Chapter 177 – Snatching Treasure (1/2)

Chapter 177 – Snatching Treasure

Watching those players who ran to pick up the drops, Skinny Dog and the other survivors of the battle all had the same thought. Since they were the first players to ever slay the Warlock, a named Lord-class monster, shouldn’t they be rewarded with higher quality drops?

Warlock Hall was a named monster. These types of monsters had their own unique histories and lore. They were more difficult to deal with than the average, unnamed monsters, but they gave better experience and drops.

Victorious Return was willing to expend so much manpower and resources to take down Warlock Hall because they were confident the reward would be well worth it.

To them, sacrificing the lives of a few ordinary members for the sake of helping an elite member grow stronger was absolutely worth the trade-off. Besides, experience could be recuperated, but drops from a Lord-class monster were hard to come by.

Anticipation filled the hearts of every Victorious Return member who took part in the Warlock battle. The higher the quality of the equipment, the happier Heaven Breaker would be. There was a chance they’d be rewarded very generously with merit points.

As the group of players tasked with collecting the drops approached Warlock Hall’s corpse, they felt a gust of wind blow past them, and before they could even comprehend what was going on, they stared in shock as a shadow suddenly emerged beside the corpse, bending down to pick up all of their drops.

Nie Yan activated a game mechanic that had always ticked him off. Whenever a Thief attempted to pick up drops while in stealth, they were instantly revealed as a blurry silhouette. It was meant to balance the game, but at the moment it only did one thing, reveal him to everyone in the surrounding area.

So it was that he exposed himself the moment that he stooped down to collect the drops.

However, the Victorious Return players didn’t immediately recognize him. All they could tell was that he was a red name player from the bloody glow outlining his body. His face was hidden by the black garb, as was his guild emblem, and considering how well-secured the entire forest was, they naturally believed him to be a member of their guild.

Nie Yan nonchalantly picked up the drops beside Warlock Hall’s corpse. He felt ecstatic but kept his composure. Flashing the OK hand sign with his left hand, he casually made his way out of the ring of players from Victorious Return.

They believed his gesture was a signal that the drop was secured. They parted, allowing him to freely leave.

“Do you know who he is?”

“Why does he look a bit unfamiliar?”

Skinny Dog shot a glance at Nie Yan. With the drops retrieved, he thought they could call it a day. Gazing at the retreating figure, he found it somewhat familiar, as though he had seen it somewhere before. He happened to glance at the chat log at that moment, only to discover that it didn’t display any notifications of anything being picked up! A sudden realization dawned on him, as if he was struck by lightning. He urgently cried out, “Fuck! He’s not part of our guild! Stop him!”

Every single one of the Victorious Return players were taken aback.

“It’s Nirvana Flame! It’s that bastard!” Skinny Dog anxiously cursed, finally realizing why the silhouette seemed so familiar.

Hearing that name brought the rest of his guild to their senses. The player who had collected the drops just then wasn’t one of them. The Mages quickly chanted their magic, desperately firing a salvo of spells inNie Yan’s direction.

Nie Yan was still casually taking his leave, as all of the Warriors around him still hadn’t reacted. Only after hearing Skinny Dog’s call did they finally understand what was going on. They all activated Charge and rushed toward the offender.

Nie Yan was surrounded on all sides, with a deadly hail of several hundred spells fast approaching from behind him.

“Drop dead!” A Warrior hacked down on him with a Flame Slash.

With nowhere left to run, they all believed Nie Yan was done for.

Unexpectedly, Nie Yan shot out a line of silk from his left hand which stuck to the to branch of a tree five meters away. With a sudden jerk of the web line, he pulled himself up into the air and swung right over their heads.

The hail of spells bombarded the area where Nie Yan had previously been, creating a massive explosion that sent dirt flying everywhere and forced back all the surrounding Warriors who had failed to apprehend him.

Nie Yan had such an ability?! Underestimating him was a critical error on their part. When the smoke and dust finally cleared, they saw that he had already escaped out of their encirclement and was bolting away.

“Stop him! Don’t let him get away!”

The Warriors all turned around and frantically charged after him.

Another hail of spells came raining down on Nie Yan. He activated Swift Retreat and zig-zagged between the trees, quickly shaking off the Warriors following right behind him.「Bang! Bang! Bang!」Several dozen spells struck the trees around him, leaving black scorch marks on the bark as they exploded.

Nie Yan was hit a few times, but it was nothing serious.

He evaded the lines of sight of the players following behind him and activated Disappear, fading away into the lush forest background.

When Skinny Dog, Tangerine, and a few others caught up, they discovered the area was completely empty without even a single trace of Nie Yan!

“Where did he go?” Skinny Dog sternly asked.

“We couldn’t stop him him. He got away!”

“You idiots! How did so many of you fail to catch one person!?” Skinny Dog cursed. He always had a short temper to begin with. But after sacrificing over thirty players to take down a boss, only to have the drops they worked so painstakingly hard for snatched away, how could he be anything less than furious?