Chapter 49: Duel (Part 1)

Combat in War was conducted in a sci-fi manner. In the game, leisure points like bars or cafes always had a designated area for gamers to do battle through cabins connected to the federal virtual network. Through these connected “game cabins,” gamers could upload their data and enter a virtual PK Map.

It was a rather interesting arrangement. In fact, it was a virtual sci-fi game where gamers could play virtual fighting games within it. This setting reminded Feng Luo of a movie. What had it been called…? Oh, yeah. The Thirteenth Floor.

On a desert that kept going on and on, the blazing sun shone perpendicularly, toasting the ground intensely until it was above 50 degrees Celsius. Apart from endless yellow sand and continuous sand dunes, the surrounding scenery consisted of a few dying trees that were scarcely distributed, casting their shadows on the sand.

Feng Luo stood in the middle of the desert and observed the map. From the corner of his left eye, he saw a debuff notification from the system.

Special Duel Map—Deadly Desert: Stamina depletion increased by 100%. Health points reduce by 0.1% per second (doubles after seven minutes). Use of blood tonics prohibited!

In certain PK Maps, the system would add negative elements based on the surroundings of the gamer. This was mainly to increase the pace of the duel for a quicker ending. It prevented gamers from intentionally avoiding combat, which would cause battles to drag on too long.

With the health point reduction debuff, plus the prohibited use of blood tonics, gamers wouldn’t be able to regenerate health fast enough to recover lost HP. In that sense, most players would choose to finish a fight as quickly as possible.

Although gamers were not allowed to use blood tonics, there was a small supply pack located in the middle of the map that would restore the gamer’s health by half. That also meant that if the gamer chose to stay in one spot, he was sure to lose.

The issue was getting to the supply pack. Running as fast as possible would drain a large amount of the player’s Stamina. This could cause one to have to stop halfway, which opened up opportunities for ambush attacks from the opponent.

A place as wide and open as this was tailor-made for a Sniper to perform a perfect shot.

Feng Luo saw a small map at the bottom-right corner of his HUD. The area shown on the map was a rectangular shape approximately two kilometers in length. The desert beyond the PK map could be seen but couldn’t be entered.

For other professions, two kilometers would have seemed huge. Other classes might not even bump into each other before exhausting their HP due to the effects of the environment. But for two Snipers, all they would need to do was walk to a position where they could see one-third of the map, and they could attack practically every corner of the area.

Feng Luo was rushing toward the center of the map while taking out his sniper rifle and started to assemble it: a muddy-brown gun body with the familiar length of slightly over a meter. At first glance, it seemed like a typical M110, but there was something very different about it.

M110 (Sniper Rifle) (Modified)

Grade: Excellent

Attack: 610

Attack Coefficient: D+

Agility: +7

Vision: +300m

Effective Attack Distance: 1000 + 250m

Special Attribute: 2% chance of electrified shot

Level Requirement: 40

Modifier: Feng Zhi Luoye

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Overall Evaluation: Excellent

What else could it be but the Eye of Thunder?

Why was Feng Luo holding an M110? Feng Luo was ready to give the Eye of Thunder a makeover, but after he’d created the first parts, he had realized that he had overlooked one important aspect—the level requirement. The lowest level requirement for the complete Eye of Thunder was not Level 40 but Level 45!

Faced with a situation like this, he didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. By right, a Level-45 Rare-grade piece of equipment must have been worth more than a Level-40 one. This was a good thing. But it also meant that even if he created the Eye of Thunder now, he couldn’t put it to use yet.

“Goddamnit!” he cursed.

This shocking realization was starting to affect his mood. To make do with what he had, he had improvised a basic M110 by installing the two most important parts from the Eye of Thunder, namely the scope and the barrel. This way, the modified M110 was upgraded to Level 40—perfect for the occasion.

The limitation set by the system wasn’t unreasonable. Stronger equipment needed to require a higher level, or else the game would lose its balance. Besides, in terms of attributes, the modified M110 was nothing less than many mainstream Level-40 sniper rifles. In fact, with two Rare-grade parts installed, the gun was stronger than standard Level-40 rifles in a few ways.

For instance, the maximum range of 1,250 meters was much longer than 99 percent of current rifles. The scope had an additional field of 300 meters, which made it even easier for him to spot enemies. For a Sniper, these two attributes were of utmost importance, which was also the reason why he had changed these parts in the first place.

Moreover, it had the incomplete yet rare attribute of a 2 percent chance of producing an electrifying shot. He recalled how the electric ball from the commander of the rebel army had grazed him a few days prior. The complete numbness he had felt then was still fresh in his mind.

It might not have been the complete Eye of Thunder, but this M110 was no doubt still a strong gun!

******

Black Panther was like a real panther. He crept quietly behind a sand dune, waiting for his prey.

A lot of people couldn’t tell the difference between a cheetah and a panther. In fact, the panther, which would wait patiently for its prey, was much more dangerous than the cheetah, who used pure speed for hunting. Panthers could stay still all day, lying in wait for the perfect moment to pounce and unleash a deadly attack when its prey appeared.

A hefty sniper rifle longer than 1.2 meters was placed in front of Black Panther. The gun was covered in a nano light camouflage pattern. From afar, apart from the black hole of the gun’s opening, it would have been difficult to tell that there was anything there.

Black Panther had maintained this position for close to five minutes, searching for traces of the gamer called Feng Zhi Luoye. As one of the leaders who had served the Fifth Space Force Special Mission Team, his record for lying in ambush was half an hour at the mouth of an active volcano with temperatures of over 100 degrees on the 19th Administrative Planet. There, he had successfully killed a highly alert volcanic gargantuan, a highly dangerous creature that consumed volcanic rocks. It was a species that was unique to the 19th Administrative Planet.

Of course, to achieve such incredible results, he had depended on the special equipment from the Federal Army. The latest high-energy-particle battle outfit allowed him to endure more than 40 minutes even at extreme temperatures of over 300 degrees. On the contrary, the Level-45 grade Excellent-grade Viper Battle Outfit he was currently wearing had an automated camouflage feature, but the temperature regulation feature of below 50 degrees was far from impressive.

Under the blazing hot sun, the temperature of the desert far surpassed 50 degrees. The Viper Battle Outfit’s temperature regulation feature wasn’t sufficient. Even though he hadn’t moved a single muscle this whole time, he could feel the hydration being sucked out of him.

Truthfully, Black Panther quite enjoyed this type of game, where the weapons and equipment were far behind reality. Perhaps, for a normal person, the firearms, armors, and aircraft in the game were exciting and mighty. But, having witnessed high-tech weapons from the Federal Army, the technology in this game was simply shabby.

Some people claimed that these games were invented by the Federal Government to scout for talents. He had always laughed in disdain at the idea. Without high-tech equipment, he couldn’t even unleash his full potential as a Federal Special Agent.

Despite that, he had utilized all sorts of skills he had gained as an army soldier to become a Sniper at Level 45 in just a few months. Without any sort of help from the system, he had achieved precision shooting within the range of 700 meters. He believed that based on his skills in this game, as long as an opponent’s equipment wasn’t stronger than his, not many people couldn’t beat him in combat.

Although the map looked like an environment where it would be difficult to lie in ambush, he had a gifted talent for wait patiently for his prey.

Camouflage (Talent)

All camouflage skill equipment effects increased by 50%. A fixed percentage of neglecting detection abilities.

Overall Evaluation: A