The duel

Li Wei froze for a second. Did that guy really just select him?

He looked at the finger pointing towards him in daze. The crowd quickly turned to look towards him. When Li Wei looked at Wang Hao, he saw a very innocent smile on his face but felt that something was wrong.

He did not know what to do. It was a very uncomfortable situation for him. Li Wei hated being the center of attention, but since the finger was pointing towards him, he prepared to stand up when suddenly:

"Of course! You dare challenge me! This great one will teach you a lesson!"

A voice suddenly sounded from behind Li Wei. It was The One Hero. He was seated just behind Li Wei and happened to be in line with Wang Hao's finger. He suddenly stood up and walked towards Wang Hao with large steps.

Wang Hao's face suddenly froze, "This... I was pointing towards this young man there," awkwardly said Wang Hao, with a weird expression as he once again pointed towards Li Wei.

"What? What is the difference between him and me? Are you scared of me ?!?" taunted The One Hero as he stopped in front of Wang Hao with an overbearing expression.

Wang Hao quickly recovered and bit his lips, "No no, it's just that it is better if it is a new recruit, right?"

"What are you talking about? I am already here! Let's exchange some pointers. Don't tell me the Wang Family just wants to bully a new recruit?!" exclaimed The One Hero while drawing his sword and grabbing his shield.

Whispers rose from the crowd. Wang Hao hesitantly looked behind him. Li Wei naturally observed Wang Hao and followed his line of sight. He saw that Wang Hao was looking at a young man seated close to Sun Rose and Bright Sun.

The young man was clearly not happy. An annoyed expression appeared on his face but quickly vanished. He glared at Wang Hao and made an almost imperceptible nod. Following that, the young man turned his eyes and met Li Wei's eyes.

The latter suddenly felt awkward. Why was that man looking at him like that? He did not do anything wrong, right?

This lasted for a few seconds, and then the young man looked back at Wang Hao pretending that nothing happened. The latter quickly drew his own weapons and agreed to fight The One Hero.

The players cheered upon hearing that and took a few steps back to give space for the duel. The two fighters were already standing at the end of the 'ring' in fighting stances.

Everyone's attention was on the two fighters. "Hey Seven. Wanna make a bet? Who do you think will win?" asked Silent Day, sitting next to Li Wei. Hearing her voice, Li Wei quickly recollected himself and looked at her.

"I don't know, I don't even know their techniques but just by looking, I think that Wang Hao looks stronger!" declared Li Wei, after carefully observing the two.

"Silent Day. Don't steal gold from him," quietly said Cai Wenji.

Silent Day silently chuckled but did not answer.

"Appearances can be deceiving. Even if The One Hero looks careless and arrogant, he does have the ability to behave like that. He is in our lead team for a reason. If he was not born in the branch family which provided him with limited support, he would be on par with the so-called geniuses," quietly commented Forge God.

Li Wei was surprised but he did not say anything and turned his attention to the ring. The fight had already started. The One Hero was constantly swinging his sword at Wang Hao but the latter was a strong warrior who also used a shield and a sword.

Wang Hao was on the defensive, blocking each sword strike, waiting for an opportunity to strike. He was well known in the Wang Family and the Fleeting Clouds Sect for his defensive fighting style.

"Cling Clang!" the two swords met each other for the first time as Wang Hao decided to parry with his sword and immediately after, he slammed his shield at The One Hero.

[Howl]

The latter immediately used his skill and pushed back the shield and followed up with [Cleave], "-19".

The timing was perfect such that Wang Hao had no time to react and could only take the damage. Fortunately, his heavy armor significantly reduced the damage.

Wang Hao got back into a fighting stance and rushed toward The One Hero. Wang Hao was already flushing red. He was the one that proposed the challenge and yet, he was the one losing.

The wind seemed to gather around Wang Hao, his entire body and his weapon were surrounded by a transparent light. The One Hero immediately felt threatened, but he did not back down. Instead, he used [Strengthen] and charged at Wang Hao head on.

But Wang Hao had other plans; he never wanted a direct clash. As the two were about to hit each other, Wang Hao suddenly stomped the ground and changed direction to the left. The One Hero could not change his momentum and could only continue forward.

When he was finally able to stop his charge, he turned to look at his opponent, but was only greeted by a [Blade Draw] on the chest, "-26". He endured the pain and raised his shield just in time to block a sword strike.

"You are quite good. Worthy of being my opponent," commented The One Hero as he pushed back the sword.

Wang Hao violently kicked The One Hero. "You should focus more on the fight! "

The One Hero quietly laughed and used the kick's momentum to take a few steps back.

Wang Hao was getting more and more frustrated; the longer the fight went on, the less respect he would get. The surrounding players would see him as a joke for challenging someone and only barely winning. He once again used his personal skill to make wind surround his body and charge at The One Hero; he needed to end this fight quickly.

"You want to end the fight already? That is not fun!" The One Hero got back into a fighting stance. "We should make it last longer, this way people will really see our strength! Isn't that the main goal of this duel?" righteously said The One Hero.

Although he looked careless, he was in fact very focused on the battle. Each one of his moves was calculated and allowed him to immediately react to Wang Hao's attack.

"Shut your mouth!" angrily shouted Wang Hao as he jumped in the air and violently swung his sword at The One Hero.

But the latter snorted and activated his own skill. And it was something Li Wei was familiar with: [Gliding Steps].

The One Hero did not even raise his feet. They seemed to float above the ground as if a small air cushion appeared between them and the ground. He easily avoided the sword strike and pushed on the ground to strike Wang Hao's neck.

"-28". The sword hit Wang Hao. The latter did not have time to process what just happened that he was immediately kicked from behind and another sword strike sent him flying.

Wang Hao ungracefully rolled on the ground and tried to stand up. He only had 29 HP left. Two more sword strikes and he would die.

But, The One Hero did not give him the opportunity to react. He stomped the ground and charged at Wang Hao. "Haha! This is what you get for challenging me!"

"You..." Wang Hao saw the sword slicing the air towards him. He was starting to feel really nervous. [Howl]. The skill immediately disrupted The One Hero's strike. And quickly after, Wang Hao followed up by slamming his shield towards The One Hero.

The latter saw his move but was not worried. Wang Hao's shield was met with The One Hero's own shield. The two pushed against each other in a contest of strength, but they both had similar strength stats and ended up in a deadlock.

Seeing that it was going nowhere, Wang Hao jumped back and once again used his personal skill. Surrounded with the wind, he charged at The One Hero. He was running out of mana and decided to bet everything on this last exchange.

Wang Hao was dangerously approaching. The One Hero carelessly let out a smug smile. He raised his shield in such a way that his sword would not be seen my Wang Hao. But the rest of the players could clearly see his sword starting to glow.

Wang Hao had no idea what The One Hero was preparing. He thought that he was just waiting for his strike. When Wang Hao got into range, he violently swung his sword at The One Hero using [Cleave].

However, his sword did not even reach the shield, he only saw a bright ray of light appear from behind the shield as it was moved to the left. The bright ray of light pierced through Wang Hao's sword, sending it flying but it did not stop there, the ray of light continued straight and pierced through Wang Hao's armor and came out on the other side of his body.

"-45"

The ray of light was naturally The One Hero's sword. It was shining emitting a bright yellow light, even as it was still embedded in Wang Hao's body.

All the players were dazed, they never expected The One Hero to have such a finishing move. Everyone thought that he would lose but he unexpectedly still had a trump card.

Wang Hao was even more surprised. He was confident that his technique would deal the finishing blow and yet, his sword was sent flying before he could even hit The One Hero.

"I lost? What happened?" thought Wang Hao.

Time seemed to freeze for a second but then the silence was broken:

"What? Why are you not dead yet? You better raise your shield quickly!" shouted The One Hero as he pulled back his sword with annoyance.

"Ok! That's enough! We have a winner. Even though you went way too far!" shouted Wang Chong as he stood up from the audience. His face was completely black. His tone seemed to be controlled to be as expressionless as possible.

Li Wei turned his attention towards Wang Chong and he saw a few meters away from him, several priests still had their staff up. It was obvious that they all used [Heal] very recently.

"Tsssk! Damn… Ruining the fun…" The One Hero grumbled and walked back to his seat, not even looking at the defeated Wang Hao.

"That was too much. We are still a guild. Killing each other would only be detrimental to us. I understand that you got carried away in the middle of the fight, but I hope that this situation will not repeat itself," continued Wang Chong.

"You were trying to kill me?" suddenly shouted Wang Hao, he seemed to suddenly realize the situation he was in. "How dare you!? It was a friendly competition, I was obviously going easy on you! How could you be so vicious?" angrily exclaimed Wang Hao as he pointed his finger at The One Hero. He was just trying to regain his self-esteem but was immediately interrupted.

"Wang Hao. That's enough! Come back," said Wang Chong, not even sparing a glance at his cousin.

"I..." Wang Hao wanted to continue but he did not dare to disobey Wang Chong. He glared at The One Hero as he grinded his teeth before returning to his seat.

"Everyone! Let's go back to farming. We shall hold this type of competition at the Colosseum. There, we won't face unnecessary deaths. We shall go back to the dungeon in 10 minutes," said Wang Chong, dismissing the matter. He did not wait for the players' reaction and left with his party.

The audience who was still dazed did not know how to react. They quietly looked at the two fighters. They clearly knew that the one having the most authority was Wang Chong, but his side was defeated. It was an embarrassing situation and the crowd did not dare to applaud The One Hero's victory.

Amidst the crowd, Sun Rose suddenly grabbed Bright Sun's hand, "Sister Cai Die! Was that 'Explosive Sun'!? How can a member of your branch family have that technique?" quietly murmured Sun Rose.

"Yes. It is that technique. My father spent countless efforts and resources to obtain that technique from the main family. It is the only way we can help him develop if he only uses our branch family's technique, it would be a waste of talent," calmly answered Bright Sun.

"Your family really have a lot of secrets, right? "

"Yours have even more!" jokingly answered Bright Sun.

"Isn't it weird? I thought the Wang Family would make a ruckus since The One Hero almost killed one of their members but yet, they simply retreated. It's as if they are trying to cover the duel… They might make things difficult for you."

"It's true. They usually value their reputation above everything else… Never mind that, the less we see them the better!" answered Sun Rose on the side.

"Mmm"

...

The One Hero got back. He did not say anything and silently sat back behind Li Wei. He completely ignored Wang Chong and the others, acting like a proud victorious warrior returning from war. Everyone's eyes were still pointed at him, but he maintained that poker face until people lost interest in him.

And as soon as the players restarted chatting among themselves, he finally spoke: "Huh! Did you guys see how I beat the crap out of this guy? He was so weak... Trying to challenge me!"

"Ok ok, you can stop bragging, he is not even the strongest of the Wang Family," calmly said Cai Wenji to stop him from bragging. Although he seemed calm, he was inwardly excited, for a member of the branch family to defeat someone from a main family, it was definitely a huge feat.

"Seven. Silent Day. What do you think of the fight? Not bad huh? Do you want to compared notes?" continued The One Hero as he turned his attention towards the other warriors of the party.

"Nothing worth mentioning. You could have played it safe and dodged his attacks. It would have been more impressive if you ended up with full health," analyzed Silent Day.

"But that is no fun, I can only look cool if I do fancy moves! I should have comboed him to death!"

Silent Day just rolled her eyes, not answering despite the pestering of The One Hero. As for Li Wei, he did not dare say anything or The One Hero might pester him instead. But he was very impressed. The One Hero was definitely more skilled than he looked, especially that last move. It was something Li Wei could only envy.