Chapter 7: Refreshed and Clear-Headed
[Wujin Shi burned through a ton of wood, dried out all his meat, and still couldn’t lure the monster out. You got it to spawn in two minutes???]
[It’s over, it’s over. You stole Wujin Shi’s monster. Just wait for him to put you on his kill-on-sight list.]
[No, but seriously, what kind of luck does this streamer have?]
With a clean side roll, Qingzhou Yiguo dodged Zhēng’s attack and pulled out his weapon to counter with a strike. The injured Zhēng roared in fury and closed the distance, slashing down with a claw.
Qingzhou Yiguo raised his weapon to block. At some point, the weapon in his hands had already been replaced with a Fusang Wood Branch, which had much higher attack and defense.
Zhēng’s level was far above the monsters around Wing Marsh, so Qingzhou Yiguo didn’t dare relax. After only a few exchanges, a portion of his HP bar had already dropped.
Wujin Shi, who had been watching from the side the whole time, suddenly stood up and silently walked toward Qingzhou Yiguo’s campfire, even using the Kunwu Blade to poke at the fire.
It was the posture of someone inspecting something.
Qingzhou Yiguo fell silent…
Only after using a big skill to immobilize Zhēng for three seconds did he finally get the chance to type an explanation.
[Nearby] Qingzhou Yiguo: I didn’t use any special materials. Maybe because today’s daily quest is this monster, it was easier to lure out.
Wujin Shi withdrew the Kunwu Blade and turned the roasted meat over with his hand.
Still inspecting.
[Nearby] Wujin Shi: I’ve taken this daily before too.
[Nearby] Wujin Shi: Couldn’t lure it out in the end. Failed the quest.
[Nearby] Qingzhou Yiguo: …
[Stop chatting already, you’re gonna get beaten to death by the monster!]
[Watch the monster, not Wujin Shi, please.]
[Wujin Shi actually went to inspect someone else’s campfire and roast meat after they spawned the monster. How is this any different from rummaging through somebody’s trash?]
[Help, I can picture it too clearly!]
Chi Zhen sighed helplessly. “Don’t say nonsense. I’ve been watching the monster the whole time, okay? Aren’t I fighting it right now? The problem is it’s hard to fight.”
Chi Zhen spared a glance at the chat, but the comment about Wujin Shi digging through trash refused to leave his mind.
Ah… help…
Wujin Shi kept observing from the side. Probably noticing that Qingzhou Yiguo was struggling to fight alone, he tossed over a party invitation.
[Nearby] Wujin Shi: Party up?
[Nearby] Wujin Shi: I only need Zhēng’s horn. I don’t want anything else. If it drops, I can buy it from you. Name your price.
Wujin Shi was worried that Qingzhou Yiguo wouldn’t be able to handle Zhēng and that the monster he’d finally managed to lure out would escape.
Zhēng only appeared once per day. If another player had already spawned Zhēng that day, then no one else on the server would have another chance to see it until the next day.
And Zhēng didn’t even appear every day. Some players had once kept statistics and found that the server had gone twenty-five consecutive days without a single Zhēng spawning.
Everyone sharply commented that Zhēng’s appearance rate depended entirely on the game planner’s mood.
Since Qingzhou Yiguo was the one who spawned the monster, the system designated him as the primary aggro target. Even if someone else came over, stole the fight, and killed the monster, all the loot would still belong entirely to him.
At this point, no matter who Qingzhou Yiguo partied with, the loot distribution rights were still his. Nobody could steal them away.
Having someone volunteer to help fight meant he lost nothing.
Qingzhou Yiguo immediately accepted Wujin Shi’s party request.
Wujin Shi instantly drew the Kunwu Blade. Sword intent surged sharply outward, and the party’s fighting spirit immediately increased by 20%.
This was the buff added by Blade Cultivators: Golden Scales Unfurl.
Comfortable. So incredibly comfortable.
Qingzhou Yiguo burst into tears of gratitude as he swung the Fusang Wood Branch. Around Wujin Shi appeared a glowing special effect of green leaves swirling in circles.
Defense increased by 30%.
This was the Spirit Cultivator sect’s exclusive buff: Spring Shadows in Empty Green. It could only be cast on one person, but the defense increase was much higher than group buffs.
During dungeon raids, under the commander’s instructions, it was usually given to the player responsible for tanking the boss’s big attacks.
But outside of raids, in 99% of situations, Spirit Cultivators cast this buff on themselves.
After all, nothing was more important than staying alive.
Giving it to Wujin Shi now, Qingzhou Yiguo didn’t think too much about it. He was simply returning kindness with kindness.
[Holy shit, it’s the Spirit Cultivator’s Green Light.]
[There are only two situations where a Spirit Cultivator gives Green Light to someone else. Either that person is their cultivation partner… or that person is their side piece. That’s why people call it the Green Light.]
[Xiao Chi, pick one.]
Chi Zhen nearly coughed up blood, but he had no time to argue with the viewers. One lapse in concentration and Zhēng might slap him to death.
He backflipped to widen the distance, immediately following up with a spell attack.
Spirit Cultivator offensive skill — Cold Qi Condensation. Upon hitting the target, it dealt damage and had a chance to inflict a Weakness debuff lasting two seconds.
Chi Zhen’s luck was usually pretty good, and the Weakness effect triggered as expected.
But it only lasted two seconds, vanishing in the blink of an eye. Sometimes, by the time a ranged class finished channeling a spell attack, the debuff would already be gone.
It could only rely on teamwork, awareness, and prediction.
And then, in that very instant—
The moment Qingzhou Yiguo cast Cold Qi Condensation, before the stream viewers could even confirm whether the Weakness debuff had triggered, Wujin Shi had already leapt into the air, bringing his blade crashing down with explosive force.
Zhēng failed to dodge in time and was smashed unconscious onto the ground, one-third of its HP disappearing instantly.
Such terrifying DPS!
Qingzhou Yiguo had struggled bitterly for ages just to shave off one-tenth of Zhēng’s HP bar, yet Wujin Shi cut down a third of it with a single strike.
Was this the terrifying power of a divine weapon?!
[I’m crying]
Wujin Shi, you’re amazing. I apologize for saying you were digging through trash earlier.]
[With DPS like that, one slash would probably delete the streamer’s life bar too. Good thing he didn’t put the streamer on his kill-on-sight list.]
[If Xiao Chi hadn’t applied Weakness, that much HP wouldn’t have disappeared.]
[Holy shit, anyone who didn’t know better would think you two had been married for ten years. You can’t develop this kind of coordination without ten years together!]
[Why are you two so in sync? You’re more coordinated than the fixed teammate I’ve fought three hundred battlefield matches with. I’m kicking him out when I get back, thanks.]
Chi Zhen no longer had the spare attention to read chat. The instant Zhēng lost control and collapsed, he immediately swung the Fusang Wood Branch and chained another five-second stun onto it.
Five seconds. Wujin Shi and Qingzhou Yiguo circled around Zhēng and unleashed a frenzy of attacks, instantly cutting its HP bar in half.
Just as Chi Zhen thought the mini-boss fight was about to go smoothly, more than a dozen figures suddenly leapt up from the cliffside and charged straight toward him.
[Nearby] Liuli Xin: Qingzhou Yiguo! If you don’t honestly explain yourself today, our Dominating the Firmament guild will make sure you never leave Mount Guguan alive!
[Nearby] Mo Li: Xinxin, don’t waste words on him. He’s definitely a spy from Way of Heaven! Look at him, partying with Wujin Shi to fight a field boss!
Chi Zhen frowned. “Why do these two IDs look so familiar…”
[?]
[Did a meteor hit you? You lost your memory? These are Liuli Xin and Mo Li, the ones who made you the target of the forums’ witch hunt!]
[The two people who used alternate accounts to gossip about Wei Yu Ning Qiu and then got doxxed!]
[This is getting spicy, family. More drama incoming. Somebody throw the streamer a fruit bomb~]
Chi Zhen remembered now, but he was too busy dodging Zhēng’s attacks to type out I’m not, I didn’t.
The other Dominating the Firmament members saw Wujin Shi partying with Qingzhou Yiguo and immediately took it as proof that Qingzhou Yiguo was Way of Heaven’s spy, convinced that Wei Yu Ning Qiu had staged everything himself for attention.
Several people instantly surrounded them. Instead of attacking right away, they started taking screenshots and recording videos one after another.
[Nearby] Ai Ni: Solid proof at last. Let’s see how Way of Heaven tries to argue their way out of this now!
[Nearby] Yusheng Hu Ni Wu You: Brothers, everyone got the evidence saved? Good. Then let’s go!
[Nearby] An Yu: Wait.
The moment An Yu spoke, the dozen-plus Dominating the Firmament members all stopped moving.
Very quickly, an ethereal-looking Daoist stepped out from the crowd. The Daoist wore the premium cash-shop 886 outfit, his entire body shimmering with flowing gold and silver light. His long golden hair floated elegantly, paired with pale skin and golden eyes, giving off the transcendent aura unique to the Infinite Dao Sect. Half western fantasy, half cultivation aesthetic. Anyone seeing him would sigh and say: what a flamboyant scene kid.
In the middle of all the chaos, Chi Zhen glanced at An Yu and muttered, “If I were Wei Yu Ning Qiu, I’d reject An Yu, too. That eye-searing scene-kid look! Weujin Shi is way better—black hair, black clothes, black blade. Cool and handsome.”
[Hey hey, Xiao Chi, you accidentally said your inner thoughts out loud.]
[I think I just watched episode one of a thousand-episode drama series.]
[The gears of fate have begun to turn…]
[Nearby] An Yu: Wujin Shi, what exactly is the meaning of this?
[Nearby] Wujin Shi: ?
Chi Zhen muttered again, “You guys are the ones who came over here yourselves, and now you’re asking him what he means?”
[Please, stop using voice chat.]
[Why does this sound so clingy?]
[Why am I getting trophy-wife vibes?]
[Nearby] An Yu: I originally didn’t want to believe this Qingzhou Yiguo knew you.
[Nearby] Wujin Shi: I really don’t know him.
[Nearby] An Yu: Don’t know him? Then what a coincidence, partying up to fight a boss together? Wujin Shi, get on YY. I’ll give you a chance to explain yourself. I don’t want to misunderstand a former good brother of mine. Why did you smear my cultivation partner?!
[Nearby] Wujin Shi: No time.
The Dominating the Firmament members were furious, feeling that Wujin Shi was unbelievably arrogant. An Yu had already been patient enough to invite him onto YY to explain himself, yet he replied with a blunt “No time”!
The crowd instantly erupted with outrage.
[Nearby] An Yu: Wujin Shi! Since you’re heartless, don’t blame me for being ruthless!
An Yu whipped out his horsetail whisk and directly unleashed a killing move at Wujin Shi. Everyone else immediately followed suit.
The scene became absolute chaos. Anyone passing by without context would think a full raid group had assembled to fight a field boss. Wujin Shi and Qingzhou Yiguo were fighting the boss, while an entire outer ring of players attacked Wujin Shi and Qingzhou Yiguo.
For a moment, the two of them were overwhelmed—fighting the boss while simultaneously dodging and countering everyone else’s AoE attacks, scrambling frantically to keep up.
Only someone at Wujin Shi’s level, combined with Chi Zhen’s fairly decent mechanics, kept them from being instantly wiped out by more than a dozen players.
The greatest characteristic of the Spirit Cultivator class was its huge number of support skills. Its direct damage wasn’t especially high, but it possessed all kinds of buffs increasing defense, attack, and critical hit rate, along with countless debuffs inflicted on enemies—stuns, weakness, bleeding, poison, and more.
Usually, Chi Zhen played alone, so he never felt much about it. Spirit Cultivators had flexible and unpredictable skill sets and elusive movement techniques, making them excellent for quests, dungeons, and PvP alike. But when it came to the exhilaration of overwhelming brute force, a solo Spirit Cultivator could never truly experience it. Even when randomly teaming up with someone on the battlefield, teammates often weren’t familiar enough with the complexity of Spirit Cultivator skills, forcing him to constantly remind them over voice chat.
But once words were spoken aloud, sometimes that single moment of delay was already too late.
Like the two-second Weakness effect, gone in an instant.
Other people would only complain that the skill itself was useless.
But now—
Fighting a field boss alongside Wujin Shi while dodging and counterattacking the siege of more than ten people, he felt an unprecedented sense of exhilaration and clarity.
It was as though Wujin Shi understood every buff attached to every Spirit Cultivator support skill. He knew the angle of every move Chi Zhen used, knew which skills targeted which classes. Without needing reminders, he could immediately follow up with a slash and finish the target off.
Holy shit, partying with Wujin Shi felt incredible.
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