Virtual World: Close Combat Mage
chapter-157

Chapter 157 - Gallantry and Tactics

Just as a row of Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno sprouted before Gu Fei, a series of Descending Wheel of Flames ignited in the sky. Looking beyond the wall of fire separating him and the opposing guild, Gu Fei saw that a familiar-looking Priest was currently leisurely bestowing Heal on the nearby Carouse’s players. When this Priest saw that Gu Fei had spotted him, he performed a curt bow toward him with a flourish of his left hand.

“Thieves, no need to enter Stealth. Archers, don’t fire arrows together; instead, keep a steady stream of arrows coming to pester him. Mages, continue what you’re doing,” Young Master Han threw Gu Fei a smile as he issued these instructions to the members of Carouse. Since the ladies had all retreated at Gu Fei’s behest, the opposing players were able to focus their firepower on him.

The ladies who were now standing at a safe distance looked on to see what Gu Fei meant by his “leave them to me” declaration, yet they merely saw him getting zoned to the side by the opponents.

“Fireball! Shoot!” Gu Fei could only cast this most basic spell under the enemies’ intense suppression.

The damage that his Fireball spell could cause was shocking, but because of its extremely weak Verdict, the enemy Warrior was able to cleave the ball of fire with his sword as if it was nothing.

Gu Fei dealt with all the incoming arrows as he waited for the wall of AOE spells to dissipate. Given that the average Mages had much higher mana pool than Gu Fei, these Mages before him were unlikely to run out of mana after casting just four or five AOE spells. While Gu Fei was being zoned in a corner, the men from both ends of Carouse’s single file formation stealthily made their way toward the Amethyst Rebirth’s ladies. Standing atop the hill, Gu Fei saw that a number of opponents were in the process of encircling Amethyst Rebirth to annihilate everyone in one go.

At this moment when advancing or retreating was not possible, Gu Fei actually received a message from Young Master Han: “Compared to your gallantry, tactic is certainly more useful!”

He is really sadistic! Gu Fei spitefully thought to himself. Despite the steadily increasing number of opponents, Carouse continued to deal with Gu Fei by zoning him and did not dare engage him in a melee.

The enemies that were not dealing with Gu Fei moved to assault the ladies, and although the ladies retaliated at the incoming enemies, they would still occasionally look at Gu Fei’s direction, hoping that he would do his “leave them to me” declaration again.

With the situation becoming worse as time dragged on, Gu Fei knew that it was only a matter of time before the ladies were decimated. If that happened, he would have to deal with a seven-hundred-man encirclement by himself. No matter how much Gu Fei loved PvPing, he still did not wish to deal with such an insane situation.

Looking around and spotting a sizeable boulder at his rear, Gu Fei sprinted toward the rock and hid behind it. As the Archers grew nervous at the realization that the boulder would shield Gu Fei from their arrows, Young Master Han merely smiled, “Don’t worry about that. Any spell he chants over there won’t hit us. That boulder has long been included in my calculations.”

The Mages of Carouse paused for a bit as they realized that the range of their spells, be it their Descending Wheel of Flames or Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno, would indeed not be able to reach that rock. Meaning, Gu Fei’s attack would not be able to reach them as well.

As the men of Carouse thought up to this, they spotted Gu Fei peeking from behind the boulder. A raging inferno sprouted before them in the next moment, yet it was a good two meters away from their nearest player. All of them laughed heartily at this and praised Young Master Han’s brilliant calculations.

It was at this moment that Gu Fei had dashed recklessly out of the rock and into the wall of fire zoning him.

“Is he surrendering to his desires? That’s suicidal!” Young Master Han laughed coldly. Gu Fei had dived head-first into the burning conflagration and was instantly lost in the flames. The time he had to spend within the flames was but a moment with his fast speed, yet he had no means to withstand the damage output of several Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno and Descending Wheel of Flames.

Young Master Han and the rest of Carouse thought that they would not see Gu Fei in this PvP arena again, yet the sight of Gu Fei making it through the wall of fire with soot streaks and burned marks on his body gave them a thorough shock.

“How is that possible?!” The Mages whose spells had formed the wall of fire separating Gu Fei from them involuntarily stopped their spell-casting as they gawked at one another.

When the bombardment stopped, only the scorched ground, a few raging infernos, and one flame wheel were left on the PvP field.

“Whose flame wheel is that? Why haven’t you made it descend yet?” These players indeed lived up to their reputation as experts of a large guild as they very quickly found the reason for the anomaly, questioningly eyeing the few Mages in charge of zoning Gu Fei.

As the Mages suspiciously looked at one another, Gu Fei suddenly laughed, “Do you mean that flame wheel? Sorry about that… That’s actually mine.” With Gu Fei uttering the word “descend”, the flame wheel finally explosively landed on the ground.

“You…” Everyone finally realized what had happened, “That’s too sneaky!”

“You’re not just a musclehead, after all!” Young Master Han could not help but praise Gu Fei’s ingenuity.

That one flame wheel Gu Fei had casted effectively disrupted the Mages’ chain of spells. The thing was that the coordination of these Mages who were casting Descending Wheel of Flames was actually flawless, as they would all take turns casting that spell, and each of them would only cast the next flame wheel after the previous one had descended. Gu Fei’s Descending Wheel of Flames had deceptively stayed suspended mid-air amid the enemies’ casted spells, giving the Mages the wrong idea that one of them had yet to drop the casted flame wheel on the ground, and thus buying enough time for Gu Fei to safely breakthrough their spell cordon that was only made up of several Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno.

This foolhardy method only worked because the Mages of Carouse had been coordinating with one another so expertly. Had they been the Amethyst Rebirth’s ladies, they would surely have unleashed spells on the targets at their convenience without a care about coordinating their attacks with others.

The originally excellent coordinated attacks of the enemies were thus exploited by Gu Fei.

“Quickly attack!” Coming back to reality, the players of Carouse realized that Gu Fei was already upon them and quickly organized themselves for a frontal assault.

“Too late!” Gu Fei said as he closed in on his most hated enemies, the Mages. Before the Mages could raise their magic staves to cast spells, Gu Fei’s Twin Incineration had already insta-killed a full circle of them.

“F*ck! What kind of Mage is he?!” The remaining players were dumbfounded. The Archers had originally assumed that Gu Fei would cast a spell to attack them, so they had readied their arrows to interrupt his incantation. Who would have thought that Gu Fei would instead dart toward them while dodging the incoming attacks to insta-kill the Mages with his Twin Incineration?

“His Spell Damage alone is already monstrous!” Everyone finally realized why Young Master Han had treated this Mage so specially and tried to prevent him from getting near them or completing his spell-casting. Truly, the Spell Damage he had just displayed was too shocking.

Several Archers split up and ran as they fired off arrows on Homing Projectile at Gu Fei.

Although Gu Fei did not fear this archer skill, the need to knock the arrows on Homing Projectile singly still made him feel very annoyed as it somewhat disrupted his fighting tempo. While Gu Fei weaved his sword to deal with the arrows on Homing Projectile, several opposing melee job classes were moving onward to surround him.

Gu Fei had casted one Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno and one Descending Wheel of Flames just now before he managed to blitz through the enemies’ ranks. Moreover, that Twin Incineration he had used to cut down several Mages almost depleted him of his low mana. He had yet to eat any fruit to recover his mana as well, so insta-killing these players that were moving to surround him was not possible.

Young Master Han seemed to also be aware of Gu Fei’s dilemma as he sniggered over by one side.

Turning his head in the direction of the laugh, Gu Fei impatiently bellowed, “What are you looking at me for?! Get rid of that Priest already!”

The enemies followed his gaze, yet all they saw was air. They returned their gazes to Gu Fei and regarded him oddly, thinking, Has this guy finally lost his marbles?

However, a figure unexpectedly faded into view from that empty space in the next instant. When this figure completely materialized, it was already within two meters of Young Master Han.

Svelte Dancer.

When Gu Fei broke through the enemies’ zoning, he noticed that a Thief on Stealth had detached itself from the ladies’ side. Gu Fei should have no idea who this Thief on Stealth was without the person revealing himself or herself, yet the person’s fast speed allowed him to guess the Thief’s identity right away, as no one could move so quickly while on Stealth besides Svelte Dancer.

The Priest Young Master Han without an Endurance build currently did not have anyone near him. With Svelte Dancer’s monstrously fast speed and high Attack Power, he might not even have time to bestow Heal on himself.

Relieved, Gu Fei returned Young Master Han’s snigger. Unexpectedly, Young Master Han merely flashed Gu Fei a cold smile. Before that smile faded away, Gu Fei had already heard Svelte Dancer’s annoyed cry: “Ahhh! Why would there be a Hunting Trap here?!”

The Archers that that had previously shot nothing but air due to Svelte Dancer’s extremely fast speed immediately made the necessary adjustments. These Archers were confident that they could hit a stationary target, so they unhurriedly made their shots.

“How troublesome!” Gu Fei said as he used his last bit of mana to carve out a portion of his encirclement and dart toward Svelte Dancer.

Gu Fei arrived to where Svelte Dancer was, and the arrows were close to hitting her as well. So he immediately bent over and swept his leg at her heels, causing Svelte Dancer to screamingly topple to the front and into his waiting back, successfully evading all the arrows heading her way at the same time.

“F*ck! Why does it seems like the new one is always heavier than the last one when I am carrying girls?!”

Heavy, fat, plump, ugly, old… were usually taboo descriptions for any women, yet the emulous Svelte Dancer did not react negatively to Gu Fei’s crass comment and instead guiltily answered, “I’m sorry! I have lots of stuff in my dimensional pocket.”

“Throw them away! Quickly throw them away!” By the time he said this, Gu Fei had already straightened his back while running away unsteadily with Svelte Dancer on his back. He felt as if he would cough up blood at any given moment due to her heavy weight.

Gu Fei had of course no wish to PvP while Svelte Dancer was on his back, so he decided to run away with her for now. He was only helping her move since she had no means to do so herself. She would return to normal without receiving damage once the Hunting Trap’s effect wore off, anyway. This was what he had learned from the Forever in Flowers’ ‘Hunting Babes with Trap’ method.

As for when exactly the trap’s effect would wear off… Gu Fei lowered his head to check, and he noticed that the trap was still clamping down on Svelte Dancer’s leg!

“Oh!” Hearing Gu Fei’s exhortation, Svelte Dancer promptly tossed out some items from her dimensional pocket.

Gu Fei indeed felt the weight pressing on his body lessening and his steps becoming lighter the more items Svelte Dancer threw out. He looked backward and saw that the enemies were closing in on them fast, yet the trap was still hugging Svelte Dancer’s leg.

“Don’t bother about me! Run!” Svelte Dancer resolutely made a decision.

“How could he?!” Someone actually answered for Gu Fei, saying, “He wants to prove that companions are important.”

He looked backward once more and saw that Young Master Han was staring at him with mocking eyes.

Gu Fei gave out a light laugh, “I’m not trying to prove anything! It’s just instinctive sometimes.”

Although Svelte Dancer had thrown out many items, Gu Fei was still heavily encumbered. This meant that his speed had barely increased, so the enemies very easily caught up to them.

The enemies catching up to him was not really a problem despite his depleted mana, but since the immobile Svelte Dancer was with him right now… Gu Fei could only sigh.

Surprisingly, the enemies who initially had their eyes fixed on the two were now gazing even more intently on the ground. “These items…” everyone mumbled.

Gu Fei glanced around them. The many items Svelte Dancer had thrown on the ground were glistening with radiance. He had a sudden realization, I’m carrying the world’s mightiest pay-to-win player. The items she carries around are of course not just mere trinkets. Although not just anyone could equip these items, they were still worth a lot of money.

How many people would actually be unmoved by such a shower of valuable freebies? These players of Carouse clearly did not wish to reject them, but… Pick them up? But what if the others scorn me for doing so… Refrain myself from picking them up? But what if the others pick them up for themselves? Such thoughts were fermenting on their minds right now.

How long does a Hunting Trap last? As Gu Fei was pondering on this and the enemies were hesitating about picking up the items on the ground, the Hunting Trap on Svelte Dancer had finally worn off.

“I’m fine now!” Svelte Dancer whispered.

“Go finish them!” Gu Fei and Young Master Han actually said the same thing at the same time.

Svelte Dancer nodded her head confidently as she hopped to the ground, “What about you?”

“Let me eat a banana first,” Gu Fei replied.

“F*ck! This again…” Svelte Dancer muttered as she zipped off.