Sword Among Us

The Sawtooth Brothers’ Crazed Demonic Cut might seem fierce and mighty when they used it together, because it would tear at the wind, rip apart rain, and their offense seemed impenetrable, but in the game, this sort of attack that relied on the image of the attack to cover up the user’s opening and increase the attack’s might was only a small trick. Perhaps it can actually increase the user’s strength by several levels, allowing them to fight against four to five people at the same level, but when they faced a real elite, those two people will still remain as two people instead of multiple people, which their attack suggested, and they will still have weaknesses.

When it came to fights at a high level in World of Martial Arts, what determined victory was the experience gained from multiple life and death encounters, great fighting instincts, followed by skill as well as strength.

Happy did not intend to put these two clowns on a pedestal. He tapped against the ground, and his hidden force was activated silently.

Whoosh!

He managed to make those two pause for a moment when they felt the impact from his offense, and during that moment, he avoided the fierce offense from the sawtooth sabers. Then, he rammed his knee against the younger Sawtooth Brother to his left, causing a bloody flower to bloom on his face.

This strike was originally not supposed to be fatal. In fact, it was not supposed to hurt him heavily, but it made the rash and older Sawtooth Brother to charge over hastily.

He swung his sawtooth saber horizontally at Happy.

The afterimage Happy left behind did not manage to stop the sawtooth saber from advancing in the slightest. The sawtooth saber just violently drew a terrifying gash on the younger brother’s chest.

“AH!”

Even if his pain senses had been reduced and could react in time, when the younger Sawtooth Brother saw that bones could be seen through the wound on his chest, he let out a miserable and terrified scream.

The older Sawtooth Brother sucked in a sharp breath. But then, his body froze, and he was sucked in by a powerful suction force. A chill touched his throat, and he was seized tightly by a hand that was as tough as steel.

A system notification arrived.

“Ding!

“Your opponent’s Affinity is over 285. Your attack has been determined to fail, and you cannot deal any damage on him.”

When he received the warning from the system, Happy did not appear to be shocked, but neither did he show a knowing look. Instead, he changed from grabbing the older Sawtooth Brother to delivering a shock at him, and a hidden force rammed fiercely into the person’s body.

Pain flared in the older Sawtooth Brother’s neck, and he felt as if his nerves were completely crushed. His consciousness then swiftly faded away.

“I did mention that the battle has just begun.”

Once Happy killed the older Sawtooth Brother with just one palm strike, he did not stop in his attack. He moved to the younger Sawtooth Brother, who was heavily injured but not dead just yet.

The younger Sawtooth Brother was bleeding profusely, and he was already half dead.

In truth, Happy saw that he had quite the decent Affinity, and he was wondering whether he will drop any good equipment.

The younger Sawtooth Brother’s companions wanted to help him, but they were sent flying away with just one hidden force from Happy. Most of them were forced back, and at the same time, he also managed to kill the younger Sawtooth Brother with the shock from the blow.

Five people died.

“It’s your turn.” Happy turned his head around, and he charged at the remaining dozen Blood Alliance members.

He used Petite Dragon and Dragon Capture frequently, and he instantly killed three people, then sent another three flying with kicks. His movements were clean and swift, and it gave off such a suffocating pressure that the people cannot breathe.

“Darn it! Run! The Sawtooth Brothers are already dead! Why are we still staying here?! Do you want to die with them?! Run!” the trap master remaining at the periphery of the battlefield shouted.

The few people from Blood Alliance who were still thinking about lasting through the fight through sheer force of will instantly turned around without hesitation.

But whether or not they could leave depended on whether Happy agreed to it.

Even though Happy did not know that this group of people were not sent by Blood Robes, since Blood Alliance sent such a group of amateurs and underestimated him so much, he did not have any intention to hold back. He used Dragon Capture with both hands and seized two people.

Then, with Dragon Capture, he tore at those two people’s throats as quickly as lightning.

Bang! Bang!

Another two corpses fell to the ground.

As he watched the remaining Blood Alliance members fleeing madly, Happy swept a glance at the area ahead of him, and his tone was callous when he spoke, “Go back and tell Blood Robes that he should come to me as soon as possible, or else, these people’s fate will be his!”

Those people did not even bother with exchanging “pleasantries” with him. They just fled without stopping.

Happy turned around resolutely.

He was pretty lucky this time, because he found quite a few pieces of equipment from those Blood Alliance members’ corpses.

There were two fourth-echelon grade one equipment, along with one third-echelon demon vessel.

The quality of those grade one equipment was about the same as his Silver Robe, but their appearance was not very pleasant. Happy did not bother about them. He just put them straight away into his Universe Bag and was ready to sell them off in the market when he returned to the city.

However, that demon vessel was pretty good.

The third-echelon demon vessel was something he obtained from the older Sawtooth Brother.

[Sleek Rat’s Jade Boots: Third-echelon low grade demon vessel.

[Defense: 1,240. Increase each attribute by 25 points. Increase Body Movement by an additional ten points. Increase dodge rate by 10%.]

In this world, the grade one masterpieces players created were all generally higher than the items dropped in the game, but they will not increase any attributes.

This was something that caused the players to be divided when it came to choosing their equipment.

Some people chose to go down the path of increasing their attributes and sacrificing their defense so that they can make their attributes stronger.

The other group of people chose to walk down the defensive path. Even though they lacked the increase in their attributes, their defense was much higher than those who did, and they can ensure their survival.

Only those who were lucky could get a demon vessel with decent attributes, which can only be dropped by NPCs with high qi realms. These pieces of equipment can fulfill their requirements in both their attributes and defense.

Happy seldom had the chance to encounter Myth Realm in the past, and he chose to walk down the path of high defense when he had to choose between low-grade demon vessels and fourth-echelon grade one equipment. Once he was secure in his own safety, he relied on his solid foundation in strength to win.

But now, his Silver Robe could no longer fulfill his demands.

This Sleek Rat’s Jade Boots was pretty decent, so Happy decided to keep it. Once he had the chance to obtain a Fire Qilin’s Scale, he will search for someone to help him refine it to the fourth echelon.

*****

“What should we do now?”

“We didn’t manage to teach him a lesson. Instead, he taught us one, and we had ten of our own die…”

The Sawtooth Brothers and a group of their companions walked out of Guanlin Temple gloomily and dejectedly. Their strength had decreased by ten percent, and their expressions were incredibly unpleasant.

“Darn it, it’s been so long since he played, so I didn’t expect that he will still be so powerful…”

“We had so many Moksha Realm players with us, but we can’t fight back against him at all. We didn’t even have any room for any sort of counterattack. I finally understand why Boss Blood Robes won’t let us into the headquarters.”

Silence.

“Now is not the time for us to say that. The key is that our members died, but we didn’t manage to complete the task. What should we do? We absolutely can’t let word of this get out, or else, Boss Blood Robes will kill us one more time…”

“Yeah…”

When the group of people remembered how great of a fool they made of themselves and imagined how the outside world will laugh at them when they learned of it, they knew that Blood Robes, who cared about his image a lot, will definitely not let them slide.

But they did not know that when they fought against Happy, the people from Hunter Clan had already recorded the entirety of the fight.

During the time they discussed the matter, another battle replay was uploaded.

[The elite of the past has returned! Dozens of Blood Alliance members tried to kill him, but didn’t manage to, and were killed instead. Happy displays his might at Mountain Villa of Ten Thousand Beasts]

A thread with this title was posted on the forum of the official website.

When it was around nine in the morning, Happy logged out of the game.

Xu Yao immediately brought breakfast over. Her tone was calm. “When you were playing the game, the doctor came over to see you, and he said that you’re recovering quite well, but he also said that you should not spend so much time on gaming. You have to spend more time in physiotherapy.”

“Got it.” While Happy answered, he placed his helmet to the side.

“Is our master awake?”

The door to Happy’s room opened a little. Then, Young Yi and Qiu Ming walked in with fruits.

“Master, we came to visit you.”

Happy found himself speechless.

He laid on his bed and rubbed his forehead. ‘These two are already publicly claiming me to be their master, huh?’

“Mistress.” At that moment, Qiu Ming called out to Xu Yao, and she ignored him.

But Happy suddenly felt his mood lift. “Qiu Ming, come here.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Elites usually have good observational skills. Now, I suddenly feel that you have the potential to become one of the greats.”

“Really?!” Qiu Ming was incredibly excited when Happy said this. “Then, master, when are you going to teach me?”

“I can’t teach you. An elite’s path is filled with solitude and loneliness. You have to go understand it yourself, and through it, grow and gain your own experience. From the moment the game was in operation, I fought in more than one thousand battles, be it small or big. I challenged more than three hundred martial artists, and all of them were the aces in the game at that time. It’s why I have my current skills,” Happy said in a sentimental manner.

Qiu Ming fell silent, but he looked excited.

Young Yi stared at Happy without even blinking and listened to him intently.

“You have to especially watch other people’s battle replays. During my time playing the game, I spent three months understanding One Emperor’s sword technique and wondered about how I can break One Emperor’s sword slashes. But unfortunately, I never had the chance to search for him to personally experience it.”

“Boss, you’re awesome. You’re actually thinking about challenging One Emperor?!”

“That’s right. Even though Phantasmal Shadow has taken the spot of the strongest player in the Chinese server right now, Phantasmal Shadow once admitted that she is not One Emperor’s opponent. You’re thinking about challenging the strongest player in the Chinese server, you know?!”

“Heh…” Happy giggled, but he felt pleasure in his heart. It was the type a person will feel when they stated a secret they had been keeping for a long time in his or her heart.

In the other world, Happy was an existence who stood as equals with One Emperor. In fact, in certain aspects, he had surpassed One Emperor and stood above him.

Hence, he will not say these words in front of the people from the other world.

But this world was where he belonged, and One Emperor was still a mountain that he could only hope to look at but never surpass.

“It’s a pity that we don’t know where One Emperor has gone to. I wonder if you will have a chance to meet him, master.” While Qiu Ming and Young Yi lamented over this fact with regret, Xu Yao just continued quietly taking care of Happy. She gave him water and handed him his breakfast.

But Happy’s next sentence caused Xu Yao, who had been incredibly calm all this while, to have her expression suddenly change.

Happy crossed his arms over his head in a comfortable manner while he stared at the ceiling above him. He said with a serious tone, “Don’t worry, I can sense that he is still around. Before completely understanding Fatal Thirteen Swords and defeating Evil Emperor, he will not leave. One Emperor and I are fated to fight in this life!”

Xu Yao said nothing, but her hand froze for a moment when she was halfway through delivering food to Happy.

It was as if Happy had returned to the moment one and a half years ago.

At that time, Happy had already become famous, and he was always in high spirits.

One day, he also made such a proud and confident statement in the morning. “After I fight against this person today, I will officially begin preparations to challenge One Emperor. Even though I know that I might lose, but I’ve been waiting for this day for too long. There are already not many people who can challenge me in the Chinese server!”

*****

Crystalline tears shone in Xu Yao’s eyes. She quickly put down the breakfast in her hands before she rushed into the bathroom.

When she shut the door, she saw herself in the mirror, and she was excited, gratified, but also seemingly sad. Xu Yao slowly covered her face and cried silently.

‘Happy is back! The proud and confident Happy who had not gone through that major incident that year is back!

‘No…

‘His words and expressions are even more prideful than before, and he has a greater self-esteem than before! He’s filled with determination and life!’