Role Playing the Dark Horse Character

Chapter 99: Mutual Obstruction as a Sign of Respect

The giant sword swung, fierce winds snapping streetlights in half.

“Teleportation? Or illusion?” the cyan-haired youth murmured at the center of the gale.

I conjured a phantom in the air, the hem of my navy-blue jacket fluttering in the wind.

The next moment, the giant sword aimed at my phantom and swung again, the phantom dissipating upon contact with the shockwave.

Another phantom appeared immediately.

The cyan-haired youth swung the giant sword, and again, the phantom vanished the moment it was hit.

This time, the shockwave’s path happened to head toward Yu Xiao.

The golden-haired youth was still stepping forward, seemingly oblivious.

I did it on purpose.

I placed the phantom between Yu Xiao and Feng Jiuqu, just to see how Yu Xiao would react.

I knew Yu Xiao was high-rank, but he shouldn’t know I knew.

The manga clearly stated Yu Xiao was a domain-type, unlike Li Baige, whose ability wasn’t specified.

The information that Yu Xiao was a domain-type was absolutely certain, and even if his ability rank was reversed, it wouldn’t change this fact.

I wanted to drag Yu Xiao into the fight.

The shockwave of the giant sword came like a blade in an instant, but at the same time, Yu Xiao slipped and fell.

He fell out of the attack’s range.

A very simple, yet effective way to dodge.

On someone like Flipping Fish, it was completely fine, perfectly fitting his clumsy beauty persona.

Afterward, Yu Xiao lay on the ground, bewildered, as if he didn’t know why he fell.

It seemed like a coincidence, or as if his high luck stat helped him escape a life-or-death crisis.

On the surface, nothing seemed wrong.

I narrowed my eyes slightly, but there was no regret in my crimson pupils.

This was just the beginning for me.

“It’s an illusion now,” the cyan-haired youth said after several attacks missed.

He realized he was being toyed with, his attacks useless.

Phantoms appeared in the air one after another, leisurely pushing up the sunglasses.

The curved lips seemed to mock silently.

This time, the cyan-haired youth didn’t attack the phantom.

Instead, he suddenly turned, launching an attack in a direction where no phantom had appeared.

The earth was sliced into a long, shallow trench by the shockwave, stone slabs shattering.

Amid the flying debris and dust, the shockwave stretched a hundred meters, splitting a building at the end in two.

But the person he aimed for wasn’t there.

As the attack missed, he raised the giant sword horizontally, spinning it around him.

A circular gale spread rapidly.

Yu Xiao, who had just gotten up, was bitten on the hand by the big dog-goose, jumped, and narrowly dodged the attack.

Afterward, Yu Xiao looked bewildered, turning his head to see the massive building collapse caused by the shockwave.

Like a bystander skirting the edges, slacking off in the fight while “accidentally” avoiding the battle’s fallout.

If it was truly just luck, Yu Xiao must be the child of fortune.

Twice now, I counted.

The first phantom was deliberately placed to guide the attack, but the second was the cyan-haired youth’s spontaneous action, completely plausible as unintentional.

Yet Yu Xiao’s two dodges seemed suspicious.

Once could be luck, but two or three times would raise alarms.

I considered my relationship with Yu Xiao, under any of my identities, to be shallow.

I had every reason to suspect him.

In the fight, I didn’t show any suspicion toward Yu Xiao, but if he wanted to keep hiding, he’d actively do something to dispel my doubts—that’s caution.

If he didn’t, either he was truly a fool, or he thought hiding was pointless.

The latter possibility would be a bit tricky for me.

At this moment, the cyan-haired youth spoke.

“I am Feng Jiuqu,” the cyan-haired youth said. “I know you’re an illusionist.”

The Feng clan, the last noble family involved in the An clan’s destruction.

Clearly, Feng Jiuqu was a member of the Feng clan nobles.

“You killed Qu Yan,” he said.

“So?” A phantom appeared.

The black-haired youth in the phantom seemed entirely unaffected.

I verbally seemed to accept the claim, waiting for Feng Jiuqu to continue.

I did want to know why this S-rank noble came alone to confront me.

“Qu Yan’s ability countered illusions. Even if he caught an illusion, he could kill the illusionist themselves,” Feng Jiuqu said.

He stood straight, back firm, the giant sword plunged into the cracked earth.

He tilted his head slightly upward, speaking to the phantom in the air: “I don’t believe you could kill Qu Yan. I want to know why.”

I instantly understood his meaning.

Feng Jiuqu wanted to know how I killed Qu Yan, and his actions leaned toward probing my ability.

In other words, he wanted to test my ability.

Yu Xiao’s goal was likely the same.

When we first met in Jiao Huang, the words I said to Yu Xiao were like hypnosis.

With Yu Xiao’s higher rank, I definitely failed.

But even if I failed, it didn’t matter.

Ability rank suppression was at play, and it could be understood as the ability failing to activate due to the rank difference.

That wasn’t uncommon.

However, during my Li Baige persona, I pretended to have a spell-type materialization ability, while outwardly I displayed illusions.

These three abilities—materialization, illusion, and hypnosis—were generally unrelated.

If they were of the same type, it could be explained as Plundering, but among these, materializing a long blade was spell-type, illusions were concept-type, and hypnosis could be categorized as mimicry-type.

Plundering couldn’t explain it.

Yu Xiao probably wanted to know what my ability really was.

Knowing their goals, I decisively started to bluff.

“Perhaps you’re right,” I said.

I hadn’t forgotten the persona I prepared back then, perfect for bluffing Yu Xiao.

Bluffing him would let me bluff more people.

The more people knew, the better for me.

I just couldn’t advertise it to enemies myself.

Now was perfect.

Even if Feng Jiuqu was gone, Yu Xiao would spread the word for me.

“Of course,” Feng Jiuqu nodded. “This is the experience I’ve gained from years in Zhusheng City.”

I smiled faintly, raising my hand: “Indeed, my ability isn’t just illusions.”

A snap rang out, and a row of long blades appeared behind me.

But these weren’t phantoms.

After my ability upgraded to A-rank, I gained a new power: if the process of turning illusion into reality, or the five minutes after it occurred, wasn’t interrupted, the illusion would become real forever.

I used this to create long blades, turned illusions into reality, and then hid the now-real blades with illusions.

I had started setting this up when I encountered Yu Xiao, and now, the illusion-to-reality process had just hit five minutes.

These were all real.

With the snap of my fingers, the long blades shot toward Feng Jiuqu at the center of the cracked ground like bullets, the sound of breaking wind ringing out as they reached him in an instant.

Facing the sharp blades, Feng Jiuqu instinctively gripped his sword hilt but didn’t draw his giant sword.

He thought this was just the illusionist’s bluff: “I won’t be fooled by such illusions anymore.”

Before he finished speaking, a long blade pierced his clothing, splattering blood.

The cyan-haired youth’s mouth was still half-open, his pupils reflecting the blood dripping from his body.

In an instant, six long blades shattered.

Feng Jiuqu’s movements were so fast that afterimages lingered, while the splattered blood still hung in the air.

The broken blades fell to the ground, followed by scattered drops of red.

Feng Jiuqu, gripping his giant sword, had slightly widened pupils.

“Not an illusion…” He let go of the hilt with one hand, pulling out the blade embedded in his chest. “Materialization?”

He looked up at the black-haired youth in midair, a smile on his lips, and at the newly appeared long blades behind him, filling the gaps left by the ones that shot out.

In his understanding, this was the creation-from-nothing ability of spell-type ability users.

“Hmph.” I tilted my head, smiled, and lightly waved my hand.

The second batch of six real long blades flew toward Feng Jiuqu.

This time, he gripped his giant sword tightly, knocking them down.

At the same time, a third batch of illusory long blades spun before his eyes, their sharp edges piercing toward him with the sound of wind.

Feng Jiuqu swung his giant sword, and when it met the illusory blades, a crisp metallic clash rang out.

Illusion turned real—Feng Jiuqu now believed these were real blades!

The next moment, the blades began to shatter from the tips, broken by immense force.

The fragments flew, and the smooth blade shards reflected a fleeting glimpse of black.

“There’s more.”

I drew the real dagger tied to my right leg.

The black-haired youth suddenly appeared behind Feng Jiuqu.

The dagger’s tip glinted coldly, but before it touched the fragile skin of his neck, it met the giant sword.

“Clang!”

Feng Jiuqu raised his hand, the giant sword blocking the sudden attack.

But he wasn’t at ease.

From the blade of his giant sword, he saw the person behind him.

Crimson eyes, lips curved in a relaxed arc, as if playing a game.

A game where Feng Jiuqu was the sole prop in a narrated performance.

Was it indifference? Or confidence that even if he knew, it wouldn’t matter?

“It’s teleportation,” Feng Jiuqu said.

The next instant, the person behind him vanished, and a low, magnetic voice came with the wind.

“Bingo.”

His initial curiosity burned brighter.

Feng Jiuqu raised his giant sword before him, his voice growing louder with excitement.

“How can one person have so many abilities? Who are you?” he asked.

“Isn’t this what you all pursue?” The black-haired youth’s figure appeared before him again, the dagger flipping between his fingers like a silver butterfly.

I smiled lightly, looking at Feng Jiuqu.

I was hinting.

And Feng Jiuqu caught my hint, following it to expand his thoughts, believing he’d grasped the truth.

“Pursue? Their research? You’re a successful experimental subject!” He showed a look of realization. “No wonder Qu Yan died—he underestimated you.”

“Facing an ability user like you, normal logic doesn’t apply.” He was like a child who’d found a favorite toy, his eyes growing more excited as he looked at me. “I’ve never seen an opponent like you!”

He was thrilled.

His demeanor shifted from curiosity to an eager desire to fight.

His muscles tensed, and he raised his giant sword: “You told me your ability, so I’ll tell you mine.”

Upon learning his opponent’s ability, Feng Jiuqu understood their intent.

An ability was critical to an ability user, and revealing it to an enemy only happened in one case.

When they didn’t plan to let the enemy leave alive.

But coincidentally, Feng Jiuqu had come with killing intent as well!

He didn’t fear the challenge—he relished his opponent’s fighting spirit!

“My ability can randomly stack status effects, on living or non-living things.” He raised his giant sword, and like before, a fluorescent glow flashed across it before fading.

“My current status is double strength.” He aimed at the phantom’s direction. “I’ll kill you, the illusionist who’s not an illusionist.”

“Good luck,” I said casually.

The next instant, Feng Jiuqu struck toward the phantom, the ground cracking as if an invisible blade extended.

But the attack could only touch the phantom, posing no threat to me.

Then, something unexpected happened.

“Kind person, run!”

Yu Xiao had been running toward this direction when he tripped.

His body lurched forward.

In his bewildered expression, he stumbled into the space between the phantom and the attack, sliding right into Feng Jiuqu’s attack range.

The golden-haired youth with an angelic face turned his head, seeing the sharp shockwave from the giant sword’s strike.

The invisible wind seemed to magnify in his crimson pupils.

He seemed stunned.

I knew Yu Xiao was absolutely pretending.

He was here to obstruct me, just as I had deliberately made Feng Jiuqu attack toward him.

We were quite in sync, probing each other and mutually obstructing.

But as I analyzed earlier, Yu Xiao couldn’t dodge this time.

If I only suspected his earlier dodges were too easy, this would dispel my doubts, as it truly seemed like luck.

And I wouldn’t let him die, so Yu Xiao wouldn’t face real mortal danger.

This was a win-win for Yu Xiao.

He wanted to conceal his identity and dispel any suspicions I might have about him.

But this was perfect for me too!

In an instant, my real body swapped with a phantom, Illusory Reality hiding my true appearance.

I stepped forward, grabbing Yu Xiao’s collar, my fingers brushing his neck.

The illusory dust exploded, obscuring Feng Jiuqu’s view and Yu Xiao’s as well.

He maintained his pose, looking toward Feng Jiuqu, unchanged.

He didn’t turn back or see the black-haired youth’s face transform in that instant.

It softened, as if becoming someone else.

My ability, when touching someone of equal or higher rank, could only turn illusions real if the person believed they were real.

Right now, if Yu Xiao, who was higher-ranked, thought I was the ‘Heige’ I’d conjured, I’d maintain that illusion.

But if he subconsciously believed I wasn’t—

Then my falsehood would be dispelled.

In that fleeting moment, in Yu Xiao’s mind, I was this form.

The change was hidden in the dust.

I threw Yu Xiao aside again, flashing out of the attack range.

The ground split before my eyes, the shockwave stretching far, cleaving a skyscraper in two.

Amid the deafening roar of the collapsing building, I hid myself in illusion again, letting out a soft laugh from within the illusion.

In Yu Xiao’s mind, I was Li.

The form from our first meeting in Jiao Huang—black hair, black eyes, not as tall as Heige, nor as sharply defined.

And a boy.

“So that’s how it is,” I murmured.