FB: Chapter 124 – Aerial Assault

“ETA on all teams, five and a half minutes,” a communications officer reported. The three approaching airships would be here in three minutes. I had to make a quick decision. Leave behind a lot of the valuable manufacturing equipment or escape.

The quick disassembly had reduced the value by over half, but even with the damage they were still worth quite a bit. Leaving them behind was letting another group profit off our hard work of taking this place and clearing it out. That was never going to happen.

“Divert teams to the aerial defenses of this base. Activate them,” I ordered. The communications officers quickly worked out which teams to contact and relayed my orders. That was why having a solid chain of command and good communication was incredibly important.

Being able to adapt quickly allowed my Mercenary Guild unparalleled flexibility to adapt to changing circumstances. A cannon single cannon fired upwards, hitting one of the approaching airships, damaging it.

They quickly landed on the side of the mountain, so they weren’t shot down. Losing an airship would be a disaster. They were highly explosive. While fast, they were basically flying bombs, very expensive flying bombs. Each of the airships that had flown in cost around 20,000 platinum in pure construction costs. Licensing, fuel, and other costs would easily make that amount over 50,000 platinum per airship. They were something even a super guild would clench up at losing.

“Have everyone board our airship and escape as planned with the manufacturing equipment. I will personally handle the vultures. Keep the defensive line intact, don’t readjust,” I declared while dramatically swinging my mega blade to the side. I didn’t want to hear the responses from the communications officers as I set off to stop the approaching force. Time to put on my game face.

Unique Mask: Visage Of Horror
A recreation of the face of the God of Horror that cannot be described with words and whose image may never be captured. All who see it despair as their very existence slips from their grasps.
+Mask Item
+Unbreakable
+Innate Artifact Skill: Aura of Horror

The skill would remove 1 HP, MP, and SP from anyone looking at it per second and stop all regeneration for myself and others. That was fine for what I had planned. While delaying would be expensive, there was no way I could be defeated.

They had wiped out the nearby player horde and there were 300 players advancing towards our defensive line at the airship landing zone. I saw a familiar face leading the large group of hostile players, Champion Storm Sword. He was the leader of an elite mercenary group called the Sword Guild. Everyone in the guild was skilled in close combat, specifically with swords.

He had 4 other Champion level players with him. The remaining players were a decent level, but were there for support. Champion Storm Sword came to a stop twenty meters from me along with his small army. I could see the looks of revulsion towards the mask I was wearing, which was at odds with the rest of my body. Magots crawling in and out of holes and rotting flesh.

“Foxy, you can’t win,” he declared and pointed his sword up towards me.

“I am the player who stands above all others, both literally and figuratively,” I declared back and pointed my mega blade back towards him. It was important to make things dramatic for the recordings. Being a top player required style as well as combat skill. It was nice that the top of the mountain granted me greater elevation.

“Falling sword formation! Blink!”

“Blink!”

He teleported where I had been standing and swung. His multiple passive skills creating a massive sword slash attack, that struck the top of the mountain. I teleported only a short distance forward and spun around with my mega blade.

Slice swung around and slammed into his head. Storm Sword went tumbling along the ground as three other players in his group sharded. Some kind of life protection skill. “Slice!” I used the ranged skill at the other four Champions rushing forward.

“Hyper Step.”

“Shadow Step.”

“Phase.”

“Super Slide.”

They all used movement skills spreading out and rushing forward. “Lock On!” That was the signature skill of Storm Sword. He had given up on Reflect. The changes I had made were even influencing the skill choices of other top players. He had already flipped back up to his feet after losing the first round of combat. He unleashed over 100 enchanted swords from his inventory that remained floating in the air. Each of them had to cost at least 10 platinum, which would put the price at 1,000 platinum he was risking in this attack.

He was clearly serious, if he was going all out like this. “Vomitatis!” I spun around, keeping his Champion level team from dog piling me. That was when all 100 swords activated in conjunction with his skill and began flying at me. Item combination skills were always the most annoying.

“Blade of Light!” One of his teammates rushed forward and unleashed a powerful stab right at my chest. The blow hit my breast and went right into my body. I had adjusted my body enough so the attack didn’t hit my heart. The damage wasn’t even critical as I glanced at my health bar. He should have invested more into Luck or had better aim. Precision was of paramount importance against high Luck builds. And now that his blade was stuck in my body like I had planned, it was time for my response. My mega blade came around as I twisted my body, making it too difficult to free his blade at this critical moment.

My mega blade struck the top of his head, which exploded like a watermelon from the force and then instantly sharded him from the super critical attack. That was the power of Luck. Critical hits were incredibly deadly, especially with a mega blade like Slice. I transitioned into a spin deflecting the flying blades. The few that hit me only did minor damage. My health regeneration from self-poisoning was stalled while wearing my mask, but my health was still fine, even if it had gone down by a fifth.

The sword had remained in my chest as I spun about. Once I removed it, if it was soul bound, it would return to the player. Unfortunately, I couldn’t steal valuable items by getting stabbed. I noticed various players rushing into position around me. Were they going to try a combination skill? Those types of skills were powerful but had critical weaknesses to them.

They required precise timing and precision to pull off. Two things that were insanely difficult in combat. But if anyone had a team that could do it, it would be Storm Sword. “Slice.” I attacked and then rushed towards the one person that was part of the combination skill that appeared to be the most nervous.

“Not today!” Storm Sword appeared in front of me and blocked my ranged attack and blow. I adjusted my footing by taking a step back and swinging. In five seconds we had three exchanges between our weapons neither of us coming out on top. He had some kind of passive strength enhancement to go toe to toe against a mega blade.

“Force Push!” A mage rushed in and pointed both of their hands towards me. I went stumbling back as Storm Sword retreated. Everyone else had fallen back as well as five players brought their hands up all at the same time.

“Command unequip mask,” I declared. The Visage of Horror left my face as the combination skill activated.

“Crushing Cage!” all five mages intoned at the same time. Time to see if I was spending a 1,000 platinum to escape or 110 platinum to escape. I pulled out a Wishing Coin. Mentally activating and tossing it into the air, I could only hope my Luck was good enough.

“Nullify Crushing Cage!” I shouted out as the consumable Wishing Coin was used up. That consumable item had a cooldown for three months, but hopefully the 10 platinum consumable would work. As beams of light moved to surround me and crush me, a golden aura burst from me, disrupting the combination skill.

There was a long moment of silence as everyone came to grips I had just countered their combination skill. I removed a 100 platinum Waypoint Teleportation Crystal from my inventory, with its location set to the Mercenery Guild Airship. “You will remember this as the day as the one you almost defeated me, the god player Foxy Blight,” I said dramatically. Behind me, my guild airship was taking off.

No one made a move to go after me and I was content to wait even if it ruined the moment a bit. “You aren’t escaping?” Storm Sword finally asked me with a sigh.

“Just making sure my people are getting away. Command activate,” I replied and disappeared from that location in a burst of light. There was a long moment of disorientation as I reappeared on the guild airship. It took me a few seconds to regain my footing. I really hated that kind of teleportation, but I couldn’t afford not to use it to escape. Well I could, but more expensive methods were much more expensive.

“Who was it this time?” Hammer Crusher asked me. There were always people trying to mess with the Mercenery Guild.

“Storm Sword and his merry men of the Sword Guild,” I replied with a shake of my head.

“We could have fought them and won,” he said. I nodded at this, but we both knew that fighting was a losing option long term. The real winners were those who earned money from fighting not losing money.

“That is true, but the rabid fans are already swarming up the mountain and other powers are probably circling the area looking for a chance to pounce. Best to leave while we are still ahead,” I replied.

“I would love to crush that idiot’s face in,” he said.

“Well, I gave it a good smack. Unfortunately, he was using life link skills. Let’s make note of that for our intelligence. A single Hexagramic Curse would have been perfect,” I replied with a shake of my head. I was just glad I didn’t have to use a more expensive method. Wishing Coins were quite useful for creating opportunities by leveraging my Luck.

Also, it wasn’t a good idea to count on such things, since it was a gamble each time. While the odds might be tilted towards me, they weren’t in my favor. I just preferred not to spend recklessly if possible. My 1,000 platinum Return Pendant Of Divine Intervention was too expensive to waste casually. It would save my life and teleport me to a safe location.

“Well we just crushed our biggest contract to date and got the manufacturing equipment for resale. A shame it is all damaged,” Hammer Crusher said.

“If it could be moved quickly without damage, Super Guild Apex would have done so. Thankfully their bean counters wrote the stuff off. We will probably end up selling it back to them regardless. It will pad our paychecks quite nicely,” I replied, and Hammer Crusher nodded at this. Also, if they had tried to move the equipment it would have been intercepted during transport.

They had probably hoped that we wouldn’t be able to take it all, or that a huge fight would break out and their Champion level team hiding in wait could pounce on us to recover it all. “Any pursuit?” I asked.

“No, we are free and clear,” a communications officer reported. That was good. Now all we had to do was get back to a city and unload the goods.

“Divert us to back up plan seven,” I suddenly declared. If I didn’t know what I was about to do, no one would know either. There were seven locations planned, but only the first was the plan that had been discussed in the Mercenery Guild as a whole. We had spies, but if we could pivot in another direction at the last moment, then it would be impossible to intercept us. That was the power of having a small elite force, which is what I preferred. No corporate board, no layers of bureaucracy to deal with.

I had no doubt some schemers would be quite unhappy with the last second change in plan, but that was what had kept the Mercenery Guild afloat for the last three years. The person controlling the airship would open up the sealed orders for the new location we were headed towards. I had written out the instructions myself and they were sealed with a self-destruct mechanism. Normally used as a gimmick, it was useful in a situation like this.

Even if I hadn’t returned, Hammer Crusher would have picked one at random, keeping our enemies guessing and clueless. Just how I liked my enemies, like frogs in a well unable to see the big picture. I was picking up on the comments from my guild members. When you were in the mud and blood, I picked up things even if I didn’t want to.