Starting from Zero

Chapter 146: The Mysterious Mage [Vol 4 Chapter 84]

Translator: blackberrry Editor: blackberrry

"That's quite a number!" I exclaimed out loud.

"Almost all the sisters want to go, we can't just leave anyone behind!" Hiko nodded her head looking slightly helpless.

"Luckily my boat is big enough, it isn't a problem to load a thousand people."

"You mean, you're willing to bring us away?" Yoshimi became excited and asked.

"I will be laying down some conditions that have to be met if you ladies want to come on board, and if you are all able to agree to it, I'll gladly bring all of you away."

Upon hearing the term conditions, Hiko and the others looked at me anxiously.

"Don't be nervous, the conditions that I'm talking about are things that all of you need to abide by. Firstly, when all of you reach China, avoid contact with the Players there as much as possible, especially for the few of you that has super obvious Japanese names. Secondly, Cherry Blossom Organization has to be disbanded, no one in China will ever use that name, you guys need to create a new Guild. Thirdly, Regardless of anything, you can no longer use the Japanese language, you can only converse in Standard Mandarin in China, and after entering the game, all of you must forget about being Japanese people! Can these three conditions be met?"

Hiko spoke up: "The majority of us used Chinese for our IGN*, aside from us few Captains, Norika Shizuka and Meigetsu Yuri, everyone else has Chinese names. But in the future, we can shout for their first names without their last names, it won't be easy to catch the Japanese accents from Shizuka and Yuri's names. As for the organization! We will definitely disband it, Cherry Blossom is too Japanese! Lastly, there isn't a problem with us speaking Mandarin, all of us knows the language since it's impossible to migrate to China without knowing how to read and write in Chinese!"

"Very good, if you can achieve all of it, that'll be the best. I have one last thing to inform all of you. As of right now, I still do not have complete trust towards all of you, as long as anyone of you goes too far and do anything that I deem is off the scale, I will consider bringing all of you back at any time. All of you have heard of my strength, if any of you are uncooperative, don't blame me for killing you back to level 0!" I spoke harshly without any emotions. I am a person who enjoyed laying out all the ugly truths and reminders first, to clarify all regulations whilst unfamiliar as I firmly believed it will only be beneficial for the future.

"Then when do we go?" Shizuka asked excitedly.

"Not so soon!" This sentence caused all the smiles in the room to freeze.

"I still have a few matters to attend to, so we will not be leaving temporarily, but don't worry, my attendance here indicates my decision to bring you all over to China, if I didn't want to, I wouldn't have come today."

"We believe you, but what matters do you have? Do you need our help? Cherry Blossom Organization has over a thousand members!"

I had not planned to inform them of my plans since I still did not have complete trust towards them, and whether or not they would do as they said if by any chance they were tricking me to gain my trust.

"No need, it's nothing much and I can do it by myself, having more people won't be good anyway!"

"Then what do we need to prepare for now?"

"You don't need to prepare much, but you can sell off everything that you can't bring, as money is interchangeable anywhere. Also, gather all of your offline members, everyone must be online on the night after tomorrow, I won't have the time to make a second trip!"

At this point in time, I truly felt like a professional human smuggler for illegal immigration!

"Yes, we will be there!" Hiko nodded her head which indicated that she understood.

"Then I'll go off first, I'll be back the night after tomorrow."

After leaving Shiromizu City, I directly teleported to Ban Rai City and headed up Mt Fuji to our stipulated meeting place, equipped back my Dark Dragon Lord Set and went offline, all I had to do was wait.

The lab was empty as usual. I looked at the scheduled surveillance image camera and looked at my current self. Haha, I had actually gained back my human shape and my skeletal structure looks to have recovered as my body actually looks supported without any more shrinkage, and I somehow looked taller than before.

"You're awake?" Rose suddenly walked in.

"Rose? What're doing over here? It's quite a distance between here and school, you shouldn't come over so late at night!"

"But I really miss you! Oh right, how's your body….?"

I laughed: "What about it? I'm already recovered!"

"Then you're coming out soon?"

"About that….I'm not too sure myself. You can ask Dad when you see him."

"I will."

"Oh right, are you still on the boat?"

"Yes!"

"Where's Bi-lin now?"

"We're at Torrent Point City's port, we have just finished the resupply!" Rose suddenly smiled and said: "The group that you helped are extremely playful, now they are addicted to acting as Pirates, they are robbing Japanese Fleets daily, causing the entire China seas to have no Japanese Ships sailing alone!"

"That's great, it'll be better if they dare not set sail ever again! Go back and tell Hawk that I will need Bi-Lin to be at Japan's open seas the night after tomorrow. Let Coin and the rest lead all of you to where we docked the last time and wait for us, I have Passengers that wants to board!"

"Passengers?"

"You'll understand when you see them."

Rose and I talked for a bit before I got her to go home. After a simple nap, it was already 7 in the morning. When I got online, Felix and Hope were already waiting for me, they were truly energetic people!

"How is it? Have Masayoshi Matsumoto and his group arrived?" My position when I went online was behind Felix and Hope, so when I spoke, I scared the hell out of them. The both of them immediately turned back and signaled me to keep quiet.

"What are you guys doing? They're all still at the foot of the mountain! As long as we don't shout, who can hear us?"

Felix pulled me into a patch of tall grass. "The enemy brought many Ninjas, I saw a few that went up the mountain first, but as I continued walking, I could no longer find them, I think they are in [Stealth], and I'm afraid there might be a few near us!"

The reasoning was truly dangerous, I immediately concealed myself carefully. With half of my head out of the grass, I activated [Star Gaze], and instantly a few white translucent figures appeared along the mountain path. Luckily when I looked around us, there were no Ninjas! The Ninjas were gathered along the mountain path, it seemed as though they were tasked with clearing the road, if they were tasked to look for people, they would not find them on the road.

"Boss, do you see those Ninjas?" Felix pulled on my armor and asked.

"Do you see that rock by the side of that road? There's one on the rock, and another two meters adjacent to him."

"How do we make our move with so many of them there?"

"Don't be anxious, let them go up, the mobs on the way will help us reduce their strength, we will only make our move at the end!"

"Oh!"

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We quietly laid in the grass and waited for movements from the foot of the Mountain. Masayoshi Matsumoto and his subordinates quickly gathered a large group of people, most of them looked to be important figures of different Guilds. Masayoshi Matsumoto exchanged greetings with the guests, then they began climbing the mountain. Masayoshi Matsumoto was at the head, while Ikeda Rikio and Tanaka Shota walked behind him, and further behind them were a dozen of teams, none of them whom I know of. But they were definitely not ordinary Players!

Masayoshi Matsumoto quickly passed through our hiding spot. All the mobs en route were already cleared by the Ninja team, and were now scouting for them! I carefully followed them, leaving Hope and Felix behind to act as support, they had no stealth or invisibility spells, and could be easily spotted by the huge number of enemies around! I, on the other hand, was much safer being alone!

Mt Fuji was truly not that tall, we quickly reached the peak of the Mountain, where Masayoshi Matsumoto led the group to the side of a volcanic crater. I carefully crouched a 100 meters behind them. This distance allowed me to move without them noticing me.

"Lord Masayoshi, is it beneath here?" Ikeda Rikio inquired about the location of the mission.

"It should be!"

"But there's lava everywhere, how do we go down?"

Masayoshi Matsumoto took out a Spirit Stone. "This can protect us and prevent us from getting harmed by the lava!"

"It's no wonder you keep saying you have a way, so it was this!"

With the Spirit Stone in hand, Masayoshi Matsumoto led the large group that consisted of the important figures of the various Japanese guilds down the volcanic crater. I anxiously extended my head out and looked into the volcanic crater, the Spirit Stone had formed a blue barrier around Masayoshi Matsumoto and the group that had completely isolated them from the lava and the high temperature. The walls of the volcanic crater had a ribbed pattern that resembled spiral stairs, and with the protection of the Spirit Stone, they were able to enter the volcano. But the problem was how could I go down. Without the Spirit Stone, I could not enter. I did not know if the Dragon Lord Set was afraid of lava or not, but I could not even withstand the heat wave that emitted from the volcano, much less the lava.

In the blink of the eye, Masayoshi Matsumoto and his group had already circled and reached close to the surface of the lava, which was replaced with another set of spiral stairs that entered the lava. Masayoshi Matsumoto and his group continued to walk down as any lava that touched the blue barrier would automatically move aside, paving an easy path for them down the lava.

I stood above the volcano alone and drenched in perspiration, I had initially planned to steal their things, but now, I could not even get through the first hurdle!

Oh right, don't I have Phiona? Phoenixes are creatures of flames and birthed from lava, who knows if she has any idea.

I detoured around the volcano crater to the other side and summoned Phiona. "Phiona."

"Yes, Master?"

"Do you have any way of helping me enter the lava without being burnt?"

Phiona nodded: "You won't get burnt by the lava regardless of anything because before you can even touch the lava, you'd have become a pile of ashes. Ashes can't be burnt!"

What the hell, Phiona was actually being sarcastic with me!

"You want to get beaten?"

"I truly don't know!" Phiona felt wronged: "I am naturally unafraid of fire, I won't have a problem going down, but I can't bring you down! My ability to enter high-temperature regions is due to my innate heat-resistance, but not because I know any Magic that avoids fire!"

"Seriously!" I summoned Loong'er out. "Do you know anything to avoid fire?"

"Avoid fire?"

"I mean, resist fire!"

"I do, but I cannot sustain the spell for long, with my current capabilities, I can sustain it for at most 10 seconds!"

That's the same as not having any! I have so many Companions, but none of them are able to help me at such a crucial moment! Suddenly, I had a strange idea, why do I need to go through the lava, I just have to get to the other side!

"Phiona, can you go down and take a look at how deep the lava is on, I don't believe that the place is completely filled with lava, there shouldn't be any more lava after a certain depth, take a look at how deep is it for a place without lava!"

"Yes!" Phiona turned and leaped down the volcanic crater while I waited above. Masayoshi Matsumoto and his group had gone down much earlier, if I were to lose them, then everything that we had done would be wasted! After another two to three minutes, Phiona came back up. "There is a rock stratum beneath 200 meters of lava, beneath the rock strata is a huge cave."

"Got it!" I spoke to Phantom who was on me: "How far can you [Blink] now?"

"I don't have a problem blinking within 250 meters!"

"Isn't that just barely longer than the depth of the lava? It won't be funny if we were to [Blink] into the lava!"

Phantom spoke honestly: "There is truly such a possibility, Especially when I can't see the place that I want to [Blink] to, in such scenarios, it is possible that I can get trapped within two places!"

That IS dangerous! But rewards come with risk, and I am a person that can ignore the risks for the rewards.

"Phantom, [Blink] downwards with the largest distance that you can use!"

"Yes!" The scene before my eyes instantly turned red, with high temperatures enveloping me from all around, although it was not at a temperature where it could kill me, it was scalding enough! I immediately knew that we did not manage to [Blink] through the rock strata, but were stuck within it!

Just when I thought that it was over, the rocks behind me suddenly loosened and I lost the sense of weight. I realized I was falling, as one could only feel the loss of weight through falls. I had to be falling!*

Bang!

I dropped onto some durable object, the collision caused me to fly out.

Thump!

This time, I landed on what seemed to be the ground as I continued to roll a few times before stopping. I quickly got up and clumsily swiped away the lava chunks on me, the red lava had made my Dark Dragon Lord Set scalding hot!

After patting the lava off my body, I got the time to look around. I was in a large cavity the size of a cinema, except for its height, which at least 100 meters taller than what a cinema would usually have! At the top of the cave was a hole where lava leaked, forming a lava waterfall. Beneath the hole was a protruding rock that extended into the lava waterfall, which was what I reckoned was the first thing that I had collided into. The lava waterfall flowed onto the protruding rock and flowed on both of its sides, and the floor beneath had formed a large lava pool. With such a speed, I reckoned that the room would be completely filled with lava soon!

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Suddenly, I heard footsteps, Masayoshi Matsumoto and his group of men had appeared in the stone room adjacent to where I was. I quickly concealed myself and stood still, as long as I remained stationary, no one could see me.

Masayoshi Matsumoto led the group and walked right past me, not even caring about the lava waterfall, most probably because they had just arrived and would think that the formation was natural. The group simply walked past in front of me and arrived at a rock wall at my side, where Masayoshi Matsumoto found a groove. He inserted the Spirit Stone he had in hand into the groove, which caused the flat wall to suddenly have a door that opened and revealed a passage further downwards.

Masayoshi Matsumoto let the group of men enter first, then took the Spirit Stone the groove and quickly bolted into the door, causing the door to shut close after his entry! I immediately pounced on the door, but it had already been sealed tight, although I could still see the outline of the door, I could not open it at all!

Back to the old method, use Phantom's [Blink]! Bang, my head collided with the wall, the shocking recoil flinging me back over 10 meters. Phantom was actually forced out of my body, and actually flew even further away!

"Phantom? What happened to you?"

Although Phantom rarely participated in battles, aside from Lucky, he had the most uses, thus I was extremely caring towards him.

"I'm fine! It was the collision!" Phantom quickly crawled back up and merged back into my body. "There is a powerful barrier preventing anyone from phasing in by any means behind that door! I'm afraid we can't use [Blink] to enter!"

"It's fine, we will think of other ways!" I walked back to the door, Damn it!

I knocked on the door, producing a low noise. Seems like smashing it will not create too much noise.

I summoned Tank: "Help me break this door down!"

Tank's two large bulging hammers on its forelegs were like the hammer-like claws of a mantis shrimp and could punch with extreme speeds. A mantis shrimp that is unable to even reach 50 cm in length could use its hammer-like claws to break a 1 cm thick bulletproof glass, with Tank's size, breaking down the stone door should not be a problem!

Tank walked right to the door and stood still. I only saw something flash, and the big door actually disappeared without a sound. Tank's punch was too fast that I could not even catch a thing, and due to the intense speed, the large door had already turned to fine dust even before the shock could take place, thus no sounds were produced! What replaced the door was a hole that looked as though it was produced by a bomb.

I gave Tank a thumbs-up, then unsummoned him and entered the passageway. The passageway was like a flight of spiral stairs that turned endlessly in one direction, and with its distinct slope, luckily the stairs were not slippery, otherwise, I was sure that we would have just tumbled our way down!

After running a distance, I heard footsteps ahead. Seems like I'm successfully in catching up to Masayoshi Matsumoto and his group.

As we walked on, the passageway suddenly came to an end as a new room emerged in front of us, but it was unlike the one at the beginning.

It was clearly a manmade location, the room had marble floors, walls that were carved and decorated and decorated ceilings. It practically looked like a Rome Cathedral!

The Japanese group stood right in the center of the hall and admired the beautiful paintings on the ceiling.

"Welcome, welcome, my fellow guests!" A deep and sonorous voice suddenly spoke up inside the hall, where even I could hear it in the passageway. The voice resonated through the entire hall, and due to the intense echoes, no one could make out where the voice had originated from.

"Who are you? What is this place?" One of the Japs asked the question that I wanted to know.

"I am the Great Magus Asmere!"

No one reacted when they heard his name, no one knows who he was! But, my Companion's mood Icon suddenly started to flicker, which meant that one of my Companion was in an unstable state. I immediately got Phantom to check on them.

Phantom ran back out. "Master, it's Lucky!"

"What happened to Lucky?"

"He wants to kill that man!"

"Who?"

"That Great Magus Asmere!"

"Does Lucky have some hatred towards him?"

"No, it's not that, Lucky said that the Dragon Race has animosity towards him. This Asmere has a nickname called the Dragon Slaughterer Magus and had single-handedly killed 30 over Great Dragons. In addition, the Bone Dragon Summon and Ghost Demon Summon and similar related Spells were invented by him, the Dragon Race had once decreed that they would give up everything to kill this man!"

"HE KILLED 30 OVER GREAT DRAGONS? Aren't all Dragons level 1000 mobs? Loong'er's father, the Shinryuu, can't even do such a thing!"

"It was not at one go, he killed all those dragons throughout his life. Don't say 30, if even two Dragons had appeared together, he would undoubtedly be done for!"

"He was truly a lucky man!"

"Where are you?" While I conversed with Phantom, the Japs inside the hall were already eagerly looking for the Great Magus Asmere's position.

At the end of the hall, a throne suddenly appeared. A middle-aged man that had a pointed mouth and thin cheeks sat on the throne as though he was some sort of king.

"I'm right here!"

"We are explorers, can we ask, do you know about any hidden treasures here?" Masayoshi Matsumoto walked out from the crowd.

"Of course, The treasures are hidden with me!" Right when the Japs became excited, Asmere spoke out again: "But….."

"But what?" I wanted to ask, but Masayoshi Matsumoto asked him instead.

Asmere looked as though he had caught them hook, line and sinker. "But I will not give them for nothing! All of you need to help me do a few things."

"Do what?" Masayoshi Matsumoto asked.

"Try killing him, but don't do it too quickly, I enjoy the process, the more brutal and cruel you are, the better!" Asmere clapped his hands, causing the hall to tremble incessantly. The ground started to tremble, and a long crack split the hall right dead center. It was not truly a split, but more of a separation. The opening was extremely perfect, and from one look, anyone could tell that it was formed through some mechanism.

Following the separation of the ground, something started to rise from beneath. At first, it was a pointed and glaring prick, then two more came out, then even more appeared. Following the rise of the object, I slowly saw what seemed to be the dorsal fin of some monster. But the size of the Dorsal Fin was too large, and suddenly recognized it. DRAGON!

"Dragon!" All of the Japs cried out at the same time.

The object that was trapped beneath the ground had completely surfaced. It was a great Dragon, and it even had the same color as Lucky. It was a Black Great Dragon. The Great Dragon was sprawled across the floor with a thick and large chain wrapped around his neck, with four more even thicker iron chains tied around its limbs. Even the Dragon's tail was chained up. The Dragon laid there and looked weak without strength, all the black scales were not as glossy as Lucky's. Seems like he didn't have a good life!

"You want us to kill this Dragon?" Masayoshi Matsumoto probed Asmere. One had to know, although there were one or two Players that had Dragon Companions, they were all obtained through rare opportunities, in a face to face true battle, who could ever beat a level 1000 Dragon!

"Yes!" Asmere nodded his head. "I enjoy watching the slaughtering of Dragons, the more cruel and brutal you are, the happier I will be!"

I saw through all of it, Asmere was just a perverted psychotic! He must have been bullied by Dragons when he was young, or some Dragon had raped his wife? It had to be some absolutely irreconcilable hatred for him to be like that!

"Why not this?" Masayoshi Matsumoto must have thought of another plan. "We will turn him into our Companion to kill other Dragons outside, isn't watching them massacring each other the most enjoyable thing?"

So it turned out that not only did Masayoshi Matsumoto want the Treasures, he wanted to bring the Dragon out as well!

"Impossible!" Asmere immediately refused: "I want to see this Dragon die, only by slaughtering it can there be Dragon Bones to work on, I have no use of a live Dragon!"

"Ok! Ok!" Masayoshi Matsumoto immediately promised him, he did not want to provoke the eccentric Asmere.

Masayoshi Matsumoto suddenly picked out his own Ninjas and rushed up with him in the lead.

Clank….clank….

The continuous sounds of metal colliding came out.

The Black Dragon looked as though it was dead as it remained stationary as he was completely indifferent towards their attacks. None of them could break through the Black Dragon's defense!

This Black Dragon was completely different from Lucky, this Black Dragon was at its max level of 1000 and had grown to adulthood. It had gained the rights to be a BOSS, and its perverse defense was shockingly high!

All of the Japs looked at their own weapons in disbelief, all of their weapons had lost their durabilities, the hardness of the Dragon Scales were truly shocking! The mountain-sized Black Dragon looked as though he was sleeping, he was too lazy to even look at the ants around him!