POSTED ON MAY 3, 2022 BY JACK RUSSELL
[You have killed a Silver Rank enemy in battle. As a result, you have acquired 980 Shared Experience points.]
A notification panel appeared before Dove’s closed eyes, telling her that she had gained tremendous experience.
“…Phew.” The corners of her lips twitched a little, and only then did she relax a little.
That shot was refined archery that she was most proud of. Within a distance of 100 meters, the arrow crossed countless branches and vines. Yet aside from merely brushing some leaves, it was not blocked by any obstacles in the dense forest. In the end, she hit the opponent’s weak spot with devastating power, penetrating through the target’s head.
This was an archery skill that could never be replicated on Earth because the enemy wasn’t in her sight at all.
While the leaves were blocking Jude’s sight, they were also blocking hers.
The serval was constantly running through the dense forest that provided her the necessary vision to execute it, allowing her to find the one and only “trajectory” that could help her avoid all obstacles.
It was also by relying on the serval’s vision that she could hit the enemy with her eyes closed when shooting from a blind spot.
She decided to attack only after analyzing Jude’s attack pattern, which allowed her to perceive the possibility of taking down this opponent.
And, she didn’t even inform the Child that she was going to fight back.
The purpose was so that the Child’s act would be more realistic for Jude to let down his guard— if she wanted to deceive the enemy, she must first deceive her teammate.
The speed at which she escaped had already told Jude that she was not a Transcended. The fact that she fled into the jungle with a longbow on her back was not because she didn’t know that the use of bows and spears was extremely limited in this environment.
Instead, this was a trap that Dove had deliberately laid down.
It wasn’t that Jude had no intention of killing Dove. Instead, he simply knew that he couldn’t stop Dove when she escaped into the forest.
He also couldn’t simply enter the forest… That would be too dangerous.
The coverage area within his senses was closely related to his Perception attribute.
When the Perception attribute was between 10 and 40 points, the Perception attribute could provide non-visual senses for the Transcended. Beginning from approximately a 10-point Perception attribute, one could directly sense the subtle situation taking place within a hemispherical range with a one-meter diameter without needing vision or hearing.
In other words, a wizard of Silver Rank would be able to quickly detect the danger within an approximate 10-meter range, regardless if it was an approaching trap or an enemy who was sneaking behind him.
The firearms and weapons of this world had just been invented not too long ago. Hence, the hit rate towards the torso was within about ten meters during battle. If it were any further, the hit rate would be a gamble if both themselves and the enemy could not stay still.
As for an arrow, an open place at the range of more than ten meters allowed him to respond to it in time.
Thus, there was [Instant Spell] — a spell that existed for taking action at such a distance.
But if he was deep in the forest, it was no longer a question of whether he could react in time. Under the circumstance that the space was too narrow, there would be no room for execution.
Dove knew from the beginning that Jude would not come after her, especially with the Child’s attempt to hold him off.
She had already used her affection ratings to ask Annan for information about the general fighting style of each profession.
Typically speaking, the mana value of wizards was limited, and not all wizards had an erosion rate as low as Annan’s. In their process to seek advancement, they were put into situations unable to cast any spell in challenging many nightmares.
Unless they happened to have a fellow wizard in the nightmare, or else their strength would undoubtedly be the most weakened.
Professions such as swordsman, hunter, and lurker usually fought in dangerous places. Hence, they would tend to react very quickly when encountering a sudden danger. They had rich combat experience knowledge of dealing with emergencies and could even subdue or assassinate enemies with their bare hands.
Not to mention the priests… Priests did not have profession levels, which meant their strength would not be suppressed by the character’s attribute they got in nightmares.
— It was only wizards who succumbed to such a weakness.
It was even more difficult, especially for the academic wizards, to exert their strength in nightmares. They were overly dependent on their spell combo. This was the intel that Annan had dedicated to Dove in the first place.
Therefore, the vast majority of wizards’ erosion rates would not be too low because the number of times they had died in a nightmare would be relatively higher. An increase in erosion rate would also mean a decrease in the safe mana value they could use— They would only be able to regain their safe mana value if they maintained a “passing rate” for a while.
This was also why older wizards were challenging opponents.
The wizard’s demand for nightmares was second only to the priest in the current mainstream profession. And the wizards who were old and had not lost control were elites who fortunately managed to survive countless nightmares. They were good at dealing with various situations and used their power reasonably.
Even after exempting the level difference in calculating Transcendeds’ strength, it was not guaranteed that a Bronze Rank wizard with sufficient experience wouldn’t be able to defeat a young Silver Rank wizard.
Dove also had a clear understanding of this living being called “human”.
Although she had fled far away, she could still vaguely sense Jude’s emotions and personality through the monitoring and surveillance of her serval.
He seemed like a scientific engineering man who had continued engaging in research upon graduating with his doctoral degree. He had obvious arrogance and had not been in a good mood lately. He was slightly anxious with a somewhat twisted brain and possibly still believed in disproved theories— Jude’s attack model was methodical, but it also had some discipline that you could tell he had come from a science background.
Such an enemy can be defeated.
Dove was confident about it.
There was only one chance for her to launch a sneak attack.
After she escaped into the forest, Jude would let his guard down towards her.
There was also some distance between him and the forest, which allowed him to observe anyone who would jump out from the woods. This would instead make him ignorant of attacks coming from this “direction” he labeled to be safe.
Jude’s spell casting range was about 20 meters in diameter, which was almost the same as his Perception range. The vines around him that he stole were the “fences” he created to protect himself.
When Jude realized that Child’s ability was entirely restrained by him, he would gradually relax his vigilance.
Dove noticed two chances for ambush in which Jude had shot out all those vines, but she didn’t act yet.
It was because arrows took time to travel, and vines retract faster than that.
In other words, attacking only when the opponent was found to be vulnerable would already make it a tricky task.
She also couldn’t use any marking ability from the [Hunter], nor could she use her profession to support her shot.
With a Silver Rank Wizard’s Perception attribute, the opponent could definitely detect the curse fluctuations of the Transcended ability that was lower than him by two soul levels.
Dove’s biggest advantage at this moment was that she was completely “invisible”.
The problem was that her attack power was not enough.
If her strength and the penetrating power of the arrow were strong enough, there was no need for her to worry about the trajectory at all. As long as she let out the serval, she could continuously shoot undetectable arrows at Jude from the forest.
To kill Jude, Dove needed to make Jude go to a designated position, ensure that he would only shoot out his protective rattan spears after Dove had released her arrow, and ensure that his naked eye couldn’t see the arrow.
She would only be able to kill him in one shot if these conditions were met.
“—Dove is awesome!”
“—Holy crap, how did you do it?”
“—How did you do it?!”
“—Chill. That isn’t a game-breaking hack.”
“—Jude: I’m done, a single shot within a split second. What can I say?”
Realizing what Dove had done, the bullet texts flooded the streaming channel even when only a few dozen players were there.
It wasn’t just those players, and even Annan was stunned, “…What kind of monster is this woman?”
That’s a longbow, not a sniper rifle…
It was fair to say that Dove had killed the Silver Rank Wizard singled-handedly despite the rank gaps. Even if there was another explanation in which the Shaping School wizards lacked defensive measures, this was still too shocking.
For a moment, Annan didn’t know whether to say that Jude was a noob or if Dove was too OP.
He hesitated for a while and then sent two bullet texts,
“—Dove is awesome!
“—Sister Chocolate is awesome!!”
Soon, other players followed him and started spamming,
“—Sister Chocolate is awesome!!”
“—Sister Chocolate is awesome!!”
“It’s Dove, not chocolate!” Dove was angry, “My real name is Dove!”