Rastel felt his heart his heart freeze at Roxanne's question.
Even though he considered the possibility of his identity been found, he never thought she would outright confront him with it.
Then considering she was stronger than him, maybe she didn't feel the need to be sneaky about it.
'I wonder if Amba can take her. Like they say, if you can't beat them up then call your elder brother.'
Although he felt alarmed, he was confident in his ability to put up a calm front and acted as if he wasn't surprised by her question.
He decided to humor her straightforwardness and just let the conversation flow.
"Hmm…. I wonder. I am a wanted man you know?"
He closed his eyes relaxingly as he felt a cold breeze pass by.
She gave a small laugh as she shook her outstretched legs and stared up the canopy.
"There have been few people like you who chanced upon something good you know, and stubbornly held it close I mean."
Her voice took on a gentle tone. He opened his eyes and looked at her.
"It is basically impossible to fight the power of guilds alone. Even though most guilds don't have a strong footing in this game, they can pressure people by just sheer numbers alone."
Rastel nodded internally to what she said, these are factors he had carefully considered.
Although he didn't know if he would be successful in running away till he got strong enough for the moment. If he did get cornered, he felt it wouldn't be too late then to find a powerful leg to latch on too.
"So hey…." her grey eyes became soft as she stared back at him.
"Do you want to go on adventures with me?"
At that moment, another cool breeze blew by sending her glossy black hair flying across her face. With her clear beautiful eyes, charming voice and thought provoking outfit, Rastel felt all his defenses crumbling without the slightest hint of resistance.
'Is this a proposal!' his heart thumped heavily in his chest.
Instead of overreacting, he chanted random stupid mantras in his head about bread and calmed his mental state significantly.
'Must still be the Prince charming effect coming into play'
Instead of answering her, he just laughed and asked a question of his own.
"Why is there so much fuss over just a single golem"
Nobody knew he had about 12 golems just sitting in his inventory, most of them haven't even seen the outside yet!
Apart from his most loved three hammer golems and the miniature clawed devil with the smiley face, he had seven other traditional golems that he had experimented with.
He had made them with Amba as a blueprint. Granted they wouldn't be as fast or powerful as him, they would be enough to cause trouble for people at his level or even a bit higher.
"Just a single golem?" Roxy peered at him like he just said something inconceivable.
"It is an open secret that you have at least 3 golems. Apart from the two hammer handed demons you used to wreck the mage wall set for you in that beginner village, there is also the one that you used to take down a quasi-commander from Blue leaf!"
'Oh fuck! I forgot I did that back at laron' he grimaced as he realized his slip up.
"Do you know what it means to defeat a quasi-commander of one the top guilds in a kingdom? Waeser is level 25, that is not a joke. You being more than 10 levels below him and defeating him in battle even taking one of his eyes out. That was basically what got the guilds to be mad about getting you."
Rastel said nothing as he thought back to the green haired wood elf he had fought when escaping Laron.
Although the battle was hard fought, it had little impact on him since it finished quickly, apart from the fact that he almost died though.
He didn't expect that information on the fight would be spread by the elf himself.
He had to admit the elf was really strong. If he didn't have Amba with him then, he doubted he could do any damage to the elf with the spells he had at hand. Even dodging the elf's arrows had put him in a lot of stress.
Roxanne sighed silently when she didn't get a reaction from him. Although all she had said was surprising even to her up till now, her voice was still calm.
She hadn't figured out his identity at first. She thought he was just a noob player carrying out an escort mission.
A lot of players did this sort of thing when the blood moon arrived. There would always be people who couldn't make it to the safety of towns in time.
Although there was a general suspicion towards muan players nowadays due to the infamy of 'Sleeping beauty', she didn't give it much thought then.
It was something she saw when they returned from killing the beast that triggered her suspicion. She saw a bunch of children playing without a care in the world right outside the cart.
They were all holding golem-like toys.
When she remembered the NPC girl that basically jumped into his arms when they returned. Her mind went back to the first picture of 'Sleeping beauty' that circulated the internet.
It was of a muan in tattered beginner's clothes laying down peacefully in a forest clearing. A large golem was sitting just in front of him and in that golem's laps, was an NPC girl whose description matched exactly that of the blue-eyed girl she just saw!
Connecting all these things together, she waited a bit to think it through while humoring his request about the lay of the land.
After deciding for a bit, she decided to extend an invitation to him.
Due to Rastel's carelessness in looking up useful in game knowledge when out of the game, he was oblivious to Roxanne's identity.
If someone like Natsu who took searching for information seriously or basically anyone who was updated on news about AOM saw her, they would have exclaimed in surprise!
Roxanne, was very popular!
She was a powerful ranker with immense popularity among the fanbase. With her exceedingly good looks and gunslinging skills, she was among one of the most popular people on AOM.
Although her level was a bit low for a ranker at just 26 where most rankers where now at the level 30 threshold, her powerful guns which she wielded with flair were unmatched in power.
She was even able to take down tanks with powerful defense abilities with a few shots of her guns. She was loved and feared by all players.
And although she wasn't affiliated with any guild, she was left untouched by the guilds and corporations in the game.
It seemed she had a powerful backing as there was once a guild that tried to pressure her into joining them. The guild's higher ups ended up getting assassinated one by one until eventually the guild leader himself was killed, in the guild's base!
This matter created an uproar and the guild had to spend an immense amount of money to bring back their higher ups. After that, no guild dared to bother her again.
If she was to be honest, she had no interest in Rastel. Although special classes and such were rare and hard to get, there was still a considerable amount of them out there.
Most decent guilds had at least one person with an unconventional power different from those given by the system. It was even a requirement for some to creating a guild.
Most people wouldn't want to join guilds without people with special abilities among the higher ups as most people with powers like that were usually really strong.
It could be seen as most people on the rankings were those with special classes or abilities.
Although Sleeping beauty was an exceptional case going by the strength he had displayed, there was no guarantee he could reach the peak of strength among rankers.
Chances were, he would just become one of the numerous decently strong people out there, what if his golem's strength were capped at this level and he couldn't get them any stronger?
There was just one reason she wanted to extend him a helping hand, well two.
The first was that he had extended a helping hand to her when she was in a tough situation, even leading away the source of danger.
It might have been a stupid move but she still appreciated it.
The second was the fact that they hit it off quite well! Most people didn't know this but she had very few friends in game, and even fewer were people she could talk so freely with.
To her, this was huge plus and she wouldn't mind having someone to go on adventures together with.
Besides who wouldn't want a powerful partner to have their back? He was basically as strong as she was even with his lower level.
If she nurtured him a bit, he would definitely become a terrifying ranker too. Even better than that golem witch perhaps.
Rastel was also having his own thinking session in the minutes of silence that followed. He was giving some things some though and was just about to say something when a loud shout interrupted him.
"A huge storm is coming in fast from the east! We need to find shelter quickly!"
It was the cart driver.
Rastel looked through the trees and could vaguely see the storm clouds approaching.
'Wait, storm?' he was deeply confused
Roxanne was also interested as she looked through the trees with a sharp glare. As if she was unsatisfied with her view, she jumped off the cart with a graceful movement and caught a lean tree branch that was hanging close by.
Just as Rastel thought the branch would snap and she would fall, she bent a bit and flung herself up to grab another sturdier branch that was close before scaling up the tree.
'The rouge class is amazing! Am I sure I thought this class thing through?' he was really impressed by her movements.
He got down the cart with a jump and climbed up the tree with an impressive agility of his own to meet her at the top staring quietly in the distance.
He followed her gaze and looked towards the incoming storm before a dazed expression appeared on his face.
There was a mass of terrifying black clouds riding the wind and spreading as far as the eye can see. Short flashes of thunder could be seen dancing within the clouds as it cast a massive shadow over the land.
The storm would soon reach them.
Rastel and Roxanne looked at the storm in awe, looked at each other and then simultaneously turned their gazes to the canopy of trees surrounding them.
The surrounding leaves were lush, green and brimmed with life. Although one could see a few dead leaves here and there if one looked closely, it wasn't much.
"It isn't autumn yet, right?" Rastel muttered half dazed.
"Huh? Yeah…." Roxanne was also lost in it.
If they were to be generous, it could be considered late summer now. But even if that was it…...
'Where…. exactly is this storm coming from?'
———————————————————————
On one of the tallest mountains of the eastern mountain range, the powerful Cloud monk sect that was located there was going through another peaceful day.
All over the mountain surface, the figures of the sect disciples in different colored monk robes could be seen moving around performing one task or the other.
Most of the sect disciples were beastmen, though a few humans could be seen going around from time to time.
The situation was the same inside the mountain where long passageways, caverns and halls had been carved into the mountain hundreds of years ago.
The cloud monk sect was an ancient and powerful sect that was worthy of the respect attached to its name as one of the overlords of the eastern mountain range especially with the strength of its sect master.
At this moment, said sect master was drinking heavily with an old man on one of the sect's numerous stone courtyards that were built on the steep cliffs around the mountain.
The laughed heartily to themselves as they drank wine from a small barrel kept on the stone tabletop that stood between them while they sat on the small stone chairs that were around it.
Not far from them, two figures could be seen sparing with each other fiercely.
One of the figures wore a grey monk robe and was wielding a double edged long sword with finesse as he stabbed viciously at his opponent who was dodging his attacks gracefully with small movements albeit with a few close calls.
The opponent was a black robed man with a constantly scowling face and short black hair with bangs that waved around his face.
He retaliated the swordsman's attacks by launching fists covered with some form of energy from time to time but the light haired swordsman was quickly to block the attacks.
They moved back and forth in a deadly dance and anyone who saw them would be hard pressed to believe they were only sparing.
These two were Gai and Marco who were currently training under the supervision of the sect master of the Cloud monk sect.
Although Gai was the main focus as he was the monk, the sect master was also able to give Marco some pointers on sword skills with his own experience and had them spar each other to polish their skills.
"The boys are really doing well" the old man in sky blue robes stared at the beastman opposite him as he watched them spar.
"Not good enough yet" the thick horizontal irises of the goat beastman blinked slowly as he poured more wine for himself into a wooden cup.
"If all that you told me is true, definitely not good enough"
The old man paused for a minute before taking another huge gulp of the fiery wine.
"We might just be overreacting, my eyes have failed me before –"
"Not on something like this." the beastman interjected.
"Even if it wasn't accurate, there will still be some truth in it."
The old man wanted to say something but couldn't refute him. A really foreboding omen was brewing and he felt helpless.
"Those people..." the beastman seemed to have sobered considerably.
"I never thought they would be willing to go so far"
The sound of the spar happening in the background echoed out loudly in the small silence that followed. It would be a terrible thing that would happen if this omen came true.
BLZZT! BANG!!!
Suddenly, a loud thunderclap echoed out!
The eyes of both men narrowed considerably as they felt the power brewing in the air. They could literally feel the mana in their surroundings moving restlessly as if in a frenzy.
BLZZT!! CRACK!!!
A flash of lightning went past the clouds that surrounded the mountain top as they quickly turned dark at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Marco and Gai stopped their sparing to look at their surroundings, is this how storms look like in the clouds?
CRACK!!! BANG!!!
A white bolt of lightning suddenly shot through the clouds straight at them!
They both felt their blood freeze as an invisible suppression came over them, they couldn't move!
SCREEE!!! BLAST!
They watched with wide eyes as the thick bolt of lightning that was approaching to send them to their doom suddenly got blasted away right back in the direction it came from.
The slightly stooped figure of the old beastman appeared in front of them, his white robes billowing softly as he held his walking stick which he had used to deflect the lightning pointing in that direction.
The redirected lightning had been countered by another lightning blast that came out of the thick clouds and they could now see a huge figure appearing from within with a slow gait.
The goat beastman's old eyes trembled slightly when he saw the figure but he held his calm.
A deep voice that resounded over nearly half of the eastern mountain range boomed out causing the sect disciples that were down below to scurry around in terror.
"YOU RECEIVED MY SALUTATIONS WELL, MASTER!"