Chapter 437: 437
“It left…?” At the western side of the city, The Observer whose legs were joined to the ground suddenly spoke.
“Who left?” Blood-crazy Shade asked, “The Anomaly?”
“No…” The Repentant’s voice echoed in their minds. “He is talking about the leader of the demons.”
“Oh? Why is that?” The blood-crazy Shade’s scary face took on a confused look. He continued. “Based on my knowledge… whenever the leader of Demons showed up, he has never returned empty-handed before.” He paused with a shift to his expression. “I met him in close proximity not too long ago… and I don’t think he’ll lose to anyone…”
“Watch your words, blood-crazy shade.” Snared Soul’s Giant Skull (or body?) turned around. It used its hollow eyes to look at the thing and said, “Do not forget the mission by to us by our king… and… your identity.”
The Repentant added, “As the 9 Phantom, you shan’t feel fear towards anything other than our king.” She turned her face around and squinted at the blood-crazy shade. “you should… learn that from your brother…” Blood-crazy shade’s brother was Banished Shade that looked like a knot of muscle with multiple eyes and gaping maw. In terms of personality, the elder brother, blood-crazy shade was cunning, greedy, and malicious; while the younger brother Banished Shade was more innocent than his brother, he was more like the boss of most scenario, with normal intellect, cruel, fearless and will fight to the end of his breath.
“Hmph… Who are you to lecture me.” Blood crazy shade replied with dissatisfactory. It raised its third arm and the claw shone. “You’re too young for that…”
Phew—
A shadow flitted past blood-crazy shade to interrupt him.
“Both of you need to stop arguing.” War Soul opened the dragon wing on its left back and stopped the argument between the two phantoms. “you’ll distract the Observer.”
…
“Qie…” Hearing that, Blood-crazy Shade shrugged its three shoulders and slithered away.
The 5 Phantoms had gathered together, Snared Soul, War Soul, Blood-crazy Shade, The Repentant and The Observer. Their mission to clean the city had been stopped because there was nothing left to clean…
After the arrival of the Leader of the Demon, the dark energy in the dimension was forced together. In the fight with ROOT, he exhausted 90 percent of this energy and that caused most of the monsters in the city to die from atrophy. Currently, the living creatures in the city, other than the players and Anomalies, were the other monsters as powerful as the 9 Phantoms. Under this condition, moving along was not a good idea. So The Observer was using its power to study the situation in the city, to try to contact the other 4 phantoms.
Of course, the other AI of the same level like the time wardens and juries had the same strategy, but they had a bigger loss. Especially the time wardens, at least four of them had been killed already…
…
On the other side, after the initial battle and the ambush from the hundreds of Origin’s Anomalies… half of the players had been eliminated. Of the survivors, many were injured and had used everything they had; there weren’t many that were still in fighting condition. Thankfully… the survivors had been tipped off to the strange going on in the city.
With the cooperation from Phantom Dawn, Shiva, Zombie Blade Victor and Uncle Worthless, the survivors gathered together and split into group. The few players that they didn’t find had been rescued by the Anomalies from Organization Z and were clued in on the scenario’s situation.
The counter against the Origin… had silently started.
But… if one analyse the battle situation, the gap between the player and the anomalies was quite big…
Take for example, the battle of Not a Scaredy Cat. Even a professional player like her, could only take on 2 level 3 Anomalies at the same time. If it was a player like Ambitionist, one would be more than enough, if he faced two at the same time, he would lose quite quickly. It was then that the combat stat ranking showed it true meaning. Against Anomalies, there was no factors like counter of mastery or equipment, at the end of the day… those at the top of the ranking would fare better than those on the bottom.
But, there was exception… like Shiva, Uncle Worthless and Ming Zi, with the correct condition, they could even one shot a level 3 Anomaly. In total, if the Anomaly lost their two biggest fighting forces ROOT and J1-Quick Bell, this could be an even fight.
…
“Who knew this day would come…” Lying Drunk lamented. “I have working with people from Zombie Blade…” he said as he sauntered forwards. Leading the way was Sashimi and Zombie Blade Victor.
Zombie Blade Victor turned his head around to give him a side eye, “If not for this predicament, I do not wish to work with people from Regulation either.”
“If you say so.” In Lying Drunk’s tone there was an undercurrent of derision. Zombie Blade Victor did not say anything else because he had gotten used to this treatment. Other than those side-lined, third rate small studios, most level 1 and 2 studios were hostile and condescending towards members of Zombie Blade. This world actually was fair. Some people or organization could obtain success through illegal method but while they gained those things, they would lose others.
“We’re close.” Zombie Blade Victor stopped after a while and whispered, “We should find a place to hide. We will wait for other players and meet up with them.”
“We’re still far from the dimensional tear, aren’t we… isn’t it a bit too early to stop here?” Sashimi looked at the Blast Tunnel down the distance.
“At this moment, we better not take unnecessary risk…” Zombie Blade Victor said, “When I found you, the four Anomalies you were fighting were the normies, the real powerful ones…”
Ding—
With a cold gleam, there was tingle. Zombie Blade Victor did not finish because he sensed the ambush so he turned his body around. A triangular metallic fan flew at him, aiming at his heart.
The timing was close! Just as Zombie Blade Victor turned his body, Lying Drunk sidled to his back and used his finger to pluck the weapon out from the air. The ding came from the collision of his finger and the sharp fan. Lying Drunk’s hand had turned into a metallic hand and the skin was glowing a shimmering glow.
“Don’t need to thank me.” Lying Drunk flung the weapon away and it stuck into the ground.
“Qiu… I didn’t need your help to begin with.” Zombie Blade Victor grumbled.
As they spoke, 8 Anomalies walked out from the surrounding alleys and corners and entered their sight.
“Looks like my sleuthing skill won’t work on them.” Sashimi said. “These bunch of people have no heart beat and pulse. If they just stand there, I can’t ‘hear’ them…”
“it doesn’t matter now.” Zombie Blade Victor said, “in this condition… your sleuthing ability won’t be of any use already…”