Chapter 326 - Hostage Plan
Sakurazaka Moony’s suggestion was truly repugnant, and it caused the nearby players to feel embarrassed for him. Still, such a reprehensible method would often yield unexpected results. Deep Waters’ expression visibly changed once he heard Sakurazaka Moony’s recommendation, with his heart even fluttering involuntarily. However, he quickly consoled himself, Relax, it’s not possible for them to do that. The system will surely restrict them!
The system indeed had a restriction placed on such acts – a change brought about by the violent and indecent situations that had occurred on the first day of Parallel World’s open beta. While the system did not restrict players from stripping themselves down, those intending to rape or sexually harass others were prevented by it from doing so. This did not mean that players could freely streak in the nude or become flashers, since such indecent acts were also closely monitored by the system.
In fact, the system catching sexual offenders and predators was a lot easier than cops catching criminals in reality. Once the system detected a sexual offender, the person’s account would instantly be deleted and the user himself or herself would subsequently be blacklisted. The game company even held the rights to sue such sort of individuals. Therefore, if any victims lodged complaints against their attackers, the players’ indecent activities in-game would come to haunt them even in reality.
This was why, besides the players’ wild acts on that first day of open beta, no similar incidents had occurred again thus far.
At this moment, Deep Waters was reassuring himself using that rule as he maintained an aloof air. When he saw plenty of the surrounding players being repulsed by that idea, Deep Waters once more revealed a placid smile of contentment on his face.
Oathless Sword could no longer stand his look. Stepping forward, he planted his fist on Deep Waters’ face. The people standing behind the Hunter quickly dispersed to make a path out, which caused Deep Waters to fly out a short distance away from that punch.
Oathless Sword picked up the rope tied to Deep Waters’ legs from War Without Wounds and violently jerked it to pull the Hunter back toward him.
Deep Waters wiped the corner of his mouth as he laughed mirthlessly. “That didn’t even hurt a bit!” He then climbed to his feet once more and stared at Oathless Sword. “But I won’t be forgetting that punch….”
“You’re still trying to threaten me!” Oathless Sword was about to punch him again, yet two hands unexpectedly shot out to grab his shoulders that then spoke the same line, “Forget it!”
Oathless Sword’s fist stopped mid-air as he looked to Gu Fei on the left and Drifting on the right. These two looked at each other, evidently surprised that the other had stepped out to stop Oathless Sword as well.
Gu Fei had been present on the scene from the start, while Drifting had come out of nowhere. Deep Waters squinted his eyes before chuckling. “Drifting, it’s you. Why are you here? Did you drift and wander your way to Yunduan City?”
Drifting nodded. “I didn’t know that you went to Linyin City, though.”
“I’ve been here for quite some time now,” Deep Waters said.
Everyone looked from one man to the other. Oathless Sword originally wanted to ask why Drifting did not mention knowing someone in Linyin City before, but the two’s conversation answered his question: Drifting did not know that Deep Waters was in this city.
While Drifting was Parallel World’s number one Mage and among the Five Unyielding Experts, he was the typical Mage that would not be found standing on the outer circle like Gu Fei. Therefore, Gu Fei’s quick-and-clean ‘kidnapping’ of Deep Waters was only witnessed by the nearby players, while the rest only became aware of it after news about it reached their assigned positions. Drifting only made his way over after hearing Deep Waters’ IGN being mentioned.
“Are you two friends?” Oathless Sword furrowed his brows as he asked Drifting.
There were pros and cons to this potential friendship; Deep Waters might give Drifting face and let them go if things worked out, but it was also possible for Drifting to be the one giving face to Deep Waters by not making things difficult for the Hunter.
Today was apparently not Traversing Four Seas’ lucky day, as Drifting merely replied with: “Sorta.” His tone made it obvious that he and Deep Waters did not have a deep friendship. Meanwhile, Deep Waters had easily seen through Oathless Sword’s thought and he laughed coldly. “Even if we are close, my comrades here have been with me through thick and thin, so I’ll never let anything get in our way.”
Oathless Sword was about to punch him again but Gu Fei persuaded him otherwise, “Forget it. Hitting him isn’t gonna solve anything besides venting a bit of your frustration.”
“Hmph. At least, this brother here has some brain in him.” Deep Waters had a rather good impression of Gu Fei.
“Find a way to break out of this encirclement first. Let’s just call it quits and kill him right off the bat,” Gu Fei continued.
“D*mn! You’re evil!” The impression he had of Gu Fei instantly bottomed out.
Oathless Sword contemplated about this for a while before casting Deep Waters a sidelong glance. “At least, this guy has a bit of integrity in him. Since he’s worried about his comrades, wouldn’t they reciprocate as well? Let’s drag him to the front and yell at his buddies – threaten them a little.”
“That’s childish – really childish. We’re gamers, so such a situation is to be expected. Our guild already made an arrangement that no person, including me, will take priority over the guild. Give it a try if you don’t believe me!” Deep Waters was unruffled by this.
“Let’s go, then!” Oathless Sword waved his arm.
Gu Fei, who had been standing beside Oathless Sword, ignored his command and turned to leave, instead. He obviously disliked doing this sort of things. Deep Waters laughed aloud when he saw this. “This brother is quite the character; I truly admire your ways!”
Oathless Sword commanded Gu Fei, yet the latter blatantly disobeyed him, causing him to lose face. However, he had no way of chastising Gu Fei, so he just passed the order to some of Traversing Four Seas’ members to do the deed. Before going, Oathless Sword made sure to get in a few more licks at Deep Waters. He only felt reassured to let Deep Waters be escorted out after making sure that he was holding the rope tightly in his hand.
Youthful Reflection was still commanding the players in the archer formation to rain arrows on the enemies. When Deep Waters was escorted to the front, they temporarily stopped their enfilade of attacks as the Traversing Four Seas’ men began to shout according to their boss’s instruction. “People in this jungle, listen up! Your boss is in our hands right now. Put down your weapons, remove the traps, and leave the forest! Otherwise, you’ll have to pick up your boss from a spawn point!”
No one answered this shout of theirs.
“Shout it once more and count to ten!” Oathless Sword ordered.
“Count, my *ss! Just kill me if you want. Nagging so much, it's clear your guild won’t have much of a future with you at its helm,” Deep Waters impatiently grumbled.
Oathless Sword completely ignored him. Coming to the front, he shouted the words himself, “People in this jungle, listen closely! I will now count to three! If you don’t act the way we have instructed, we’ll kill your boss first and play with you guys again! I’ll begin the count now!” It was obvious that Oathless Sword had long since lost his patience. He had ordered his men to count for ten seconds moments ago, yet he had changed it to three seconds now that he was the one speaking.
“One!” Oathless Sword bellowed.
There was no response.
“Two!” he yelled once more.
There was still no response.
Oathless Sword began to slowly lift his claymore.
“Three!” Once he shouted this, Oathless Sword’s claymore came crashing down. Evidently, he was not all talk. Since he did not hold much hope for this method to begin with, he might as well just go for broke. Even if it was useless, it was still better to slay Deep Waters. The situation would remain unchanged even if they kept Deep Waters alive, so Oathless Sword decided to just kill him off. Not only would he be able to vent his frustrations by doing so, it could also boost the morale of his troops.
“HOLD IT!” Just as the claymore came crashing down, a distinct shout was heard coming from deep within the jungle.
Oathless Sword’s eyes glinted, but he did not stop his claymore’s descent. It was nothing but a basic attack, after all. Oathless Sword’s Strength was not at the level where he could insta-kill a player. He originally wanted to slash Deep Waters a few more times, but with the enemies finally reacting, he unwillingly stopped his attack after that one cleave.
“Who shouted that?!” Instead of feeling relieved, Deep Waters was angered by his comrade’s yell.
Someone, who looked like a Mage, appeared from behind a certain tree. The man glanced at the rather haggard-looking Deep Waters being held hostage by Oathless Sword and showed a pained expression. Turning his gaze over to Oathless Sword, the man said, “We’ll remove the traps; just let him go!”
“Did you drink too d*mn much? We have an agreement about this!” Deep Waters roared, “Just ignore me!”
The man avoided looking at Deep Waters again and merely kept his gaze trained on Oathless Sword.
Oathless Sword revealed a victorious smile. “Honorable men, indeed. What a bunch of good comrades you’ve got there. When the quest is over, there’s a high chance of us becoming good friends with you guys. Please go ahead!” After saying this, he made a be-my-guest gesture.
The Mage waved his arm and countless Archers began removing the traps that they had set up. It was clear how well-trained they were based on their movement.
Oathless Sword surveyed his surroundings and his eyes promptly turned cold, saying, “When I said traps, I meant all of them.”
The Mage did not speak, but his contemplative look signified that he was currently sending out a message on a channel. In no time at all, more Archers appeared from behind the trees and began to remove the traps. The number of men that had emerged gave the players from Yunduan City quite the shock.
Excluding those who remained out of sight, at least two hundred players were out and about. The Traversing Four Seas’ players had expended great effort in developing the level of their guild, but they were currently just at level 5 with seven hundred fifty members. Oathless Sword estimated that the enemies would probably have that same number. Still, just from this scene alone, Deep Waters’ group seemed to have over two hundred Archers – all of them being Hunters. Was this job-class composition not seem a little over the top? Considering these men were busy removing the traps, they appeared to not have just set up one trap each. Was it possible for every Hunter present to actually be capable of setting up more than one trap?
These Hunters showed a level of skill that left the watching crowd breathless. After completing the task assigned to them, these Hunters stepped aside and quietly watched the players from Yunduan City. The Mage turned to address Oathless Sword, “We’ve held up our end of the bargain; release him.”
“Idiots! You’re all a bunch of idiots!” Deep Waters was pissed and moved by his comrades’ integrity. Burying his head, he moaned.
“Moony, go take a look!” Oathless Sword motioned.
Sakurazaka Moony nodded his head as he went forward. Going around the entire border, he turned his head over to say, “There are no more traps.”
Oathless Sword was extremely satisfied with this. This feeling of victory was just too great, and he could not help but wish to share about his impressiveness. As such, he coolly smiled to the Mage and said, “May I ask which direction should we head to reach Linyin City?”
“That way.” The Mage pointed toward a certain direction, which was coincidentally where Sakurazaka Moony had just checked for traps.
Oathless Sword nodded his head in relief. “Thanks.” Now that he was feeling good, Oathless Sword courteously but confidently addressed the Mage, “We’ll automatically release Brother Deep Waters from our custody once we depart.”
Oathless Sword gathered the expedition once he said his piece, preparing to head in the direction that the Mage had indicated. Unexpectedly, someone suddenly stepped out from the crowd and lazily waved his arm. “Wait a sec!”