Chapter 594: Purge Tower

The combat video that the official website had fully illustrated one single message to the players—so long as they’d reached Tier 4, so long as they were willing to pay with hard work, and so long as they were persistent enough… anyone could advance through the ranks and compete in the second phase of the Grand Tournament—Last Man Standing Contest.

However!

Unlike the first phase, where the game developers flamed up the fighting spirit of the players by encouraging everyone to participate, the second phase’s “Last Man Standing Contest” was a pure “survival of the fittest” competition.

Fifty players of different levels, fifty Tier 4 to Tier 6 NPC Warriors and one extremely powerful Mini Boss NPC.

There could be only one survivor among them all!

Only that one last person who was able to defeat every opponent be it players from various Leagues or the NPCs could advance to the next phase. During this time, anyone who was defeated by players or NPCs, would be disqualified from the contest and teleported out of the arena.

Of course, even if a player had defeated all the other players but couldn’t successfully slay all the NPCs, he or she would still not be able to advance to the next phase. Therefore, one could not advance to the next phase by simply avoiding fights and conflicts in the arena. Even if they were to evade all the battles, they would still have to eventually face the strongest combatant that survived the arena!

After studying the risks of the second phase of the Grand Tournament, many players now realized that there should be at least two million players that could advance to the Third Phase. The ones who could advance to the next phase were definitely not weaklings.

However, before the Second Phase could start… the Second Phase combatants had to traverse to the Purge Tower.

And in that short time of less than ten minutes, it would result in at least a million players being stabbed in the back and shot down from the competition.

This Purge Tower sure was a harsh place. This Last Man Standing Contest was a game to the death!

***

Entering the Purge Tower!

In a flash, Qin Ruo had stepped into an area that was entirely foreign to him. Scanning the surrounding areas, Qin Ruo couldn’t help but be surprised by what he saw.

Silver Warriors, Silver Elementalists, Silver Bowmasters, Silver…

There were various kinds of silver combatants in the area, clad in silver armor and helmets. Apart from that, their weapons were all made of silver too—axes, swords, sabers, clubs, everything!

Qin Ruo reflectively tried to extend his barrier after seeing these silver combatants.

However, he couldn’t move at all. Not only that, he couldn’t summon Poochie too.

Luckily, no one in the scene was moving. They all stood there like lifeless pieces of rock and wood.

Qin Ruo let out a sigh of relief—it would seem that this “second phase” has a time limit before the battle began.

As he calculated his moves, a system message was suddenly heard in his ears.

60 seconds before the commencement of Last Man Standing Contest!

In 60 seconds, no players are allowed to move…

It was as he thought!

Qin Ruo held his breath and paid attention to the system messages.

During the Last Man Standing Contest, no player is allowed to communicate. No private messaging is allowed!

“No communication?”

Qin Ruo grinned as he heard this. This rule had no effect on him; in fact, this was beneficial to him. He didn’t want other players to recognize him and then call out the others to gang up on him.

Yet, the next system message sent a frown up his face…

During battle, all damage would be halved!

“I can only deliver half of my usual damage?”

Qin Ruo thought he could just pre-emptively cast a chain Frost Burst to wipe out the players and NPCs around him, then slowly defeat the stronger ones with his Lycan Barrages.

He didn’t think there would be such a peculiar rule set in place.

If that’s the case, the possibility to shorten the battle time would be tremendously decreased. Almost every player in the vicinity could use their potions to help them last the battle; and if he showed too many of his hands in combat, he would pose too much of a threat that would result in the others ganging up on him.

Now Qin Ruo understood why the system allowed them to “rest” for sixty seconds.

Other than observing the surrounding environment, it was to also allow the players to devise a battle plan.

Understanding this, Qin Ruo took in a deep breath and started to scan the areas inside the Purge Tower.

An area of just two hundred meters in length.

The ceiling was fifty meters away from the ground.

Seeing this, Qin Ruo had forfeited the idea of using his Angelic Wings. This Last Man Standing Contest seemed to want players to butt heads in a narrow encapsulated area—going airborne would be a bad idea.

Revealing himself as a Winged Champion would turn himself into a target of many. And there could be even some veteran champions in here too. Anything was possible.

As time ticked by, the players in the tower had also noticed a menacing Element looming around…

After a few seconds, Qin Ruo noticed something…

There were a lot more players that were clothed in silver robes in the tower. It would seem that all the mage-type players, the Elementalists, Summoners and Priests, had been given the same appearance.

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Qin Ruo carved up a frown on his brows again. This was another problem he needed to deal with. All these Mage classes didn’t really share the same combat styles. The Summoners were obviously the more advantageous ones—they could activate their Beastform Fusion and then get to melee range to take out the unsuspecting opponents; the Radiant Priests could use their psychic type attacks while the Shadow Priest possessed sneakier Magic strikes.

Every class had their own unique way of fighting.

Handling the Priests might be not too much of an issue; however, what if that wasn’t a priest? What if that was a Summoner who had fused with his Beastform and had inched closer for a powerful melee strike?

As for the Warriors, they too didn’t share the same fighting style.

Amongst the Warriors, there were different classes that had various resistance to Water-type attacks. Other than that, Swordmasters and Berserkers reacted to Magic Attacks differently. And naturally, Titanwraith Berserkers, Beastblood Berserkers and Steel Berserkers all had different ways of attacking…

“Phew.”

Qin Ruo let out a heavy sigh.

The sixty-second time limit was almost over.

Suddenly, Qin Ruo felt a sudden gush of energy in his body. The unknown force that was stopping him from moving had now started to fade away. Even though he was still unable to move freely, Qin Ruo could now move his hands and step forward really slowly.

Suddenly, the system message sounded in everyone’s ears again.

Players are allowed to make combat preparations. In the next 15 seconds, you are immune to any form of attacks!

After the fifteen second grace period, Last Man Standing Contest will commence!

Qin Ruo’s eyes glimmered.

‘Fifteen seconds…

‘Hmph!

‘That’s good news.’

He could do so much in fifteen seconds… He only needed four seconds to activate his Magic Shield and Barriers. He could then use the remaining time to expand his Elemental Perception and form his Twelve Frostramparts.

Of course, the other players had also started moving slowly to make the appropriate battle preparations…

Shield and Barrier activations, Combat Aura activations, Berserking, flinging out shields, summoning pets… everyone was busy preparing for the coming bloodbath! Qin Ruo even saw two Silver Bandits vanish to thin air.

Qin Ruo immediately activated his Elemental Perception.

Having expanded his Elemental Perception to serve a wide area in the tower, Qin Ruo was finally able to sniff out one of the Bandits. Even though it was just a Tier 4 Bandit, Qin Ruo put extra attention to him as he faded away from his view again. Then, he saw another Bandit too.

Tier 5 Bandit! He shouldn’t let his guard down.

Frostbarrier!

Darkfrost Shield!

In 4 seconds, Qin Ruo successfully activated his double Defense Magic…

Cloaked by his Defense Magic, Qin Ruo started to accumulate his Mana. Slowly but surely, a few Frostramparts started to form around him as he paid extra attention to the surrounding combatants.

The combatant that stood closest to him was a warrior that had activated his ruby red Berserk skill.

He initially inched closer with his axe to Qin Ruo as he didn’t see any Barrier and Shield were formed around him.

Seeing Qin Ruo’s body suddenly being enveloped by Defense Magic, the Warrior then hastily moved towards another Bowmaster that was charging up his arrow.

This Berserker’s actions and reactions looked a lot like what a player would do.

As for that Bowmaster who was charging up his arrows, standing completely still… he was most likely an NPC…

“The Bowmaster has a higher chance to die and the Berserker seems to be a pushover.” Qin Ruo immediately concluded and then looked at the other two combatants thirty meters away.

One of them was an Elementalist while the other was a Warrior.

There was a black shadowy barrier encompassing the Elementalist; he carefully clenched a Magic Staff in his hand and scanned the surrounding areas. Then, he slowly moved towards the empty space where the Berserker previously stood.

As for the Warrior, he had been walking in circles while wielding his long sword… even though he hadn’t activated his Combat Aura, Qin Ruo felt a fleeting murderous scent on this Warrior. It felt as though he was a stalking wolf, preparing to ensnare and devour its prey at any time.

‘Is this Warrior a player? Or an NPC?’

Qin Ruo pondered.

Suddenly!

Something else attracted his attention.

Fifty meters away, there was another Elementalist who like Qin Ruo, had activated his Defense Magic. He was also slowly forming Aquaramparts around him… and with great speed too. It seemed that he too had the same idea as Qin Ruo—he wanted to use Frostbursts to clear out the enemies!

Yet, this kid was somewhat unlucky…

Whoosh!

As he was forming his fourth Aquarampart, a Warrior suddenly spread a pair of black darkened wings from his back and zoomed towards the Aquamancer!

It was then the system message announced.

The Last Man Standing Contest has now commenced!