Chapter 337 - Street Fight
“Scoundrel!” This anger-filled shout came from Sakurazaka Moony.
Many people were affected because he had fallen for Deep Waters’ ruse. Sakurazaka Moony might be reprehensible, but he still felt regret for causing that debacle. In fact, he was so embarrassed by it that he could not look others in the eye. All the members of The Great Hunting mercenary group were equally sheepish about it, and only Fireball looked unperturbed by all this. He could probably be crowned as the King of Shamelessness within The Great Hunting.
Sakurazaka Moony fired off an arrow toward Deep Waters as he was cursing the latter. He strongly wished this shot could behead Deep Waters right at this moment, so he could acquit him and his brothers from their sin. His emotions must have overwhelmed him and caused his shoulders and fingertips to stiffen, as that Snipe he had fired off was way subpar, missing Deep Waters by at least three paces.
“Everyone, hold your fire!” Seeing the other Archers and Mages intending to follow suit and send their own attacks at the enemy, Oathless Sword hastily stopped them with a raise of his hand. At this crucial moment, he had shown an unexpected level of cool-headedness. This was only but a game at the end of the day; killing Deep Waters would not leave his guild leaderless. Besides venting a bit of their pent-up frustration, Oathless Sword knew that this kill would not truly affect the overall situation of the quest.
“What are you trying to do?” Oathless Sword stared at Deep Waters, who was still sitting on the rooftop, as he addressed him.
“He he… Nothing much. I just wanna see how many of you are still alive.” Deep Waters chuckled. “It’s a lot more than what I have expected.”
“It’s not that easy to completely wipe us out,” Oathless Sword replied evenly as he privately instructed on the guild channel, “Thieves, use your Stealth and check our surroundings.”
Deep Waters, for his part, quickly noted those Thieves that had disappeared. Laughing, he said, “Don’t worry; there’s no ambush this time.”
“And you would be kind enough to let us go?” Oathless Sword did not believe a word he heard.
“Of course, not.” Deep Waters laughed again. “I’ve simply changed my tactics this time. We’re going to directly face you all in combat.”
Saying that, Deep Waters’ comrades suddenly flooded the entrance to this street in a grand fashion. All their Archers had their bows with nocked arrows, ready to fire at the drop of a hat.
“Your guild’s archer formation is pretty lethal,” Deep Waters said, “But don’t forget; we Hunters can fire arrows as well.”
Just as Deep Waters said these words, all his Hunters released their bowstrings together.
The arrows flew like a sudden downpour. With some Hunters firing from a squatting position and the others while standing, the arrows sailed in an arc quite similar to Traversing Four Seas’ archer formation. Although the enemy Hunters’ coordination was not comparable to Traversing Four Seas’ archer formation, the Yunduan City’s players were still on a street that did not give much room to maneuver or provide much cover. With the lack of any road to salvation and the gates of Hell opening wide for them, succumbing to this arrow assault was almost a guarantee.
“Guardians, quickly come forward and block the attacks! Charge onward!” Oathless Sword issued this order swiftly. This was actually the correct command. Turning around to flee in such a situation would only expose their backs to the enemies’ arrows. And with the clear disparity in movement speed between the job classes, it was unlikely that anyone besides Thieves with Fleetfoot could safely escape from this assault.
Nevertheless, the firepower that the enemies possessed was truly high. Traversing Four Seas’ archer formation was only consisted of about one hundred fifty players. Meanwhile, due to Linyin City’s skewed job-class composition, a majority of the players in it were Hunters. Deep Waters almost had over four hundred Hunters in his guild alone. As a result, it did not take long before white lights flashed intermittently within the ranks of Yunduan City’s Guardians who had come forward with the support of Priests from the back.
“Don’t rush in foolishly! Archers, get in position and return fire!” Oathless Sword bellowed.
This move proved to be very effective. While the Archers from Yunduan City might not be as numerous as those from Linyin City, they had the protection of the Warriors in front of them while the Archers from Linyin City were essentially defenseless. Faced against Yunduan City’s retaliation, the Linyin City’s Hunters were clearly more affected and their ensuing shots were no longer as rapid as before.
However, the assault that Deep Waters’ guild was currently mounting was not only limited to that. More players began to appear on the rooftops, and these new arrivals were far more fearsome than the Archers standing before them – Mages.
Mages filled the rooftops of the houses lining the street on both sides. Raising their staves in the air to cast spells, they could quite possibly wipe out Yunduan City’s entire army if they were to bombard them just like what they had done back in the jungle. People cried out in alarm to draw everyone’s attention to the Mages. Following this, the Archers, who had been providing cover for the Guardians’ forward charge, turned over to begin firing over on the rooftops where the Mages were, instead. The enemy Mages’ opportunity to cast spells was hampered by the Archers’ barrage of arrows on them.
However, although the Archers’ volley of arrows successfully interrupted some enemy Mages’ chanting, the rest of the Mages managed to avoid their attacks altogether. Flames began to explode on the street and on the rooftops. People died, and others survived....
Both parties engaging in this battle had about the same number of players, but since they were locked in a ranged exchange, only Mages and Archers were of much use. The well-balanced job class composition of Yunduan City’s players actually turned into a disadvantage for them at this point, as barely two hundred Archers and Mages on their side could deal with the ranged enemies of close to six hundred.
The number of players on either side might be even, but reality showed that Traversing Four Seas and the mercenaries were on the losing end. Linyin City held the high ground, and their imbalanced job-class composition created by the lack of Priests, which should be a major flaw, was… In this situation, this particular disadvantage had yet to affect the outcome of this engagement.
“Thieves, retreat, circle around, and find a way to take care of them!” Oathless Sword shouted. Since they were unable to match the opponents in ranged combat, Oathless Sword and his men must find a way to engage the enemies in melee. The entrance to the street in front was still dozens of meters away, making it difficult for them to rush in and close the gap, so Oathless Sword could only have the most opportunistic job class, Thieves, that was currently useless in this battle, to back off and search for a chance to re-engage.
Amid all this, plenty of players with extraordinary skills were able to quickly find ways to get into melee range.
The first man to get himself on a rooftop was the other core member of Traversing Four Seas, Gale Force. Everyone saw him run straight to a wall and executed the Fighter’s skill, Swallow Dropkick. He did not direct this kick to anyone but to a wall, instead. Using that momentum created by his attack, he propelled himself up the wall.
With a punch, Gale Force immediately struck a Mage down the rooftop. Hugging the player next to him, he also tossed that man over the ledge. Gale Force could tell how unfavorable their situation was, so his current goal was not to finish off the Mages but to disrupt their formation on the rooftops. They would no longer have much of a problem once he succeeded in disrupting these Mages’ formation above the roofs. Nevertheless, one player’s Strength was far too limited. The enemy Mages swiftly shifted their position and a whole lot of them hurled Fireball, which could somewhat track its target, to tease Gale Force. A few of them even activated their Arctic Whirlwind to engulf him with its whirlwind.
“Priests, get me two Priests to keep an eye on things up there!” Oathless Sword anxiously yelled.
All the Priests were flustered. Not only did they have to keep healing the Warriors who were tanking the enemy Hunters’ incoming arrows, they also had to aid the players who were injured by the Mages’ bombardment. Their hands were already full juggling so many fronts of this battle simultaneously, yet Oathless Sword was now calling for two of them to dedicatedly Heal Gale Force....
Fortunately, Gale Force was not the only Fighter in this battalion. Others who saw what Gale Force had done followed suit and tried to replicate his actions. However, not one of them succeeded. Most of the players ended up flying backward and away from the wall instead of upward when they used Swallow Dropkick. The only one who got the closest to executing what Gale Force had done was actually Amethyst’s Lie Lie. This lady managed to send herself flying upward, but she unfortunately did not fully grasp the move’s sequence and failed to grab a hold of the top wall when she went by, landing back down to where she was standing moments ago.
As all the Fighters stood up to try again, a second person from Yunduan City managed to make it on the rooftop. Of course, that person was Gu Fei. No one had an easier time getting up the roof besides him, and this was entirely because he had the Blink skill in his spell arsenal. After finding a good position, he extended his hand, disappeared with a swish, and materialized right on a rooftop. In front of him was a man chewing on a piece of straw in his mouth. This calm and confident commander of the opposing side was currently giving out order to all the Mages to target the potential threats that made it on the rooftops.
“Hey, bro. You can’t possibly be thinking of killing me, are you?” Deep Waters was not the least bit flustered when Gu Fei appeared before him.
“Why not?” Gu Fei was curious.
“If I’m not mistaken, your PK value right now is 29 points. There’s going to be dire consequences if you reach 30 points!” Deep Waters chuckled. He seemed very satisfied with this calculation of his. “So you don’t scare me at all.”
“You’re really humorous!” Gu Fei laughed as he flipped the sword in his hand with a graceful stroke and casually dissipated all the balls of fire flying toward him.
“What skill!” Deep Waters gushed in awe. Gale Force had already been pelted with balls of fire until he was almost seared tender. The rooftops were currently filled with Linyin City’s players, so it was not convenient for them to throw out AOE spells, but because there were many of them, hurtling Fireball on their targets was still very effective. Who would have thought that Gu Fei would easily swat away six balls of fire with a swing of his sword, though?
“Here I come!” Gu Fei took two steps forward and attacked Deep Waters.
“If you want to kill me, why aren’t you chanting a spell?” Deep Waters was still grinning.
“Twin Incineration! Incinerate!” Gu Fei roared. His body turned a full circle as the flames flared around him. Following his pivoting motion, he stepped forward and reduced six Mages into white lights. By the time the fiery glow subsided, he had already turned to Deep Waters, and before the Hunter could react, Gu Fei planted a kick right at the center of his chest in one fluid motion. Deep Waters rolled for a few meters before tumbling over the ledge and landing onto the street. He stared with dumbfounded eyes at Gu Fei.
“Aren’t you a Mage? Why aren’t you using mana on me?” Gu Fei looked down at him from the rooftop and laughed. He quickly turned to slash his left and right as he chanted out respectively, “Descending Wheel of Flames! Descend! Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno! Arise!”
Gu Fei’s casting time would usually allow anyone to escape its AOE, but they were currently all on the rooftops and had limited space. If they wished to evade his spells, they would have to leap down the street. These men were obviously aware of how frightening Gu Fei’s spells were, so plenty of them chose to take the leap of faith. A number of them did not think about which direction they were jumping to in their dazedness and ended up landing on where Yunduan City’s players were at, meeting an ending that could not be expressed in words.
Gu Fei continued to advance deeper into the enemies’ ranks. Although he no longer had any mana left, these Mages were unable to engage him in melee and use AOE spells. The occasional balls of fire that they would toss at Gu Fei were essentially useless as well. Moreover, their Strength was no better than an infant’s since they were Mages. As for Gu Fei’s Mage, it had the upper hand against the average Mages when it came to Strength since he had the Bandit Leader’s Ring and other equipment augmenting that particular stat. Sticking to them and dishing out kicks and punches with great impunity, he handily knocked off all the Mages from the ledge with his most effective moves. In mere seconds, the Mage formation that took up almost half of this side of the wall had been disrupted to the point of them being no more than a shade of their former selves.