The next day, Shen Li woke up early at six in the morning, when the alarm rang. He continued the same as the previous day, with some changes. While eating breakfast, Shen Li checked the school forums and saw that the School’s President had announced a tournament would be held. Every department would have to compete among themselves. The information about the tournament would be released at the school tomorrow.
Shen Li saw that their class president had created a group for the class and had invited him. Shen Li accepted the invitation and saw that students were chatting about the tournaments. He decided to leave that for a while and continue his work. First, he went to the researchers' website, answered the questions about the Liberty Statue, and received 450,000 deposits. Together with a deposit, came a formal letter asking him if he would like to join them. There are a lot of benefits they offer, and Shen Li had to say he likes the offer.
But there were also disadvantages to joining them as well. For example, he would have to move to the Main Star and live there. His identity would have been exposed then, and it would arouse the suspicion of the people since he had claimed to have lost his memories. He might even be taken as a spy from some unknown race or country, so until he became unreplaceable as the Pharmacist, and had protection from the strong backers, he would keep his identity hidden. Shen Li knows very well that he would not be able to keep his identity hidden forever with the high technology here, and he needs to join someone strong enough to protect him in case his identity got exposed.
The researchers were waiting for the reply on their side anxiously. They first wanted to track him but realized that the master had some shielding device, and decided to connect directly so as not to anger the master.
“Do you think the master will agree to join us?”
“Who knows, maybe the master will join, maybe not. Most of these masters had strange tempers.”
“It would be great if the master would join us.”
“Hum, how are you so sure that the other side is the master? It could be a fraud as well.” Another researcher from the cut into their conservation.
“You are just jealous that the master was able to answer the questions about the Great Wall.”
"Now that I think, it isn't the Great Wall your project? You have not been able to research any new information for a long time." The other chimed in as well. They know this researcher very well. He is the relative of one of the directors and came in here with a back door. He had always acted like he owned this institute and didn't take the work seriously.
Just then, a reply from the master arrived that he rejected the offer. The man was happy and said, "See, it is a fraud. Only you guys would think it was some master. I will report to the chi_'' his words did not finish as another reply came from the master. The master said they would like to remain anonymous and they would like to discuss the terms with them. The other looked at the research with a face saying that he was the dumb idiot here. The researcher could not take the stares from the researchers around him and left embarrassedly.
We should inform the chief.” The zombie face who was standing among them reminded the others, and one of them called the chief.
The chief arrived at the same time as the call from the other side came in. The call connected, and the mechanical voice, obviously from a voice changer, came from the other side.
"I am 'Revealer'. I saw your invitation, but there are things I could not agree to."
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"Ok, then let's adjust the terms. We had time for it." The chief was happy that there was still a chance to recruit this master.
Their discussion goes on, the researchers did not like that the other party wanted to remain anonymous. But, they have to agree, since it would be too much of a loss if they didn't. They also add small traps in the contract which will make that contract work to their advantage. After finishing the contract, they send it to the other party to read and sign.
Shen Li looked at the document very carefully, looking on the Star Net for anything he did not know. He took his time and examined the document very closely, noting down the trap he found in it. After checking for a second time, he couldn't see any more traps, but his instincts were screaming that he missed something important.
He could not think of any problem, then his attention was disturbed when a new message said that he had received 8.55 million for the questions he answered this morning. Money! He realized the fact he was missing, he immediately went to check, and sure enough, it was stated in one of the terms that 'you will only receive the money once you finish the project.'It means that he would only be able to get money if he completed a project.
It might look like a normal term, but since it is about providing information, it was a critical point. When providing information there would be many things he did not know about, and it would be hard to complete a project. They would be able to take advantage that he could fill 70 % to 90% only, making him provide information for free. It was this critical point that made his instinct ringing. He also asked to add the period the contract would expire and the terms to let him resign if he no longer wanted to do this work, so he would not be bonded to the association forever.
Shen Li sent the notes of the things he wanted to change and asked them to change this term especially, to make it so he would receive money on the percentage he was able to complete. The chief and researchers were a little embarrassed that their traps were discovered but compromised his terms and changed them before sending the new contract again. Shen Li read through this one, and once he was sure that there were no more traps, he signed it.
After finishing the signing, he logged into the virtual world since the energy stones had been left in the room for only a night. So it would not have much effect. Once he logged in, he was standing in front of the forest. He first went to his cave behind the waterfall, the cave was filled with water energy. It was the perfect time to absorb them, and Shen Li immediately took the chance, sitting down in the circle of energy stones, and started absorbing the energy. It took six hours for him to absorb the energy in both energy stones and air, and reach level-3 stage1.
After he finished absorbing, he sat there for a while and cultivated his energy inside to make sure he wouldn't experience an energy imbalance. His wood ability, which was already level-3 stage 4, was able to keep the balance inside him. He then trained his water ability for another 3 hours. Many people might think that water ability is weak and useless.
But Shen Li, a pharmacist knew the importance of water ability. Water is the universal solvent, and if one could control the water fluidly, then he would have an advantage against the enemy since he could use the blood inside them. If he wanted to reach that level, he had to practice his water ability very hard and diligently. But that wasn't a problem for Shen Li, who would make sure everything was in the perfect condition to protect himself, no matter how hard he had to practice.
After practicing, he went to the monster's area, not wasting time on the somethings he thought as unimportant to him. Once he went inside, he was at the same place he logged out. He did not even have time to fully observe the surrounding situation before jumping aside purely on instinct. Shen Li took out his sword and held it in his right hand immediately while his sight didn't stray from the high-level zerg that pounced on the place he was previously standing. It was big and had an antenna on its head. Shen Li knows that it is the highest level zerg on level-5.
Shen Li used his ability and surrounded the water strings on his sword while charging forward toward the zerg. He knew that he had to kill this zerg first because this kind of zerg never moves on its own. It means that its group was nearby, and this type of zerg with an antenna can call for backup. He dogged to the side when the zerg used its two big legs in the front to attack him. He moved his sword to his left side, sensing the attack coming from that side, and sure enough, the zerg's spike tail stabbed toward him. He did not use his wood ability since today, he was training his water ability, and he had to be prepared to fight with his water ability only if his water ability was exposed in the future. Shen Li controlled the water molecules in the air under the zerg, shaping them like small swords spinning at a fast rate, and stabbed the zergs enough that it was able to feel pain. But it didn't do much cause of the zerg thick skin. Taking the advantage that the zerg was disturbed because of water swords, he charged toward the zerg again, water strings on his sword, but this time spinning like the small swords.
Shen Li jumped high and backflipped when the zerg attacked him again, landing on its back. Shen Li thrust the sword toward the small area on its neck, which was its weak point. With the force of the sword together with the spinning water strings, he was able to thrust the sword fully, killing the zerg. The green blood of the zerg splashed on his face, and he wiped it with his clothes. Then, he heard the rustling sound of bushes nearby and looked around vigilantly. Sure enough, he saw about twelve dozens of zergs surrounding him. Charging with ferociousness and the sheer number of them made most players afraid and want to run away.
But Shen Li was no other person but someone who had faced hundreds of zombies alone. He had a determined look on his face and held the sword tightly in his right hand while moving the water molecules in the air toward him.
"Come, let's see how strong you are?" Shen Li charged toward them without hesitation, at a fast speed, ready to go all out.