“Team 2 stay close, continue damage output!!”
“Team 1 close-range, make space! Long-range has no angle!”
“Healers keep up, don’t just wait for people to move aside!”
Wei Chen’s voice echoed through the surroundings, and the team chat flashed with his additional instructions. This boss fight was reaching its climax, so it was natural that the guild leader of Blue Brook Guild was directing with both his hands and his mouth.
Windguard City.
Lonely Mayor Shanbei.
Wild Bosses each only spawned once a week. The location wasn’t fixed and the time was variable, so even just finding one was already a valuable event, let alone being able to kill it uncontested. Wild Bosses were the source of much of the conflict between the various large guilds and powerhouses – after all, everyone knew that the strongest equipment and the rarest materials could only be obtained from a Wild Boss.
Killing a Wild Boss was very difficult, even more so when there were many competitors. To have one quietly and peacefully fall into their hands like this was truly a golden opportunity.
But the easier it seemed to be, the more careful Wei Chen became.
“Watch it watch it, about to reach Red Blood!” Wei Chen reminded the team. After the Boss reached Red Blood status, its battle power would increase explosively, as programmed by the Glory creators. Many Boss hunting teams had gotten the Boss down to ten percent, only to fall under this final burst of power.
But Blue Brook Guild’s elite team was famous in the Glory world. They had battled Lonely Mayor Shanbei countless times, and with a wealth of experience under their belts, they had made preparations early on.
Seeing everyone listening to his reminder and preparing themselves to defend against the Boss’s attack, Wei Chen finally allowed himself to relax just the slightest. But soon after, he sent another message to a smaller team: “How is it, what’s the status?”
“Don’t worry, both of them are still here, haven’t left,” a team member replied quickly.
“Good, keep a close eye on them. Don’t let your guard down until we finish this,” said Wei Chen.
“Understood!” That squad member wouldn’t even think to mock Wei Chen for being overly cautious. After all, the two players whom he was currently watching had interfered with Blue Brook Guild’s progress countless times in the past.
One Autumn Leaf, Autumn Tree!
If a Glory player didn’t know these two names, it was a sure sign that they were a newbie. When discussing who the current best player of Glory was, these two names appeared the most often. Others like Blue Brook’s boss Wei Chen’s Warlock Swoksaar, the famous Striker Desert Dust, or the Exorcist called the “Master,” Peaceful Hermit, were all famous experts, but compared to these two, they still seemed just slightly lacking.
As Wei Chen directed the Boss battle here, he had also sent out a special squad just to keep an eye on One Autumn Leaf’s and Autumn Tree’s movements. Without a doubt, it was because he felt that they posed the greatest threat to their Boss kill.
After hearing that the two of them still hadn’t moved, Wei Chen allowed himself to relax slightly further. To him, the threat of these two players was even greater than the threat posed by the Boss going into Red Blood.
“Team 1, ready.”
“Team 2, ready.”
“Team 3, ready.”
…
All of the team leaders were keeping a careful eye on the Boss’s health bar. In the instant the Boss reached 10% health and released its explosive power, they would all have different responsibilities, and they all began to remind their respective teams to ensure they were one hundred percent ready.
10.23%.
10.21%.
10.2%.
10.18%.
…
…
…10%!
“Block!” the leader of Team 1 roared, and the Knights lifted their shields to meet the incoming death.
Boom!!
The quartz-paved ground shattered and flew outward in a wave. By the time the fragments fell back to the ground, the Boss had seemingly disappeared.
No one was surprised; this wasn’t the first time they had witnessed this scene. The splintered ground, with the Boss at the epicenter, was just to show the strength of Mayor Shanbei’s leap into the air.
Lonely Mayor Shanbei was preparing his powerful move – Rock-Breaking Earth-Shattering Slash!
But because of the Knights’ protection, the first part of this brutal attack was successfully endured.
“Fire!” ordered the leader of Team 2. The long-ranged attackers of that team, whether Gunner or Mage, all sent their attacks flying at the Boss. At the same time, Team 4, which was tasked with healing, was already furiously restoring the health of the Knights of Team 1. These next few moments would be crucial.
“Forward!” Team 1’s leader ordered, and the group of Knights advanced forward in an impressive display, gathering beneath Lonely Mayor Shanbei, who had leapt high into the air. The Knights lifted the shields they held to form one giant shield, then quickly began performing all of the defense-boosting, damage-absorbing skills they knew.
Blue Brook’s Knights were preparing to meet Mayor Shanbei’s attack head-on, using their vast defensive power to directly stop this Rock-Breaking Earth-Shattering Slash.
Rock-Breaking Earth-Shattering Slash dealt large-scale damage, but it relied on contact with the ground to propagate; if held up by the Knights’ shields like so such that it couldn’t spread through the ground, then the damage dealt by the shockwave would decrease by 70%.
So as long as this one attack was blocked, the team’s rhythm wouldn’t be disrupted, and they would be able to kill Mayor Shanbei before he launched his next big attack.
Falling!
Mayor Shanbei held a heavy hammer in his hand. This wasn’t a weapon available to any of the classes, but it followed the moves of a sword-type weapon, and this Rock-Breaking Earth-Shattering Slash was just a massively powered-up version of the Berserker’s Earth-Shattering Slash. When the Boss fell, it directly connected with the large shield composed of eight Knights linked together.
Bang!
The noise was so loud that the players felt like their eardrums might burst, and a striking light burst forth.
Wei Chen’s Swoksaar was walking around in a circle, making sure that there were no flaws in the positioning of the eight Knights as they held up their shields against the Boss’s attack – the attack wasn’t just a brief moment of contact, it was a continuous outpouring of damage that had to be endured. But as Wei Chen watched, he suddenly saw a silhouette darting toward the site of the collision.
“Who the hell is that!!” Wei Chen scolded immediately. It still wasn’t the time to attack, so which team did this impatient guy belong to? The light was too bright, so Wei Chen was unable to clearly see the ID on the player’s head.
What happened next only made Wei Chen even angrier. That guy who had charged forward suddenly lifted up a cold light that struck one of the eight Knights right on the body.
That Knight was instantly sent flying into the air and was battered by several more waves of slashing attacks.
“Fuck, we have an infiltrator!” Wei Chen shouted. But right now, the infiltrator wasn’t the biggest issue.
Mayor Shanbei’s attack was still pushing against the eight Knights. And now, one piece of the defense had chipped away.
The eight Knight formation had been researched and developed – one more, and they couldn’t squeeze into this circle; one less, and they couldn’t endure the damage from the attack!
Although the Knights had already absorbed some of the damage from the attack, the attack had yet to finish – losing a piece of the defense at this moment, the power from the Rock-Breaking Earth-Shattering Slash instantly swept toward this opening!
“Block!” Wei Chen realized that the infiltrator should not have been the first thing to which he directed everyone’s attention.
The remaining seven Knights quickly tried to close this gap, but it was already too late. It was true that only the direction of the attack had changed – it hadn’t gotten stronger or anything – and the Knights had already absorbed a sizable chunk of damage from the attack. But still, this situation was outside of Blue Brook’s plan.
The seven Knights were each taking greater damage because of the opening, and they couldn’t withstand it – like flower petals, they were scattered to the sides. And the power leaking through the gap in the defense demonstrated the specialty of this Earth-Shattering Slash, mercilessly spreading through the ground toward the players.
But at this point, there was already no path of retreat.
“Block, attack!” Wei Chen ordered.
The healers quickly became the busiest players on the field. Because the power was residual, it didn’t deal one-hit-kill damage; because the power was splintered, the damage it caused as it spread through the ground was significant in some areas and nonexistent in others…
The attackers of the various teams dodged as best as they could as they began launching their attacks, and the healers frantically tried to keep up.
Wei Chen yelled and typed and felt that his hands and mouth weren’t enough – if only he had another way of issuing orders! And then, in the midst of this chaos, he once again caught sight of that earlier player.
This guy, after causing such a big mess, still hadn’t left? He was still mixed in with the crowd?
Troubling Rain!
Wei Chen quickly memorized this character’s name, and then checked the class – it was a Blade Master.
When had he appeared?
Wei Chen realized that he truly had no recollection; this wasn’t someone he recognized. This sort of unknown name – when had he mingled amongst them, without a single person noticing?
And what about now?
Wei Chen discovered that aside from himself, not a single person had noticed the presence of this Blade Master. In this chaos, everyone was worried about keeping themselves alive – they had no time to care about him.
No… It wasn’t that simple!
Wei Chen saw that this Blade Master was still moving, still changing position. This guy… he even went up and attacked Mayor Shanbei, but none of the Blue Brook players noticed him doing so, as though he were an invisible man.
Of course, he wasn’t really invisible. He was just constantly jumping between gaps in the formation – despite the chaos of this scene, he was able to swiftly detect which positions would allow him to go unnoticed.
He has some skill?!
Wei Chen found that this opponent’s skill surpassed what he had imagined. But he didn’t move his character, nor did he immediately alert the team. Wei Chen, who wasn’t in the thick of battle at the moment, simply gained another target of observation.
That Blade Master named Troubling Rain was still darting through the crowd, still using that gap-jumping method, and Wei Chen found himself more and more impressed. He always believed himself an expert, with skill surpassing the average player, but it was quite possible that even he didn’t match up to this guy’s acute judgment and ability to capture empty space.
“Who in the world is this person?” Wei Chen was growing curious, and so finally sent a message to the team: “Pay attention to my orders, don’t hesitate.”
Blue Brook was used to their boss suddenly pulling off some crazy strategy, and so despite this kind of seemingly arbitrary direction, they did as he said and listened closely.
“Team 1 retreat. Team 2 at 4 o’clock. Team 3 opposite. Teams 5, 6, on top. Team 4, stay close to 1!” Wei Chen issued directions uninterrupted as he laid out the formation. At this moment, in his eyes, Mayor Shanbei wasn’t their only opponent – that Blade Master had to be dealt with as well. This guy’s gap-jumping attack method gave Wei Chen chills the more he watched, because he already figured out this guy’s intent – this guy was planning on getting the last hit on the Boss! And with his skill, if Wei Chen hadn’t noticed his presence earlier, he likely would have succeeded with ease! Glory’s rewards for killing a Boss involved complex calculations, but there was a set reward for dealing the killing strike, and it absolutely could not be taken away by an outsider like this.
The team moved according to his directions, and the attacks directed at Mayor Shanbei naturally lessened. Wei Chen was carefully guiding that Blade Master into the trap he had established, when suddenly, he heard an angry and exasperated voice. “Fucking hell do you guys know how to play this game or not?”
“You’re just about to take down the Boss what are you doing now?”
“I thought Blue Brook Guild was an elite group? Don’t you guys know how to work as a team?”
“Who’s leading you, could he be any more of a dumbass?”
The word speed was even faster than Wei Chen’s, and more importantly, there were no repeats. In fact, there was even coordination – as the voice spoke, speech bubbles popped out, and although the contents of the voice and the speech bubbles were entirely different, they connected to each other.
At this point, there was no way that the surrounding players couldn’t notice. Once the crowd noticed this Troubling Rain, there was suddenly chaos again: “Fuck who’s this!”
“Damn this is that infiltrator from earlier right?”
“Kill him!”
Quite a few attacks had already been launched, but at this moment Wei Chen was stunned. What was this! Was this really the time to blabber and complain like that? Would it kill you to hold it in for just a while longer! And if you really need to say something, fine, but you talk so much! Dumbass, I’m killing you today no matter what!
The formation Wei Chen had ordered was specifically made to target this Blade Master, and so when everyone started attacking, they felt that it was especially convenient, and that coordination was especially easy.
Troubling Rain also suddenly realized the reason for Blue Brook’s adjustment in formation, and since he was already exposed anyway, he didn’t hold back in his chatter. “Fuck, so you guys stopped attacking the Boss in order to attack me! That’s such a cheap move!”
“Over here, over here! Haha, you guys didn’t succeed, there are still gaps!”
As he hollered, this guy continued to maneuver around by darting between gaps in the formation.
“Let me teach you a lesson, brat, this one isn’t called a gap, this is called, ‘please, sir, enter the ern’!” Wei Chen’s Swoksaar flashed with light, and a Hexagram Prison accurately formed over the gap that the Blade Master had leapt to, successfully trapping him inside.
“The fuck is an ‘ern’, isn’t it ‘urn’??” Although Troubling Rain had no chance of escape, his mouth still didn’t shut as attacks from other players rained down upon him.
“Who cares what it is!” Wei Chen channeled his embarrassment at his mistake into anger. “Just go die!!”
“Just you wait, Blue Brook, this isn’t the last you’ll see of me!” Troubling Rain was still yelling when his health finally dropped to zero.
“Next time,” said Wei Chen, “remember to lie low.”
