Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

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Translator: Exodus Tales  Editor: Exodus Tales

“Then, are you gonna be hiring someone or not?” Gu Fei scratched his head.

Svelte Dancer looked at him contemptuously. “Why are you being so passionate for? Do you have some sort of relationship with him? Are you thinking of earning commission from yours truly right here?”

“Who’s thinking of earning commission?!” Gu Fei was affronted. “My comrade Eternal Dominion’s situation is slightly dire. He’s playing this game and using his good kung fu skills to earn some extra dollars by PKing people. I just mean that we can help him out a little; what commission nonsense are you spouting about?”

“Are you for real?” Svelte Dancer was all confused.

Gu Fei nodded his head, his expression all somber.

Vast Lushness was skeptical, however. “Why is he still playing this game if he’s in a dire situation?” The cost of the equipment to play Parallel World was not cheap, so anyone who was in the state of destitute that Gu Fei was describing should be unable to afford it at all.

“Well, he placed all his eggs in one basket, you know? He truly can’t find any job in the real world,” Gu Fei explained.

“Is that so? Then, aren’t you in a similar situation?” Svelte Dancer asked. She knew that the two men were the same sort of people.

“My… My situation’s a little better,” Gu Fei hedged.

“And why is that?” Svelte Dancer pressed.

“Uhh… Because I have more relatives.” Gu Fei figuratively wiped sweat off his forehead. Everything simply could not be explained in one sitting if they were to really dissect why his family was wealthy and Eternal Dominion’s was not. They would have to look back in the annals of history and traced all the way to the rules that the two families had and some of the changes made respectively, as well as the opportunities present… It was really complex! Gu Fei did not have a good grasp of the matter himself, so all he could do was make up a simple excuse.

“Oh, you depend on familial aid to survive…” It was clear that Svelte Dancer had misunderstood what Gu Fei meant by ‘more relatives.’

“Uh… sure…” Gu Fei thought about it but was still too lazy to give a proper explanation.

“Then, call Eternal Dominion over. He sounds so pitiful.” Svelte Dancer was inundated with compassion.

“Okay.” Gu Fei quickly sent a message over to Eternal Dominion. He originally thought that poor boy would be elated, but who would have guessed that the reply he got was very awkward?

“What? Another job? I’m quite busy right now, and I don’t think that I can find the time to head over to where you are! Where are you, anyway?”

“Baishi City,” Gu Fei answered dutifully.

“Baishi City? That’s way too far. It’s gonna take me so much time going back and forth! How much am I getting? We’ll talk about this more if its cost efficient!”

Gu Fei felt utterly choked. They had not seen each other for several days, but from the tone of the brat, he seemed to be doing quite well for himself, and his days were spent in a rather fulfilling way. Just as he was wondering how he should reply to this message, Svelte Dancer saw the change in Gu Fei’s expression and quickly asked, “How is it? Have you gotten a hold of him yet?”

“He seems to be rather busy recently as his business in-game is picking up.” Gu Fei was able to remain composed, not feeling unhappy despite the cold response from someone he had passionately advocated moments ago. After all, he did introduce Eternal Dominion to the job of a professional gamer in hopes that he needed not live in abject poverty while practicing kung fu. He felt a sense of pride and satisfaction when he heard how Eternal Dominion was thriving.

“So, is he coming or not?” Svelte Dancer pressed on.

“It doesn’t matter if he’s coming or not; you’ve still got me here, right?” Gu Fei tried to laugh it off.

“Are you sick?” Svelte Dancer scorned.

Gu Fei laughed it off, not explaining further.

Just as they were in a state of limbo over what to do with the matter at hand, it was unknown just what was going on with Eternal Dominion as he suddenly sent a message. “Ha ha! Oh, it seems that I have nothing happening these few days; I guess I’ll make a trip over. Baishi City, is it?”

“Yes!” Gu Fei wiped off his cold sweat. He wondered if the kid had actually stated he did not want to do it before so as to intentionally raise his status by making himself sound busy. It seemed that, over the last few days, the man had learned to be shrewd businessman.

“I won’t be able to make it today, but I should arrive tomorrow,” Eternal Dominion said.

“Are you sure tomorrow is fine?” Gu Fei asked. Luori City was a good distance away from Baishi City, and the amount of time Eternal Dominion was able to spend online was not too long as well.

“No problem. I’m currently at Linshui City’s harbor, and it’s not too far from Linyin City. Isn’t Baishi City just right next to it?” Eternal Dominion replied.

“That’s good, then. I’ll see you tomorrow,” Gu Fei said.

After sending that message, he turned to Svelte Dancer. “He’s coming over tomorrow.”

“Who?” Svelte Dancer was lost.

“Eternal Dominion.”

Svelte Dancer apparently thought that they were past this topic, never even considering that they would revisit it a few seconds after, so she was perplexed. “Didn’t you say that he’s busy and can’t make it?”

“He suddenly said that he’s coming.” Gu Fei was helpless.

“Are all you kung-fu practitioners touched in the head or something?” Svelte Dancer asked.

Gu Fei was speechless.

There was nothing left to discuss that night, so Gu Fei logged off as per his usual time. While Vast Lushness might still be facing her crisis, none of them dared to be careless any longer. The members from Forever in Flowers and Blue Ease’s men, which numbered over the hundreds, swarmed out of the city to grind their levels with her, so they were no longer afraid of Southern Lone Blade striking once more. It was just that the style of the two groups was entirely incompatible and simply could not see eye to eye with each other. The personality of those hailing from Yueye City was the sort that would immediately fight someone they could not stand the moment they met, and in the entire night of grinding, they suffered five casualties due to infighting. Those deaths turned out to be for naught in the end, too, as the two groups continued to grind their levels together. Blue Ease and his veteran gamers were all silently marveling over the fact they had never seen such an odd manner of getting along before in all the time they’ve been gaming.

Svelte Dancer originally hung out with them to grind at the start, but she soon slipped away halfway through the night, wandering about all the grinding map, hoping to find traces of Southern Lone Blade but unfortunately failing to do so.

Actually, Southern Lone Blade and his team did see Svelte Dancer that night; it was just that due to the profession they were in, they were highly vigilant. Whenever the team would be grinding, Glue would divert part of his concentration to take note of their surroundings for any players that would have an ulterior motive to get anywhere near them. Before Svelte Dancer could even catch a glimpse of them, Glue already spotted her in advance.

Bullying the enemy when they were alone was only something a team led by Silver Moon or No Smile would do; Southern Lone Blade and his gang were professional and disciplined. If it happened that it was only Svelte Dancer beside Vast Lushness, they would definitely give it a shot, but if it was just Svelte Dancer alone, they would not even hesitate to avoid her. None of them felt it was a necessity, as killing Svelte Dancer would simply be a waste of time and a meaningless endeavor that contributed nothing to the task assigned.

———————————

The next day when Gu Fei went online, he first checked in with Svelte Dancer and the others, only departing to look for Eternal Dominion after all of them reported that they were safe. Eternal Dominion had logged on not too long ago himself and had just set off toward Baishi City from Linyin City. Gu Fei reckoned that it would be time for him to log off by the time the guy reached the city. On the contrary, it was the five members of Young Master’s Elite that had made their way over to Baishi City.

After Gu Fei’s fight with Southern Lone Blade last night, he informed his fellow mercenaries about that miscreant being back in business. The five that were still in Linyin City, playing the guessing game about the whereabouts of Ye Xiaowu’s group, instantly made their way over without another word after Gu Fei’s report and spent the remaining half of the night in Baishi City.

—————————————-

In a tavern in Baishi City, a horde of players were seated at the various tables around. Not mentioning Blue Ease’s men and Forever in Flowers’ members, just the named players alone could fill a whole table.

Gu Fei was really speechless. “Comrades, we’re only going up against seven players. We’ll never ever have the chance to see them appear our whole lives with so many of you here.”

Young Master Han, who had heard Gu Fei’s formation last night, saw the packed tavern right now. There were even players without seats, so his next words dripped out with contempt. “How are we going to draw the enemies out from hiding at this rate? You guys are really too much. Since there’re only seven of them, it is more than apparent that we will use our numbers to bully the few. We should not be waiting for them to appear. Rather, we should take the initiative to drag them out in the open.”

“Yes, we should’ve done it that way sooner!” Blue Ease slapped the table. He had many players on his side, yet he ended up confronting the enemies by himself yesterday. He was already feeling that something was amiss, and now that he thought about it, what sort of logic was that? He held the numerical advantage; why would he need to lure them out by feigning weakness?

“If we do it like this, we might scare them away,” Gu Fei argued.

“If we scared them away, Vast Lushness will be safe, and our goal is achieved,” Brother Assist reasoned.

“That’s right!” Everyone in the tavern nodded in agreement.

Gu Fei was depressed. It was apparent that there was an ideological difference here. The majority of them were thinking conventionally, using their total combat strength to achieve shock and awe. They were relying on it as a deterrence to their enemies doing the deed; meanwhile, Gu Fei was hoping to lure the enemies into doing the deed before using their combat strength to directly eliminate them. There was a saying that went: ‘ A hero uses martial arts to violate the law ¹ “; sure enough, Gu Fei’s intention created a greater dissonance.

Blue Ease was clearly a doer, so the moment he felt that the idea proposed to be reliable, he immediately organized his men into parties and assigned them to patrol certain areas. Just as he managed to assign half of his men, a dissonant voice was heard as a player feebly raised his hand. “May I know just who we are going after?”

“Eh?” Blue Ease was stunned and began to exchange glances with all the players on the named table. Evidently, despite the many players cramping this establishment, most of these bit players had no clue just who Southern Lone Blade and his team were. They could not possibly write out a placard calling for ‘Southern Lone Blade, please report to me’, right?!

From this incident, it could be seen how much foresight Southern Lone Blade and his men demonstrated by regularly keeping such a low profile. Even if anyone wanted to mobilize huge forces to search for any traces of them, a good chunk of these people simply had no idea who they were beside their names, so there was simply no way for them to execute anyone, accordingly.

“G*dd*mm*t.” Blue Ease absolutely vexed.

“Uhm… Those gathered here, is there anyone, aside from the handful of us, that can recognize that man?” Brother Assist asked.

In the end, the players who could were just the six members of Young Master’s Elite, Vast Lushness, Blue Ease, Fireball, Svelte Dancer, and Sakurazaka Moony. It was only a total of eleven players.

“Should we split into eleven groups and search for them?” Brother Assist asked Young Master Han for his opinion.

“That’s too little.” Young Master Han had a very good grasp when it came to maps.

Everyone’s head was hurting. This also demonstrated why the talent was a valuable commodity in Parallel World. In their current situation, only the talented could recognize Southern Lone Blade and his men; everyone else was entirely incapable of doing so. Talent was truly in short supply.

“Do any of you know how to draw? We can draw a portrait of them,” one of Blue Ease’s men suggested.

Gu Fei was the first to look out the window. Drawing was something very foreign to him.

The other five members of Young Master’s Elite followed suit, for this task depended too much on a skillset they did not have.

Blue Ease and Sakurazaka Moony had no words, either, as Fireball answered stiltedly, “I might be able to do it if the subject’s a lady.”

All eyes finally fell on the two ladies. Everybody felt that since there were no other candidates, perhaps the ladies would be able to do something about it.

“I can’t do it. I don’t know how to draw,” Svelte Dancer blurted out as everyone stared at her.

“Perhaps, any of you is able to accurately describe them out and let me do the drawing!” The person who had first suggested this offered his service. The man was evidently skilled at drawing, which was why he had brought up the idea.

Describe… Gu Fei stared out the window once more. They were looking for someone who could put words to what they witnessed before, and now they wanted someone whose words could paint a picture… Today’s scenery outside sure was very captivating…

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