Chapter Ninety-Eight: This Is a Crushing Welfare Match

“No problem. Let them come.”

Huang Yunshuo laughed, then with one easy shot he blasted an NPC soldier into a spray of gore. Ye Piaoxue charged in and snatched the final blow, her body shimmering white as she scooped up the loot. Little Kettle and Morning Dew Lightfrost then teamed up to kill another low-health NPC.

The group was slower than at the very beginning in gathering buffs, but their numbers kept rising steadily.

In the end, the opposing side seemed to have gathered about a thousand players. Led by several players, they suddenly thrust in from the battlefield flank, trying to envelop the dozens of blue-side NPC infantry.

“The archers, focus fire there. Pull that group back as fast as you can. Send the high-HP infantry forward.”

Huang Yunshuo, who had already coordinated with the commanders, immediately relayed the plan and rushed there with four others. About a hundred blue players also began shifting to the flank.

“Cover the flank retreat! Archers, shift your fire!”

By the commander’s order, the NPC force that already held the field began to move. More than a hundred nearly full-health NPC infantry surged forward. A full volley of arrows covered the withdrawal of dozens of lower-Health infantry.

Everything happened quickly. By the time the thousand-strong red side realized something was wrong, the fat targets they had been locking for so long had already vanished into the crowd.

The red side was packed so tightly that random movement was difficult, and they became ideal target practice for Huang Yunshuo’s predictive cannon work. He landed one shot per blast, each one hitting a player squarely in the head, turning him to white light. Dozens more were shaken by the blast and nearby damage, and their formation broke apart in misery.

With Double-Headed Hound’s Kiss equipped, Morning Dew Lightfrost’s offense was formidable. A few icy arrows later, she had taken out several players in quick succession.

“Retreat. We’re not finishing it.”

Seeing more and more enemies pouring in this way, the red players immediately lost nerve. A whole lot of them ran back faster than they had come, and in a moment they had slipped beyond Huang Yunshuo’s range.

“Break into the enemy center!”

Such a rare massing of fresh troops on the flank could not be wasted. At the commander’s cry, a large body of NPC infantry charged toward the red NPC center.

Under the cover of archer volleys, hundreds of players rushed in like a swarm, Huang Yunshuo among them.

The red players, seeing the danger, came up only to check the attack. Because their numbers were larger, Huang Yunshuo and his group temporarily withdrew, but that one charge had already shattered through the red NPC center.

Two minutes later, the battle ended. The red NPC army was annihilated, and two to three hundred players on both sides had fallen. All the materials were swept up by blue players. The trade-off had not been worth it.

On the blue side, 230 NPCs survived—the highest NPC team-fight survival count in history— with the hundred-strong archer unit almost untouched.

Seeing such a lopsided result, every participating player was wildly exhilarated.

“What do we do next, big boss?”

A player asked Huang Yunshuo. They had seen how close to decisive the few of them were; they wanted to cling to that giant, dependable pair.

“If you can, gather some players and tell them that participating in NPC battles gives better points than slogging through wild-monster farm runs. With more manpower on our side, victory is easier.”

Players rarely think that clearly, so Huang Yunshuo welcomed the help.

“Got it, big boss!”

After a short discussion, the hundreds of players split and spread into the wild zones to summon more.

Under Huang Yunshuo’s prompting, the NPC forces swept through three hyena and White Cat nests in a row. Seeing this, many red players deemed things dangerous and withdrew from the neutral map, letting some skip the PvP segment. At that moment, the second wave of NPC troops also arrived.

A mass of 830 had gathered. The players marching with the expedition kept increasing around them, quickly surpassing a thousand, and the growth kept accelerating.

People are easily swayed by the crowd, truly. In truth, not many of those hundred-odd called players actually came. But in a winning lane everyone’s courage swells, and people love running where bodies are thick. One thing led to another.

“Attack!”

From fifty meters away, both sides opened archer fire. On the blue side there were a full two hundred archers, and their pressure was far more relentless.

On Huang Yunshuo’s suggestion, two commanders dropped the guard for the archers. All six hundred and thirty infantry drove forward at once, and the first charge pinned the red force immediately.

“Keep ranged classes with the archers. The rest of you—don’t just stand there. Charge.”

Huang Yunshuo said this after noticing many eyes on him.

Melee players gradually peeled off from the archers and followed behind the NPC infantry to deal damage; dozens surged forward at a time, and soon they could drop a full-health enemy soldier.

That was partly because most players still couldn’t afford 800-point weapons. Many could only force the minimum damage of minus one, and twenty defense was still too much for them. Otherwise, they would have killed NPC soldiers much faster.

That was also why, though the red side had once had over a thousand players, the blue NPCs had still held so comfortably.

The blue host had reached the enemy lines, their momentum complete. Huang Yunshuo cast a glance at the red players who hesitated and had already abandoned the fight, then began outputting damage at ease.

The instance was about to end, and the points from assisting NPC troops seemed even more substantial, so Huang Yunshuo did not bother to fight players over the killing blows.

When the third NPC wave arrived, the remaining seven hundred from the first two joined them. With three to four thousand players sweeping behind the NPC army, they crushed through the red third wave NPCs with almost no losses.

On the red map, large player groups worked with NPC troops to encircle and eliminate each stubborn cluster of red players. More players kept respawning at the Red Hall of Return; morale collapsed, and despair spread in waves.

Boom!

As the Red Hall of Return was destroyed, five thousand blue players erupted in a roar that shook the air, and everyone remembered Huang Yunshuo’s name.

“Now that’s satisfying! If players listened as well as this time every time, damn, how little energy we’d spend!”

In the town square, Huang Yunshuo said it with clear satisfaction.

In this run, he started to slack once things got deeper, so his points were lower than last time—around 7,500.

“Can your points be used to redeem the Champion’s Lament?”

Morning Dew Lightfrost, who had just had 3,100 points credited, smiled broadly with delight.

“Yes, it can be redeemed. I’ll show you right away.”

Huang Yunshuo could barely hold back his excitement. His heart was full of anticipation.

Even a rocket launcher I built risking everything is no match for the weapon I can redeem after clearing three runs. It was absurd—truly absurd.