Child of Destiny

...

Beast Glade Kingdom, Wolfdom City.

Shin and the others picked a certain inn in this city so that they could stay there for the time being which also became their temporary meeting place.

Shin was sitting crossed leg on the bed while wearing a deep frown as he closely watched the 3D virtual map projected in front of him. There were also a lot of red dots blinking on that virtual map, indicating all of the locations that they had already marked after their investigation.

Shin thought for a few moments before deciding to separate the places where the quests that they were investigating were taken and where the package was delivered; yellow for the former and red for the latter.

Then he started connecting the dots with the same color before taking another look at them. But unlike what he had expected, he didn't find any kind of pattern or whatsoever even when he was done connecting them.

"What are you doing?" asked Cloe as she sat beside Shin.

"Trying to figure out our opponent's plan," answered Shin while re-arranging the lines connecting dots. But no matter how hard he tried, those locations seemed to really have no connection with each other.

"Tsk! This puzzle is really tricky," muttered Shin before giving it another try. And this time, he started grouping the glowing dots in 5 before connecting them once again.

Shin repeatedly did this for a whole hour but ended up with no better results, so all he could do was scrape everything up and start over again. "Maybe it is because they are not complete yet which is why we can't find any specific pattern yet."

Seeing that Shin was too immersed in thinking, Cloe got a little bored and just lied on the bed instead. She was quite mentally fatigued from the series of events in the Real World so she really needed to rest a little to recover her peak self.

After all, she was not like a monster like Shin and the others who were still full of energy to play the game despite the previous battles that they took part in.

Fortunately, the gaming cabin that she was using also had a stable sleep mode whenever she wanted to rest inside the game. Given all of that, Cloe took advantage of the fact they were currently resting right now to get a little bit of rest.

"Hey, sing me a lullaby," she whispered.

Hearing that, Shin couldn't help but knit his brow before saying. "Can't you see that I am busy? And if you really want to rest, just log out of the game and have a proper sleep outside."

"Come on~! I don't have any energy to argue with you this time," she replied with a quiet voice which made Shin sigh helplessly.

"Come closer, I'll help you sleep comfortably but I will not be singing any lullabies, understand?" said Shin as he adjusted his sitting potion and moved closer to the head of the bed to lead his body on it.

Sensing his movements, Cloe suddenly smiled and quickly turned over to Shin and moved closer to him before quickly embracing his waist.

"Hey! I didn't tell you to hug me!" said Shin with a frown but didn't remove the arms wrapped around his waist. Then he gently patted the back of her shoulder with a slow rhythm and let her sleep.

He didn't even bother to turn his head at her when he was doing that and just focused on studying the virtual map in front of him. It acted so naturally as if he was already used to these kinds of scenarios.

At that very moment, the door of the room suddenly opened followed by Arthur and Charlotte entering the room.

Whistle~♪

"You two are acting like that even though we are supposedly working with other people? Are you not afraid that they misunderstand your relationship?" said Arthur smirkingly as he took a seat on the bed across the two.

"They can think whatever they want. It is not like they know anything anyway," said Shin nonchalantly without taking his eyes away from the virtual map in front of him.

Hearing that, Arthur just shrugged his shoulders and before looking at Charlotte who was currently looking at the scene, stunned and dumbfounded.

"Hesh~! Let's forget about it. This is not my problem anymore," muttered Arthur with a soft voice before opening a virtual screen in front of him to browse on the online forums, forgetting about everything else.

Charlotte stayed standing on her spot for quite some time before releasing a deep sigh and proceeded to look for a spot where she could sit.

A few moments later, Owen finally came back alongside Ithilien and was about to greet everyone inside with a loud voice. "H-…!"

Swoosh!

But before he could even complete a single word, a flying dagger suddenly flew past his cheeks and landed on the wooded wall behind him.

Then Owen gulped a mouthful of saliva before taking a good look inside the room. And that was when I noticed the strange atmosphere inside. Especially when he saw Shin and Cloe.

After that, he took a quick glance at Arthur who practically signaled him to stay quiet. The latter was even gesturing with his hands to say – "I will shut up my mouth if I were you." –

Then his eyes roamed around the room until his sight landed on the spot where the ominous energy was coming from. He saw Charlotte browsing on her virtual screen with her glaring eyes.

"Ahm… I am too scared to enter inside," whispered Owen to Ithilien as he stepped out of the room.

Seeing that, Ithilien shook her head and smiled bitterly before taking the lead to enter the room. And when Owen saw that, he had no choice but to follow her.

"Let's just hope that we don't suffocate inside then," muttered Owen with a bitter smile of his own.

Not long after, Archimedes and Daulla entered the room too. Fortunately, what happened to Owen didn't happen to them.

Well, that was to be expected since both of them were not fond of talking anyway. But the strange atmosphere within the room somehow affected them. Even Archimedes who didn't seem to bother about the world couldn't help but became bothered by it.

If they didn't encounter any mishaps from entering, it was a different case for the trio of Leonard, Alucard, and Akailu. The latter two both had big mouths, so they were quite loud when they entered the room.

Right after they entered the room, they were immediately greeted by immense Killing Intent which also made them immediately shut their mouths. And when they turned their heads towards the direction where that killing intent was coming from, they saw Shin looking at them with a sharp and deadly glare.

Naturally, the two Titled Rankers didn't like the look that they were getting from Shin, especially that they were not that 'familiar' with each other.

Fortunately, Leonard quickly hopped behind the two and put his arms around their necks. "Hey! Let it pass this time. That guy is just-…"

He was in the middle of talking when Cloe finally woke up and said. "Oh! Everyone is already here? Then let us start immediately."

She said it as if nothing was going on, so the strange atmosphere inside the room changed all of a sudden. She magically erased the tension that was built up earlier with just her clueless attitude.

After that, the group started reporting what they had discovered so far. Then also reported the coordinates that they got from their investigation.

With all of those coordinates, Shin was finally able to fill some blanks that he needed to figure out the next move of their opponent. He was also able to complete the real formation that the opposing side was trying to create.

But right after he completed the formation, the only word that came from his mouth was a loud curse. "F*ck!"

Hearing that, the others quickly turned their heads towards his direction and waited for him to explain what happened.

Shin took a few moments to organize his thoughts before enlarging the virtual map in front of him and placing it in the middle of everyone. And when the others looked at it, they immediately saw the huge formation circle that covered the entire Beast Glade Kingdom after all of the red dots were connected.

And to make it even worse, it was not a single formation circle but two. The yellow dots were also forming another formation circle which was slightly smaller than the previous one and was placed inside it.

"Hey, wait! These formations circles are already complete!" said Akailu as started the virtual map. "But how is it possible? It should be far from being complete just a few moments earlier, but how come it suddenly-…?"

The others were also quite confused since they also tried to find a pattern in their opponent's movements but they couldn't find anything up until now. So, they would naturally become completely surprised after knowing that the formation became completely all of a sudden.

Then Shin suddenly explained what happened. "Those guys, they mislead us by purposely giving out the locations that we need. But at the same time, they also left all of the most important locations to hide their real progress."

"And while we were too occupied at finding the exact location of those places, they simultaneously handed out the final set of quests to finally complete the formation without us knowing."

He then paused for a brief moment before muttering to himself with an interesting smile. 'So, this means that we are currently facing a really scheming strategist. This is starting to become more interesting.'

...