“So that’s how it is…” After quickly scanning the effects of these four skills, Hua Jian thought, “With this combat power… it wasn’t for nothing that I turned into such an ugly thing.”

“Ahem… Lady Hua Jian,” At this moment, seeing Hua Jian’s transformation, Ukyo Tachibana asked with a puzzled look, “You are…”

“What’s there to make such a fuss about?” Before Hua Jian could answer, Heitetsu Jinjie, at the other end of the alley, spoke first, “It’s just a transformation ability, in this heterospace… have you seen too few of them?”

Hearing this, Ukyo Tachibana thought: What he said made sense; it was just a change of appearance and an increase in strength. There were plenty of people who could use such tricks. Lady Hua Jian was incredibly powerful; it wasn’t strange that she had this ability.

Therefore, the two swordsmen said nothing more about it and continued to focus their minds and immerse themselves in the battle.

And Hua Jian… also began to take action.

“Hmm… as expected, I still have to take care of Xiao Tan first…” After a moment’s thought, she decided to attack Wang Tanzhi first.

This was not an act of impulse (she didn’t have any objections to Xiao Tan’s attempt to assassinate her), nor was it to take advantage of her own people (thinking Xiao Tan was easy to bully), but a calm judgment based on the actual situation.

First of all, Hua Jian knew Xiao Tan’s strength relatively well. She knew roughly what skills and equipment he had and what kind of responses he might make. This was an advantage in terms of information.

Secondly, Xiao Tan was very fast. If he tried to escape with all his might, probably no one here could stop him. If Hua Jian were to eliminate Qisha first, Xiao Tan would most likely retreat, which would mean she would miss this opportunity to kill Xiao Tan.

Thirdly, in terms of overall combat strength, Qisha’s defensive ability was obviously stronger. To put it more bluntly… he was harder to kill.

In summary, Hua Jian’s choice was undoubtedly reasonable and correct.

Chi chi chi chi…

As the saying goes, no sooner said than done! With a burst of air-splitting sound, the "rock golem" that Hua Jian had transformed into, floating in mid-air, suddenly accelerated, flying close to the ground towards Xiao Tan's location.

【岩切】(rock_polish), polish the body, reduce air resistance, and quickly increase one's own speed.

“So fast!” Seeing the rock golem coming towards him like a giant cannonball, Xiao Tan was immediately shocked.

At this moment, Heitetsu Jinjie had already ambushed to his side, and the other two sides were dead ends against the walls. Retreating… only left the option of going "up." But… in front of the "Thousand Man Slayer," jumping high or using a move like [Heaven and Earth Reverse Divine Art], which goes straight up and down, had a very high probability of being seen through and killed… Anyone familiar with fighting games understood that when facing a master, it’s best to "jump" as little as possible, because many times, when you jump up and then fall down, half your health bar is gone…

“Tch…” Xiao Tan spat and, with no other choice, faced the rock golem and used the [Demon Bat Ghost Shadow], which he had intended to save for self-preservation; in the blink of an eye, Wang Tanzhi turned into two, dividing into two afterimages, bypassing both sides of the opponent and flashing behind the rock golem.

Bang!

Immediately afterward, a gunshot came from behind Hua Jian.

It turned out that while using his dodging skills, Xiao Tan had already thought of a counterattack in his mind… the moment he arrived behind his opponent, the [Winchester Shotgun] was ready to fire.

Unexpectedly… the shotgun pellets only left a few shallow black spots on the rock golem’s stone shell, without even cracking it.

“Hmph… you should give up on this level of attack early.” Hua Jian smiled slightly. “To be honest, this gun… only made me lose 2% of my Survival Value. Even ignoring the ammunition, reloading speed, and my healing ability… do you think you can create fifty opportunities to fire this up close?”

“Sister Qin… your goading is useless.” Xiao Tan wasn’t stupid and immediately saw through that the other party was trying to provoke him. “You’re trying to trick me into using the [Special Beam Cannon], aren’t you…” He paused for a moment. “There must be some kind of conspiracy…”

Indeed, Hua Jian’s purpose was to induce Xiao Tan to use the devastating [Special Beam Cannon]… This way, she could use another skill in her current state—[Magic Coat]—to instantly kill Xiao Tan.

“Heh… quite smart.” After being exposed, Hua Jian wasn’t angry. “I originally wanted to use a trick to solve you, so I could reveal less information to that guy over there…” She glanced at Qisha in the distance. “Now it seems… I can’t.”

While the two were talking, Hua Jian’s mind raced, and she used another trick.

【魔术空间】(magic_room), creates a special space within a certain area. While the magic room exists, all players’ equipment within the space will be temporarily disabled.

Whoosh—

As soon as the skill was released, an orange, invisible force field instantly bloomed, centered on the rock golem, engulfing the area within a hundred meters.

For the two NPCs, this skill was useless, and for Hua Jian in her current state, it had no meaning. But… Xiao Tan and Qisha were out of luck… The moment their equipment lost its effect, they were shocked to feel their bodies become heavy… This was undoubtedly a sign that their physical abilities had declined.

“Take this!” Hua Jian didn’t give Xiao Tan any room to breathe. After releasing the magic room, she charged up again and used her fourth skill.

【精神切割】(psycho_Cut), cuts the opponent with a materialized psychic blade, with a high probability of triggering a "critical hit."

In an instant, layers of crimson psychic blades wrapped around the rock golem. Streams of thorn-shaped blade light swept out in all directions, and coupled with the huge collision volume of the rock golem itself, forced Xiao Tan, whose speed had been reduced, to retreat in a panic.

“Damn it…” In that split second, Xiao Tan thought, “It’s huge, has terrifying defense, and is so fast… Whether I’m cut by the blades around it or hit directly by it, I’ll be seriously injured.” He tapped his toes quickly, leaning backward, like a dragonfly skimming the water, leaping backward repeatedly. "Using a skill to block it… I'm afraid only the A-level [Bone Scraper Knife Technique] can contend with the opponent's offensive, but this skill is ‘ineffective against targets that are too large,’ and there's simply no 'meat' to scrape on this rock golem. Even if its size were suitable, the skill probably wouldn't be able to exert its full power…"

Thinking of this, he had already quickly retreated more than ten meters. At this time, Heitetsu Jinjie was still flanking him on his side, preventing him from detouring; and not far behind Xiao Tan, was the battle circle of Qisha and Ukyo Tachibana. Continuing to retreat… would cause him to crash into Qisha’s back.

On the other hand, Qisha was also suffering unspeakably at this moment. In the few seconds after the [Magic Room] was activated, Qisha didn’t understand exactly what its effect was. His first reaction was—“This is probably a skill that reduces my physical abilities.” This wrong judgment… quickly made him pay a bloody price.

Because the gauntlets on his hands suddenly lost their original attributes, Qisha’s hands were bleeding and he was retreating steadily in the next few rounds of engagement, as Ukyo Tachibana hacked at him. Only then did he come back to his senses… It turned out that the effect of this orange domain was to invalidate the equipment on his body.

Just as Qisha was starting to consider how to escape this very unfavorable domain for him, Wang Tanzhi’s back came barreling over at high speed.

At this moment, both of them had nowhere to retreat. Not only were they facing enemies on both sides, but the opponent they were back-to-back with was also an untrustworthy opponent.

Thus, the two who were trapped in a desperate situation… used their ultimate means at the same time.

“Dance of Death!”

“Fierce Star Blaze!”

Xiao Tan, who had activated his Title Ability… disappeared from the line of sight of the other four.

And Qisha, who had used his Soul Intent, suddenly manifested a white, fierce flame all over his body, causing the surrounding temperature to skyrocket, forcing Ukyo Tachibana to stay away.

“This kid…” Two seconds later, Heitetsu Jinjie shifted his gaze upward, looking at the sky, “What is he going to do…”

After all, he was a swordsman known as "Unparalleled Under Heaven." Even though Xiao Tan's speed had momentarily surpassed his dynamic vision, he could still judge the direction of his movement based on the opponent's last action before he "disappeared."

“Flying into the sky at super speed, is he trying to run away…” Heitetsu's mind flashed, predicting the enemy’s intentions, “No… judging from the shifting momentum of his knees and shoulders, he’s trying to use something…”

His inference was correct. Xiao Tan, who had obtained "Dark Speed Force," was no longer worried about being cut down after jumping high. Therefore, Xiao Tan decisively used a combo of [Heaven and Earth Reverse Divine Art] plus [Terrifying Shadow Soul Chaser]. With his current speed, the damage this strike dealt to a single target would definitely not be inferior to Brother Jue's [Spirit Gun].

“It’s over!” Just as Xiao Tan’s killing move was about to descend, Qisha also twisted his body and unleashed his strike with a roar.

He abandoned Ukyo Tachibana in front of him and instead used his ultimate move against Hua Jian, who was rushing from behind. Although there were no equipment attribute bonuses, the power of an S-level skill was there, coupled with the power of Soul Intent… Qisha’s [No Style] could be said to be a sure hit.

In an instant, the battle situation reversed.

The two fighting-specialized players, who had been pushed to their limits, each used their trump cards, launching attacks from above and in front of Hua Jian, respectively.

Not to mention the rock golem, even a script Boss (of course, here it refers to those general script Bosses that need to be killed, and the three monsters in this script are not among them) would probably be in dire straits if hit by these two moves at the same time.

“Heh… very well.” But Hua Jian smiled again.

Boom—

A moment later, dark shadows fell rapidly from the sky, and white flames exploded on the ground.

The effect of the [Magic Room] also dissipated with the sudden sound of explosions.

However…

The system announcement declaring Hua Jian’s death was delayed.

After the collision of darkness and light, in the dust that dissipated, what finally appeared… were Wang Tanzhi and Qisha, who were both wounded, and… a pile of broken rocks.

The result of this move was—the fused rock golem was shattered, but before it collapsed, the effect of [Magic Coat] had rebounded part of the power of Xiao Tan and Qisha's two moves.

“Heh… as expected…” Xiao Tan, kneeling on one knee and panting, gave a wry smile, “Presumably… long before we targeted you… you had already used ‘that,’ right?”

“Hey… what are you talking about?” At this time, Qisha was lying on the ground, unable to even sit up, so he simply started chatting with Xiao Tan.

“He’s not talking to you.” The next second, Hua Jian’s voice came from not far away.

Xiao Tan and Qisha turned their heads upon hearing this, only to see… Hua Jian had returned to her original human appearance, standing a few meters away, looking completely unharmed.

“That’s right, I used ‘that’ a long time ago (because Qisha, an outsider, was present, they didn’t say it very clearly).” Hua Jian looked at Xiao Tan, then continued, “As soon as I entered the script, I used it on myself.” She shrugged her shoulders. “In other words… to kill me, ‘once’ is not enough.” She sighed. “Of course, I still have to praise you two. In my original plan, I didn’t plan to die even once. Unfortunately… I was still killed once by you. Alas… Next, when dealing with Bu Jue and Sister Yu, I’ll probably be treading on thin ice…”

“Hahaha…” Qisha shook his head and laughed, “You guys from the Inferno Front… are all more terrifying than the last…” He took a long breath. “If possible… I really don’t want to meet you in the competition.”

“Rest assured…” Xiao Tan also sat down on the ground, “I don’t want to meet you either…”

At this point, the two of them could be considered to have admitted defeat. Neither of them had the idea of ​​“downing a bottle of Survival Value Supplement and fighting another hundred rounds,” because at the moment their moves were exhausted, Heitetsu Jinjie and Ukyo Tachibana’s sword intent had already enveloped them. As long as they had even the slightest thought of resistance, the two of them would definitely notice it and strangle it with a sword.

“You’re an exception, Wang Tanzhi.” Qisha continued, “You’re a pretty honest person. I’m looking forward to… being able to fight you one-on-one, fairly, next time.”

“Keep dreaming…” Xiao Tan squinted his eyes and said, “I’m still looking forward to developing a cure for cancer.”

As they were saying this, Hua Jian on the other side had very efficiently taken out a handgun from her knapsack, pulled back the safety, and aimed it at them…