He Yi’s appearance caused a small commotion as the players of Floating Ice City shot her admiring looks. Everyone said that the Fruit Knife Goddess, Wind Fantasy was the prettiest woman in Floating Ice City, but who would’ve thought that the leader of Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls was every bit her equal?

Whoosh whoosh…

A clear breeze blew up her milky-colored cape and her beautiful hair. He Yi was clad in silver armor, and the metal linings clinging tightly to her breasts only served to accentuate her already amazing curves. But that didn’t matter. What really mattered was that He Yi was petrifying men wherever she looked. In a sense, the smile on her gentle face and the flowing light in her eyes were as deadly as a Medusa’s gaze.

…...

“Am I beautiful?” He Yi stopped in front of me and lifted her cape a bit. She looked like a princess knight the way she was acting.

I nodded. Gui Guzi nodded. Our leader was absolutely one of the deadliest players in existence if we judged by beauty alone. It was to the point where I suspected that the whole reason Candlelight Shadow went after us like a madman back in Spirit of Grief was because of He Yi, not me.

He Yi licked her lips and smiled. “Stop looking and join the guild already. I just cleared out three slots for you guys!”

“Got it!”

I nodded and sent her a join request. At the same time, I asked her, “Boss, the guild hasn’t reached Rank 2 yet, has it?”

“No, but we’re almost there. Let’s work hard tonight and get it to Rank 2 before bedtime!”

“Okay, not a problem!”

A while later, the three Dark Musketeers appeared in Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls and caused a massive wave of commotion of our own.

“Oh god, Broken Halberd Sinks Into Sand really is joining us? I can’t believe I finally got to meet a CGL pro in person, the former Falling Dust himself no less. Ah, my world is falling apart…”

“Beiming Xue is here too? Wahahaha, that’s awesome! Our archers will finally have a backbone we can rely on! Beiming Xue, I love you…”

“Gui Guzi is here as well! Brother Gui, you’re my idol! There’s no one who’s tankier than you, my super tank! The way you keep your enemies at bay while they poke holes all over your body during the competition is the shit, man~~”

“Tsk tsk, now that the champions of ‘Who Will Fight Me’ have joined Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls, Floating Ice City is all but ours to take! Hell yeah!”

…...

I had to say though, the three battles at Silver Moon Valley, Who Will Fight Me, and Greedy Wolf Forest had made Bloody Mercenaries bloody famous in Floating Ice City. In fact, we were now more famous than Mad Dragon and even Gods of Destruction, the so-called second best guild of the China server!

We had dealt a blow to their self-proclaimed title, so I expected Gods of Destruction to challenge Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls and Bloody Mercenaries very soon unless something unexpected happened. I wasn’t arrogant enough to think little of Gods of Destruction, and the fact was all the players beneath Dominating Heaven Blade were first-rate or second-rate at the worst. If we really clashed swords against one another, I expected Bloody Mercenaries and Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls to eek out a draw at most, even if our guilds were now combined in strength.

Of course, it would be a lot easier to eliminate Gods of Destruction if I could persuade Lin Yixin and her Snowy Cathaya to help us. However, Beauty Lin was also a temperamental woman, so I wasn’t sure who she would destroy if I carelessly dragged her into our war. She could easily decide to annihilate Bloody Mercenaries’ asses if she felt like it one day. It wasn’t even a small possibility, or at least that was what my subconsciousness kept telling me for some reason.

That being said, the entire Floating Ice City would quake if the Fruit Knife Goddess decided to make a move, so I supposed it didn’t really matter in the end.

…...

He Yi looked incredibly pleased after accepting three fearsome generals into her guild in one go. Smiling brightly and beautifully, she asked, “Say, you were planning to form a party and go on a leveling trip, right? Which party is yours? Can I join you?”

I nodded. “Of course. I’ll reserve one slot for you and take just eight people!”

“Great!”

According to the rules in Heavenblessed, a player before his third class promotion could form a 5-man party, a third-promotion player could form a 10-man party, a fourth-promotion player could form a 20-man party, and finally a fifth-promotion player could form an insane 100-man party!

I messaged inside the guild chat. “I’m gonna go on an adventure and grind some levels. Anyone would like to join me? Flash your IDs if you want to join me.”

A minute later, more than seventy players out of the ninety plus who were online were flashing their IDs. These people must have so much free time on their hands that their balls were hurting from inactivity.

I picked some names and messaged again.

“Level 60 warrior Chaos Moon, Level 61 magic knight Alexander, Level 61 priest Moon Dew, Level 61 warrior Wolf Fang, Level 61 archer Shangri-La, Level 61 tactician A Broken Smile, Level 60 mage Singing to Wine, and Level 60 mage Moonlight Stone. Come to the eastern gate so I can add you to the party. Our leader, From Water, will be joining me as well. Let’s go farm some EXP for the guild!”

All the chosen players were expressing their excitement in the guild chat.

Beauty Chaos Moon: “Hoho, did the handsome guy just say my name? He did, didn’t he?”

Beauty Moonlight Stone: “Just give me some time to kill one last mob and I’ll show up right away. Heehee, take this! Ice Dragon Howl~~”

Beauty Moon Dew: “Anyone thirsting for some heals?”

A Broken Smile: “Haha, this is perfect! I just learned the Level 60 Tactician skill called Intimidate. It reduces the stats of all enemy targets by 5%! I’m sure it’ll be very useful for grinding!”

Shangri-La: “Wow, there are so many beautiful girls in this party. I’m sure tonight’ll be a night of happiness…”

......

Rolling my eyes at the last comment, I said, “Dating is not allowed during grinding. Anyone who breaks the law will be shot at by our firing squad for ten whole minutes!”

The joke got a laugh out of everyone.

While I was socializing with the grunts, Murong Mingyue, Gui Guzi and Beiming Xue also formed their own parties and made the atmosphere even livelier than it already was. It was the sign of a good guild environment.

He Yi walked up to me and said, “It looks like your reputation as a CGL Hall of Famer and a top player is doing wonders so far, Lu Chen. It’s so good to have you back. Before your return, I wasn’t sure the guild had the power to take on a super guild like Gods of Destruction, but now? Hehe, it’s only a matter of time~~”

I smiled back and nodded. “Yeah, Gods of Destruction are so-so at best. If their numbers weren’t so ridiculous, I could’ve beaten them solo…”

“Is that a boast?”

I curled my lips and replied, “Sure, why not? The words boasting and bragging are actually synonymous with absolute confidence, you know?”

“Now you’re just spinning it to make yourself look good~~”

“Hehe, come on, it’s time to add our members into our party!”

"Mn!”

He Yi and I walked side by side. When I put a hand on my sword, I felt like a super bodyguard for some reason. I was He Yi’s Divine General as she said, and I adored the nickname because it was the goal I had been working toward since a long time ago. The fact that my efforts were recognized made me happier than I would admit openly.

A breeze hit us when we arrived on the stone bridge at the eastern gates, and my Bloody Purgatory Cloak fluttered slightly in the wind. He Yi watched me as she asked with a smile, “What is your plan to do after this, Lu Chen?”

“Oh?” Surprised by her question, I replied without hesitation, “To keep you company, of course~”

“Oh? To do what, exactly?”

“To conquer all our enemies and reach the top of the world, of course!” I declared forcefully and raised my sword like a knight swearing fealty to his princess.

He Yi giggled before nodding at me. “Very good. Then let us begin our conquest right here at Floating Ice City!”

“Yes!”

I thought for a moment before saying, “The power structure in Floating Ice City is still a bit unclear at the moment, but I think we can consider Gods of Destruction and Mad Dragon as our direct competitors, and Peach Garden the knife in the darkness we need to watch out for. I’m sure they’ll rise to the surface very soon, and if I’m not mistaken they’re even scarier than Gods of Destruction was!”

“Mn. And what about our allies?”

He Yi blinked once, knowing or unknowingly left me speechless for a moment. It took a while of thinking before I finally said, “For now, we have no allies. Maybe Snowy Cathaya…?”

“Got it. If we can make an ally out of Snowy Cathaya, we’ll be able to truly establish ourselves as a powerhouse in Floating Ice City. If we don’t, Gods of Destruction may just destroy us and devour the whole city in one go!”

“Yeah!”

I looked at the land across the bridge and smiled. “We may be hanging around in Floating Ice City for another month or so before the super cities open. Speaking of which, which city do you think we should join: Sky City, Wind City or Vanished God City?”

He Yi said, “I’m fine with whatever. You can decide!”

“In that case, let’s wait until we get more info~”

“Okay!”

…...

It didn’t take long before eight people with a beautiful ancient sword around their shoulder area showed up. They were the elite players we had been waiting for!

Chaos Moon was a high-level warrior with great looks and great equipment. Her skill was yet to be determined.

Moon Dew was a high-level priest with great looks and great equipment. Her skill was yet to be determined.

Moonlight Stone was a high-level mage with average looks and average equipment. Her skill was yet to be determined.

A Broken Smile was a high-level tactician, possibly the best tactician the guild had right now.Unfortunately, he still wasn’t good enough to be of use. A tactician was best deployed during group fights, especially during the latter stage of the game where a fifth-promotion tactician could apply their buffs to a hundred players. It didn’t take much to imagine how much destruction a tactician could cause just by buffing his allies with Encourage and increasing their Attack.

As for the rest, they were walk-ons that didn’t deserve a close examination. In reality, our party only really needed priests, mages and archers. As for melee fighters, He Yi and I alone were enough to handle anything!

He Yi’s level wasn’t very high. She was Level 55 and she hadn’t reached her third class promotion yet. Still, I could see that she had been grinding very seriously as of late.

After our ten-man party was formed, it was time to depart!

Our party composition was scientific, or in other words, acceptable: 5 melee fighters, 2 mages, 1 priest, 1 archer and 1 tactician. This party had someone who could use Encourage and Intimidate, tanks, long-ranged attackers and Ice Dragon Howl spammers. Unless we ran into a super boss or something, there was practically no middle-level grinding zone we couldn’t handle

Chaos Moon asked me a question, “So, where are we going, brother Broken Halberd?”

The muscles in my face twitched for a second. She must be a natural socializer; not many people would address the other person as their “brother” during their first meeting.

I opened the world map and mulled over the available choices for a moment. A while later, I said, “How about we head to Silverscale Coast?”

The average level of the mobs there was 65, and they had great catches like the Spearfish. There was nothing better than leveling up and collecting some cooking ingredients at the same time, killing two birds with one stone!