593 Chapter 593 - A Lesson in Fighting Monsters (1/2)
Since this boy who had slipped and fallen to the ground did not know what had happened, he checked himself in a daze, only to see that his HP had dropped by a miniscule amount. With his fighting spirit surging once more, he climbed up to his feet and began slashing away at Gu Fei.
Gu Fei, who was happily preparing to say some choice words to promote kung fu, could not get a word in edgeways as the boy's longsword was hacking at him in every direction. Gu Fei swiftly let his attack sail past, expressing his surprise. ”What are you doing?”
The boy came to a halt and quickly sheathed his sword. ”Are we done fighting?”
”Are you looking to kill me?” Gu Fei was angered.
The boy scratched his head. ”But I've still got plenty of HP!”
Gu Fei was vexed. ”Isn't falling to the ground enough for you?”
”That's me being careless.” The boy criticized himself. Finding that half slice of an apple he had slipped on, he gruffly kicked it away and cursed, ”Who's the deplorable person who tossed out rubbish here?!”
Gu Fei was pissed. It seemed that the skill he had demonstrated was too profound. Was this brat foolish enough not to realize that it was Gu Fei who had thrown that apple which made him fall? Still, the crowd should have seen this with their eyes! Gu Fei turned to regard the rest of his students, yet all they did was stare right back at him. Indeed, they had witnessed Gu Fei throw that apple, but none of them thought that he had done so after precise calculation. Everybody quietly looked at him until one of them finally found the courage to call out. ”Sir, even though this is a game, littering like that isn't good…”
I'll... bear this! Gu Fei could only grit his teeth and shove the discontent down his belly. After all, at the end of the day, they were his students. Did he really have to end up beating them up black and blue, just like mere ruffians, to demonstrate his kung fu? Gu Fei did not think that it was wise to be so ruthless, which was why he had devised such a move to demonstrate his skills and dexterity, but his students ultimately viewed it as him littering. Truly, it was a good deed that had no returns!
”Teacher, are we still continuing?” that Warrior asked.
”All right. Teacher isn't gonna be polite anymore. Don't blame me for being too harsh on you!” Gu Fei had to prove his kung fu. Beating people up did not really hurt in-game, anyway. Rolling up his Midnight Spirit Robe's sleeves, Gu Fei got ready to show his students the real deal.
”Ha ha! Don't go easy on me, sir!” The boy looked to be far more confident than Gu Fei. ”Ahh!” After he uttered that line, this student already found his head looking up at the sky. Feeling a slight jolt of pain in his nose bridge, he looked around in shock and saw in time Gu Fei's fist retracting after appearing right before him mere moments ago. His teacher looked right at him. ”You'd better concentrate!”
”Ahh…” The boy was unable to react at all, absolutely clueless on how he had ended up eating that punch. Thus, when he saw Gu Fei's second punch come flying toward him, the boy wielded his longsword to meet the blow straight on instead of dodging it.
Gu Fei had already expected his student, based on the latter's current standard, to go for such a crude fighting style, which aimed to devastate an enemy at the substantial expense of his own. Of course, Gu Fei was not about to let him succeed. That punch of his was a feint in the first place, so he took a step back after he drew that slash out, ducking past the sword to connect another punch right onto the boy's shoulder. Gu Fei was still considerate; he did not wish to end up bruising his student's face.
A Warrior would not actually feel pain or even a tickle from the two punches from the Mage. The youngster's sword stabbed nothing but air, so he overturned his hand to continue his attack. He did not expect Gu Fei to be standing in an extremely tricky position, though. The moment the Warrior's sword swung by half an arc, the boy realized that his arm could not twist any further. Meanwhile, Gu Fei seemed to have already known what would happen as he flashed this student a slight smile when the latter's sword swing could no longer continue. In that moment, Gu Fei reached a finger out and flicked the boy's forehead, causing it to bounce back crisply.
Everything else that had happened after this display finally convinced these non-practicing students just how terrifying Gu Fei really was. That longsword that boy was waving could not even touch Gu Fei in any sense of the word. It would be understandable If anyone were to say that Gu Fei had been running about, forcing the boy to chase right after him, but it just so happened that Gu Fei was always near him – sometimes on the left and others on the right but never apart. He tracked and followed the direction the boy's sword would swing and dodged it every time even as he retaliated at every opportunity he got.
Even the boy had lost count how many punches he had taken. If Gu Fei had wielded a weapon with even the slightest physical damage, that boy would have long since been dead. The only reason he had managed to survive for so long was entirely because Gu Fei was fighting with him barehanded, but after all those fists flying his way, even a blockhead could tell that there was no way he could beat his teacher. It was only that the audience was no longer just the students around; plenty of players passing by had also stopped to watch this spectacular fight. This caused the boy to feel a little unsure on what to do, and the only option he had left was to continue and mechanically slash his sword at Gu Fei despite knowing that every slash he made would be useless.
Gu Fei saw that blank and silly face of his and could not help but laugh. With a quick punch right at that boy's forehead once, he disengaged from the melee and beamed. ”Will that do?”
That boy rubbed his forehead, completely in shock to the point that he could not reply.
The other students were also dumbfounded for the longest while before surging around the two all of a sudden and making a huge racket as they cried out, ”Teach me, sir!”
Having finally achieved his desired effect, Gu Fei was utterly contented. He immediately put on airs and kept his students in suspense. ”So, if you've got skills like this, would any of you still need levels?”
”No need!” All the students fought to answer his question.
”He he!” Gu Fei chuckled before he corrected himself. ”Actually, levels are still necessary. Without the stats your level provides, there's no way anybody can dish out moves so quickly.”
”So, what exactly should we do?” His students were all confused.
”Levels are your foundation, and kung fu is your technique.” Gu Fei had thought about this himself before and considered such a summary would be the most sensible.
”So, should we be grinding our levels or be learning kung fu?” His students still could not make sense of things.
”Learn kung fu? That's too much for you guys. Do you really think that it will be like grinding levels in games – something that can be achieved in three to five months?” Gu Fei asked.
”It's gonna take that long?” His students were astounded.
Gu Fei's expression turned cold. If three to five months is a long time to these twerps, what will they think once they learn that I've been training since young, yet even now, I am still working tirelessly to better myself?
”There's only one month of holidays!” His students sighed with great disappointment.
Gu Fei sighed as well. That's right. Even if the average person likes to learn kung fu, not only do they not have the time, it is also not optimal for them to do it. If he had been inundated with both the nine years of compulsory education and the college entrances exams since he was young, there was no way he would have any kung fu to speak of.
”You guys truly don't have the prerequisite to practice and learn kung fu, but I can definitely teach you all some combat techniques, so that you at least can deal with monsters and PK in this game,” Gu Fei said.
”YAY! Let's get started, then!” the students all yelled.
”Let's go out into the wilds.” Gu Fei waved his hand and led the class of students out.
-------------------------------------------
Out in the wilds, Gu Fei pulled a monster and began giving them an on-site lesson. Skill. This was real skill. Using his perspicacious kung-fu eyes to find out these NPCs' attack patterns was what he had learned in the process of fighting monsters. His number-two spot back then on the experience efficiency leaderboards was not just merely for show. Using his talent, the monster grinding method that he had discovered was certainly well beyond that of many players. Even Sword Demon and the other veteran MMO gamers were not on par with him.
Furthermore, a monster was an excellent learning model as it would immediately respawn when eliminated in a meticulous fashion. At the moment, all the students were seated neatly in two rows, as if attending a P.E. class, and were watching Gu Fei break down the monster's attack patterns.
”Against this sort of attack, the first sequence is to turn to the side, take a step to the right, and distance yourself. Take note of this distance; everyone, please memorize it.” Gu Fei flicked his sword and insta-killed the monster before repeating the same sequence of actions of turning to the side and taking a step to the right twice.
”All right. Everybody, get up and follow me to do this once,” Gu Fei said, clapping his hands to instruct his students to stand up.
”Turn to the side!”
”Step to the right while taking note of the distance.”
After he finished his step, Gu Fei turned to check if the students were making the same step, correcting several of their mistakes in the process.
”Yup… Just like that… One more time. Turn to the side and take a step to your right. Hmm… not bad.” Gu Fei was completely engrossed in the lesson.
”Okay. The second sequence here is the counterattack. The counterattack will be a little different as it'll depend on what sort of weapon everyone uses, and that requires targeted exercises; everyone should split up according to their job classes. Uh… Priests can be together with Mages, Archers; Archers, if you wanna keep to your ranged attacks, please go and practice CS. All right. Everybody should first practice that first step I've shown you before. I'll personally take each group and instruct them individually on how to counterattack.”
Gu Fei went about each step as he taught these students how to retaliate, according to the length of the weapon used, and the method of attack.
”All right. Now that everyone has gotten a good grasp of the counterattack, let's link these two parts and do it once over. There's a detail here everyone needs to take note, and that's joining the first and second parts like this is only done to make it easier for everyone to practice. In truth, these two parts should be done all at one go, so perhaps we should not be calling them two sequences if we want to be very technical about it. It will be terrible if everyone is still counting the sequences during actual combat. For subsequent practices, everyone should give up the habit of compartmentalizing it like this. Both sets of actions must be treated as a whole when executed. Is everyone clear?”