Sora was heading through Frost Peak Village to go to his territory. On the outskirts of the village, there was a large group of people, all with the guild name ‘Everlasting’ above their heads. It was the only other guild on the server and it looked like they were doing some sort of guild activity. The players were separated into many different groups of five and then further separated into more groups with one person leading them. Sora wasn’t too interested in them and kept going without getting involved in any of their business.

“If it isn’t Ethereal, leader of Phoenix Rising.”

One of the men leading the groups stepped towards Sora with a cocky grin on his face. The man looked at Sora with disdain in his eyes. Sora just ignored him, continuing to walk through without giving him a second glance. This only infuriated the man more, he couldn’t swallow this humiliation and actually jumped in front of Luna to block his way. Sora could only sigh as he got mixed in with the guild's business.

“What do you want?”

“Ah, just wanted to have a friendly chat, you are quite famous you know.”

“I don’t really have the time.”

“I guess some other time then. Just remember this; we will soon replace you as the number one guild.”

“I’ll remember that if you can deliver a message to your guild leader for me.”

“What might that be?”

“Tell her to keep her dogs on a shorter leash.”

The man had a face full of anger as he watched Sora ride away on Luna, if he had more authority then he would have attacked him then and there. The rest of the guild members had mixed emotions. Some were angry just like their leader was, while some were embarrassed by his actions. Sora didn’t bother looking back and continued heading towards his outpost.

After a short ride, he arrived at Frost Peak Mountain, entering the cave to head into his outpost. He had plans to build more in his territory this time since the last time he had to use all of his money to buy defenses to help against the demon invasion.

Territory Coffer: 1445 gold and 29 silver

Would you like to collect the money?

Sora took the money and looked at his outpost. It still looked very shabby to him so he was excited to make it look more like a proper town. He needed to save some money to buy more Elven Dew Drops but the rest he would dump into his territory.

The first thing Sora did was close off a part of his territory so he could build. This stopped any players from entering the area until his building was complete. Once the area was set up he started looking for the buildings he could make. Some of the higher tier buildings included things like a Dragon Roost, Void Tower, Misdirecting Teleportation Tower, Divine Ranked Dungeon, and many other things that were too expensive to even think about getting yet. Even if he did have the money, he would need various materials to build some of the buildings. He stopped fantasizing about the future and went back to the lower tier buildings.

A gray brick foundation appeared in the area Sora had targeted. Bricks started to materialize out of thin air and stack themselves along the edge of the foundation, along with cutting through the foundation to create rooms. Training dummies, archery targets, armor racks, weapon racks, and many other decorative pieces of furniture were placed within the building before a roof appeared on top. Sora named the building ‘Phoenix Garrison’, which was seen on a sign hanging above the door. The garrison had its own menu that allows Sora to buy guards to help keep the peace in his outpost. He bought the basic guards that wore iron armor and wielded an iron sword and shield, they flooded out of the garrison and started posting up throughout the city. Each of them was level 50, making the players think twice before trying to cause any trouble.

His next project was an auction house. The building itself was made from a dark wood that looked like it was polished. Only a few counters were opened but it would allow players to buy and sell things from other players without having to go all the way back to Var. The name of the building was ‘Golden Waterfall Alliance’, which was only named that way since the group controlling the auction house was not under Sora’s control. This auction house had the same name as the one in Var since it was owned by the same group. This building took a large chunk of Sora’s funds but it would be extremely useful to players.

The last thing Sora wanted to add was going to be extremely expensive, but it should help bring in more players. He took the remaining fund he had and set up a circular building that looked like the base of a tower. The building only had one doorway at the front and the other side of the room had a circular platform with many runes and shapes carved into it. This would be the first teleportation portal to be discovered in the game unless you count the one going into Gzarna’s lab as one. He set the destination to Frost Peak Village and watched as the remaining amount of money was depleted. The runes on the platform glowed blue before the entire platform lit up, creating a small buzzing noise that seems to be constantly moving with waves of light that hovered above the platform.

An area in Frost Peak Village shimmered for a second before a platform that looked like the one Sora had built appeared. The space distorted as Sora appeared on top of the platform, with many eyes on him due to the sudden appearance of the platform. He activated the portal again to go back to his outpost. He felt a bit ripped off since the portal only went to the closest village but it was still better than nothing. The flight service in Frost Peak Village would suffice for now until he can get a portal that goes to Var.

With his new additions to his territory completed, he stepped into the portal once more so he could fly to Var. A lot of players had gathered around the portal, wondering what it was. Just as someone was about to try it out, the space distorted and Sora appeared. The player that was about to step on the platform became startled and jumped a little.

“Hey, what is this thing?”

“Ah, it will teleport you to the outpost in Frost Peak Mountain.”

“The one owned by Ethereal?”

“That’s the one.”

Sora stepped off the platform and went towards the flight service. Many of the players started to try out the portal, paying the fee of 1 silver to be instantly transported to the outpost. Many players that were passing by would use the portal since it was convenient, creating, even more, income for Sora.

…..

Spring was looking at the man in front of her, she had an irritated look on her face every time she saw him. He was currently telling a story about how rude Sora had been to their guild, asking Spring to take action against him. She could clearly see the loopholes in this man's story, making her rub her temples for a bit before putting her hand out to stop him.

“So you’re saying that Ethereal attacked you, then started to badmouth our guild?”

“That’s exactly how it happened!”

“Wait right there and don’t talk or move no matter what.”

At first, the man was confused but he followed his orders. After a short wait, another person who had been at the scene showed up. The man seemed to catch onto what was going on and started to sweat a bit. He squinted his eyes at the player, hoping this small signal would help him understand what was going on. Unfortunately, the player had no idea why he was squinting and ignored it completely.

“What happened today with Ethereal?”

The new person started to give a detailed description of the events that took place, completely exposing the man that had blatantly lied about what happened. He started to sweat more and more as the story went on, all the way up until the end. Spring had known the man had lied but didn’t think it was this exaggerated. She wasn’t really mad at him, just annoyed by the trouble he is trying to cause.

“Must you really try to cause trouble at every minute of the day?”

“But he ignored me!”

“Are you a child?! He obviously didn’t want to get involved with guild affairs so he avoided you. Then you thought it would be a bright idea to block his path and insult him for no reason? Even if he did ignore you, what does it have to do with the rest of the guild? Be a man and take care of your own problems, we can’t afford to start creating trouble already.”

“Are you afraid of hi-”

The man realized his mistake and stopped himself from going any further, grasping his mouth as if he was a kid that just said a bad word. Spring only looked at the man with disgust, if he didn’t have connections with her then he would already be gone. She controlled her anger and took a deep breath.

“It’s not that I’m afraid of him, in time I will be able to prove our guild is superior. As of now, our guild has barely been made, even if Phoenix Rising is still small, it has more than enough manpower to beat us. He also has control over a territory already, you heard about what happened to the players that were blacklisted from his territory. That area is too precious to be banned from it right now. Plus…”

Spring stopped talking as she thought about Blossom. She shook her head and looked at the man again. He had lowered his head further with each point made towards him. He looked and acted like a child, even when getting scolded he looked as if he was innocent. Spring could only sigh as she looked at him, waving him off. The other player stayed as Spring turned her attention towards him.

“How are the dungeon runs going?”

“Every group has entered, some of our guild members also said they saw a large group of Phoenix Rising members entering the dungeons.”

“Alright, we will continue as planned. Let’s just try to focus on becoming more powerful before sticking our nose in other people's business.”

…..

Sora went back to the auction house after landing in Var, seeing a few people who looked like elves along the way. He smiled at every one of them since it meant they had given him a huge profit. The area around the auction house had more elf looking players than anywhere else, with many still at the counters trying to find more of the Elven Dew Drops. Sora collected his 3,000 gold and left the auction house. If he would have known they would sell this fast then he would have waited to collect the money before going to his territory so he could build more.

He emptied any unnecessary items from his inventory in his bank before heading back towards the flight service, this time going to Tidal Wave Pass. After a fairly long ride on Luna, he returned to the Hidden Sky Branch Village. He wasn’t able to get the discount on the Elven Dew Drops this time, spending 20 silver per drop to purchase 5,000 drops. He would have bought more but he determined that it would probably stop selling after the hype for the product was over. Sora headed back to Var with his inventory full of pure profit. He put every drop into the auction house for 5 gold a piece with an estimated profit of 24,000 gold.