Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

Sword Demon’s sudden action raised a lot of eyebrows and earned everyone’s admiration. This was especially true for Brother Assist as he was feeling overwhelmed by shame when everyone scrutinized him for attempting to eavesdrop on the couple’s conversation. Sword Demon, meanwhile, lived up to his name as the once head honcho of Heaven-defying Guild who was never bounded by minutiae from irrelevant principles whenever he did things. The way he pulled open the door directly looks truly stalwart and resolute! Brother Assist thought to himself.

Eh? Opened the door directly? Brother Assist, who had insulted himself with the thought, began to exchange glances with the others in the cottage. Each of them could not fathom just what Sword Demon’s inner conscious was like; naturally, their thoughts were having an even hard time keeping up with what he was doing now.

Sword Demon instantly looked to his left and right upon stepping out and spotted Deep Waters and Coco standing at one side just under the eaves of the cottage. The faces of the two were black with anger, and it was apparent that their conversation had become unpleasant.

This was of course to be expected. Just as Sword Demon was pondering on how he should butt in, Deep Waters saw him and simply turned his head to the side without revealing any emotion.

“Hmph! I’ll continue to find proof and show you the truth!” Coco yelled this and turned to leave. She saw Sword Demon and shouted at the man. “What are you out here for?! Go in and continue our meeting!”

Sword Demon was not good with words to begin with, much less when it came to messy and extremely delicate situations like this. He wanted to say something but was at a loss for words. By the time he thought of something, Coco had already re-entered the cottage and Deep Waters had departed. Sword Demon shook his head and sighed before he stepped into the cottage.

“Where’s Miles? Why isn’t he here yet?” Coco asked when she got inside.

Nobody made a sound. The members of Young Master’s Elite were all madly calling out on the mercenary channel: “Why aren’t you here yet?! Hurry!”

Anyone could tell at a glance that, Coco was agitated upon her return.

Just what did Deep Waters say to her? Everyone was curious, but nobody dared to ask. They all turned to look at Sword Demon. Everyone recalled how he had said “We’ll ask Coco when she’s back”, so they were of course waiting for him to ask the question. “Ahem!” Sword Demon coughed under everyone’s expectant gazes. “I wonder why Miles isn’t here yet—”

F*CK! Everyone cussed to themselves. So, there are times when he’s dishonest, too!

A knock came. As Sword Demon was standing nearest to the door, he quickly pulled it open. This time, it was finally Gu Fei, looking positively spirited. Greeting everyone upon stepping in, he said, “There’re so many here!”

“Why were you so slow?!” Coco chided. No one else dared speak up; they recalled Coco explaining Gu Fei’s tardiness earlier – how the Bounty Assignment Hall he had teleported into was quite a far from their present location. How long had it been since then? Was this the rumored fickleness found in women?

“Heh. I met your hubby on the road, and we exchanged a few words,” Gu Fei answered.

“What did you talk about?” Everybody was dumbfounded.

“What else? Slaying him, of course!” Gu Fei replied with vicious zest.

“And then?” Their mouths were all agape.

“Then, he lowered his head and ran off!” Gu Fei replied.

“Why did you do that?! Who asked you to bully him!” Coco bolted over to Gu Fei with reckless abandon, looking as if she were about to cry.

“I’m joking…” The intensity of her reaction gave Gu Fei quite the shock, and he hastily explained himself. Coco was stunned.

“Can’t you guys tell that I was joking?” Gu Fei asked the crowd.

They shook their heads, with Royal God Call and War Without Wounds flashing a their middle fingers to Gu Fei. Gu Fei pulled his sword up. The two men proceeded to pick at their noses with that same finger, looking to their left and right respectively.

“That was in bad taste! Not even considering the time and place when making such a nasty joke,” Coco remarked.

“What happened?” Gu Fei was confused, but he could tell that something was not right.

“Deep Waters has just come by!” Sword Demon informed.

“Is that so? Why would he be here, too?” Gu Fei was perplexed. “Didn’t we fail?”

“Of course, he’s not here to watch the video,” Xi Xiaotian said. “Which begs the question: why was he here?”

Xi Xiaotian did not point to anyone when she posed that question. Still, only one person could answer that in this room, and it just so happened that, while everyone was very concerned about that matter, none of them felt right to ask about it directly.

“He came looking for me.” Coco seemed to calm down a little.

Everyone kept quiet, waiting for her to continue.

“Let’s watch the video!” Coco changed the topic.

Everyone was beside themselves as they cried inwardly that this was not the issue that they wanted to know about. None of them had a choice in this matter, however, for Coco had already taken the scroll out. Everybody quickly gathered around. The item was not like a DVD player where people could play, pause, rewind, fast forward, slow down the recording… In short, they only had one chance to watch it.

“Everyone, please pay attention.” Xi Xiaotian reminded everyone this before Coco unfurled the scroll. “Since we can only view this once, everyone should take note of any detail they can find.”

“Of course!” War Without Wounds and Royal God Call would always show a positive attitude toward any request made by a beautiful lady.

“Take note of Broken Water Arrow and not me…” Xi Xiaotian felt that there was a need to clarify this point to the two.

“Of course, of course,” they answered accordingly.

“It’s starting,” Coco announced as she unrolled the scroll.

“Can you adjust the volume—” Royal God Call requested, superimposing Xi Xiaotian’s words on the video. The man was instantly gagged and sent sprawling to the ground by the others. The rest then held their breaths as they watched the scene of Xi Xiaotian and Broken Water Arrow talking without missing a beat. The entire thing continued until the man stood up and left; Xi Xiaotian remained in her seat in shock. Finally, the video came to an end and disappeared along with the scroll itself.

Xi Xiaotian regarded the crowd. She had already mulled over the entire conversation as she was making her way over to this rendezvous point and made no new discovery whatsoever. Having watched it while adopting the perspective of someone uninvolved, her view of the situation remained unchanged. She did not know if the others could catch anything from this.

“Did anyone discover anything? Speak up while our memory is still fresh!” Coco called out.

The five members of Young Master’s Elite looked at Young Master Han. It had become their habit to do that by now; would anyone be willing to be scorned by the man after saying their piece or wait until the man finish expressing his observation, instead?

Young Master Han was not courteous and quickly spoke up. “There’re quite a few things worth noting. Broken Water Arrow expressed his disinterest in workshops, which implies he’s not a member of another himself, but he did not deny the existence of a ‘plan’.”

“Did he not deny that? I seem to recall him saying that there’s a misunderstanding regarding that plan.” Royal God Call climbed up to his feet and quickly demonstrated that there was worth to his existence here.

“And which word or phrase did he say to deny its existence? Point it out to me.” He was abruptly met with Young Master Han’s callous contempt.

Xi Xiaotian, meanwhile, nodded. “The words he had used doesn’t deny its existence; one could even say that he’s admitting the existence of a ‘plan’ to a certain degree.”

Young Master Han nodded as well. “It’s strange that he repudiated the notion of being a member of a workshop yet confirmed the existence of a ‘plan’.”

“Must it be a workshop that comes up with a plan? One person can also come up with a plan on his own!” War Without Wounds said.

“Didn’t you hear her mention the reaction she got when she used the label ‘you guys’? Broken Water Arrow didn’t make any evasive response to that, too,” Young Master Han rebutted.

“That’s as good as an admission in itself,” Xi Xiaotian added.

“So, it’s a group but not a workshop. Could he be a spy sent by another guild?” Brother Assist asked.

Young Master Han and Xi Xiaotian did not answer his speculation.

“His statement about it being a misunderstanding was what backed you into the corner and made it difficult to proceed, right?” Young Master Han asked.

“Almost unable to continue,” Xi Xiaotian corrected.

“You followed it up by telling him of your assumption of the plan he is currently executing. Naturally, you didn’t do that in hopes of him accidentally spilling the beans and laying out his actual plan in his panic, right?” Young Master Han asked for confirmation.

“Naturally. I merely did that to let him know his value, or in other words, I emphasized it to him. The moment someone realizes their worth, their next move is usually to find a way to benefit or profit from it.” Xi Xiaotian affirmed his deduction.

“So, you first called his attention to his value, and then you attempted to put a price to it,” Young Master Han summarized.

“That’s about right.” Xi Xiaotian agreed.

“What if he agreed then?” Young Master Han was slightly interested in that.

“Do I need to spell it out? I could then get proof of whatever it is you all want,” she said.

“Which means, even if Broken Water Arrow has been innocent all along, you’d use this to get proof of his wayward character the moment he took the bait,” Young Master Han surmised.

“That’s right,” Xi Xiaotian admitted.

“That’s really despicable.”

“Of course. A swindler is inseparable from such terms.”

“He did not rise to the bait in the end, though,” Young Master Han stated.

“Yes, that’s how it went. I take it that you’ve arrived at the same conclusion as mine?” asked Xi Xiaotian.

Young Master Han nodded in agreement.

“What… What sort of conclusion did you two arrive at?” Brother Assist asked.

“That Broken Water Arrow is telling the truth, and you guys…” Young Master Han was now pointing to Gu Fei, Sword Demon, and Coco. “…misunderstood the man.”

Sword Demon did not say a word, and the same went for Coco. It was only Gu Fei who remained skeptical. “Are you certain?”

“Didn’t Royal screw up from the beginning? Perhaps Broken Water Arrow realized it then, so intentionally stuck to his act,” Brother Assist suggested.

“I’ve also thought of such a possibility, but thinking about it carefully, if he were putting on an act then, he would be able to hide his reactions to the words ‘plan’ and ‘you guys’– he should be able to handle it far more beautifully when I probed him, leaving no trace of doubt as a result. Now? Even though I’m saying that you guys were mistaken about Broken Water Arrow’s intentions, I’m also stating that he joined this guild because he’s after something. Something or someone is driving him to do this. All in all, he’s not just a simple player who decided to join Deep Freeze,” Xi Xiaotian said.

“Does that mean that Broken Water Arrow didn’t drop a hint to Deep Waters, which made the latter travel all the way here?” Brother Assist asked.

“This. You can actually ask Deep Waters that yourself.” Xi Xiaotian turned to gaze at Coco. “Also, the matter with you guys stalking Broken Water Arrow, you could’ve just asked Deep Waters directly if Broken Water Arrow specifically nudged him over! You didn’t seem to have asked him about that, did you?”

“Well…” Coco also thought that she had been a little impulsive. She believed that Deep Waters would not hide anything from her, so if she were to press him about it, she could have easily found out if Broken Water Arrow had specifically brought Deep Waters over to the tavern that day. Instead, she opted to avoid Deep Waters immediately and follow the two men to play a cynical guessing game.

“It’s all your fault!” Coco fumed at the two.

Sword Demon was feeling extremely guilty when Xi Xiaotian came to his defense, “Brother Sword Demon doesn’t seem like such a meddlesome person!”

Gu Fei stared at Xi Xiaotian. “I say… Could you be working with Broken Water Arrow to toy with us?”