His body had acted before he could rationalize the action.

"So you're The Dawn, huh..." Chie looked Li Ming up and down, "Its a pleasure to meet you!"

"Well this is a surprise! I guess we have one more match to go here! Why don't you come on over and set up your equipment here, we'll just have a quick match." Exiged said ecstatically.

"Alright." Li Ming answered stiffly, picking up his gear.

Li Ming took the stairs to the stage, feeling the eyes of everyone on him. Everyone in the room wanted to watch a match between the man who revived the Swordmage cla.s.s go toe to toe with the Gunner who won 18 matches in a row. He set up his gear and booted up his game.

***

*Whoooooooosh*

A howling gust blew past the peaks of a broken down cityscape as the two players sp.a.w.ned inside a desolate plaza. An owl hooted from above, peering down at the two new arrivals. The players we of course, The Dawn and MeiChie. Li Ming was using the same setup as his previous Swordmage build.

MeiChie, on the other hand, shrouded her clothes in a purple cloak; beneath it, the blocky silhouette of her techwear-like clothes was revealed as the wind fluttered through her cloak from time to time. She drew out her rifle, which she would be using in this match. The rifle looked like a metallic WA2000.

She loaded her rifle as 2 flying crystals hovered behind her shoulders, threatening to shoot at any time. Those crystals were magic trinkets. There were probably 2 more magic trinkets with a hovering ability, keeping those trinkets in the air.

This left Li Ming 6 more trinkets to worry about.

The countdown started to signal the start of the match.

"5..."

Li Ming readied his spear and his firelance and wind arrow volley trinkets.

"4..."

MeiChie aimed her rifle towards Li Ming.

"3..."

The spectating crowd tensed up in antic.i.p.ation.

"2..."

Li Ming glanced at her gun barrel, trying to see exactly where she was aiming at.

"1..."

Li Ming realized that he couldn't see where she was aiming at, as she was too far...

With the flutter of the owls wings signaling its departure, MeiChie's first shot echoed throughout the plaza.

"Kuhh..." Being unable to read where the shot would target, Li Ming chose to dodge to the side. Unfortunately, MeiChie had landed the first shot on him, immediately dropping his starting health percentage down to 95%.

To make matters worse, the two floating trinkets were also equipped with "Tracer Shots", which would follow a gunner's shots to it's target, dealing very little damage, but making the target bleed out. This would lead to Li Ming dropping down to 89%, but because those were trinkets instead of an actual ability, the "Tracer Shots" would only bring him down to 93%.

However, this wasn't the worse news. MeiChie had disappeared! She seemed like she was also using the skill "On the Hunt" like him. He couldn't believe it! She had used a similar strategy to him, where he would deal the initial hit, and then depend on his trinkets for follow up hits! Right now, she had taken the lead, and he didn't even have the ability to counter attack!

*BOOM*

Another shot rang out, quite far away from Li Ming. Thankfully, He had dashed away just in time to have the bullet barely pa.s.s by him. Despite it barely sc.r.a.ping by his armor, it had still managed to drop his health down to 92%, with the bleed effect from the two "Tracer Shots", threatening to drop him down to 90%.

However, as she fired another shot, Li Ming caught a short glimpse at what MeiChie was doing. She was das.h.i.+ng back as she was shooting! All players who played Legends Rise knew that moving increases the chance that your ranged attacks would miss. That was the reason why not many players would even bother attempting to do what MeiChie had done just now.

It was a miracle that the second shot hadn't hit Li Ming dead on. He was partially thankful that he was able to somewhat predict the shot 's timing to dodge in time.

'This can't continue...' Li Ming thought, 'I'll just become a block of swiss cheese at this rate!'

Resolutely, Li Ming activated his 'Concussive Flare" and tossed it upwards. The concussive flare was an area of effect ability. Although the ability's effectiveness would be diminished over greater distance from the origin of the explosion, Li Ming wouldn't need to aim the flare anywhere, as it would affect all enemies caught in its range. Li Ming was also immune to the effects of the flare, making it a useful disruption tool.

The flash of light also cast a shadow against solid objects, so it would also slightly reveal where a player would be for a millisecond even if they were stealthed. This ability would give Li Ming the time he would need to close the distance between the two. Despite being blinded by the "Concussive Flare", MeiChie was try her best to dash backwards away from Li Ming.

In an instant, Li Ming charged forwards, closing the gap to where he believed MeiChie to be. He stabbed his spear forwards, activating "Ghost Strike" in the process. Li Ming was betting on his own prediction here. He only had a brief moment of when the flare went off to see the shadow of where MeiChie could possibly be. He had spotted her das.h.i.+ng backwards, so he needed to calculate where she would be at this moment to stab at.

Li Ming felt the familiar feeling of his spear hitting a target. He knew that his invisibility activated here because of "Ghost Strike"'s effects, and now he would have the chance to play the hunter in this constantly evolving cat and mouse chase. He immediately followed up while he was in melee range with her. He swung out his spear, throwing out a "Firelance" before his spear would hit, and followed that with a "Wind Arrow Volley".

The "Firelance" crashed and exploded onto MeiChie, followed by the slash of a spear, and the piercing "Wind Arrow Volley". This alternating of spell damage and physical damage had activated "High Tempo", increasing his damage to a higher level.

MeiChie saw her health drop down to 88%. She grimaced as she watched Li Ming slip back into stealth. Unhappy with this sudden turn of events, she pulled out her own trinket and threw it out. The trinket flashed red as it flew outwards, across the plaza.

Li Ming, while in stealth, saw this trinket fly out away from MeiChie. Unfortunately for her, he had already circled around behind her to continue his a.s.sault. All of a sudden, MeiChie's cloak glowed purple.

A burst of waves were shot out behind her! Li Ming, who was already stabbing forwards with his spear, didn't have the time to counter this action. He was. .h.i.t with the entire burst of five waves, dropping him down to 80% health. This cloak's ability had dealt a whole 10% of damage to him, and had put MeiChie back into stealth.

Frustrated, Li Ming stabbed his spear forwards once again, only this time, his spear punctured nothing but empty air. Suddenly, a brilliant flash of red light appeared across the plaza. Turning his head, Li Ming saw MeiChie taking aim at him yet again. However, this time, her rifle was glowing white.

Li Ming could only brace himself for another impact.