Chapter 333 – One After Another
“I’m more than glad if they have designs on my city.” A sinister smile graced Bai Xiaosheng’s lips. “Then when the time comes to turn against each other, I won’t have to be polite with them and thank them for helping me capture Hero City.”
“Impressive, that’s Uncle for ya.” Fatty gave a thumbs-up.
No wonder Bai Xiaosheng invited so many higher-ups from other guilds, he was waiting for them to jump into his trap here. At that time, when they gathered their guild members and put up a life or death fight to steal Hero City, only to find out that no matter how hard they struggle, they could never outmatch Bai Xiaosheng, one could imagine their despair.
Beep beep. Bai Xiaosheng’s communicator rang. He took the call, listened to something, and sneered after the call was finished.
“Many players are rushing to this place. I see they’re all starting to deploy people here. Very well, we can just wait for these free slave laborers to come now.”
……
There was nothing special on the way. In the seemingly boundless space of Heavens Scar, the group had traveled for more than half a month, going at least over ten thousand miles in without seeing any sign of Hero City.
Along the way, they came across numerous monsters. There were large-scale armies of both human and demon spirit soldiers, and even monsters bred from the soldiers’ hostility during their lifetime.
There were so many monsters to the point it was annoying. Except for the human soldiers that retreated after Bai Xiaosheng took out the Tower of Heroes, the players had to kill everything to the very last monster to proceed. Fortunately, they didn’t bump into anything too powerful, such as those that general had mentioned, the thousand-year-old fellows that survived the grand war. Slaughtering for more than half a month, the whole team of 200 over players all advanced two or three levels.
When they had annihilated the Undercrows, Fatty had risen to level 55. Currently, he had gained another level and reached 56.
In addition to levels, the harvest of items had been even more worthwhile. Needless to say the numerous Violet gears, there were also plenty of blueprints, recipes, tools with special functions, and even damaged artifacts leftover from the grand war that absolutely delighted the players.
Aside from the two blueprints at the beginning, Fatty gained another called the Demon Dragon Cannon Blueprint. It was siege equipment used by the Demon race, with an appearance like a type of terrestrial Demonic dragon, hence the name. The Demon Dragon Cannon could shoot a black beam that was corrosive and therefore had a destructive effect on the buildings of the Human realm.
“Uncle, they should all have arrived by now, let’s stop taking detours,” Fatty whispered to Bai Xiaosheng.
“How did you know I was taking detours?” Bai Xiaosheng was surprised.
Rolling his eyes, Fatty pointed at a distant place on the ground.
“We have passed that thrice. Please, Uncle, even if you want to take detours, be a little more professional and stop passing by the same place.”
“My bad, my bad, I’ll pay attention next time.” The hint of a smile flashed past Bai Xiaosheng’s ever calm face.
“Guild Master Bai, how far are we? Why do I feel like we’re just walking in circles?” asked a guild master. From the looks of it, others had noticed this as well.
“Cough… My apologies. I’ve also just realized this now thanks to Fatty. According to the map, Hero City is not much further away. Please keep up the good work, everyone, we should arrive soon.” Bai Xiaosheng pretended to look a little abashed.
If a person looked down at the ground from a bird’s-eye view, they’d see right away that Bai Xiaosheng’s group was being followed by over a hundred other teams of players that arranged in the shape of a fan. Those teams kept a certain distance from each other, showing that they wouldn’t provoke others, but wouldn’t be merciful if being provoked, because the death of each player of another guild meant one less obstacle on the way to claim Hero City. During this short trip, at least a thousand players had boarded the flight to the death altar in Heavens Scar and turned into the Darkness God’s new slaves.
Every once in a while, HeadofGod sent the brothers of God Familia to record the situation behind and bring it back. And then, Bai Xiaosheng, Fatty, and HeadofGod would hold a secret discussion. Now that they thought the time was ripe, Bai Xiaosheng started leading the group in the direction of Hero City.
The farther the players went, the more frequent and stronger the monsters appeared. At last, they finally ran into a bunch of very powerful ones.
They were the Demonic spirits of dead Demonic soldiers who varied in bizarre appearances. Some had human bodies but animal heads, some had human heads and animal bodies, some had several heads or more hands than others, some could be recognized as aquatic at first glance that people would wonder how they even survived on land.
These Demonic spirits didn’t just randomly gather together. Like the previous human soldiers, they rushed towards the players in a combative formation.
After days of cooperation, the players already learned to coordinate with each other. They quickly got into positions and launched various attacks at the Demonic spirits.
The Demonic group also launched a series of long-range attacks at the players from quite a distance. Numerous black flame arrows whizzed right into the players’ formation. Some players turned pale on the spot as the arrows nearly insta-killed them.
In this kind of situation, rogues were normally positioned at the sidelines, so Fatty and God Familia had no qualms about hiding behind the others and watching the show. Bai Xiaosheng also hid behind the masses, and even obviously grabbed the guy in front of him to be his meat shield.
“Uncle, maybe try to be a little less obvious?” Fatty and God Familia were speechless.
“They’re even more obvious than me, what’s the point being courteous now?” Bai Xiaosheng felt very justified. Those bunch of guild masters had contacted their underlings and even openly let them follow behind his group, waiting to rob Hero City the moment they found it.
The Demonic troops amounted to less than 900. Rounding up, they barely made a team of a thousand. However, the attacks from their formation were troublesome and dealt quite considerable damage. In just a few minutes, over a dozen players had nearly died. Their numbers would already have declined had it not been for the priests.
Speaking of which, it was truly a miracle how they had hung around here for more than half a month without a single death. One reason was that the monsters they met weren’t too OP, and another was luck.
“I heard that those who have respawned at the Death Altar were forced to change to dark attribute and become the slaves of the Darkness God. Unless a Holy Mage of the Grand Magus rank or higher dispels the dark force in their bodies, they can never enter the human main cities for the rest of their lives. Or be discovered by the NPC troops and get killed on the spot.” Bai Xiaosheng smelled of schadenfreude.
First ignoring how rare Holy Mages were, the rank of Grand Magus alone only happened at the 8th class enhancement. To the current players hadn’t even made the 6th class enhancement, the 8th was too far distant.
The Demonic party didn’t charge at the players head-on and risk their lives. As former military, they naturally possessed their own combat formations. They stood over ten meters – the exact distance for their magic – away from the players and restrained them from advancing with long-range skills while dispatching a small team of 200 to attack the belly of the players’ formation.
The players fell to a number disadvantage despite each of them being an expert. This kind of group battle just didn’t bring individual strength into play. Under the oppression of the Demonic spirits, the players began to suffer casualties.
“This won’t do. Call for people!” No one wanted to die, especially if they’d have to turn into a slave of the Dark which already sounded hair-raising enough. At this moment, they couldn’t care less about their reputation and started summoning their guild members.
Heeding their guild masters’ call, the guild teams behind raced over. After paying a certain number of lives, the players finally wiped out the Demonic troops, though the result was not at all joyous to the majority of them. The faces of the guild masters were gloomy and their eyes flashed with fury upon hearing their underlings depict the horror of the Death Altar.
“Guild Master Bai, we need to find Hero City as soon as possible. After you claim it, we must find a way to restore our brothers to normal,” a guild master woodenly said.
“Indeed, we must hurry.” Bai Xiaosheng shrugged it off lightly. After the enemy party was annihilated, he led the group forward as usual.
“Strange. I understand if the guilds send their members here, but why are there so many guildless people as well?” Fatty was confused. Apart from the guild players, many guildless ones were sighted either alone or in small groups doing nothing and only following at the back, apparently just waiting for Hero City to appear.
“Someone spread the news.” Bai Xiaosheng gnashed his teeth. “I bet the entire CN region already knows of this, and moreover made our detailed info public.”
“In other words, even for those who don’t come in, whatever we find out, they will also know?” HeadofGod finished.
“Yeah. Don’t let me know who’s doing this, or I shall disclose all of that bastard’s private matters once I find out!” Bai Xiaosheng vowed.
Fatty felt a chill run down his spine. Uncle Bai Xiaosheng looked truly determined to be vengeful. The one who did this should really keep themselves well hidden, or everyone would have a show to watch in the future.
As more and more powerful monsters appeared on their path, the guild masters had no choice but to move their guild members to the front to clear the way. Currently, there were only several dozens of players around Bai Xiaosheng, either guildless or righteous players who didn’t set their eyes on Hero City.
“Guild Master Bai, the situation doesn’t look too bright, huh?” Fierce Dragon TheTalent didn’t call over his guild and just stuck around with Fatty’s group.
“Humph, we’ll see who will have the last laugh.” At the moment, Bai Xiaosheng wasn’t so sure anymore. On the one in a million chance the system really made an exception, the Tower of Heroes in his hands might amount to nothing but a waste of time.
After a full month since entering Heavens Scar, the group finally saw the vague outline of Hero City.
