A beam of light from the sky illuminated the magic circle in the center of the capital city. In the VR game Legendera, this happened every time someone resurrected and was a common sight.
But this time, there was a large crowd of players around the magical circle. These players showed a spectrum of emotions. Some were grinning ear to ear, some were tearful, some pitied the resurrected player, and others smiled at his misfortune.
The light faded away and revealed a player, In his early twenties, clad in tattered silver armor. Two golden shortswords hung from his belt.
Dark Lion - Level - 0
The levels of the surrounding players varied, but except another ten or so level zero players, none of them were below 100.
Leon opened his eyes, the light of resurrection faded to reveal the crowd of players that surrounded him. Most of them belonged to various guilds, but a few ones among them were guildless, and these were the players that had a sorrowful expression.
Leon engraved the names of the guilds in his heart. Do you guys think this the end? Just wait, this is only the beginning.
Opening the interface of LegendEra, Leon chose the option to delete his character.
LegendEra system - Are you sure? Once deleted, You cannot retrieve a character.
After clicking yes, darkness surrounded Leon, and the scene before him disappeared.
With a clicking sound, the gaming cabin opened. Leon got up, stretched, and opened the Legendera forum on his computer.
[End of a Legend - Dark Lion deletes his character !!!]
[Dark Lion Killed to level - 0 by the Guilds alliance! ]
The top two threads of Legendera Skyfire kingdom's forum was about him. Well, why wouldn't it be? He was the number one guildless player in the entire Kingdom. Numerous guilds have tried to recruit him. But Leon liked freedom. He wanted to play and enjoy the game without the restriction of a guild and being a pawn for their power struggles.
He was the one every guildless player looked up to, an expert among experts.
So why and how was he executed to level zero?
That was because he was a thorn in the path of the guilds. In Legendera, there were only limited resources. Hunting grounds, resource locations, and rare quests were all valuable things that these guilds fought to obtain. And the ability of a guild to hog one of these locations and block others' access was what made them shine in front of others. More resources meant more growth to the guild.
The ones who suffered most from the guilds monopolizing these locations were the independent players. Even banded together, they weren't able to fight against the experts from the guilds. But there were a few expert independent players that could turn the tide when joining the fray. Most of them were bought out by the guilds spending enormous amounts of money. Only Leon and a few others remained in the Skyfire kingdom.
This time, those remaining experts had joined together to form a player association to fight back. And by beating all the three-star guilds, they managed to hold the field in a prime location. But who were these three-star guilds? Even the one-star guilds in the Legendera were operated by major corporations in the real world. These powerhouses wouldn't let a few guildless players tarnish their reputation. And thus, they decided to bring experts from various other cities. And to ensure that Leon and his ragtag team was finished off, they even formed a temporary guild alliance to destroy him.
Resurrection points were inside towns and cities, and thus inside safe zones. One wouldn't be able to spawn camp the resurrecting players as doing so will get them arrested by the city guards. So when Leon was spawn camped to level zero, it meant that at least a hundred guild players were jailed for a few days. And this was only the ones the guards got. There were countless others Leon managed to kill by himself before his levels fell too low. But these costs were nothing for the 3-star guilds. Each of these guilds had hundreds of thousands of players across the Kingdom and numerous experts among them. This loss was not even a drop of water in an ocean for them.
Leon closed the forum and walked out of his apartment. He was a full-time player. As someone with expertise, he was able to make enough to get by from the game itself. Be it by selling equipment or carrying players. But now that he was unable to do any of those in the Skyfire Empire as Dark Lion. He could only start over as a new character. But Leon wasn't going to do in Skyfire Empire in the central continent. He was going to do so in the fifth continent that was about to be revealed.
Each continent was an expansion in the LegendEra world. New players awaited the release of the new continent before joining the game. And all the guilds would transfer a few of their experts to the new continent to get a foothold. A new continent meant new opportunities for the players. Everyone was equal at level zero when a new continent opened, even the transferred characters. Only when the new continent's average level became the same as that of those in the central continent would the seals on the continent be lifted. That was only when free trade and travel to other continents be possible. At that time, another expansion will happen in the central continent, and a new tier of jobs and new levels will be available.
Thus Leon decided to start anew in the fifth continent. And this time, he was planning to make a guild himself. Establishing a guild in Legendera was easy. All one required for it was to go to the town hall and register it with ten other players. And there were tens of thousands of these guilds in Legendera, known as black-star guilds. They were only guilds in name and had no power. To become a real guild, one at least needed to be a one-star guild. And the requirements for this were harsh. Only those gaming studios or companies with funds to invest was able to nurture a one-star guild.
With LegendEra's release five years ago, most of the other VRMMO games have faded away. With the immersion that LegendEra provided, other games couldn't fight with it. Within a year of its release, LegendEra's total population of players had reached a hundred million.
Now that it was the fourth anniversary of LegendEra, the number of players had reached five billion. And 250 million new players had registered to enter the new continent. With this many people playing the game, the money-making opportunities in it were immense. Gold farming studios appeared in every corner of the city. Corporations invested billions into the game. And the total economy surrounding the game alone had reached a trillion dollars in real life.
If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.
Even if Leon wanted to nurture a one-star guild, he had no financial backing to do so. Thinking about it, he felt a headache incoming, but he refused to give up.
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Three days passed.
Leon laid in his gaming cabin with his eyes closed. He was currently browsing the gaming forums as the 5th continent hasn't opened yet. There was a timer on the top of the screen, counting down to the unveiling of the new continent. When the timer had 5 minutes remaining, the Legendera interface showed the character creation menu.
Please choose a character name.
"Dark Lion" Leon was going to use the same name on this server. He had retreated from his fight with the guilds for now, but he didn't want to run away from a setback.
Then the class selection menu appeared. Dark Lion chose the class he was the most familiar with - swordsman.
Choosing the same appearance he had before, Leon waited for the timer to reach zero.
As the timer reached zero, a warm light enveloped Leon. He was no longer in the gaming cabin but in a crowded medieval village center in the Black Woods village. The name came from the deep black-colored trees that were a specialty of the forest surrounding this village. And as all the construction used that timber, the village itself was mostly black.
Many players were hurrying about to find their first quests. And those who were new to Legendera were looking around astounded as this was the first time they had seen a game so realistic.
Walking into a nearby shop, Leon purchased a wooden sword with the ten copper coins that he had. After swinging the weapon a few times to get the hang of it, Leon walked out of the shop.
Leon walked into the crowds, sidestepping anyone on his way, and passed through the city gates. He headed to the leveling location a bit far from the town. The hunting grounds near the town was sure to be filled with new players. But venturing deep into the woods was a suicide at this point, so Leon could only choose from a few locations to level up to level one. Level one was the requirement one needed to accept quests from the NPC's. Those players earlier running around to find quests were all newbies who didn't even take the time to read a guide.
Soon Leon reached the hunting grounds called Spiritling nursery. There were hundreds of little fireballs in the fields, appearing, disappearing, and jumping around.
will-o'-the-wisp - Level 1 (Common)
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HP - 50/50
As Leon reached for his sword to start hunting, he sensed danger. Without thinking, Leon jumped sideways. And at that moment, the place where Leon stood got pierced by a dagger.
Turning around, Leon saw seven players standing about twenty feet away. And another player, this one an assassin, standing where he stood before.
"You are rather perceptive." The swordsman that was leading the team said haughtily.
Slithering Flame - level 1
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Whispering Venom guild
HP - 200/200
"I didn't think you would dare to show up with the same name, or are you an imposter?" Slithering Flame asked. He was not sure if the one he tried to kill was the real Dark Lion. But seeing how he dodged the silent attack of an assassin with expertise, Slithering Flame became sure that this was indeed that Dark lion.
"Would an imposter be able to do this?" Leon asked with a smile as he swept the legs of the assassin that tried to kill him. The assassin was caught off guard and fell face-first to the ground. But before he could put forward his arms to break the fall, he saw something in front of him - the tip of a wooden sword, aimed at his neck.
Critical Hit!
-150
But before the assassin could react, another flurry of attacks came from above
-20 -20 -20
And in a couple of seconds, the assassin was dead.
Leon lifted his head and sneered at the other whispering venom members. He was level zero, but the other parties were only level one. They might have higher hit points and base stats, but this early into the game, Leon was sure that the other parties did not possess any special skills. Only the proficiency of their basic attacks and their experience counts, and Leon was sure he could wipe the floor with these guys. He just hadn't thought that the guilds would target him again this fast as the new continent had only opened.
"Everyone attack him at once!" Slithering Flame was fuming when he saw Leon butcher the assassin in a few strikes.
He ordered all his stupified underlings to attack Leon at once. Slithering Flame had only accidentally stumbled upon Dark Flame here. He thought that he could get some merit points in the guild if killed the guild's sworn enemy. Even if he couldn't drop Leon's level any further than zero, after a player died, they would only resurrect after an hour. While an hour was not much time, in the early stages of the game, even an hour of inaction could leave one in the dust as others leveled up.
But Slithering Flame had forgotten to account that Leon was an expert, while he was not even one of the core members of Whispering venom.
The bloody battle continued. One after another, each of Slithering flame's underlings fell.
"You guys hold him back," Ordering his underlings to become sacrifices, Slithering Flame ran away with all his might.
Leon looked at the fleeing Slithering flame for a second with a slight smile before starting his slaughter once again.
After finishing off the other men, Leon didn't stay any longer in the Spiritling nursery. While he was able to fight against these few men, he was not sure he could fight against all the reinforcements. And he was already tired as the stamina of a level zero character was not much. Sighing at the thousands of experience points hopping around in the field, he walked away.
Whispering venom was one of the members of the guild alliance that had hunted him down. And now that there was this much commotion, Leon was sure that all of their members in the BlackWood village would be swarming here in no time.
Leon sat atop a hill, watching the sunset. It has been almost an hour after the opening of the continent. But Leon hadn't even killed a single mob yet. Every hunting ground he went to, he would end up in a battle with some guild. And the number of players he killed till now was no less than thirty.
When one killed a player, their name would become red, and a skull would appear after their name. Now he had a red name two blood-red skulls after his name.
"The view is breathtaking isn't it?" A voice asked.
"It is." Leon, who was enamored by the view involuntarily answered before realizing someone was near him and drew his sword.
But when he saw the man who was sitting beside him, his sword fell from his hands, and a wave of primal fear washed over him.
With his skin as pale as death and his black hair fluttering in the wind, he had a pitch-black, blood-stained scythe hanging on his back. The aura of death the man exuded was infinite. The air around him reeked of blood.
Yama - God Of Death - level ???
HP- ???/???
This man was Yama. The final boss of the game. He was a roaming boss and whenever he went, death and destruction followed.
Just last month, he destroyed an imperial city, killing about twenty million players. And there was nothing anyone could do about it. Only if all the other god-level NPCs joined hands would they be able to beat Yama.
Why in the hell was he in this level one map? And why was he having small talk with me?