Chapter 226 - 226. The Open Path
When he looked back, he was given a great scare. There were six of his people out here with him who were not trapped inside the rocky alley. But now, two of them were lying on the floor. A man in full armor was waving a black longsword cutting at his other underlings.
"Who are…" He was halfway in his shout, demanding the identity of their ambusher, before stopping. Because he realized he didn't need to ask the person's identity. The man was already famous amongst the upper management of Death Associates guild. His image had been circulated to warn them about him, and was one of the targets that the guild plan to deal with in the near future.
He didn't expect to meet the man here. But, wait, now that he thought about it, he could see that this ambush made more sense. He must have been working together with that group from Handy Craftsmen guild to attack them here.
While Earmouth thought that it was all a conspiracy, their attackers, John and Flame, on the other hand, were themselves surprised to see Jack appearing here.
"So you really are around. How do you conceal yourself in the meeting?" John sent a message to him.
Jack replied with a short message, "can't you see that I'm busy here?"
John chuckled, "aren't you an expert? Don't tell me you have trouble fighting while texting. Not to mention the texting was thought-activated."
Jack didn't bother to reply anymore. He never stopped moving as he fought against Earmouth's underlings. Earmouth himself had been firing his spells non-stop at Jack, but all of them had been cut by Jack's sword or nullified by his kite shield. Another player was in critical health already after suffering several cuts from Jack.
A Fighter came at Jack, trying to prevent him from killing another player, and gave that player a chance to use his restorative potion. The Fighter executed Power Strike, Jack let the skill struck him as he sent the same skill unto the attacker. Jack was pushed back two steps by the skill, while the Fighter was sent flying back. Before the Fighter hit the ground, Jack used Sword of Light and slashed the Fighter mid-flight. The Fighter crashed down to the ground and was not getting up anymore.
What was that crescent light? Earmouth was in a panic. A high-HP Fighter was killed with just two hits?
Earmouth instinctively moved back, letting his underlings dealt with Jack. He was never an expert. His high position in the guild was all due to his management skill and his aptitude in evaluating new recruits. Hence, when another of his underlings fell, he had the urge to just run away.
At this time, the Wall of Vines behind him started to wither. He looked back and then looked up at John who was standing atop the rock formation. Seriously terrified that John would pull out another magic scroll to recast the plant wall spell.
John did still possess some Wall of Vines magic scrolls, but after a thought, he decided to not use it to block the back path. After all, there was a monster of an expert down there, why not use him to his advantage?
After seeing that John didn't cast another of that plant wall, Earmouth immediately ran inside the rocky alley. At that time, another of his underlings had fallen again. The remaining one, a ranger, ran away following Earmouth.
"The path is open! The path is open!" He shouted to attract the attention of the trapped players.
The ones that heard his yelling, turned and looked. When they realized there was no Wall of Vines at the entrance from where they entered this rock alley, they immediately ran in that direction. They had been continuously harassed by the players up there, without being able to retaliate. Now that one of the blocked paths was opened, how would they still want to stay inside that rock alley and be punching bags?
They ran towards the opened path in droves. On their way, they saw two fools ran inside frantically. What were those two doing? Didn't they know that the inside here was a trapped hell? They couldn't care less about those two fools. Most of them had already run out of their restorative potions. They needed to run out there out of the range of those abhorred players above.
Earmouth saw the belittling look from the players who passed by them, but he couldn't care less as well. These players would soon find out, that the players up there were nothing compared to the freak of monster that had come up from behind them.
As the players that were trying to run out from the rock alley were about to reach the exit, a lone unknown player stood in their way. He carried a black longsword and a kite shield.
What was this clown doing? They all had the same thought.
A female Fighter from Wicked Witches came forward and bellowed aggressively, "move aside! Or prepared to get trampled!"
In VR games, Jack had gotten accustomed to not differentiate between genders. After all, whether it was male or female, their strength was determined by their stat points, not their real physics. There was no such thing as weaker gender in games. Hence while he was a gentleman mostly in real life towards women, in games, he bore no such discrimination.
Furthermore, in past VR games, there was even a possibility of a man using a woman persona in the games. Thus the female characters in those past games were not necessarily women in real life. Jack had developed the habit to treat both genders with equal prejudice. When the female Fighter approached him in an aggressive manner, he responded by using Power Strike as he would if the Fighter was male.
The female Fighter was sent tumbling back by the strike, crashing the players behind her which were trying to make it out of the rock alley.
"An enemy! He is an enemy!" They started to scream.
Jack didn't respond to them with words, instead, he just dashed into their throng, cutting and thrusting with his swords. He repeated his strategy like when he was fighting the robber mob from before, utilizing his speed and not stay in one place. He charged from one opponent to another, delivering only one attack to each, didn't stay long enough for them to land a successful counter-attack. When his opponents formed a wall to block him, he used Charge to forcefully punched through their formation.
The expertise of this lot was actually higher than the previous robber mob. After all, they were the official members of three famous guilds. However, several aspects had caused their prowess to fall, which allowed Jack to not find fighting them any harder than the robber mob.
First, it was because they were no longer in their top condition. They had been harassed by John's people without being able to fight back. Their mental fatigue and helplessness had made them forget the mindset that they were amongst the top combatants in VR games. At the moment, they were just trying to escape from the slaughtering field.
Secondly, they were made up of three different guilds. Who prior to this operation, had never worked together. In fact, they were even competitors most of the time. Hence, the synergy between members of these three different guilds was completely off balance. Jack had capitalized on this by charging in between the groups of these three guilds back and forth.
Thirdly, many of them had lost much HP. Some had even burnt through their stock of restorative potions. Hence, they were fighting with a worried mind, which in turn affected their performance. Jack had made sure to target those with low health, increasing their casualties and plunged them into a more panic mindset.
John was admiring Jack's work from up there. "That guy sure is something," he mumbled to himself. He glanced at the other end of the rock alley and noticed more people had realized the back path had been freed. They started to push their way back.
Despite Jack's performance, John still thought that if all those people went to him, he would get overrun. So he unfurled one of the magic scrolls that he still had in his bag, and aimed the spell at the middle part of the rock alley. Wall of Vines erupted from the ground and cutting the mob into two. One half was still trapped at both ends by the Walls of Vines, while the other half was tussling with Jack.
John sent an instruction to all his people except Fierce Flame to deal with the half that was trapped by the spells. While he and Flame went to assist Jack. The reason why he didn't send others to assist Jack was because Jack's movement was too erratic. Without enough skill and exceptional aim, these helpers might end up hitting Jack instead.
This was also the reason why the magicians from the three guilds were having trouble hitting Jack. He kept on moving in between their teammates unceasingly, if they cast their spells carelessly, they might friendly-fire their team instead.