Chapter 4414 — The Plan for Self-Preservation

"Brother Ling, this is something only you can handle. You must do me this favor," Qi Wenmo said, turning to Wei Zhao for help.

"Well... all right then." Wei Zhao was briefly taken aback, but he did not decline; he agreed on the spot, readily and without hesitation.

True, he was not as deeply rooted in the escort agency as Steward Song, but by virtue of his standing and strength—and above all his various exploits—the entire agency regarded him with no small awe. Simply overseeing a single bout should not prove too difficult.

Besides, Wei Zhao was rather interested in the matter himself. He was used to fighting and dueling in person, but he had never tried his hand at being a coach on the spot; today was the perfect chance to indulge the urge.

Qi Wenmo would hold the fort in the escort-defense battle, while Wei Zhao would take four Golden Core escorts to the Yongxing Escort Agency's ground, to raid their escort and storm their arena.

By now, the four escorts on the Yongxing side had already taken the field, every one of them braced as if facing a mortal foe.

Just as Wei Zhao had said to Qi Wenmo earlier, the Qingtian Escort Agency was, after all, one of the five great agencies, its fame known far and wide. The four from Yongxing had readied themselves to fight to the death before stepping up, yet at a moment like this they could not help but feel tense—and oddly enough, it was the four escorts who had come with Wei Zhao who were not nervous at all.

Such is the way of the world: the greater the contest, the more crucial the occasion, the more it holds that when the enemy is weak, we are strong. Whether one has that confidence makes all the difference. Falter before the fight begins, and even a forty-percent chance of victory will be whittled down to thirty—or less.

Wei Zhao sized up the four opponents' strength: two at the very peak of late Golden Core, two at late Golden Core. Within the Golden Core tier, that counted as fairly strong—and fairly balanced.

Barring surprises, these must be the finest under the Yongxing banner. The escort-defense and escort-raid battles began at the same time and were limited to the span of one stick of incense; the defending side enjoyed a natural advantage over the raiders, so many agencies placed their strongest hands in the defense battle to guarantee their scoring rate.

Their own four, by contrast, numbered one at Golden Core Great Perfection and three at late Golden Core. On paper, the two sides were roughly matched—no advantage, no disadvantage. As for how the match would unfold, that would depend entirely on how each side performed on the day.

"Remember: for the first half-stick of incense, launch no real attacks—at most a few probing feints, but do not get tangled up with them. This is a four-man team battle; watch each other's backs and leave them no openings." Wei Zhao slipped quickly into the role of on-the-spot coach.

The four were somewhat taken aback. Even in similar contests before, no one had ever laid out such detailed tactics for them—at most someone stood by to oversee the fight. Who would have thought Wei Zhao would speak with such method and professionalism?

They did not realize that Wei Zhao was treating this entirely as a coach in the mortal world's ball games. On the field, everything was of course executed by the players, but a truly brilliant coach kept the course of the match firmly in his own hands and thereby decided the final outcome. The same principle applied here.

"But we have only one stick of incense. If we don't attack for the first half-stick, we'll be left with only the second half—surely that won't be enough?" The four exchanged doubtful glances, and at last the strongest of them, the Golden Core Great Perfection expert, spoke up.

To be honest, Wei Zhao had not been with the Qingtian Escort Agency long, but given his outrageous exploits and the dazzling array of titles that hung about him—above all the honorary escort chief's post that Chief Escort Qi Mingyuan had personally promised—the four of them held him in genuine awe and did not dare disobey his instructions.

Still, they were risking their lives in this fight. For their own sake and for the agency's, they had to win this match. Without that resolve, given the brutality of a life-and-death battle like this, stepping onto the field would only mean dying faster.

That was precisely why they worried: what if time ran short and they failed to seize the escort? What then?

A failed raid meant not a single point. Even if they survived, how could they face the agency? How could they face taking that fifty thousand spirit jades?

After all, they would have to keep making their way in the agency for years to come. Everyone wanted to save face; the sting of being gossiped about behind one's back—or worse, pointed at to one's face—was truly hard to bear...

"No, there's time enough," Wei Zhao said with a confident shake of his head, then laid it out for them. "Don't misunderstand. This kind of match looks like a fight to the death, but the key is not in killing—it's in that chest of escort goods."

"Huh? Aren't we fighting for the headcount points?" The four exchanged looks. The first match was nominally a raid-and-response, but anyone who had read the rules knew it was plainly a scramble for points by headcount—the escort goods were just a symbolic gimmick.

"Heh. If it were just a plain brawl, wouldn't you say it lacks all technique? That sort of crude strategy works well when you hold absolute superiority—but look at their strength. If you really fought that way, how many chances would you give yourselves of walking out alive?" Wei Zhao countered.

"That..." The four were silenced at once. They were no fools; with the two sides so evenly matched, once the match turned brutal, total annihilation was not out of the question. If two of them survived in the end, that would already be a fine result.

"Remember, this match is not a simple brawl. What you must do is not only wound the enemy but, more importantly, preserve yourselves—and the key to that lies in that chest of escort goods." Wei Zhao instructed them gravely. "By the rules, whichever side takes the goods holds the initiative, and whoever holds the initiative controls the flow of the match, letting you secure your points while walking away whole."

At this, the four's eyes lit up. They had indeed stepped onto the field resolved to die—but if they could score and still come away alive, who in truth was so tired of living?

"Escort Chief Ling, just tell us what to do. We'll follow your lead," the Golden Core Great Perfection escort declared first.

"Yes, yes—whatever you say, we'll do it!" The other three nodded vigorously in turn. (To be continued...)

...R861