Sash's Heart
As soon as Bloptl entered his arena, and saw his opponent being none other than their brand new Boss; Leader. Bloptl instantly thought back to all the teasing, humiliation and verbal abuse—as men would have it with one another—he did against Zbey, and as the thought of karma went up his 'headaching' head and wanted nothing more but to instantly give up, lest he is noticed by Tongqiu... it happened.
"Oh, hey! What are you planning? Stay there, come and fight it out with me. Since it is so coincidental, let's take this as your interview for officially entering my League, not anyone can get into my Order, you know?"
CLASH!
His heart was broken... it shattered in pieces as his back, legs, forearms and even all of Bloptl's ass was covered in cold sweat in less than a moment; but there was no way back. The Leader has already spoken, and his words were, though not known since it was the first time Tongqiu made a true public appearance after the founding of his Association and having wreaked havoc in his own Region, they were still very heavy since The Order itself has already shown its might through the Team vs Team—shortly—and Association vs Association segment.
And so on, Bloptl sent himself to the hurricane of pain, punches, kicks and forced self-healing until Yun Beishang finally let him go with a punch to the cheek and jaw combo and then disappeared altogether. When Bloptl went back to the world of the living, an all smiley and eye-teasing eyed Zbey welcomed his brother in arms with his arms well crossed.
But... this was not the end, as just as the crowds saw the last 64 players go on to the next phase, Tongqiu was actually at the first round and in the 4th arena as he then faced Lost In The Moment, the Suicidal Vanguard Legendary Hidden Class player, also previous team member of the Quintessential Team and now member of the League of The Order.
When Lost In The Moment appeared on the arena, saw Tongqiu and saw him looking at himself with a mannerism that entailed that he was being observed all naked and vulnerable. The always steeled-minded player who actually got the requirements for wearing the mantle of such a Hidden Class; faltered and felt cold sweat uncontrollably even in parts of his body he didn't—and shouldn't—know he could sweat about from.
PAMPAM BOOM! CRA-CRACK... BANG!
SLAP! KICK! POH POH POH! PAAAAAAAM~!!
-2,400, -2,400x8...
A Suicidal Vanguard who would feel that his unique skillset was shit at the moment: +120, +120, +120, +120, +120, +120x100...
PA!!! Thud...
As Lost In The Moment was finally dying for the second—and thankfully last—time on the arena, his eyes were so full of the passing of time as if he had gone and went through unimaginable lives while his back was to the arena's floor and his arms and legs were sprawled outwardly in powerlessness.
With only his vision being more than perfect due to the strengthening of his virtual body, and unfortunately, Lost In The Moment could hear Yun Beishang's words as they overkilled all of what he had ever felt in his life. Such words; were of 'hm, ah! So it seems you're not bad, but your Hidden Class is okay. I will take a look of the requirements of that thing later, welcome to The Order.'.
Anyway, such was the life of mere mortals in the face of a being who can fight against almost-godly creatures, enemies and whatnot. But, Yun Beishang, wasn't the only person of The Order fighting around with their every battle being overly watched and anticipated too. It was only Sash and Xiao Ruo, from all of the others who either did not get bored or rather decided to log off and keep taking care of Tonkia and bombarding her with inquiries like a child who is envious of another child's toy.
And it was on the 16th placements that Xiao Ruo gave the crowds, and viewership, a heart attack, heartwarming, heart-bleeding and heart-stealing moment as she was matched up to rival Sash for the next phase. What naturally happened next was to be expected from her, as everyone in The Order were all too fond, liking and adoring of Xiao Ruo.
But as for the outsiders, since they obviously didn't know the real Xiao Ruo, it was to be expected to see them all go crazy, incredulous and overwhelmed at the sight of the that little thing hopping towards Sash cutely and with abandon before finally getting to embrace Sash's waist and rub her head endearingly onto Sash's equipment.
That was when the onlookers got their overdose of heart-whatnots after being initially crazed, incredulous and overwhelmed at seeing the more than brutal, merciless and even somewhat cold Xiao Ruo turn into the most beloved masco-being of the entire game that is Rising Essence.
Not even Lil' Riria was capable of holding half a tiny candle to the adorable Cute Rawrr, let alone other several young girls who have appeared before and somewhat got spotted. In any case; Xiao Ruo was then teleported out of the arena, soundless, as she gave the bigger sister, Sash, the opportunity to keep on fighting on the segment while she herself went back to go watch Tonkia in their world.
To the envious but silent and adult eyes of Sash, the bigger person-no, sister; Xiao Ruo disappeared as Sash lamented her good fortune of having such a beautiful Little Ruo caring for her. On the other hand, though. Everyone else watching this happened thought that Sash was feeling depressed over not having found the battle that she was hoping to have, where only someone equal could rival her.
With this delusional and heroic mindset and thoughts of all the crowds and viewership, Sash passed on to her 8th placements phase-battle while Yun Beishang also naturally did so. To the surprise of not that many, Hidden Daggers managed to also reach the 8th placements phase, and at the same time however; a crazy thing happened as the rules for spectating the arenas changed.
Just as Yun Beishang and Sash were on the arenas all at the same time, as it was more than obvious that only 16 people remained and all of the fights in the 8th placements phase would be capable of being held at the same time as per the rules... the invisible but omnipotent barriers were lifted as Yun Beishang instantly saw quite a couple of figures that enlarged his pupils to no end.
*PING* Global System Announcement: Attention to all Journeyers, for the 8th placements phase and forth, all arenas will have open view to each other as well as being able to hear all sounds and including voices from other arenas. There still won't be any possibility to interfere in any fight, but one can now be distracted by other arenas, please be careful and concentrate on your own arena. The battles for the 8th placements will start in less than 8 seconds, 7 seconds, 6 seconds, 5...
'...Sash!' When Yun Beishang saw Sash's arena, his heart seemingly ceased to exist, and at the same time, he totally ignored Hidden Daggers who unceremoniously appeared on the same arena that he did and was now throwing daggers with her glance alone. If looks could kill in this game world, he would've been gone '-500 -500 -500...' multiple times already.
Because, just as Hidden Daggers managed to give herself so much fame and recognition with her strength alone, unlike the smaller Can't Catch Me with both of them being from the House Asami; so did Sash got to be recognized even before the Team vs Team segment commenced, let alone the Association vs Association segment.
Because everyone knew how boring and dull was to see quite a few billion to fight it out to a 100 first to have met the requirements for being picked as a qualifier for the 64th placements, the 128 people who managed to not only endure so many battles altogether, but to also do it in less than most of the people's time were all nicely investigated by casual players, surfers of the internet such as netizens and important people from New Earth. Be it for the sake of sponsoring a person or group or actually recruiting them into under their wing like a Founding Clan looking for talent, an incredible Association recruiting new talents or even certain other organizations looking to make good use of certain people from in-game evaluation.
Naturally, some other people weren't investigated at all; and instead were simply worshiped and admired by either a few or a lot of people. One of them, in contrast to Sash's popularity, was True Dragon as the Young Master of the Founding Yun Clan and as an incredible warrior that could obliterate any enemies while also giving them the appropriate respect and honor!
Of course, that wasn't just entirely true now, was it? Their previous showcase at the Association vs Association segment was shortened unnaturally, and the performance of True Dragon was similarly not spectacular even amongst elite or pro players. It was to the point that nor he nor his Association were ever remembered as soon as they left the arena; wholly overshadowed by either The Order or simply by the ongoing Associations vying for the next qualifications for the next placements phase.
Sash and True Dragon were both a Carefree Dragon class, both wielding a long pole arm and both having the greatest skillset and movement, agility and possible flexibility capabilities for dueling more than anything else; these classes weren't useless in 'anything else' but they were the best at dueling and the comparison of that to other classes was huge.
While pole arms would always grant great shows for a battle, unlike the swords, they weren't meant to be fast and aggressive; at least not mostly. And for the Carefree Dragon class, the connective of one's basic attacks to one's skills in which one didn't needed to simply put their minds into it and then a skill would be released as they could, instead, change the everything that their skills can do.
For example, the Carefree Dragon class does have very good CC skills; and they excelled, totally, in Movement Speed and Attack/Action Speed the most. They were the very few classes who had both of these as the main cores in strength for an ordinary class. Their resistances, tanky properties and even damage, however, was very small compared to the regular evaluation of any class.
As such, due to the limitations of the system, a Carefree Dragon's potential would be much more apparent and won't be disadvantageous in terms of damage. In fact, with Ascent of the Jove Bloodline, Sash could also deal Magical Damage and as such, she had chosen for herself the 800 total of inflicting True Damage-ish in the Global Tournament.
On the other hand, True Dragon would only have 500 True Damage-ish inflicting upon his enemies per hit. But, it did not mattered that to Yun Beishang. As a practically owner of the current Founding Yun Clan, the True Dragon, namely Yun Lao. How could he not know of Sash? Of the people around Yun Beishang, in particular? It was more than obvious that she was recognized as soon as they both entered the arena.
And now, Yun Beishang was aware of the battle between the two of them ahead of time. Naturally, so was Yun Lao, and whose visage turned bizarre for an entire second right then and there. When he looked at Yun Beishang, Yun Beishang in turn only glanced at him momentarily before letting his gaze rest on Sash's back.
At that moment, Yun Lao smiled, very deviously, inside that eery cruel self of his. While Yun Lao had a strange expression go through his countenance for a second, Sash was uncaring as he only gave him a 3 seconds glance at the beginning when they first appeared on the arena. Once she did that, just as she hoped that this wouldn't bother Yun Beishang in the least while he fought, the invisible barriers 'tumbled' down.
After some seconds of Sash's sensual pale-orange lips opening up in a gasp to this development, she suddenly felt something warm and safeguarding be kept on her back. So, she turned her head back to look at none other than Yun Beishang, and even as he wore his Renaissance Crown's Great Petal Helm, she could see a gaze so purely doting land on her as all of her worries were seemingly lifted up from her shoulders.
"Hooo..." As her pale-orange lips brightened under the sunset, Sash's mask slowly disappeared from her face and only her Dragoon Inspired Valiant Headgear remained. Only her lips, nose and the very center of her chin and forehead were visible as even her eyes were behind a glass-like silk clothing that covered them entirely and only the intense Mental Power of Yun Beishang could go through them.
Swish, whistle~~~...
Suddenly, as the crowd gasped, the sounds of that came into the ears of the contenders below on the arenas; which only served to even more maintain 'distracted' a Sash whose sexy wavy long orange hair reaching her big buttocks trembled furiously as it swayed when the incoming fierce gust of wind came her way.
Whoosh... Pkan-Ling~CLINK-Clank, clank, clank, clank, clank!!
Pfruiyl! ...Pfruiyl!
When the edge of a halberd was about to reach the back of her head from her right, Sash's eyes only widened as her pupils shrunk instead, but instead of her dodging, she used her very own Dragoon Inspired Lord Counteractive Defenders to block against the incoming halberd. In one single swoop, Sash's single right arm almost perfectly parried off True Dragon's halberd's blade as she left-handled her Dragoon Inspired Lord Spear that was as long as 7 meters long without taking the spearhead in consideration, towards the right shoulder!
Right after, a series of metallic sounds clashing against each other were heard as a purple glint flashed by up and down in a frontal crescent shape on Sash's left and True Dragon's right. Sash, instead of going for the act of destroying the enemy in one sole barrage of her skills and attacks, used her Long Spear to clash it multiple times at the armor of her opponent.
With the capabilities of a Carefree Dragon, True Dragon could've easily followed up with a next attack, as ferocious and fast as before, once he was blocked off or clashed against by a defensive taken-out-at-the-last-second equipment from her inventory, he would just retract his 4 meters long halberd back and simply whip it down against her once again; it was as simple as that.
But, for someone who almost killed off Yun Beishang right away after starting a battle back then, who was Sash? She was not someone that any person who only has the chance to go far due to the limitations of the system and arduous top-notch training on New Earth could ever face off directly, let alone compare to her!
Because instead of even using her body to take that attack; not blocking nor deviating the attack with a weapon or item, she instead damnably parried off his halberd at once!
But that wasn't enough for her as she began bombarding him with almost-deafening attacks to his armor that left him stunned mentally by a total of 2 seconds, more than enough for Sash to deliver a connected combo attack of 6 cleaves from her Long Spear upside-down.
She wasn't even damaging his virtual body nor directly attacking him, as she kept on only wearing down the armor chest that True Dragon was wearing.
Stomp!
Whoosh, rustle... swish, swish, swish!
As True Dragon was dazed but now finally recuperating himself from his initial scare, Sash stomped her left feet on True Dragon's sternum, with her beautiful and breathtaking face forming a ferocious frown and a pair of indomitably cold, domineering eyes as she retreated by jumping into a backwards somersault that went to a speed even faster than Xiao Ruo's without the use of her Sun-Reaching, Earth-Diving Decimating Leaps.
"Woah! Did you see that?!"
"Holy fuck, I thought she was flying."
"Naaah! I thought the camera was slow mode and that was why we could see that imperfect jump backwards."
Players on the crowds and people commenting on the forums' streaming features were astonished at Sash's movement; Sash had made a 17 meters long jump backwards, a somersault. And though she had an effect that allowed her jumps and falling to be 70% faster, it was not speeder. Which meant that she could only move faster in her jumps or while falling down and not to traverse more distance with a jump.
As such, even though Sash used not much strength and she 'only' jumped backwards those 17 meters, she appeared to be flying backwards with her head slowly rotating in a reverse clockwise motion. When she reached her last few meters from her jump, she completed the somersault extremely fast as she noiselessly landed on her feet with her Dragoon Inspired Lord Spear leaving a trail of a steel-bright majestic sheen in midair.
Step-ZZzzzzZZZZZ!
Ka-cha! Swishswishswish~...
Just as True Dragon wanted to take an angered step forwards, he was stopped by his diminutive instinct as he then instantly heard the sound of crackling; be it either thunder or fire. However, the next moment, his doubt was cleanly answered as the sight of Sash's Long Spear contrail suddenly turned dark purple and light violet for an instant. The very next moment, a smallish lightning bolt containing those very same two colors descended onto the contrail still left behind and then, a huge 13 meters long area of contrail became visibly scary as bolts of lightning danced around without stop and in a mocking manner towards every single person watching this and not just True Dragon.
Sash, Sweeping Heavenly Lightning Blink!
After she used such a unique skill of her own 'talent'-based virtual body, she got an extra of raw Movement Speed+30% thanks to her Dragoon Inspired Lord Armor Set at the same instant her Jove skill was completed, as she then rushed towards the nervously gulping down miserable image of True Dragon, Yun Lao!
At the same time that Yun Lao saw Sash use an impossibly more amazing and overlord-ly skill that any of which he had, bought and demanded to his Founding Yun Clan, his thoughts disheveled up and down, here and there nonstop! In just mere instants, jealousy overcame him and hatred as well as a wants for possessing her, and hence, her skills! Appeared in his train of thoughts.
'No, no! This damn girl is the lost Kernti genius for sure, I just-as long as I catch her, and for myself, not only I get to enjoy you, damn woman. I also get your Founding Clan's support, even if it's just in the infancy levels, as long as I impregnate you I-uh, ah-I...'
"Glck!" Just as Yun Lao was going hard at it with his own thoughts, a familiar presence overwhelmed him like the eyeing of a God ruling over his entire self out of disdain and without even wanting to really have done it. As soon as he more or less understood what this familiarity was, he began to turn his head to his left as he followed his below-elementary instinct; began, as in, because Sash was now already getting into the distance of just a few meters before him, only a couple instants later from the 17 meters in distance from each other.
And now, Sash's face was contorted in serious hatred as well as... duty as she empowered her Long Spear with bolts of dark violet and light purple lightning encompassing it when she unleashed a devastating slash straight at True Dragon's face with but all of her strength!!
...
Let It Rain's Note: So much fury... Sashy-Sash, is scary... ｜ｏ゜）.
