Full-time: The Strongest Sniper

"Beautiful!" Zhang Jiale exclaimed in amazement upon seeing Qiu Fei's transformation of the Falling Flower Palm into Dragon Fang. This change of move was indeed very beautiful. To make such a timely response in such a short time, without any hesitation or delay, decisive and precise, this move was truly beautiful.

"What incredible speed!" Qiao Jingjing exclaimed in amazement at the sight. After all, Qiu Fei's ability to instantly switch attacks and precisely control the character's body and attack direction was something they could hardly achieve at the moment. Of course, it wasn't impossible, but it was something they could do with conscious practice. To execute such a move in such extreme circumstances in actual combat was something they couldn't do at the moment.

Chen Guo then turned her gaze to Xiao Nai, signaling him to hurry up and explain. After all, Ye Xiu and his team's battle was still ongoing, and if they didn't explain clearly what other exciting scenes were to come, they wouldn't be able to keep up with the explanation.

"The key here lies in the attack range of the skills. Although both sides are currently using melee skills, the Falling Blossom Palm, because it involves pushing the palm forward, has a shorter range compared to the upward-sweeping Skyward Strike using a weapon. This gives Ye Xiu the opportunity to strike first despite being behind. If Qiu Fei can't change his move in time, he'll be the one hit, and the consequences of being struck by Ye Xiu's Skyward Strike are predictable. So, although there's still a gap between him and Sun Xiang, it's quite limited, and reaching Sun Xiang's level of strength in the future shouldn't be too difficult," Xiao Nai said.

Meanwhile, before Qiao Jingjing could finish her sentence, Ye Xiu and Qiu Fei continued their actions. Facing Qiu Fei's changed attack, Dragon Fang, which was a straight thrust and slightly faster than Skyward, forced Ye Xiu to perform a forced backflip, canceling Skyward and leaving a white afterimage in his place. His character had narrowly avoided Qiu Fei's attack.

Forced skills, a type of passive skill, allow a character to forcibly interrupt another skill and successfully use it. Because there is no cooldown between the forced use of the skill and the previous skill, professional players will always choose to use any forced passive skill.

The afterimage is the effect of interrupting a skill and using a forced skill. Ye Xiu used a forced backflip.

Immediately after his jump, Ye Xiu unleashed a Dragon Fang attack. Ye Xiu was no longer in the path of Qiu Fei's Dragon Fang, but Qiu Fei, wielding the attack, was still in its path. Facing Ye Xiu's counterattack, Qiu Fei immediately sidestepped, dodging the attack. Simultaneously, he thrust his spear forward again, this time using the Battle Mage skill, Thrust.

Then Ye Xiu swung his body, actually using the movement to fling the Dragon Fang that Qiu Fei had just dodged towards Qiu Fei, thus just managing to parry the thrust.

The weapons clashed once more, sparks flying between their spears. Battle mages could unleash certain skills on their opponents, and whether the attacks were parried or blocked, they would not be wasted, as they would generate a corresponding aura afterward.

It's important to understand that parrying attacks, a tactic of countering each other's attacks, is widely used in Glory of Kings, and naturally, it's one of the fundamental skills that all professional players must master. However, situations involving parrying attacks mainly occur in battles between players of the same class who have similar attack patterns. After all, players of the same class tend to have similar skills and playstyles, and in a stalemate, both sides might even use several identical or similar skills in succession.

When both sides are attacking each other, such parrying skills naturally become the most practical but also the most problematic defensive method.

However, the situation is somewhat different for the Battle Mage class, because experienced professional players and even casual players will try to avoid engaging in such a battle with a Battle Mage.

The reason is simple: to parry, you have to use your own attacks to counter the opponent's attacks. However, even when these attacks collide, the battle mage still considers the skill effective. Although the opponent takes no damage, the skill is not wasted and can still trigger the skill's aura.

Auras have always been the most important combat tool for Battle Mages, and also one of the class's defining characteristics. Auras not only deal damage, but more importantly, each aura provides different buffs.

There's a world of difference between a Battle Mage with and without Auras; in fact, there's a saying in Glory: "A Battle Mage without Auras is like a toothless tiger." The Battle Mage is designed to grow stronger with each battle, as evidenced by skills like Auras and Fighter's Will, which require sustained combat to activate.

Therefore, when facing a Battle Mage, you must be very careful even when using parrying and blocking, otherwise you will suddenly find that as the two of you fight, the other's buffs and auras will increase, and the attacks will become stronger and stronger, until you are overwhelmed by the golden onslaught of auras and the Battle Mage's Will.

This is why Ye Xiu's One Autumn Leaf is hailed as the God of Battle.

This leads everyone to try to avoid prolonged battles when fighting against Battle Mages, which also proves the importance of Battle Mage runes.

Just as professional players try to avoid directly engaging in combat with Battle Mages who can generate auras, Battle Mage players also specifically train in parrying and other defensive techniques, and even develop strategies to guide their opponents into parrying. These are the fundamental skills that Battle Mage players practice every day.

However, the situation is somewhat different now, because the actual battle is between two battle mages, and both of them need the magic runes but don't want the other to get them, which is why the previous battle turned out to be so complicated.

The main complexity lies in how to parry the opponent's attacks and which skills to use to parry so that you can get the desired aura while the opponent gets the less important aura.

After all, different skills generate different auras, and the attributes and buffs provided by these auras are also different. There's a lot to learn about this.

Following this clash of weapons, a dazzling pattern simultaneously appeared behind both Qiu Fei and Ye Xiu, the two battle mages.

Behind Ye Xiu was a pure white, attribute-less aura, while Qiu Fei's side had an ice-blue, ice-attribute aura.

As soon as the auras were generated, both sides jumped back simultaneously, unleashing their own auras and blasting them directly at each other!

As if by prior arrangement, the two's combos collided again at the point where their weapons had just met, creating a massive explosion that sent up a faint shockwave. Thanks to Glory's realistic physics engine, this slightly extended the distance of their back jumps.

Although neither of their auras hit the other, their aura buffs appeared on both of them at the same time.

A layer of icy blue magical energy and chill appeared on Qiu Fei's battle mage body, as if he were wearing armor. This was the effect of the ice attribute runes—increasing the character's defense. (End of Chapter)