Chapter 6: The Return of Lone Wolf

At the main branch of the Victorious Wolves Sect, the core members of the sect consisting of six people had been confused by the mysterious disappearance of their leader during the conference. They were now stressfully sitting and discussing. Then, a black shadow suddenly emerged on the floor in the meeting room on the chair of the guild head.

All the people inside the room panicked at the sudden occurrence. They each drew their weapons and clutched it tightly, waiting for the upcoming event that might be a sudden invasion of enemy’s guilds.

Soon, the body of a young man dressed in an elite wuxia clothing appeared. When everyone saw the familiar figure, they disarmed.

“Leader!” shouted everyone with the tone that expressed relief.

“Hmm? Everybody is still here? Do we have a meeting that lasts a week long now? I’m just not here for a while but our meeting had become more intense, huh?” said the man jokingly.

“It’s not funny! Where have you been? Everyone was looking for you. We couldn’t even get in touch with you.”

A young woman with graceful looks complained. She had long braided-hair over her shoulder and was wearing a male wuxia outfit.

“I went to do a hidden quest. It’s a special area so we couldn’t contact each other. Are you worrying about me that much, Ratri?”

The lady’s cheeks turned slightly pink.

“Who is worried about you?! I am just worried about the guild. The guild that had its leader suddenly disappear for a week!”

“I am truly sorry. It’s a quest that I was forced to do. When the quest condition was met, it instantly teleported me there.”

Then, the old man with a white mustache stepped forward.

“Easy, easy, it’s a good thing that the leader has come back safely. By the way, could you please tell us that quest’s detail?”

“Oh, Hermit. It’s a duo quest that I almost forgot about it. It’s the first quest I ever received though. Nevertheless, I can’t tell you much detail, otherwise my reward will be confiscated.” answered the man.

Hermit understandingly nodded, “Then, could you at least tell us what the reward is?”

Hermit knew well that most of the hidden quests’ rewards are good. With even the restriction that forbade the quest holder to share information to anyone else, the reward should be at least B Grade item.

“It’s a card.”

“A card? Just one?” said Ratri. Everyone in the room also wondered what kind of quest would give only a single card while taking one week to finish it, “show us.”

The man opened the system window.

“It cannot be removed from my window so I will read it out loud for you guys.”

In this game, a player cannot look into another player’s system window. Except for players equipping Peek Card which was a C-grade card that dropped from One-Eye Bats.

[(S) Pride Card – Level 1]

[All basic stats will increase by 50% when you aren’t in a party.]

[You will earn only 10% of all experience points from now on.]

The whole room suddenly showed expressions full of shock and delight. The core members were shocked on how good this card was, and delighted that with this card; their leader’s strength would be increased by half. And a half of his strength was considered very significant.

Afterward, it was Hermit, the guild’s strategist, who broke the silence of the room.

“Formerly, if I didn’t hear wrongly, the leader said that it’s a duo quest. May I ask whether another person also got the same reward?”

“No, it seemed like he got another card. But the usefulness of his card shouldn’t be much different from mine.”

“Then who is that person? Is he an ally or an enemy?”

Everyone wanted to ask this exact question as well. Being a friend or foe, the result would be very different. If that person was an ally, then their alliance would get stronger; but if that person was an enemy, it would mean a more dangerous opponent had shown up.

“I don’t know too.”

The room quieted down again, and it was Hermit again who spoke up, “You did a one-week long quest together, why don’t you know?”

“I really can’t explain the detail since it’s related to the quest. But I can say that he may be neither an ally nor an enemy.”

“Do you mean, he is a guildless player?” asked Ratri.

Guildless players or individual players refer to the players who weren’t affiliated to any guild. In this game, there were many kinds of people who wanted to seek for something they couldn’t find in real life. Some sought for authority, some sought for money, some sought for strength, but some were just here to relax. Many people didn’t have any interest in doing quests, leveling, and in-game authority; they came here for their personal reasons.

“It may be so since I saw him in Beginner’s Clothing.”

All the members were glad. If that guy was still a new player, then the chance he still wasn’t in any guilds was high. If they could invite him into their guild, he would be a good asset.

“Well, I know what everyone’s thought is. It’s fine to invite him, but please don’t importune him so much. You all are forbidden to use violence against him as well. That’s our sect’s policy. Maybe he just wants to enjoy the game.”

“We know that, leader. Now, could you please tell us about that person’s identity?” hurriedly asked Hermit.

“Well... his right arm looked weird; it’s kind of like an arm of a golem. His location is now likely to be on the Island of Beginnings. But judging by his potential, it won’t take long until he arrives at the Main Continent.”

“Is he that good?”

“Not much. But he could fight against fifty Level 80 Squire Rank wolves at the same time.”

Everyone in the room was shocked by the fact that ‘not much’ of their leader meant the new player being able to fight against fifty Level 80 Squire Rank wolves.

“You’re exaggerating, right? How could a new player do that?” argued Ratri.

“He could. He is able to use Qi of Little Tiger, Qi of Little Fish, Bone Restructuring Qi, Basic Qi, and maybe Recovering Qi as well.”

“What!? A new player could use qi? And He even possesses two of Qi of Little Divine Beings, on top of that! How is that possible?” shouted Ratri.

“It’s possible, I myself am the one who transmitted him those qi... except for Recovering Qi though, since he already had it from the start.”

Everyone in the room stared at their leader speechlessly.

“Hmm? What about it?”

The man played dumb.

“Don’t play dumb. Other qi aside, how dare you transmit Qi of Little Tiger and Qi of Little Fish to an outsider? More importantly, didn’t you once tell us you couldn’t transmit those?” said Ratri.

“It’s because that place is special, it has five times the recovery rate than normal and I could see that he had a potential for growth,” answered the man, “Calm down, it doesn’t mean I lose anything by transmitting qi to others, so it’s fine. I just had to stabilize my qi for a moment back then.”

Basically, Qi of Little Tiger and Qi of Little Fish are two of Qi of Little Divine Beings series; including Qi of Little Tiger, Qi of Little Fish, Qi of Little Bird, and Qi of Little Turtle.

Normally, nobody could transmit these qi to another person since it’s required an enormous amount of qi points to perform such tasks. By the way, qi point was a secret stat that wasn’t shown in status window (if it isn’t upgraded.) The maximum qi point of this man was insufficient to transmit any Qi of Little Divine Beings. However, in the mansion, he had found that even qi point’s recovery rate was five times higher than normal. He then had tried to convey some qi to Sila.

The very long time that he’d had to take to stabilize his qi after transmitting qi to Sila, even with five times recovery rate of the mansion, had been concrete evidence that transmitting the Qi of Little Divine Beings really required a lot of resources.

Sila had been lucky too. Usually, when Qi of Little Divine Beings entered one’s body, one’s health point would be decreased constantly until one died or was able to control it. But with the mansion’s health point’s recovery rate that surpassed health point’s declining rate, Sila could somehow survive, though it took a lot of time and he felt very painful.

These two problems had always prevented this man to transmit the Qi of Little Divine Beings to his guildmates even though he would love to. However, all of them had been solved simultaneously by the existence of the Mansion of the Seven Deadly Sins.

Later, the leader got many complaints from Ratri. Everyone somehow smiled in a mild manner with that sight. They all knew that the leader and Ratri were actually a couple in real life that had decided to play the game together. However, except for the core members present, all the other guildmates only knew Ratri as a vice leader. In fact, the leader didn't care if everyone knew about Ratri being his girlfriend. But it was Hermit who told him that he should keep this a secret to reflect a good sect’s governance.

“Well, let the meeting end now. My ears are going numb.”

Then everyone dispersed and announced the reappearance of their leader to other guild members. They said that the leader just had left to practice, and now he was back, with the strength that increased tremendously.

When everyone went out of the room, the man went outside to the terrace and circulated Qi of Little Bird. Then, he soared like a majestic bird onto the door facade.

The praises could be heard from the audiences below, admiring their leader’s skill.

The man gestured his hand for everyone to silence then everyone was quiet down in unison.

“Now I have completed my intense training. Sorry to make everyone worried. With my current strength, I guarantee that our sect will be the one who wins this year’s war event!!”

This was the action Hermit begged him to do some work: at least motivating the guildmates’ morale.

“Then, please excuse me.”

“Leader? Where are you going? We should celebrate with you completing your training.”

One member shouted, and everyone seemed to agree with him.

“Let’s get it ready in another seven days, then. I am going to hunt Silver Griffin and will surely bring its meat to feed everyone. There’s a rumor that its meat is very tasty, we will know soon whether it is true or not.”

He declared and then soared, disappearing from everyone’s sight.

The guildmates suddenly buzzed because they all knew that Silver Griffin was a magical beast that nobody in the game could solo-kill it; this fact alone was enough to indicate its fearsome abilities. Still, their leader planned to hunt it alone! With the goal of getting its meat, the fight would get much harder since he has to tear it off alive; because in Monster Soul, when a monster died, it became a shattered light in three seconds.

“If he can get the meat, we will surely win the war event this year.” said one member with admiration.

Silver Griffin, Marquis Rank, Level 600. Swift and flying-type magical beast, together with high physical and magic endurance, and it could even use magic spells.

The yell got louder to the versatility of their leader. Everyone was proud to be a member of this guild.

Ratri felt glad as she saw these incidents. Her loved one was truly majestic. She still remembered the day back then when their guild only consisted of mere seven persons.

While Ratri smiled lovingly, Hermit’s voice cried out.

“Leader! I told you to incite them, not to go outside! Your last week’s assignments are still unfinished, yet you are going to leave for another week!? Do you have any idea who will have to clear your work instead!? Leader! Come back!”

Everybody turned their heads to Hermit and thought:

‘Leader is skipping his work again...’

Ratri giggled. She took a glance at the wooden sign in front of the sect, which was the first guild sign that her lover had wrote.

‘Victorious Wolves Sect, a home of all Wuxia,’ with the signature: ‘Lone Wolf.’

***

Meanwhile, Sila appeared in some strange place. It was a sweet pink room with colorful flowers patterns. He was confident that he hadn’t known of anywhere like here.

While he was still confused, he could spot a young lady who had fallen asleep in a sitting pose on the chair, putting her face down on the table in the middle of the room.

This woman was considered very pretty. She was wearing a pink dress with lace. Her skin was also smooth white.

Sila looked around the room. Soon he realized that since he had been teleported from the Hall of Beginnings, this room must be within the Hall of Beginnings. The time had passed for seven days; Mister Crow would have gone back, so this girl must be Lucy, Crow’s granddaughter.

With the thought that he didn’t want to disturb Lucy’s sleep, Sila walked toward the door, but it didn’t open.

‘I have to find a red button,’ thought Sila as he remembered that Crow once tried pressing a red button.

However, Sila couldn’t find any button.

While he didn’t know what to do, his system window alarmed.

[You have received one message.]

Sila read the message and then frowned.

“Come meet me on the second floor of the Town of Beginnings’ restaurant after you get this message. Be fast.”

‘There isn’t any sender name on the message, so who is the sender? I haven’t been acquainted with any player yet, have I?’

Sila tried to wake Lucy up, but her sleep was a very deep one. No matter how many times Sila had poked, called out, or slightly shook her body; she was still sound asleep. Since she was a lady he wasn’t close to, Sila was afraid of offending her too much. So, he stopped trying to wake her in the end.

Afterward, Sila decided to circulate his qi while waiting for Lucy to wake up herself. He then entered the meditation state.