However, that smirk quickly disappeared from her face when she saw something that made her second guess her own eyesight. Since when were there two of them?!
Ying Yue was caught off guard by the attack, but her body started to quickly sink into the ground. The only problem was that the arrow was rapidly closing in! She could not descend fast enough to avoid it.
But, even with the arrow's sudden change of direction and its speed increase, it was unable to make it to its intended target, Ying Yue.
Bang!
Izroth's flickering silhouette appeared before Ying Yue. His sword, with a faint aura around it, clashed with the arrow and sent it flying away!
«Resisted»
'Poison?'
Seeing that he resisted something without the use of a skill or a willpower check, Izroth immediately knew that there was only one other thing within RML that would cause that message to appear and that was poison! However, thanks to one of the passives on his Heavenly Golden Body skill, he had resistance to some forms of poisons.
"Thank you." Ying Yue said in a soft tone.
Izroth gave a slight nod in response to Ying Yue's thanks. But, there two things on his mind at the moment. First was how someone managed to get within attack range of them without him realizing it, and the second was how that person was not attacked by the monsters that poured out of that forest just moments ago.
Either way, whoever it was decided to attack the members of his party. He would not let them off so easily. Izroth's flickering silhouette disappeared from his current position.
While everyone was still confused as to what was going on, Midnight wasted no time summoning his totems. As for Mirage, one could see the fire lit in her eyes. Someone dared to launch a sneak attack on her party?!
"Good! Very good! Let's see who has the confidence to pick a fight with us!" Mirage was clearly seething with rage.
The person in the forest had a dumbfounded expression on her face. That guy actually managed to deflect her arrow? Impossible! He should not have even been able to see it after the second change of course! Also, how was he in two different places at once? A clone? Teleporting? The last thing she wanted to do was deal with some troublesome rare class as that would overcomplicate things.
However, before she could even fully process what just took place, a streak of light flew right at her. It was moving at insane speeds! Her facial expression darkened and clear shock could be seen on her face when she realized that the streak of light was, in fact, her own arrow! But, how?!
Of course, Izroth did not simply parry the attack away. He used the Sword Return skill that was a part of the Second Sword Form: Returning Wave to reflect the attack right back towards its owner!
Bang!
The arrow pierced right into her shoulder. Luckily, she was able to avoid a critical hit. However, it was not the damage of the arrow itself she was worried about, it was the poison on its tip. The moment the arrow pierced into her body, she became completely immobile and unresponsive. She was paralyzed!
"Trinity!" One of the players in the group called out to the player who was just struck by the arrow.
Trinity affected herself with a special poison that rendered the target it struck defenseless for five seconds. Then after the five seconds were up, if the target used any skills that required mana within the next five seconds, the poison would return for another eight seconds. This would have effectively removed Ying Yue from the fight for a full twelve seconds.
Although her plan had backfired, fortunately, even if her attack was deflected, it should have been moving too fast for anyone to know exactly where it came from. But, even if they knew the direction that it came from, it would be impossible to discover their position thanks to an item they had called the Veil of Serok.
As they stayed within range of the person holding the item, even if a person was directly in front of them, they would be incapable of seeing or perceiving them. The Veil of Serok was just that powerful of a magic item!
Trinity let out a small sigh of relief as she said, "It was a good thing they gave us the Veil of Serok." While she was willing to do whatever necessary to complete the assignment she was given, she preferred to minimize head-on engagements. After all, their classes were suited to ambushes and sneak attacks, not immediate direct confrontation.
As for the poison, as long as they waited it out, it would not be an issue. However, just as that thought crossed her mind, she felt an unnatural breeze float past her. For some reason, this breeze sent shivers down her spine.
"So this is where you're hiding. You were even closer than I anticipated." A voice drifted into Trinity and the surrounding players' ears. Where was that voice coming from? How was their position discovered?
Of course, the voice belonged to Izroth who had followed the flight trajectory of the arrow back to its point of origins. He stopped in between Trinity and the five players that were with her. His silhouette could be seen constantly flickering in and out of existence.
"Impossible! How did he find us?" One of the players in the group said in a shocked tone.
"Is the Veil of Serok malfunctioning?"
"What's going on with his body? Is he glitching or something?"
"Relax, he is just guessing that we're here. How can a magic item as strong as the Veil of Serok malfunction? He can't even see or hear us. Once the poison wears off on Trinity, then we'll teach that idiot a lesson for confronting us by himself."
It was just as those players said, indeed, Izroth could not see, hear or sense them. To even deceive his Soul Sense was an incredible feat. However, did they believe that just because he could not see them, and did not know their exact locations, that he was unable to harm them? He knew exactly what was going on through their minds at a time like this.
"Very well, if you won't come out yourself, then I'll just have to personally send you an invitation of my own." Izroth said in a carefree manner as he gently tapped his foot against the ground.
A wave of tremors spread throughout the ground and rushed towards Trinity, as well as, the other five players that were gathered. Izroth used the AOE skill Behemoth's Quake. By doing so, even if he did not know where they were located, as long as they were within thirty meters of him, they would suffer some kind of damage. This would be the case even if they were invisible or hidden.
Worst case scenario, he wasted Behemoth's Quake and had to wait a few minutes for its cooldown to reset. However, as the first wave of tremors reached Trinity and her party, Izroth did not see anything on the battle logs. But, he was now absolutely confident that there were players here.
Even though Izroth did not see anything appear in the battle logs, the stacks of Storm Surge Charge on his Sword of The Storm shot up by six! This meant that there were a total of six players hidden within thirty meters of his current location. Judging by the speed of the tremors and how fast he received the stacks, those players were definitely less than ten meters away!
"Let's just attack him now!" One of the players said.
"If we attack now then Trinity will be his first target, idiot! It's just 200 damage, we can just heal it back with an HP potion."
As the second wave of tremors went out, Izroth's stacks of Storm Surge Charge increased by another six stacks. But, it soon dropped down by ten stacks, as a strong gust of wind appeared around his sword. He used ten stacks to activate the skill Tempest Strikes, one of the skills that came along with his Sword of The Storm.
Woosh! Woosh! Woosh!
Since Tempest Strikes converted his physical attacks into blades of wind and extended its range by ten meters, he used it to attack randomly in every direction. Being able to attack five times per second with his Flickering Steps active, it was like a hurricane swept through the surrounding area as sharp blades of wind tore right through everything in its path.
"He's insane!" One of the players said in a tone of disbelief. He could not follow Izroth's movements with his eyes and all he was able to see were the flickering afterimages of his arm seemingly waving around without purpose. However, he soon felt a strong force crash into his body. Then, a split second later, it happened a second time, and then a third time. By the time the fourth strike came around, he had died.
"Cai Hu! This guy...!" Trinity gritted her teeth as she glared at Izroth with hateful eyes. She watched on helplessly as one of her party members were killed right before her.
"How can he attack so accurately when he can't even see us?!" One of the players commented.
Fast! It happened way too fast! How had he been killed? The tremors did not do nearly enough damage to kill him that fast, otherwise, they would all be dead by now!
'That's one down. Five more to go. Not being able to see or sense them is a bit troublesome, however, how long are they be prepared to remain idle?'
Izroth watched as the particles of the player that he eliminated scattered around and dissipated. It did not matter what skill or item was being used, once a player was killed their particles became visible for all to see.
Izroth paid close attention to his stacks of Storm Surge Charge as it was how he could tell if his attacks were hitting someone or just striking thin air. Of course, he took into account the one stack he gained every three seconds while in combat and made sure not to confuse it for the stacks he earned by landing a successful attack.
The moment his first blade of wind hit Cai Hu, Izroth instantly followed up with a wave of attacks aimed at the same location with deadly accuracy. He kept doing so until he observed the particles that confirmed that he had successfully eliminated the hidden player.
By the time the player even realized that he was under attack from the blade of winds, he had already met his demise. After all, Izroth's attacks were simply too fast to track.
"He's too dangerous! He'll be our first target!" Trinity commanded as the effects of the poison finally wore off. Even though she could not use a skill for another five seconds, she could still move and fire off basic attacks.
Of course, she would have liked to wait until she could use skills again before deactivating the Veil of Serok and attacking, however, someone had already been killed! She could no longer afford to play it safe.
Ooooooooooooom!
Five shadows appeared from out nowhere before transforming into players. Trinity had lifted the effects of the Veil of Serok. While it was active the carrier of the item was capable of attacking, however, others affected by the magic item was unable to attack or defend themselves. In a way, it was a double-edged sword. But, who would have thought that they would run into someone like this here?
"I see you've finally decided to take me up on my invitation." Izroth said.
"Kill him." Trinity said in a cold tone without wasting any words on Izroth.
"Not one for small talk I see. In that case, I'll only need one of you." Izroth said in a nonchalant manner.