Chapter 4458 — The Exchange Sacrifice Strategy

"Heh heh, looks like this tactic is working after all," Wei Zhao said with a faint smile, nodding in satisfaction.

"Brother Ling, what kind of tactic is this, exactly? How do they dare defy Wu Conglong's orders? This is utterly bizarre," Qi Wenmo said, his face full of disbelief.

When Wei Zhao had laid out the tactic earlier, to prevent any leak he had explained it only to the five escort fighters taking part. Everyone else, Qi Wenmo included, had been kept entirely in the dark.

And it was not only Qi Wenmo—everyone present with even a passing understanding of the trade harbored the same doubt. The Wuma Escort Agency was famed for its iron discipline, orders given and orders obeyed. With escorts whose strength was hardly outstanding, it was on this alone that they had secured a foothold in the South Continent seas; it would not be an exaggeration to call it their lifeline. Yet now...

"It's not that they truly dare to defy orders openly. It's just that, much as Wu Conglong has been ceaselessly indoctrinating them, from the start until now we've been doing the same to them. Simple as that," Wei Zhao said with a smile.

"Huh? Indoctrinating them?" Qi Wenmo's expression turned all the more peculiar. "How could that be? Brother Ling, you haven't said a single word of that sort."

"Indoctrination doesn't have to come through words—actions will do. Every move our five escorts have made from the beginning until now has planted a suggestion in their minds, cementing an idea deep in their subconscious," Wei Zhao said.

"What idea?" Qi Wenmo scratched his head.

"Brother Qi, suppose it were you—facing a pack of opponents who scatter the moment they close in, and being asked to trade your life for theirs in single combat. Would you do it?" Wei Zhao asked instead of answering.

"Of course not! When you know full well your opponent is weaker than you, who'd be fool enough to trade life for life one-on-one?" Qi Wenmo blurted out reflexively, then caught himself and slapped his thigh. "Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant! Brother Ling, you're truly a master!"

"I wouldn't call it mastery. I saw their morale was blazing the moment they stepped up, and it would have been unwise to clash head-on, so I simply decided to feign weakness before the enemy. As for what's happening now—that's honestly an unexpected gain," Wei Zhao said with a smile.

"First drumbeat rouses; the second fades; the third is spent"—that was the wisdom the ancients had left behind, and against fighters of the Wuma Escort Agency's sort, pumped up like fighting cocks and ready to die for the cause, it worked a marvel of restraint. As for the psychological suggestion planted along the way, it had left the Wuma escorts wavering—something even Wei Zhao himself had not foreseen, that the counter-indoctrination would prove so effective.

"Heh heh, Brother Ling, don't be so modest—you must have calculated exactly this and had our brothers flee in such an undignified rout. Now that bastard Wu Conglong is in for a real headache. Iron discipline is the very foundation their agency stands on, and now his men won't obey—let's see what he's got left to swagger with!" Qi Wenmo was thoroughly elated.

"It's not necessarily that they won't obey. It only looks as though they're not obeying," Wei Zhao corrected him. With a command strategy like the Wuma Escort Agency's, making their escorts outright defy Wu Conglong's orders was absolutely out of the question.

"Same thing, same thing." Qi Wenmo chuckled, then said with some impatience, "So what do we do next? Time to press the advantage?"

"No, the moment hasn't come yet." Wei Zhao shook his head mildly. It did look as though their side now held a slight psychological edge, but that was far from enough. The Wuma Escort Agency was not so easy to deal with, after all; applying pressure now would likely provoke a backlash and defeat the purpose.

"All right." Though Qi Wenmo was itching with impatience, he had said he would leave everything to Wei Zhao, so naturally he would not butt in. Whatever Wei Zhao said, they would do.

"Outrageous! A pack of outrages! Have you all turned my words into wind past your ears? Do you mean to go back and taste the family law? Hurry up and join forces to finish one of them!" Wu Conglong was still stamping and raging below the arena.

At the words "family law," the five Wuma escorts on the arena gave a sudden start and dared not dawdle another instant. They hastily shook off the stray thoughts crowding their minds, mustered their strength anew, and hemmed one Qingtian escort into a corner—still that same late-Golden-Core fighter.

At the same time, the four Qingtian escorts left unharassed fixed their sights on the enemy's strongest, the Golden Core consummate master, in a repeat of what had just happened.

"Kill him! Kill him!" Fearing another mishap, Wu Conglong bellowed, urging them on.

Even as he urged them, the four Qingtian escorts' powerful techniques were already poised, the arrow on the string, the moment hanging by a thread. The Wuma escorts—above all their leader, the Golden Core consummate master—hesitated, but cowed by Wu Conglong's tyranny, they ultimately stiffened their resolve and struck.

"Time to come down," Wei Zhao suddenly ordered from the sidelines. Then, before everyone's watching eyes, just as the Wuma escorts launched their full assault, the cornered Qingtian escort unhurriedly leaped down from the arena at the very last moment, leaving every one of their attacks to fall on empty air.

At the same time, the Wuma Agency's Golden Core consummate master instead took the full-force blows of the four remaining Qingtian escorts all at once; caught mid-hesitation, he was struck in every vital point and died on the spot!

In an instant, the whole arena fell utterly silent, and at the sidelines Wu Conglong's face turned unspeakably grim, black as the bottom of a pot.

On the Qingtian Escort Agency's side, leaping from the arena counted as forfeiting, so they lost one late-Golden-Core fighter. On the Wuma Escort Agency's side, however, a Golden Core consummate master had been struck dead on the spot.

A textbook exchange sacrifice—but anyone could see that this time the Wuma Escort Agency had come off far the worse!

After the long attrition before, the morale of the Wuma escorts on the arena had in truth already been worn down near to nothing. Otherwise, had their morale still blazed as before, they would not have wavered just now, much less hesitated and botched the moment.

And now, having swallowed such a heavy loss—especially after being toyed with so thoroughly—their morale plunged to rock bottom in an instant, and for a while they simply did not know which way to turn.

"Feign weakness, retreat when the enemy advances, wear down their morale, then break them with a single strike—Brother Ling, you've grasped the essence of the art of war!" Qi Wenmo's eyes flashed again and again. He was a connoisseur, which was how he could see it so clearly; anyone else would mostly have been awed without understanding, wondering how the Qingtian Escort Agency, scurrying about in such a sorry state, had somehow gained the upper hand out of nowhere.

"Young Master Ling, was the strategy you laid out from the very beginning an exchange sacrifice?" Steward Song, who had kept silent all this while, spoke up—a rare occurrence.

"Indeed. Against a tough opponent like the Wuma Escort Agency, brute force wounds us too much; this exchange sacrifice, lopsided in our favor as it is, is just the thing to break their morale," Wei Zhao said with a nod. (To be continued) R752