Chapter 395: Purple Dawn (2/2)
His blunt honesty provoked the opponents to a flying rage, and all five of them shouted on top of their lungs and charged him. They looked like they wanted nothing more but to turn the dragon warrior’s head into a pig head.
Unfortunately, they had underestimated Li Chengfeng way too much.
Li Chengfeng ran in an S-shaped pattern and swung his sword only at the most opportune moment. It wasn’t the coolest moves he could use, but it was certainly the most effective. Three stabs later, two archers and one mage fell to his sword. Naturally, the remaining bard and warrior couldn’t escape their fates as well.
It was 1-0 in just half a minute!
The opponents looked like a fully-deflated balloon when the second round began. After showing off his skill during the first round, Li Chengfeng proceeded to show off his class and equipment superiority. He ignored all the attacks landing on his dragon armor and simply plowed through them with sheer brute force. Again, the battle was over in 30 seconds, and we moved on to the next match with a perfect 2-0 score!
The third match went surprisingly smooth for us, although I supposed it was only to be expected. This was just the third match, and millions of parties were participating in this tournament. Realistically speaking, Li Chengfeng was powerful enough to 1v5 at least 80% of the participating parties, although of course the remaining 20%—parties like Blazing Hot Lips—could just as easily wipe the floor with him.
……
The next few matches went the same way. Li Chengfeng and I took turns to solo our opponents while He Yi, Murong Mingyue, and Beiming Xue simply watched from the sidelines and relaxed. Long story short, we took it easy unless the enemy’s average Level was above 100.
In fact, when we encountered a 5-man archer party who were all around Level 100 or so during the seventh match, I suggested that He Yi should challenge them 1v5. The beautiful guild leader looked apprehensive, but not even stage fright could change the fact that she had almost 2000 Defense. Just as I predicted, none of the opponents were able to hit He Yi for more than 100 damage.
”Big bro, why did you ask sister He Yi to fight this match herself?”
I replied while watching He Yi chasing after a middle-aged archer, ”Don’t you think that skill is the most important factor in a melee versus ranged battle? If your positioning, timing, or strategy are off, you won’t be able to even touch the enemy, let alone kill them. Therefore, the reason I asked Eve to fight this solo is so that she could polish her skill and ascend to new heights.”
”Mn, makes sense…”
We resumed watching after I explained my reasoning. He Yi looked afraid at first, but a while later she calmed down completely and started turning the tables. Multiple times she was able to herd the enemies into themselves and kill them while they were busy disentangling themselves from each other, playing them like a fiddle. When the match ended with a perfect 2-0, we all saw a bit of confidence peeking out of our beautiful guild leader’s features. After putting her skills to the test and coming out on top, I was sure she had become better than ever before!
Before you master a skill, you must first master your own confidence. You must stay calm enough to think, and be arrogant enough to believe that everything was under their control.
……
The Who Will Rise preliminaries tested a player’s stamina more than anything, and the further one progressed, the stronger one’s opponent became. A party who tried to conserve their strength might find themselves disqualified the next second, so even we stopped fooling around and treated the matches seriously. Starting the tenth match, we fought as a party, no matter how weak or strong our opponents were.
The pressure started growing after the fifteenth match.
Murong Mingyue died both rounds of the sixteenth match, but it was a clean 2-0 victory for us.
Li Chengfeng died tragically again during the seventeenth match, but again, it was a 2-0 victory.
The eighteenth match was easier than the previous two matches, so we were able to knock out our opponents without losing anyone.
……
”We’re finally at the second last match…” Beiming Xue beamed at the large display above the orchard, but couldn’t stop herself from rubbing her stomach. ”I’m so hungry…”
I looked at the time and noted that it was 6:50 pm. By now, everyone was tired and hungry after fighting so many stressful matches in a row. At least we only had two more matches to go before we were finally free.
Only 128 parties were left in the tournament now. A veteran would know that the battle to enter the Top 64 was a critical one, and basically no one who made it this far was a slouch. Moreover, experts from other major cities should show up as opponents any time now. Only the best of the best would be able to qualify for the offline segment of the tournament!
……
The big screen shuddered for a moment before displaying our next opponent. The party’s name and formation entered our view—
Candle Dragon Second Seed
Fighting On All Fronts LV-105 Warrior
Gao Jianli LV-106 Assassin
Red Dust LV-104 Magic Knight
Purple Dawn LV-106 Phantom Archer
Zero Degree Rain LV-105 Assassin
……
”Fuck…” Li Chengfeng gasped a little before saying seriously, ”This battle is going to be harder than all the battles we fought earlier. I’ve seen almost all the names in this party in the forums before. These people are incredibly famous in Wind City!”
He Yi nodded in agreement. ”Purple Dawn, the Phantom Archer, is one of the few talents Candlelight Shadow had taught personally. From what I heard, he was planning to make him a Candle Dragon seeded player in the CGL Hall of Fame. There was a time Peach Garden and Candle Dragon clashed against one another in the desert, and Purple Dawn hid in the desert for an entire hour just to wait for the perfect opportunity to ambush Indigo Collar’s general, Wheel Shadow, and kill him. As a result, Peach Garden lost that battle. He is a player of incredible fortitude.”
I raised my sword and declared confidently, ”That’s great. Eliminating a party like this from the tournament will hurt Candlelight Shadow for sure!”