I logged into the game as fast as I could and appeared within the Black Cavalry Scout Camp once more. I immediately noticed Mona, the blacksmiths and the huge pile of Obsidian Metal in front of them.

"Ah, you finally came back!" Mona greeted me.

I tapped the ore-covered table once before saying smilingly, "I have an urgent matter I need to deal with, so I trust you to handle these, Mona. Don’t worry, I’ll be back in a jiffy!"

"Mn. Watch out for the Moon Shadow Lupus!"

"I know!"

After that I summoned the Ancient Divine Dragon, took off to the sky, and joined Hickey’s party as soon as possible. I quickly discovered that she and her party members were fighting at Obsidian Cave already.

……

I used a Mad Leopard Card while I was still in the air. A few minutes later, I arrived at a forest and a great battle. Hickey and Warscar were commanding around 10000 Zephyr Cavalrymen and charging into the enemy head-on. Gui Guzi and his 10000-strong Dragonlight Cavalry party played the flank.

At the frontline, Tear Stain executed Ice Flame Slash + Ice Blade Slash combo and instakilled 4 Berserking Zephyr Cavalrymen at once. At the same time, she activated Void Barrier, a Divine General Skill that caused all attacks targeted at her to have a 50% chance to miss and greatly reduced the amount of damage she would’ve received. Moreover, considering her current stats and Luck, I reckoned that a normal player’s attack only had a chance of 30% or less to hit her.

While a high-hit-rate player like Beiming Xue would still be able to hit her most of the time, it still increased her survivability drastically, not to mention that she had a lifesteal attribute as well. As a result, she and her group of high-level Throne of the Wild players were able to tank even the Berserking Zephyr Cavalry head-on.

Warscar let out an angry roar and used Earth Shattering Slash + Barrier Break at a high-level knight next to Tear Stain, killing him instantly. Tear Stain might not be afraid of Warscar’s massively boosted Attack, but the rest of her players couldn’t claim the same thing.

"Damn you!"

Visibly furious, Tear Stain activated Blitzkrieg to increase her skill combo limit from 2 to 3. Then, she executed Ice Flame Slash + Ice Blade Slash + Barrier Break combo against Warscar. The triple-skill combo was so devastating that even Warscar’s S1 set was groaning under pressure. The man himself was yelping in pain as he withdrew to the back—

110292!

102929!

142281!

Tear Stain’s Barrier Break was too powerful for Warscar to endure, and his HP dropped to just 25% or so. Temporarily knocked out of the fight, the viking hurriedly rode toward his priests and beckoned them to heal him. Thankfully, it only took him a short time to return to full health.

Pu!

Hickey let out a battle cry as she slashed Tear Stain’s waist with Barrier Break. However, her mouth fell open when she realized that the skill only dealt 90882 damage. She had no idea that Tear Stain was so tanky until she attacked her.

"Hee…"

Surprisingly, Tear Stain let out a giggle before spinning around and knocking Hickey away from her. A smile dancing on her lips, she said, "You are the former number one expert of the Netherlands’ champion arena, Hickey? Come at me!"

Tear Stain spurred her mount forward and dashed into Hickey’s zone without hesitation, swinging her sword three times with lightning speed. Hickey was a beat slower than her opponent, and she could only defend herself from the attacks and be knocked back again.

Gritting her teeth, Hickey ran along an S-shaped path and cut right into her opponent’s trajectory, intending to use the butterfly maneuver to defeat Tear Stain. It was a high-level technique that involved darting into the enemy’s blind spot repeatedly and attacking them from there. Unfortunately, Tear Stain’s mastery of the butterfly maneuver was on the same level as her senior brother’s, Candlelight Shadow’s. There was little chance the technique would work on her.

Chiang!

Tear Stain parried Hickey’s first strike and allowed the second to hit her. During this time, she raised her arm and yelled, "Absolute Zero!"

Crack crack crack!

Hickey abruptly froze in her tracks. Her fingers were glowing with the light of her Divine General Skill, Great Earth Dragon’s Blade, but she wasn’t able to unleash it in time. Countless blocks of ice had sprouted from beneath her feet and frozen her entire body. She wasn’t the only Godkiller player who suffered the same fate either. Absolute Zero had a wide range, so dozens of Zephyr Cavalrymen close to the two girls had been frozen as well. Of course, the Berserking vikings were unaffected by the CC skill.

……

Damn, neither Warscar nor Hickey were able to beat Tear Stain. Her individual PvP skill was just too much for Godkiller to handle.

Swhoosh!

So I dropped down from the sky and charged straight toward her. I brought my sword down on her head as swift as lightning!

"Ah?!"

Caught off-guard, Tear Stain only had enough time to raise her sword in an attempt to parry the attack. She also tilted her arm slightly so that she could minimize the amount of force she received from my attack. The essence of parry lay in the redirection and removal of force pressing toward you. The more force you managed to redirect, the less damage you would receive.

I saw exactly what she was attempting to do, so right before our blades were about to clash, I abruptly twisted my wrist and shifted my blade about 3 cm horizontally. By the time Tear Stain realized what I had done, it was already too late. We both knew that the gap between the strongest and weakest point of the parry was just 3 centimeters apart.

140201!

As my strike crushed Tear Stain’s parry, the Ancient Divine Dragon landed heavily on the ground and let out a mighty roar, scaring the shit out of Tear Stain’s mount and causing it to backpedal. However, I hounded Tear Stain doggedly, summoned an indigo bagua diagram beneath my feet, and thrust my sword straight toward her chest. Again, I changed the angle of my attack at the last moment, avoided her blade and stabbed her right in the abdomen!

Pu!

182893!

Tear Stain’s complexion turned gray as her HP dropped past the halfway point instantly. However, instead of withdrawing to her priests, she grabbed the blade of my Purple Ying Sword with her left hand and executed Ice Blade Slash with her right!

Pa!

My body turned icy. Fuck, the skill actually got through my resistances and froze me. Still, it was only 1.5 seconds, which was nowhere enough time for her to kill me at all. Even without a bard or a Famous General buff, I had almost 1 million HP. It was near impossible for anyone to instakill me in 1.5 seconds.

In fact, that wasn’t what Tear Stain was planning anyway. After moving away from me and drinking a health potion, she ordered, "Archers, use Shock Arrow and Bone Eroding Arrow on Broken Halberd Sinks Into Sand! 2nd and 3rd squad, enter the two rightmost caves and dig as much Obsidian Metal as you can!"

Countless archers answered her command and fired their skills at me. After I had recovered, I raised the Dragon God Shield defensively in front of me, dashed sideways and cast Summon the Storm on top of a group of archers, killing them all. Not done yet, I slapped my palm to the ground and cast Rise of the Guardian Dragon, tearing all the Throne of the Wild cavalrymen around me to pieces. The skill was just way too deadly.

"What?"

Tear Stain looked like she had just swallowed something disgusting. She had no idea I had acquired such a powerful skill until now. Up until recently, I had been grinding at Iron Skull Wilderness, so it wasn’t like the paparazzi had many opportunities to capture footage of my battles and post it on the internet. It made sense that most people including Tear Stain wouldn’t know about Rise of the Guardian Dragon.

……

Standing several hundred meters apart from each other, Tear Stain and I stopped fighting temporarily and watched each other closely. Around us, Bloody Mercenaries, Godkiller and Throne of the Wild were duking it out, and beneath us, countless bodies littered the ground. We spoke as if we were the only two people left in the world—

"Tear Stain!" I growled. "Why have you broken our agreement? You agreed that you would operate at the sections of Dragonbone Mountain Range that aren't close to the China server!"

Tear Stain answered with a shrug, "Hey, it’s not like I wanted to break our agreement, it’s just that our engineers need a very special ore called Obsidian Metal, and unfortunately it’s only available in the areas close to the China server. This is Purple Grape City’s domain anyway, so neither you nor me has a monopoly over these resources. That stinky brat of yours called Gui Guzi wouldn’t let us through, so technically speaking, you’re the ones who forced my hands!"

I raised the Purple Ying Sword and smiled dangerously. "Gui Guzi is my brother, not a ‘brat’. Also, since ancient times, there’s been a saying ‘first come first served’. We are the ones who came to Obsidian Cave first. If you insist on challenging our natural right to these resources, then don’t blame me if I wipe you all out! Show me what you have, Candlelight Shadow’s junior sister!"

Tear Stain’s expression changed. "Is that a declaration of war, Lu Chen?"

I pointed at the ground beneath me and growled, "This is Godkiller’s territory you’re standing on, and you know that we’ve been here for a few days already! Not only that, you’re the one who attacked us, and now you’re saying that I’m the one who’s declaring war on you? Do you think that Godkiller is a guild you can push around however you like? Just watch, I’m going to kick you and your fucking guild out of Ice River Canton’s borders right now!"

"Good! Very good! We’ll see who emerges as the victor when all this is over!"

Backing away even more, Tear Stain ordered, "Ranged parties, I don’t care if you have to lose ten thousand men, suppress Lu Chen with all you got! The rest of you, rush down the enemy from the sides now! Lu Chen is the only real threat in Godkiller, no one else is a match for you! Attack at full power and don’t hold back!"

……

A new chorus of battle cries filled the air. Tear Stain was really going all out this time.

Behind me, after cutting down a low-health Burning City player, Hickey reported, "Boss, I just received news that Tear Stain is gunning for Obsidian Metal because her territory is now Rank 10, and her territory skill allows her to create a heavy siege engine called ‘Obsidian Thunder Siege Engine’. That is why they are doing everything in their power to take this cave…"

I frowned. "Burning City wants to create Obsidian Thunder Siege Engines? Who are they planning to siege?"

"Who else?" Gui Guzi appeared from behind me and answered.

I raised my sword. "There’s no more need for words then. Kill them all! Don’t let them mine even a single ore!"