This included even the thief who had launched the initial sneak attack.
Just as he stunned the priest in front of him and, taking advantage of the opponent’s temporary inability to resist, prepared to turn his sharp blade to first reduce this team by one crucial healing profession, he suddenly felt a sharp gust of wind coming from behind.
The attack was so fast that he couldn’t react at all, and a familiar stun effect appeared above his head.
The skill he had always used to great effect was now used on him—whether that counted as karma or not.
There’s a thief!
The stunned thief was greatly shocked, but the shocking part wasn’t why another thief had suddenly appeared, and seemingly on the opposing side.
Rather, it was how the other had approached so close without him noticing at all.
He considered himself not outstanding in the guild, but still a skilled expert, yet he had been approached by another thief player without realizing it—this was simply a humiliation.
Even the top thief experts in the guild couldn’t achieve such superb stealth techniques.
But the thief was only shocked, not particularly tense, because his other two teammates were right beside him; he believed he wouldn’t be in any danger.
Not just him thinking that—the other two teammates felt the same; after the initial daze upon seeing their companion attacked, they immediately reacted, instantly abandoning their targets in front and turning to jointly attack the suddenly appeared enemy.
In the three’s estimation, this person would definitely stop and restealth; after all, facing simultaneous attacks from two thieves, even a plate armor profession couldn’t take it, let alone a fellow fragile thief.
However, the next situation made their eyes widen.
Backstab, Gouge, Bone Pick, Strangle.
Counting the initial stun damage, in just five strikes, that thief’s health plummeted to zero like flowing water.
Such high damage, such fluid movements.
Including the killed thief, everyone who noticed this scene had their mouths agape.
One must know that thief skills all had startup animations; using five skills would take at least seven or eight seconds.
Yet the opponent’s combo had no pause at all, smoothly outputting everything in two seconds—it didn’t look like five skills but rather one skill straight through.
Even Yi Li Qingqiu forgot her original purpose, stunned in place, but what shocked her even more—or rather, what drew her attention back—was the immediately following situation.
System: Player [Satahia] requests to join your team. Accept?
That thief was one of them? And there’s another person?
Yi Li Qingqiu didn’t hesitate to choose accept, her gaze following the team member marker that appeared after joining, noticing the girl hidden in a corner of the forest, chanting magic.
Cross Flame Wall.
Two suddenly appearing walls burning with flames horizontally divided the battlefield.
While Yi Li Qingqiu’s team felt puzzled, the next second they completely understood the meaning of this magic.
In stealth, Modao and the others rapidly approaching head-on collided right into this oncoming flame barrier; the burning effect immediately broke the stealth of most of them completely, turning them into live targets.
“Everyone, deal with these guys first.”
Yi Li Qingqiu’s voice brought them back to their senses, and they unhesitatingly unleashed their strongest outputs; countless magics and attacks assaulted the other side.
Having lost the initiative for ambush, the thieves’ fragile bodies’ weakness was fully exposed under such intense output—with just one round of firepower, the twenty-one thieves were reduced to only eight fleeing in disarray.
Modao was no exception, even activating his life-saving skill to escape from the opposing output.
Without succeeding, most of his brothers had died; this made the usually calm Modao unable to help but feel a surge of hostility, casting a predatory gaze viciously toward the direction of that fire mage.
But just as he prepared to have his brothers join him in first slaughtering this meddlesome guy to vent, a sudden scream instantly dispelled that notion—
Not far away, a brother who had barely escaped was hit by a surging fierce flame; the health he had barely recovered to 80% with an instant recovery potion was instantly cleared.
“Run, quick, this person’s magic damage is high!”
Modao’s eyes widened, almost roaring at the side, immediately activating stealth and rapidly retreating toward the forest behind.
Just one magic’s damage had insta-killed a thief with over half health remaining—this person was simply a monster.
Right now, he had no thoughts of revenge; all he had was to find that guild who provided the intel and settle the score properly—with such a major intel error, he had to bite a chunk out of them.
Seeing Modao and the others so disheveled, Yi Li Qingqiu covered her mouth and chuckled lightly, but suddenly thinking of something, just as she prepared to help that suddenly appeared thief, she discovered the other had already killed the remaining two, their figure still vanishing from sight.
Yi Li Qingqiu was stunned, turning her head to see that the fire mage had also disappeared into the forest, accompanied by a system prompt of leaving the team.
The team on the other side also quickly dealt with the lured monsters, conveniently cooperating to finish off the Marsh Frog King’s remaining health, but they weren’t so concerned about its dropped items, instead crowding around Yi Li Qingqiu asking questions left and right.
Even though they had focused their main force on clearing monsters and holding the BOSS earlier, they were still very attentive to the battlefield situation.
Though it seemed full of twists and turns, from Modao suddenly launching the attack, to someone appearing to help, and then that group of thieves fleeing in disarray, it was all just in a short one or two minutes—truly ever-changing.
Among them, the thief’s agile movements and the mage’s absurd magic damage naturally drew their attention—or rather, it was hard not to.
Faced with the team members’ continuous questions, Yi Li Qingqiu very directly spread her hands, using an innocent expression to indicate she knew nothing.
“Why did those two help us?”
“Maybe we ran into good Samaritans.”
An Tong… Could it be that little sister?
“Then why leave without even saying hello?”
“I said they’re good people; of course, they do good deeds without leaving a name.”
Thus, the entire team’s curiosity was immediately blocked clean by that smiling face.
“Stop gossiping; Song Song, pick up the items. We’re changing spots to level; otherwise, that uncle will come knocking again.”
Yi Li Qingqiu smiled and clapped her hands, arranging in the team.
“Forget about what just happened for now.”
But while she said that orally, she secretly contacted the intel personnel in the guild, instructing them to keep an eye on two names.
“Be as gentle as possible when investigating; don’t attract too much attention to avoid suspicion of ulterior motives, but still be thorough where needed.” Yi Li Qingqiu paused. “Especially that thief.”
If it were other guilds, they might focus more on that mage with ultra-high magic damage, but Yi Li Qingqiu was different.
Even if the petite figure could be explained as natural, it couldn’t escape her manual radar—clearly, that thief using a cloak to conceal their form was a cute loli.
But what truly made her very concerned was another aspect.
An Tong…
Thinking of a certain little one she had met once and who had ghosted her for so long, Yi Li Qingqiu’s eyes flickered with a different light.
Those who knew her well knew this was the sign of the little devil smiling beneath the gentle neighbor big sister exterior.
Meanwhile, on the other side, I continued advancing toward the original direction with Satahia, but Satahia was still somewhat puzzled.
“Why did Your Majesty the Demon King help those people? Clearly, at first, you weren’t planning to meddle.”
“There’s someone I know inside.”
Satahia was right; if I hadn’t recognized the girl leading that team as the sister who brought me home that day at the supermarket, I absolutely wouldn’t have meddled.
But no choice—since I recognized her, and she had helped me, smoothing it out in passing was no problem.
After all, under Satahia’s ultra-high perception, all the thieves’ stealth was almost like bright dots on radar, hard not to notice, and since these people had attacked first and were already red-named, dealing with them had no other issues.
The reason I had Satahia join the opposing team first was fearing her high fire damage might cause friendly fire.
“Which one?” But clearly, while Satahia had extremely high attributes, her intelligence was somewhat lacking.
“That arcane mage.”
Looking at the still bewildered Satahia, I curled my lip and chose a rather special way to answer.
“C+.”
“Oh, the leader…” Satahia immediately screened out the key target from her mind. “By the way, why didn’t Your Majesty the Demon King greet them?”
Indeed, for some people, feature-based identification was the most suitable.
I thought silently, and facing her question, I gave a straightforward answer.
“Too troublesome.”
Yes, appearing like this would probably lead to another lively scene of onlookers pinching faces and patting heads—not narcissism, but I had a deep understanding of modern girls’ overflowing maternal instincts.
Moreover, my relationship with that sister wasn’t particularly deep, and being asked why I hadn’t contacted would be awkward, right?
Perhaps also because of what Xinghe Haohan said earlier, better to stay away from his cousin or something.
So, after resolving the trouble there, I didn’t choose to stay and directly left with Satahia, thus avoiding the issue of contact with the other side.
Even if noticed, it would probably just be that guy Satahia—after all, a fire wall nearly burning half health, one skill insta-killing thieves, and so on, was very impactful.
However, I wouldn’t think that in this world, there were still quite a few loli fans.
But anyway, after crossing the forest, we finally arrived at the entrance of the Mihri Ruins.