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Panda Novel

Where had Deception gone?

Of course, with their omniscient view, the audience couldn’t be clearer about this. The Blue Rain fans present were more concerned about whether or not Song Xiao knew the answer to this question.

But it seemed that… he didn’t. Song Xiao’s pace didn’t change in the slightest, Receding Tides still cautiously walked along the thicket, while continually adjusting his field of vision. The moment that Deception’s silhouette had appeared happened to be when he was looking away, a stroke of bad luck for him.

Nonetheless, by continually adjusting his field of vision, it meant that Mo Fan couldn’t easily find a position from which he could mount a sneak attack. After Deception had concealed himself, he very carefully and very patiently followed Receding Tides, gradually closing the distance between the two. With the environment of Misty Thicket, being able to see the opponent meant that the two players were in fact already very close to each other. Even so, this was still a very long process. Sometimes, because he wasn’t able to find a suitable route to approach, the distance between Deception and Receding Tides even increased.

But no matter what, Deception still hid behind Receding Tides, not being discovered from start to finish.

One minute, two minutes……

Normally, this was a distance that could be crossed in an instant, but Mo Fan had unexpectedly used more than two minutes to close the distance. The extreme caution that he showed was purely to avoid Song Xiao discovering him.

With one player at full health, while the other only at 28%, to most people, the opportunity earlier when he had first encountered Song Xiao was already more than enough. If he had just charged up and forcefully fought him head-on, he could perhaps have already concluded the battle, but unexpectedly, Mo Fan still cautiously prepared a sneak attack.

The broadcasting department was practically crying already. If this went on, would today’s group arena be fought for two hours? Unexpectedly, the rounds were actually being played in such a dragged-out manner.

After using two minutes and forty-one seconds, Mo Fan seemed to have finally reached a distance that he was satisfied with. When Song Xiao turned around again to look in another direction, Deception put the Ninjutsu · Disappearing Body Technique to full use, forming seals with both hands at a rapid pace.

Ninjutsu · Shadow Dance.

More than ten Shadow Clones of Deception had already surrounded Receding Tides in the blink of an eye, raising their Ninjatos, which gently fell towards Receding Tides like leaves.

Ninjato, Silver Weapon: Sixteen Leaves (十六叶 shí liù yè).

The moment that this Silver weapon was revealed to the world, everyone was startled. The Silver Weapon of the number one Ninja in the professional circle, Team Misty Rain’s Dark Forest, was called Sixteen Nights (十六夜 shí liù yè), only differing by one word from Deception’s weapon, but overall, it sounded the same.

The names for all Silver equipment was system-generated, but as a way of generating publicity, clubs would often ascribe their own meaning to the name of a piece of Silver equipment. For instance, Dark Forest’s Ninjato, Sixteen Nights, had a chance of inflicting Blind as an additional effect, so this could be the origin of the word “Night” in the equipment’s name. But then, what about Sixteen Leaves?

Unlike the bigger clubs, Happy didn’t have established systems in place. As a result, since they focused purely on training well, playing well, and achieving good results, other aspects such as publicity weren’t particularly well-honed. Even if they had some sponsors to help with publicity, they wouldn’t sponsor the likes of Deception, a character who hadn’t appeared many times in Happy’s games.

Since Mo Fan hadn’t appeared very much, the various teams didn’t have a clear idea of what properties Sixteen Leaves possessed.

At this moment, after Ninjutsu · Disappearing Body Technique was quietly used, Shadow Dance immediately surrounded and attacked Receding Tides. As they attacked, more than ten Ninjatos gently floated down, fluttering like long leaves that had been curled up by the wind.

Sixteen Leaves? Was this what it was named after?

The audience may not have thought of so much in an instant, but the broadcast’s explanation had to be more acute. In that instant, they had immediately been given a speaking point for Happy’s Deception.

“Sixteen Leaves!” Pan Lin shouted loudly. As he shouted, he saw Deception’s Ninjato floating like leaves, and then he saw the fresh, red blood that had instantly filled everyone’s field of view……

“Everything hit!” Pan Lin shouted again.

Truth be told, whether or not everything connected was impossible for anyone to determine in that instant, but it was just that the blade’s edge spraying fresh flowers of blood in that instant was far too dazzling a sight. Even in the online circle, there might not be many Shadow Dances in which every single Shadow Clone managed to hit their mark at the same time. This wasn’t something that could be achieved by the opponent simply being unable to guard against it. Even using a wooden dummy, having a player control that many Shadow Clones to find the appropriate angles to attack at the same time was a difficult feat. In Glory, it wasn’t possible for characters to physically overlap with one another. Even though teammates couldn’t damage each other, they would definitely still block each other’s paths. Of course, the Shadow Clones from Shadow Dance were no different. In this instant, for Shadow Dance to completely connect in such a spectacular fashion, it wasn’t just because Song Xiao couldn’t defend well enough. It was also a matter of Mo Fan’s skillful character control.

“Beautiful!” Li Yibo matched Pan Lin praise and shouted. However, in this moment, the television broadcasters were actually somewhat conflicted. It was indeed an exhilarating moment, but when directly observed, it was a little bit too bloody.

But that bloody moment passed by in an instant. Just as the television directors were distractedly considering whether or not to quickly cut out that scene, the bloody moment had already passed. Those eye-catching flowers of blood fluttered and scattered on the ground, like the shedding of dead leaves, creating a poignant scene.

In the end, just as everyone was shouting and praising Mo Fan’s brilliant ambush, Receding Tides, with countless blades in his body, suddenly raised both his arms and started to spin. A skill that shouldn’t have even appeared in a Qi Master’s arsenal was used, and as both his arms rotated, the surrounding trees and leaves had already started to spin in the air from the centrifugal force. The Deceptions that had closely surrounded Receding Tides also started to sway.

Spinning Cyclone Kill!

Some people immediately recognized the skill. This wasn’t a Qi Master’s ability, instead, it was from another Fighter subclass. It was a Grappler skill! Using centrifugal force, the Grappler would attract and then crush everything in his surroundings using his two hands, a powerful Level 70 skill!

Of the ten Shadow Clones of Deception, no matter which one was the heart, none of them were able to escape from Receding Tide’s control. The priority of grab skills had always been the highest in all of Glory.

In the whirlwind, Receding Tides quickly rose up, and his arms continued to spin wildly in the air. As a result, the qi from the attack also gradually brought those ten immobile Deceptions away from the ground……

Boom……

A deep explosion rang out from within the thicket. Spinning Cyclone Kill didn’t originally have this sort of audio effect, but at this moment, the effect of the Spinning Cyclone Kill that had been added onto Receding Tide’s weapon was really too shocking. He had managed to completely grab all ten characters at once……

If there was only one target, the Grappler would entangle the target, jump up, flip, and fall, creating huge amounts of damage. But at this moment, there were simply too many targets, so this one Spinning Cyclone Kill seemed to falter. As he jumped, he was already teetering on the verge of collapse, and the targets weren’t entangled within his hands, instead, he was using qi to gather his targets. Of course, when he flipped over, there was no flip, and when Receding Tides had barely jumped up, he had already started to fall, and those Deceptions that had been forcefully gathered by his ability also immediately started to fall.

Nonetheless, this one move had the priority of a grab skill. The Deceptions hadn’t been launched high, and they hadn’t been been flipped, meaning that the damage output from the skill would be somewhat lower, but even so, a hit was a hit.

Boom boom boom… boom!

The ten Deceptions fell to the ground first. Receding Tides brought the qi from Spinning Cyclone Kill to the ground last, sending out a final heavy sound. The resulting shockwaves spread out and immediately collided against the pile of Deceptions on the floor from all directions.

The whole stadium had been silent for a long time, and in that moment, it finally exploded in enthusiastic cheering and applause.

“Song Xiao wasn’t completely defenceless!” Li Yibo sighed, deeply moved.

“Song Xiao really focused his attention. Even though Mo Fan’s ambush succeeded initially, it was quickly defused by him,” Pan Lin said.

“Exactly!” Li Yibo immediately added, “Spinning Cyclone Kill’s startup isn’t fast, but Receding Tides still managed to use it in that instant, meaning that he must have made that decision ahead of time. In the first instant that Shadow Dance was used, Song Xiao immediately made a precise judgement and controlled his character accurately. But under the suppression of Shadow Dance, he had no way of escaping, so he straightforwardly took the attack, but quickly responded with a Spinning Cyclone Kill!”

“And even though Spinning Cyclone Kill is slow, it has high priority. Even though so many Shadow Clones of Deception were attacking Receding Tides, it still didn’t manage to interrupt the usage of this skill!” Pan Lin added.

“Exactly, so after forcefully taking this blow, the offensive that Mo Fan launched was broken by Song Xiao,” Li Yibo said.

“The defensive capabilities of Team Blue Rain’s players are indeed impressive…” Pan Lin said.

The two of them went back-and-forth, clearly analyzing the present situation, but this wasn’t because the two players had reacted slowly afterwards. On the contrary, Mo Fan’s next reactions were extremely fast. The moment Spinning Cyclone Kill hit the ground, a pile of Deceptions staggered unsteadily, but amongst them, several took advantage of the opportunity, got up, and scattered in all directions.

Song Xiao had no way of figuring out which of those fleeing Deceptions was the heart of the Shadow Dance, and even if he knew, there was no use. The heart of the Shadow Dance could be transferred.

At the end of the day, it was because his Spinning Cyclone Kill was only level one, so the strength of the centrifugal force was insufficient. There was no way it could fully control that many characters, and in the last instants of the skills, there were still some gaps left.

Mo Fan was extremely agile, and using these small gaps, he immediately controlled Deception to dodge the attack.

Poof poof poof poof……

As the Deception with the heart of the Shadow Dance escaped, the Shadow Clones immediately turned into a cloud of smoke.

Mo Fan’s Deception escaped, immediately escaping into the dense thicket. With that many escaping figures, Song Xiao had no way of knowing which was real.

Deception had escaped, but he was still behind Receding Tides, and he immediately charged out once more!

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