"Boss…"

Ye Yuse could only watch in shock as Candlelight Shadow crumbled in front of her. His ambusher was a Level 225 magic swordsman, and the man said with a pleased and twisted smirk on his face, "Martial God my ass. This is all you amount to…"

Pu!

The ambusher picked up a pair of wristguards Candlelight Shadow dropped before pulling his sword from the latter’s back. The status screen above his head stated—

Amber Pupil LV-225 Magic Swordsman

Nation: None

Main City: None

Guild: Dark Mercenaries

Position: Leader

……

I could hardly believe my eyes. Amber Pupil had been exiled from the China server and stripped of his in-game nationality and identity, so I wasn’t expecting to ever see him again. However, not only had he returned to the China server, his very first act was to stab Candlelight Shadow in the back!

"Boss…"

Ye Yuse let out a dazed murmur as she watched Candlelight Shadow’s body. Then, a steely look entered her eyes, and she activated her Heavenly River Transformation. She dashed sideways while hitting Amber Pupil with a Hold charm. Then, she dropped God Suppressing Pagoda that dealt over 600k damage to the magic swordsman. The spell was even more powerful than mages’ Touch of the Dragonkiss.

However, Amber Pupil continued smirking his twisted smirk and said, "Do you think you can defeat Dark Mercenaries alone, Ye Yuse?"

Ye Yuse ignored him and continued attacking him, but holy light kept descending on top of Amber Pupil and healing his HP. There were dozens of priests at the foot of the hill behind him, and Ye Yuse didn’t possess the firepower to immediately wipe him from the surface of the map alone.

……

Rustle rustle...

I darted across the shrubberies and brambles at max speed toward the duo. The moment I entered within a hundred meters of Amber Pupil, I immediately threw my Chill of the Nine Provinces at him.

"Shit!"

One look at the spinning blade was enough to inform Amber Pupil that I had arrived. He spun around and tried to parry the skill, but his efforts proved to be completely futile. Coiling Dragon Revolution was very difficult to parry because the projectile was spinning with high speed and force. Not even Candlelight Shadow could parry it one hundred percent of the time, much less the likes of Amber Pupil!

Bang!

My sword penetrated his chest and caused a huge damage number to pop up—390187!

Unfortunately, the damage dealt by the skill was lower than expected because I had executed it from maximum range. I had no choice but to act as quickly as I could though. Amber Pupil was clearly planning to kill Ye Yuse, and I absolutely couldn’t allow this to happen. Candle Dragon was our sworn enemy, but even they didn’t deserve to die in the hands of a traitor like Amber Pupil.

While clutching his chest in pain, a furious-looking Amber Pupil ordered in a tightly-controlled voice, "Take out Ye Yuse now!"

Rustle rustle rustle...

Countless archers burst out of their hiding spots and swarmed Ye Yuse from every direction. They were all Dark Mercenaries, and they were all eighth-promotion players. Their arrows struck impotently against Ye Yuse’s Magic Shield, but it was only a matter of time they got through. Ye Yuse’s class was Charm Master, so her Magic Shield wasn’t as durable as proper mages’. She was going to die unless someone could get to her now.

The defeated troops of Candle Dragon fared even worse than Ye Yuse. Screams of pain erupted from everywhere when the arrow rain landed.

Pu!

An arrow pierced through Ye Yuse’s Magic Shield and her chest. She staggered to the back until she hit a thick maple tree. Before she could do anything else, a couple more arrows pierced her body and hailed her to the tree trunk. Her scepter slowly dropped beside her body.

"Ye Yuse!"

Li Chengfeng descended from the sky, but the hero was too late to save the princess. Right before she died, the Charm Master stared at the bravest general of Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls and shot him a smile. "You’re too late, Li Chengfeng…" [1]

Pu!

One last arrow robbed Ye Yuse of the final sliver of HP, and all that was left after a white flash was her dead body. Now, almost everyone in Candle Dragon, regardless of importance, was dead.

……

On the mountain ridge, Amber Pupil watched us with a cold, stern expression while surrounded by a huge army of Dark Mercenaries players. They were all unaffiliated players, but I recognized some familiar faces here and there. For example, I saw some mages who, I was pretty sure, had been elite mages of Hero City. Their levels certainly spoke for themselves. For some reason, they had all abandoned their main cities and become members of Dark Mercenaries.

Chaos Moon walked up to me and said in a hushed voice, "It looks like the legends are true after all."

"LEGENDS? What legends? Just speak normally, please…" I rolled my eyes at her attempt to be dramatic.

Chaos Moon turned serious and said, "After Tang Long was sentenced to life imprisonment[2], his nephew, Amber Pupil, was chased out of the China server. For half a month, he was forced to wander the outer lands as an unaffiliated player. That was until the flagship players of the Northern Alliance came to the decision to sponsor Amber Pupil and help him remake Dragons Run Wild. Now, the Dragons Run Wild guild has changed its name to Dark Mercenaries, the guild in front of us!”

I gripped the Chill of the Nine Provinces tighter. "I see. Tell everyone to get ready. We’re going to test out their mettle in sixty seconds! What the hell do the Americans even see in Amber Pupil though? He doesn’t have the character or the strength to deserve such support…"

Chaos Moon chuckled. "He’s a traitor, that’s why. When you were exiled by Tang Long, you had devastated the Japanese in Final Duel Valley so much that Elephant City couldn’t help but invite you to become their West King. Amber Pupil is just a pure traitor though. He and around 40k Chinese players had willingly cut themselves off from their own main cities, become unaffiliated and fought for scraps in the outer lands like wolves. It’s exactly because he is a selfish bastard that the Northern Alliance is willing to sponsor him and bring him back into the game. As you may have noticed, Dark Mercenaries are here to lay claim to our Gold City. The Northern Alliance is obviously plotting to weaken our strength through Dark Mercenaries."

"It’s a nice dream, but it’s still a dream nonetheless."

I clenched my fists and gnashed my teeth. "I would rather give up on a City of Heaven than allow Dark Mercenaries to set foot on our homeland for even a second longer!"

Chaos Moon added, "On the surface, Dark Mercenaries are a mercenary guild who’ll throw their lives away for anyone who pays them well. They are very different from your standard mercenary guild though. For starters, they are at least 500k players strong, so we cannot afford to underestimate them…"

It was at this moment a thousand-man captain of Dragonlight Cavalry asked me, "Vice leader, do we really have to go up against Dark Mercenaries? I thought we were here for Gold City[3]…"

I nodded. "Yeah, the situation has changed."

While saying this, I leaped up to a giant rock and pointed at Amber Pupil’s party. Right now, they were about 300 yards away from us. I shouted, "Brothers and sisters, there is a saying that human beings will die for riches, just as birds will for food, and that is exactly correct! After all, the reason we came all the way here was just to earn some extra contribution points. However, the traitor, Amber Pupil, has snuck into our homeland with evil plans in his mind, and someone has to stop him and his guild.

“Warsky Alliance and Candle Dragon may leave Dark Mercenaries alone to seize Gold City, but we cannot! We are the shield of the China server, the guild of brothers and sisters who are forged by the hot blood in our veins! We would rather die to the last person than allow our enemies to invade our homes! Our nation’s needs come first, and right now our nation needs us to stop Dark Mercenaries from whatever it is they’re planning! You only live once in this life. Will you let it be one where you’ll look back and regret everything? To that, I say no!"

Buzz!

The Chill of the Nine Provinces shone, and all 30000 Dragonlight Cavalrymen standing in front of me unsheathed their weapons in response. We could have pursued the remnants of Candle Dragon and their allies, but we chose not to because of Dark Mercenaries’ appearance. These cruel and greedy bastards must be chased out of the China server as soon as possible, or we would surely regret the consequences later!

"Little Gui, take 5000 men with you and attack from the left. Chengfeng, you do the same from the right. The rest of you, you’ll be joining me on the full-frontal assault. We’re going to catch the enemy from three different directions and crush them like the bugs they are. On a side note, make sure you hit as many people with your Ultimate Strength Break. Dark Mercenaries vastly outnumber us, so it is up to your proper use of Ultimate Strength Break to win this battle!"

After everyone gave me a nod of acknowledgement, I wasted no more time and raced for the mountain ridge. I raced way ahead of everyone so that the enemy would focus their firepower on me instead of the Dragonlight Cavalry.

I checked my remaining Divine Energy Points while shrouding myself in Battle Astral Wind. I only had 57 points left, which meant that I could unleash the Xuanyuan Slash two more times at most. Provided that the angle was excellent, an SSS Rank Ancient Divine Skill was powerful and wide enough to one-shot a thousand players at once. Unfortunately, its cost was just as great. I would have to choose my timing carefully. If only we could have thousands of Divine Energy Points...

……

Meanwhile, Amber Pupil stared straight at me while growling, "Lu Chen is coming. I want everyone to kill him with everything you’ve got. Archers, decide now who among you will be spamming Shock Arrows, and the other group, Skypiercers. Mages, surround Lu Chen with God Devil Breaks. Taking him out is the fastest way to make the entire China server tremble beneath out boots!"

Ting ting ting ting…

It was impossible to dodge all the arrows flying toward me, but I didn’t need to. I activated Ghost Spirit Step Art and gave myself a 75% chance to evade an incoming attack. I changed my movement speed and direction repeatedly to trick the archers into missing me. Those I couldn’t dodge, I either parried with the Chill of the Nine Provinces or relied on the Battle Astral Wind to catch them all. Heaven only knows how much damage Battle Astral Wind stopped with this one charge alone.

Crack!

When I reached a suitable distance, I abruptly crushed a protruding rock under my boot and shot toward Amber Pupil like an arrow. Then, I executed my signature skill, Burning Blade Slash!

Boom boom boom!

As the triple-hit skill deleted over 70% of Amber Pupil’s HP, I swung my blade across his neck and produced a MISS. It wasn’t an execution error, however. I had hit him with a Pardon so that his healers couldn’t outheal the next combo of skills I was going to hit him with!

Amber Pupil was well aware of what I was planning. While backpedaling frantically, he shouted, "Heal me now! Now!"

I threw my sword at him using Coiling Dragon Revolution. The ranged skill was more than enough to delete over 50% of his HP after Pardon.

……

Swhoosh!

Unfortunately, Amber Pupil activated his invincibility skill at the last moment and caused my blade to bounce harmlessly off of his body.

I frowned but refrained from killing him with Xuanyuan Slash. He wasn’t worth 20 Divine Energy Points, especially since I could just kill him after the invincibility ran out.

Whoosh!

Suddenly, a sea of flames engulfed my person, shredded my Battle Astral Wind and dealt over 400k damage to me. It was Hellish Tribulation, the Onmyouji class’s ultimate skill!

I looked up. Standing between some mountain rocks was none other than the Onmyouji, Now and Forever.

……

I grinned. So the former guild leader of Sword Lord of Jianghu had joined Dark Mercenaries as well! Whatever they were planning, they weren’t pulling their punches for sure!

1. T/N: this totally isn’t foreshadowing anything, nope.

2. T/N: Holy shit Tang Long truly is the politician. Chengfeng was so sure he would get the death penalty, but he managed to change it to life imprisonment instead

3. E/N: And we thought too much food spoils the stomach and that you are here for Candle Dragon. I guess we were both wrong…