Chapter 1507: Duel of Kings

"Lu Chen!"

I understood what Lu Buyi was trying to say the moment he shouted my name. The moment I added him into my party, all of my stats abruptly skyrocketed by 225%. At the same time, I used Hunter Card and increased my max HP further to 14.78 million. I was temporarily out of range of a bard, or I would be sitting at over 20 million HP right now. It would’ve caused everyone’s jaw to hit the floor with a resounding clang!

Buzz!

A fiery red light erupted toward the sky. As I thought, Candlelight Shadow was going to hit me with a Dragon Tooth Arm-empowered Pangu’s Axe. As an SSS Ancient Divine Skill, it ignored the target’s Defense, and its damage was solely derived from the user’s base Attack. Right now, Candlelight Shadow was fully clad in Sacred Armaments, Lower Divine Armaments and other incredible pieces of equipment, so this one attack could definitely do over 2 million damage at base. With the nonuple multiplier, well, how many people could survive so much damage?

I activated Resurrection Art so he couldn’t send me back to the main city even if he managed to kill me.

I also activated Profound Armor and wreathed my sword in the flames of Burning Blade Slash. If we were going to fight against each other, then I might as well go all out, not to mention that negotiations had broken down completely.

……

"Die, Lu Chen!"

Candlelight Shadow uttered hatefully. He obviously hated the fact that I had dragged him down his throne, and today he was going to repay that "favor" using the Dragon Tooth Arm!

A swathe of crimson light fell toward my head. The Pangu's Axe covered an extremely wide area, and not even with my speed could I escape to safety in time. I could only tank this attack head-on!

BOOM!

My entire body shook as a huge damage number rose from my head—

10,393,065!

What a ridiculous amount of damage! What a terrifying man Candlelight Shadow had become! Every player who saw this scene was flabbergasted, and even I was gnashing my teeth together in irritation. Not even the Cloak of Divine Fervor’s 50% damage mitigation would have been enough to save my life had he managed to score a critical hit! Right now, who else besides me could survive an attack with over 20 million base damage?

The duel was just beginning, however. I cut through the flames of the Pangu's Axe and struck Candlelight Shadow’s armor three times with Burning Blade Slash. The skill greatly injured Candlelight Shadow and restored a ton of HP—

719,377!

801,823!

1,029,874!

Bang! I kicked Candlelight Shadow in the chest with all my might and sent him stumbling backward. While he was catching himself, I raised the Xuanyuan Sword and executed my true counterattack, the SSS Rank Ancient Divine Skill Xuanyuan Slash!

"Shit!"

Candlelight Shadow hurriedly summoned his fire dragon and leaped onto its back. He was trying to escape into the sky.

I gave him no chance to do so. By shortening the channeling time of the skill as best I could and bringing down the Xuanyuan Slash at the same time, I was able to hit him in the back and send both him and his dragon crashing back against the ground. Not only that, the large group of Qiu Beast Cavalrymen behind him got caught in the attack, ate a ton of splash damage and sustained heavy losses as well. Candlelight Shadow himself lost 2.74 million HP in one go and dropped to 50% HP, although he had around 12 million max HP or so and was thus not even close to dying. Of course, he would be dead if my attack had triggered its septuple damage effect.

Since I hadn’t gotten lucky and one-shot Candlelight Shadow, I chose to drop three Ancient Seals atop Candle Dragon’s shield formation instead. The pale-faced magic knights hurriedly shouted, "Heal us, priests! We can’t hold out much longer!"

Before they could finish, a beautiful figure descended from the sky and dropped five God’s Tears in a row, killing many of them. She was of course the ascended Lin Yixin.

……

"Take them out, mages!"

At the distance, Ye Yuse commanded with a wave of her scepter.

The sky became illuminated by an innumerable amount of Fireballs, Touch of the Dragonkiss, Galaxy Storms and more spells. Both Lin Yixin and I were caught squarely in the bombardment, but the amount of damage we received could only be described as mind-boggling—

31,980!

1!

MISS!

1!

45!

……

The ninth-promotion [1] players could greatly penetrate our Defense, but only them. Everyone else—especially those who were slightly over Level 230 and didn’t have very impressive equipment—did little to no damage at all. Some of them couldn’t even deal a fixed 1 damage thanks to our Unusual Physique. This was the power of a Divine Rank player [2]!

Lin Yixin’s eyes widened. She almost couldn’t believe the amount of damage she was receiving.

I wasn’t nearly as surprised as she was since I had time to acclimatize to my new power. This was why people said that Divine Rank players would be the focal points of all future Nation Wars. Unless your enemy’s power exceeded a certain threshold, practically no one could penetrate your Defense or deal an effective amount of damage. If I hadn’t ascended, a Level 230 mage would have dealt around 4,000 damage to me using a Touch of the Dragonkiss. Now? The spell could only do at most 50 damage to me, and at minimum 1. The power gap between a god and a mortal was especially obvious in a chaotic war like this one!

……

"Let’s retreat, Yiyi!"

Back to the present. Ye Yuse and God’s Dance were slowly approaching us, Transient Smoke and Clouds looked like he could spring into action at any moment, and Candlelight Shadow was staring at us with unbridled fighting spirit. They were clearly plotting to kill either me or Lin Yixin. The two of us might be able to treat most of their attacks as air, but not Candlelight Shadow’s nonuple damage effect. It would be safer not to engage him unless absolutely necessary!

Pa! Pa!

Lin Yixin and I left behind a pair of mini cyclones and flew toward Ancient Sword Dreaming Souls’ formation. We cut down some Candle Dragon players on our way down before hovering above a bunch of Dragonlight Cavalry.

Pure Love was going to buff me when I stopped her, "It’s fine, I don’t need it yet. Buff Fighting Spirits so he can go on a rampage, Pure Love!"

"Got it!"

Pure Love waved her scepter a couple of times and gave High Fighting Spirits full buffs. The warrior then rushed right into a group of enemies, spun his new Sun and cut down everyone around him with a Whirlwind Slash. At this point, the Qiu Beast Cavalry were absolutely incapable of stopping High Fighting Spirits, not to mention that Pure Love’s buffs had propelled his max HP past the 10 million mark, and his equipment gave him a total of 11% lifesteal. Even with his recklessness, I was certain that High Fighting Spirits would be able to keep himself alive!

In the sky, Li Chengfeng asked me while gripping his new Cyan Peak Halberd, "How are we doing this, Lu Chen? Candle Dragon is in front of us, and Warsky Alliance is behind. If we dare to launch an all-out assault against Candle Dragon, they are sure to hit our rear. It’s been a long time since Warsky has declared war on us after all!"

I sucked in a deep breath before assuring him, "There is nothing to worry about. Treat this as a practice war of some sort. We can afford to lose this battle, so let us stay calm and deal with them as they come! Anyway, we’re going to split up our forces. I, Eve, Little Gui, Chaos Moon, Lian Xin and You and Yun will be attacking Candle Dragon directly. You, Beiming, Fighting Spirits, Heaven’s Rain, Diamond Dust and everyone else will take 20k Dragonlight Cavalry with you and take the fight to Warsky Alliance! Best-case scenario, kill Warsky and get him to drop his Immortal Blade!

Li Chengfeng chuckled. "Got it! Third and fourth column, follow me! We’re going to face off against the so-called number two guild of Sky City!"

Hovering in the sky and looking toward the horizon, I asked, "When are your men arriving, Yiyi?"

"Ten minutes!"

"Wonderful. Tell Purple Marquis to hit Warsky Alliance from the rear and cut off their retreat path. I want to see Warsky weep after we drop 20% of his players’ equipment!"

"No problem. I’ll stay with you to fight Candle Dragon and find a chance to take out Candlelight Shadow. Is that fine?"

"Of course!"

……

Without needing to be prompted, Lu Buyi added Lin Yixin, He Yi, Chaos Moon and more elite players into his party so they could enjoy his 225% stat buff. This was the advantage we wielded over our enemies. Without it, this would be a hard fight since Candle Dragon alone numbered over 100k players, and we were only tens of thousands of elites strong.

Boom!

I hit the Candle Dragon players at the front row with a skill before bringing down the Xuanyuan Sword. Since I had changed my attack mode to guild attack mode, all Warsky and Candle Dragon players within 1000 yards of me lost 70% of their HP instantly. It was absolutely deadly to say the least!

Everyone was livid when they saw that their HP had fallen to dangerous orange. A wide-eyed Blue Sky Scar swore, "Fuck! It’s the effect of the Xuanyuan Sword! I know it’s the number one weapon of the Twelve Divine Armaments, but isn’t it still a little too imbalanced?? All units, do not retreat and heal yourselves with health potions! Priests, keep our frontliners alive at all costs!"

Meanwhile, Chaos Moon was eliciting screams of pain and death wherever she went with her new Dihai Blade. The blade was a perfect fit with her style and eliteness.

Rock Crush!

A rock-filled blade aura traveled about dozens of meters to the front and killed off an entire group of magic knights. Chaos Moon was extremely fast, and she strove to kill her enemies as quickly and efficiently as possible. Her blade fell downward, and five low-health enemies dropped dead before they could make an escape.

It was at this moment God’s Dance Blinked in and surrounded herself in a spiraling inferno. Her scepter didn’t look like an ordinary weapon. Then, she spun on her feet and hit Chaos Moon’s chest three times with some sort of flame spike that dealt a shocking amount of damage—

1,923,877!

1,726,673!

1,826,364!

A ninth-promotion mage was no joke. Although Chaos Moon’s Magic Resist wasn’t as great as mine, she was still one of the best players in our guild!

"Come back, Chaos Moon! God’s Dance’s Magic Attack is too high!"

I shouted at her while she beat a quick but orderly retreat. She didn’t forget to attack the closest players and lifesteal some HP, which was a good thing because a trail of arrows nipped at her feet immediately after. The situation was incredibly dangerous.

"God’s Dance wields a Lower Divine Armament scepter that can cast unique offensive spells! Be careful!" He Yi warned.

I hurriedly spun around and threw Coiling Dragon Revolution at God’s Dance.

Boom!

The sword cut through all enemy players in the way and dealt over 2 million damage to them. It was a cathartic experience because all the high-level mobs and bosses I encountered in the Purgatory took less than 1 million damage from the skill. It was only back in the Human Realms that I realized just how scary my Attack had become!

"Watch out, Little Wu!"

Candlelight Shadow abruptly descended from the sky and stood protectively in front of God’s Dance. He executed Shattering Sword and Shield and, against great odds, actually managed to send my sword flying back to my hands. I sucked in a deep breath. The fact that he managed to cancel my skill meant that his Attack and Defense stats weren’t too far behind my own. This was going to be annoying!

1. T/N: I wanted to say this earlier, but it seems you CAN be ninth-promotion without being ascended. Lu Chen just did a shit job explaining it because to be fair, why would he need to pay attention to how a normal player completes their ninth class promotion? The goddang author has no excuse though ☜

2. T/N: now that I think about it, Thunder should be fucking ashamed that Lu Chen when he was still a noob managed to do even 1 point of damage to him ☜