“Seven.” The warrior that Seven had defeated approached her again, “Hi. I’m Chaser. Chase to my friends.”

“Hey Chase.” She smiled at him.

The guy had become a lot more docile now that he’d had his ass soundly whooped.

“Cocky to my opponents,” he was amused to see that her emotions and thoughts showed directly on her face, “But not so cocky to those that have shown themselves to be skilled. But I really do have a terrible filter on my brain so if I say anything bad please forgive me.”

“Deal.” Seven gestured towards his teammates, “Have you guys been a team long?”

She and Chaser began to speak happily and soon the others followed in their steps.

“You know, we’re free for a couple of hours.” Nastin approached TidalWave and Third.

He definitely wanted to fight a lot more against this mysterious team that they’d challenged.

Third sighed, “We definitely don’t have anything to do urgently. What’s a couple of hours if it means we have fun and practice.”

He knew he would probably sneak off to shop between the fights anyway.

“We should start doing group battles.” TidalWave wanted to take it a step further.

He liked what he had seen when watching the fight Seven had won. Now that he’d seen her growing in skill and winning against skilled opponents that outnumbered her it caused his blood to boil. He wanted to grow even stronger before she surpassed him.

He secretly wanted to know what would happen if he fought against two or more of the enemy players as well.

Third sometimes thought that TidalWave was just as transparent as Seven, “I think I might go for some fights against your wizard.”

At his words, Glacier waved hello and walked towards them.

“Two wizards in one spot isn’t something I thought I’d see so soon.” Third commented as she joined them, “Hello.”

“Hi hi.” Glacier was an incredibly cheerful girl despite her rather energetic demeanour in the arena, “Yeah I know right. Nice staff.”

She still had the beginner staff.

[Archy has won the duel against player: Grenda]

Archy had won the duel without difficulty. He had been absolutely delighted to meet a fellow highly skilled archer and so he hadn’t held back and had taken out both of her eyes within seconds. Unfortunately, he didn’t critical hit but despite her veil of darkness he somehow managed to find her immediately and end the match.

He had done the same as Seven and dodged all of the arrows shot towards him.

“Wow.” Grenda seemed more amazed than dispirited, “That was god damn amazing.”

“Haha,” Archy laughed and looked bashful, “Thanks. You were really good too. Are you guys here long?”

He clearly wanted to fight more.

“We can fight against them for another two hours.” Third called out to him, “Maybe you and TidalWave can show them your teamwork.”

“Oh-oh-oh” Roxxy reacted to Third’s words, “You guys will love it.” She gestured towards Seven, “They’re so strong together. They fight Seven for hours a day two on one so they can get in some practice, and because they’re afraid to get their asses kicked if they try to fight her alone.”

The Dark Horse members and Roxxy’s team laughed.

“Well, it is true.” TidalWave admitted to the giggling teams, “We do fight Seven as a duo for hours a day. It’s good practice.”

“Oh yeah?” Nastin was interested, “How about we see how good you two are together.”

Nastin and Grenda decided to enter the arena together. It seemed like they were a duo rather than Chaser who informed them that he usually practiced with Glacier. TidalWave and Archy entered after them. They had each given their opponents a rundown of their skills and now the paladin was confident he would last longer.

To Seven’s surprise, it didn’t turn out to be a quick match like she thought it would. TidalWave and Archy suddenly had to contend with a lot more attacks compared to when they fought Seven, but the real challenge was Nastin.

The paladin of light was a monster compared to the first match when he fought against TidalWave. Using Grenda’s invisible arrows as cover fire he jousted evenly with TidalWave as he avoided Archy’s arrows. His sword was wreathed in a golden aura that extended his attack range and he chanted buffing magic which increased the speed of his attacks and movements. Grenda also got a speed buff to her attacks.

Unfortunately, Nastin’s skill couldn’t compensate for Archy’s dominance over Grenda. Nastin’s partner quickly took an arrow to the chest and jumped back as she was suddenly thrown into a defensive position. Archy skirted around to catch up to her as she ran and TidalWave made sure to block off Nastin. Without the cover of his ally’s arrows, Nastin pushed the offensive trying to defeat TidalWave so that he could meet up with Grenda.

“Hot damn.” Chaser looked down in amazement as Grenda fell to Archy and then TidalWave decimated Nastin, “You fight against them?” he asked Seven.

“I haven’t actually won yet-”

“She averages around three minutes against them.” Spark Joy walked up to them as Seven was putting herself down, “She gets very close to killing them both but they’ve had a few hundred battles to get used to fighting her.

Chaser let out a whistle. He couldn’t imagine fighting for a full seven minutes alone with those two monsters.

“Why don’t you show them?” Roxxy stalked Spark Joy and popped up from behind her back, looking directly at Seven, “It’s fun to watch you three fight.”

She pointed at Seven. She wanted to see Seven fighting one against two. She knew that Seven probably wouldn’t win but she loved watching the fights. It gave her a lot to analyse when she viewed her teammate fighting.

“No-no I couldn’t possibly… it would be rude to the Dark Horse guys to fight each other.” Seven hesitated.

She had already taken a lot of the spotlight.

Nastin and the others had just appeared in the platform as she spoke, “Oh.” he seemed extremely interested, “We’ll be here for a lot more fights. I want to see you fight against those two.”

He had just come back from getting his ass whooped so he wanted to see how they fought when they were in an extended battle. He was already formulating plans of attack against them both and was confident that as long as Grenda regained her usual confidence they could win. He also wondered if Chaser might become more motivated after seeing TidalWave fight against the same opponent he had. They were both warriors that were extremely skilled but Chaser had slacked off a lot. Even if Chaser was at full strength Nastin had his doubts.

The entire Dark Horse team could tell TidalWave was on another level.

“Okay.” Seven said happily.

The Dark Horse team looked at each other curiously. They had watched Grenda and Nastin get creamed so they were curious as to how Seven would fare.

It turned out she fared very well. The teams became quiet as they watched TidalWave and Archy try their hardest to reach and kill Seven. The two had quickly spread out in their usual formation of Archy in the mid-range closing in on Seven and TidalWave distracting her with close combat.

“Flame arrow.”

“Reaper’s fury.”

“Shadow dance.”

Each attack from TidalWave and Archy was executed perfectly in sync. They fired off abilities and tried their hardest to close in on her but she slipped out of their attacks and fired off magic in retaliation.

Nastin made sure to watch them all closely. Despite his curiosity about Seven’s playing style he actually paid the most attention to Archy. This was a fight between three opponents that knew each other’s moves intricately and could react before their opponents had even made their moves. Nastin could use this opportunity to study TidalWave and Archy and try to find any weaknesses. Archy was the key to the TidalWave and Archy duo. With his cover fire being so accurate it bordered on cheating he allowed TidalWave to unleash his full potential. As it was, Seven would never defeat them.

But it appeared that she’d become extremely motivated after winning against Chaser and Grenda. She played the field extremely well. She never let Archy and TidalWave chase her into a corner and she conserved her mana diligently.

“Wind blast.”

-Miss

TidalWave dodged her wind blast only to hit empty air as Seven sidestepped his retaliatory attack.

“Hot damn.” Chaser’s eyes were as wide as saucers, “No wonder she killed me so quickly.”

TidalWave had a deadly disposition about him. Every attack was aimed to kill and if Seven fired back at him there was a high chance he would dodge or block it with his sword. He also had the benefit of forcing her back with the help of Archy’s arrows.

Even then, he was occasionally hit by her attacks.

Nastin nodded, “If she’s used to fighting against this kind of opponent it’s no surprise.”

He could see she was conserving more mana than it seemed. Despite firing off a steady stream of attacks she knew TidalWave’s movements well enough to dodge without using her stone shift skill most times and she recovered her mana between dodges as she avoided Archy’s arrows. It wouldn’t last infinitely at this stage of the game but once she had a few more levels and items it would become an invaluable skill.

Every one of the Dark Horse members could see that this was an insane battle. If Seven had been hesitating when she fought against Grenda and Chaser this was her when she was sure that she knew her opponent’s abilities. She had thrown caution to the wind and tried everything to kill her opponents and avoid dying. After six and a half minutes she ran out of mana and TidalWave finally managed to catch up to Seven and kill her.

“A new record.” Archy praised her as they all appeared back next to their teammates, “Good fight.”

“Good fight.” “Good fight.” Seven and TidalWave agreed with him.

“I shall go next.”

Third surprised everyone by volunteering himself to fight and winning four battles in a row. In the end, he lost against Blastar, the rather quiet paladin of healing. Blastar joyfully healed himself for all the damage that Third dealt and managed to get in close enough to kill him. Nastin looked keen to fight Third as well but held back as he saw that his teammates wanted another go.

Seven and the team quickly began to realise what it meant to be a renowned team.

These people weren’t well known for no reason. Within half an hour, half of them had already begun catching onto their enemy’s playstyles and were forming counter attacks. Wins were still rare but such a little time frame meant that even this amount of improvement was simply monstrous. But there was a simpler explanation.

‘They were already this good.’ Seven came to the same conclusion the rest of her team had, ‘They were just rusty.’

The Dark Horse team was like a group of skilled people that had never had to actually utilise their skills. They were rusty in places but more importantly, they had never really thought of different ways to use their attacks and had never encountered opponents that could cause them to go all out.

The moment they became serious they completely changed.

Nastin quickly became nearly undefeated and when Seven fought against him she quickly found herself dodging frantically. She tried her hardest to make him utilise every move he had so she could memorise his playing style.

‘I might not be able to beat him this time,’ She thought as she felt an aura-covered sword slash through her, ‘But next time will be different.’

She definitely had to attack him before he finished chanting his buffs.

Even Third was anticipating the fights enough that he put off his shopping trip in favour of fighting more duels. It was rare that he got to practice his rift magic against people that weren’t Seven and Archy. He also had the second-highest win rate of the team behind TidalWave. Unfortunately, he lost against both Blastar and Nastin frequently as their classes countered his own.

The two hours passed quickly and the Dark Horse team grumbled as Nastin reminded them that they had to go, “We’ll add each other as friends so you can all bang at each other’s heads later.”

The players all added each other as friends and parted on good terms. Considering how they’d started out when they both met it was a drastic difference. TidalWave and Archy were particularly sad as they had been having the time of their lives.

“Seven,” Third tilted his staff into the street, “We should both go to check out the magi guild.”

They watched the Dark Horse members walk away and then the team began to head out to do their own things.

Seven and Third had barely spent a coin during the week that had passed because their frontline was skilled enough to keep monsters from reaching them. When taking into account their own skills they had hardly been scratched by enemy attacks. Their supplies of consumables were untouched and even bigger than before and they even had spare ingredients in the bank to sell off if they needed emergency funds. Other than the spiked killer that repelled enemies they hadn’t wasted a single bean or mushroom on themselves. The players in the city had begun to rise in number drastically and Third predicted that soon someone would become an alchemist and they’d be able to start selling off their ingredient stash for a lot of gold.

In short, they had a lot of money.

Seven herself had forty-five gold saved up. They had killed hundreds and thousands of monsters, making short work of even the biggest groups. She was looking forward to buying the incredibly powerful wand she had seen the last time she’d gone to the magi guild. If she hit someone with it now she would probably blow them up.

“Welcome, Mr Third and Miss Seven.”

A familiar face greeted them as Lass seemed to be the attendant in charge of the store this time. Seven waved hi to him and looked straight towards the wand she had seen last time.

[Advanced Wand of the Magi: A wand that has been expertly crafted and imbued with devastating magic by a skilled Magi. Advanced Magic Blast: Deal double your Intelligence as magic damage. Cost: 2 mana. To buy: 20 gold.]

It would cost her almost half of her earnings which she had gotten from killing countless monsters and completing quests. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that if her team hadn’t been so powerful it would have taken her weeks to come close to purchasing it.

The truth was that every purchase came with certain drawbacks. If she spent this much money on one thing it was possible that she would miss out on even better items in the future. If she bought the want she would most definitely turn into a killing machine because her damage would more than double, but she would also become a glass cannon, unable to take many hits before she died.

Also, each advanced magic blast was now two mana instead of one.

“I can see you are eyeing our finer products. The finest wares you will find until reaching Lux.” Lass spoke in his usual formal tone, “However might I make a recommendation?”

“Of course.” Seven was happy to see what Lass would offer, although she was certain she would leave with the wand.

Lass brought out a small box from underneath the counter as though he had been hiding it from others.

“Perhaps it is a bit expensive but I feel that it may be within your price range.”

He took out a small blue ring.

“Hoo.” Third was watching from the side while perusing his own store window.

[Ring of Mana Regeneration: Regenerate 0.5 mana each second. Costs 30 gold.]

“Oh damn.” Third and Seven eyed the ring greedily.

Unfortunately, it seemed that Lass was only offering it in Seven’s shop window.

Lack of mana regeneration was incredibly annoying to them right now. Seven’s wisdom was at 30 which meant that she regenerated 0.3 mana every second. This ring would more than double her mana regeneration. If she bought this ring and stayed with her current wand she might not have any mana troubles at all. If she bought the wand then she wouldn’t be able to also buy the ring.

“How much are you missing?”

“I’m five gold off if I buy the wand.” She despaired.

“I can give you a loan.” Third said simply.

He was even richer than her somehow.

“Heck yes.” Seven suddenly realised this was an option, “Are you okay with giving away five gold now though? Isn’t there something you want to buy.”

She felt bad that she was scabbing money off of him. He didn’t even know if she would actually pay him back.

“I run a tough bargain.” Third told her honestly, “Since I don’t foresee any trouble in our farming for the next while, I want you to give me every single coin that you pick up from drops until we have made up the five gold coin payment. Considering our farming speed that should get the payment out of the way quickly.

“Oh.” That was a tough bargain, but she had enough supplies now that she could go without picking up money for a day or two, “Let’s do it.”

A few seconds later Seven marvelled at her ring and wand. Both had given her massive power boosts. If Archy and TidalWave hadn’t bought anything during their trip she could probably beat them in a duel. But that was wishful thinking. She knew that she still wouldn’t be able to win.

The attendant was gazing at her curiously.

“Miss, may I ask you a personal question?” Lass saw her nod and continued, “The magi guild has divined that you know and have been seen with a person called Attracting. May I confirm if that is correct?”

Third and Seven groaned.

Nothing good ever happened when that guy came up in conversation.

‘Then again we did just have a couple of fun hours playing with new people because of him.’ She thought to herself.

“Yes, I know him. He’s a friend.” She grew curious, “Why do you ask?”

“Ah, you see.” Lass seemed to churn his thoughts so as to say only what needed to be said, “The magi guild is rather curious about this individual. You see, within a few days he managed to requisition the help of a couple of large organisations and their troops for a rather special mission. One of those would be our own magi guild.”

“Oh?” Seven wanted him to continue.

“He has recently managed to convince the city lord to send out troops of paladins and has gotten the local bishop to make our guild lend magi to attend to the success of this same mission.”

Third frowned, “What’s the mission?”

He couldn’t even imagine how a single player had already managed to influence the game to this extent.

“He claims to have discovered a dragon hoard and the source of corruption. However due to the increased number of corrupted creatures he cannot reach the hoard without the city’s help. Of course the theocracy of Verm has no need for material wealth, however, our organisations cannot ignore the presence of the corruption’s source which Attracting claims to be able to eliminate.”

Lass’s words made Seven and Third frown harder.

They hadn’t received any notifications from their dragon treasure quest. One of the prerequisites to keeping the quest was to make sure that Attracting didn’t find out about the dragon treasure. If they had failed the quest then they would have been informed the second Attracting had found out about it. However, he clearly knew about it but they hadn’t failed the quest.

It was a strange turn of events.

“When will you head out?” Third wanted to grab as many details as possible.

“When Attracting asks us to.” Lass stated simply, “He stated that he still has to obtain some reinforcements.”

“Reinforcements?” Seven pondered out loud, “Who could that be?”

Seven swore she saw Lass’s eyes flash red for a split second, “I am not sure. However, I am very curious as to how he obtained this information. I cannot seem to discern its origin.” He looked up at her, “Do you happen to know?”

Suddenly Third froze and Seven looked at him curiously, letting the NPCs question go unanswered, “What’s up.”

Third was busy reading over a private message he had received.

He snorted as he sorted through the contents, “It’s Attracting. He is messaging me to ask if I will join him in a dragon treasure hunt.”

Seven suddenly received a few messages from the team asking if she and Third had received a private message from Attracting.

“That means…” Seven was piecing it all together.

“I believe,” Third closed the message from Attracting and ignored it, “That this means we are the reinforcements he is waiting for.”

“I’m not.” Seven hadn’t received a single message, “Why you guys?”

“Because we are strong.” Third pulled a face, “But of course, you are too. I believe he simply hasn’t noticed your talent and skill.”

“No need to coddle me.” Seven shook her head at Third, “So our team is the reinforcements?”

“No.” Third looked at Lass speculatively, “I believe he must have sent a message to every player he has met with. The contents within promise a lot of items, gold, and glory at the end of the quest. I do not think many people would be able to resist that.” he tilted his head, “I emphasise, a lot of gold.”

Third showed her the message and she whistled. Attracting was offering them up to a thousand gold each. That was an insane amount.

He messaged the team and confirmed that every single one of them had completely rejected the invitation outright. Unfortunately, he didn’t know how many skilled players Attracting had interacted with. There couldn’t be that many skilled players currently active in Lum.

“Ah,” Lass was suddenly bathed in a golden light, “It appears the mission is beginning. I will have to close the shop for the duration of this expedition.”

He looked at them apologetically and they hurriedly left the store.

“Does that attention seeker find it impossible to not make life hard for us at every turn.” Third said grimly.

“I know what you mean.” A new voice called out to them and they turned to find themselves facing a priest in white robes, “Good day codlets.”

It was the resident priest of Torkay, Barnacle.

The priest smiled at them but it was strained, “Unfortunately it appears that despite my warnings Attracting has found out about the dragon’s treasure.”

“Ah.” Seven had the feeling that they were going to lose the quest.

“However something very strange is occurring around that man.” Barnacle frowned, “It seems physically impossible for him to have found out about the treasure. He has not been told by you that it exists. He has not consulted with the paladins that fought the dragon to divine the treasure’s location and instead has somehow come up with every correct answer on his own.”

Barnacle shook his head as though trying to dispel his confusion.

“As my prophetic dreams have left me quite clueless I am afraid I cannot discern how Attracting discovered the information he did. However,” He waved his hand and Third and Seven could see the treasure quest window in front of them, “It would be remiss of me to simply dispel my request and abandon your group. It was not your doing that caused these events to pass. So we will have to compromise.”

[Dragon’s Legacy. Deep within the Signet Woods lays the lair of a once-mighty dragon. Though now deceased, in life the dragon was widely feared as one of the rulers of the Signet Woods and nobody knows what wonders may appear in its collection. Find the dragon’s treasure hoard deep within the woods before others do. Quest condition: Quest will fail once the treasure has been located by other players or NPCs. The quest will automatically cancel if the details are shared with the player: Attracting.]

Before her eyes, the words of the quest began to change.

[Dragon’s Legacy. Deep within the Signet Woods lays the lair of a once-mighty dragon. Though now deceased, in life the dragon was widely feared as one of the rulers of the Signet Woods and nobody knows what wonders may appear in its collection. Find the source of the corruption that has moved into the dragon’s lair and destroy it. Quest completion: The source of corruption is destroyed. Quest condition: Quest will fail if the corruption’s source escapes.]

Two small orbs appeared in Seven and Third’s hands.

[You have received quest item: Eye of Light]

Now they had to find this ‘source of corruption’ and destroy it. But the quest didn’t specify failure for allowing others to find the treasure any longer.

“What-” Seven went to ask Barnacle a question and then realised that she was speaking into thin air.

The priest had disappeared.

“Now.” Third looked grim, “We have a time limit.”