FB: Chapter 109 – Crushing Victory

“Fire, flank teams!” Kill Blade shouted over the chaos of battle. His commands were quickly relayed to the appropriate teams Cannons on the flanks fired. The NPC team hunkered down behind a wall of golems as they were forced to stop moving due to the intensity of the fire power being unleashed.

They would only take some minor damage from such attacks, but the goal was to pin them in place. I didn’t want to think what that cannon fire was costing. It was better not to think of the financial damage being done to the Fanged Fox Guild at the moment. It was being well spent.

“Sealing team, go!” Sixteen people that were quite brave and already in position moved as one from hidden spots across the battlefield on the NPCs that were pinned down. That last suicide squad teleported into the middle of the high level NPCs with thorn spears and bombs. Another distraction to keep them overwhelmed.

The sealing team each activated a consumable called Crush Wall, that cost 100 platinum each. That was another 1,600 platinum right there. Anything weaker and the consumables wouldn’t have worked on such high level NPCs. It formed a barrier of force that moved in one direction for 3 seconds, pushing most things out of the way. While the NPC was almost on the right spot, it wasn’t perfectly correct. This attack was meant to push all the NPCs next to each other for one moment for a very high damage attack.

The 500 platinum bomb went off. A specialized bomb, which would only shoot directly upwards. It was a trap item that Kill Blade had the trigger to. It was meant to take out powerful flying monsters, damaging their wings, forcing them to land.

The damage was immense, but was highly concentrated into a single beam for a single moment. While many would assume this would be enough, I knew it was not and made sure we had a follow up plan. I took a powerful sight stabilization potion. More money being used up.

“Blink. Vomitatis.”

I swung my mega blade at the burnt support mage. They were the most dangerous with that spatial lock skill. My blade hit their chest. I didn’t have time to properly aim for their neck. There were sparks, but they went flying, not being able to resist the force behind the below, just the damage. Closing my eyes, three 10 platinum flashbang grenades fell off my belt, exploding and disorienting the NPCs further.

While they were highly skilled at combat, how fast NPCs would handle rapid attacks depended on their level. Even high level NPCs could get overwhelmed, when hit with a range of attacks in succession. Bringing my blade back around, I opened my eyes which were unaffected even if my ears were ringing from the flashbang grenades.

I had transitioned into an overhead blow. The lightning mage brought up their staff to block my attack. Slice hit their staff, which shattered in half. No absolute level defense for items and mage staffs were fragile to melee attacks. “AHHH!” The lightning mage screamed as my mega blade slammed down on their shoulder. There were a lot of sparks, but they were driven down to their knees. I was getting unlucky with my attacks. But these NPCs were just that high level. Breaking through the absolute level barrier was a nightmare for a reason.

“Vomitatis.”

The lightning mage got a face full of vomit as I brought my mega blade back up over my head. Various players had rushed forward and were already stabbing thorn spears into the support caster who had been knocked away. The golem mage was about to recover, but was hit with Crush Wall, pushing him away.

Killing the lightning mage was the priority. The support mage was getting pecked at to death by my guild. And the golem mage was knocked away. The lightning mage could take me out with one attack and had the potential to reverse this entire situation with their area of effect skills.

My mega blade slammed directly onto their head as they brought up their arms to shield themselves. “Slice!” My mega blade impacted so close to the impact of the skill it hard to tell the difference. The arms of the lightning mage were cut through and then my blade slammed into this shoulder where I had struck before. My mega blade sunk deep into his chest, blood poured out.

“Slice.” With my blade inside of them, it counted as a critical attack and their body was ripped apart even more as I yanked my blade free. I was already consuming an ass fruit as I brought my blade back up. The lightning mage toppled over, but I didn’t hesitate to swing a third time and smash their head in.

With high level NPCs it was best to be sure that they were dead. There were false death items out there. The body or possible corpse sharded from the follow up attack, leaving behind an amulet and a tome. I quickly scooped both of them up and put them in my inventory.

I noted that the support mage had ripped out the thorn spears and disappeared. Some recall teleportation. Annoying, but not surprising in the slightest. I rushed at the golem mage who brought up a golem between us to defend himself.

“Blink.”

I teleported above and behind him. I slammed my blade down on his back as he spun about. There were more sparks as he stumbled. “Vomitatis.” With only a single NPC to focus on and support from my guild, the battle was all but over. Still, I didn’t let down my guard in the slightest as I wore them down.

He collapsed to one knee while heavily bleeding from his neck, his hands limp by his side. “I am G Man. A Dark Mage fighting against the tyranny of the Human Empire,” he declared despite taking several attacks from my guild. It appeared he was about to die with all the blood he was losing, but one of QAI’s subordinate program decided to add some additional drama.

“Halt attack,” I called out and my guild stopped attacking. “I am God Slayer Foxy Blight,” I declared.

“Your name shall adorn my tomb,” he said. I didn’t hesitate.

“Blink.” I put as much distance between us as possible and began running. The worst kind of NPCs were those with some kind last attack after they were about to die. There was the chance to get useful information or a better item. Or you could get a final attack in an attempt to take everyone down around them.

The earth bent up around G Man like a Pac Man rising out of the ground. Two partial spheres moved upwards, slamming together, creating a massive half stone sphere in the middle of the battlefield. It was going to be a pain to get to the drops. Another way that QAI limited one player, like myself, from getting too much good loot.

It was a scam after all the money that had been spent, but it was what it was. I made my way back to the half sphere of stone and swung my mega blade. It ripped out a small chunk. Looking at the massive size of the half stone sphere it would take a while to get to the center. While only half was visible from the surface, I had no doubt it was a full sphere.

“Instruct Kill Blade that he should go forward with the full scale assault to get the necessary war merits. The enemy fortress should be in disarray. I am going to be working on this,” I said to one of the nearby guild members. They quickly relayed the message as I got busy hitting away on the stone sphere.

The annoying part was that such deaths weren’t permanent for NPCs, similar to players. One had to follow the lore to kill something permanently. I had no doubt this stone tomb would provide a link to another one, that would reveal a critical secret about G Man. I wasn’t going to bother with that nonsense. While interesting, it was a rabbit hole I wasn’t about to explore personally. I had people for that.

It was likely that G Man would show up again since Gamabuturon was similar. The NPCs were vengeful to varying degrees. That was another way QAI slowed down the top players and guilds. They got more attention the more enemies they took out.

While it might seem like we should avoid such a conflict, I hadn’t thought it would be this bad right away. The Fanged Fox Guild would be tripling its rates at a minimum, using the spending we had done as justification. Even if the money was going towards a good cause, it wouldn’t be common knowledge. This entire battle was a huge money pit. With the payouts we would need to give guild members, we would probably end up spending around 4,500 platinum.

That was three times what we were earning. A massive loss. It would have been a smart decision to walk away. But it was small expense in terms of reputation. The Fanged Fox Guild was winner. While it was hard to put a price on such a thing, I knew it was much more valuable than 4,500 platinum. It was a massive deterrence and threat.

If we fought, we fought to win. Other guilds would look at all the money we had spent and would hesitate to mess with us. It would also justify higher rates in the future, while our expenses would hopefully come down as people leveled up and got better skills. That would take a while. But right now the guild had fully recovered the cliff it had been hanging over.

That was the advantage my guild had over others, I was able to make a decision like this. But I also knew the board would not be happy and the shareholders would be a mixed bag. While I had won, the cost would raise questions about the overall profitability of the guild as a whole. It would probably be enough to see me removed.

I also knew that someone would ask why I was getting the high level items instead of the guild. There was no policy on high level items at the moment. It was finders keepers right now. I had also killed all 3 of the high level NPCs personally. All this would change once questions were asked.

It was unfortunate, but that was the cost of having a corporation and guild joined at the hip. While I had become filthy rich, that money came with a lot of strings attached to it. At least they were strings of my choosing, that I could cut at any time.

Most likely I would be sidelined in some way. My power curtailed so I didn’t treat the guild as my personal force. Understandable, but it was disappointing. This type of battle wouldn’t happen again for so many reasons. A good thing, since I didn’t think I could win another battle like this. The NPCs would talk with each other and my tactics would be known.

The tricky part would be trading these high level items for the items I needed. I had a lot of skills that needed attention and needed items to increase their rank.