As the last four healers of Nine Dragons Emperor's team were swiftly cut down, dissolving into four brilliant streaks of white light, the entire battlefield fell silent.
"She got this much stronger?" Long Wu glanced at the four fallen healers, shock and disbelief welling up inside him.
He still remembered Huo Wu.
The last time they clashed was at Zero Wing's stronghold, and back then Huo Wu hadn't been worth a second thought in his eyes. But now, after such a short time had passed, she was completely dominating him.
"Just where did Zero Wing find so many experts?" Nine Dragons Emperor watched Huo Wu's ethereal, ghost-like figure flicker across the battlefield, his eyelid twitching involuntarily.
Though it had lasted only a heartbeat, it was clear that Long Wu alone was no match for her in a head-on fight, and the skills Huo Wu was wielding were extraordinarily troublesome.
Six afterimages made it impossible to distinguish the real from the fake — all attacks passed harmlessly through, yet every strike from those phantoms appeared to deal actual damage.
Unless you could hit all six phantoms at once, she was practically invincible.
But Huo Wu's power wasn't the most critical issue — the real problem was that every healer had been eliminated, putting them at an overwhelming disadvantage.
This sudden emergence of experts from Zero Wing was devastating — not only was their damage output staggering, but their mobility was equally terrifying. In the entire team, only top fighters like Long Wu, Shadow Fang, Si Ling, and Xue Shou Yan Wang could hold their own. Everyone else was nothing more than sitting ducks, without even the ability to buy time...
"Guild Master Nine Dragons, we can't keep this up — when is the backup going to arrive?" Si Ling was being relentlessly harassed by Fei Ying and the distant Hei Zi, unable to cast any of his large-scale destruction magic that required long incantations. He could only keep dodging and using instant-cast spells to defend himself.
It was an incredibly frustrating situation.
In terms of skill, he far surpassed both Fei Ying and Hei Zi. But in raw stats and reaction speed, the two of them completely outstripped him, leaving him running himself ragged. Now that every healer in the team was dead, if the fight dragged on any longer, he'd simply be ground down and finished off by Fei Ying and Hei Zi.
At that moment, it wasn't just Si Ling who wanted to know when reinforcements would arrive. Without backup, a complete team wipe was only a matter of time.
"We're... pulling out!" Nine Dragons Emperor scanned his steadily dwindling team and spoke through gritted teeth.
Forget about wiping out Zero Wing — he couldn't even stop them from taking down the three beastman bosses. He simply couldn't understand why the gap between the two sides was so vast.
If anyone heard about this, they probably wouldn't believe it.
Zero Wing had barely more than a dozen people actually fighting them, yet all of their top experts couldn't do a thing about those dozen. And Zero Wing still had over thirty people handling the three beastman bosses on the side...
At Nine Dragons Emperor's command, the remaining members began an orderly retreat.
"Hahaha, Boss, they're running scared!" Hei Zi watched Nine Dragons Emperor's forces retreating and felt an indescribable sense of satisfaction.
None of the people on Nine Dragons Emperor's side were ordinary experts — any one of them would be top-tier in a first-rate guild.
Moreover, a figure like Nine Dragons Emperor stood at the very apex of the virtual gaming world — someone they used to look up to from afar. Never in their wildest dreams had they imagined they would drive him back with just over a dozen people.
He was going to have plenty to brag about to his friends later.
"Boss, should we pursue?" Huo Wu was nonchalant about it all, even looking a bit dissatisfied. She wanted to wipe out Nine Dragons Emperor's entire team.
"No pursuit — our goal is to capture the settlement. If we wait too long, reinforcements from the surrounding area will arrive." Shi Feng shook his head and turned his gaze toward the three beastman bosses. "Priority is taking down all three bosses!"
"What if they charge back in to cause trouble?" Huo Wu watched the retreating Nine Dragons Emperor, clearly unwilling to let them go. She knew they would never just stand by and watch them capture the settlement.
"If they dare come back, I won't hesitate to wipe them all out!" Shi Feng's gaze turned cold.
The situation now was nothing like it had been at the Ancient Tower. Before, he and Shui Se Qiangwei and a handful of others had had to tank everything on their own. But now with Huo Wu and the others, they had solid tanks, damage dealers, and healers — capable of forming excellent team coordination.
The group immediately shifted targets, turning their attention toward the three beastman bosses.
After a brief but fierce exchange, the combined damage output of Jing Wu Ming and the others could barely keep the three bosses' health from regenerating. Though each boss had only a little over 20% HP remaining, their total health pools all exceeded a hundred million. The beastman Chieftain alone had a staggering 130 million HP — and that was after being suppressed by the Thunder Domain.
"No way! Nine Dragons Emperor actually retreated?"
"Zero Wing Guild is insane! They only have about a dozen people — how is their combat power so terrifying?"
"Does Zero Wing Guild really have this many hidden experts?"