Second World Chapter 227 - 227. A Slippery Rogue

Jack was focusing on fast motions coupled with fast attacks. He was not aware of John's and Fierce Flame's assist until one of Flame's arrows lodged onto the skull of a Fighter whose weapon was about to hit him. He made a quick glance and saw the two atop.
Of the two, Fierce Flame was playing a better assist role, as her aims were more precise and swift. John knew his aim wasn't top-notch, however, he assisted Jack not by targeting those near Jack. Instead, he played it smart by sweeping out those that was at death's door after getting attacked by Jack. Since Jack couldn't stay at one place long enough to finish the task, he gladly picked up the baton.
The rate by which the players at this outer half fell was higher compared to the ones that were trapped at the other half. However, even when they kept on losing people, not one of these ones from the outer half fled. Jack must admit he applauded these players' solidarity.
Little did he know that it got nothing to do with their comradeship. It was simply that they had been thoroughly frustrated at being bullied without any ability to fight back when they were being trapped by the Walls of Vines. Now that an enemy presented himself on the same ground as they, they were eager to vent out their frustration on this lone enemy.
However, many of them especially those at the back were starting to get confused. What were those at the front doing? It sounded like they were still fighting? Wasn't the enemy just one person? They had been shouting at first for the ones in the front to not finish off the enemy, to let them have a piece of the guy as well. But the fight had been going on for a while and yet the commotion from the front had yet to cease. Couldn't you guys hurry up? Or else that detestable Mage at the top was going to trap them again. While they were still wondering, a shadow slipped through the crowd in front and passed through them. Suddenly their HP was reduced by a huge chunk. What had just happened? When they turned at the shadow, it was nowhere to be seen.
Jack who was causing the chaos, was instead enjoying the exhilarating feel. In the past VR games, the game systems were always tried their best to bring balance amongst players. Of course, there were those pay-to-win players who spent real-life money to gain an advantage in-game. Nonetheless, the difference wouldn't upset the balance too much. And even if such pay-to-win brought a huge advantage, there were always other pay-to-win players to provide some balance.
What Jack was experiencing now, was a sole advantage where his attributes completely trumped others. And he was the only one to possess such an advantage. Hence his euphoria. The best comparison to describe his condition was of a cheater who had managed to hack his character and was still allowed to play freely.
As Jack continued to abuse his superiority, something on his radar attracted his attention.
Hm? Jack muttered as he put more attention to his radar. He immediately saw what had caught his attention. A single red dot was following his movement with equal speed as his from behind. And since he was attacking as he moved, this red dot was gaining on him. In fact, it was almost upon him.
Despite his consternation, Jack didn't panic. He swiftly swiveled his body and brought his arm which was holding the kite shield to his back. He was lucky to have performed that defensive movement, because just as his kite shield was brought to cover his back, he felt a hard impact and a loud clang.
The attack was not strong enough to push him away, but he still chose to jump back to provide some space from his covert assailant. With how close he had been to getting hit from the back, this assailant was not simple.
After he jumped away, he finally got a good look at the attacker. It was the level 17 female Rogue from Wicked Witches, one of the two advanced classes in the three guilds coalition apart from his disguise. Jack used his God-eye monocle to scan the Rogue and learned her name was Slim Blade, with an HP of 310. She was wearing red color leather armor. Jack noticed the crimson dagger on her hand appeared to be not ordinary. He surmised that the weapon was at least Uncommon if not Rare grade.
Due to the Rogue attack, Jack's movement had stopped for a brief moment, allowing other players to land some attacks. He quickly used Swing to repel those opportunistic players before dashing away again. He turned to look at the Rogue but found that she had disappeared. With how chaotic the condition was, he couldn't afford to look around to search for her. His radar was of little help as all the players were the same red color dots. He could only return to his previous tactic while being alert at the Rogue's hidden offense.
"Peniel! What's the first skill one gets when becoming a Rogue?" He asked her fairy friend while continuing his fast movements and attacks.
"Backstab," Peniel answered simply.
"Sister, can you be a bit more informative, please? Can't you see that I'm busy? I can't keep on repeating the same question at the moment. Is it some kind of an active skill? How much damage can it cause?"
"It is a passive skill. It will render every hit struck on the back of a target to have a higher chance of being a critical hit and also caused higher critical damage. Even if the hit failed to score a critical, the base damage will still be increased by half."
No wonder she was trying to attack from the back, Jack thought. For it to be a passive skill was sure a headache. There was no cooldown nor stamina consumption, the only drawback was it was only affective if struck from a specific direction, which was a target's back. Now that he knew about the skill, he could anticipate the direction from which that Rogue would come at him.
As expected, he quickly noticed via his omnipotent radar, an approach from a red dot with a distinguished movement pattern, coming at his back. He was exceedingly thankful to have gotten this God-eye monocle. Without its radar, it would be extremely difficult to notice the Rogue sneaking up on him amongst this chaotic fight. Under any other circumstances, the Rogue class would perform exceptionally well in such a turbulent battle.
Since he had known about the coming attack, he purposefully slowed down his steps. He needed to brush off more attacks from the others due to it, but his concentration was more onto the Rogue as he deemed her as more of a menace. When the red dot was almost upon him, he turned around abruptly and used Swing.
The skill caught the Rogue off guard, she still managed to stab at Jack but since the hit was to his front, it was considered a normal attack. While she herself had more than a third of her HP shaved off just from that one Swing. It terrified her greatly, she had never met such a high damage player before.
Jack was just about to follow up with a Power Strike, but the Rogue rapidly retreated to behind the crowd. Her speed and decisiveness in retreating were astounding. Jack figured the girl was accustomed to the hit and run tactic, she was practically made for the Rogue class. She soon disappeared amongst the masses. Jack tried to chase after her but she was nowhere to be seen.
Jack took out a basic healing potion and drank it to recover his HP, he never stopped moving and dodging other players' attacks during the time. Since the Rogue was nowhere to be found, Jack went back to harassing the other players, while paying attention to his radar for a backstabber.
More of his opponents fell as time went on, and even more ran out of their supply of restorative potion. Only Fierce Flame's arrow was assisting Jack at the moment. John had gone back to the other end to renew the Wall of Vines spell, the guy seemed to have a limitless supply of that magic scroll.
Hm? Jack suddenly noticed something weird. His HP bar was almost half empty! He knew he couldn't dodge every attack, but even so, his defense allowed him to brush off most of it. His health after last drinking the basic healing potion was almost full, and not too long had passed since then. It didn't make sense for his health to drop so expeditiously.
As he was wondering what was wrong, a flash of light swept past his side while he was blocking a player's attack using his shield. He turned and caught a glimpse of a red-figure disappearing behind other players.
It's that f**king Rogue again!
😉