Thud thud thud…

Countless arrows and magic spells like Touch of the Dragonkiss erupted across the defensive barrier that was my Battle Astral Wind. I kept dashing horizontally and retaliating with Myriad Sword Obliterations and Burning Blade Slashes so that most of the enemy’s attention was on me, not He Yi, Gui Guzi and the others. The good news was that Battle Astral Wind was insanely durable. Despite being blasted for ten seconds straight, I had only lost 19% durability in total. There was also the fact that I was currently inside a forest, and I was using obstacles to force certain ranged skills to miss and avoiding over 75% of the attacks in general. That was why the enemies were as frustrated as they were.

The Phantom Wolf King roared and killed all the archers and mages who were unlucky enough to stray onto its path of carnage. Although eighth-promotion mages had a skill called Galaxy Shield that greatly increased Magic Shield durability, only a handful of mages had hit that threshold. Therefore, the Phantom Wolf King was still a god among ranged players.

I controlled the apparition to perform all kinds of dodging movements and offensive skills. Burning Blade Slash, Summon the Storm and more. My goal was to maximize my DPS and minimize the threat the enemy posed to the other players. Once all of our players had come back online—I expected it to take between 10 to 20 minutes—we could withdraw from this place.

……

On the other side, Godslaying Blade, Aurora Thrust and more skills erupted from the 10000+ Dragonlight Cavalrymen who were making their way toward my location. Hero Alliance’s players they faced looked tired and terrified because of that monstrous charge we had done earlier. Having lost their courage to go head-to-head against the Dragonlight Cavalry a long time ago, most of them simply focused on getting out of our way.

Suddenly, a man rushed out of a tent about 50 yards away from my position before scrambling up his mount. He wielded a dark red blade, his armor resembled a dragon. It was of course Li Chengfeng. Upon activating Great Earth Transformation, he immediately cut a dozen or so players in the neck and jumped into the air. Then, he threw his blade at a group of players and one-shot them all with Dragonblade Revolution!

"Lu Chen!" Li Chengfeng shouted. "Why are there enemies all around us, and how are we going to do this?"

I pointed to the east and said, "Eve and Little Gui are coming to us from over there! Our main force is there as well! Join them while I cover for you!"

"Got it!"

……

Relying on Battle Astral Wind to protect me, I dashed toward the enemy—blue ripples of energy spreading from beneath my feet every time I took a step—and cut down everyone in my path. At the same time, I cast Summon the Storm to clear out a path for Li Chengfeng. The dragon warrior didn’t waste even a second to empower himself with Battle Soul Possession and kill off all the low-health players who survived Summon the Storm.

We quickly met up with our main force, but the entire canyon was overflowing with enemies. It meant that we had to sweep the whole place to rescue the players who couldn’t exit their tents despite having come back online. In theory, our tiny stream would eventually grow into a thick river that could withstand the enemy’s brutal attempt to suppress our charge. In practice, it was of course a lot harder than it seemed.

Thankfully, the strategy went smoother than expected, and our numbers kept swelling more and more. The buffs Moon Dew, Pure Love and more applied to us helped a lot to maintain our momentum, and our counterattack truly began when Lu Buyi came online as well. A 100% boost to all stats was more than enough to transform the one thousand troops he commanded into moving fortresses capable of sweeping almost any enemy. Slowly but surely, we were able to turn the situation on its head.

It took half an hour, but we were able to hold out until practically everyone had come back online. It was at this moment a new army appeared from the northeast direction. They were Chinese, and they were commanded by none other than Warsky himself. They numbered around 200k players, which meant that their main force was still relatively intact.

Warsky yelled while swinging his blade, "We’ve come to protect your rear, Lu Chen! Lead Ancient Sword to the defense line we set up at Sky Forest now!"

I nodded. "Got it. Thanks!"

We broke out of the heavy encirclement and pulled out of Wind Canyon. Speaking of which, the tally showed that over 20 million players had died in the map in the past 24 hours. It wouldn’t be inaccurate to call it a meat grinder.

……

Sky Forest was in every sense of the word the hinterlands of Sky City. Many Sky City’s players had grinded on this map from Level 50 all the way to Level 180 or higher. It was a very fertile map. Not only that, a total of 5 player territories had spawned there. They belonged to some of the strongest guilds of Sky City.

After I arrived at the edge of the forest, I immediately turned around and shouted, "We’ll set up our defense here! Magic knights, you will form the first defense line! Archers, mages, priests, you don’t need to tell you how to position yourself, do you? Use the forest as cover to minimize the damage to receive! Also, can someone get all the catapults in our guild out here? The artillery support will be much appreciated! Today, we defend Sky Forest like we defend our homes! Today, we live and die together with Sky City!"

Sky City was the last main city of the China server. If we lost it, we would truly have nothing left.

Chiang chiang chiang...

Puffs of dust clouds rose into the air as our players dropped their long shields on the ground. It wasn’t long before a defense line about several kilometers long was formed. Joining our left side were native guilds such as Snowy Cathaya, The Monarch Descends, and Baidicheng, while our right were foreign guilds such as Blazing Hot Lips, Candle Dragon, and Peach Garden. Regardless of our origin, every guild in the China server had come together to protect our second last line of defense to the death.

……

A while later, Dominating Heaven Blade, Dominating Archer God and the rest of Gods of Destruction walked up to us. The guild leader started apologetically, "Sorry, Lu Chen. It’s our fault that the canyon entrance was breached. We still have 50k players or so, so feel free to use us as you please."

Knowing that they had done their best, I said, "It’s okay. Why don’t you join our defense line and help us defend this section of the forest?"

"Okay!"

Speaking of which, Hunting Moon Dynasty’s troops had dwindled to less than 100k as well. Blazing Hot Lips had accepted them to plug a small hole in their defense line.

I examined our guild’s defense line again before frowning. "How many Dragonlight and Zephyr Cavalrymen do we have left?"

He Yi replied quietly, "We have over 30k Dragonlight Cavalrymen, 18k Zephyr Cavalrymen and 15k Dragonlight Archers left. They’ve fought too many battles in a row, so many of them are not in tip-top condition…"

I nodded in agreement. If it wasn’t for them, Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls wouldn’t have been able to cut straight into the heart of the enemy’s army and wreak havoc there. And if it wasn’t for He Yi, our super cavalry—at least not in these numbers—wouldn’t even exist in the first place. After all, Dark Moon City might’ve been stolen from Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls if she hadn’t made the painful but necessary decision to kick me out of the guild.

I shuddered when I thought of this and reached out to grab He Yi’s hand. In a gentle tone, I said, "Thank you for everything you’ve done during my absence, Eve."

He Yi smiled back. "I’m fine. Why are you talking about this now?"

"It’s n-nothing…"

Murong Mingyue chuckled. "Try saying it to Eve again once you’ve returned to Suzhou. If the atmosphere is right, you may even be able to convert it into a first down, if you get what I mean…"

He Yi turned beet-red instantly.

I rolled my eyes in exasperation. "You truly have no shame, sis…"

"I’m shameless? This is a perfectly valid concern for a fellow sister, okay!? You’re the shameless bastard who’s been screwing around with Beauty Lin for god knows how long!"

"Maybe we can go back after this Nation War is over."

"Hmph hmph, good!"

It was at this moment Li Chengfeng interrupted, "Er… dear leaders, I know you miss each other very much, but this doesn’t seem to be the right time to flirt. The enemy is almost upon us…"

Murong Mingyue shot him a coquettish look. "Aiyo, someone is jealous I see! Now that I think about it, you were trying to woo Diamond Dust, right? So? How did it go?"

Li Chengfeng sighed. "Now that you mentioned it, I simply must complain about this. You remember that time I took her to a movie? During a touching scene, she broke into tears, grabbed my shoulder and called not my name, but Lu Chen’s! She’s been twisted too much by him…"

I turned purple. "Fuck, how am I getting dragged into this mess? This literally has nothing to do with me!"

He Yi giggled. "On the contrary, it’s perfectly natural for a known womanizer to be blamed for such things. Don’t worry though, no matter what happens, you’re still the vice leader of Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls. We’ll make sure you look good even when you exit the stage…"

Me: "..."

……

I put a hand on Li Chengfeng’s shoulder and said, "Well, keep working on it. She’s a young woman, so her view of love is still relatively simple. As long as you don’t give up, you’ll be able to set her on the straight and narrow eventually. I promise you that my image of her is like Richard Moore in Detective Conan…"

Li Chengfeng clenched his fists in determination. "Fine, I’ll do my best to set her right. If I fail though, you have a duel waiting ahead of ya…"

Thud!

I planted my sword on the ground and declared, "You can try, but you’ll never beat me…"

"Bruh, I know it’s the truth, but you could’ve put it a bit nicer…"

It was at this moment the girl in question walked up to us with a frigid expression on her face. "Pooh! Who are you calling twisted, Li Chengfeng? And so what if I like Lu Chen? I never change my mind once I set my mind on someone, so just give it up already! What do you like so much about me anyway? I’ll change! In fact, I have a sister who I think is a perfect fit for you. I can introduce her to you if you want!"

Li Chengfeng hugged his sword and rocked himself. "I don’t wanna…"

"She comes from a rich family. She has five houses at the 3rd Ring Road of Beijing!"

"No!"

"She’s as pretty as Yang Mi…"

"No!"

"She’s kind, gentle and has a great personality…"

"No!"

"Her bust size is 36D…"

"N-oh. What’s her name?"

……

A chorus of uncontrollable laughter filled the forest for a moment, so much so that even Lin Yixin was shooting us a frown—

Sun Qingqing said, "I can literally hear the slime in his cackle. Wanna bet that your Lu Chen is flirting with some girl again?"

Lin Yixin clenched her fists tightly. "Hmph! I bet that bastard is flirting with Diamond Dust or being flirted at. Either way, they’re both dead!"

Purple Marquis raised his blade. "Really? I’ve wanted to duel Lu Chen for a long time now, not to mention that Dark Moon City is an amazing territory. Let’s attack it next month, shall we?"

Nangong Lexi also agreed. "Yeah, we should totally occupy Dark Moon City. Your order, boss?"

Lin Yixin looked at them teary-eyed. "You’re all baddies…"

Of course, the crowd stared back. "Fuck you!"