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He Ming was dumbstruck.

Rullo’s fearless chanting of powerful spells instantly became purposeless. That ugly doghole seemed to split the entire world into two.

Boundless Sea had vanished. That doghole didn’t seem that big, yet he had very precisely darted right through. Fang Rui’s mechanics were extremely precise, but how he got so good at worming through holes was a mystery. He Ming didn’t know of any training with this sort of content, and he believed that Wind Howl wouldn’t have something like that either.

His wonderful lead, broken, by this doghole? He Ming couldn’t accept that. He immediately cancelled the high-level skill he was casting and hastily adjusted his character’s position. Though the hole wasn’t big, an Elementalist could utilize their elemental power so long as they could see.

But when he got there and looked at that hole...

Complete darkness. He couldn’t see anything on the other side.

He Ming’s face clouded over. That bastard had blocked the hole? What sort of technique was this! That was way too low, wasn’t it!?

The structure of the map quickly flashed through He Ming’s mind, and he immediately brought up what the terrain was on the other side in his mind. If he went around through this corridor, then that would be too far. He’d have no idea where Fang Rui would stash his Boundless Sea by the time he got there. The fastest way was still to retrace his steps out of the corridor and climb over the wall!

He Ming immediately came to a decision. Rullo hastily retreated backwards. Just looking at the hole made him irritated. Swiftly, Rullo’s staff raised and he chanted a Fireball.

Boom….

The Fireball accurately flew through the doghole, sending waves of fire inside and smashing against whatever was blocking it.

He Ming didn’t want to waste time here. He had randomly flung a skill just to vent a little before Rullo hastily dashed away. But suddenly, his character seemed to slip from his control and was flung towards the doghole.

Cloud Grasping Fist!

He Ming immediately realized what it was, but apart from seething about this dirty play, he couldn’t do anything about it.

Rullo was flung horizontally towards the doghole, but naturally wouldn’t be able to fly right through. In the end, he crashed against the entrance, his health even slipping a little.

Pulse Break: Break Intelligence.

Flash Burst!

Boundless Sea’s hand came through the hole and these two skills were consecutively blasted onto Rullo. With this Qi attack, even the walls were shaking. Then, both of Boundless Sea’s hands came through, grabbing onto Rullo. With a yank, the parts of the wall around the doghole shifted out, almost to the point of shattering. The enlarged doghole was enough for Rullo to get through, and he was immediately thrown to the ground by a Back Throw from Boundless Sea.

The crowd was dumbstruck. The big screen wasn’t even sure which shot to show this from, so it just ended up replaying this moment from several different angles at once.

Rullo, having clambered to his feet, had already been completely closed in on by Boundless Sea. Teleport was still on cooldown, so he couldn’t pull away. Qi Master’s had the weakest close combat ability out of the four Fighter classes, but it was better than Elementalists. Now, Fang Rui didn’t bother with any tricks and had Boundless Sea teach Rullo a lesson with his fists.

No, it wasn’t exactly with his fists. Qi Master skills were primarily palm strikes and jabs, very rarely punches. When they connected, it seemed light, without much strength, but they played with the inside of the body. Those light strikes injected internal energy, and the damage it dealt wasn’t second to any physical punch.

With the slaps and hits, He Ming’s Rullo didn’t look like he was losing in a very ugly way. On the contrary, all the dust that had gotten on him when he was thrown to the ground had been struck clean. At the same time, his health bar was also being cleaned.

He Ming didn’t want to be slapped to death by Boundless Sea like this. Fang Rui’s Qi Master was still riddled with holes because he wasn’t familiar enough with his class, and he was hindered by the habits he had spent years cultivating as a Thief player. Now, when he was attacking, he’d show a lot of openings when comboing. This was no secret. It even appeared in the news!

And what He Ming had to do was to not miss the opportunity when it came!

Rullo swung his staff. Even Elementalists could swing their staffs for normal attacks. He Ming fought back as much as he could. He couldn’t just stand there against Fang Rui’s palm strikes like a sitting duck!

His efforts weren’t for nothing. When the dust on his robes had mostly been slapped clean, Boundless Sea finally stumbled.

Piercing Lightning!

This instant cast spell blasted forth. At such a close distance, Fang Rui wouldn’t have time to dodge no matter how quickly he reacted. Boundless Sea, struck by Piercing Lightning, went numb.

In that short time, Rullo once again activated Absolute Focus and then followed up with a cast-free level 75 ice element ultimate: Absolute Zero.

They were simply too close. Although Piercing Lightning’s short paralysis had passed, Fang Rui didn’t have the time to escape Absolute Zero’s range. Instantly, Boundless Sea became an ice statue. One of his legs was still in midair, suspended in his fleeing position.

He Ming let out a breath of relief.

Absolute Zero had the longest freezing time out of all ice element skills of the 24 classes. When maxed out, it would freeze for up to 8 seconds.

He Ming didn’t rush, having Rullo pull away. In 8 seconds, he didn’t rush to attack, because attacks would reduce the freeze time of Absolute Zero. In a one on one, it was best to use these 8 seconds to prepare to launch an offense.

Fang Rui’s Boundless Sea maintained that rather silly pose, forced to watch as He Ming’s Rullo escaped to a position and distance suited for an Elementalist’s attacks.

Fang Rui was helpless.

Like a rookie that met the Rookie Block, he had met the labor pains of transitioning between classes. He had met it last round and hit it this round too. Even after using his masterful dirty play to save himself from the torrent of attacks and complete a counterattack, he still revealed an opening that the opponent was able to grasp.

He had been too greedy...

Fang Rui criticized himself. With how well he was settling in, it was better for him to just use simple and fast methods to stall his opponents and chip away at them, like with Zhou Guangyi. The problem was that such simple methods would be easily seen through by pro players. Fang Rui didn’t have an infinite amount of tricks like that to use. The current him was at his wit’s end.

Fuck, if only I were still a Thief...

No, he had already come this far, how could he still have thought like that? Having these thoughts meant that his determination and will weren’t enough! Now that he had switched classes, he had to completely become a Qi Master. The tricks he had as a Thief couldn’t be employed anymore.

Couldn’t be employed?

After confirming this to himself, he suddenly had a doubt.

Could they really not be employed anymore?

A second doubt rose from his heart.

What a joke. Thief and Qi Master, two completely different classes that had no similarities whatsoever.

The classes might not have similarities, but… what about the thought process? Could the Thief’s playstyle and strategies not be used by a Qi Master at all?

Imagine if he were a Thief, who had acquired the skills of a Qi Master.

Thinking from this angle, Fang Rui’s eyes suddenly lit up.

What if he were still a Thief, but had a bunch of Qi Master skills?

These thoughts boiled in his head, a movement of ideas that not even Absolute Zero could freeze.

”It’s about time.” He Ming, advantage back in his hands, typed in the chat. It felt pretty good to have this sort of advantage against an All-Star level player. He took note of Absolute Zero’s timing and, without wasting any time at all, a rather long chant was finished and a skill flew out!

Fire Storm!

Elementalists had ice, fire, light and dark element spells, but because they only had a limited number of skill points, they couldn’t learn all the skills of all the elements. Usually they would choose two elements to focus on and spent their leftover points on some helpful skills from the other two elements.

He Ming’s Elementalist focused on light and fire. The fastest light and the fiercest fire. Fire and light could be called the most offense oriented combination for Elementalists. Rullo’s equipment naturally would would prioritize buffing light and fire. As for Ice and Darkness, He Ming mostly used them for their effects.

Now that Boundless Sea had been frozen by Absolute Zero, he was about to receive the fiercest attack.

It was unfortunate that the strongest of hs skills, Fire Bird, was still on cooldown. He Ming didn’t have many options.

The Fire Storm whirled in and Boundless Sea quickly got out of Absolute Zero’s effect, but at the same time, Lightning Hell fell from the skies.

For a fire and light Elementalist like Rullo, how could he lack the level 75 spell, Lightning Hell?

And this ultimate of light element spells had inherited the most distinct characteristic of its element: a quick attack with a short chant.

Lightning Hell had to be chanted, but the chant went by like a weak, low level spell.

The time it took for Fire Storm to devour the effects of Absolute Zero was enough to finish Lightning Hell’s chant. A bolt of lightning fell just as Absolute Zero faded. Boundless Sea had no way of dodging.

One bolt, two bolts, three bolts, four bolts...

A full six bolts of lightning struck. The lightning bolts actually didn’t strike soon after one another, but, for Lightning Hell, so long as one struck, the target would be locked on, and the rest would be directed towards the target by the system.

Boundless Sea, after taking the first strike, had then taken all five other strikes.

After two ultimates, Boundless Sea had once again taken heavy damage. The damage from the attacks he sent at Rullo, almost like he was patting the dust from him, was easily returned full force.

”Want to run?”

Seeing Boundless Sea darting through after escaping from Lightning Hell, Rullo pointed his staff and a Fireball sped out.

Boundless Sea practically lunged forwards to dodge the Fireball, then coming to a roll, jump, crouch, then roll. Boundless Sea rapidly moved forth using this weird method.

He Ming was stunned.

This was quite an unusual way of movement, but you couldn’t call it weird. This was actually rather common.

Thieves liked to move in this way. Since traps were the main skills of Thieves, they had to crouch to set the traps, so the character would use crouching movements and maintain low set movements like rolling. Staying close to the ground allowed Thieves to maintain the form they needed to set traps. It was both convenient and discrete.

But this set of movements for these skills had appeared on a Qi Master?

”Hahahaha, are you going crazy from longing for your Thief?” He Ming sent a rofl emoji, yet that was when he suddenly realized that something was pulsing in the air.

Qi Blade!