---Western XiGuang Province, Sharkborn Sect--
Before them was a bustling town with a harbor at the foot of massive, steep cliffs. Built into the cliffs were the exotic buildings of the Sharkborn Sect's Monastery. Partially built, partially carved directly into the stone of the cliffs, it looked almost like they grew from the bedrock.
It was a fascinating sight.
"We have arrived..." the solemn Perl Woul informed the party he was guiding, as the ship he had boarded was anchoring in its final harbor. The group from Minas Mar had spent most of the past three days on this ship; they had boarded at a harbor town called Konan, not too far from the rift between worlds.
"You were not joking when you said the Voracious Cloud Continent was big..." The party leader of the Special Ops team mumbled. Madog looked back at the long journey. They were using the native traveling methods to stay hidden, but even if they didn't, they may not have been much faster.
The distances in this place were blown out of proportion. This was the closest target on their list, and if Madog's
Why did they take this arduous journey? The Sharkborn Sect was one of the organizations working together with the Scene. Marco's investigations had found that there were still roughly 20 people of Urth surviving in this place.
15 of them were young adults being raised as servants or other sect disciples. The remaining 5 apparently showed great talent for cultivation and were initiated as disciples of the inner sect. They were the most worrisome targets to extract.
All of them were still children below the age of 10, and Master Mountain had warned them about the means of these Sects. Indoctrination, brainwashing, obscure curses, or even bugs implanted in their brain. At least the bug thing seemed not to be the style of the Sharkborn Sect.
They were more into feeding servants to their pet fish for nourishment. Reports showed that there used to be 50 kidnapped people here. What happened to the missing 30 was the reason for this sect's impending doom.
Madog would have loved to be the executioner, but his job was only to evacuate the innocent people of Urth. The honor...restoring these cliffs to their natural state would belong to the second wave.
"Perl Would, are you going to wait for us, or will you help us?" the party leader asked the mysterious assassin. Although the man was not a player, they had seen his power during the tournament, and there was no doubt that he would be a great help.
"I will make sure this ship is still here when you return," he answered mysteriously. Madog nodded. After all, the cultivator was only hired as a guide, not as a muscle. The player just thought it would be good to have one more member to get people out.
Only Perl would have noticed the presence of this group of assassins vanish from his perception, but he could hardly pinpoint the moment when they had turned completely invisible. Although he could do something similar to others, experiencing it himself made his skin crawl.
....
---Western XiGuang Province, Gold Monastery--
His teeth ground as he swung the shoddy broom with anger. He was staring at the dust with hate, not actually directed at the dirt. But the dirt was the only one that wouldn't punish him for this look. The rough wood of the broom handle was soaked in blood.
The wounds from the slaps he received the last time he dared give someone the wrong look had opened again. His hand stung as the scab got stuck on the wood; however, he ignored the pain. It only increased his anger, and he gripped the handle even harder as he swung the broom as if to break the bristles.
In the back of his mind, the same scenes had kept playing over and over. The time when the hunter came to capture him and his family. The time in the cells. How they took one after another until it was his turn. How they had treated him like cattle, shipped off with others to this hellhole.
This was slavery! No, maybe it was even worse than slavery. If only he could cultivate like the children- No... If only he had used his time and actually leveled up when he had the chance. Maybe he couldn't have stopped all this from happening, but at least he wouldn't feel so... helpless.
"You missed a spot," someone said and kicked him in the ass. He stumbled forward and failed to regain his balance. He fell face-first into the dust he had scowled at. Behind him, a group of people laughed.
He already knew who it was before he bit the dust. The same pieces of shit that cause his hands to be raw like ground meat. The disciples of the Golden Monastery, or to be more precise, outer disciples.
They were the sons of rich merchants in the surrounding area. Their parents paid to allow these little shits to learn the techniques of this place. As if it wasn't bad enough that he, a grown adult, had to endure their arrogant remarks, he didn't even have the option to get physical if he wanted to.
"Old man, your work ethic is really lacking. No wonder your home world is so dirty, you savages barely know how to hold a broom!" the little savage that kicked him taunted him with a snarky smile.
"Right, right. Yet, this creature knows no shame. The Golden monastery allows it to live in luxury like this, and it still gets all haughty," another youngster added. The insults were as biting as one would expect from a couple of minors. Not a lot. The source of his anger was that he couldn't even answer some offhanded comments.
"At least it learns. I guess 50 hits with a stick properly taught it, that it can't talk back to proper disciples like us," another said with a sardonic smile, seeing how he kept avoiding so much as eye contact.
Now that hurts, because it was true. He hated himself for bowing to violence, but it worked. In the end, it was because he was too weak. Everything was because he was too- Why was it suddenly so quiet?
The four youngsters before him had suddenly frozen stiff. For a moment, he stared at them in confusion before he realized that the light in their eyes had extinguished. Their gazes were dull, but their bodies had not gotten the signal to keel over, yet.
However, the bodies never fell. Starting from their heads, they suddenly started turning gray and crumbling to dust. What in the world was going on? Had a hostile sect infiltrated? Was he the next would-
"Man, this stuff works even better than Alison mentioned...." he suddenly heard a voice, and a man in dark gray armor appeared where the group of youngsters stood before. His racing heart pumped even quicker.
Not out of fear, but because he recognized the armor. The people of the Cloud Continent rarely wore proper armoring. Many found it unsophisticated or cowardly. A waste of resources, even. But even those factions he had seen didn't wear armor like this. This was player armor!
"A-Are you from Urth?" he asked hopefully.
"Oh, sorry, I was a little distracted by the poison's effects. Hi, I'm a member of the Oathguard of Minas Mar. I'm here to bring you home," the stranger spoke the words he had wanted to hear in every waking moment since the guards of Y-City knocked on his door.
"Tha-thank you!" he said, tears shooting in his eyes. he didn't care whether the stranger was truthful; even if it was a lie, it was enough.
"Shh, you can do that later. Here, wear this. We have some more people to find. Maybe you can help?"