Virtual World: Close Combat Mage
chapter-30

Chapter 30 - Cyclone

Gu Fei finally encountered his first obstacle after having it easy playing the game so far.

Using kung fu to defeat the female Warrior opposite him right now might be easier said than done. The female Warrior’s defense was akin to that lower-half armor worn by Mountain Bandit Leader Sooto back then. She did not even budge as Gu Fei struck her with his sword.

The lady’s entire body was being concealed by her armor and helmet, and only her face was visible. Gu Fei felt that striking her face might be overdoing it, seeing as they just had a little misunderstanding. It was not as if a deep grudge existed between them. It was just a little misunderstanding caused by a burlap sack.

In reality, no matter how well-made a suit of armor, it could not safeguard a person’s entire body as there would always be opening near the joints. Those areas of the armor were deliberately given less reinforcement to provide a person a full range of motion or the ability to move freely. Unfortunately for Gu Fei, as realistic as the game’s simulation was, it was still not possible for it to be realistic in every aspect. The person inside the armor was unusually agile, and Gu Fei’s sword forcefully bounced back even when he slashed it at the joints of the body armor.

Gu Fei and the lady traded blows for a few more rounds. He came to the same conclusion after he tried attacking her right wrist, left knee, and left shoulder: The armor was impenetrable.

The harmless attacks had in fact reassured the lady. She was freed from all her worries now that she saw all the attacks, which Gu Fei inflicted on her, were ineffective. She swung her huge axe wildly, as she charged toward Gu Fei as if she was a huge windmill.

Gu Fei was left with no choice but to dodge the barrage of attacks as he tried to come up with ways to counterattack.

The curious spectators coming out from the tavern were so astonished that their jaws fell to the ground.

All formed the same opinion about Gu Fei in their minds: manly.

If a Mage that dared to clash directly against a Warrior with a sword was not considered manly, then no one else would be.

This manly Mage was a little foolish, however! Confronting the enemy’s strong point with his own weak point, how was that not foolish?

Everyone could see where this was going; Gu Fei could not harm the opponent with his common-grade sword and only managed to drag the fight with his agile movements. He continued to dodge every strike with little trouble, yet the Warrior remained patient while dishing out her attacks. She was not the least bit perturbed by continuously missing her target with her swings.

Gu Fei did not give up either. He focused on attacking the armor’s joints while he kept dodging. But it was still futile even after attacking five or six different joints on the armor.

Looks like this will be a battle of patience, Gu Fei analyzed. He was curious which one of them would be the first to become fed up with this battle since they could not harm each other.

The answer was revealed soon enough: It was the spectators!

Seeing Gu Fei had no chance of physically slaying his opponent, everyone began to wonder why he did not use spells during the fight.

“Spells! Spells!” everyone began to chant along after one of them started it.

It was a must have during a PvP for a Mage, yet Gu Fei needed to be reminded by others to use his spells. This led to a change of heart in him, Nothing wrong with trying spells now that my kung fu is not working. Gu Fei was not a stubborn and inflexible person after all.

He moved to a side to evade the incoming swing, and raised his sword and yelled at the top of his lungs, “Fireball!”

“Here I am!” somebody nearby replied to him.

“F*ck off!” Gu Fei roared at Fireball’s direction, before turning back and issuing a command to the ball of fire he summoned, “Fire!”

The fireball flew straight toward the female Warrior.

She seemed to be a little stumped at first, but she swung her huge axe the next instant to tear apart the little fireball that was unleashed by Gu Fei.

The fireball exploded near the edge of the axe. Did it cause any damage? Gu Fei was not sure as he could not feel the sensation in his hand like physical combat.

“You are actually a Mage?” The female Warrior did not actually continue to swing her huge axe at Gu Fei like how he had anticipated. The lady rested her huge axe near her foot and sized Gu Fei up.

What an obtuse lady! It took her this long to realize I am actually a Mage, Gu Fei thought to himself.

To be frank, unless they knew about Gu Fei’s identity beforehand, nobody would actually think he was a Mage judging from the way he fought just now.

The female Warrior was a little alarmed at the moment. The person in front of her was not slow in terms of speed, and he could actually dodge all her attacks with ease. If he had maintained a distance between them and attacked with spells a while ago, she would have been dead by now.

“I don’t need you to go easy on me!” the lady blurted out what was on her mind.

“Go easy on you?” Gu Fei did not really understand this.

Am I being tricked by him again? The lady’s anger, which had been reduced by half through the battle, was immediately replenished as soon as she thought of that.

With her right hand, she lifted the huge axe that rested on her leg. She raised her left hand as well and held on to the axe’s handle.

It was a battle stance that the lady had not displayed previously! Until now, she had been wielding her axe with just an arm. Gu Fei, who possessed considerable real combat experiences, could tell that something was about to happen, A powerful skill is coming right up.

Sure enough, a whirlwind emerged from the ground and wrapped around the lady as she stepped forward with her right leg and turned her body.

“Ah! Cyclone!” someone among the spectators yelled.

The skill Warriors could learn once they reached level 30: Cyclone.

The rotation carried the weapon along to execute a 360-degree attack from every direction. While the skill’s damage output was dependent on the user’s proficiency, the skill’s duration was decided by a Warrior’s Rage points. Theoretically speaking, if a Warrior had unlimited Rage points, then this particular skill could be carried on for an infinite amount of time.

As for the Rage points, they increased the most when a Warrior was being attacked. They would slowly accumulate as well when a Warrior hit an enemy or slay an enemy. It was an aspect unique to the Warrior job class.

Gu Fei had been slashing away at the female Warrior for god knew how many times already. The increase in Rage points caused by a single attack from Gu Fei was not that much since his slashes were basically harmless to her. However, the Rage points had been slowly accumulating. Right now, the lady’s Rage points bar was close to being full.

As she unleashed her skill, the spectators were forced to take a few steps back from the impact. It was as if the lady had spun herself into a vortex as a huge cyclone formed in the middle of the venue. Her huge axe could be seen turning into a black ray and mixing itself into the cyclone. The cyclone then flew toward Gu Fei’s direction.

It’s too fast!

Nobody would have expected that the clunky Warrior could perform such a high-speed spinning like this when she executed the skill.

Close-combat job classes are really the best after all! Gu Fei was still in the mood to express such a thought even when everyone was squealing loudly at his impending doom.

The Warrior’s Cyclone moved faster than Gu Fei as she spun like a whirlwind. It was impossible to avoid the attack.

Gu Fei could only raise his sword in an attempt to block the attack. Yet, pinpointing the axe’s trajectory inside the whirlwind was not a simple matter, and blocking it when it was spinning this fast was even more so.

Even though Gu Fei was confronting the skill with all his might, he knew that it would be impossible to stop the attack, seeing how her Cyclone was rolling with such force. However, giving up before the very end was not Gu Fei’s style.

A loud sound of breaking could be heard as Gu Fei’s common-grade sword split into halves. He lost his balance as the gusty wind blew over his body, and then he was swept upward and thrown into the air by it.

It was obvious just how much defense Gu Fei possessed with his beginner mage robe. He would have already faded away as a white light if he had not somewhat blocked that devastating blow just now. Still, death was inevitable for him, seeing how his body was bleeding all over and how his HP was diminishing at a visible rate.

“I failed to dodge it!” Gu Fei felt frustrated. He made a last ditch effort at the very end. Initially, he had planned to borrow the rotation force of the Cyclone to send himself outward in order to evade the attack. Yet, who would have thought that his sword would break apart at that decisive moment? Instead of dodging the attack by borrowing the momentum of the Cyclone, Gu Fei’s sword shattered and the axe hit him multiple times before he was flung outward. He barely managed to avoid a death sentence and succeeded in postponing it... for a mere two seconds.

“I would actually need a miracle to stay alive,” Gu Fei smiled bitterly. And yet, there was indeed a miracle!

A ray of white light suddenly appeared and shrouded Gu Fei. He thought it was a summon to the death, but his HP that was close to running out actually stopped depleting further and could be seen replenishing faintly.

Gu Fei who had never experienced it before was not aware that this was the most basic skill of a Priest: Heal.

As Gu Fei fell down from the attack, he looked around and managed to grasp the entire picture. He saw the lady called Luo Luo continuously bestowing Heal on him. However, Gu Fei was not safe just yet. His HP was still depleting, and an advanced Priest skill called Cure was needed before he could fully recover from his wounds. Unfortunately, there was nobody around with that skill at the moment. All Luo Luo could do was bestow Heal on Gu Fei repeatedly to maintain his health. It was a tug of war between a healing skill and the depleting HP.

Of course, the female Warrior was not happy seeing somebody interrupt the PvP between her and Gu Fei. But when she turned around and saw the one performing Heal, she was stunned, “Sis Luo Luo.”

Luo Luo nodded in acknowledgement as she slid her hand into her pocket and pulled out a few bottles of medication and a roll of bandage. She handed the items to the dumbfounded Fireball and said, “Go and get his condition stabilized.”

Fireball snapped himself back and rushed to Gu Fei’s side after receiving the items. He lowered his body down toward Gu Fei.

I’m saved! Gu Gei thought to himself, as he saw the items on Fireball’s hands, and how the female Warrior and Luo Luo actually knew each other.

However, Fireball just held on to the items without using them. Gu Fei stared at him with a puzzled expression.

“Hurry! Why are you spacing out like that?” Luo Luo was panicking at the other side. She was using Heal like crazy to restore Gu Fei’s HP which just kept on dropping. It seemed like Gu Fei’s injury was pretty serious. If this continued, her own MP would be depleted as well. By then, it would be too late to heal Gu Fei even if they used the medicine.

Fireball whispered covertly to Gu Fei, “Drunk bro, do you want to stop the bleeding with your acupuncture strikes first?”

Gu Fei was already about to curse at him, but he managed to endure the urge to actually do it. I am a teacher! Gu Fei calmed himself down, and said coldly to Fireball, “You read too many wuxia novels.”

“Oh? You don’t actually know how to do acupuncture strikes?” Fireball seemed to be in quite a shock.

“The medicine!” Gu Fei could not stand it anymore and he yelled at Fireball. His HP had dropped significantly when he got agitated and Luo Luo became frantic as a result.

“I’ll do it!” The lady who had wounded Gu Fei approached them.

“What are you up to?” Fireball said this righteously as he blocked her from getting close to Gu Fei.

“Oh, f*ck you! Just heal me already,” Gu Fei’s voice got weaker by the second.