On the 56th floor of the main street, Pani, the strategy meeting has already split into two opposing camps.
When Lin Yuan pushed open the door, Asuna was pointing at the NPC village on the map, while Kirito was standing on the other side of the long table. The former advocated luring the area boss blocking the road into the village and using the guards and residents to disperse the attack; the latter refused to use those talking and living NPCs as bait.
"The player's life is more important than the program," Asuna said.
"After living here for a year and a half, do you still think they're just background characters repeating lines?" Kirito retorted.
The surrounding players had different perspectives. Some just wanted to clear the path as quickly as possible, while others couldn't accept bringing monsters into the village themselves.
Diabel saw Lin Yuan and asked in a low voice, "Which side do you support?"
"Neither side supports it." Lin Yuan glanced at the reconnaissance map. "You haven't verified how the Boss selects targets after leaving its original area, or whether NPCs reappear after death."
Asuna frowned. "Every new tactic has unknown aspects."
Therefore, the person who decides to use it should bear the consequences.
Lin Yuan didn't continue the argument. No one in the meeting was under attack, and the raiding team had no shortage of people capable of making choices. He noted down the Boss's known charge moves and turned to leave the hall.
The argument behind him didn't stop just because he had come.
Lin Yuan left Pani and, instead of staying nearby to wait for the meeting's outcome, entered the wasteland along the north path. He had come to the fifty-sixth floor not just for a regional boss.
Deep in the wasteland dwells an ape-like monster with arms covered in bone armor. They do not use weapons, but before pouncing, they lower their shoulders, concentrate all their weight on their forelegs, and then suddenly accelerate in a posture almost touching the ground.
This way of unleashing power is more interesting to watch than the regional boss.
When the first Bone Armor Ape pounced from behind the cliff, Lin Yuan did not immediately draw his sword. He dodged the descending long arm, his gaze fixed on the monster's waist and back. The Bone Armor Ape landed, turned, and kicked off the sand with its right foot, its second charge clearly faster than the first.
Lin Yuan took half a step back.
Claws grazed his clothes. In the same instant, he lowered his center of gravity, mimicking the monster's leg-waist-leg motion as it pushed off the ground, and his body suddenly pressed close to the Bone Armor Ape's chest.
The sword remained unsheathed.
The leather-covered scabbard struck the monster's jaw, lifting it off the ground.
After landing, the Bone Armor Ape had only a small amount of health left. It roared and pounced again. Only then did Lin Yuan draw his sword, the blade passing cleanly through the seam between the two layers of bone armor and piercing into the core.
The monster shattered into blue light, leaving no experience points and dropping no items.
Lin Yuan repeated the starting motion from before. The sudden acceleration that the monster achieved with the system's assistance was broken down by him into a process of exerting force sequentially through the feet, knees, waist, back, and shoulders. The first time he imitated it, there was a noticeable pause, but by the third time, the pause had disappeared.
Three more Bone Armor Ape followed the sound and surrounded them.
Lin Yuan took the initiative to go to him.
He didn't simply copy the monster's crouching posture, but instead incorporated that step into his own swordsmanship. His feet exploded, shortening the distance needed to draw his sword. Before the longsword was even fully drawn, a diagonal cut appeared on the monster's chest.
The second one swung its arm from the side. Lin Yuan spun around to dodge, using the momentum of his turn to slash upwards with his sword. The last one tried to jump backward, but he shattered the ground and chased after it into the gap, the tip of his sword piercing its throat before the monster could leap.
Three clusters of blue light dispersed one after another.
Just as Lin Yuan was about to sheathe his sword, he felt a slight, unexpected vibration in his wrist.
He held his longsword horizontally. There were no cracks on the surface of the blade, but the edge was no longer as straight as when it was first forged. If a player were to check, the system would still show that the durability was within a safe range; but for Lin Yuan, who did not rely on the equipment window, that slight bend was already quite noticeable.
The sword is deformed.
When Nezha forged it, he used the sturdiest materials available at the time. Even if an ordinary player has a higher strength attribute, the impact generated by swinging the sword will be corrected by the system. However, Lin Yuan's strength is directly applied to the sword. The system can restore the part that is judged as durability loss, but it cannot eliminate the deformation left by each real collision.
If you keep using it at full power, it will eventually break.
Lin Yuan ran his thumb along the spine of the sword, making a mental note of it. He didn't immediately return to town. The sword wasn't broken yet, and there were still monsters worth observing.
Suddenly, hushed conversations drifted from afar.
The two leveling teams stood on the rocky slope, not approaching. Clearly, they had already witnessed the brief battle that had just taken place.
"Is it really him?" a player with a shield asked.
"I was there during the first boss fight." The person next to Lin Yuan stared at the empty space above his head. "No name, no health bar, and no sword skill light."
"He killed the second-floor boss all by himself?"
When the raid team arrived, he was the only one left in the boss's room.
Another player couldn't help but say, "We can't keep calling him 'the guy without the cursor' every time we mention him, can we?"
After a brief silence, someone said:
" The Nameless Swordsman."
This title quickly garnered several echoes. It wasn't derived from his attire like " The Black Swordsman," nor was it a title bestowed by the guild; it was simply a fact that everyone would notice when they first saw Lin Yuan.
Lin Yuan sheathed his slightly curved sword and walked between the two teams.
Someone mustered up the courage to ask, "Are you really called the Nameless Swordsman?"
"I have a name."
"So what's your name?"
Lin Yuan.
The player was taken aback, seemingly not expecting such a direct answer.