Chapter 130 Maze of Strange Stones

The map for this battle was a massive maze of strange stones. Thousands of cylindrical stone pillars stood irregularly in the desert, each varying in height and thickness. The thickest resembled pagodas, while the thinnest were like flagpoles. The arrangement of the pillars was dense, but without any discernible pattern.

A bright moon hung in the sky, a gentle breeze stirred, and thin clouds drifted by.

This environment was simply a paradise for assassins.

Walking on sand wouldn't leave much of a footprint to begin with. Coupled with the cover of the wind, it was difficult for opponents to detect Xiao Tan's movements.

The surrounding maze of strange stones provided countless hiding places. Even if Xiao Tan appeared in the enemy's line of sight, he could disappear again in just three to five steps.

Under these conditions, if one of the combatants was an agility-based melee player, and the other was a shooting specialist, the latter was basically doomed.

And this battle unfolded precisely under these predetermined conditions...

Some might wonder, although the two players who met were random, the map should have been determined based on the players' data, so how could the system generate such an unfair match map?

The answer was simple... because the environment of the maze of strange stones had no effect on Bu Tiange...

Hooosh...

Accompanied by continuous, dull sounds, two swift shadows intersected.

Since the beginning of the script, this was the *n*th time Xiao Tan had faced this kind of attack. He knew very well... although the attack wasn't fast, it was heavy and had tricky angles. If he were to block it with his own strength, he would lose a lot of Survival Value. Therefore, he had to dodge it in an awkward posture and keep moving.

"This isn't going to work..." Xiao Tan panted, his feet moving constantly, thinking to himself, "Unknowingly, my Survival Value has been depleted by half, and my Stamina Value is down by a third. I can't even get close to him... Speaking of which, his ranged attack is very strange... Could it be a Ling Neng weapon (spiritual energy weapon)?"

He guessed correctly. At this moment, Bu Tiange, standing on top of a giant stone pillar, controlling two boomerangs for ultra-long-range attacks, was using a Ling Neng weapon.

[Name: Thunder Boomerang]

[Type: Ling Neng Weapon]

[Quality: Excellent]

[Attack Power: Strong]

[Attribute: Electric]

[Special Effect 1: Flyback (Senses the user's location and automatically flies back to their hand)]

[Special Effect 2: Hunt (Locks onto the target and makes a precise attack)]

[Special Effect 3: Ultrasound (During flyback or hunt, if conditions allow, it can sense and avoid obstacles)]

[Special Effect 4: Thunder (Releases a powerful electric shock, can only be activated in close combat, after use, the Thunder Boomerang will lose all special effects for one hour)]

[Note: In 1977, a tourist traveling in Australia accidentally hit the back of his head with a boomerang he threw and died. As a result, his soul traveled tens of thousands of years into the past and became a Koori (Australian Aboriginal, a nomadic people with no fixed residence, scattered throughout Australia. Before the Europeans occupied Australia, there were more than 500 Koori tribes with a population of 750,000). From then on, he embarked on a legendary journey full of adventures, romances, sweeping the continent, and slaughtering gods and demons, becoming a legendary existence. Many years later, a weapon he once used reappeared somewhere in the multiverse, and that is... the Thunder Boomerang!]

As can be seen from the item description, this thing was not affected by the maze of strange stones. With the help of the ultrasound special effect, the Thunder Boomerang could sense the existence of obstacles like a bat and make appropriate accelerations, spins, and changes of direction in the air to bypass the obstacles and strike the target directly.

Of course, it wasn't that the Thunder Boomerang was a guaranteed hit weapon. There was also a phrase "if conditions allow" in the special effects. This meant that there were situations where conditions were not allowed. For example, if the obstacle was a ten-meter-high wall, and the user was standing at the base of the wall throwing the boomerang at a forty-five-degree angle towards their feet, that would be a situation where conditions were not allowed. No matter how powerful the boomerang was, it couldn't reverse its spin as soon as it left the hand, then fly vertically upwards, bypass the wall from the top, and then descend diagonally to hunt the opponent...

Generally speaking, the user of the Thunder Boomerang couldn't aim in too outrageous a direction or angle when throwing it, and there couldn't be particularly large obstacles between the target and themselves... like a dam. This way, the advantage of this weapon could be brought into full play.

Right now, Xiao Tan was in a sorry state because of these repeated precise attacks.

A dozen minutes ago, when the battle had just begun, Xiao Tan had tried to get close to his opponent, but he had been forced back by the heavy firepower of the opponent's continuous shooting weapon.

At that time, Xiao Tan wasn't in a hurry. He was a patient person, and he remained calm under these circumstances. He thought: at worst, I'll drag it into a war of attrition. As long as I use the obstacles to maneuver around you, your bullets will eventually run out.

Unexpectedly... Bu Tiange's Ling Neng weapon kept coming over and over again.

Thus, Xiao Tan was caught in a dilemma. Forcing his way closer would likely result in him being riddled with bullets before he even reached the attack range. Trying to maneuver and wear him down... the opponent simply ignored him.

In short, Bu Tiange's tactic was to remain unchanged in the face of all changes, sticking to the spot and using ranged methods to harass him.

Repeating this cycle, Xiao Tan was the one being worn down, both in Survival Value and Stamina.

"Tch... if it weren't for that pair of boomerangs, his camping-style gameplay would have been judged as passive play..." Xiao Tan muttered annoyedly while dodging a new wave of boomerang attacks, "What should I do..."

If Feng Bujue were here, he probably would have come up with a dozen tactics more shameless than the opponent's. But Xiao Tan, on the tactical level, was basically in a "going with the flow" state. Sometimes, with a flash of inspiration, he could make amazing moves, but most of the time, he was far less resourceful than those strategy-type players.

"Wait... even if this guy's attacks are automatically tracking... how is he locking onto my location in this pile of rubble?" Finally, after running around for more than ten minutes, Xiao Tan realized this problem that he should have thought of earlier.

It was night, and he was already hundreds of meters away from the opponent, surrounded by towering stone pillars, so how was the opponent aiming?

"Is it some kind of heat-sensing skill..." Xiao Tan thought anxiously, "Hmm... he's been attacking non-stop for more than ten minutes, how much consumption would it be if it was an active skill? Could it be a passive pupil technique..." He quickly rejected this guess, "No... a passive heat-sensing pupil technique would make it impossible to see normally, it shouldn't exist."

Hooosh...

Another wave of attacks, Xiao Tan stepped twice on a stone pillar beside him, flipped backwards in mid-air, and dodged again.

"If it's not a skill... then it's equipment." Xiao Tan thought, "It can't be Soul Intent, can it..." Although he had heard Brother Jue and Sister Yu describe the concept of Soul Intent, he felt that he only had a superficial understanding because he had never experienced this kind of ability. Moreover, Soul Intent was indeed extremely rare, not something that could be found everywhere.

"I didn't see him wearing anything on his face before... but facial equipment can be hidden, which means..." Xiao Tan thought to himself and leaped up.

He chose a giant stone pillar several meters in diameter, stepped on the vertical surface of the pillar, and began running around the pillar.

After running around like this a few times, he flashed and lightly leaped onto another pillar next to him, doing the same thing...

At the same time, Bu Tiange, standing at a high point hundreds of meters away, actually stopped attacking. Because a strange scene appeared in his thermal imaging goggles—near the original clear hot spot, a vague area of high temperature appeared, like a cloud of orange mist, hiding the target's whereabouts.

"What is he doing..." Bu Tiange muttered, "Could it be that he set a large fire?" Thinking of this, he quickly switched the goggles to display mode and flipped them up to his forehead, using his own eyes to look into the distance.

But, the distance was still pitch black...

This was also to be expected... the footprints that Xiao Tan's [Fei Yan Liu Hen (Flying Nightmare Leaves Traces)] stepped on burned with black fire.

"Eh?" Bu Tiange put the thermal imaging goggles back on and found that there were more and more high-temperature areas...

On the other side, Xiao Tan saw that the opponent hadn't attacked for a while, so he knew that his method was working. He sped up, jumping and running between more pillars, leaving as many black fire footprints as possible, and expanding the effect of visual interference.

"What exactly is going on..." Bu Tiange lost track of the opponent, and suddenly felt a little flustered. His surprise value also increased slightly. "There's no firelight, but the high-temperature area is getting bigger and bigger... Could it be that he's spraying high-temperature bodily fluids everywhere..."

Without being able to determine the opponent's location, his Ling Neng weapon lost its use. The [Hunt] special effect couldn't be activated at all.

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Xiao Tan gradually approached the area where the opponent was located and began to create a "footprint encirclement" around Bu Tiange's camping spot.

"He is a studio player, his overall strength is definitely stronger than mine. Even if his level is the same as mine, he definitely has the advantage of resource integration in terms of equipment and skills. With more choices, the combination will be more reasonable..." After getting rid of the passive situation, Xiao Tan began to calculate the offensive strategy in his mind, "However... he is not a player at the top of the combat power rankings, and his strength won't be too different from mine... As long as I can catch his flaw, create an advantage at a specific time and place... I have a chance to win."

"Coming, are you..." Bu Tiange wasn't stupid either. Seeing that a circle around him was gradually becoming a high-temperature area, and that the area was shrinking, he naturally knew that the opponent had reached a very threatening distance.

"Tch..." Bu Tiange simply took off his goggles. Anyway, when he looked out through the thermal imaging, everything around him was already a cloud of orange mist, so there was no point in wearing them.

"Haa... hmph..." Bu Tiange calmed his emotions with deep breaths, so that his trembling hands could stabilize.

His personality was the complete opposite of his sister's, [Cai Bu Pa Ne (Not Afraid)]. His sister was a fierce tomboy, while his personality was, to put it mildly, timid and weak, and to put it bluntly, a sissy.

The reason why Bu Tiange chose shooting specialization was because he wanted to avoid direct melee combat (he entered the game during the closed beta, and there were no Spiritualist and Summoner specializations to choose from at that time). Having been used as a human punching bag by his sister since he was a child, he had long developed a strong psychological shadow of physical conflict. From his fixed-point defense tactics, it was easy to see that this kid's style was to not give others a chance to get close at all.

Shh...

Suddenly, two extremely slight sounds came from Bu Tiange's left. Without saying a word, he turned the heavy machine gun he had set up and swept a barrage of bullets in that direction. But without the thermal imaging device, he didn't even know what he was shooting at.

"The fire from the machine gun firing is not enough to dispel the shadows between the stone pillars, and the sound of gunshots and shell casings falling can be used as my cover..." Xiao Tan thought calmly, hiding behind a stone pillar, "Sure enough... he is relying on some kind of thermal imaging device to confirm my location, and now he is basically blind..."

It turned out that the subtle sounds just now were made by Xiao Tan grabbing a handful of sand and throwing it hard at the stone pillar, which was a conscious test.

At this moment, the battle situation had completely reversed. Wang Tanzhi was like a beast lurking in the darkness, testing the opponent's reaction with ease, looking for an opportunity to deliver a fatal blow.

And Little Brother Bu Tiange... after the opponent saw through his combat mode and cracked one of the links, he fell into an absolute passive state.

As a player specializing in shooting, Bu Tiange's eyesight was also good, but because Xiao Tan was hidden in the darkness and his clothes were dark (Xiao Tan's assassin suit was a dark red coat with a golden cape), it was extremely difficult to capture his figure with the naked eye.

On the contrary, Xiao Tan, who also had C-grade Reconnaissance Specialization, didn't have this concern... Bu Tiange was always standing on the top of that giant stone pillar, using it as a lookout point and defense point. As long as Xiao Tan poked his head out slightly from behind a pillar, he could glimpse the opponent.

"Haa... haa..." Bu Tiange tried to lower the sound of his breathing as much as possible. The feeling of fear made his vision and hearing more sensitive. He thought to himself, "Stay calm... the opponent is testing me, I can't fall for it." He calmed himself, "I'm too nervous... I don't need to be in a hurry to fire. I'm high up, with a machine gun in hand, no matter how fast he is, he can't get close to me instantly. At the beginning of the script, he was forced back like this... There won't be any difference now." He made up his mind, "Hmm! I'll fire when he actually appears in my line of sight. Recklessly firing wildly will only give him an opportunity to take advantage."

Shh... another sound.

This time, Bu Tiange just turned his head warily, staring at that side with wide eyes, without pulling the trigger.

Whoosh... Following the previous movement, another series of sounds drifted from the darkness in an arc, and then suddenly stopped three seconds later.

"Didn't fall for it this time..." Xiao Tan thought. He originally wanted to repeat the old trick, using the method of throwing sand to attract the opponent's attention. When Bu Tiange fired, he would go around to the blind spot in his line of sight, kick the pillar twice, and complete the assassination.

But he didn't expect... that after he threw the sand and started at high speed, the opponent didn't fall for it...

Therefore, Xiao Tan quickly stopped and lowered his footsteps again, hiding himself.

In these short few minutes, neither of them spoke, nor did they use any substantial killing moves, but this game of wits and courage had already entered a white-hot stage.

Suddenly, the wind picked up...

The sound of the wind passed through the maze of strange stones shrouded in the night, making a desolate echo like a wail.

Driven by the desert evening wind, a dark cloud slowly covered the moonlight...

At this moment, with a "click", a light suddenly lit up from behind a stone pillar. Then, a man wearing a miner's hat walked out from behind the pillar.

When the dark clouds covered the sun, this light source appeared so dazzling, and the miner's hat was a striking yellow, making it difficult to ignore even if you wanted to.

"Hey... too arrogant." In an instant, the sentence flashed through Bu Tiange's mind, but his actions didn't slow down because of this. He immediately pointed the gun at Xiao Tan and pulled the trigger.

However, at that moment, that point of light turned into a band of light.

Bu Tiange also expected that the opponent wouldn't sit still and wait for death, and that moving at high speed was also reasonable. "Hmph... you want to rush up? You can't be faster than a bullet."

Of course, Xiao Tan couldn't be faster than a bullet, at least not yet. But he didn't need to be faster than a bullet, he just needed to be fast enough to deceive the opponent's eyes...

The gun fired, and the dense firepower of the machine gun poured down.

In the same second, the light point in the darkness split into two, and a second later, it split into three again. Three blurry bands of light appeared and disappeared intermittently, and spiraled diagonally around the stone pillar.

"I knew you would use this skill!" Bu Tiange didn't panic. Xiao Tan had already used the [Feng Zhu Chen Xiang Hua Yi Jin (Wind Ceases, Dust Fragrant Flowers End)] move when he first tried to break through the firepower network. At this moment, his method of using afterimages to create light and shadow overlap had long been seen through by Bu Tiange.

"The result this time won't change either!" Bu Tiange slightly adjusted the muzzle of the machine gun, increased the area covered by the barrage, and covered all three light and shadow figures in the firepower network. Last time, he also used this method to force Xiao Tan back and also knocked off a lot of Survival Value.

But this time, a scene that puzzled him appeared.

One, two, three... three points of light disappeared one by one.

Darkness returned, and in front of Bu Tiange... there was nothing.

"They're all afterimages?" At this moment, Bu Tiange's surprise value soared, "Where is the real body?"

This question was soon answered.

An icy sleeve sword pierced in from behind Bu Tiange's neck, penetrating the cervical vertebrae and protruding from the front of his throat. The gushing blood burst into a cloud of blood mist in the air, scattering with the wind.

Ten seconds ago...

Xiao Tan, disregarding the consumption of Survival Value, deliberately turned on the light of the miner's hat, and relied on the afterimage skill to forcibly rush up one side of the stone pillar. When he successfully reached a certain height, he left the last three afterimages, and at the same time... reached out and turned off the light on the miner's hat. Then, he curled up his body and used the [Evil Demon Bat Ghost Shadow] towards the stone pillar in front of him, using the skill's special effect... instantly appearing on the other side of the stone pillar.

Thus, he successfully disappeared from the opponent's line of sight.

Three seconds passed, under the cover of the gunshots, Xiao Tan had unknowingly arrived behind Bu Tiange... taking his ninth victory.