Starting from Zero

Book 4, Chapter 10

Unexpected Acquaintance

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"I told you, silly. Join our guild. I heard that you got some really nice equipment. Oh and your Luck would help us a lot too."

The girl's expression is super confident, before Rose rushed over and knocked her over. The screen shook again, then Rose's face came up, with some tears and messy hair. But she's smiling big.

"Don't worry about it Ziri! I won't give up even if it means they would tickle me to death! Ah!...."

There she goes.

That girl showed up again. She tried to keep a stern face but her hair and those straws tangling on her head are not really persuasive.

"Join us now or we'll use some serious torture!"

"So what exactly are you doing to Rose?" I can only see a group of girls running back and forth in the back of the screen. That doesn't look like what would happen inside a jail cell.

"Hey, listen. I can get you all out of there, how about we talk about it in person? You ladies are making me dizzy!"

"Ahhhh!... Get her off me!... Eh-ha- " The girl didn't get to answer before she was pressed down again. Rose must be pretty skillful at whatever they're playing. These girls... Now I'm worried. Not for her safety, but for fear that Rose might get led astray by their crazy playstyle.

Ugh, gotta rescue her fast. I really don't want to get myself a real "evil witch" instead. Though for some reason I think I'm already too late.

A moment later, Rose was pulled away by someone and the "vice master" appeared on the display for a third time. Her clothes are all messed up.

Elfy almost slapped her hands against Hawk's eyes. "Don't look!!"

My face feels a little hot too. "Can you, um, tighten up?"

"Huh? AH!"

She just noticed her breast-level collar and began to tidy up.

"...Alright! Let's talk business. You said you can get ALL of us out?"

"Yes I did. I wasn't chilling off when my wife is there. I've been looking for ways and improving myself just to get her out as soon as I can."

"Okay. Come meet me in the jail and let's talk."

"Understood."

I used my Star Gaze to locate Rose, told Hawk to wait for me in the city and then teleported in front of the prison.

"Ouch!" A girl yelled.

"Yowl!" I yelled.

My teleport ring caused a little accident. It determines your target location based on the coordinate you set. But if there are obstacles at that location, it will transport you to a random vacant location within 10 meters of the original point, or simply doesn't work if there are none. And now something is just blocking my target. Well, someone.

I chose to get to the entrance of the prison. Someone is passing through so my ring picked a point near this person, which happens to be right in front of her. Without much time to react, she walked into me and sat back on the ground, knocking me flat as well.

"Oh! I'm sorry!" I apologize in order not to cause too much trouble.

"Hey watch it!" Another girl came, who obviously doesn't know how I get here. All she saw was someone bumped into her friend. She helped the sitting girl up while mumbling: "Geez. Why would someone rush into a prison so fast? There are enough rooms in there."

"Sorry ladies, that wasn't on purpose. I...was distracted!" I tried to help the girl too. "Did I hurt you?"

"I'm fine! I'm not made of glass or something. And Snowy, you don't have to blame him like that." She pulled on our hands and stood up. "So what have you done?"

"Em?" That's not expected. I thought she forgave me, did she just decide to get back on me again?

"It was just an accident, I promise!" I need to get out of this.

"That's not what I meant. I want to know how you appeared out of thin air. It didn't look like someone just logged on. Player who just came up will appear slowly, but you got in front of me in a flash!"

She asked that while staring at my face. I think she looks familiar but...I can't remember who she is. She looks beautiful. No, "magnificent" would be the better word. It's the feeling of a women who can lead other people into actions. Though that kinda feels weird when a young girl is carrying that kind of temperament.

"It was teleportation. I think the system caused an accident by placing me right in front of you."

"Teleport?" She lowered her head for a moment. "So...you got the hidden class as a Taoism Sorcerer?"

"Taoism? I'm a knight." I touched my armor. "Would a Taoist wear heavy armors?" (*)

"Oh, my bad. Then how did you?..."

I'm in a hurry here so I just displayed my ring to her. "Got it?"

Her eyes went wide. "However did you get this thing?"

"System reward. I'm the first player to use a teleport station within the China region."

"There is a reward for that??" The girl called Snowy stared at the display in shock.

"Will you sell it? I'll pay a high price!" The other girl exclaimed.

I drew my hand back. "Nope. I apologize for what I did. But that won't be any reason for me to sell my ring. I'll go inside now if there's no more questions."

I left them behind me.

The structure looks pretty good. It's a single hallway behind the entrance, the walls are well painted, and the floor is boarded using big flagstones. The place is much tidier than I expected. Whoever designed this place didn't plan to make it the same as those terrible places in real life.

Two doors stand at the end of the hallway, a blue "M" and a red "W". I can see they tried as best as they could to make them NOT look like a toilet.

I walked into the women's door. There's nothing like those heavy metal blast doors you would imagine, it's just a bamboo curtain. There's only one large room inside, with a light-blue barrier splitting it up into two areas. I'm standing in the smaller area, the other side must be for the prisoners.

"Hey love, right here!" Rose noticed me as soon as I entered the room.

I walked to the barrier. A dozen or so girls are all staring at me. From the looks of their hair and those messed up straws everywhere, they didn't stop whatever they were doing after I cut the chat with Rose.

The "vice master" came over to me. "Well that was pretty fast. But weren't you outside the city just a moment ago?"

"Never mind that. I'm here to speak to Rose."

She moved closer. "Ziri you...cleaned your red name?"

I held up my left hand and displayed my bracelet to her. "Nice trick right? I'll ask my friend to take this thing to you, then you can just walk out of here. By the way, where is your friend you mentioned before? [Rosy]? Let's take her along."

The "vice master" humphed. "This lady doesn't need your service! My status will return to normal in 20 hours anyway."

"...So you're Rosy?" My mouth went wide. "But, you were just, I dunno, forcing us to join--"

"Master!" Rosy suddenly looked behind me.

I turned to check the new arriver. It's the girl who bumped with me back at the entrance.

"You! You're Ziri?"

"How did you know?"

My face is covered up, and she didn't recognize me just now did she?

"I'm [Red Moon], leader of Goddess Alliance. I knew something was familiar when I saw you. Rosy told me that Rose's husband is coming to visit her, and he's called [Ziri]. That's why I immediately returned."

"Red Moon? I knew it! You didn't come just to get some revenge because I pushed your off the platform last time eh? I didn't do it on purpose you know, my hands slipped!"

"Wait what? That was you? Then why are you suddenly Rose's husband?"

Huh? What is she talking about?

"Are you coming to settle that matter or not?"

"What--no! Rose has been telling me that you're powerful and such so I just came to recruit you since I have this chance. And I always thought the Ziri she mentioned and the one I met in the dungeon are two different people with the same name."

That's a relief. "Phew! So I'm safe."

"Not really. You have to join us."

Oh please not again.

"No can do." I shook my head, then took off my helmet so I can shake my head easier. My appearance won't be too much of an issue in front of a bunch of girls right?

...right?

I'm hearing a lot of gasps. Damn it.

Rosy took out a small mirror and looked into it, then looked at me, and looked at herself again, before she sat down into a corner. Snowy did exactly the same and decided to sit with Rosy.

Now I'm seeing a line of girls crouching against a wall together.

"What's going on?"

Red Moon just chuckled. "Well...girl problems, not going to explain. So why do you refuse my offer? We're the second largest guild within the region of China, apart from the number one, which is the Righteous League. All other guilds are like totally powerless compared to us. And Righteous League is just a tiny bit bigger than us. We don't even know who would win if we actually fight with each other. We won't fight though, because their leader is my brother. Believe me, we'll go surpass them soon enough."

"I mean no offense to your guild, but whether to join you got nothing to do with how big you are. I already have my own guild."

Red Moon interrupted me. "I heard it. The 'Blizzard Rose'? With just two people? What can you do with that? Join us. Come on."

"That's not important. Blizzard Rose is created by me and Rose, for that reason alone I will see to the end of it. Besides there are other facts why I shouldn't join you. From the looks of it the majority of your members are females right? I would feel really constrained if I'm in there. I'm trying very hard here to prove to everyone that I'm a guy...Joining Goddess Alliance will totally ruin my effort. And, as you can see I'm the loner type. I don't like staying among other people all the time. I'm pretty strict about my schedules too. It will be bad manners if I join someone and refuse to participate in your quests and activities, am I right?"

Red Moon's face is getting redder and I get the feeling that she will punch at me any time. However she just let out a deep sigh.

"Huh...If that's what you hope for. We do need talents but we don't have to go as far as to beg people to join. Snowy, let's go."

She dragged Snowy out of the room. I think Snowy is still depressed for whatever reason.

Rose beckoned me so I walked close to the barrier. She just looked at me with a weird look. "What are you afraid of? Come in."

"Eh? I can get inside?" I pointed at the barrier doubtfully.

"Of course. It will only block red names. Other players can just ignore it."

I poked at the barrier. She's right, I don't feel anything.

"So this is...the very expensive outfit you told me?" Rose leaned close to inspect my armor.

I nod. "Yeah. I wouldn't have it repaired yet but...you know, to save you. I owed the repair fee to Clark, now I still need to give him 150k Crystals."

"It looks worth it. What's that on your hand? Is this a weapon?"

"This." I pressed on the spring and released my claw blade. "One on each hand. And this..." I pulled out the dragon cord. "Use this as rope or cut stuff."

"Wooh! Where on earth did you get this thing?" The sitting-at-corner Rosy is now attracted as well.

"Oh, you're ok? What's gotten into you all?"

"Because of you, lady boy! Geez why would you look so nice? We were already feeling defeated by master and Rose. Now even a man looks better than us!"

"...That's it? Well sorry! I didn't ask for it. The job was nicely done by my parents, you should complain to them not me. Or maybe go ask your parents why didn't they give you the face of a super star."

"Ugh. Forget it! So what's the level of your armor? I never seen anything like this. There are too many weapons! What's this hole?"

"Hole?"

"This one." Rosy pointed at the back of my hand. "The hole above the three ones where your claw comes out."

I aimed my hand towards the door and pressed something. Thud! A bolt stuck into the wall beside the door, followed by a scream.

"AHH! Who was that?? This is murder!"

It's Elfy. Hawk is following her too. They were walking into the room whey I shot my crossbow, and Elfy just saw something pierced the wall beside her left ear.

"Oh, sorry sorry. You came! I was...telling them about my weapon."

"Watch it! If I moved faster that thing would opened up my nose!"

"Are they the new friends you mentioned?" Rose looked towards the couple.

"Yup. This is Hawk, a Paladin. And his girl friend Misty Elf, Archer. This is my wife, Crimson Rose."

We exchanged some greetings and began to discuss about the rescue plan.

"The situation is simple:" I raised my left hand. "Any player wearing this bracelet may pass through the barrier as they wish. We will first exit the city, and Hawk will take the bracelet back to Rose so she can leave. We just need some more tours if we want to bring everyone out. Easy enough right?"

"Yeah...but there's a big problem." Said Elfy.

"What problem?" I don't see anything. "Just, walk around the entrance for a couple of times right? What's wrong with that?"

Elfy pointed at the girls against the wall. "They all know what the bracelet does right?"

"Yes they do." I'm still confused.

"Rosy, the prisoners are not ALL from your organization I guess?"

"What do you mean 'organization'? Well, only three of them are. And mind your words! That sounds like women mafia or something. Our guild is made up of good people. Even if we joined some sort of group fight, there wouldn't be so many prisoners from our guild."

"I...apologize. I just needed to make sure. So most people here are not from your guild, how do we trust them then? If anyone get the message out that there is a bracelet capable of getting rid of your red name status, what do think will happen?"

I'm still slow. "Robbery? But this is inside a city! Robbers get caught."

Rosy answered before Elfy can explain: "Use your brain! The bracelet will sell for at least 200k Crystals on the market. And Hawk will be carrying it alone, so if anyone kills him they will only earn 100 Evilness--just a day in the jail. 200k Crystals I say! A bunch of people would try to rob us for way less than those money."

"This thing costs so much??" I'm beginning to wonder if I should just sell it later to pay my debt!

"What should we do then?" Rose asked.

I got an idea though. "Rosy, your guild is like, second in command in the whole country right? And your brother commands the biggest guild? Can you send someone as escort?"

She shook her head. "You're not our member, we don't have to help. You just shut the door in front of our master's nose and now you ask for her help? She's already helping, by not sending anyone to take your bracelet!"

"But you need to get out of here right?"

"Forget about it. We'll all be free in at most three to five days, not like your dear wife. Some extra days won't be an issue for us. If Rose isn't my friend I'd already ask my members to come take it from you. This thing is priceless in future group fights or guild wars. Sigh, why did I meet with Rose first? And now I don't want to make her feel bad. O lord. Am I being too kind to this world?"

Hawk nudged me. "Don't worry, we can take a little risk. You see how I fight, and I can just run if I need to."

"No other choice I guess."

Elfy suggested: "Let's go together. If anything happens we run in opposite directions so they must split up as well, which means better chance for us. They won't know who's carrying the bracelet anyway."

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(*) In games, a "Taoist" is usually the Chinese version of mage, who usually performs hexes or deals with ghosts and spirits. They kinda look like "Onmyouji" in Japanese culture.