Floating Up — MMORPG: Rebirth of the Legendary Guardian

Floating Up is the Defender and second-in-command of Sword and Fire Mercenary, an elite contract group that competes with Zhang Yang in the auction house, dungeon rankings, open-world objectives, and a decisive series of arena duels. (Chapters 47, 78, 92, 110–113, 122, and 127–131)

Biography

Rebirth and White Jade City

Floating Up first comes to Zhang Yang's attention as a rival seller of Earthen Round Shields, undercutting Zhang Yang's auction price and helping drive the market downward. Zhang Yang recognizes him from his previous life as a Guardian-class player of comparable skill who had remained in the A-class league; in the current timeline, Floating Up is instead a Defender. He soon demonstrates broader competitive standing by leading the party that sets a new Hardcore-mode record for the Middle Wing of Marzerway's Lair, earning the associated gold, gemstone, and reputation rewards. These early appearances establish him as both a commercially alert player and a capable party leader before his direct conflict with Zhang Yang begins. (Chapters 47, 78, and 92)

As Sword and Fire Mercenary's second-in-command, Floating Up leads a manhunt party hired to kill Zhang Yang, then diverts toward the Land Lease when the field objective appears more valuable. He analyzes the untouched monsters in the Underground Tower and correctly deduces that Zhang Yang forced his way through and used the respawns to block pursuers, but Sword and Fire still loses its surviving party to the boss encounter. Rather than continue an unbounded vendetta, the mercenaries offer individual arena fights: if Zhang Yang defeats the combat members, they will reject future contracts on his life. Floating Up challenges him first and uses a full defensive kit to recover from near defeat, but cannot overcome Zhang Yang's superior positioning. After all six fighters lose, Floating Up joins the group's sober assessment that Zhang Yang's personal skill, team, and guild make further contracts strategically unsound. (Chapters 110, 112–113, 122, 127–131)

Appearance and personality

The supplied corpus does not describe Floating Up's real-world or avatar appearance beyond his equipment and shield-based combat. He is serious, analytical, proud of his performance, and pragmatic about risk. He recognizes tactical details quickly, protects the mercenary group's reputation by locking the arena with a password, and curses when defeated, yet he also accepts the evidence of Zhang Yang's superiority and supports ending future assassination contracts rather than escalating a failed job into a personal feud. (Chapters 112–113, 122, 130–131)

Abilities and gameplay

Floating Up is a Defender, a cooldown-based tank class that does not use Rage and deals much of its offensive damage as Holy damage that bypasses ordinary physical defense. His passive defenses reduce physical damage by 15% and magic damage by 10%, allowing him to take the least damage of Sword and Fire's group during an area attack. He and Dominating Blade also react quickly enough to use Devotion and a tanking strike together to hold a mass of summoned monsters while repositioning so none can attack from behind. Their modest defense values still leave them vulnerable to sustained focus and boss-wide damage. (Chapters 127–128 and 131)

In his duel with Zhang Yang, Commanding Seal adds Holy damage equal to 30% of each melee attack for thirty seconds. Shield Toss hits a target and two nearby enemies for physical damage and slows them by 50% for three seconds, while Sanction provides a five-second ranged stun without requiring Floating Up to face the target. Devotion adds persistent Holy damage around him. These tools let him take control of the first exchange and remove roughly 3,000 HP, but they cannot prevent Zhang Yang from repeatedly reaching his back; once Sanction is on cooldown, Floating Up lacks an immediate counter to that positioning. (Chapters 130–131)

His survival combination is powerful but finite. Divine Protection removes negative effects and grants five seconds of immunity, but halves his damage and healing during that window and has a seven-minute cooldown. Holy Restoration then restores his HP completely on a two-minute cooldown. Using both resets a nearly lost duel, yet Floating Up still dies after the immunity ends because the recovery does not correct the underlying control gap. His performance therefore shows strong burst defense and recovery, limited by long cooldowns, reduced output during immunity, and dependence on keeping an opponent in front of him. (Chapter 131)

Relationships

Zhang Yang: Floating Up begins as Zhang Yang's economic competitor and contracted pursuer, then becomes the first Sword and Fire member to test him in the arena. His defeat and analysis help convince the mercenaries to stop accepting contracts on Zhang Yang. (Chapters 47, 78, 110–113, and 130–131)
Dominating Blade: Sword and Fire's captain and fellow tank. Floating Up acts as his second-in-command, shares tactical command, coordinates monster control with him, and participates in the final discussion about ending the Zhang Yang contracts. (Chapters 110, 112, 122, 128, and 131)
All Wounded: A fellow mercenary in Floating Up's manhunt party. All Wounded joins the failed Underground Tower attempt and later jokes about Floating Up's shorter duel, prompting Floating Up to defend his performance by pointing to the damage he dealt Zhang Yang. (Chapters 112, 127, and 131)

Items

Earthen Round Shield: Floating Up openly lists this crafted shield below Zhang Yang's desired auction price, creating sustained price competition even though demand remains high. The corpus does not establish that the shield is part of his personal combat loadout. (Chapters 47 and 78)
Level 20 Gray-Silver set and shield: He enters the arena duel in a complete Level 20 Gray-Silver set and uses a shield as the focus for Shield Toss. The equipment supports his defensive kit, but its defense cannot overcome Zhang Yang's stronger gear and positional control. (Chapter 131)