Chapter 914: Dark Swordsman

Translator: alyschu

Swhoosh!

After I returned to the waiting area, I leaned against the handrail and smiled at the girls, "That’s that. I leave the next three 1v1 matches to you girls!"

Beiming Xue replied confidently, "No worries!"

The second match was between Beiming Xue and Amber Pupil. Her opponent was a Dark Swordsman; a class that was very similar to mine in some ways.

The two combatants teleported into the battlefield. Amber Pupil looked like a 25-year-old man. He wielded a sharp blade and donned a black armor. Although he was facing a cute girl like Beiming Xue, his expression was as gloomy as his class. He let out a cry and imbued his sword with a sheen of red energy. It was of course the Undead Energy buff skill. Unfortunately for him, undead energy only worked against living targets, and Beiming Xue was an Asura—an undead creature—since the start of the game thanks to her class. Therefore, his undead energy wasn’t going to work on her.

Before the battle began, Beiming Xue backed to the far end of the arena so that she could utilize her range advantage to the max. However, Amber Pupil himself walked all the way up to the barrier separating the two of them to minimize the distance between them as much as possible. This man was far more aggressive than Now and Forever was.

3!

2!

1!

Fight!

The moment the match began, Amber Pupil immediately locked onto a wilted tree next to Beiming Xue and activated Charge, closing the gap between them in an instant. Before he even came to a full stop, he shouted, "Square Slash!"

Boom!

A sword energy the shape of a square split the air, and Beiming Xue was hit before she could do anything. She immediately lost 62993 HP!

Our breaths nearly stopped. If it wasn’t Beiming Xue, if she wasn’t wearing the Windchaser equipment set, she could’ve been one-shot there and then!

Beiming Xue wore a frigid expression as she loosed Bone Eroding Arrow at Amber Pupil and backed away. She knew that this would be an uphill battle if she didn’t lower the enemy’s Defense first. This was despite the fact that she had already activated Bow God.

She immediately followed up with Evil Spirit Volley. Her bow flicking technique was so sublime that she was able to direct all twelve arrows at her enemy.

Amber Pupil narrowed his eyes and parried most of the arrows fired his way, unintentionally showing off his top-class reaction and skill and causing countless spectators to exclaim in admiration. The fact that it was the dark archer’s Evil Spirit Volley that he was parrying only made his skill look all the more impressive.

After Amber Pupil was done defending himself, he activated War God Rampage—boosting his movement speed beyond imagination—and caught up to Beiming Xue instantly. Then, he raised his weapon and shouted, "Die, dark archer! Dark Slash!"

Light burst from his blade, and he brought it down on Beiming Xue in one mighty swing. However, not only did Beiming Xue not dodge out of the way, she pulled out her dagger and met the attack head-on!

Chiang!

She... she actually managed to parry the skill! No one thought that an archer could pull off such an astounding feat!

That being said, some of the power of the skill still went through her parry, dealing around 10k damage and causing her to skid across the grass. Before she came to a stop, Beiming Xue raised her bow and fired Mountain Stagger Arrow + Spiraling Arrow Blade at Amber Pupil!

69920!

81837!

Amber Pupil was both shocked and in awe of Beiming Xue. He was impressed by how skillful she was at manipulating external force to her own advantage, and even more impressed by her armor penetration. Amber Pupil clearly had a lot of Defense, but after eating Bone Eroding Arrow, the Windchaser equipment set armor penetration effects came fully online and tore apart his HP like paper. At this point, his chance of surviving a counterattack was exactly zero.

"You die!"

Beiming Xue narrowed her eyes and aimed her bow at the sky. One arrow flew into the air, but a rain of arrows fell back down with the power of an artillery strike behind them! It was none other than the seventh-promotion skill, Skypiercer!

Boom boom boom...

Dust flew everywhere as the arrows exploded around Amber Pupil, and in the end, the dark swordsman wasn’t able to survive the attack. He dropped to his knees and slumped against the ground!

The individual score turned 1:0. Beiming Xue had scored the first point for the team.

The second round started quickly, and both combatants appeared on the battlefield once more.

In the arena, Amber Pupil looked thoughtful as he hummed to himself. Just like the previous fight, he didn’t say a word to Beiming Xue.

Beiming Xue herself was keeping silent and playing with her bow and her arrows a little. It wasn’t like she had anything to say to Amber Pupil anyway. Ever since she became close with Lin Yixin, she had become a lot more proficient in using a dagger. As a result, her ability to survive melee engagements despite being an archer improved drastically. It was a good thing of course.

The countdown hit zero, and the battle began once more!

Just like the first round, Amber Pupil let out a mighty roar and Charged Beiming Xue. The difference was that this time, he used Square Slash and Dark Slash in rapid succession. Square Slash was an AoE skill, so one couldn’t really parry it. After taking a hit, she swung her dagger and successfully parried Dark Slash again. This time though, she had fallen into the enemy’s trap.

Amber Pupil smiled and grabbed Beiming Xue’s arm with his free left hand. Then, he said, "Goodbye, Beiming Xue—Rage of Trapped Souls!"

A gigantic, bloody arm suddenly burst out of the ground and grabbed Beiming Xue completely. At the same time, the combat log stated that the dark archer was immobilized for 7 seconds!

"Shit!" He Yi and Lin Yixin swore at nearly the same time.

What could an archer do if they couldn’t move? Not even the Windchaser equipment set was powerful enough to protect her. Two strikes later, Beiming Xue was sent out of the battlefield.

The score turned 1:1. For now, the match was a draw!

After Beiming Xue returned to the waiting area, she said indifferently, "I didn’t know he had a skill like this. Next time, he won’t get the chance to come close to me anymore. Don’t worry, big bro, Sister Eve. Beiming Xue promises to win this match no matter what!"

I nodded and said, "We believe in you, young woman. Now go and kick his ass..."

Beiming Xue: "..."

......

For the third and the last time, Beiming Xue and Amber Pupil were teleported into the arena for the decider round!

It seemed impossible, but Amber Pupil’s eyes somehow grew even steelier than before. He knew that he must win this match because it might be his team’s only shot to mount a comeback later. The reason for this was the Phantasm of Stars, Lian Xin. During the Battle of Poplar Valley, she had wiped the floor with top-tier experts like Warsky and Blue Sky Scar and fought the famous Fruit Knife Goddess to a draw. In fact, she almost pulled off the impossible and killed her. No one in his team was foolish enough to think that they could beat Lian Xin with absolute confidence.

Unfortunately, his opponent, Beiming Xue, wasn’t a small fry herself. The dark archer was famous almost since the start of Heavenblessed, and she was growing to become the face of all archers in China. Her skill and equipment were among the best he had ever seen, and if it wasn’t for the fact that metal-armor classes had a slight advantage over archers, he wouldn’t even have a sliver of hope of beating her.

The moment the match began, Amber Pupil launched himself from his original position and dashed toward Beiming Xue at high speed. He only had one goal in mind, and that was to immobilize her with Rage of Trapped Souls and one-shot her. It was literally his only shot at defeating her!

Beiming Xue ran away from Amber Pupil while firing Spiraling Arrow Blade and Evil Spirit Volley at him, dealing a ton of damage. Because the Windchaser equipment set ignored 40% of the target’s Defense, Amber Pupil lost over half of his HP in just the blink of an eye. She hadn’t even hit him with Bone Eroding Arrow yet!

When Amber Pupil’s HP fell to 25%, he finally decided to take a gamble and activate Charge!

However, Beiming Xue saw it coming and used her own Leap, launching herself 20 yards away from him. Even better, she let loose Skypiercer while she was still in midair and caused Amber Pupil to grit his teeth in frustration.

Bang bang bang!

The arrows pummeling against helmet hurt like a bitch. Amber Pupil knew that he was going to lose there and then, but he wasn’t willing to give up just yet. He continued rushing toward Beiming Xue with everything he got.

"Hmph..."

Finally, Beiming Xue couldn’t restrain herself any longer and cast her Divine General Skill. Well of the Abyss appeared right beneath Amber Pupil’s feet and immobilized him for 15 seconds!

When the spell was close to reaching its end, Beiming Xue fired her Spiraling Arrow Blades at Amber Pupil. The arrows struck right as the spell ended and killed him where he stood!

The score turned 2:1, and Beiming Xue successfully won her match.

......

The overall score was now 2:0. If the players of Sword Lord of Jianghu were fairly confident in their chances of winning even after Now and Forever suffered a loss in my hands, they weren’t now. Their faces looked pale. I bet that they were wondering how the hell they were going to beat Lian Xin, and how they were going to justify their failures to their master in the China VR department right now. They were paid a high salary to do their jobs, so of course they had to perform up to the standards that was expected of them. I could already imagine their fates if they failed to even qualify for the internationals.

When the third match was announced, Lian Xin raised her Thunder God Scepter and declared confidently, "Don’t worry, everyone! I’ll definitely win this. Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls is destined to qualify for the internationals and become champions anyway!"

I nodded but cautioned her. "Don’t underestimate your enemy, Little Xin!"

"I know!"

......

Lian Xin’s opponent was a 35-year-old uncle called Romantic Ashes. He was a magic swordsman with a slightly balding head and a blood-red sword. There was no telling how strong he was.

The moment the battle began, Romantic Ashes charged straight toward Lian Xin and gathered flames around his blade. It was a clear sign that he cultivated both martial arts and magic. A sword slash empowered by fire magic dealt several times more damage than normal, so it could definitely threaten even a mage like Lian Xin.

Unfortunately for Romantic Ashes, Lian Xin had no plans to let him get close to her. She slapped down a trio of Origin Force Fields in front of the magic swordsman, and, caught off-guard,the guy faceplanted into one of them and began bleeding from his nose. He probably wasn’t expecting Lian Xin’s game sense to be this good!

Ice Spiral Matrix!

A storm of icy blades immediately engulfed Romantic Ashes and deleted a huge chunk of HP.

90289!

The amount of damage he took was so ridiculous that his face turned purple with shock. Circling around the Origin Force Fields and conjuring an icicle at his palm, he shouted, "You are courting death!"

He activated Charge and tried to close the distance between himself and Lian Xin. A magic swordsman was still a swordsman. He must get close to Lian Xin first before he could have a chance to kill her.

Charge was a really fast skill, but...

The corners of Lian Xin’s lips turned up as she slapped down another Origin Force Field in front of Romantic Ashes!

Bang!

Romantic Ashes must feel like he was about to suffer a concussion right now. Before he could do anything, Lian Xin cast Dimensional Storm and killed him where he stood!

It was 1:0. Lian Xin never gave her opponent the slightest chance to turn the tables on her, and it wasn’t looking like this was going to change anytime soon.

......

When the second round began, Romantic Ashes changed tactics and tried to trade range attacks with Lian Xin while searching for an opportunity to get close to her. Unfortunately, he soon realized the gigantic flaw in his plan: his icicles only deleted 10% shield durability from Lian Xin’s Telekinetic Shield, but her spells deleted over 70k HP from his health pool...

By the time Romantic Ashes finally realized he was fucked, Lian Xin had already slapped down twelve Origin Force Fields and trapped him at the center. One Ice Spiral Matrix later, the battle was over!

The score was 3:0, and Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls successfully knocked out Sword Lord of Jianghu from the WEL. Some distance from us, Now and Forever looked so angry that his eyes were bloodshot.