Black Online

Chapter 217: Genius Plan

’He will attempt to attack me right away.’

Remu completely ’Read’ Fang Raon’s intention, and he didn’t make a move with his own soldiers.

He entered a thinking tank inside his mind as he thought about his next move, and not only one move.

He was thinking a dozen moves ahead.

It was something that was a must-do during Chi-Go matches, as sometimes the winner was decided on the basis of who had planned the most strategic moves in advance.

’I’ll do that...’

He quickly decided on his strategy.

Meanwhile, the first of Fang Raon’s soldiers were already nearing his tower—it was his Assassin, who was moving really quick.

’Go for Helper.’

Fang Raon ordered.

In that moment, Assassin used his skill—Shadow Step—and disappeared from where he was currently standing.

Then, he appeared near the oblivious-looking Helper and immediately swung the daggers without waiting.

"Switch."

Remu snapped his fingers.

His Mage opened the grimoire. The pages flipped. One of the pages started glowing.

Swoosh~ Helper disappeared, and in his place, Warrior appeared, who immediately blocked the dagger with the shield.

’He chose the Switch skill. Rock made me study all the skills that are possible to select in the General’s Game.

’Switch skill allows Mage to switch the locations between two souls, and in this scenario, he made Warrior and Helper change positions.

’It looks like Remu didn’t choose an offensive approach but a defensive one. He literally only has Warrior that can fight.’

Fang Raon thought.

’I already have a way that I can counter this strategy already. I have three offensive soldiers, so if I just make them attack each of Remu’s soldiers individually, it doesn’t matter if he keeps changing locations of Helper, one of my soldiers will be able to kill him.’

Fang Raon thought.

However.

As soon as he thought of that, he knew that Remu was already aware of his thought process before he even did his plan.

"Clone Rush!"

Remu shouted.

In that moment, several identical-looking clones popped out of Warrior’s body and started running away.

’Oh, snap! He can also change the location of his soldiers with those clones. This was his plan all along!’

Fang Raon’s eyes widened in surprise.

It changed everything.

’Is he going after my tower then?’

The clones kept running, and they were indeed heading straight for his tower. The thought sent a shiver down Fang Raon’s spine.

’If he uses Switch once his clones are at my tower, he can just switch their locations and start attacking my tower.

’His clones would appear here at his tower, and while they aren’t as strong as the original, they can still stop me from attacking his tower in return.

’Remu only has Warrior that can do some damage to my tower, so it will take a while for him to destroy my tower. And since he already has revealed his Clone Rush skill, he doesn’t have any other offensive skill to use to break my tower.

’Can I defeat his clones and destroy his tower before he can mine?’

Fang Raon wondered.

While looking directly into Fang Raon’s face, Remu knew immediately what he was thinking about.

As if he were reading his mind.

’These clones are not strong. However, they are very durable. I’d say they are as durable as this tower right here.

’Thus, for him to destroy my tower, he would need to kill three clones, which is basically three towers, and then the main tower.

’There is no way he will be able to do that in time!’

Remu thought with a smirk.

"Shadow Step!"

At that moment, Fang Raon made another decision really quickly and made his Assassin to start running back to his tower.

He was using Shadow Step, which drained some of Fang Raon’s mental energy, but it had to be done.

’Damn?!’

Remu looked shocked.

He tried Reading Fang Raon to see his intention, but he couldn’t Read anything as if his mind were in a blank state.

While Remu was occupied with his own thoughts, Fang Raon thought of another plan, and once he gave an order to his Assassin, he just erased all his thoughts.

So that Remu wouldn’t be able to Read him.

’In a way, this kid just used Read. He noticed that I was currently thinking, so he thought of a plan, and since I wasn’t paying any attention to him, I wasn’t Reading him.

’And when he was done thinking of a plan, he just completely reset his thoughts into a blank slate.

’I already knew this, but this kid knows Read, but doesn’t know how to use it apparently, which is strange.’

Remu thought.

Assassin was making rapid progress as it headed back to the Blue Tower, and at the same time, Tank and Mage reached Remu’s Red Tower.

And also, the clones reached Blue Tower.

"Switch!"

Remu gave the order.

With the Switch skill, all of Remu’s soldiers replaced clones over at the Blue Tower, and the clones appeared at Remu’s Red Tower.

"Flame Spirit!"

Fang Raon ordered his Mage and Tank, and they immediately attacked the clones without hesitation.

’I need to kill these clones quick!’

Meanwhile, Remu’s Warrior started attacking the Blue Tower while the Mage and Helper were just standing there, as there really wasn’t much they could do.

...

"Who do you think is winning?"

Della asked.

"Remu has a slight advantage since he is already attacking the tower, but I think Fang Raon’s plan is really strong too.

"He uses Assassin to go protect the Blue Tower, but there is a problem, as Mage can also use Switch on Fang Raon’s soldiers.

"Thus, once Fang Raon’s Assassin reaches Blue Tower, Remu will just make the Assassin switch positions with the clone and then be right back at Red Tower!"

Rock said.

"...What if that’s exactly what Raon wants him to do?"

Della asked.

She had an idea about Raon’s plan, and when she thought of that, she literally had goosebumps.

It was a really devious plan, in her opinion, and she started thinking of Raon more highly than even before, even though she already considered him a genius.

"What?"

Rock frowned.

"If Remu uses one of his clones to teleport Assassin away, doesn’t that mean there will only be two clones protecting the Red Tower?"

Della said with a smile.

"Ah!"

Rock’s eyes widened in surprise.

"I see! Fang Raon uses his Assassin as bait to force Remu to teleport one of his clones away so he only has to deal with two clones instead of three.

"Then, it is much more manageable for him to kill the two clones with a man advantage and then go after Red Tower!"

Rock thought that it was a truly brilliant plan.

"However, does Remu already know about this?"

Elena wondered.

"It’s highly unlikely. He is very reliant on Read, and it looks like Fang Raon is masking all of his thoughts.

"And even if he finds out, so what? His alternative is to make his Warrior fight the Assassin, but that fight will last a long while.

"During that fight, Raon’s soldiers can easily take care of the clones and then go after Red Tower.

"Remu is completely trapped, and he has no other choice than hope that his Warrior manages to destroy Blue Tower in time!"

Rock said, and then he looked at the health of the Blue Tower.

[Blue Tower - HP: 922/1000]

"Go, Raon, you can do it!"

Della cheered with a big smile.

"..."

Rock frowned as he noticed something, and he let out a deep sigh, but it wasn’t related to Fang Raon’s match.

Instead, the long sigh was targeted at Fang Raon’s sister—Anna—who was playing at the neighbor table.

"What’s with the sigh, father-in-law?"

Elena asked curiously.

"It’s Raon’s sister. She is not trying to win the match. She is just delaying the end of the match."

Rock said.

"What, why?"

Della asked with a frown.

"She waits for Raon’s match to first end. If Raon happens to win, then Anna will go and beat her opponent.

"However, if Raon loses..."

Rock trailed at the end.

"Then that means Anna will also try to lose? Does that mean that she is just trying to compete against Raon in the next round?"

Della asked with a frown.

She didn’t understand what was with Anna’s strange behavior towards her brother, as it really didn’t make any sense.

"Anna doesn’t care about this tournament. She only wants to go against Raon."

Rock said with a serious look.

...

In the match, Fang Raon’s Assassin reached the Blue Tower after using Shadow Step many times to make that trip quickly.

’I did use some of my mental energy, but that’s fine.’

Fang Raon thought with a few sweat droplets appearing all around his forehead, but with his backhand, he just wiped it all off.

"Haha, that won’t work, brat. Go back to where you came from!"

Remu shouted with a smirk and used ’Switch’ to change the locations between the Assassin and one of his clones.

"Heh, gotcha~"

Fang Raon grinned.

Then, his Assassin joined the Tank and Mage at attacking the two clones, and with a man advantage, the clones were suffering greatly.

"Ah?!"

Remu looked shocked.

He’d been keeping eye on how his clones were faring, and it looked like they would be defeated approximately in five minutes.

However.

With him having to teleport one of his clones away, Fang Raon now had one soldier more than there were clones, which tipped the scales greatly.

The clones were quickly dying!

’Eek, I fell to his trap!’

Remu looked scared.

Even if Fang Raon couldn’t use Read, he was able to tell what he was thinking about, and he just smiled.

’Let’s win this match!’

"Attack, my soldiers!"