Chapter 389 Dirty Fireworks

Since there few Players actually relied on their wealth, Xi Wei’s adjustment of the runic system therefore did not affect anyone aside from Marni. In fact, with the cooler special light effects, the Players had become even more motivated to give the hill-folk a beatdown.

As such, the hill-folk who felt as if they had collided headlong into a steel wall was being cornered even further, with the Players giving them a good trashing with their variety of skills.

It was true that they were buffed by the Lord of the Peaks’ divine power, but that was not preexisting welfare, but a buff given to his own believers just recently so that they could kill the Church of Games’ followers. That being said, how could a temporary strengthening compare to the Players who earned their EXP trickle by trickle, constantly familiarizing and refining themselves?

If they were not obsessed with gaining three times the reward points from capturing compared to killing, the three hundred Players would have massacred the few thousands of hill-folk without leaving anyone alive!

And just like Xi Wei predicted, after the Players collectively weathered through the difficult starting phase, they now looked the shape of a strong legion with a place amongst the best on the continent!

As the Players continued to improve and nourish the God of Games from various aspects, Xi Wei himself would raise the limit of Player level and strengthen the Players. With this cycle now coming round, the Church of Games would rise rapidly and become a force that the other faiths could not ignore!

Still, the only thing that was curbing them from rocketing forward was that there were too few Players to form an effective swarm…

But that was digressing. Either way, Kaven Mor, the Hill Shaman and the Lord of the Peaks’ Chosen One was feeling a lack of power despite will in the face of the Players vicious assault.

As more and more hill-folk ended up killed or captured, Kaven Mor’ mental state took a turn for the worse.

They had never ended up so miserable, even though Kaven Mor himself had led his tribe to pillage and ended up being pursued by the Brilliant White Church’s sacred corps!

Moreover, this was the one occasion he could not choose to surrender, since this was no raid but a religious war-in the truest sense of the term!

Under such circumstances, choosing to surrender was equal to betraying his own god, which was the most heinous of crimes in this world.

That was the reason why wars between churches were always solemn, profound and cruel-something which Kaven Mor learned most deeply. “This isn’t working. The dude’s resistances are too high and he’s even invincible against most control skills! It’s too difficult to capture him alive!”

“Hitting him in the balls might work! There was another hill-folk with powerful resistance and will, but he was knocked out while foaming at the mouth a Holy Lancer hammered him there repeatedly!”

‘Which bloody church are you people from? Isn’t that too cruel, damn it?!’

Despite the air being heavy like a solemn self-destruction ritual just moments before, Kaven Mor almost broke out into a tirade of curses.

His rhythm off-balanced, he hence stumbled a little and would have suffered a strike otherwise.

Indeed, Kaven Mor lost composure even as he watched the youth who was circling around himself whilst holding a greatsword that could crush a drake’s egg.

Even if buffed by the Lord of Peaks, his balls would either be crushed or end up with such agony that leaves him immobile if struck by that weapon.

Still, the truth was that because of the Rules of the Game, the Players would only cut down their foes HP even if they struck said foe in a physically vital position in normal combat. Effects would not reflect physically even in critical strikes.

The problem, however, was that the hill-folk were buffed with the Lord of the Peaks’ divine power, which came with their own Rule Resistance. Therefore, the hill-folk were immune to the Rules of the Game created by Xi Wei.

While they would be immune against the Players’ control skills and debuff, the effect of the Players attacks would also be reflected in full effect on the hill-folks’ physical body instead of only cutting down their HP.

It was difficult to label that as a good or bad outcome, but from the current situation, the bad outcome appeared more significant. After all, the Players’ attack skills mostly sourced from Xi Wei’s own gaming experiences, making the gameplay exceedingly complex and develop variety amongst the Players’ skills. It was like a vaudeville in the perspective of most people of this world, and there was just no imagining what form their attacks would take.

For example, the Divine Earthsplit Blade was a sacred art that unleashed a sword’s qi along the ground toward a target. It was not powerful since it was one of the earlier skills the Players would pick up, and they learn it only to unlock later stronger skills… and yet, this one technique was working wonders as it reached unbelievable success rates of nutcracking!

Now, having known that there was no salvaging the situation and that his side was being routed, Kaven Mor finally regained some shred of rationality-perhaps out of worry for his own balls.

But that was not important. Upon understanding that his advantage was lost, Kaven Mor decided to come up with a way to escape and rally the other tribes.

For better or worse, he was a Hill Shaman. The other two major tribes wouldn’t act against him even if they don’t see eye to him, whereas he could simply rely on them to rescue his own tribe, perhaps even luring hill-folks from the other tribe to his own. Hence, Kaven Mor suddenly switched defense to attack, punching down Joe who could not react in time without trying to get another hit in in the heat of the moment. Instead, he directly created a small earthquake by twisting his foot on the ground, seizing the moment when the other players surrounding him could not attack to directly sprint toward a gap in their encirclement which he had eyes on earlier!

And thanks to the Lord of the Peaks’ divine power buff, each step he took was much more powerful than an average person’s step, allowing him to run with extraordinary speed and taking him off the edge of the jungle in the blink of an eye!

If he fled into the jungle, he could keep relying on the Lord of the Peaks’ buff and the hill-folk skill of blending into the mountains. Catching him would be more than difficult when that happened.

Still, the Players led by Edward were not in a hurry.In fact, in the split second that the earth started quaking, Edward had already reacted

—but he did not bother summoning his Blackfire Dragon, take to the air and avoid the earthquake.

After all, Kaven Mor’s attempt to escape was within his calculations since the HP bar over his head openly revealed that he was too weak, his armor now mostly shredded.

Not a moment too soon, a streak of cold glint flashed like a lightning bolt.

In the next split second, Kaven Mor’s trousers that were weaved out of vines and leaves from an unnamed tree was blown up amidst a fiery light! There was not even time for the smile that appeared on his face at the thought of surviving a disaster to fade away…

He was sprawled over the ground in the next instant, foaming at the mouth while his eyes rolled upward, and he was soon unconscious.

On a tree crown nearby, Gou Dan moved his eyes away from the eight-times magnifier while putting away his AWM, throwing a look of disdain at Kaven Mor’s blurred-out lower body and spitting to the ground.

“Dirty fireworks.”