CH 13

Shen Huai was also well aware that this wasn't the best way to delegate the lanes, but he did not feel like expending the effort to argue. Besides, a game at Warrior rank was no problem for him.

The 6v6 War Campaign mode drew inspiration from the traditional Chinese games of warfare. The player teams would be automatically divided at the start into attackers and defenders. The victory condition for the attackers was to break through the city gates and destroy the city banner in the heart of the city, while the defenders' mission was to crush the enemy camp.

Every time a player kills an enemy player during the match, they would receive attribute bonuses. Besides that, there was one other key point ― clearing minions.

Three minutes into the game, both camps would automatically dispatch minions. The first side to kill 100 minions would obtain either an attack tank or a defense tank. The tanks had great attack power, so the team which manages to obtain tank-support first would gain a huge advantage. Therefore, clearing minions was a compulsory course for players specialising in team battles.

Shen Huai swiftly made his way out of the city gates and hid carefully in the grass. Meanwhile, he instructed <Falling Sleet> to jump up into a tree.

The minions on both sides clashed, and the opponent players for this lane were the launcher and the holy priest.

The combination of ADC and healer was very common in professional matches. Hard to kill if you attack, but also a constant source of remote harassment if you tried to ignore them to focus on levelling, this combo was extremely difficult to deal with.

Launcher was the gunner subclass with the highest attack speed. Launchers basically relied on skill bonuses on top of basic attacks to deal damage, and thus had great capacity for continuous damage output. They were very popular in 6v6 team battles.

Although <Falling Sleet> was also a gunner type, she was a sniper subclass. The strength of this subclass was an extremely long firing range, which could reach up to 2000 metres under the prone sniping position. That was almost as far as two-thirds of the map in the War Campaign mode. However, snipers had very low attack speed, and their skills involved aiming and a charge meter. Moreover, every shot fired required a manual bullet reload, so it was a relatively more cumbersome subclass.

This was why there were so few top-class snipers. Compared with the launchers with their explosive damage at mid-long range, or the well-rounded machinists with their summons, the sniper could be said to be the character class with the least consistent attack rhythm.

Of course, if you could play like Song Xue-Yang and never miss a single shot, then that would be a completely different story.

The enemy launcher managed to guess their character classes by process of elimination after looking at the distribution of players in the other lanes. He typed into chat.

[ All ][ Empty Dreams of Grandeur ]: GG! A free handout!

He was clearly speaking on behalf of Shen Huai. There were lots of people who played sniper, but only a handful were really good at it. In addition, there were also hardly any experts who played the almost extinct assassin character class. No matter how you looked at it, it indeed seemed to be a handout of a free win for the opponents.

The launcher was very confident, especially after finding out that he was up against a sniper and an assassin. He took the initiative to attack, leading the healer with him to swagger blatantly into the long grass.

A fight within the game was often shaped by the first few milliseconds of the encounter. Shen Huai launched an attack on the launcher at the very moment he entered the grasses.

His attack was extremely fast — the launcher was half a beat too slow to react. By the time the launcher wanted to fight back, the assassin had already finished a 4-hit combo and triggered Invisibility, vanishing from sight!

The launcher was flummoxed. It had felt like barely a second since he had entered the grass, how had this assassin managed to land a 4-hit combo so quickly? Mind you, there were very few players who could successfully trigger the combo effects of an assassin within the game, much less at such speed.

The Invisibility effect from the Shadow Mark combo would only last for 10 seconds. Shen Huai tapped on his mouse to mark the opponent holy priest, and Song Xue-Yang instantly got the message to fire a shot at the healer.

The black-clad assassin reappeared as soon as the shot rang out. The holy priest startled and almost threw his mouse in shock, but he quickly noticed that he had not lost any HP.

Song Xue-Yang's shot had not only missed its mark, but had also exposed his team's positions. The holy priest rapidly retreated. [ The sniper is on the tree! ]

The launcher sent a Bounce Shot into the branches, forcing Song Xue-Yang to retreat, simultaneously activating "Rapid Fire" in a ferocious attack.

The attack speed of the launcher was fearsome; with Rapid Fire activated, he could almost fire 4 to 5 rounds of bullets every second. Sent tumbling down from the tree, Song Xue-Yang instantly lost a third of his HP.

Shen Huai dashed over to shield Song Xue-Yang and then charged towards the launcher.

He had his reasons for doing so. Firstly, he could help Song Xue-Yang block the enemy's attack, and at the same time, the launcher definitely wouldn't dare to continue standing still to deal damage when he sees Shen Huai charging at him. Meanwhile, Shen Huai would deal higher damage the lower his HP dropped anyway, so helping to tank this bit of damage would serve a dual purpose.

As expected, when the launcher saw the assassin rushing him from the front, he uttered a scornful 'retard' in his mind, but he also couldn't do anything but turn tail to run.

As soon as he turned to run, his back was to Shen Huai, which was exactly what Shen Huai wanted.

He immediately cast Shadow Mark, and then rapidly struck with a "Backstab - Pierce - Assassination - Dark Razor" combo, retreating as soon as the combo special effect 'Invisibility' triggered.

At this moment, the launcher's Bounce Shot cooldown had just ended. He was planning to use this to counter attack against Shen Huai, but maddeningly, the assassin had already disappeared. He had no target for his full hand of skills.

And then, a qigong master suddenly charged over.

<West Wind>'s attack was blatant and direct, a frontal charge. He led his attack with the CC-skill "Dragon Snare" and then sent the holy priest flying with a Thunder Palm. But at the very instant <West Wind> used Thunder Palm, the holy priest swiftly cast a damage reflection skill on himself. <West Wind> was unable to react to this in time, or perhaps he was just too used to launching this series of attacks... he ended up firing three Qi Blasts which pushed himself into a HP-Critical state.

Just as the launcher was struggling with the dilemma of having nowhere to direct his ready hand of skills, he saw the opponent qigong master charging over on his own and even splurging all of his crowd control skills on the holy priest! Overjoyed, the launcher immediately fired a Bounce Shot, knocking <West Wind> back into a wall and triggering Stun, simultaneously unleashing a torrent of bullets with Rapid Fire.

<West Wind>'s HP plunged drastically. As soon as his stun status was dispelled, he turned to run, but still ended up giving up 'first blood' under the attack of the launcher's 'Hail of Bullets'.

Both Song Xue-Yang's and Shen Huai's game perceptiveness was world-class — they knew how to salvage the situation even when their teammates committed grave errors.

The enemy healer was under their control while the enemy DPS was still focusing his attacks on their qigong master. Without even having to think about it, Shen Huai charged at the healer and stunned him with a Soul Steal, swiftly following that up with a 4-hit combo under Reaper's Mark even as Song Xue-Yang decisively sniped at the healer.

<Empty Dreams of Grandeur> killed <West Wind>. First blood!

<MuWanGe> killed <Fleeting Years>!

After the launcher finished off the qigong master, he returned to find that his teammate, the healer, was dead, and instantly moved to retreat, but Shen Huai did not give him a chance to do so.

An HP-Critical launcher on his own was easy pickings. Shen Huai speedily chased up to him and dealt him a critical blow from behind, which Song Xue-Yang then followed up with two basic attacks. Finally, the poor launcher's life was reaped by Shen Huai's Wild Blade Dance.

<MuWanGe> killed <Empty Dreams of Grandeur>! Double Kill!

This was great news for their team, but the team's qigong master was disgruntled.

[ What's your problem? When I attack, you guys hang back, and after I'm dead, you guys attack? Sacrificing me? You got a problem with me? ]

Shen Huai ignored him, quickly clearing the current wave of minions before returning to the city to replenish his HP.

<West Wind> became even angrier at this. [ Rubbish assassin. No awareness at all. No wonder your win rate is still less than 50% after 80 matches. ]

In "City of Despair", it was possible to look up the battle records of your teammates and the opponents, and this data included the number of Arena matches played as well as the win rate.

The previous owner of Shen Huai's account clearly wasn't very good at PKs, so the win rate was already like this when he bought the account. Today was his first time playing in the Arena with this account.

[ Hurry up and surrender! Of all the classes, why play an assassin? It's impossible to win with such a trash class! ]

Shen Huai hated others using character class as an argument. He quickly typed out: [ Shut up! ]

<West Wind> was a classic example of someone who becomes more worked up the more others argue back. Before Shen Huai said anything, <West Wind> just felt like this was a waste of time and wanted to grumble, but now, he erupted with a string of censored words. [ F***! Wow so shameless! Who the f*** do you think you are?!  You guys can keep playing. I'm gonna start griefing. ]

Soon after this, <Horizon> suddenly typed out [ Crap! ] in the party chat. At the same time, the system announced: <West Wind> has been killed by <Increments of Time>; <Horizon> has been killed by <Increments of Time>.

It turned out that <West Wind> had rushed directly into the opponent's elementalist's face as soon as he had finished cursing in chat earlier. The enemy spellcaster had quickly silenced him while the elementalist cast "Thunder Sprite". This was a single-target skill with extremely high damage, and the skill had the special ability to bounce and deal damage to nearby enemy units as well.

After being hit by Thunder Sprite, <West Wind> accelerated and ran towards Hai Xing. As a short-legged mage, Hai Xing naturally could not outrun him, and so he lost half his HP to the bounce damage from Thunder Sprite. The opponent elementalist was no newbie — he swiftly cast the AoE attack Thunderous Ensemble on the both of them. <West Wind> was standing close to Hai Xing, so Hai Xing once again lost a significant amount of HP due to the lightning damage.

In the end, <West Wind> ran onto a bridge and caused the bridge to collapse with a Qi Shockwave. Hai Xing, who was also on the bridge with him, fell into the water alongside him. Being in water would boost the damage received from lightning attacks — the enemy elementalist immediately activated his special, Heaven's Wrath!

Five bolts of blue lightning lit up the skies, arcing towards the ground with loud booms. Hai Xing died instantly and the instigator <West Wind> wasn't spared either, the both of them losing their lives to the enemy.

It could be said that Hai Xing's death was completely <West Wind>'s fault.

Seeing this outcome, <West Wind> commented scornfully in the party chat. [ Haha, trash. ]

Who was Hai Xing? He was the fiery rocket of Maple Moon, the most combative member with the fiercest temper! Out of consideration for Ash Wing's presence in the team, he had been holding back from yelling at the idiot, but now the idiot had not only dragged him down with him but had also ridiculed him? He wasn't going to let it slide anymore.

[ You SOB! Who are you calling trash? Stop shooting your mouth off when you suck so bad! ]

Finally meeting someone who would argue against him, <West Wind> felt invigorated!

[ I'm calling you trash! You trash, come solo if you can't take it! Arena 1 on 1, who loses will be the son! ]

[ Dear son, come call daddy first, then daddy will solo you! ]

[ Hehe, just admit it if you're too scared. ]

Hai Xing was so mad that he pulled his headphones off and threw it onto the table. Still, no matter how angry he was, he still retained some rationality. He knew it was against regulations for him to solo against a random player as a pro, and people would talk if this got out. And so, he took a deep breath, put his headphones back on, and waded back into the trash-talking.

<West Wind>: [ A bunch of trash. Play slowly, you all, I'll continue griefing. ]

And then he started typing in the general chat.

[ All ][ West Wind ]: It's really impossible to play with such trash noob teammates. They suck but don't want others to call them out on it. Dunno where they get their confidence.

[ All ][ Horizon ]: I thought you wanted to grief? Why are you still blabbing? Go grief, daddy here will carry you to a win!

[ All ][ West Wind ]: You think you can carry your daddy to a win? No thanks, this daddy doesn't want to win.

[ All ][ Horizon ]: Hurry, go grief! If you don't, you're a nothing but a chicken!

During this exchange, <West Wind> fed the enemy twice more, both times to the opponent's DPS, the elementalist! The boost of 4 kills under his belt allowed the elementalist to choose a set-up which buffed his damage by 20%. With just one lightning bolt, <West Wind> and <Horizon> were once again HP-Critical right out of the city gates.

Shen Huai knew that he could not let things go on like this. By the time the elementalist's attack bonus reaches the upper limit of 50%, even Shen Huai would be helpless to recover the situation. Thus, he typed out to <Falling Sleet>: [ To the main gate. ]

And then, completely ignoring the launcher and the holy priest at the West Gate, he activated Stealth and ran towards the Main Gate.

Consumed with anger, Hai Xing forgot all about acting like a noob. An Ice Ball struck the elementalist from a tricky angle, freezing him in place, closely followed by the AoE skill Ice Storm. The enemy spellcaster tried to cast a crowd control skill on him, but found that Hai Xing's Ice Storm skill had forced him into a corner. If he wanted to go closer to help his teammate, he would have no choice but to take damage from Ice Storm.

Halfway through, he realised that he was losing HP much too fast, but when he tried to retreat, an Ice Wall rose to block him. He could only surrender his displacement skill to phase through the ice wall, but Hai Xing seemed to have predicted where he would land. Almost at the precise moment he stopped, a high-damage Blizzard smacked him mercilessly in the face. The spellcaster had just used up his displacement skill, so he could only watch as his character's HP was whittled away by the Blizzard until he died.

The spellcaster had no words to describe his anguish. This ice mage had still been a total noob just moments ago... how was he suddenly playing like he was on steroids? The player behind the character must have changed, right?! The change in operational style was just too dramatic!