Virtual World: Close Combat Mage Chapter 389 - A Swathe of Traps

Deep Waters had not taken such a vantage point for show. This position actually guaranteed he would be able to initiate an attack on the streets around him from any angle. Without any hesitation, Deep Waters drew his bow and fired an arrow towards the newcomer.
Naturally, this person making his way over was Gu Fei. The large building he had walked out of was Luori City’s Bounty Assignment Hall, where he had been busy cleansing his PK value. That person whom he had just slain was a player at a grinding zone outside of the city. When he received the message from YMH informing him of the need for assistance by the Prison, he figured it would be faster to just quickly finish off his target and teleport back to the Bounty Assignment Hall after, rather than turn back from where he had been, especially given how close both the Prison and Bounty Assignment Hall were.
Thus, after he had slain his bounty target and teleported back to the Hall, the first thing he saw stepping out was Oathless Sword and the others escorting Todd coming under intense arrow fire right by the stairs outside the Prison. Gu Fei had not even noticed that the entire area was filled with traps, but he figured they must have surely been held down in place or something, so he swiftly hurried over with a wave of his sword, prepared to send forth an AOE spell towards the crowd of enemies before him.
But before he could even begin his spell incantation, he felt a bout of murderous intent coming from above his head and looked up, only to find Deep Waters’ bow releasing an arrow straight towards him.
This arrow came towards him blindingly fast, but more importantly, it came without making a bit of a sound. Had there been any sound, Gu Fei would of course be able to evade it the instant it was fired, but in the end, he only realized it was coming towards him after he turned his head and caught sight of it.
Gu Fei had already sensed the killing intent in that particular person, but given how close these two men were too one another, the soundless arrow cut through the air at such speed that even Gu Fei found himself scrambling a little, sliding the sword he had pointed out across his body as he used the tip to deftly touch the incoming arrow, bringing it down before it did any serious damage.
The others were all dumbfounded by this. Even Gu Fei himself felt a little strained from this one move, with his face turning slight red as a result.
Just as he was about to say something, he suddenly heard the clank of metal and Gu instantly had a bad feeling come over him. He lifted his leg in an effort to evade, but it was already too late.
The speed at which the metallic jaws of the trap from Deep Waters’ Snare Shot sprang out was much faster than the usual Hunter’s Trap, and with the lack of dirt in its way as it sprang forth, no matter how quick his reflexes were, there was no way he could make it in time. The intricate jaw shot towards him, biting squarely onto his leg without fail.
“You’re so stupid!” Svelte Dancer had been hoping for the arrival of a savior, yet she did not expect said savior would end up like this. They already had plenty of experiences watching Deep Waters shoot out his Snare Shot and were well aware that its cooldown and duration were the same. After all, was that not why Oathless Sword had been trapped in place all this while? But now that Oathless Sword was now caught within the array of traps all around, they no longer had to particularly target him like before, which was why Deep Waters had immediately sent his Snare Shot towards Gu Fei then.
“What are you panicking for?”
Gu Fei appeared to be very composed, however, which was the same moment Deep Waters yelled out, “Kill that man first!”
Svelte Dancer and Oathless Sword were both melee job classes, while Vast Lushness was a Dark Priest without much attack power to begin with. Naturally, they could only suffer through the arrows from the Archers now that they were ensnared, but Gu Fei was a Mage! He was more than capable of dealing out ranged attacks, capable of instakilling with just one cast of his spell to all deserving of death. It did not seem to matter if he was trapped or otherwise, so he had to be the first to be killed.
All the Hunters turned to target him, and Vast Lushness was instantly anxious. Gu Fei had been caught in Deep Waters’ trap after taking those few steps, the Archers could all shoot him, yet she was unable to heal Gu Fei since he was currently positioned a little bit too far for her skills to reach him.
Thinking that Gu Fei was the only hope left for everyone, Vast Lushness decidedly leapt out as far as she could, clearing over a meter in that one jump. While she had doubtlessly landed on a trap with this one move, it only restricted her movement; she was still able to use her skills in her current state, and Vast Lushness raised her hand and bestowed a Heal upon Gu Fei.
Deep Waters saw how heroic this lady acted, and that leap she took brought her out from behind Todd, whom she had been using as a meatshield all this while. He thought to himself, You’re clearly risking your life here, can just a measly Priest like yourself be enough to save him?
In the end, he witnessed a scene that left him the most flabbergasted ever since he started Parallel World.
Everybody had already released their arrows, but Gu Fei was already ready. His right hand was still holding onto his sword, and his left hand pulling out a saber from his dimensional pocket. Both hands flurried as he immediately demonstrated an authentic display of swordsmanship that flashed both sword and saber, the arrows that hurtled straight towards him were all deflected off. Even though some arrows still managed to make it through, the HP Gu Fei lost from taking those few arrows were easily replenished with Vast Lushness’s Heal.
Everybody was dumbfounded after firing this cluster of arrows. Each of their mouths were hanging agape as they went “ahhhh” for the longest time, before finally exclaiming, “M*th*rf*ck*r, what sort of acrobatics was that?!”
All these Archers had forgotten about firing a second wave of arrows, but Gu Fei’s hands did not stop. Dropping the last arrow to his feet with the sword in his right hand, he whirled his left wrist and lifted his Sacred Flames of Baptism in reverse, casually thrusting a backhanded blow from under his arm.
“Argh!” A shrill cry instantly came from behind him, as this stab had been entirely unexpected.
“Twin Incineration, Incinerate!” Gu Fei chanted, Moonlit Nightfalls in his right hand had already lashed out, but because the trap he was caught on restricted his movements entirely, Gu Fei had to twist his waist quite exaggeratedly. This move was not smoothly executed due to his improper footing, allowing the person behind him to retreat with that stab of the saber, and the sword brushed past without making contact at all.
Gu Fei could only sigh when this happened. Had it not been for the fact he could not move his foot accordingly, it would have been impossible for this opponent to get away from his slash.
“COCO!” The slash missed its target entirely, but Deep Waters had anxiously yelled out, leaping off the rooftop he had been on this whole time without caring for anything else as he sailed towards where Gu Fei was standing.
Gu Fei immediately stuck his sword out when he saw this, “Electric Wall, fall!”
“Ah, f*ck me!” Deep Waters cursed in mid air. He originally looked extremely cool leaping off the roof like that, but he had not expected Gu Fei to suddenly erect a wall to block him like that. Deep Waters was instantly caught in that wall, looking like a tiger pouncing upon its prey. Even more unfortunate was how Electric Wall had a sort of absorption effect to it. The wall suspended him in the air in that same pose, looking more like a lizard as the electric current coursed through him, spitting out sparks from time to time.
“Ahhhh! Deep Waters!” That person behind Gu Fei seemed to have ignored Gu Fei at this instant, darting over towards the Electric Wall while looking up at the Deep Waters stuck up in the wall.
“Quick let him down!” that person demanded angrily as she turned towards Gu Fei.
It was at this moment he realized this person was a lady. He instantly realized the relationship between this woman and Deep Waters, but all he did was smile, “Just wait a while!”
The trap that snared him released at this point, so Gu Fei darted out. That lady wanted to block him from approaching, but Gu Fei easily spun around to pass her as he sprinted towards the Archers.
These men looked as if they had awoken from a trance as they raised their bows to fire. Gu Fei’s sword and saber combo was invincible, littering the ground with arrows wherever he ran. Quite a few arrows made it past his guard, for it was difficult for him to flawlessly swat every arrow away even if he was more skilled than he was. Thankfully, Vast Lushness was around to cast her Heals on him and allowed him to survive through the damage. Had he been taking all these men on his own, there was a good chance that he might have already perished under the constant rain of arrows.
“Beware of traps!” Svelte Dancer hurriedly cried out this reminder when she saw how Gu Fei rushed forward without even slowing down. He was about to enter the whole swathe of traps those Hunters had set up; even though Gu Fei had Blink, it only allowed him to cross a five meter distance, which was not enough to materialize right beside these men.
Yet Gu Fei had already clearly seen that. Even though the traps were densely packed, there were still plenty of spaces between them, and when these gaps registered under his eyes, he easily figured out the various paths he could take using the footwork that he was well versed in since his youth. Without any exaggeration, had it not been for the fact that there was elevation on this flight of stairs, Gu Fei would actually have been able to avoid all the traps and make his way through everything with his eyes closed, as long as he successfully took his first step.
Everyone watched as Gu Fei came running towards them without slowing down in the least, taking each step without fail in the gaps between the traps, moving right up to the first Hunter in several steps.
This Hunter was holding his bow in his left hand and arrow in his right at the moment, and had no idea how he could defend himself; so he turned to run. Gu Fei was quick, swiftly tossing out his self-made sky hook on to that man’s collar as he tossed the other end of the rope towards Oathless Sword.
Oathless Sword was naturally beside himself when he grabbed a hold of it. Having stood here acting like a live target for these Hunters had nearly bored him to death, but now that he finally had his hands on something to do. With a guttural bellow, he pulled the rope. What little strength that Hunter had was nothing compared to what Oathless Sword possessed. This man was instantly floored with that forceful jerk, and was then inhumanely dragged across the trap laiden ground towards him. Each trap snapped and clamped onto this person’s body, ending up at Oathless Sword’s feet in a blink of an eye.
Oathless Sword was addicted to this. He reached out to that Hunter and picked him up to toss him right out once more, before giving a good tug on the rope. Unfortunately, that hook that caught onto this man’s collar was not secured enough for this sort of rough handling, causing the hook to slip off in that throw as it ended up back in his hand, but without the player. Now that Oathless Sword was left with nothing to play, he tossed the sky hook back to Gu Fei. “Miles bro, Miles bro, get me another.”
Gu Fei was currently engaged with several of those Hunters at once, so when Oathless Sword threw the hook towards him, he randomly picked one of them and hooked that person’s clothes.
“AH!” That person reached out in panic, hoping to remove it, but Oathless Sword had already given it a strong tug, and that man was yanked from where he was standing in an instant.
Gu Fei’s Twin Incineration insta-killed two men beside him, before he bolted towards the next target. The number of Archers dropped, and the arrows they fired were no longer that much of a threat to him. Vast Lushness no longer needed to use her Heal to assist him, and was instead using her Mana Sacrifice to provide him a constant stream of mana instead.
Oathless Sword had managed to drag in another player; he had immediately lost control of the previous player when he tossed him out, so he was currently wondering if he should just slay this man on the spot or secure the hook a little bit better when Svelte Dancer cried out, hopping eagerly, “Toss him over here, toss him to me!”
Oathless Sword did not put too much thought into this, answering heartily with an “Alright!” as he heaved that man over towards her.
That man crashed and tumbled onto the ground, immediately destroying quite a few traps with his landing. Svelte Dancer stretched her leg out and stopped him. She then adjusted the direction of the man before making him roll out with a powerful kick.
That man cleared out the traps on the ground in his disoriented state. The direction he went tumbling out in caused quite a few of these Hunters to panic, as the man had managed to clear a path for Svelte Dancer to charge in towards them!