I gently passed Moonlight Stone to Gui Guzi and gave my fists a tentative clench. Good, I still have some feeling and strength left. Slowly, I walked up to Candlelight Shadow and asked, "You ARE the guild leader of Candle Dragon, right Candlelight Shadow? In that case, you must know that Wind Listener is pursuing Moonlight Stone, right?"

Candlelight Shadow replied grimly, "So what if I do? I’m their guild leader, not their parents. It is not my business to interfere with my guild members’ relationships."

"Are you aware that Moonlight Stone hates Wind Listener then?" I continued closing the distance between us.

Candlelight Shadow declared upright and unafraid, "Again, so what? Not all relationships bear fruit."

I laughed. "When Wind Listener harassed Moonlight Stone, not a single person in your base tried to stop him. When Wind Listener barged into Moonlight Stone’s room, your people just let him do as he pleased! This is none of your business, you say? What about the conflict between Wind Listener and Moonlight Stone’s older brother then? Your generals are literally fighting among themselves, and you just stood by and let it happen! Are you really going to tell me that this is proper leadership?!"

Candlelight Shadow continued grimly, "A successful person cannot be bothered by trifles if they wish to achieve great things. Unless someone crosses the line, I won’t involve myself in my guild members’ conflict. Plus, I’ve already told Wind Listener to give up on pursuing Moonlight Stone. I can’t do anything about it if he refuses to listen."

"You can’t do anything about it? YOU can’t do ANYTHING about it? Hahaha! Hahaha!"

I abruptly punched Candlelight Shadow in the face and dropped him to the ground. I then roared at his prone form, "What the fuck do you think Moonlight Stone is? A merchandise to use to curry favor with Wind Listening Pavilion? It’s your responsibility as a guild leader to ensure every member of your guild receives the respect they deserve! If you can’t do something as simple as that, then I will! I hereby declare that Moonlight Stone is Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls’, and we will not allow Candle Dragon to humiliate her any longer!"

Candlelight Shadow coughed out a few drops of blood as he climbed to his feet. He let out a laugh before saying, "Interesting! Who would’ve thought that a vice leader of Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls would try to teach me how to be a guild leader one day?"

Before I knew it, I was thrown back several steps by a punch to the chest. The attack was heavy and powerful. As it turned out, Candlelight Shadow’s physique was incredibly strong for a professional gamer.

Thud thud thud...

I held up my hand and stopped Gui Guzi and High Fighting Spirits from coming to my aid. I said, "Stand back. The two of us should’ve come to blows a long time ago, and I don’t want anyone to get in our way!"

Candlelight Shadow charged me again, and our fists met in midair. This time though, I was the one who won and sent Candlelight Shadow staggering to the back. I caught up to him and kneed him in the stomach, staining his white windbreaker in my blood and eliciting a painful groan from him. In fact, the blow was so powerful that he flew through the air and smashed into a porcelain vase. Pieces of the vase, flowers and water spilled across the ground, but as Candlelight Shadow climbed back to his feet I could see that he was smirking a bit.

Suddenly, Candlelight Shadow grabbed a thorny stem beside him, leaped to his feet and whipped my arms like it was a whip. It left fleshy holes in my arms and inflicted massive amounts of pain.

I responded by kicking Candlelight Shadow in the stomach again, but he managed to land a solid punch on my ankle.

As I stumbled forward, I lowered my center of gravity and punched Candlelight Shadow in the cheeks.

Bang!

This time, he hit the ground and slid almost two meters away from me.

Tempest Shadow couldn’t stand this any longer and shouted, "Do you think there’s no one who can stand up to you, Lu Chen!?"

He rushed toward me and punched me hard in the shoulder.

Thud!

The blow was painful, but I allowed myself to drop to the floor while sweeping out with my right leg. After Tempest Shadow fell to the ground, I kicked out again and successfully dug my boot into his face. There was so much force behind the blow that he rolled a couple of times across the ground while screaming in pain.

……

I slowly got back to my feet while covering my leg. My entire body was hurting like a bitch.

A bit of pity entered God’s Dance’s eyes as she said, "You just want to take Moonlight Stone with you, right, Lu Chen? Then go. You’ve made a big enough mess of our base already."

I nodded at her while limping back to my allies. "Thank you!"

After a drenched Candlelight Shadow finally climbed back to his feet, he uttered, "I’ll admit that your criticisms and your actions have some merit, Lu Chen. It is my failure that Moonlight Stone, a guild member of Candle Dragon was bullied under my watch. That is no excuse for the humiliation you’ve dealt to our guild, however. Wash your neck and wait for us. When the time is right, we will return this humiliation tenfold!"

I turned back to shoot him a smile. "Like I care. Do whatever you want, but if you dare to bully my friends again, I swear I’ll bring an even bigger group and crush your mob like the ants they are!"

Candlelight Shadow: "..."

"C’mon. It’s time to leave, Little Gui, Chengfeng…" I said.

Everyone nodded and followed behind me.

When Li Chengfeng passed by Candlelight Shadow, he murmured in a voice that only the former Martial God could hear, "This one doesn’t count. When the time comes, you and I will settle our score once and for all!"

Candlelight Shadow shuddered, but didn’t reply.

Ye Yuse was standing next to God’s Dance. She was wearing a set of black uniform. Her gaze shifted from us, to Li Chengfeng, and finally to Candlelight Shadow. She then walked up to him and grabbed his arm in support, "Are you okay, boss?"

Candlelight Shadow nodded. "I’m fine. Let’s check up on everyone’s injuries right away. We also need to prepare a statement for when the cops arrive."

Ye Yuse replied calmly, "Don’t worry, Li Chengfeng is involved in this mess as well. Just leave it to him to wave the incident away."

Candlelight Shadow: "..."

……

Meanwhile, Chaos Moon had rushed out of her vehicle the second we exited the building entrance. She could barely keep her jaws from hitting the floor when she saw our appearance. "What the fuck happened in there? This was supposed to be an escort quest, not a battle! Is that guy with drooping head okay? He’s not dead, is he?"

Du Thirteen looked up and retorted, "Stop jinxing me, Chaos Moon. I’m just tired…"

Pa!

After I entered the driver’s seat, and Li Chengfeng entered the front passenger’s seat while clutching his wounded arm, he asked, "I don’t think I can fasten my seatbelt like this, so I’m not going to bother. Is that okay?"

"Do whatever you want…"

Li Chengfeng then took out his phone and called a number. He started saying, "Chief Huang, did you receive a call about a brawl in Candle Dragon’s base? If you do, just forget about it. It’s a brawl between players, and it’s already over. If you must investigate it though, feel free to call in a player named Wind Listener and ask him exactly how he tried to force a girl to have sex with him."

However, I hurriedly stopped him. "No, don’t! If the cops investigate this, they’ll have to bring Moonlight Stone in for questioning. she’s already been traumatized enough by this incident."

Li Chengfeng nodded. "Very well. In that case, just look into this guy’s past three years of criminal record and lock him up for a couple of years, Chief Huang. Huh? What if he doesn’t have a criminal record? Trust me, he absolutely does. Thanks, man. I’ll treat you to lunch someday. Bye~"

……

While this was going on, Chaos Moon was bandaging the wounded in her car. I had no idea she had brought some gauze with her. She truly was an attentive woman!

After she was done with her passengers, she walked over to our car and performed some basic first aid on Li Chengfeng, Du Thirteen and me. Of the three of us, Du Thirteen fared the worst because he had blocked a lot of knives with his bare arms. Luckily, the wounds were pretty shallow and didn’t reach the bones or sever any muscles. He should be fine after Chaos Moon had disinfected and bandaged his wounds.

Du Thirteen suddenly let out a chuckle as he lay against the backseat. "Man, I’m so going to fill my belly with good food after this. It’s the only way to make up for all the energy I lost, hahaha…"

Li Chengfeng joined in on the chuckling as well. "I am seriously impressed with all of you. You guys fight like you put your lives on the line!"

Gui Guzi nodded. "This is the first time I see you fight, Li, and I feel like I learned a lot of things…"

Li Chengfeng replied, "Thank you for the praise, but no homo man…"

Gui Guzi: "..."

Chaos Moon frowned while she was bandaging my arms. "Why are there rose thorns on your arms, Lu Chen? Were you really trying to save Moonlight Stone, or were you womanizing again?"

I barely held in a scream of pain before retorting, "The fuck you’re talking about? This one was caused by Candlelight Shadow!"

"What? You even fought against Candlelight Shadow?"

"Well, duh. How could I not after everything he has done? The sonuvabitch abandoned Moonlight Stone to the wolves just to curry favor with Wind Listening Pavilion and their 3000 high-level players. That’s way over the line even if his goal is to become the number one guild of China once more. You have no idea how close it was, do you? If we were even ten minutes late, god knows what would’ve happened to Moonlight Stone…"

Li Chengfeng nodded. "Yeah. Thank goodness you were decisive, Lu Chen. I would never be able to forgive myself if Moonlight Stone was raped by Wind Listener!"

"Me too!" Gui Guzi uttered while clenching his fists.

I grimaced in pain again before catching Chaos Moon’s hands. "For fuck’s sake, can you please be gentler? It seriously hurts, you know?"

As Chaos Moon burst into a giggle, she planted a sudden kiss on my cheek and said, "It doesn’t hurt now, does it?"

It certainly didn’t. Both Li Chengfeng and I were too busy being shocked by her sudden kiss right now.

Du Thirteen complained, "Oh man, why didn’t I get the same benefit?"

Chaos Moon laughed. "And why would you! I like Lu Chen, not you!"

……

After that little intermission, Gui Guzi suggested, "Say, do you guys wanna have dinner at a restaurant after we return to Suzhou? This is an occasion for celebration, right?"

I nodded in agreement. "Yeah. It’ll be a celebration for Moonlight Stone’s return to Ancient Sword!"

Chaos Moon rolled her eyes. "You mean a celebration for your total victory over Candle Dragon, right?"

Surprisingly, Li Chengfeng shook his head and said, "Total victory? You kidding me? Little Gui nearly died there…"

Chaos Moon: "..."

……

After the treatment, we rested in the car until I finally could move my limbs properly, or past 3 pm or so. Then, we drove back to Suzhou.

He Yi, Lian Xin and Murong Mingyue were already waiting at the entrance when we arrived at the gaming base. He Yi had even brought over a surgeon and a physician to inspect our injuries. Thankfully, the experts once again confirmed that none of our injuries were severe enough to warrant serious treatment, so the dinner to celebrate Moonlight Stone’s return was a go.

Speaking of Moonlight Stone, the girl’s tensed features finally relaxed when she returned to the warm and welcoming group that was Moon Dew, Heaven’s Rain, Diamond Dust and Yu Tong. Soon, even the unpleasant experiences she had suffered in Candle Dragon would be washed away with time. On a related note, Li Chengfeng had also dispatched some men to fetch her older brother, Tiger Leopard Knight, from Candle Dragon’s gaming base. After everything that had happened today, there was no way Tiger Leopard Knight could remain in Candle Dragon any longer. I mean he could, but I would be shocked if he somehow survived the combined vengeance of Candlelight Shadow and Wind Listener!

……

We went to a 6-star restaurant to have our dinner. We ate to our heart’s content since the bill would be footed by the guild.

Rustle rustle...

Some time during the dinner, He Yi rose to her feet beside me while holding a half-drank glass of red wine. She then said, "I just received word that Candle Dragon has declared war on us 15 minutes ago. Shall we make a toast to our enemy?"