Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

By using his Blink at its maximum range, Gu Fei was able to move six meters forward. No matter how turbulent and furious the undercurrent was, it would not be any faster than an instantaneous rematerialization. Gu Fei turned around and brandished his Moonlit Nightfalls as he chanted, “Electric Wall! Fall!”

The description for the Electric Wall spell apparently stated that it was capable of blocking everything. The moment that it came into existence, it was more or less able to cover the whole opening of the dark tunnel. The sparking electricity that the wall created helped shine a bit of light on their surroundings. In a glance, Gu Fei could see that the flow of the water was indeed a little stymied by the wall, though it was quickly losing its spark and dimming over time until the time when the water would eventually completely overwhelm it.

Gu Fei was ultimately reassured when he saw that his Electric Wall had not isolated Slyris on the other side. However, the lady did not appear to be conscious as she continued to remain sprawled in a puddle. Gu Fei neither had the time, nor could he care to spare too much thought into this. He quickly ran over to grab her with one hand as he unfurled another Teleportation Scroll with his other hand.

“Hurry!!” Gu Fei shouted at the teleportation formation that appeared as he turned his head back to look at his Electric Wall.

Like a lamp that was suddenly extinguished, the tunnel went dark once more as the sound of the raging lake water exploded in Gu Fei’s ears. The teleportation formation managed to light up as the white glow surged. Gu Fei used this bit of light to finally confirm that Slyris was still with him, only to receive the fright of his life. Slyris looked pale as a ghost under this white light.

Whether we’ll make it in time all depend on this one moment! This thought flashed through Gu Fei’s mind in an instant. The white glow of the teleportation formation shone, even as the lake water engulfed the two of them at the same time…

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In a certain grinding map outside Yunduan City, a group of players who had not participated in the City Wars had been using this time where players would not suffer the penalty of losing a level upon death while the event was ongoing to furiously grind. Suddenly, they saw a white light appear on the ground as two figures appeared right out from it. The rumbling sound of water accompanied the two players when they materialized; a rather realistic aspect of the Teleportation scroll was the fact that the formation would bring along the water that was caught in the white light as well, splashing on Gu Fei and Slyris upon their arrival.

All the players in the vicinity stopped what they were doing and blankly stared at the two drenched players that appeared out of nowhere. Gu Fei was not particularly bothered by what was going on either. Slyris was still leaning heavily on him, and it was evident that she had not recovered consciousness yet.

However, it was not difficult to deal with such occurrences in the game. Gu Fei propped Slyris upright and shook her for a bit before she slowly came back to her senses. By this time, a crowd had already formed around them as someone curiously came forward and asked, “Bro, what happened? How did it get to this?”

“We fell into the water,” Gu Fei answered.

How could these people here not see that was the case? They had wanted to know further details about it, but found it difficult to continue probing. Slyris was now conscious and after shaking her head a little, she was completely sober. She got quite a shock when she saw that there were so many players crowding around her, asking in alarm when she turned her head to find Gu Fei beside her, “What happened?”

“Nothing much, I used a Teleportation scroll to get us out,” Gu Fei finally sighed in relief when he saw that Slyris was fine. He casually pulled out an apple and wiped it before biting into it. Keeping his mana properly topped up so that he could be ready for PK anytime was a good practice that Gu Fei had turned into a habit playing Parallel World.

“What the hell, why didn’t you pull us out!?” Gu Fei took the time to express his disapproval at Sword Demon while he was munching on his apple.

“It was all so sudden, we were not ready at all! What exactly happened?” Sword Demon had been hailing Gu Fei all this while, but Gu Fei did not have the chance to reply throughout the entire ordeal.

“The Water Enchantment immediately shattered upon being frozen, and the two of us got flushed down into the tunnel behind it,” Gu Fei gave a short summary.

“Oh, so where are you now?” Sword Demon asked.

“I used a Teleportation scroll to get out, so we are fine,” Gu Fei answered.

While Gu Fei was relating all of this to Sword Demon, Slyris was doing the same with Yan Xiaozhu, and everyone was only at ease after learning that they were all safe.

“Let’s go!” Once Slyris had sent her message, she called on Gu Fei to depart from this place. She found it really embarrassing to be completely soaked while subjected to the scrutiny of the crowd. These players around them were all extremely curious, yet they could not just block the two of them and grill them about what happened. Thus, all they could do was send the odd couple away with their eyes as they departed, privately speculating among themselves endlessly.

“Is there anything else? Slyris asked Gu Fei even as she inspected her current state.

“Nothing. Truly, I must thank you for your help,” Gu Fei hurriedly expressed sincerely.

“Is your quest done just with the breaking of the Water Enchantment? What was that all for anyway?” Actually, Slyris was also someone who enjoyed researching the game to a certain extent. This was evident ever since that first instance when she did her technical analysis of that incident between Gu Fei and No Smile.

“I don’t know yet. I’ll have to make a trip back to the city to find out.” Gu Fei had been running back and forth plenty of times just for this quest today.

“Well, if that’s all, Xiaozhu and I can leave now?” Slyris said.

“It’s not often you find yourself making the trip out here, why don’t you spend some time around to casually walk around and see the sights?” Gu Fei said.

“Everyone’s all engaged in the City Wars, what is there to walk around for? Besides, in my current state…” Few ladies would be completely unconcerned with their own image at the end of the day.

“Don’t worry, you’ll return back to normal soon enough,” Gu Fei told Slyris as someone who had experienced it all before.

“Then I guess I’ll just air-dry myself here!” Slyris no longer wished to walk around soaked to the bones like she was currently, saying this in an audibly self-deprecating tone.

“That works too. Call Xiaozhu and the others to join you! I’m heading back to the city to hand in my quest,” Gu Fei said.

“Bye.”

Gu Fei made his way back to the city gates with deft ease. The area outside the north gate was actually still silent, though Ray was no longer out on the open battlefield picking up stones. Gu Fei did not bother taking another look after making his way out of the chaotic battle as he hurried over to the north gate. Meanwhile, Traversing Four Seas was having a bit of trouble restraining themselves.

None of them originally dared to put much stock in what Young Master Han had told them. But because Oathless Sword had seen Gu Xiaoshang with him, that was the reason why none of them chose to not give face and express their doubt about this, for it was far more fatal for Oathless Sword if it turned out that Gu Xiaoshang was actually lying to him. But now, after seeing that Thousand Miles Drunk, the man who was apparently supposed to be intending to hunt him down, coming and going through the north gate so many times with such nonchalance, even Oathless Sword could not help but wonder what was going on.

“That guy must surely be tricking Xiaoshang as well! What’s his goal of creating such a lie? Youthful Reflection, what are your thoughts?”

“At the end of the day, our rival is always Carouse, and Young Master Han happened to be a member of Carouse as well. I’ve already said we need to be prepared for such an eventuality,” Youthful Reflection said.

“But I don’t seem to see any movement from Carouse’s end either!” After their guild coalition had disbanded, Traversing Four Seas and Carouse were still very concerned with each other, each afraid that the other would have tricks up their sleeves.

“I have no idea just what that Thousand Miles Drunk is up to! Youthful Reflection, bring some men and when he comes out, circle over and ask him,” Oathless Sword said.

“How… How do I go about doing this? What do I ask?” Youthful Reflection was uncertain if he should laugh or cry. “Do you expect me to go and ask: Are you going to kill our guild leader?”

“Honestly, if you were to directly ask him like that, I feel Thousand Miles Drunk is not the sort to deny the truth. Ask him and he just might give you the truth!” Oathless Sword said.

“Isn’t your assessment a little off? That guy’s actually rather sinister!” Youthful Reflection exclaimed.

“I asked you to go and ask that guy, so that’s exactly what you’ll do! You won’t lose a level dying anyway, so what are you so afraid of?” Oathless Sword retorted.

“Me, afraid? What’s there for me to be afraid of? It’s just that the task that you’ve assigned to me this time is completely nonsensical!” Youthful Reflection felt oddly embarrassed by what Oathless Sword was asking of him. Even if this was just a game, running up to someone and asking them directly “are you trying to kill me?” sounded absolutely naive and disgraceful. It was not as if Youthful Reflection was not someone who was without any sense of shame.

“Gale Force! Hey Gale Force, don’t walk away!” Oathless Sword had twisted his head over to call out for Gale Force. That twerp actually ran off, and because a Fighter would ultimately be that bit much faster than a Warrior in terms of their movement speed, Oathless Sword was unable to chase after that person, only to receive a single message from Gale Force, “I’m not going!”

“If neither of you are going, I’ll go!” Oathless Sword angrily barked.

“Fine, you may go then. If he really has a mission to kill you, that would save us the trouble of waiting on tenterhooks here,” Youthful Reflection snapped.

“Then what do you think we should do!?” Oathless Sword was fuming as well.

“Why don’t we look for Royal God Call?” Youthful Reflection asked.

“That guy? What can he do?”

“Actually, all we want is to get this information verified, right? Royal is from our guild at the end of the day, so let’s get him to help inquire about this. I really don’t think he would have any excuse for refusing to help us with something like this. He’ll have benefits as well if our guild does well during this City Wars event!” Youthful Reflection reasoned.

Oathless Sword felt what he said made sense, so he nodded, “Let us go find that man then!”

Royal God Call was just a child, so he did not have any real power or duty in Traversing Four Seas. However, this particular child happened to have quite the background, so Oathless Sword and Youthful Reflection did not just call him out on the guild channel. Instead, they had casually asked for his whereabouts and personally went over to speak to him in person.

If Royal God Call was not engaged in activities all by himself, he would be together with those experts from his mercenary group or mixing around with the ladies from Amethyst Rebirth. After the initial mingling with the members of the guild when he first joined Traversing Four Seas, the kid spent less and less time playing with everyone there. He did not manage to form close friendships with anyone in the guild either, so when Oathless Sword and Youthful Reflection came to where he was, they saw Royal God Call alone with his three bows slung to his back, angrily seated upon a tree stump.

Actually, having the three bows stored in his dimensional pocket would be far more convenient if his intention was to freely use any of the three different weapons, and the twerp would really have those bows in his dimensional pocket during actual combat. But he would normally be found carrying all three so openly as he did now, just so he could pretend to be stylish and stand out; Adolescents were all like that.

“Royal! What are you doing here?” Oathless Sword chuckled even as he came forward. While he would feel immense pressure when in front of people like Young Master Han, Gu Fei or other such veteran experts, he was not really intimidated by Royal God Call in the same way.

Royal God Call looked pissed, and when he looked up to find the two giants in Traversing Four Seas approaching him, he did not react any differently as he casually answered, “Just sitting down.”

“Ahem. Uhm, those comrades of yours in that mercenary group. How are they doing?” Oathless Sword asked.

“They are all dead,” Royal God Call answered.

“What? What happened? How did they all die?” Oathless Sword was shocked.

“How would I know!?” Royal God Call was irascible and yelled, getting up to leave.

Oathless Sword was petrified where he stood, only coming back to his senses after a good while. He glanced over to Youthful Reflection, all confused, “F*ck, what is all this about? Who pissed in his cereal?”

Youthful Reflection swept his gaze over to the other guildmates around, asking the same question, “Was he in an argument with anyone?”

“Nope!” They answered.

“D*mmIt, what kind of day are we having!?” As the guild leader, Oathless Sword was both physically and mentally exhausted at this point. He was in charge of over a thousand players, yet a random twerp was throwing a tantrum at him. Out of all the kind of leaders in the world, it was only the ones found online that would face such a grievance.

“That’s right, why don’t we look for Brother Assist and ask him about this? I happen to have him on my friends’ list as well,” Youthful Reflection said.

“Will that work?” Oathless Sword asked.

“Let’s ask and find out!” Youthful Reflection said as he sent a message over. In the end, he received an emotionless response from the system, which left Youthful Reflection helpless. “He has blocked all incoming messages.”

“Then who else is left? I think it’s just War Without Wounds,” Oathless Sword said. “Ah, forget it. I know his guild’s, Home of the Warriors, guild leader, Blue Stream Squall. Should I ask him?”

“Asking anyone else would be a much more reliable than directly asking Thousand Miles Drunk,” Youthful Reflection commented.

“Fine. I’ll go ask. Brother Wounds is a pretty selfless person, otherwise, there’s no way he would choose to play a Warrior,” Oathless Sword said. Players who chose to be a Warrior would either consider any fellow Warrior to be bosom buddies, or they would think highly of themselves and think of everyone else as noobs. Oathless Sword was no doubt the former, but it was a pity that War Without Wounds was the latter, and this only highlighted the poor judgment that Oathless Sword had toward others this time. With Home of the Warriors’ guild leader, Blue Stream Squall, acting as the intermediary, Oathless Sword sent a message directly to War Without Wounds after he added him as a friend, “Brother Wounds, I need to ask you something.”

“With your bros, Thousand Miles Drunk and Sword Demon, did they really pick up a mission to assassinate me?” Oathless Sword asked War Without Wounds, whom he thought was an honorable and sincere man. When War Without Wounds received this message, the first thing he did was broadcast it in the mercenary channel, “Hey! What’s going on here? Oathless Sword just asked me about Miles’ and Sword Demon’s mission! Does he not know about it?”

“Oh, perhaps he is having his doubts after seeing that Miles and Sword Demon did not make a move on him after all this time?” Brother Assist postulated.

“Okay, so how should I answer him? Miles, Sword Demon?” War Without Wounds called out.

“Anything goes,” Sword Demon did not really have much of an opinion either way.

“What about Miles?” War Without Wounds asked.

Gu Fei had already entered into the city, so he was unable to receive any messages coming from outside the city, and had not seen the situation brewing in the channel. Instead, it was Young Master Han who had the urge to kick all of these people out of the mercenary channel. This really is such poor form. With such an attitude, how could this city war even continue? Do these people even realize that the two guys are actually on the enemy’s side? This system was really too preposterous; private messages are entirely restricted, yet a mercenary channel allowed for a bridge to communicate with a third-party.

“Young Master, what are your thoughts?” War Without Wounds had even endured asking him for his view.

“Get the hell out of my sight immediately,” Young Master Han replied.

War Without Wounds quickly shut up, as he replied to Oathless Sword, “What exactly do you want to know?”

“Nothing. I just want to find out if there’s any truth to this matter,” Oathless Sword answered.

“It’s true. 100%,” War Without Wounds told him.

“In that case… Just when are they going to make their move? That Thousand Miles Drunk had been going in and out of the city so many times, just what is he up to!” Oathless Sword asked.

“How would I know anything about that!?” War Without Wounds said.

“Well… Brother Wounds, just do whatever you can within your means, but no matter what mission or quest your bros Miles and Sword Demon are both up to, can they just give up on it? If there are any potential losses here, I would be willing to bear the cost, if I can afford it!” Oathless Sword had over a thousand men under his command, so he was not really afraid of the threat that just two men could bring. But the key factor here was that these two men were not just some programmed NPCs from the system, so there was no telling when and how they would strike. It was as the saying went, ‘One does not fear the act of theft, but that a thief might be thinking of acting’. That was the situation that Oathless Sword had found himself in; if he knew someone was coming for his head, a simple fight and everything would be settled there and then. However, this dragging out of the inevitable was what left him in suspense, and the trepidation itself that made Oathless Sword feel uneasy. Furthermore, he did not dare to let his guard down, because he reckoned the penalty for this arranged assassination might be out of the ordinary. It might not be as simple as tossing him back to the encampment and respawning, so he did not dare to simply show himself and end this nightmare where he was being haunted by fear.

After fighting two rounds of this City Wars, the average player would have died plenty of times, but the guild leaders themselves had barely been touched at all. Everyone was worried about there being such a stipulation and thought there would be great costs incurred if a guild leader were to die, which was why everybody had ensured that they were being well protected this entire time. Fighting for such a long time, the system had yet to display anything like a record of the scores everybody accumulated, and that only served to keep the players feeling uncertain about many things.

When War Without Wounds received this message, he had no choice but to answer, “I’ll help you ask, then.”

“Much obliged. If you were to succeed, I’ll be sure to express my substantial gratitude toward your aid in this matter,” Oathless Sword was someone who knew how to act.

“Is that so? Then what are we still chatting for!? Hold on!” War Without Wounds quickly cried out “Sword Demon” eight times in the mercenary channel, getting Sword Demon’s attention before continuing, “Oathless Sword’s asking me to relay his words, that he would reward us well if you guys give up on your mission.”

Sword Demon was utterly speechless.

“Is… is there really a need for them to go so far? At the end of the day, they are just two men; is there really a need for Oathless Sword to be so afraid?” Brother Assist said.

“It’s probably because he wants to avoid making huge losses just to avoid a minor setback. With two such experts breathing down his neck, he must surely be second-guessing himself no matter what he was doing. Oathless Sword probably wants to devote all his efforts toward this City War and have no wish to waste any time worrying over this,” Young Master Han gave him a simple explanation, demonstrating his grasp over how Oathless Sword’s line of thinking.

“This sounds oddly pitiful…” Brother Assist sighed.

“Where’s Miles? Why hasn’t he said a word?” War Without Wounds asked.

Even though Gu Fei was unable to see these messages, Sword Demon had made sure to keep him informed of what was being discussed and Gu Fei’s stance essentially boiled down to four words: who cares about him?! Sword Demon agreed with his sentiment as well. He felt Oathless Sword’s actions here could be construed as cheating, and that was hardly honorable.

Gu Fei had returned to the Vigilante Corp Chamber by this time; having gone back and forth so many times, he was already nauseated from all this running. Upon entering the room, Gu Fei loudly reported to the captain about what he had done, at the same time making sure that the Great Mage Austin could hear him as well: He had shattered the Water Enchantment.

“Perfect. Now head back to find Guillermo and find out what’s the use of that tunnel you’ve uncovered,” the captain instructed.

“What? Do I need to look for him again? Just what kind of quest is this? Does it ever end!” Gu Fei was infuriated. He was annoyed with such quests that sent him running around like this, especially when it was a quest where he could not even have anyone to slay.

But why would an NPC care for his complaints? All it saw was Gu Fei speaking again, and the captain threw back retorts of “why are you still here?”, “Go on, quick!”, “Hurry up and secure the city’s victory!” And other such responses.

Gu Fei was helpless. All he could do was slam the door and leave, seething in his rage as he ran out of the City Hall. Over by Oathless Sword’s side, his failure to resolve this situation with Gu Fei and Sword Demon had left him dejected. Just as he was unsure what he should be doing, he happened to spot Gu Fei walk out of the north gate once more. He was walking along the walls looking particularly arrogant, strolling about the space like he owned the place. The guild members no longer found this to be a strange sight, so Oathless Sword gritted his teeth and ordered, “If he intends to drag things out, I simply don’t have the time to keep him entertained. Everyone, listen up, follow Thousand Miles Drunk’s every movement. We’re killing the target!!!”

“F*ck yeah, there’s finally something to do!!” Having been lonely and bored this whole time, plenty of players got a little excited the moment they were given the order, but the fact that there was only a single target here might just be a little too little. Everyone knew just how fearsome Thousand Miles Drunk was, but now that they were deploying everyone in the guild to fight against him, no one was really seriously afraid of fighting him any longer.

“Send the Archer Formation out; Thieves will disperse and strike when the opportunity presents itself, the rest of you will follow me!” Oathless Sword gave the command and the whole of Traversing Four Seas finally moved out.