Chapter 105: The Curator’s Sword
“Uncle!”
Grenta stared at Noco, whose chest had been pierced through, completely stunned.
As for the hundreds of Great Ape Gang members present, they were all plunged into shock and terror, each of them frozen on the spot, unable to believe this was real.
The Great Ape Gang had stood in the wilderness outside the City of Light Chasing for decades. Even in great wars with other top-twenty wilderness gangs, at most some ordinary senior officials or core figures at the vice gang leader level had died, but never once had a vice gang leader actually been killed.
The closest incident was more than ten years ago, when a vice gang leader offended a young master of a powerful clan in the suburbs and was ambushed in the wilderness by eight quasi-martial artists. Even then, that vice gang leader did not die; only over ninety percent of the more than one hundred followers he brought were killed, but all eight quasi-martial artists were taken down as well.
Now Vice Gang Leader Noco had been killed by the combined efforts of one limit apprentice and one advanced apprentice, and this had happened inside the Great Ape Gang headquarters itself. It was as if the sky had been torn open.
If this matter spread, the prestige the Great Ape Gang had built up in the wilderness over so many years would likely be wiped out in a single day.
The hundreds of Great Ape Gang members present even felt that once responsibility was pursued afterward, none of them would escape death and they would all be buried with Noco.
“Kill! At all costs! We must take down every last one of them!” Grenta seemed to have forgotten the wound on his arm altogether. His eyes bloodshot, he glared in the direction Luo Wu Shang and the others had fled and let out a roar. “Activate the defense grid! Enter level one alert status! Anyone who dares to shrink from battle will die without fail afterward!”
With Grenta’s command, all the Great Ape Gang members around them also roared in response. They either slapped both hands on the ground or pounded on their chests, their eyes turning blood-red and crazed as their beastly nature was fully ignited.
In an instant, piercing sirens that echoed through the entire valley rang out across the whole Great Ape Gang headquarters. Hearing the alarms, every Great Ape Gang member, whether they had been fleeing or looking to regroup with gang experts, seemed to be provoked into a frenzy and charged toward the entrances and exits of headquarters.
Whenever they discovered intruders, whether they were beginner apprentices of the Great Ape Gang or ordinary members, they charged like mad, trading their lives for their enemies’ lives.
“Wu Shang, what did you do? These apes have gone completely insane. Before they still knew to run, now they don’t even care about their lives.”
Zhang Qing Wei watched Luo Wu Shang and the others sprinting out from the Great Ape Gang’s core area while fending off the encirclement of more than thirty Great Ape Gang members. Darting between houses and evading arrows from afar, she was filled with confusion.
At this moment it was not only Zhang Qing Wei who faced massive encirclement from Great Ape Gang members; the other gathered players were in similar situations, making escape anything but easy.
“We took out one of their vice gang leaders and let Yi Ye score a B2-grade halberd.” Luo Wu Shang, her face slightly pale, blocked more than ten incoming arrows while retreating. “We need to pull out quickly. If that group behind catches up, it will be very hard for us to get out of here.”
“Vice President Luo, amazing. You really killed a boss.” Fang Zhen, who had joined up, could not help giving a thumbs-up, looking with some envy at the halberd on Yi Ye Fu Yun’s back. “As expected, killing bosses is the most profitable.”
Their Dawn Squad had searched the Great Ape Gang headquarters for a long time and had not found anything good or any elite leaders, only killing a few advanced apprentices and getting a few A6-grade weapons.
And a B2-grade weapon, even just one, was worth several million points. Not to mention that a halberd could substitute for a spear, which meant Yi Ye Fu Yun now had a suitable B2-grade weapon. It was simply fantastic.
“We should hurry and retreat.” Li Ranxing knocked aside a few incoming arrows and reminded them, “In this game, stamina and qi and blood are not infinite. Once we run out of qi and blood, even a group of beginner apprentices can surround and kill us.”
“This game is too real. We do need to move faster. There are elites and leader-level enemies hidden among these people. Their archery is extremely precise and fierce, and they’re using B2-grade arrows. A6-grade armor is completely useless.” Saiwai Qiangke clutched the wound in his shoulder where a B2-grade arrow had pierced through. Blood was still flowing, and his face was pale as he gave a bitter smile. “The pain in this game is bearable, but the injuries to the body affect everything. Even the torn muscles in my arm twitch so I can’t use my strength. I’d only heard others talk about this before. I never thought the game would reproduce everything to this extent. It’s unbelievable.”
“Everyone be careful. Do not get hit in the abdomen by those arrows with massive destructive power. If you take a hit to the liver, in reality you’d be paralyzed and unable to move for a short time, no matter how strong a hero you are. This game is very likely the same. At that point, any ordinary person could finish us off.”
Everyone present agreed with Li Ranxing’s suggestion. Though there was still some time, after a series of battles their blood qi consumption was huge. If they kept fighting and ran out of blood qi, even moving would be difficult, let alone fighting.
Luo Wu Shang, Fang Zhen, and Yi Ye Fu Yun’s three teams quickly reached a consensus and began breaking out toward a location to the west.
Although the Great Ape Gang headquarters was in a valley with only one entrance and exit, that entrance was wide, and it would take a while before a complete encirclement could be formed. To the west happened to be the Warehouse Area the Great Ape Gang had built, which normally had almost no guards. It was the perfect place to break out.
However, while Luo Wu Shang and the others had a good plan, they had not realized how terrifying the Great Ape Gang’s level one alert status would be.
Once level one alert status was activated, any enemy seen had to be fought to the death. If any enemy escaped, there would inevitably be a reckoning afterward, and the gang’s punishment was far more terrifying than death.
In the span of what should have been less than a minute’s distance for Luo Wu Shang and the others, more and more Great Ape Gang members converged to encircle and kill them. They ended up fighting for a full five minutes without even seeing the outer wall, while the number of Great Ape Gang members attacking them continued to grow.
Even though Luo Wu Shang and the others killed wave after wave, from the initial more than two hundred enemies to now over a thousand, the pressure only increased.
At this moment, even veterans like Luo Wu Shang who had fought countless battles in Pilgrimage finally felt what it meant that two fists cannot beat many hands, and that enough ants can bite an elephant to death. This was completely different from other virtual games.
In other virtual games, levels and stats were everything. Killing low-level monsters and players was as easy as playing around. You did not even need to deliberately block or evade low-level monsters and enemies; you could just tank it with your body.
But in High Martial Arts Descend it was different. Even the attacks of low-level enemies needed to be blocked and dodged. If a weapon struck your body, you would be injured, one hundred percent. If it hit a vital spot, you would be stunned or die outright.
Fortunately, Luo Wu Shang and the others were also rich in combat experience. By constantly moving among the enemies, they avoided many of the Great Ape Gang members’ attacks, greatly reducing the number of enemies they faced at one time and making things much easier.
Fang Zhen and the others were used to coordinated team combat. With mutual support, they could always defuse danger with ease and even turn the tables.
As for lone experts like Xiao Yuan Ye Feng Kuang from the strategy group, they broke the formation by targeting key points. Using heavy strikes to knock back enemies rushing in, they caused those flying bodies to crash into the mass behind, making it impossible for those enemies to seize the chance to attack. Every heavy blow took down one person.
Though everyone was fighting hard, they were killing Great Ape Gang members almost every second, leaving batch after batch of them lying on the ground. The road was paved with the corpses of Great Ape Gang members, and blood truly flowed like a river.
Even the Great Ape Gang senior officials commanding the battle were shocked by this sight.
“No wonder that Obsidian Martial Arts Hall, with so few people, can still be ranked forty-second by the Martial Artist Association. These ten-plus from Obsidian Martial Arts Hall, if they went against other large wilderness gangs, might really be able to slaughter those around the fiftieth place.” A Great Ape Gang quasi-martial artist elder looked at the remaining thirteen members of Obsidian Martial Arts Hall with amazement.
A mere nineteen people, the strongest only a limit apprentice. Under normal circumstances, any Great Ape Gang senior official would look down on them and not take them seriously.
Yet these nineteen from Obsidian Martial Arts Hall had astonishing combat power. Under siege by more than a thousand of them, they had fought until now, killing over three hundred Great Ape Gang members while losing only six on their side. Such a record could not be found anywhere else in the wilderness around the City of Light Chasing.
“No matter what, they all die today!” Grenta, whose one arm could no longer move, stared fixedly at Yi Ye Fu Yun and Luo Wu Shang, his tone allowing no doubt.
The other six quasi-martial artist elders who had arrived did not refute him. They simply watched silently as Luo Wu Shang and the others’ stamina and blood qi weakened more and more.
Vice Gang Leader Noco had always treated Grenta like his own son and personally oversaw his cultivation. Now that Noco had been killed, Grenta would certainly seek revenge. Moreover, the Great Ape Gang could not afford such a loss of face; they had to silence everyone.
“I feel like my hands are so tired I can hardly lift them. Does this game have to be this real?” Yi Ye Fu Yun panted heavily as he swept his gaze over the ape clan corpses covering the ground and the remains of Saiwai Qiangke, who had long been chopped into minced meat. Watching the Great Ape Gang members charging at them again, he said helplessly, “If I’d known, I would have focused more on improving stamina and blood qi. Now this B2-grade weapon I just got is about to be gone.”
“Everyone hold on a little longer. We’re only a hundred meters away from the wall.”
Fang Zhen narrowly dodged an arrow and blasted back three Great Ape Gang advanced apprentices with one thrust. Catching sight of the nearby wall out of the corner of his eye, he brightened and encouraged the remaining twelve still fighting.
The twelve who were still struggling in battle were also motivated by Fang Zhen’s words and squeezed out the last of their strength, quickly pushing toward the wall.
“Kill! We absolutely cannot let them leave alive today!”
“Six elders, charge with me!”
Watching Luo Wu Shang and Yi Ye Fu Yun trying to break through toward the wall, Grenta rushed ahead first. The other six Great Ape Gang elders at quasi-martial artist level stopped watching from the sidelines and charged swiftly at the players who were almost completely spent.
Their speed was so fast they covered the hundred meters in less than three seconds.
“This is bad. Their leaders are charging. In our condition, we’re no match.” After crushing a Great Ape Gang beginner apprentice to death with one palm strike, Zhao Hu saw Grenta rushing over and his expression darkened. “With this wall in front of us, we won’t have time to escape.”
In their current state, just standing was difficult. Facing those peak-condition quasi-martial artists head-on would mean certain death.
“Forget it. It’s just death. I’ll stay and hold them off. Wu Shang, you take the B-grade weapons and run!” Zhang Qing Wei looked at the five-meter-tall wall less than ten meters away and stopped retreating. She took a deep breath, drew the A6-grade battle saber she had picked up, took her stance, and resolved to hold nothing back. If she could die taking one Great Ape Gang elder with her, she would.
“Trying to leave? Not that easy!”
Grenta was the first to reach her. With a flicker of his figure, he appeared in front of Zhang Qing Wei and brought his B2-grade hand axe cleaving down.
A martial artist-level martial skill, Tear the Sky, erupted with triple strength. Nearly four thousand kilograms of force smashed into the Rippling Wave Saber, which had just over three thousand kilograms of force behind it. Zhang Qing Wei’s entire body was hurled back into the wall. A huge notch appeared in the A6-grade battle saber, almost cutting it in two.
“Die!”
Relying on the powerful support of his A6-grade battle armor, Grenta did not pause at all after that strike. As Zhang Qing Wei landed, he followed up with another axe. His speed was so great that even Luo Wu Shang could not save her in time and could only watch that axe fall.
Boom!
Just as the more than one-meter-long hand axe was about to strike Zhang Qing Wei’s head, the wall behind her suddenly shattered. A streak of blue lightning shot out and lashed toward Grenta.
Empowered by his A6-grade battle armor, Grenta managed a midair twist at the last instant, narrowly dodging the blue lightning in the nick of time.
Only when the blue lightning vanished did everyone present gasp.
Where the blue lightning had passed, a blackened sword mark more than ten meters long and over one meter deep was carved into the ground. A Great Ape Gang advanced apprentice in A5-grade armor and several beginner apprentices were all sliced cleanly in half along with their gear, blood spraying everywhere.
“You want to kill my disciples of Obsidian Martial Arts Hall, but did you ask me first?”
With a low, deep voice sounding from outside the wall, everyone turned to look.
In front of the collapsed wall stood a man in a jet-black martial robe. His pitch-black eyes shone like stars in the moonlight. In his hand he held a pale blue long sword inscribed with unknown blood-red runes, faint arcs of lightning curling around the blade with a crackling hiss, as if it did not belong to this world.
“Master of the Pavilion?”
