Virtual World: Close Combat Mage

When Gu Fei saw that Eternal Dominion glaring at him as if he had found a reason for revenge, he knew he had asked a foolish question, yet he laughed, “I think you can become a professional gamer! It’s a pretty reliable way for you to properly utilize your kung fu.”

“What? Are you encouraging me to be a crook?” There were many different types of professional gamers out there. Most would run themselves haggard, as busy as a bee, before selling the equipment to players who were filling the merchant role. These were all jobs that any average gamer could do, but anything that would require kung fu expertise would mean it required a show of force, and currently, the only job that someone like Eternal Dominion could fill into was only larceny.

Eternal Dominion might not be up to Gu Fei’s standard when it came to kung fu, but he was not a noob like Gu Fei when it came to gaming.

“Of course not,” Gu Fei hurriedly corrected himself. If he did not explain himself, Eternal Dominion would most surely despise his lack of character for even suggesting it.

“Look,” Gu Fei patiently began to talk him through his thought process. “The gaming industry is huge, there are plenty of ways to earn a living in here. Take those larcenists for example... no one takes kindly to their actions, or even existence. So thinking in reverse, robbing these larcenists would not only get rid of this evil plaguing the game, there might even be rewards to be gained from taking them out.”

“F*CK!” Eternal Dominion had thought Gu Fei had came up with some ingenious business plan and was patiently listening to his explanation. He instantly expressed his disdain once Gu Fei finished. “Larcenists like them essentially have the entire gaming community as their potential target, a huge pool for them to pick and choose from. Conversely, my client pool would be limited. How am I gonna find so many cases of robbery to act on?”

“Of course there’s sure to be some difficulty to this, how else could you earn anything from it if it was not so!” Gu Fei criticized him back.

“So why aren’t you doing it?” Eternal Dominion retorted.

Gu Fei thought for a bit, but he had no choice but to hurt Eternal Dominion once more with his reply, “Bro, I’m not short on cash here...”

Eternal Dominion was in tears. He was right! Gu Fei’s Gu Family was hardly in the need of funds, and considering Gu Fei was the only one in his generation that was actually still practicing martial arts, he essentially had the entire family doting on him; why would he need money of any sort!?

“Bro, there’s no way earning a living will be easy!” Gu Fei counselled Eternal Dominion.

“Mmm. I’ll ask around and consider it,” Eternal Dominion said.

Gu Fei could tell from the tone Eternal Dominion had just used that he was not truly interested, so he tossed out yet another thought, “What’s more, those players that have been robbed will surely be upset about it. They might be willing to fork out money just to hire you to take care of those larcenists, right?”

Eternal Dominion thought that was not a bad idea when he heard it, yet the twinkle in his eyes quickly dimmed, “That’s rubbish. Of course those guys would love to take revenge, but the problem is that those sort of robbers will not usually reveal themselves so casually. Why would they not be aware that a host of their victims are looking to get even with them?”

“See, that’s an entire market right there! Most people would not be able to find them, so if you are able to apprehend them, you would essentially monopolize the scene yourself, bro!” Gu Fei said.

Eternal Dominion was exasperated, “If the others could not even locate them, how would I be able to? I’m just yet another gamer in this aspect, as well!”

“Buddy. You’re one of the Five Unyielding Experts. Use that,” Gu Fei told him.

Eternal Dominion began to think further upon this. By this time, he finally felt somewhat moved to act on Gu Fei’s suggestion.

“Come, let me introduce you to some people,” Gu Fei said.

“What people?”

“Powerful people! They are all powerful entities, comparable to me and... uh.... Your dad in the martial community,” Gu Fei said.

Eternal Dominion was in tears once more. Gu Fei had actually placed himself and his own father next to one another. But Eternal Dominion also understood why Gu Fei hesitated just now. Gu Fei had originally wanted to “me and you”, but that was no longer a viable comparison! This was entirely because Eternal Dominion’s name in the martial community was still barely known. The only one from Gu Family that had made a name for himself was his father, so Gu Fei had no choice but to adapt what he wanted to say.

Even though that was hardly courteous or humble, there was not any elders around them at the moment, there was no need to nitpick over such semantics since everybody here was of the same generation. Eternal Dominion wallowed in his sadness for a bit and did not say a thing about it. He followed Gu Fei as he asked, “Powerful people? What powerful people?”

Obviously, the powerful people Gu Fei was talking about were those men in Young Master’s Elite. Even though Gu Fei was most likely better than any of them in terms of PvP, they were the real deal when it came to matters pertaining to the game, be it knowledge or the network they had.

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This was also the first time Gu Fei had attempted to initiate a meeting like this. Those experts gave him face, meeting at the tavern as discussed. Everybody arrived separately, while Gu Fei and Eternal Dominion waited for them to trickle in.

Every one of them widened their eyes when they entered. All of them recognized Eternal Dominion, and knew that the two men even had a PvP match right in the streets yesterday. They were rather amused to find the two men now sitting together like this.

Gu Fei introduced Sword Demon, Young Master Han, Brother Assist, and War Without Wounds one by one to Eternal Dominion.

After hearing him reply “I’ve heard so much about you!” to each of them, Gu Fei finally could not stand it as he asked, “Have you really heard so much about them?” Gu Fei felt Eternal Dominion should be birds of the same feather, so there was no way he could have heard plenty about these MMOs experts.

Eternal Dominion immediately tossed him a disdainful look, “I’ve never met them before, but having played this game for so long, how would I not be aware of these names?”

Everybody around the table felt a pleasing sensation wash over them when they heard that. Though these two were both martial practitioners, they felt that Eternal Dominion was more likeable than Gu Fei, and they instantly warmed up to him as they disregarded Gu Fei and abandoned him to his corner.

Gu Fei was not exactly bothered by Royal God Call’s absence, but seeing everyone but him here, he asked, “Where’s Royal?”

The four man exchanged glances and answered in unison, “Did none of you travel with him?”

The four men was silent in that moment.

Young Master Han calmly raised his glass and took a gulp, “Then he’s surely lost out there.”

Royal God Call had indeed lost his way. He was not alone to begin with, but he had suddenly spotted Drifting on the street, yet the man did not seem to have seen him.

That was an opportunity that Royal God Call had long been waiting for! He immediately went off on his own, trailing after Drifting in hopes of finding a chance to finish his rival off. Even though they had all worked together for the mission previously, Royal God Call had never once regarded Drifting as a friend. He still considered the Mage to be someone he hated the most.

Naturally, the solution for someone he hated most was to kill him off! It was a MMO after all, there were not that many laws or reasoning to follow. Furthermore, Royal God Call had always been a very conceited expert.

But Drifting was clearly making his way through the market, moving through the crowd of players such that Royal God Call had not found the opportunity to strike for the longest time. Trailing Drifting all the way through such a crowd only ended up with him losing the trail and getting himself lost instead.

Thankfully, Royal God Call was still within the city, so there were plenty of people he could ask if he was unsure. It was also at this moment that he received a message from Gu Fei, and he slowly headed in the direction of the tavern, inquiring with passersby as he searched for his destination.

It was very easy to ask for directions in an MMO. With how huge the virtual space in Parallel World was, players would often take care to note down the coordinates of several locales they often visited, so most of the players that Royal God Call approached were able to provide him with the right coordinates and direction.

But he was a geographically inept person in the end, so such a precise and effective method of using the coordinates provided caused him much pain. What he had hoped for were instructions like “cross this street, take a left and pass the next three streets, take a right turn and walk straight ahead before taking a final left” sort of directions when he was approached other players.

There were few players who would give such clearly defined directions in MMOs, so Royal God Call had a really tough time as he asked for directions and attempted to make his way over. After meeting the same player three times, asking for the same directions, that player was finally moved by the pitiful Royal God Call tightly clutching onto his booklet, putting his business on hold as he personally brought Royal God Call to the tavern.

Royal God Call was very touched by this gesture, but he continued to act nonchalant about it!

“Thanks a lot, man!” Royal God Call said. “The name’s Royal God Call. Just say my name if you ever meet any problem in the future!”

Unfortunately, this player helping him was an older gentleman himself. He had not spent much time playing MMOs, so he had never heard of this legendary name before. Moreover, Royal God Call appeared to be no more than a bratty child in his eyes, so he merely smiled placidly as he dismissively said, “Sure! Don’t wander around the city by yourself next time,” this older gentleman parted ways with that final piece of advice.

Royal God Call instantly found his fellow mercenaries seated in the tavern as he made his way over to take a seat with them, acting all dignified. It had been almost forty minutes since the next-to-last person, War Without Wounds, had arrived. The eyes of the lightweight Sword Demon was already glazed by this time.

Gu Fei did not even waste time giving Royal God Call a proper introduction, slapping the table soundly as he declared, “Everybody’s here! Let’s talk business proper.”

“Let me catch my breath first!” Royal God Call had been walking in the street for such a long time, while he was not physically tired, the mental exhaustion he experienced was substantial.

Gu Fei did his best to control himself, waiting for Royal God Call to take two long draws of his liquor before finally asking, “Shall we begin?”

Royal God Call’s keen eyes already saw that Gu Fei’s hand had already plunged down his dimensional pocket, so he quickly nodded repeatedly.

“Eternal bro here is preparing to become a professional gamer,” Gu Fei started.

“Hey hey, don’t just make decisions for me willy-nilly!” Eternal Dominion hurriedly interrupted. Wasn’t he just saying he was going to introduce me to some experts? How did things progress so quickly, anyhow? I haven’t even made the decision to do this myself yet!

Gu Fei swept a glance to him, ignoring what he said.

The others had already began to speak up, “Professional gamer? What business would that be? Larceny?”

Sure enough, the first thought everybody had given the skills Eternal Dominion had demonstrated was how much of a waste it would be if he was not doing larceny.

“Of course not! He’s going to rob the larcenists!” Gu Fei said.

“There’s not much money to be made in that.” These MMO experts came to the same conclusion Eternal Dominion had instantly. “Players who excel in larceny depend mostly on traps and surprise attacks. The equipment they use is often very average, so there’s no telling if there’s anything to be made there.”

“But they must surely be hated by the masses, right? Perhaps there are people out there willing to put a bounty on them!?” Gu Fei pressed.

Brother Assist immediately smiled, and it was a very confident smile at that. “If that’s the case, then you would require plenty of information with utmost accuracy!”

Thus, Gu Fei once more introduced Brother Assist in greater detail, “This is the King of Information, Brother Assist! His well of information runs deep!”