Virtual World: Close Combat Mage
chapter-586

Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales

Southern Lone Blade’s glare coldly swept through the gathered crowd, showing an imposing look that disregarded life or death. The crowd began to feel their hearts waver, and plenty of them avoided making eye-contact with him; some even moved to hide their faces. As the saying went: ‘People may spend a thousand days as a thief, but there is no way anyone can defend against theft for a thousand days.’ Besides, there was no way to catch a thief in this game and beat them to death, so it could really be pursued as a lifelong profession. What about the average player, then? Could they make a living out of preventing theft?

This was especially effective on the players standing at the forefront, with plenty of them feeling great remorse, thinking that they had provoked a very troublesome person – the sort of trouble that would leave a lingering scent leading back to themselves even if they did their best to wash clean of the matter. These players all began to cover their faces as they turned their heads away, searching for a way to avoid Southern Lone Blade altogether.

Southern Lone Blade took advantage of this sudden chaos to make his way out. It was as if the crowd were of one mind, thinking to themselves that it was not going to get better even if he walked away now. Considering how long they had been confronting him, it was apparent that they had already offended the man; thus, there was no point in them being afraid anymore. They would just kill him if he dared to step out and abscond far away once the deed was done, making it impossible for Southern Lone Blade to find them after!

It was with such thought that these men allowed Southern Lone Blade to pass. Plenty of them secretly took out their weapons, intending to eliminate the evil for the sake of the people the moment he stepped outside. What use would there be in hiding now if Southern Lone Bladehad already planned to target someone?

However, who would have thought that he would not head outside but go to an auction panel to type away on it after squeezing through the crowd, instead? In the next moment, everybody saw the words he had typed into the search bar as it was displayed on the panel: Teleportation Scroll.

“F*CK!” Someone groaned loudly. This man was about to use a Teleportation Scroll and disappear, which proved that he was unfazed by them even with their threats. It seemed that having a guilty conscience and evil being unable to triumph over righteousness were all mere platitudes! The crowd began to surge forward again once they thought of this, and the players that were planning to sneak-attack the person outed themselves. Hurling curses his way, they waved their weapons high above their heads.

Southern Lone Blade ignored them all as his search for a Teleportation Scroll bore fruit. Current research revealed that the highest drop rate of this item came from level 50 or so magic-type monsters. However, killing a level 50 monster would mean killing something ten levels above the average level of players, and this was only achievable to a truly powerful team. Additionally, this item had an extremely limited availability since it was a chance drop. Thus, while it was not the sort of high-end item that the average players had yet to hear about, given the current rate of production for this item and that it was a one-time use commodity, most players were still unable to use such type of scrolls as common tools, and using it was viewed as an act of burning money in the eyes of many.

Southern Lone Blade, who was playing Parallel World to earn money, was all the more unwilling to burn so much in-game currency just for this sort of thing. Unfortunately, he was simply left with no choice at this point in time. Seeing the series of numbers that came after that Teleportation Scroll, he could almost hear his heart shatter into a million pieces. He gritted his teeth for the longest time before he hard-heartedly smashed that key on the display.

As Southern Lone Blade turned around, someone began shouting. “Don’t let him through!”

He might have bought the scroll, but he still had to make his way over to the distribution NPC to retrieve it.

Southern Lone Blade stared at the player who had shouted that, nodding. “I’ll keep you in mind.”

The player could not help but shudder as he felt a chill past his heart. At first, he thought that Southern Lone Blade had a guilty conscience and that righteousness would triumph over evil, but all that confidence in him evaporated now that he got singled out by Southern Lone Blade himself. He shrank his neck back a little, but he puffed out his chest to give himself a bit of encouragement. “Who are you trying to fool?”

“Larry’s Saber, Strength, and Agility variant. The current market price is about 200 gold coins.”

“Karan’s Battlegear, visually appealing, but the stats are average. At most it would go for 100 gold coins on the market.

“Ring of Limits, now that’s a good one. A magic defense ring, able to resist Ice, Fire and Lightning, all the three types of spell in this game. Even though it increases resistance by just a little bit, it shouldn’t have much problems getting 500 gold coins.”

“Vitality Emblem. Mmm… It increases your Agility. It’s a bit wasted on you. It should be worth 300 gold coins if I sell it to an Archer or a Thief.”

Southern Lone Blade recited everything unhurriedly, evaluating every equipment this player had on him and even pulling out a booklet to write down everything. Finally, he sighed. “Looting all your gear will earn me around 2750 gold coins. You’ve done pretty well for yourself.”

Silence. Southern Lone Blade had just demonstrated the quality of a professional larcenist through his accurate evaluation of all that player’s equipment. In that moment, all the others onlooking these two appraised the said player’s equipment, as if they were witnessing a tragedy unfold.

“Someone will quickly be in contact with you.” Southern Lone Blade shut that booklet with a resounding clap, as if he had just sentenced the man to his death, before glowering at the others present. “Anyone else?”

Everybody’s eyes began to dart away once more, and Southern Lone Blade took this chance to leave the auction panel and walk off. All the players before him avoided his gaze and instinctively opened a path for him. Southern Lone Blade laughed mirthlessly. He had such a good grasp of the average players’ mentality, but he would always be mistaken when it came to Thousand Miles Drunk. That man’s way of thinking just isn’t that of a gamer! Southern Lone Blade snapped the quill in his hand the moment that guy’s name came to mind.

He was now in full view of everyone, yet no one stepped forth to impede him, so Southern Lone Blade successfully retrieved his Teleportation Scroll straight from the distribution NPC. Turning back, he swept his gaze across the whole lot of players that did not even dare to look him in the eyes and departed from the Auction House with a quick unfurling of the scroll.

Everybody was rooted to where they stood for a long time. Exchanging glances, they were uncertain on what they should be saying now. Their thoughts were all over the place. Even though that robber’s flagrant act had left them feeling discontented, not one of them had even dared to stand out for fear of being targeted. Before their benefits suffered any real loss, a person’s absolute sincerity would always be hidden deep in the recesses of their hearts.

The crowd was quiet for a good while before slowly leaving the Auction House with their heads hanging low in shame.

After Gu Fei contacted Southern Lone Blade, he no longer hid in that corner but repositioned himself in the open clearing outside the Auction House’s instead. He strolled about while he read his book leisurely, knowing that a whole throng of players inside was surrounding Southern Lone Blade. Thus, when he saw the mob suddenly swarm out as if they had been let out of class, he realized at once that Southern Lone Blade had left the Auction House, too. He quickly fired off a message to Eternal Dominion who was standing guard at the Bounty Assignment Hall.

“Nope. I didn’t see Southern Lone Blade,” Eternal Dominion replied with surety.

“He didn’t use the Windchaser’s Emblem, huh…” Gu Fei muttered to himself, knowing full well that Southern Lone Blade had seen through their plan, and quickly hailed a departing random player. “Where’s the robber Southern Lone Blade?”

“He left,” the person answered.

“How did he leave?”

“He bought a Teleportation Scroll and disappeared,” was the reply.

“How did he get near an auction panel?” Gu Fei was surprised. Considering how all those players were mobbing that larcenist, he was sure that Southern Lone Blade had no chance of escaping unless he logged out there and then or activated the teleportation function of his Windchaser’s Emblem.

The person did not say a word in response to Gu Fei’s question, which indicated that Southern Lone Blade’s means to get near an auction panel did not shine a good light on their lot. Simply put, they all succumbed to the threat of that team of larcenists.

“I have no idea,” this person mumbled before leaving in a hurry.

Gu Fei was stunned. Soon, he discovered that the players departing from the place all had the same heavy air on them. It was in stark contrast to the glee they had shown while surrounding the robber Southern Lone Blade beforehand! Just what in the world happened? Gu Fei questioned a few more players, but everybody’s replies to his questions were evasive. However, after getting bits of information from the handful he had approached, he still managed to get the gist of what had happened. In the end, all he could do was to heave a deep sigh.

Unhealthy practices like this in real life had been completely brought over to the MMO world, so who was it that claimed that online games were unrealistic? Furthermore, doing such vile stuff became all the more frightening online than in real life. In reality, the perpetrator would easily be subdued by the mob and sent to the relevant department for justice, and even if that did not happen, the crowd would have beaten the person to death, so at the very least, no one would need to worry about potential reprisal going forward. However, the knowledge that Southern Lone Blade was another player that would respawn upon death, everyone got a really good sense of just how terrifying reprisals could be.

Gu Fei did not blame these people for having such thoughts, for in this troubled world, even the officials advised everyone not to put up an excessive resistance to the point that their enemies would lose all sense of reason. The bad guys were too much at the advantage here, whereas the good guys lacked enough security.

“There’s no need to wait there anymore. Southern Lone Blade got away.” Gu Fei sent this message to Eternal Dominion.

“Ah? Where did he escape to?” To Eternal Dominion, Southern Lone Blade managing to escape was equivalent to him losing potential income.

“He used a Teleportation Scroll. No idea where that man is right now,” Gu Fei replied.

“Then, what now?” Eternal Dominion asked.

“There’s no way we can locate him any time soon, so you should go do your thing!” He told the other this before contacting Southern Lone Blade. “I dare you to tell me where you are now!”

Just how depressed got Southern Lone Blade after receiving such a message? He had the urge to blocklist Gu Fei, but thinking about it in another way, it was just two messages with a few words inside, which sought to provoke him psychologically. It would not do any harm if he could show some fortitude, and there was no telling that he could not gain some useful information from doing so. Thus, he decided to let Gu Fei remain as his ‘friend’ and of course did not bother replying to the latter’s ‘dare’. Just as he got his bearings on this new location he had teleported himself to, he contacted his comrades.

“There’s no way we can lead a happy life with Thousand Miles Drunk around!” Southern Lone Blade broached the subject in this message.

“What?” Both teams that had been playing Landlord and Tie for Golden Flower all this while were having the time of their lives when they received his abrupt message.

“That guy has latched on to us, refusing to let go. If we don’t take him down for good, he’ll just remain a repressed trauma to us,” Southern Lone Blade explained.

“Can’t we just keep our distance from him?” Flame Singed Clothes meekly asked, showing how little confidence he had with that question.

The game world was huge; it was hardly difficult avoiding someone, but Southern Lone Blade simply could not stomach this outrage. Trees needed bark to survive, and humans needed to be able to breathe to live. Most people were willing to throw away their faces for the sake of living, but if they were to swallow this bitter pill, they would surely shorten their lifespan by a decade at the very least.

“Didn’t that Fleeting Smile person mention that he has a plan to take care of Thousand Miles Drunk? I wonder what he has in mind?” Glue reminded everyone that settling Gu Fei was already their next big assignment, which Southern Lone Blade and Flame Singed Clothes seemed to have forgotten.