Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

Chapter 204 - A Lingering Spirit

What was called the sound of silence? Right now, that was what one could hear inside Ray’s Bar. It was so quiet that anyone would hear it if a pin dropped.

...Everyone was in awe at the way Gu Fei finished off Silver Moon just now.

Twin Incineration was a spell that Mages seldom used, so most Mages had low proficiency in it. Therefore, they considered Twin Incineration as the least lethal of all the spells in their arsenal. The other job classes knew of this as well. And yet, Gu Fei had just defeated a Knight with what everyone judged as the weakest mage spell.

To be able to finish off a Knight by just casting Twin Incineration twice... This was by no means a small feat, and everyone began to think of how fearsome Gu Fei’s Spell Damage was. Ironically, nobody realized that Silver Moon had high resistance against magic, and that Gu Fei could actually insta-kill any regular players by just casting his spell once. A ‘Twin Incineration’ spell that Gu Fei incorporated into his swordplay moves was very different from a ‘Twin Incineration’ spell that was cast by regular Mages, after all.

Compare to his use of Blink, these knowledgeable leaders viewed his use of Twin Incineration as more noteworthy. People merely chalked it up to a person luckily obtaining a skill scroll if anyone happened to posses Blink right now, and although getting a hold of Blink was not easy at this point of the game, Blink’s lack of any offensive properties made people undervalue it.

Gu Fei’s connection with Brother Assist and company, his real purpose for coming in the bar, and his disruption of the ‘meet and greet’ event... None of these mattered anymore, and at this moment, the leaders, especially those who had not managed to speak with Drifting, only wanted get close to Gu Fei to try recruiting him over, so they began gravitating toward him.

Although Drifting was renowned, none of them knew of just how powerful he was. Small and medium guilds and mercenaries would not even dream of having someone like him as a member, and only large guilds and mercenaries would think of inviting him just to have his name be associated with their organizations. Moreover, there was even a possibility of such players to turn into a ‘leader’ from being a ‘subordinate’. As such, these leaders were keener on acquiring and nurturing a rising star like Gu Fei.

As they were thinking of this, Gu Fei who no longer had any business in Ray’s Bar sprinted out of it.

“Hey, bro, wait up!” Many of them tried to chase after him, as they judged that they had a higher chance of recruiting the nameless expert than the famous individual Drifting. As for the others, they got torn between getting to know Drifting and chasing after Gu Fei for quite a while before finally resolving to pursue Gu Fei. Eventually, they all returned to the establishment in disappointment.

“Just who exactly is that guy?” everyone began to wonder.

“He is so fast. He must have added a lot of points to Agility,” someone said.

“I tried to appraise his gear before, yet I failed to get a read of his robe and sword.”

“His sword and robe must be top grade, and they are probably the source of his high Spell Damage,” a leader accurately deduced.

“Wait a minute. With such a high Spell Damage, how come the damage of his Blazing Tree of a Thousand Inferno is so low?” someone posed this question.

In the blink of an eye, only a minority of the leaders in Ray’s Bar continued to converse with Drifting and a majority of them heatedly discussed the enigma that that was Gu Fei. Young Master Han used this moment to send Brother Assist a private message, “Let’s leave now!”

Brother Assist wholeheartedly agreed to this. War Without Wounds, who had been standing by the entrance, easily slipped away from the bar. As for Royal God Call, he was also able to leave the place unrestricted as no one was keeping tab on him, and he even managed to spit twice in Drifting’s general direction without anybody noticing it. But when it was Young Master Han and Brother Assist’s turn to leave, many leaders immediately took note of it.

“You two, don’t leave just yet!” someone shouted and everyone turned to look at the two.

Young Master Han smiled, “Our business here is done. Everyone, please have a nice chat with Mister Drifting!”

“Wait!” Several leaders jumped out and blocked the two’s way out.

“We still want you two to tell us more about the Mage just then!”

“We don’t know that guy,” Young Master Han maintained.

“Don’t humor us as if we are children. None of us here thinks that you guys don’t know one another.” Their discussion of Gu Fei covered every detail from his first appearance to the bar until his departure, and it was very obvious that he was familiar with Brother Assist and the others based on their interaction. Everyone was busy trying to get to know Drifting just now so they had chose to put the matter of Gu Fei aside, but now that they learned about Gu Fei’s indomitable fighting prowess, these people who now had their eyes on him would naturally not let him get away so easily.

Once more, the situation went a little out of control. Brother Assist smiled helplessly as he tried hard to explain themselves to everyone. Meanwhile, Young Master Han was silently observing the surrounding people while standing beside Brother Assist, and he had noticed something odd: While this group of leaders was anxiously trying to find out any information about Gu Fei from Brother Assist, there were two men who did not join in. Those two were instead focusing on portraying Young Master’s Elite in a bad light by reminding everyone on how sketchy the whole thing was from the start.

These two men were Silver Moon’s companions, which caused Young Master Han to utter Oh no! in his mind. Could it be... that Silver Moon has purposefully goaded Miles into attacking him to expose the latter’s fighting prowess and create this situation, afterward? This must be his real objective from the start! Man, that guy is truly a lingering spirit that just won’t rest!

Young Master Han seemed to have a tendency to over-analyze Silver Moon’s scheme, whether it was during the guild war in Yueye City, or during their recent clash in the mercenary group tournament, and this time was no exception. It was understandable, as he did not actually know Silver Moon that well. Was Silver Moon a guy who would readily sacrifice himself just to get revenge? Of course not!

But besides that, Young Master Han’s judgment was spot on. Silver Moon’s death was indeed what had caused the chaotic situation right now.

Over by a spawn point, Silver Moon was cursing Gu Fei and all the eighteen generations of his ancestors and descendants when he suddenly received a live feed of the situation at Ray’s Bar from his two companions. Realizing that his death had indirectly exposed Gu Fei’s impressive Spell Damage, he became elated and resolved to not let this opportunity slip. With all the leaders turning their attention to Gu Fei and the rest of Young Master’s Elite, Silver Moon hurriedly ordered his two companions to try their best to instigate a fight, “Remember, this is not about forcing them to reveal information about Thousand Miles Drunk. The most wonderful outcome we can hope for is for the present leaders to realize that the entire thing is nothing but an elaborate scam! Only when one side yearns to find out and another side refuses to share information can it eventually escalate into a fight, so what you guys must do is emphasize the inexplicable actions that Thousand Miles Drunk has done as well as the lies that the group has said just now!”

The two listened intently at Silver Moon’s instructions. It was precisely because they wanted to plant suspicion into the leaders’ minds about this whole matter that the two had animatedly participated in the discussion about Gu Fei before. While everyone was surrounding Young Master Han and Brother Assist to ask them about the Mage Gu Fei, the two men kept on spouting accusing words from the sidelines. Their words fueled everyone’s suspicion further until it reached the point where the leaders directly demanded for Young Master’s Elite to promptly hand over Gu Fei so that they could hold him accountable over the matter.

“What they must request is something that neither Brother Assist nor Young Master Han can fulfill. It’s the best-case scenario for us. Only such a contradiction between expectations can create an impasse between the two sides. At least, my death won’t be in vain that way,” was what Silver Moon told the two men.

“It’s a success!” one of Silver Moon’s two companions excitedly reported, “They are now demanding for Brother Assist to immediately hand over Thousand Miles Drunk to give them an account of the matter. I doubt that they can do that now.”

“Indeed, they seem to have some sort of misunderstanding among themselves. Miles must have really come to mess things up for them just then. He must have some reservations regarding this moneymaking scheme that his friends had cooked up. I don’t know what’s up with them, but it thankfully let us get to this point. Sit back and watch the show now!” Right now, Silver Moon felt that losing a level was no longer that tragic.

“Where’s that Mage? Quickly call him back! Don’t say all that nonsense about you guys not knowing him. You’re not fooling anyone here!” All the leaders were currently pointing and yelling at Brother Assist and Young Master Han.

The ‘not acquainted’ reasoning that they had given could no longer be used. This originally harmless white lie had suddenly grown teeth and came back to bite them. They had truly dug their own graves this time. As for the crowd’s demand of ‘calling the Mage back’, it was indeed something that Brother Assist and company could not do. This was entirely because Gu Fei had not replied to any of their messages.

Brother Assist no longer had any ideas left and he sweated profusely from anxiety. Young Master Han, meanwhile, seemed to not care in the least bit to quarrel with these people. Besides those few words he had said earlier when these people had blocked their way, he had actually not said another word after. His eyes flickered unevenly, and none could tell what he was thinking about.

“Are you guys calling him or not?! Don’t think we didn’t notice that that Mage is the one you guys were planning to introduce to us. It just happened that Drifting bro is here, so you beseeched an expert like him at the very last minute for help. Are you lot trying to hide that Mage of yours to find another opportunity to profit from us again?” Young Master Han’s hastily made-up plan to drag Drifting down with them was too flimsy a save. Adding the fact that the leaders had Silver Moon’s insiders inciting them from behind, many of them had now seen through this whole charade. The situation was now a step closer to what Silver Moon had hoped for with everyone treating this whole affair as a scam.

If Young Master’s Elite only ‘cheated’ one player of his or her 100 gold coins, perhaps they would just receive a few verbal curses as the player would not bother to rally a force against them for such a measly sum. But with many of them gathered together, the leaders, who really thought that they had been scammed, ended up encouraging one another to hunt down the perpetrators.

“What do we do now?” Brother Assist saw that Young Master Han had not spoken a word, so he quickly sent him a private message.

“Don’t worry. Someone will stand up and speak for us,” Young Master Han calmly replied.

“Who?” Brother Assist asked as he swept his gaze over the crowd before them.

“These leaders are trying to learn more information about Miles with the intention of poaching him. Think about it; who would be opposed to that kind of goal?” Young Master Han asked Brother Assist.

“Oh...” Brother Assist got what he meant and his gaze shifted toward the relatively more tranquil side of the bar. Still seated over there were the four ladies of Amethyst Rebirth....