The demons were definitely strong, but they were defeated soon enough.

The battle was over, just as Ian had planned before the darkness got lifted.

In exactly ten minutes or so.

During that time, Ian managed to take down the other three demons.

The defeat of ‘Lateros’—the one who had the strongest single attack—felt like shackles were freed from Ian’s foot.

Whatever had happened, the battle was over, and once the darkness released by Kaka was gone, bright light started to fill the place.

In front of Ian appeared the Suitor.

The Suitor had a very calm expression.

Ian turned his gaze towards the Suitor, and the words from the Suitor rang all over the place.

[You did well Ian. It was a splendid battle.]

Ian responded with a satisfied smile.

“Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Suitor.”

[I’m really thankful for having you here.]

“It was fun being here.”

The suitor had a warm conversation with Ian for a while and extended his hand towards Ian.

And from his hand, golden light began to shine.

“Um…?”

Ian was just staring at the light in front of him. The golden light soon transformed into a golden chain.

[Well, here you go. You have passed the Gateway of our Maurya Empire.]

The chain left the suitor’s hand and found its way to Ian.

The suitor then spoke once Ian had the chain.

[That is a token proving that you have passed the test. You are now one of the strongest warriors of the Maurya Empire.]

A few lines of system messages began to emerge in front of Ian’s eyes.

Tring-

[You have successfully passed the ‘Test of Gateway’ in the Maurya Empire.]

[You have earned fame of 150,000.]

[You have earned 3 gold bars from the Maurya Empire.]

[You have earned the item ‘Maurya’s Warrior Chain’.]

Ian checked the Maurya Empire’s gold bars first.

He started to get dizzy because of it.

‘Can I exchange the 3 gold bars—which worth 3 million gold—in the Maurya Empire?’

Well, the 3 million gold wasn’t a big deal for Ian, but he was still surprised that he got more than what he was expecting.

The next thing Ian did was intriguingly look at the Golden chain, which was decorated in a very eye-catching manner.

‘This is the chain of the warriors in the Maurya Empire? Let’s check it out.’

Ian—who was expecting a lot from the Golden chain—looked into the item information to confirm.

But contrary to his expectation, the chain was a miscellaneous item and not a wearable one.

[Maurya’s Great Warriors Chain/ Rank – Legendary / Classification – item.]

Though it was accompanied by a tremendous amount of explanations, Ian didn’t bother to check it out and just placed it into his inventory.

He kept it with him as this was going to play an important role in meeting the King of Rings.

‘Aeh… can’t you change the chain, and give me something better.’

But at the moment, the suitor who was looking at Ian all this time laughed and said.

[Haha, looks like you are disappointed with the warrior chain.]

Ian was surprised at what he heard, but he tried to calm down.

The message for the completion of the quest wasn’t issued yet, so he didn’t want to give the NPC the wrong impression.

“Ah, No. It’s not like that. It’s just that I tend to think a lot.”

The suitor just chuckled at this.

[Huhu, You don’t need to avoid my eyes, Ian. Anyone would have hoped for a greater price for passing such a tough gate test.]

Ian was a bit embarrassed.

‘What? Then he should have given something that has a greater value.’

But Ian couldn’t speak his mind.

“No, this item is great enough for my efforts here.”

Looking at Ian who was spewing lies so effortlessly like a well-oiled machine, the suitor just smiled.

[Haha, you surely have the qualities to be our hero. My eyes are never wrong.]

“Ha… Haha. That is a huge deal.”

But the suitor wasn’t done talking just yet.

[The Maurya Empire’s chain that I gave you is an item that actually had hidden power in it. For now, it is just a plain chain that has no special meaning… but you’ll understand it once you get stronger.]

Ian’s expression changed because of what the suitor said.

‘What was that? Will the seal on this chain be released later and turn into a legendary equipment?’

Somehow it didn’t turn out o be bad, and Ian felt better.

“Thank you for taking care of me, Mr. Suitor.”

[It was nothing.]

After sharing a few more words, the suitor showed Ian around.

There was a place, with a big moving magic circle.

[If you go through that you’ll move to the garden in Hwangseong cabinet of Maurya Empire.]

Ian’s expression brightened.

That was because of the distance between the Maurya Empire and Hwangseong was shortened, and by using this magic circle, Ian would be able to save a lot of time.

“Thank you, Mr. Suitor”

And the words from the suitor continued.

[There will be a messenger waiting for you in front of the magic circle in Hwangseong. It is a lion that the King has sent for you, you should follow him.]

Ian nodded vigorously.

“I understand.”

Then came the quest completion message that Ian had been waiting for.

Tring-

[The quest ‘Gateway of Test’ has been successfully completed.]

[Earned 150,000 fame points.]

Then another line of message emerged.

[You can now go to the ‘Hwangseong of Maurya Empire’. Do you want to move? ( Y / N ).]

* * *

“You kids… you nerds. What did you say? You were confident?”

The underground testing room of LB’s.

It was originally a place where the QA employees were present before creating new content for the game.

They were trying to find a way to balance the game by testing various plays. Looking for bugs and errors was what always happened in this room.

But today, for some reason, the testing room was very noisy.

“I’m sorry sir. We are really ashamed.”

“Gosh… yah, even an AI would have managed to do a better job than you guys. How can a level 215 take down five 300 level ones? Huh?”

The five staff members standing in front of the long-haired male bowed their heads because of his scolding.

And around them, the other employees—who were in the room—looked at the five staff members’ pitiful sight.

“Huh, they have been caught by Director Choi…”

“Right. Their first job is to avoid other problems after getting away from Director Choi.”

“Well, I don’t know. Those five were the best of the testing team. I don’t think that anyone can play a level 350 and still manage to take down one of those guys like ‘he’ did.”

“But… I think so too. Especially, there are rumors that his control ability is off the charts.”

“Right. Actually, ‘That guy’ is just plain monstrous. Our team members weren’t lacking in skills. As a matter of fact, he’s the best user of all the tens of millions of user in the Korean servers in the Kailan game, so he can’t be considered anything less than a professional user… but these guys just seemed like amateurs against him, right…?”

“Right. The director didn’t seem to have thought it through…”

Just like what the staff said, the director didn’t think the situation through. He just went up to the stairs after yelling at the staff.

And once he went up, the staff—who was on the far left of the five-member team who had been yelled at—spoke.

“Yah, Oh Seung Chul.”

“Yeah, Mr. Han Daeri.”

“Why did the Director got angry like that?”

“That… the director… wagered for this…”

Han Daeri hit his forehead with what Oh Seung Chul said.

“Oh my god… this wasn’t what you were supposed to do, especially after knowing the details…”

“Huh, what were we supposed to do? In fact, none of us thought that he would manage to get out of the situation at all. We all thought that we would catch him and then take the bonus for ourselves…”

“That’s what everyone wanted…”

The identity of these five were the five demons that Ian had met at the Gateway of Test.

Surprising as it may sound, the demons that Ian went against were actually being controlled by users.

In the original course, the demons were meant to be controlled by AI.

However, the quest clear speed of Ian was way too fast, so the planning team asked the testing team to get involved.

The monsters of the gate were being controlled by amazing players in order to block Ian.

But the result they got was fatal, and once again all the employees were frustrated with the outcome.

“Huh, I thought that I managed to win till the middle-battle.”

“Mr. Daeri you should also head up and work… it wasn’t that we were lacking, that guy is just a monster.”

“I know…”

And this was how Ian unknowingly went against the LB staff and came out with a huge accomplishment.

* * *

Weeing-

Taj Mahal, the most famous structure of India.

The Taj Mahal had been famous all over the world for its beauty and grandeur.

And the place that Ian had come to in the Maurya Empire reminded him of the Taj Mahal.

“Wow…”

Ian who had entered the Imperial Palace of the Maurya Empire through the magic circle was forced to admire the beauty.

Ian didn’t know what a Taj Mahal was, the only thing he knew was that the palace in front of his eyes was beautiful.

And as Ian was looking around someone approached him.

“Are you Mr. Ian?”

Ian nodded and answered.

“Yes?”

“I’m Machamuthra, the lieutenant the King has sent.”

“Nice to meet you.”

The guy called Machamuthra smiled because of Ian’s politeness and guided him.

“Follow me, the King is waiting.”

“Then, let’s go right away.”

The moment the man heard Ian’s answer, he quickly started to walk, and Ian followed him too.

The palace of the Maurya Empire was so huge that Ian thought that he was supposed to turn back as it seemed like a maze.

‘Ah, why did they have to construct it in a such a complicated manner…’

Did it take him 5 minutes?

The lion who was guiding Ian stopped. This was Ian’s first time to see such a gigantic and gorgeous gate.

And with a very warm smile, he spoke to Ian.

“The King is inside. Let us go.”

Ian looked down and answered.

“Thank you. Let’s go.”

Ian pushed the door without any hesitation. The giant door which was three times taller than Ian moved very smoothly.

At that moment Ian realized that he had lost control of his character.

‘The quest seemed to have started.’

Ian looked at the man who was sitting in the middle of the room with a relaxed face.

Alongside him, Ian saw an elderly man with white hair who was sitting on the throne.

The old man seemed to radiate an awesome pressure and dominance, and the pressure that Ian felt was much different from what he felt with the suitor at the gate.

And ‘He’ spoke to Ian.

“Come on Ian. I heard quite a lot about you from Iriel.”