Chapter 735 Hunting and Being Hunted

They couldn't find Xiao Lei at all. Especially since Xiao Lei himself surely understood the gravity of the situation, if he intentionally hid, it would be even more troublesome. The only thing everyone could confirm at this point was that Xiao Lei was still online.

The *Feichang Nitian* and *Chongsheng Zijin* guilds combined only had a little over sixty people. A carpet search of Cloud City was far from sufficient. Although people from the *Caiyun Jian* guild ran as soon as they saw them, and they had managed to kill some opponents, this was only when the opponents offered no resistance at all. Perhaps some of those killed belonged to Xiao Lei's Tavern, but this meager achievement was nothing to celebrate. As time went on, the situation would only become more severe. Once the opposing secondary guild finished upgrading, the balance of power in the battle would shift immediately. They would no longer run, no longer offer no resistance. They would set up ambushes at the respawn points and then rush up and fight anyone they encountered to the death, trading two lives for one, three lives for one, willing to pay any price.

"What do we do?" Everyone could only pin their hopes on finding Xiao Lei. Experts like Yu Tian Shen Ming were already taking risks by moving around the city alone. Everyone was running around like mad, just to grab Xiao Lei. This character, who was usually a popular topic but dismissed by most players, had now become the key to victory or defeat...

At the four city gates of Cloud City, players from *Caiyun Jian*, which belonged to Xiao Lei's Tavern, were trying their best to blend in and leave inconspicuously. The four city gates were already under heavy surveillance by a large number of players. How easy was it to enter and exit freely? But the *Caiyun Jian* players seemed oblivious to this situation. They quietly sneaked in, mixed into the crowd. Some players had already spotted these guys, thinking they were important points, and didn't make a sound, wanting to quietly take them down for their own guild. But amidst the chaos of the battle, with people coming and going, some combat teams rushed in and out, and these players who had infiltrated the battle quickly disappeared.

"Damn it, idiots!!!" The players who were watching their prey cursed inwardly at these inopportune combat teams.

But, once, twice, three times... Some players spotted their prey more than once, but each time, such teams would appear, and after a chaotic scramble, the prey would vanish...

"Damn it, they're stealing points, aren't they?" Some people realized. They began to pay attention to these teams. And they quickly saw that the teams were from *Caiyun Jian*. Everyone was discouraged. It turned out to be *Caiyun Jian*, who had killed Qianli Yizui. How could they compete? The players could only silently retreat to the side, wanting to pick off some of the remaining prey when *Caiyun Jian* wasn't paying attention. But *Caiyun Jian* seemed to know when prey would appear, and whenever these players discovered someone sneaking out, *Caiyun Jian* was already on standby, quickly rushing up to snatch up the prey.

Finally, the hunting players discovered that the *Caiyun Jian* teams seemed to have stopped moving. They were excited, feeling that their chance was coming. But since then, they hadn't seen any prey appear. On the contrary, a large number of players were sent back to the respawn camp by system guards for being too distracted and focusing on the city gates.

Of course, the *Caiyun Jian* guild's actions weren't hunting; they were providing cover.

Guild quests, especially medium-sized ones that required combat, were mostly not limited to the main city. They often required going outside the city to complete certain plots. Most of the players who received the quest needed to leave the city, but at this time, the attacking guilds had already begun to pay close attention to these defending players. Taking advantage of someone's carelessness to slip into the main city was impossible for the attacking players; they couldn't rush in to chase and kill. But coming out of the main city again was a moving target for points in everyone's eyes.

So when *Caiyun Jian* received word that quest takers were about to leave the city, the prepared teams would come to meet them. The players who blended out of the city were squeezed into their ranks. Other players saw that the system wouldn't attack the defending side, so it was naturally safe as can be. The protected players could easily change their equipment, and naturally, they could swagger out without anyone knowing who they were. Unknowing players only assumed that they had been killed by the *Caiyun Jian* players.

They approached forty-three times, successfully extracting forty-three quest players. Another six had quest content within the main city.

The forty-three people couldn't team up or communicate with their *Caiyun Jian* comrades, but they could still walk shoulder to shoulder and communicate with language. This was something the system could never prevent.

"Everyone, stop wasting time, and split into groups to carry out the mission!" Gu Xiao Shang ordered. These guys who had wandered around the city felt like they had met family when they saw the guild's big shots. Everyone exchanged information about the situation inside and outside the city, talking non-stop.

"Guild Leader, Wushi Zhi Jian is here." Someone gave Gu Xiao Shang a message at this time.

"Oh? Not just him, right?" Gu Xiao Shang had expected these people to come. Their actions could be hidden from small and medium-sized guilds, but not from large guilds. Just the fact that three hundred people had quit the guild was suspicious enough. The large guilds wouldn't fail to notice what *Caiyun Jian* was up to. Among the players watching those entering and leaving the city gates, it was impossible that there wouldn't be players from these large guilds. Combined with the information that three hundred people had left the guild, *Caiyun Jian*'s actions would certainly arouse deep suspicion.

"Just him alone, Guild Leader," the guild player said to Gu Xiao Shang.

"Oh? Is that so? You guys go ahead and do your thing. I'll go meet him." Gu Xiao Shang asked for Wushi Zhi Jian's location and went to meet him.

"Xiao Shang." Wushi Zhi Jian was as enthusiastic as ever.

"You're alone?" Gu Xiao Shang asked.

"Who else would there be?" Wushi Zhi Jian smiled.

"Nilü Ershang, Yunzhong Mudi, and Heise Zhishi, I thought you guys would come together," Gu Xiao Shang said.

Wushi Zhi Jian smiled awkwardly, looking embarrassed to speak.

"Say what you want to say!" Gu Xiao Shang said.

"Uh... we wanted to know, a new guild has been established in the main city, Xiao Lei's Tavern, is it related to you guys?" Wushi Zhi Jian finally asked. In fact, as Gu Xiao Shang had expected, Nilü Ershang and others were all going to come together, but Wushi Zhi Jian was afraid that Gu Xiao Shang wouldn't be able to handle their accusatory manner, so he overruled the others and insisted that he come alone first to probe.

Who in Cloud City didn't know Wushi Zhi Jian's feelings for Gu Xiao Shang? Nilü Ershang and the others couldn't hold their ground on this matter as well as Wushi Zhi Jian, so they had no choice but to agree. But how could these guys be fuel-efficient lamps? They agreed verbally but secretly sent assassins, who would sneak in to eavesdrop if they had the opportunity.

A god-given opportunity!! Gu Xiao Shang and Wushi Zhi Jian didn't meet in the crowd. After the *Caiyun Jian* main force left, Gu Xiao Shang actually met with Wushi Zhi Jian alone, which gave the assassins a chance to eavesdrop. Although the three guild leaders weren't there in person, they were all listening to the live broadcast from their own front-line reporters. They were originally worried that Wushi Zhi Jian wouldn't do his job properly, but now that they heard him asking the question that everyone was concerned about, they finally felt that this guy wasn't completely out of his mind.

"Uh, they're our people," Gu Xiao Shang said.

"Xiao Lei is also a defending player? How did you guys know?" Wushi Zhi Jian asked.

"We saw it! That player who often goes in to pick up stones is Xiao Lei," Gu Xiao Shang said.

"That, how could anyone recognize him?" Wushi Zhi Jian was surprised. Many people had seen that garbage collector, but he was too far away for anyone to recognize. If they were close enough, everyone would be eager to kill him. How could they let him pick up trash so leisurely?

"Hehe, of course you can recognize him if you have binoculars," Gu Xiao Shang said.

"Then what are you trying to do by doing this?" Wushi Zhi Jian asked. The other guild leaders had speculated in private, initially thinking that Gu Xiao Shang was going to betray them and move the entire guild to the defending side. But the news that Qianli Yizui had been honorably killed by them soon came, which made everyone confused again.

"It's nothing, we just want to take the initiative. There are a lot of system NPC guards in the city. If you want to attack the defending players there, you have to be a defending player like them, otherwise the system guards will help them," Gu Xiao Shang said.

This idea was easy to understand, but Wushi Zhi Jian and the other three guild leaders had something they didn't understand, which Wushi Zhi Jian now brought up, "What good does this do for your guild? You don't get any points this way."

"We just found a way to kill them, so we did it. Perhaps you guys have other good ideas?" Gu Xiao Shang said.

Wushi Zhi Jian was speechless. They were being played around by a few defending players, and all the guild leaders in the city were being kept in a cabbage field, making them so embarrassed. What good ideas could they have? Their idea was to defend, defend, and defend again, and then hope that the other side would come to provoke them again, and then give them a head-on blow. But they had done so much defending, would the other side still come? The other side had come, but they immediately left when they saw this posture, and then it was just cabbages and guild leaders living together in loneliness...

"If there's nothing else, I'm going to do my thing." Gu Xiao Shang nodded to Wushi Zhi Jian and left. Wushi Zhi Jian was stunned for a moment, then returned to the guild leaders' confinement area. The three guild leaders had actually been listening to the broadcast, but they still had to pretend. At this time, they were all very eager to ask Wushi Zhi Jian, "How was it? What's the situation?"

Wushi Zhi Jian despised the three of them in his heart. He knew that the three had sent stealthy guys to his side. Wushi Zhi Jian was also very cunning. He himself didn't have anti-stealth, but he could always borrow it. With thousands of members in Zongheng Sihai, how could they not have anti-stealth? Wushi Zhi Jian deliberately borrowed one, firstly to defend against being attacked, and secondly to confirm his view of these three guys. The result was, of course, that he was right.

But Wushi Zhi Jian also had to pretend, so he repeated the conversation with Gu Xiao Shang verbatim. After listening, Nilü Ershang immediately sneered, "Hmph, she talked to us about trust before, but has she ever trusted us?"

Wushi Zhi Jian glanced at Nilü Ershang, "I asked, and she told me the truth. The situation is basically the same as we guessed. Isn't that trust? Do you mean that before they do anything, they have to report what they're going to do to us? Is that what you call trust?"

Nilü Ershang was stunned after hearing this, but he was still a little unhappy in his heart. Wushi Zhi Jian sighed and asked the three of them, "Your guild, can you draw three hundred people, give up the points they currently have in the guild, and leave the guild to do such a thing?"

"This..." The three didn't answer. In fact, everyone knew the answer. Large guilds could attract players largely because they could quickly accumulate a lot of points. Now, if they asked people to give up points, what was the point of people joining the guild? Wouldn't they all rebel?

Wushi Zhi Jian sighed, "Do you know DKP?"

"Nonsense, how could we not know?" The three guild leaders rolled their eyes. How could veteran online game players not know the DKP system? The DKP system is actually a team's point system. Each person's DKP is equivalent to their contribution value in the team, which determines the distribution of rewards in team activities. DKP can be said to be the currency circulating within their team. It is earned by participating in team activities and consumed when distributing rewards. In the past, when building a team in online games, the DKP system would inevitably be used. However, because the parallel world is fully immersive, the previous DKP software could not be inserted. Fortunately, the guilds in the parallel world already have a mature point system, and players have gradually obeyed the system's calculations. In the parallel world, those who want to create their own DKP system can only do it manually, but some teams still use it. For example, the points recorded by Jian Gui in the Gongzi Elite Team are a type of DKP.

When they heard Wushi Zhi Jian suddenly mention this, the three were first surprised, then suddenly looked at each other and said in unison, "No way? Is Caiyun Jian still using manual DKP!!"

They knew this, because they all had insiders in Caiyun Jian. Caiyun Jian used manual DKP from the beginning, which everyone admired. Everyone knew that as long as the DKP system was reasonable and fair enough, manual DKP could be more humane and comfortable than software. Especially since Caiyun Jian was already a level 4 guild at the time, and the scale was considerable, manual DKP itself was a tiring exercise. These guys were waiting to see when they would give up. As time went by, they stopped paying attention to this matter. When Wushi Zhi Jian suddenly mentioned it, the three of them remembered that Caiyun Jian used DKP. Could it be that after so long, now that they were a level 6 thousand-member guild, they were still using DKP?

The three quickly contacted their own insiders and confirmed this news. Caiyun Jian uses manual DKP. In this way, for the players of Caiyun Jian, each person's system points are only considered the guild's public assets. What plays a decisive role is the DKP that the players themselves control. When distributing rewards, these people with no points but with DKP can still ask people with points to buy equipment on their behalf, and they will consume DKP. Moreover, since this matter was involved, the three major guilds had further in-depth understanding and learned that in Caiyun Jian guild activities, points would be concentrated on one person as much as possible, which added to the advantage. Some reward equipment that required a lot of points would require a player to accumulate over a long period of activity in a general guild, but in Caiyun Jian, everyone intentionally let the act of obtaining a large number of points be given to a unified player, helping him quickly hoard a lot of points. They could get high-end equipment more easily, as long as they converted the equivalent relationship between DKP and points. From the personal experience of several insiders, they felt that this system of Caiyun Jian had no meaning at all...

"This, DKP is DKP, but from the perspective of city warfare, they still won't get any system rewards by doing this!" Nilü Ershang said.

"So you don't have to be jealous, do you?" Wushi Zhi Jian said.

Nilü Ershang couldn't answer. Indeed, what Caiyun Jian was doing was just an act that would not have any system rewards. Even if they killed Qianli Yizui a hundred or a thousand times in the city, they would not get a single point because they were using the identity of defending players. But why did he still feel inexplicably jealous in his heart? Jealous that they could make such a plan? Did his enthusiasm for killing Qianli Yizui and his group also surpass earning guild points?

"Cough, but does this mean that Qianli Yizui and his group are temporarily confined to the main city?" Heise Zhishi asked.

"I don't know, I didn't ask," Wushi Zhi Jian said.

"Go ask," the three of them urged Wushi Zhi Jian.

"Don't you have friends? Go ask yourself," Wushi Zhi Jian said. The three glared.

"Don't worry, as long as you ask, Xiao Shang won't hide anything," Wushi Zhi Jian said, "However, I'll say the ugly words first. If anyone has any selfish intentions at this time and goes to disrupt their actions, then I will definitely not let him go."

"How could that be? What they're doing doesn't have any points, and we're not envious. It's good for them to eliminate Qianli Yizui like this. What are we jealous of?" Yunzhong Mudi said.

"That's good..." Wushi Zhi Jian nodded meaningfully.

On the Caiyun Jian side, the forty-three players who left the city were accompanied by someone to complete the mission. Although they couldn't team up together, this was actually more convenient. In the case of different teams, the content of the monster's ownership calculation is nothing more than three aspects: first strike, last strike, and damage output during the killing process. The first strike can be obtained without fail; the difference between each other in the output during the process is not too big because everyone does not team up; as for the last strike, with the current player's quality, it can be obtained as long as there is no mistake. Overall, it can be said to be more foolproof.

After Gu Xiao Shang separated from Wushi Zhi Jian, he also rushed to a certain mission location.

"Everything is going smoothly," Gu Xiao Shang saw Han Jia Gongzi.

"Yeah," Han Jia Gongzi nodded, "They can't stop the guild from leveling up to level two. Eliminating these guys next won't be too difficult. Finally, there can be one more step. I think you can start considering it now."

"You say," Gu Xiao Shang said.

"Hehe, after clearing out Qianli Yizui and Jian Gui and the others, these three hundred people can take turns joining the defending guild before returning to Caiyun Jian, and then be delivered to Caiyun Jian for killing. Which is more valuable, players or system guards? Judging from the difficulty of killing, it will probably be the system guards. However, this part of the killing is equal to being given away for free. More than three hundred people, each killing ten times, I think the points will be considerable. Of course, you don't have to kill too thoroughly. Calculate the number of times for each person, leave three or five times, and then this group of people can focus on doing tasks." Han Jia Gongzi said.

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Yesterday's chapter number was wrong again. Now it is seven hundred and thirty-five. Repeat, now it is seven hundred and thirty-five. Yesterday was seven hundred and thirty-four, seven hundred and thirty-four!