Little Piglet wasn"t the only one who was shocked. If I wasn"t sure if Little Piglet was super-tier or not before, I was now. I hadn"t bothered parrying his Ice Ray Flurry because he had deliberately angled the beams so that they would hit me from three different directions. I was fast, but I was only human. No reaction was fast enough to counter such an unpredictable attack. Moreover, Little Piglet was a super-tier expert, meaning that my usual predictions were useless against him.
I let out a growl and imbued myself with Wild Roar. Currently, the most logical action for me was to run over my opponent with my devastating attack power.
Little Piglet watched me sternly as ice spread from beneath his feet. It was the visual effect of Freezing Heat. The skill would dissipate in about 7 seconds, so Little Piglet had to deal with me in this time frame. Otherwise, his 40% attack speed would be completely wasted.
I swung my sword and fired the Dragon Slaying Slas.h.!.+
Swhoos.h.!.+
A cyan blade energy dropped from the sky, forcing Little Piglet to change directions and dodge out of the way. My Dragon Slaying Slash had actually missed its target!
MISS!
I had thought this might happen eventually, but my heart still sank when the skill missed. Dragon Slaying Slash was a long-range skill with 1 to 1.5 seconds of channeling time. By predicting my enemy"s movement and concealing my skill movement, I normally would have a 100% hit rate against ordinary experts. Unfortunately, Little Piglet was not ordinary, so it was impossible to hit him consistently with Dragon Slaying Slash.
“Hehe…”
Little Piglet chuckled before das.h.i.+ng toward me from the side. He moved as quick as lightning.
I ran toward him like the wind myself. After successfully parrying Little Piglet"s first attack, I thrust my sword toward his chest in an attempt to hit him with Ice Ray. He would definitely be at a disadvantage if the skill hit!
“Naive!”
Little Piglet growled before gliding to the right like a nimble snake. The Purgatory Sword almost scratched his chest, but it still failed to make contact in the end! He was just too fast to be caught by an attack like this!
Unfortunately, that wasn"t the end of my combo. Little Piglet"s pleased expression froze when he realized too late that a bright cyan light was glowing from the left hand I had purposely hid from his view!
Boom!
I fired the Dragon Slaying Slash again at where Little Piglet was escaping too. This time, there was on dodging the attack!
Bang!
3459!
Failing to foresee my hidden move, Little Piglet suffered a lot of damage. He never thought that my Ice Ray was just the diversion, and my killer move was the Dragon Slaying Slash with a high chance to miss. In Heavenblessed, accuracy wasn"t completely reliant on pure data. Sometimes, it was possible to increase one"s skill hit rate to 100% through prediction and calculation!
The Dragon Slaying Slash almost ended Little Piglet where he stood. If he hadn"t drank a large health potion earlier, he would"ve been dead already.
“Dammit!”
I thought Little Piglet was going to back off, and he did. But before he moved away, he spun around without warning and stabbed his sword toward me. Judging from the sheen of blue covering the blade, it was an Ice Ray!
My eyes turned steely as I circled to Little Piglet"s flanks and swung my sword at the same time. The Ice Ray just barely missed me as my own sword traveled toward his neck!
1453!
He was still alive. It looked like Little Piglet had over 7000 HP. No wonder he thought he could challenge Lin Yixin and I solo.
……
Rustle rustle…
Our war boots dug deep into the snow and dragged long marks as we skidded away from one another. Staring at me with steely eyes, Little Piglet waved his sword and surrounded himself in a surge of cyan wind energy without warning. The energy turned into a cyan s.h.i.+eld, and the message in the combat log surprised me yet again—
Beep!
Combat Log: Player “Little Piglet” used “Wind of Recovery”, regenerating 50% HP over 10 seconds!
……
What an amazing recovery skill! It was much better than my Tenacity of the Dead! Just who was this Little Piglet, and why had I never heard of him in China before? He didn"t even look old. Was he one of those super experts who chose to stay anonymous until now?
Little Piglet raised his sword into the air after recovering himself with Wind of Recovery. A b.l.o.o.d.y energy suddenly bolted down his weapon and into his body, buffing his attack power by 20%! It was yet another buff skill called Strength of Divine Arms!
s.h.i.+t, he"s even harder to fight now!
……
Not far away, Pillar of the Nation laughed loudly. “Well done, Little Piglet! Kill Broken Halberd Sinks Into Sand, and you"ll become the number one expert of Sky City!”
But Little Piglet looked completely unaffected by his hirer"s cheer. Right now, he probably only had eyes for me, the terrain around us and both our cooldowns. He was probably waiting for that one opening where he could launch a devastating strike against me, wasn"t he? Even I had to admit that he was a true professional.
I myself was waiting for such an opportunity. Little Piglet"s HP and Defense weren"t too far behind mine, so the only way to beat him was to one-shot him. If the fight dragged out, he could rejuvenate himself with Wind of Recovery, while I only had a low-rank Regeneration of the Undead to pa.s.sively regenerate my health. It would be incredibly bad for me if I allowed that to happen. Moreover, Little Piglet hadn"t summoned his pet to fight me, so I couldn"t throw away my pride and order my little wolf to help me either.
Both of us were waiting for that one-shot. Both of us also knew that the other party knew that we were waiting for that one-shot.
We had returned to full health about ten seconds later. The atmosphere was murderous and solemn. At the side, Pillar of the Nation was recording the entire battle and waiting for Little Piglet to put me down with this one strike.
Swhoosh swhoosh…
Both of us took off at the same time as snow flew around us. We zigzagged toward each other and clashed swords about four to five times in just a couple of seconds, leaving at least five meters of intersecting footsteps on the ground. So far, none of us were able to hit each other because every attack and counterattack had been successfully parried by the other party.
Behind Pillar of the Nation, a warrior"s jaw hit the floor as he said, “WTF, guys, change your camera angles and look at their movement from top to bottom…”
That"s right, if you were to look at the ground from above, you would find that the footsteps we left on the ground looked incredibly similar to a hexagram.
……
Crack!
A series of devastating exchanges later, my sword finally diverted a little from its original path and hit Little Piglet on the shoulder instead of the neck.
The killing intent in his eyes suddenly exploded like the sun. This was his chance!
Ice Ray Flurry!
The triple strike was absolutely devastating. I had lost almost 4000 HP in one go!
But I wasn"t planning to guard the attack from the beginning. Slamming my foot on a protruding rock on the ground and leaping to Little Piglet"s right like lightning, I kneed the warrior right beneath his armpit!
Bang!
797!
Damaging Little Piglet wasn"t the intent of the knee strike, knocking him off balance was. While his rhythm was completely disrupted, I attacked him four times in rapid succession—Pardon + Desperate Gambit + basic attack + Dragon Slaying Slas.h.!.+
MISS!
4657!
1239!
3568!
I dealt over 9000 damage in one combo, but Little Piglet was still alive. Wind of Recovery was still healing him, and he was able to drink a health potion immediately despite being caught by surprise. His reaction speed really was incredible!
My Purgatory Sword shone brightly, and I fired one last Thousand Mirage Slash while growling, “Die!”
Boom!
The attack sent Little Piglet rolling far, far away across the floor, but he was still alive! It was because someone had healed him for 2874 health!
Where was that priest?
I looked up and saw a male priest walking out from behind Pillar of the Nation. He was Level 91. No wonder he was able to cancel out my Thousand Mirage Slash with a Greater Heal.
……
Clang!
I sheathed my sword and said softly, “You"ve lost, Little Piglet!”
Little Piglet cut a sorry figure as he climbed to his feet, but he simply let out a chuckle. “You"re right, I lost. That being said, you"re nothing special if you didn"t have that Dragon Slaying Slash…”
I smiled. “And if you didn"t have Ice Ray Flurry, I could kill you even without a weapon!”
“...”
The conversation ended there as Little Piglet returned to Pillar of the Nation"s side. He said calmly, “Leader, I can"t beat him one on one, so I leave it to you to decide our next course of action. I wouldn"t mind if you chose to gang up on him…”
His words surprised me. Little Piglet was definitely a mercenary with none of the sense of honor and principle an expert should have at all, but his skills were undeniably exceptional. Right now he was probably better than the likes of Transient Smoke and Clouds or Blue Sky Scar, and on par with Farewell Song. It was the reason I was challenged to the extent I was. If Farewell Song was here, and he chose to work with Little Piglet and fight me 2 on 1, I would be lucky to have even a 30% chance of winning.
……
Eyes br.i.m.m.i.n.g with hostility, Pillar of the Nation smiled and said, “Relax, we aren"t the only ones who want them dead. Just wait patiently for a moment, our allies will be arriving very soon!”
Lin Yixin and I grew apprehensive as a couple of archers joined them and aimed their arrows at us. From the start we were stuck in combat mode, and it was looking more and more impossible to use a return scroll somehow and teleport back to Sky City.
A few minutes later, another twenty players joined Hegemon Palace as Pillar of the Nation had said they would. The leader of the new party was none other than Li Le himself, and he was accompanied by the usual Flower Room experts, Spring Mud, Night Sorrow, and Moon Shadow.
……
I turned around to look at Lin Yixin. “Aiyo, it looks like we"re going to die here…”
Lin Yixin nodded. “If each of us take one of them with us, it"ll be worth it. Two, and the last laugh belongs to us…”
“...”
I didn"t want to die here though. It took me so long to grind to 98%, just 2% away from hitting Level 100. If I died and dropped to Level 98 now, the entire day would basically be wasted. How sad would that be?
……
Li Le stepped to the front while directing his archers. “Prepare your Devil Piercing Arrows and Volleys. Your goal is to one-shot Broken Halberd Sinks Into Sand!”
“Yes, guild leader!” They responded.
There was no getting away from this, so I plotted to kill as many players as possible before going down. The first two idiots I"m going to kill are Pillar of the Nation and Li Le!
Warsky"s strategy was a complete success so far. For just 5000 RMB, he managed to draw all these hostiles like bees to honey. My hopes of getting my fourth promotion was looking more and more unlikely by the second...
At the side, Little Piglet was holding his cyan sword and wearing a careless expression on his face. However, there was no mistaking the killing intent he hid behind his mask.
Another group of people came up the hill, and this time it was G.o.ds of Destruction. The leader of the party was Dominating Heaven Blade, and the battle axe in his hand was crawling with thunderous energy. Wait a second, isn"t that my Purple Thunder Battle Axe?