A week in real life equated to almost a month inside of the game since time flowed faster by 3 times. For the entirety of that time, Lizzy spent it all on trying to complete her 2 very important quests. There were no heads or tails about the skills she needed to learn, so instead, Lizzy focused on hunting down 10,000 monsters that were 5 levels above her own.
If Lizzy had to comment about it, it was a very long and arduous hell grind because not all monsters 5 levels above her level were counted in the quests’ kill counter. It didn’t specify anything but after killing a few monsters, Lizzy found out that she needed to kill elite-ranked or higher monsters that were 5 levels above her. Elite-ranked monsters had strengths that were close to mini-bosses or bosses that were of a similar level to her.
Lizzy had to hunt and kill 10,000 of these things but another alternative was to kill 50 normal-ranked monsters in place of a single elite-ranked monster to raise the quests’ kill counter by 1. If she had to choose, Lizzy would definitely pick the former rather than the latter. The latter required her to put in so much effort but at the very least, killing normal ranked monsters still counted for something.
Thanks to finding out about this, Lizzy didn’t discriminate with what kind of monster she killed. As long as it was 5 levels higher than her, she’d strike it down, and being a Berserker, Lizzy could continuously hunt without rest since her HP, MP, and SP were nearly inexhaustible. Fighting against monsters that were many levels higher was something her good friend Maria was capable of easily doing. Lizzy rarely went out on hunts like this since she valued quantity over quality.
Taking down a horde of lower or similar leveled monsters was more efficient than killing a few powerful monsters since she could use a ‘carpet-bomb’ method and clear out the monsters. It was what most players in the game did except for a select few and it wasn’t like Maria had never thought of doing that but she simply didn’t want to. There was no fun in killing helpless maggots that can’t even put up a challenge for her.
Lizzy knew all about Maria’s antics and quirks so she knew that her best friend always hunted monsters that were 20 levels higher or even more than her own level. She also did it happily and with ease.
“J-Just how does Mary do this...this is so freaking exhausting…” Lizzy said out loud as she took down a level 150 Orc.
The orc was 9 levels higher than her and this was another problem she needed to face. If she rose in level, then Lizzy needed to take on even stronger monsters than before, making the quest progressively harder. This was nearly an IRL week later since she started her quests, so she gained quite a few levels but she was nowhere near done. She only completed about two-thirds of her quest requirement after all this time, the number of monsters she had killed were innumerable but the counter was still only 6290 out of 10,000.
Lizzy thought that this was going to be the easiest objective to complete but she thought wrong.
“D-Dammit...I’m so sick and tired of listening to these monsters scream and die...I wonder how Mary does it…”
*DING*
You have leveled up! 141 → 142
“...” Lizzy sighed and let out a hollow laugh before mumbling, “I don’t know if I should be happy looking at that or sad…”
Lizzy couldn’t understand how her best friend, Eos, and Sky even managed to complete their Awakening Quest.
“Whatever, if they can do it then so can I.”
Lizzy hyped herself back up and shook her arms before she shouldered her two greatswords and was about to head back to grinding when suddenly she received a message.
*DING*
[Emily: Liz, where are you?]
Seeing that it was her Vice-Guildmaster, Lizzy stopped and found a place to rest in before replying to her.
[Lizzy: What is it, Em?]
[Emily: Our guys found clues to the skills you need to learn for your Awakening Quest.]
[Lizzy: Really? Tell me now!]
Lizzy’s eyes shined when she read Emily’s message. Before going out to hunt for the past in-game weeks, she had assigned a few members of her guild to find clues through texts, quests, or anything that could give her a hint to find the Dragon-race skills she needed to learn for her Awakening Quest. She waited in anticipation for the first week but after no one acquired any information, she stopped expecting so much and focused on hunting instead. She didn’t think that only a week or so later, someone actually found something.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
[Emily: You’ll have to go back...to planet Eur…]
[Lizzy: Wait, what? Never mind, fill me in once I return to the guild house. I’m coming back right now!]
Lizzy halted her hunting and quickly took to the skies, flying straight back to Discordia. Unlike her friend, Maria, Lizzy knew how to read and use her [Map] so she wouldn’t get lost. The only thing she had to nitpick about was that she wasn’t as fast as her friend who could travel at supersonic speeds.
“If only I could fly as fast as Mary. Also, why doesn’t this game have return scrolls or something?!”
*****
Lizzy arrived back at her Guild’s Headquarters in Discordia City and Emily quickly briefed her on the information her guildies acquired.
“...So I have to head back to Eur? Man, this is bad…” Lizzy said as she rubbed her eyebrows.
“Yeah...Although Mary’s been sabotaging so many of the contribution quests in the past weeks, she can’t be everywhere at the same time so it’s inevitable that there’s been a few guilds that lucked out and completed their quests before she could sabotage them,” Emily replied.
“So we’re close to opening the portal already then?”
“Mhm...probably in a week or so―in-game time―the portal will be opened,” Amanda chimed in.
Amanda was on Gaia now after Lizzy had taken time off to do her quest. With her and Emily managing the guild along with the other guild executives, nothing went wrong with the guild master being out of the picture. Things proceeded smoothly as normal and it was gratifying to Lizzy that she had such capable friends and subordinates to help her out.
Right now, it was a bad time for her to continue her quest because the Void Sea opening could come at any time within the next 5 or so days. If she were to leave for Eur, she might come late or miss out on entering the Void Sea with the advance team.
Pioneering a new realm was definitely something she wanted to be a part of but not only that, this new realm was extremely dangerous and if she didn’t go in with the advance team, she might land herself in a precarious situation since she wouldn’t know about anything inside of the place and she needed to be wary of not only the unknowns of the new realm but also the enemy players of the Pantheon that would also be exploring.
Lizzy thought hard for a moment before saying, “...Should we...help Mary and sabotage the―”
“No!”
“Definitely not!”
Her two friends immediately rejected her proposal and so did the other guild executives that were present in the hall. The other executives already knew that Maria was the Black Shadow that was sabotaging the faction contribution quests but they knew to keep it a secret because she was their Guild Leader’s best friend and an ex-member of Fallen Angels.
Even if she was an ex-member, most of the guild executives and guild members still saw her as a guild member because it was the system that had kicked her out of the guild due to some bug or something. However, even if they knew that Maria was sabotaging the quests and wanted to help out, it was an unwise decision on their part.
“Right now, Mary is anonymous and people think that the ‘Black Shadow’ is a monster. If we tried helping the ‘monster’ we’d be viewed as enemies from both sides!” Amanda argued.
“What Vice-Guildmaster Amanda said is true, Guildmaster,” An executive named Peter, IGN: FlowsLikeWater, spoke up and said. “However, we may be able to delay the Void Sea realms opening.”
Lizzy turned towards FlowsLikeWater and asked, “Speak.”
“Ahem, if I may, Young Mis―I mean, Guildmaster.”
FlowsLikeWater, aka Peter, was a person that Lizzy knew IRL because he was a Director from her parents’ company who they dispatched into the game to help her manage her guild.
It wasn’t only Peter but the other guild executives were also those that were from the companies that sponsored the guild. Their Guild held the interest of many people in the real world so it was only natural that they’d be given help to manage such a large organization that was originally supposed to only be a gathering of friends. Peter held a high position in Lizzy’s family enterprise so he had a good head on his shoulders. Listening to the advice given by those around her was one of Lizzy’s greatest traits so she didn’t mind hearing him out.
“We don’t need to necessarily help your friend with sabotaging the contribution quests but what we can do is sabotage the contribution quests from the enemy guilds of the Pantheon.”
“...I thought we had a temporary cease-fire with them?” Lizzy said.
“Young Mi―I mean, Guildmaster, you cannot be too naive. Our interests are what we need to uphold first and foremost. Since you need time, then we shall make time. If we stir up a little conflict and break this delicate truce, the Pantheon guilds and the Celestial Order Guilds will be fighting against each other again.”
“Hmmm…”
“We don’t want the Pantheon Guilds to get there ahead of us and we can start sabotaging them using this reason as a front. With us in the lead, the other guilds will follow, creating more chaos and more opportunities for your friend to complete her task.”
It was a good but certainly devious plot. However, she was desperately in need of time so Lizzy was tempted to go along with it. The only downside was that they’d be tainting their good image a little which was something Lizzy was quite reluctant to do.
Peter saw his Guildmaster’s worries and quickly said, “We can use the spies we planted inside of the Pantheon Guilds to stir up trouble first, then we can strike back in the name of retaliation but we’d have to sacrifice a contribution quest.”
Hearing this, Lizzy immediately approved of the plan, “Let’s go with that. It’s a bit devious but I won’t naively reject such a good plan. I seriously need the time to complete my quest since it’ll be a great asset for us when we explore the Void Sea Realm.”
Emily sighed in relief because Lizzy agreed to it. She had already heard about the plan from Peter before the meeting but was a bit worried that her friend would reject it.
“If we go in as we are now...only the Nine Hells Guild with their Awakened Guildmaster would reap the most benefits. I can’t let that happen, especially since he took away my first place medal…”
Lizzy probably wouldn’t have agreed to the plan if she didn’t want Eos to hog all of the benefits they’d find inside of the Void Sea Realm. She still held a grudge against him who lucked out on their match and managed to defeat her. She almost had a first-place clean-sweep on all of the IGC tournament events she had participated in but Eos had ripped that honor away from her so she wasn’t going to let him reap all of the benefits.
To counter an Awakened Player, Lizzy naturally needed to become one as well since only Awakened Players can fight against Awakened Players.
“Proceed with the plan. I’ll leave immediately so I’ll hand over all my authority to Emily and Amanda. Unless it’s something extremely urgent, don’t contact me. I’m putting all of my focus into my quests so I can come back as an Awakened Player.”