel to the fire.

Silver Moon and No Smile were veterans, indeed! Just as how Sword Demon, Young Master, Han and the others realized how tremendous the impact of this efficient monster grinding routine would have to the game, the two naturally shared a similar insight to this, and so what they had said made perfect sense. Adopting such a point of view as they chattered about those men’s actions, it was as if Xiaowu had found like-minded people for once – Rare that he could hold a serious conversation regarding this with these two men.

Silver Moon and No Smile had not lost all hope with Ye Xiaowu; The two men felt that with how this person had gone to great lengths and expenditure to gather all of those that had history with Thousand Miles Drunk, he should still have a plan in the works, and that Broken Water Arrow should know about it! It was apparent to the two how differently Ye Xiaowu treated Broken Water Arrow. The two were actually friends, while Silver Moon and No Smile were no more than pawns on a chessboard for this.

Neither of them were afraid of being pawns, but they were fearful of the fact that they were pawns who were clueless as to what the next move they would be making. This was why the two kept trying to pick Ye Xiaowu’s mind regarding how he wanted to deal with Gu Fei, and they finally managed to gain some very important information today. All this time, they were thinking that Ye Xiaowu was like them, someone whom Thousand Miles Drunk had crippled by several levels before, and now bore deep-seated resentment to the point of wanting to seek revenge. To form closer bonds with the Priest, the two denounced Thousand Miles Drunk’s viciousness, but Ye Xiaowu did not seem to react much to these efforts.

Now, the two finally discovered that Fleeting Smile did not have any personal vendetta against Thousand Miles Drunk, and it seemed that he was very concerned with how Thousand Miles Drunk’s actions affected the balance of in Parallel World.

“Could this man really be an employee of this game’s company?” Silver Moon and No Smile privately messaged each other. They had long had their suspicions about this eventuality, which was just never confirmed. After all, everybody knew about the rule of employees of the game company being restricted from entering the game.

“Why will he care about such things if he’s not a game employee?” No Smile challenged.

“Maybe he’s insane?” Silver Moon gave a wild guess.

“He’s pretty sane to me.” No Smile wiped off his sweat.

“Don’t you think that, with how he usually acts so sneakily, it’s as if he knows things he doesn’t intend to share with us?” Silver Moon asked.

“Er… a little, I guess.” No Smile did not dare to deny this.

“Say, do you think that he was a game company employee that was let go afterward?” Silver Moon’s guess was precisely what had transpired.

“If that’s the case, why is he still so concerned about this game?” No Smile questioned.

“You’ve got a point there…” Silver Moon agreed with his query. There was no way that these two extremely selfish gamers could imagine that Ye Xiaowu had willingly resolved to protect the game even at the expense of abandoning himself.

Neither was able to come to any conclusion after discussing it for a long time, so all they could do was continue and toss out clichéd lines at Ye Xiaowu. However, having a deeper understanding of Ye Xiaowu now, it was much easier for these two men to make casual conversation.

“Now that Thousand Miles Drunk’s group has done something as irresponsible as this, we must think of ways to stop them,” Silver Moon expressed.

“That’s right!” No Smile heartily supported.

“Yes!” Ye Xiaowu replied lightly.

At the same time that Silver Moon and No Smile were secretly chatting with each other, Ye Xiaowu and Broken Water Arrow were also privately messaging each other.

“These two guys… You don’t believe how they are acting, do you?” Broken Water Arrow asked.

“Only a fool will,” Ye Xiaowu said. “How many more days do Old Breaker need?”

“About four days more. It’s already the best he can do,” Broken Water Arrow replied.

“It’s been hard on him.”

“I’ve enquired after the workshop Thousand Miles Drunk and company announced in their post; the next step for them is to continue their lesson in the White Mill, and right now, they are merely accepting registrations from the interested players, but seeing how passionate these players are, I’m afraid that they’ll be able to proceed in four days’ time. In fact, they might already be done with studying the monsters in White Mill, and are already researching the next map,” Broken Water Arrow said.

Ye Xiaowu sighed. “I never thought that that guy would advance so quickly. Just what exactly was the catalyst to this? Why did he suddenly want to do this? I feel like, given his caliber, this sort of fighting routine is not something he newly discovered,” Ye Xiaowu wondered.

“Who knows…” Broken Water Arrow had no answers, either.

“At the moment, they’ve already destroyed the Wilderness Camp… so if there’s a chance that we can delay and rescue the White Mill from collapse, we gotta give it our all!” Ye Xiaowu said.

“We just need to stall for four days!” Broken Water Arrow said firmly.

Ye Xiaowu did not speak and merely nodded.

Silver Moon and No Smile were still cursing and lambasting Gu Fei’s actions on their end, hoping that Ye Xiaowu would casually follow up the conversation and reveal his plan. Ultimately, Ye Xiaowu simply gave them a simple ‘yeah’, leaving the two men uncertain if he had heard any of their words at all.

Silver Moon could no longer stand this and finally blurted out, “Just tell us if there’s anything you need us to do!”

No Smile was startled by this, because from the very beginning, both men had already made the decision to mainly fish in troubled waters and avoid becoming the vanguard. However, since Silver Moon suddenly volunteered the two of them thusly with his usage of the word ‘us’, how could he not get flustered? In that moment, No Smile still did not consider Silver Moon to be a comrade, wondering to himself, M*th*rf*ck*r, you’re only at level 30 something, so you have nothing to lose. Yours truly here is at level 41, and me losing one level is equivalent to several of yours, b*st*rd!

While No Smile was feeling pissed deep down, Silver Moon sent him a private message. “You can’t bag the wolf if you’re unwilling to lose the child! It appears if we don’t show a bit of effort, there’s no way we can benefit in any sense.”

No Smile felt that what he had said made sense, but they still had no idea what sort of benefit they would be getting. To take such a huge risk and pit themselves against Thousand Miles Drunk so suddenly, just the thought alone made his stomach churn and his legs wobbly. Ruminating on this further, No Smile realized that Silver Moon was a Knight at the end of the day, and that trump card skill on his King’s Blade would be used for support only. If they were to face against Thousand Miles Drunk head on, why would he ever be in the frontline?

F*CK! I got sold out by this *ssh*l*! was No Smile thought to himself, immediately coming to the realization that his maliciousness was no match for Silver Moon’s. The man truly lived up to his exploits as a man who could abandon his ‘spouse’ and brothers the moment his guild fell apart; he would not even bat an eyelid betraying a friend.

No Smile was in the frame of mind of throttling Silver Moon to death, but he did not externalize it at all. By now, Silver Moon had already taken the initiative to volunteer him, and No Smile could not find any way to back out from it, so he might as well express his willingness to try his best to Ye Xiaowu, even though he was grumbling deep down. If this ended up costing him his life, he would make sure to drag his ‘brother’ Silver Moon down and die together with him.

Still… even if we die together, my one level just isn’t worth the same as one of his! No Smile was despondent.

“Yes, it’s best not to drag things out further when it comes to dealing with Thousand Miles Drunk.” It was as if Ye Xiaowu was influenced by their proactiveness.

“Old Broken, where’s Cool Apple?” Ye Xiaowu asked.

“He’s already in position,” Broken Water Arrow said.

“Great… Hand Silver Moon the Torc of Leadership!” Ye Xiaowu said.

Silver Moon’s eyes glinted. He did not expect that they would have already obtained his Torc of Leadership. With this item, he would once again have fulfilled his King’s Blade’s activation requirement.

Broken Water Arrow did not hesitate, either. Taking out the Torc of Leadership and passing it to Silver Moon, the latter took it at once and equipped it. He then pulled out his King’s Blade; its blade was already gleaming with an undeniably golden luster. Anyone who looked at it would feel the slightest sensation of warmth overwhelm them.

“You two will head over to this set of coordinates.” Ye Xiaowu handed them a piece of paper.

Silver took it and gave it a glance. It was just a set of simple coordinates, and it should be somewhere inside Baishi City.

“Where is this place?” they asked.

“The location where you two will be lying in wait. It is also the location where Thousand Miles Drunk will finally be cleaned up.”

“Oh? What’s the plan?” They pressed on.

“We lay an ambush here as Old Broken lures Thousand Miles Drunk over. Meanwhile, you two are the unexpected reinforcement and will play a decisive role in this attempt,” Ye Xiaowu said.

“Uh… Silver Moon’s King’s Command is of course something no one else can do, but what about me? Just what exactly is my decisive role in all this?” No Smile had his doubts. He was someone who knew his limits and was no more than a run-of-the-mill expert. He was nothing as unexpectant as Silver Moon with his King’s Blade, so how could he play a decisive role?

“Because this is Baishi City, and Thieves’ Stealth can be interrupted by anyone who possesses the White Dust. Only someone like you with the Vanish skill can re-Stealth yourself after you get interrupted, which is why you’ll be the one executing the decisive attack,” Ye Xiaowu explained.

“Oh, so that’s how it is…” No Smile immediately understood this. He had also spent a period here in Baishi City, so he was aware of the miraculous uses for the White Dust found in this region.

“Then, where are the people we’re forming a party with?” Silver Moon asked.

“There’s no need for a party,” Ye Xiaowu replied.

“No party? Then, my King’s Command…” Silver Moon was nonplussed.

“Honestly speaking, we don’t have a lot of manpower with us, and Thousand Miles Drunk’s strength is not something we can deal with by getting the King’s Command buff stacked on top of us. The goal of the others is merely to get Thousand Miles Drunk expend some of his mana, so there’s no need to waste King’s Command on them. Just use it only on No Smile alone!” Ye Xiaowu said.

“Him alone?”

“I believe you have been directly using the King’s Command skill inlaid in your King’s Blade, right?” Ye Xiaowu chuckled.

“That’s right. What’s the matter?”

“Try and use it like a Knight’s Blessing. Choose a particular target before casting the skill,” Ye Xiaowu said.

Confused, he randomly activated his King’s Command on himself like it was a blessing. He glanced at his stats in that moment and was instantly so astounded that his mouth hung agape without shutting.

“When using King’s Command on a target, the stats increase isn’t 15%, but actually 30%! You understand what’s going on now, right?” Ye Xiaowu asked.

“Drastically increasing No Smile’s power and have him sneak up on Thousand Miles Drunk during the confusion to deal the killing blow on the man?” Silver Moon summarized.

“I’ll leave it you two to act according to the situation; there’s no need to attack if a ripe chance doesn’t present itself. After all, your strength is important to us, and we can’t lose that,” Ye Xiaowu said.

The two men felt a sense of comfort rush over them from head to toe. After having been treated like stray mongrels for so long, who knew how long ago it was since the two were ever valued by another like this?

However, their enemies were Thousand Miles Drunk, and the two were not the sort to be complacent from a couple of compliments. This was when No Smile voiced his query. “Thousand Miles Drunk probably has a method of detecting Stealth and doesn’t need the White Dust to discover my position; this ambush might not succeed.”

Gu Fei had seen through No Smile’s Stealth in the past, and that memory was still fresh in his mind.

This was when Broken Water Arrow came forth and schooled the man. “Thousand Miles Drunk’s able to detect you through Stealth not because of an equipment but because of his intuition.”

“Intuition?”

“That’s right. Having spent a long time undergoing specialized training for this, he can sense the changes to his environment through the senses around him. This sort of unique ability can be simulated in this VRMMO setting, which is why he can locate a Stealthed player through his intuition alone. Still, there’s a condition he must fulfill to achieve this, and that is for the target he is sensing to pay heed to his existence. Do you understand what I’m saying?” Broken Water Arrow remarked.

“No, I don’t. Please be a little more specific…” No Smile asked.

“When you’re near him, don’t focus your attention on him. Glance at him just once, remember his position, and get close to him. If necessary, you can get Silver Moon to direct you to him. The point is, you won’t be discovered as long as you don’t focus on the man. Once you’re able to get close to him and strike, it will be too late for him to get a read on your position properly,” Broken Water Arrow explained.

“Oh, so that’s how it works,” No Smile exhaled.

“Furthermore, he’s going to be surrounded at that time, so there will be many players with their eyes on him. His intuition then will be in quite a mess. He won’t be too precise catching you in the act as you creep up on him, so you can relax,” Broken Water Arrow said.

“Doesn’t that mean that we have a very high chance of success?” Silver Moon asked.

“It will all depend on you two,” Ye Xiaowu replied.

“I have a question; since this is the case, why is there a need for us to ambush him? Let’s just go look for Thousand Miles Drunk and jointly attack the man. Won’t that be the same as me and No Smile finding the chance to ambush him?” Silver Moon proposed.

“How is that the same? How do you know that Thousand Miles Drunk’s alone right now?” Ye Xiaowu retorted.

Silver Moon was taken aback and immediately recalled the terrifying friends Gu Fei had.

“We are already pushing it going against Thousand Miles Drunk given our capabilities. If he still has assistance, how will we even possibly succeed? That’s the reason why we designed a trap like this; we’re waiting for Thousand Miles Drunk to be alone before we reel him in,” Ye Xiaowu said.