I slowly moved forward, approaching my pursuers. My first victim was the healer. One swing of the spear killed him instantly, and I didn't even break my invisibility. It seems that when killing in one blow, I could stay under the effects of the spell. After all, from the perspective of the game, the 'fight' was over before it had even begun.
“Why he died?” - There was a panicked scream from the closest player, who had seen how his ally had fallen.
Here's why. One more blow, and Ninja went after his comrade. The other three pursuers quickly guessed my location and even cast a area spell, but since they were running toward me, they had no chance of surviving. Five more swings of the spear and two Berserkers and a Healer were on their way to the resurrection point.
Before I could rejoice in my victory, more pursuers appeared in the distance. I didn't wait for them, but rushed away. Considering the people's 'love' to me, they' would just smash me with meat. There was nothing I could do against a hundred players.
“He's over there! Surround him! To the left!” - The players shouted after me.
The loudest one was a ninth-level Priest. He could see where I was, which told me he was very experienced at tracking invisible people. His commands controlled the 'pen hunt,' so I decided that I had to get rid of the most clever and observant ones first.
There were four pursuers, so I rushed toward them. Again, they only sped up in response to my approach, so the collision was swift and deadly. True, one Assassin managed to hit me, taking 2/3 of my life in one blow. But since my spear hit harder, that success was the only thing my pursuers could achieve.
I rushed to the side to throw the possible pursuers off my trail. But before I'd run twenty meters, more players appeared in front of me. And this time there weren't just four of them, but a whole bunch of them, walking in a chain, scouring the area. It looked like they were trying to catch me, like in the game of sleight of hand. As I looked around, I made sure that there was shouting on the opposite side, too. Right now, no one could see me, because I was standing still. I should use this advantage while I could.
Since I was in the woods, the first thing I looked at was the nearest tree. At a height of a couple of meters, there was a sturdy enough branch that I could try to climb it. However, it wasn't a real world, but a virtual one, so I wasn't sure how the game mechanics would react to such an attempt.
Slowly approaching the tree, I grabbed the trunk with my hands and feet and started climbing up. It wasn't much use, because my legs refused to hold on to the tree. Somehow I climbed a meter in height, and then I made a clumsy jump and hung on a branch. To be honest, I could have achieved the same result simply by jumping up from the ground. As I pulled myself up, I tried to climb the branch, but only hung on it, bent over in my stomach area. I now resembled a bunch of sausages trying to balance on a branch. The result of my attempts to somehow change my position was that I tumbled forward and hung on the branch again, clinging to it with my hands.
The pursuers were already very close, so I should have stopped fooling around by now. I activated my foresight and started trying to figure out how to climb the tree. To be honest, the magic of probability wasn't free for me, so I tried not to use it unless I had to.
Finally, I found a way to climb the tree. I just had to ignore the presence of my legs and climb up using only my arms. This kind of climbing technique was quite common on Earth. As a result, I was able to climb up a bit and stand with my feet on the branch I was hanging on earlier. To be honest, my current state could not be called 'standing,' but rather I was 'stuck in sprites,' and I did not fall down only because I held on to trunk and branches with my hands. There was no way to climb higher, so I just stayed where I was, watching my pursuers.
Meanwhile, they kept arriving and arriving. The crowd of people literally flooded the forest, leaving not a scrap of free space.
“He must be here somewhere!” - The idiots shouted, not even trying to look for me in the trees.
“Search everything with your hands.”
“Are you sure he's here?”
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
“We're wasting time. He's probably gone by now.”
Each of the pursuers had his own opinion of divine importance, which he sought to pour out on his neighbor. This whole circus lasted more than half an hour. First, the people were looking for me. Then, they were trying to figure out where I had gone. Then they started to argue with each other. In the end, everyone left disappointedly, leaving only one player downstairs.
My most stubborn 'fan' was named Blooming Wild Rye. He kept walking around in circles near where I had last been seen, whispering something to himself. When I was tired of sitting in a tree like a monkey, I trivially waited until the idiot came closer to me, and then jumped off the branch, simultaneously striking him with my spear. The player died before he could even realize what had killed him, and I rushed away with all my might.
In the global chat room there were once again screams that Cheater had killed someone, but people were already burned out and there were no one willing to run to catch me. And I hid from the few most vengeful pursuers, stopping in place and waiting for them to run ahead. Unlike me, the Assassins couldn't be invisible all the time, so the chances of my movement being noticed by a hiding player were minimal.
Finally, I reached an area where my pursuers were no longer in sight. After orienting myself using the map, I took the road that led to another outpost, and followed it. After fifteen minutes, I was finally able to reach the portal and travel to the City of Crabs. Here I appeared with my invisibility already turned off and walked quietly down the street, blending in with the crowd. My Healer's Clothes set was already fairly common, so I wasn't conspicuous. I hid my blue pirate triangle in the interface settings. Although it was listed as being worn on me, it wasn't visible. And, of course, I turned off my Massacre God Aura, which was giving me a lot of damage while I was fighting players in the forest.
As I walked down the street, I once again made sure of my godlike popularity. All, literally all the players were talking about me and the destruction of the First Seed of Evil.
“That Cheater! If I saw him now, I'd tear him apart with my bare hands.”
“The Berserker quest had to be redone.”
“But I'd almost finished it. All I have to do is report back to the Warriors' Guild.”
“Ha ha, all claims to the Cheater.”
“Scorpion Dungeon is no longer passable. We all died there after the destruction of the Seed of Evil.”
“He looked like an evil god! Surrounded by bloody mist, his eyes shone like demonic rubies, and the expression of his face alone sent shivers down my spine.”
“Didn't you see the title 'God of Massacre' above his head?”
“What title? I'm telling you, he's a demon. A true creature of Chaos, infiltrated into our world!”
I couldn't let this couple pass me by and decided to intervene in the conversation.
“Is this Cheater that horrible?” - I asked with a shudder in my voice.
“Worse! He's evil incarnate!” - The player, who had described my appearance so vividly, began to convince me. – “If I saw him in front of me now, I would surely faint from fear.”
The other one stared at me after these words and started laughing quietly, clamping his mouth shut. He seemed to have figured out how to read my name. The only way to see the players' names was to focus on them. So the march through the city didn't feel like the usual scene in online games, but more like reality.
“Oh, I'm already scared.” - I was scared, winking at the laughing player. – “How could this possibly have happened? Could he have destroyed the Seed of Evil by accident?”
“No! I'm sure he planned it from the beginning. People like that are imbued with evil to their very souls. Hey, why are you laughing?” - My conversation partner took offense, turning his attention to his comrade.
“Ah-ha-ha-ha! Oh, I can't. Ha-ha-ha-ha!!” - He couldn't stop himself.
Taking advantage of the fact that the panicer turned away, I walked on, hiding in the crowd.
“What?!!! Cheater?!?” - I heard a panicer’r yell. – “Where? Where is he?!”
The people around me didn't pay any attention to these wild cries. Every second person here was in a state of panic attack, so such cries no longer surprised anyone.
After walking through the streets of the city, I went to take my exam. At the Council of Mages, the discontent of the crowd was literally in the air. Half of them cursed loudly, calling my name in vain, while the other half stood dejectedly, staring at one point or banging their heads against the wall.
I quickly paid my 'fee' and went to take my level 8 exam. With my spear's unexpected damage bonus, it should have been a piece of cake. Only when I appeared in the arena, I was surprised to find a stone golem in front of me that had 20,000 HP. That's a lot. In my previous exam, I had fought an opponent with 1,500 HP, but here it has 20,000.
I had nothing to fear, though. The stone golem was rather slow. His fists on the ground created a small area of AOE damage, but overall, the threat from him was minimal. If I carefully monitor the enemy's movements and retreat in time, there was no problem with him.
My spear did 254 physical damage, plus another 500 poison damage. The stone golem was armored, so the physical damage was reduced to 150. Poison damage, on the other hand, entered in full, though how could you poison a stone? That damage was combined with +20% of my Earth Adept bonus. In total, I was dealing 780 damage per hit. Compared to the spear, my magic was completely useless, so I only used Discharge for paralysis and healing. To kill the golem I needed 26 strikes with my spear, which took me about 15 seconds. Easy!