Virtual World: Close Combat Mage
chapter-270

Chapter 270 - Is there a need to go to such extent?

The system would only give the rewards after the guild versus guild tournament ended, which created a chance for a mercenary group to disband before being awarded its dues. It turned out that this was what these two were really worried about! Young Master Han did not know whether to laugh or cry at this, and his anger died down as a result. He looked at Gu Fei and earnestly explained in a soft voice, “Do you know that because you failed to hold on to your life at the very end, we lost the chance of achieving ‘perfect victory’? Without it, we lost the privilege of having our victory specially announced on the world channel and thoroughly ruin our opponents. What b*llsh*t top guild of Yunduan City; I am the top guild of Yunduan City! No, wait. It’s the top guild in Parallel World! WA HA HA HA!” Young Master Han’s voice increased in volume the more he spoke until he was simply laughing maniacally at the end.

At which point Gu Fei got it, “Did he have too much to drink?”

Brother Assist nodded, “He drank quite a lot during the match as well…” Recalling his time on the mountain peak, his eyes almost got blinded by the scintillating glow of Young Master Han’s empty bottles.

“Is he really drunk? Why can’t I see that?” War Without Wounds expressed his doubt.

“He couldn’t even differentiate between a guild and a mercenary group, so how could he be sober? Are we a guild?” Gu Fei rebuked. Sometimes, idiocy really brought out the worst in people.

“Oh…” War Without Wounds hummed. Indeed, Young Master Han had just declared that he was Parallel World’s number one guild.

Sword Demon merely sighed deeply. Being a long-time friend of Young Master Han, he naturally knew that the latter had a little too much alcohol.

“Anyway, what exactly happened to you? How did you die?” Brother Assist asked Gu Fei the question that everyone was wondering about.

“It’s the ‘reflect damage’ trait,” Gu Fei simply replied.

“Oh…” everyone intoned. All of them naturally got it.

“Tragedy! What a tragedy!” Young Master Han suddenly began lecturing them, “Aren’t all of you peak experts in your respective fields? ‘Reflect damage’! How could none of you think of this trait that best counters high damage but low HP job classes; aren’t you guys ashamed of yourselves? Why did you guys not warn him about this beforehand?!”

“Well, why didn’t YOU?!” Royal God Call could not help but counter.

“I?” Young Master Han contemptuously gave him a sidelong glance, “Why would a pure person like me think of such a despicable thing?” Young Master Han’s reply was so narcissistic that no one present could stand it.

“I really have to hand it to you; you’re still a total narcissist even when you’re drunk. Sword Demon, when will he sober up?” Gu Fei asked Sword Demon.

Sword Demon paused for a moment before replying, “It’s about time now. He’s actually not that far gone, since he can still talk business and do what he is supposed to. He’s just a little more chatty than usual.”

Brother Assist returned to the topic at hand, “So far, I haven’t seen any equipment with the ‘reflect damage’ trait. How about you guys?”

All shook their heads.

“This type of equipment entirely depends on the proc rate and the degree of effect just like Fatal Blow. Someone will have to gather nearly a full-suit of equipment with the relevant trait to effectively use it. If either the chance or degree is low, the trait is pretty much ineffectual. Furthermore, the user will have to lower his or her defense stat to achieve a powerful degree of reflection, essentially putting the player in a very precarious state. Considering that there’s no potion or similar item that can recover HP during PvP in Parallel World at present, it can be said that no solo player out there could survive using such a build,” Brother Assist analyzed.

“Plus!” War Without Wounds added, “This sort of equipment is extremely silly. The user must have the enemy attack him to deal with the enemy. What if your enemy chooses not to fight you, instead? Truly, this is a one-time trick that can only be used when the opponent is unaware of it. Since everyone can use Appraisal in Parallel World, how can such equipment be useful when players make it a point to appraise the enemies before engaging?”

“Speaking of which, Miles doesn’t really know how to use Appraisal, yeah?” Royal God Call suddenly remembered this.

“Mmm... I’ve never really used it,” Gu Fei admitted. The Appraisal skill he had zealously trained for a while had pretty much been abandoned by him recently.

The experts in the room exchanged looks before shouting in unison, “That’s too d*mn dangerous!”

“That’s a bad habit you need to change!” War Without Wounds sincerely advised.

“That’s right! If your opponent knows of your bad habit, that person can intentionally create a whole suit of equipment that reflects damage just to f*ck you up!” Royal God Call quipped.

“Come to think of it; since that person could kill you with ‘reflect damage’, why did she only deal with you at the last moment?” War Without Wounds voiced his astonishment.

“Miles know that woman, right? She probably did that as a favor to him!” Royal God Call was winking at him as he said this, “Which babe is it? Have I met her before?”

Gu Fei was unimpressed by his action and did not say a word in response. Brother Assist said, “If it’s a favor, why would she do that to Miles in this match?”

“Oh. Perhaps, she’s using this chance to experiment something with me? She did admit wanting to use that method to target someone else,” Gu Fei reasoned.

“Hmph!” Young Master Han audibly harrumphed, destroying their assumption that he had dozed off. His head remained buried in his arms as he said coolly, “Is there any other idiot out there who won’t use Appraisal in a PvP situation?”

“True!” War Without Wounds agreed, “Didn’t I just say that this method is far too passive that it can only be done when the target doesn’t know of it? Since Parallel World has the Appraisal skill, such equipment essentially has no value in PvP, so no one will use it for that.”

“That’s not true! If someone were to assign one or two of these people in a crowd, even if Gu Fei has the habit of using Appraisal, he wouldn’t be able to appraise every one of his targets before unleashing an AOE spell! Miles would be killed off by casting an AOE spell at that rate.” Royal God Call made quite a lot of sense when he gave this supposition.

“That’s not exactly right… ‘Reflect damage’ trait can only be triggered if it’s a melee attack of sorts!” War Without Wounds refuted.

“That actually depends on the design of the game itself!” Brother Assist argued.

“Yeah. I once played a game that has a system for ‘reflecting’ ranged attack,” Royal God Call shared.

“What about in Parallel World, then? Does this game have something like that or not?”

“Nope,” Brother Assist declared with certainty.

The two were suspicious. “Didn't you just say you’ve never seen the ‘reflect damage’ trait in any equipment before?”

Brother Assist did not know whether to laugh or cry at this question, “It’s true that I haven’t seen it, but I know about the design and effect of ‘reflect damage’ in Parallel World. ‘Reflect damage’ is certainly not applicable for ranged attacks here.”

“Oh. That explains why Miles has survived until this day,” Royal God Call said.

“He he… You gotta be careful in the future, Miles. Who knows which of your enemy knows about your bad habit of not using Appraisal and decides to assassinate you in that way?” War Without Wounds cautioned.

“No way! Could it be that this babe in today’s match used this method to remind you of this?” Royal God Call gasped.

“Who would be considerate enough to go to such lengths?!” War Without Wounds also gasped. All turned their gazes on Gu Fei.

“D*mb*sses. If she wanted to remind him of this, she could just tell it to him straight. What’s the point of going through all that trouble?” Young Master Han asked.

“Man, you’re right!” War Without Wounds and Royal God Call nodded their heads in agreement.

“Unless…” Young Master Han was actually not done with his words.

“Unless what?” the two men quickly asked.

“Unless she’s afraid that Miles won’t believe her words,” Young Master Han continued.

“So this woman went through all this trouble just to make Miles believe her? Whoa! It’s far too amazing to be believable now!” War Without Wounds and Royal God Call shook their heads to deny this reasoning.

Gu Fei felt quite shocked. The youngster and middle-aged man continued to quarrel while Young Master Han would occasionally say his piece in his half-drunken state, more or less analyzing the situation in its entirety....

Could Swindler Tian really be trying to remind me of this thing? Now that he thought about it, Xi Xiaotian had actually reminded him to use his Appraisal skill more often earlier. Although she had said it mockingly, everything would have made perfect sense if Young Master Han’s deduction was correct.

However, War Without Wounds and Royal God Call’s input about this being too over-the-top made him hesitate. She would not be so bored to do that, right? Gu Fei preferred settling things upfront, so he immediately opened up his friends list to inquire about this hypothesis. Unfortunately for him, Xi Xiaotian was no longer online. It was already past 9 P.M. The guild versus guild tournament should currently be underway, which marked the official end of the mercenary PvP tournament.

The members of Ultimate Class 3 Guild sent him this message at this time: “Sir, which mercenary group are you in?”

“Young Master’s Elite; don’t you guys know that?”

“WOW! FIRST PLACE! SO POWERFUL!” all the students exclaimed.

“Sir, let us join your mercenary group!” someone requested.

“Shoo! What’s the point of joining such a messy mercenary group?!” Gu Fei chided. He looked at his fellow mercenaries; Young Master Han had a vile personality, was a complete narcissist, and an alcoholic; War Without Wounds’ action was too inappropriate for his age while Royal God Call was too immature... The only common ground the two shared was how much of a pervert they were; Brother Assist was conscientious and careful, but he was always fretting about something or another. Gu Fei could not say whether he was Brother Assist or Brother Troubled1; finally, there was Sword Demon. While he had an upright and reliable character, he was totally addicted to gaming. Therefore, he was not an ideal role model for his students.

They’re truly a bunch of trash! Gu Fei sighed to himself. He tactfully neglected to examine himself, though; if he did, he would realize that his love for PvPing was far more troublesome to other players than the other five men’s respective flaws! Any players with some PK points on them would even tremble in fear at the sight of him.

The six men stayed inside the room at Ray’s Bar and waited for the guild versus guild tournament to end. The game officials had said before that the system would send out the prizes once the two tournaments ended. Still, none knew when that was exactly. All of them were beside themselves with excitement as they kept on guessing what the rewards would be.

Young Master Han eventually sobered up, while Royal God Call got drunk in his stead. A child like him had no decent tolerance for liquor, yet he ironically became well-behaved when drunk, snoring steadily at a corner of the room.

“Royal, you’re far too negligent. To actually fall asleep at such a tense moment…” War Without Wounds snickered.

Time slowly went by until the system announcement rang. The guild versus guild tournament result was out. To no one’s surprise, Traversing Four Seas came out on top. On second place was Armor Guild and on third place was The First Light Guild. Gu Fei had not heard of these two guilds before.

“The prize is coming!” War Without Wounds grabbed Gu Fei in his excitement. The person he always bantered with was still fast asleep in the corner!

[1] This pun works better in Chinese. Basically, the IGN 佑哥 (Brother Assist) is homophone of 忧哥 (which means ‘worried’, ‘troubled’, or ‘concerned’).