Chapter 339: The Desired Item

Sila—along with Alpha, Isaac and Midnight—rushed out of their headquarters. His badge created a mini holographic arrow pointing to the west. After running on the street for two hundred meters, however, they no longer needed the badge’s search function. That was because they could hear Miki’s shouts from a distance. Ahead of them was a crowd, though they could see Miki in the middle.

She was confronting five men, including the leader of the 16th squad. Sila could tell because the man had a badge like his, except with the number 16 printed on it.

“Miki, can’t you just simply back off? We’re on the same side. Please don’t make it hard on us,” The 16th Squad Leader asked politely.

“No! Not until you admit your team cheated me, Mugen! Your team arrived after I did. How could you get the booze?”

Mugen wore tailor-made fabric armor, perfectly fit for his physique. His long braided black hair reached his back. On his waist were two katana with different lengths. His behavior and speech were sleek. He gave off the vibe of a refined man.

“Erm... Miss Miki, this gentleman didn’t cheat, I assure you. I set aside his portion beforehand.” The man, who seemed to be the shop’s clerk, came out and explained what happened.

“Beforehand? That’s obviously cheating! Your sign here clearly says “No reservation. There are only thirty bottles for sales.” If it’s possible to reserve, I would have already done that. I wouldn’t have wasted my time getting into the queue.”

Sila and his squad’s members looked at the sign, which clearly said as much. Still, Mugen didn’t seem like a despicable person, his expression showing distress. Sila and his team were close enough to join and help Miki anytime, so they didn’t act rashly. They chose to wait for further explanations.

The liquor shop was a small business outlet operated by the 15th squad. They often hunted nearby monsters for their ingredients or purchased them from other squads, then brewed liquor that they would later sell, earning funds for their squad.

Now that there was a commotion in front of the shop, the leader of the 15th squad eventually came out. Seeing the man, Sila was thoroughly shocked. It was fortunate that he was wearing a mask, or else the people would notice the change in his expression.

“Is there a problem, everyone?”

Miki loudly expressed her rage. “There is! I’m a regular customer, Wolfe! You’re a leader, so you must take responsibility for letting a swindle happen in your shop!”

The 15th Squad Leader was a man by the name of Wolfe, or rather the person who Sila instantly recognized as Lone Wolf since he wasn’t wearing a mask. His face had many wrinkles and seemed to be older by twenty years. There were dark circles around his eyes, which looked rather hollow like they belonged to an undead. He also had a messy beard. Even Ratri wouldn’t recognize the man if she was present.

Following the man was an elder with a mask covering his face. As things stood, Sila guessed he must be Hermit.

“Actually, this is just a misunderstanding. We could only make these Snow Liquors because Mister Mugen here had brought us a rare ingredient called Snow Dust without charging. He just asked us to keep one bottle for him. Thus, that bottle is the thirty-first one, separate from the batch.”

With the shop owner’s explanation, bystanders finally understood the situation. In conclusion, Miki was just too quick to snap without asking. Things seemed like they were going to end well, but no, they didn’t.

“The 15th and 16th squads are on friendly terms. Your explanation fits the situation too well. Maybe you’re lying, who knows?” Miki continued to accuse.

Her claim was possible, at least. Still, Sila knew Lone Wolf’s personality. The man wouldn’t do something like that.

“Let’s get Miki out,” muttered Sila, to which Alpha and Isaac easily complied. They moved through the crowd and approached her.

“Let’s go back, Miss Miki,” Isaac told his comrade. He and Alpha tried to pull her back while Mugen and his people opened a way for them.

“Alpha! Isaac! Let me go! They cheated us! How can you guys forgive them so easily?!”

“You’re in the wrong here. Don’t make things up. Quit bringing more shame to our squad,” Alpha bluntly told her. From Sila’s observation, Alpha seemed to be the center of the 99th squad since he was the most reliable out of the four.

Turning his head to Mugen, Alpha apologized, “We’re sorry. Also, about the debt, we will pay it soon.”

“No problem. Please take care of Miki,” Mugen replied, his voice gentle.

“I can take care of myself! Don’t pretend to be nice!” Miki struggled, trying to break free from Alpha’s and Isaac’s restraints. Her shake-off technique was executed beautifully as if she were the embodiment of a martial arts manual. Since Alpha and Isaac weren’t serious in containing her, she easily broke free.

“You’re so annoying! Isaac, wrap her up!” Alpha frowned.

A long vine flew out of Isaac’s palm. It fastened around Miki’s body and lifted her up. However, she continued to struggle. While Isaac could hold her leg, Alpha failed to catch her, causing her head to knock the ground.

“Ouch! Are you for real? Catch me properly, man!” Miki yelled.

“Just behave yourself. Stop struggling!” Alpha complained as he pulled her other leg.

“Miss Miki, did you become heavier?” Isaac blurted without thinking. Noticing her returning sharp gaze, however, he bowed his head. “Ah... it’s all just my imagination, I guess.”

“Let’s get going. Sorry again for the trouble, everyone.” Alpha turned to bow his head to the other side.

Miki turned her head around, spotting Midnight and Sila from afar. “Midnight, you didn’t help me again. Oh! Leader, you’re also here. Help me, Leader!!”

The word Leader from Miki’s mouth seemed to come with a spotlight. As soon as she said it, all eyes were on Sila. Some people even paved ways in order to take a look at him. Silently, Midnight stepped aside as if he didn’t want others to misunderstand that the Leader in question was him.

Sila received the intense gazes from everyone. They seemed to alternate between his mask and his leader badge. If each of their gazes represented a matchstick, his body would have been burned to dust by now.

Since the attention was unavoidable, Sila joined the scene and introduced himself, “I’m the new leader of the 99th squad. I heard that my squad has caused a lot of trouble. Please accept my apology.”

Sila specifically directed his eyes toward Mugen since he knew that Miki had caused trouble for the 16th squad at least twice now.

“Our Leader has come! You all are finished! Let’s do it, Leader! Punish them all!”

Everyone mostly ignored her provocation, everyone except Mugen, that is. The man sensed some kind of expectation in Miki’s tone. Apparently, Miki expected a lot from this so-called new leader, even more so than Alpha, Isaac, or Midnight, all of which had been in the same squad with her for so long. It made him wonder why.

“Please excuse my rudeness. Can you tell me your name again, Mister New Leader? I didn’t hear you very well just now.”

In fact, Sila had deliberately skipped over his name. He actually wanted to avoid attention until he got his hands on information about the person he was pretending to be, the Thief Monarch Nero. However, it seemed it could no longer be delayed.

“Nero.”

After hearing his name, no one showed any particular reaction. It seemed Nero wasn’t as renowned as Sila had thought, which was very good for him. Unfortunately, Miki seemed to be displeased at the fact that no one knew about her new leader despite her initial reaction being identical to theirs.

“He is none other than Nero, the legendary Thief Monarch, you dimwits! Let’s do it, Leader. Don’t let them look down on us!”

Sila and his teammates regretted not asking Isaac to gag Miki’s mouth. Things seemed to end well many times, the other side forgiving them time and time again. However, Miki never stopped provoking. Eventually, one of the Mugen’s men couldn’t take it anymore.

“Enough! Our Leader already forgave you many times, but you never stop. This is beyond my endurance. What the heck is a Thief Monarch? I don’t know him. I bet he just made that title up himself. He is just the leader of a crappy squad, so his skills must be on the same level.”

“Stop!!” Mugen loudly scolded his man, causing the man to bow his head and stop talking.

Mugen turned to Sila, bowing his head. “I’m sorry my man lacks manners.”

“It’s okay. I don’t care,” replied Sila.

Lone Wolf suddenly interrupted, “I failed to notice it when you mentioned Nero, but the term Thief Monarch Nero indeed rings a bell. I heard of you a long time ago. It’s unexpected that I’m only just meeting you now after playing this game for years.”

Actually, everyone else also searched for the name Nero from their system windows. They wouldn’t normally do it when they came across strangers, but Miki’s claim that Nero was famous piqued their interest. Still, Nero’s stories were very old. The intel about him was dated several years ago.

“A player from the pioneer era. One of the Ten Rising Stars, the Thief Monarch, Nero.”

The Ten Rising Stars was a list of powerhouses, made by players back in the early days. The list included Zero and Lone Wolf. The list soon shrunk as it was unreliable, especially when a particular newcomer—Cross—publicly and single-handedly beat two people on the list. In the end, the list changed to Four Emperors. Thus, Ten Rising Stars were like an outdated fashion magazine—unreliable and unhelpful. Just based on the fact that Montra wasn’t included in one of the ten already indicated a lot about their inaccuracy.

As for Nero’s epics, excluding the tale about him establishing the first-ever bandit group, there were only rumors about him and his band robbing other players. Still, he was only in the list because he was a pioneer for bandits. The feats he had achieved in the past could be seen anywhere by now. Even his skills were said to be mediocre, with Magic Arrow seeming to be his only decent move. He tended to fight with a group, rarely acting alone.

Fortunately, the real Nero seemed to be a magic-type, or at least was viewed as one from the majority’s perspectives. Well, it wasn’t strange since most players are prone to try using magic abilities when they first enter the game. Magic points are the only visible energy resource in the initial stage. Magic Arrow is also a basic skill that any player can learn. It is easy to cast and very safe to use, so it suits a new player.

Most veteran players, Nero probably included, tended to avoid selecting their main energy type even when they met the qualifications. They would play the game using standard and item skills. It would appear as if they could use all three energy types this way, but that wasn’t the truth at all. As long as they hadn’t selected the energy type, their rank would be stuck at Squire Rank. More importantly, not selecting the energy type would block them from learning the most important supportive skills—Basic Qi, Basic Magic, or Basic Psychic—which severely hindered the growth of their characters.

As it turned out, Nero also relied a lot on Magic Arrow in his early days. No one, at least in the majority of players, really knew which energy type he belonged to. It wouldn’t even be strange if the real Nero chose to become a magic-type player like Sila had claimed.

Based on the information found in the forum, Nero’s life as a gamer was that of a total loser. He became renowned for the briefest of moments then disappeared like a firework. Whatever he attempted had failed. Trying to play a prank on a new player? The guy turned out to be Zero, and Nero was beaten instead. Trying to flirt with a young woman? She killed him and one of his most important items dropped. The saddest event of them all was that no one even noticed when he had left the game.

Going through the information he asked Zarnak to recite for him, Sila couldn’t help but pity the man. Maybe the 16th member’s previous speech would have infuriated the real Nero. Well, Sila wasn’t Nero. He wasn’t angry, just sympathetic.

“The Shadow Army doesn’t ask about the past. Let’s stop talking about what has already happened. It’s good that we came to an understanding. Please beg my pardon,” Sila ended the conversation and asked to leave. He didn’t want the situation to escalate any further.

Sila beckoned his squad to leave. Nevertheless, the same member from the 16th squad rudely shouted at him behind his back.

“You can run away today, but we will see tomorrow how ‘legendary’ you are!”

Mugen directed his sharp gaze at the man again before saying goodbye. “We have to go back as well. See you tomorrow.”

The conflict had ended, so the crowd gradually left the scene. Sila and his squad brought Miki back to their headquarters. Some people looked at them on their way back. Sila had a feeling that the situation where they had to carry Miki back like this must have happened before. At the very least, Alpha and Isaac seemed to know where their hands should go in order to avoid setting her off.

When they finally arrived at their headquarters, Sila asked the gang about the meaning behind the 16th squad’s member’s departing words.

“Back then... the man said something like we won’t be able to run away tomorrow. What did he mean?”

Alpha shook his head. “No clue. Maybe he was just being a jerk?”

“I don’t know... he seemed pretty serious about it. Maybe something will really happen tomorrow...” added Isaac.

Miki continued, “Whatever. If they come at us tomorrow, we will just beat them down, one by one!”

“It’s about the Monthly Re-Ranking Tournament,” Midnight interrupted.

“Ah, that!” Alpha just realized. “We never had a leader, so we never bothered.”

“What tournament?” asked Sila. Seeing Miki stop struggling, he told Isaac to let her down.

Isaac deactivated his magic, causing Miki to fall to the ground. No one helped her up, but she didn’t care in the least. She got up and wiped off the dirt on her clothing as if nothing had happened.

“It’s the Monthly Re-Ranking Tournament. It’s a system Cross put in place to measure the strength of his members. The Shadow Army was established a while back, but we only seized Colossia City recently. Knowing that the city was once called the Battle City, Sir Zero desired to revive its past glory by reintroducing the Monthly Re-Ranking Tournament. We didn’t have a squad leader so we never bothered to participate,” Alpha explained.

Sila’s objective wasn’t about taking care of the squad. He asked, “Can we not participate?”

“We could when the squad didn’t have a leader, but they said it’s mandatory when that isn’t the case. They want leaders from each squad to get to know each other. We have to at least participate, though I think we can give up halfway, maybe?”

“Should we do this kind of event? We’re at war and are currently surrounded by goblins. It isn’t the time to do something like this,” Sila expressed his opinion.

“No, Leader. This tournament is very important. The members of the Shadow Army don’t fight each other. Our ranking is mostly determined by accomplishments. However, for bottom-line squads like us, we don’t get many jobs to prove ourselves, so the event is another decisive way to promote. It also helps us get to know each other, making us ready to fight external foes.”

“Are you afraid you will lose, Leader? No worries. We’ll win this for sure!” Miki declared with absolute confidence.

“We?”

“The event doesn’t only measure the strength of leaders, but also the squad’s teamwork. There are many details. Do you want to read it yourself?” Isaac handed Sila a notice.

Sila flipped through it without thinking. However, Zarnak suddenly spoke up in his head, quite loudly, “My inattentive master, look at the reward.”

“The reward for placing first is a decent building with a free upgrade ticket, together with a swimming pool and training facilities. It can hold a hundred people inside.”

“Not that. I mean the consolation prize. Look at the fifth page.”

Sila hurriedly followed its instructions, looking at the said price. “D-Grade Short Dagger. Light and easy to use. Suitable for use in kitchens.”

“The image in this book is very small, but I spot Lady Igsia’s symbol engraved on the dagger’s handle. This dagger must have been made by a chieftain-level goblin. It could be a clue to help us find the sword.”

Sila squinted his eyes, intently glaring at the image. All he could see on the dagger’s handle was a small dot, however. In fact, the paper’s quality was quite bad. It could’ve just been an ink stain.

“Are you sure? You won’t tell me later that you misunderstood it, right?”

“My vision is different than yours. I can see what you can’t.”

Actually, there were only three real rewards for squads who got first to third place. The other rewards were miscellaneous and were granted to the squads with Best Teamwork, Best Qi-Type Player, Best Magic-Type Player, Best Psychic-Type Player, Most Popular, and etc. As a matter of fact, most squads participated in order to get a better rank for their squads. The rewards were just a bonus.

This was especially the case for the dagger, which was a consolation prize, so no one really cared about it. The condition to get this reward was to rank last in an activity.

Checking his squad members, Sila was relieved. ‘There is nothing to worry about. This reward is already in the bag.’