"What exactly happened?" Lina questioned as she sat opposite the man who was nursing his aching nose.

Benji and Julia sat at the side and they too waited to hear what he had to say.

​​

Lina had checked his nose and after making sure that nothing was broken, she brought out the ice pack which was currently over Leon's injured nose.

Once she had taken care of his injury, they finally got the chance to inquire what was wrong with him today.

Benji and Julia already had a faint idea about the cause of his disheartened and moody behavior but Lina was completely oblivious.

Therefore, she investigated whether something had gone wrong while she had been away.

"They kicked me out!" Leon sobbed after he heard the inquiry being made.

The sight of a fully grown bearded man with a bright red and slightly swollen nose, crying his heart out was strange for them to digest.

Benji grimaced with disgust at the snot that was flowing out of his nose while Lina and Julia patted his back and handed him tissues.

"Okay okay. Who kicked you out and from where?" Lina investigated further as she could not understand what was going on.

'Did his mother kick him out?' She wondered whether this was the cause of his behavior.

The more she thought of it in this way, she found that Leon must have done something which had led to this outcome.

Therefore, with suspicious eyes, she leered at him and waited to hear his answer.

Feeling her intense gaze, Leon sniffled and hiccuped before revealing everything to her from the very beginning.

As he continued his narration, Julia's face turned cold while Benji scoffed louder than before.

'I should've known.' He shook his head but when he looked at Lina who was listening attentively, he once again shook his head but this time at her.

"I'm leaving!" Julia announced as she did not wish to waste her time with this nonsense.

Benji sympathized with her and decided to leave as well.

"Cover for me, Benji!" Leon whined when the other man was about to leave.

Just as Benji was about to refuse, he saw the sly man rubbing his swollen nose which indicated that he owed this to him.

"Shameless," Benji muttered before rolling his eyes and leaving this time without looking back.

Once Lina and Leon were left alone, they descended into silence for a few moments.

"Let's do it!" Lina proposed and saw the man's confused face.

'No wonder he was kicked out.' Her scornful look only made him pout in return.

Sighing, Lina pulled out her phone and logged into an app before gesturing to him to do the same.

*Doom~*

The soundtrack that began to play once she had successfully logged in, woke him up from his daze as he hurried to follow her instructions.

Once he had logged into the app, he looked up and saw that Lina had kicked off her high heels and was seated comfortably on the other side of the couch.

The familiar soundtrack resounded in the room once again but this time it was coming from his phone.

"Name?" She questioned without raising her head from the screen.

"King Jiu." Leon blushed as he revealed his username, resulting in a chortle coming from the other side.

Earlier, he had disclosed the root of his pain to Lina who was the only one who understood her anguish while Benji and Julia left him without any remorse.

This was due to the fact that Lina and he were comrades with similar interests and one of them was the app that they had just logged into.

{Doom To The Dynasty}

The first time he had spoken to Lina, she was playing this game, and the two later even bonded over it.

However, until now, they had never revealed their usernames to the other as DTD, the game, was built over the grounds of secrecy of the players' offline identity.

They had indulged in numerous conversations on how to clear levels and raise ranks but never once had they disclosed their in-game username to the other person.

That changed today as he had just uttered the name that he went by in the game.

Lina typed his name into the game and promptly sent him an invite to join her to clear missions.

DTD was a violent and gruesome graphic game that allowed people to form their own clans or groups to beat the game.

The players would begin from the borders of the Kingdom and had to clear levels in order to move closer to the Central Palace where the final boss was.

Each level was harder than the one before and only a few were able to reach close enough to the Capital city.

The Palace where the final boss, the Emperor of the Dynasty resided had never been ventured by any player since the game was initially launched.

This was due to the generals surrounding the Palace being so strong that no one could ever think of surpassing them and conquering the final boss' territory.

*Ding*

The sound of a notification made Leon click on the inbox and his eyes widened in surprise.

"Hel… Hellfire sent me a request!" He choked at first then squealed in surprise as his jaw dropped at the sight of the name on the screen.

As someone who had played DTD for a long time, he was aware of most of the famous players' usernames.

The name 'Hellfire' was one that he was quite familiar with.

The reason for this avatar's fame was none other than the fact that she was said to be a girl and also was a kickass player at that.

While most girls stayed away from this game, there was still a handful of them that did take an interest in it.

Yet, they could not level up at a steady pace or attain a spot in the rankings.

However, there was one exception to this and that was none other than Hellfire who always maintained her position in the nationwide top ten rankings.

Looking at Leon fangirling while gawking at the screen, Lina rolled her eyes before clearing her throat.

"Accept it!" She scowled since he was wasting her precious minutes.

The meeting with the important members of Obsidia would begin in less than an hour and here she was, preparing to play video games with her friend.

Leon snapped out of his thoughts and alternated his gaze between the notification he had received and the lady seated before him.

"Lina…" He muttered with suspicion as he tried to peek at the phone in her hand.

What he saw left his eyes wide open once again.

The avatar of a tall and lean young girl with black attire and flaming red hair was what his eyes had caught.

"You are Hellfire!?" He yelled in surprise as the same avatar's image was seen in the notification he received.

'Was he always this slow?' Lina rolled her eyes and gave him a quick nod before gesturing with her eyes, asking him to accept the invite.

"I'll delete it if you make me wait any longer." She threatened and succeeded in getting her way.

In fear that she would do as she said, Leon hurriedly pressed the 'accept' button which led him to a different screen.

__

Every player who was logged into DTD got a notification at that very moment, informing them of the arrival of a Top 10 player in the waiting arena.

{Hellfire reappeared!}

{Look! She's not alone this time!}

{Who is that weakling with her?}

The public chat room of the app displayed numerous messages and every one of them was concerning the player who had just logged in.

What shocked most was not that Hellfire had appeared in a low-level waiting arena near the outskirts of the Kingdom.

It was the fact that she had teamed up with someone else for the very first time throughout her gaming history.

Hellfire was a solo act and she did not accept clan requests.

This was common knowledge and even those who sent her requests to try their luck would be rejected effortlessly.

They called this her arrogance but she had the capability to be arrogant which brought her many fans as well.

Therefore, those fans right now were glaring at the avatar of the mage with a long black beard and blue robe who appeared to be in the same team as her.

{Hellfire entered the lowest level with that low-ranking mage?}

The comment caught their eye as right before them, Hellfire and the mage named King Jiu had teleported into the game and that too at the lowermost level which was at the outskirts of the Kingdom.