Guild Wars

Shuangtian opened her eyes to find herself in an alleyway that was filled with filth and corpses. She was only groggy for a few seconds before the overwhelming stench hit her.

She cringed and jumped to her feet, immediately using the Water Element to hurriedly cleanse her body as well as a strong gust of wind to blow the smell away.

After sorting herself out, she finally had time to take stock of where exactly she was and noticed that she was in a rather archaic alleyway that was quite narrow.

Shuangtian frowned and jumped up to the top of the nearby building, and was surprised to see that it was quite busy around her.

There were many people flying about and also vaulting around the rooftops, all wearing different kinds of attires and using different movement styles.

The city itself reflected in her eyes was a mixture of Ancient Chinese and Western Cyberpunk, which caused her to have a strange experience.

From her current height, she could see endless prosperity, business, and lights in the city showing that it was lively.

To make sure she wasn't going crazy, she looked behind her to make sure the alleyway she had jumped from was still there, unsurprisingly it remained filled with shit and dead bodies.

Naturally once Shuangtian appeared in the public eye like this, there were many who stopped whatever they were doing and came over to get to know her. This would be the norm for her unless she eventually became like Eva in the past who used to wear a veil.

Shuangtian's brows furrowed but before she could deal with them, something appeared before her.

｢'System' to Player Announcement

After a cursory scan of your memories, it has been found that you've arrived from a Pseudo-multiverse that is digital in nature. As this counts as a True Universe, you have obtained the qualifications to enter this realm and speak to the World Will.｣

｢'System' to Player Announcement

Origin Being Shuangtian, I'm the Will of the Eternal World. After scanning your memories, you appear to be affiliated with the two Origin Beings turned Semi-Eternal, Draco, and Eva. As such, things should be relatively simple to explain to you using them as a backdrop.

Just like them, you possess two Eternal talents; A Chaotic Eternal Bloodline and the Unity of Body and Soul. Same as them, you have chosen to seek out how to bind your Chaotic Eternal Bloodline to the Origin of the Universe you came from, something which is possible here.

This Eternal World has its own rules, and to achieve your desired goal, you will need to undergo a trial.

Your current location is a complete Eternal Plane called the Xia Dynasty. This is not like the Fragmented Plane your two allies previously visited and took control of. This Plane has a Plane Lord, a complete society, as well as a full hierarchy of Eternals, their powers ranging from Weak to Supreme.

As such, you're heavily advised against replicating the aggressive path that your predecessors took. Rather, your chances to reach your goal will be far higher should you manage to blend in and settle into this world, then slowly achieve what you need to.

Much like I did for them, I will digitize the Plane for you and apply the same rules as in the digital universe you came from, though you can only use 'Eternal' level powers and talents here.

I will also inform the Plane Lord and have him temporarily provide you an identity that will prevent powerful Eternals from interfering with your business. Use this wisely.

Much like with the other duo, your goal here is set, which is to reach 'Level 10' in the system I shall generate for you by killing the Demons and Demon races in this land.

Beware, everything around you will also have 'Eternal' level power, making it so that all will be on equal footing. You shall possess the ability to respawn, but you will lose some of your progress every time you do so.

Good luck, and may your path to Eternity be fruitful.｣

Shuangtian read through it quickly and found that while some things were similar to what she had seen in the Evil Duo's memories, a lot was also different, especially the location she ended up in.

It should have been obvious that her trial would be elsewhere. Not only did Draco and Eva conquer the Desert Plains Fragment Plane, but they had also killed pretty much every Eternal monster on it to level up.

How was Shuangtian supposed to face a trial in such circumstances? As nice as the World Will was by giving her so much advice and warning, it was only because of her high potential that it bothered, not because it owed her something or even liked her.

Same with Draco and Eva, otherwise, it wouldn't have cruelly blasted them away when they had tried to rush in. Not every spiritual entity was like the AI who could be tricked into love by a fuck boy.

Shuangtian then felt the world around her change slightly as if a wave had passed through. The fellows who were approaching her also froze as their expressions changed, likely feeling what happened.

Seeing that this change originated from Shuangtian, their friendly and interested expressions changed to one of wariness and hostility as they backed away.

"Woman, what did you do?!" One fellow roared in a language that Shuangtian knew she shouldn't understand, but could grasp because of the world's digitization.

Shuangtian glanced at the fellow and ignored him aiming to leave. Seeing that she didn't mind him, the fellow's expression fell as he became furious.

"Damn bitch, I'm talking to you!"

He immediately burst into flames and threw out a giant fist of fire toward Shuangtian. The girl simply ignored the attack and let it strike her, continuing to move as she slowly felt the power within her blood.

She noticed that while her bloodlines was more 'free' here, it was far less… how should she say... potent? She was basically going through the same kind of experience as Draco and Eva when they had first entered their trial ground.

It wasn't that she had been weakened or suppressed, not in any way, as she was practically untouched power-wise. It was just that the ceiling here was much higher and the world was sturdy, so the feats she could perform before that would shatter Space would barely crack it now.

It was like a powerful martial artist who was able to punch a cement block into pieces, now punching a steel block he only dented it. His strength hadn't changed, just that the object/item he was working on had changed to something of a higher quality, so his same level of strength resulted in less permanent damage to it.

The fellow who tossed his fire punch at Shuangtian looked gratified that he had 'punished' her since the flames were still spreading and the smoke covered the outcome.

He stood there with his hands folded behind his back like a supreme ruler descending upon the earth and the crowd looked at him with awe.

However, the dust soon settled showing Shuangtian who had gotten far away as she headed for a more prosperous area to find some information about where she was at.

Unlike Draco and Eva, she did not have psychic powers to rape the mind of others to get what she wanted, so like a normal and sensible person, she had to ask.

As for the fellow who attacked her, his face changed greatly as he turned and ran right away. What a joke!

Did you expect him to come here and get his ass whooped for fun?

Sure, he was a retard young master archetype, but even retards knew when to bolt. There was no way anyone would do what he did and then shout 'how dare you' and attack again, right?

Haha, any author who even wrote that kind of rubbish in their story surely wouldn't have novels at the number 1 spot of online reading sites, right?

Some among the fellows here had their eyes gleamed with different emotions, some disappearing into shadows while others chased after Shuangtian as if to chat with her.

Shuangtian herself was occupied with the screen before her.

｢Name: Shuangtian

Eternal Talent: Chaotic Eternal Bloodline, Unity of Body and Soul.

Eternal Class: Chaotic Eternal Bloodline

Level: 1

Exp: 0

Power level: Weak

——————

Eternal Power: 100

Eternal Control: 0.1

Eternal Limit: 100

———————

Eternal Skills: None

Eternal Items: None｣

Shuangtian was still wearing her jade empress dress formed from her elemental energy. This was quite weird on a normal basis, but it made her fit in somewhat here.

Shuangtian soon arrived at a bustling street and jumped down from the roof. When she landed, she caused a great thwomp, and a small crater formed in the ground.

This surprised her, as she thought her strength would not cause the cement here to crack, but that was relative. If she did this on Earth, she might cause an entire city block to go under, not just a small radius around her legs.

This also caused the pedestrians around to glance at her with awed expressions. Even though there were fellows up there doing wuxia-style rooftop jumping, not too many if any could actually achieve this level of power.

In fact, looking left and right, Shuangtian could tell that all of these beings were powered-up entities. Not all of them were humans, though. There were orcs, beastmen, elves, and the like walking around freely.

However, none of these fellows even registered as Eternals or Semi-Eternals. They were not even Pseudo-Eternals, but they weren't ordinary folk either.

In terms of power, they were similar to Rank 3 Kings in Boundless from what Shuangtian could tell based on what she could sense and feel after comparing it to the memory database in her mind.

However, obviously, while Rank 3 Kings could even suppress elite players in the game - due to Rank and Level suppression - they were just slightly above average folk here.

Shuangtian shook her head and entered a nearby shop. Inside were consumables like drinks, edibles, and some strange items that were definitely special or unique to this locale.

However, Shuangtian didn't care about that right now. Rather, she walked straight to the dude at the cashier and then released her aura as her demeanor became imposing.

"Greetings, my name is Jade Empress. I'm an Eternal who has just entered this city, so I need information. The first to provide it to me shall get a small reward."

Shuangtian spoke quickly and fluidly, using the experiences from Draco and Eva's memories to guide her on how to handle this situation. Upon feeling her aura and hearing her words, the fellow at the cashier first was horrified then became confused.

After briefly displaying a look of excitement, he quickly looked left and right before bowing to Shuangtian.

"Esteemed Eternal what do you want to know?" he asked hurriedly.

Shuangtian frowned. "Everything. I'm too busy to directly scour your soul, so speak quickly and concisely."

Hearing about soul reading, the fellow's excitement was instantly cooled and fear captured him completely. He lost all intentions to take advantage of this opportunity and was now hoping to just retain his bloody mind after this.

"Y-Yes… I tell you right away!"

After that, the fellow babbled everything he knew, even including details that were not necessary, but Shuangtian soaked everything up like a sponge. When it looked like he was about to stop, she would release her aura a bit to scare him and get him talking some more.

Once she was sure there was nothing more relevant he had to say, she casually flicked her finger with which she generated a seed. The seed landed in the fellow's hand and he looked at it as if he recognized it but was not sure.

"That is a core for a Wood Element Golem with power just beneath an Eternal. Use it wisely." Shuangtian revealed lazily and left the shop in a flash, making use of her speed to create a scene.

As for the fellow, his hand holding the seed shook and his eyes became glazed over. He, a normal cashier working minimum wage in this city, actually had the power just below an Eternal…

Suddenly, his boss came in and saw him in a daze, and smacked him upside the head.

"You trash, is it so hard to man a simple cashier? Quickly focus on your task before I dock your pay again!" The boss roared angrily.

The cashier displayed an expression of fear at first, then his eyes gleamed when he felt the seed in his hand. Vicious thoughts grew in his mind and he eventually acted on them!

Shuangtian did not know and did not care that she had given an oppressed person the power to fight back, nor did she care about any of the chaos that would ensue due to her actions.

Right now, she was quickly thinking about how to settle in with the information she had acquired.

There was a lot of detail here, but essentially, this city was called Li City and its population should be around 10 trillion. The highest power level was the City Lord, who was a Pseudo-Eternal.

In fact, this Li City was, as you'd expect, a 'starting area' city in that its average power and size was one of the smallest on this Plane, a perfect place to randomly appear and start your climb to power from.

And Shuangtian also learned some things, like the power level and the factions of the city.

The power hierarchy was like this:

Mortal - Basically people who were without powers/average civilians. Though it had to be noted that the average civilians in an Eternal Plane were about as strong as Rank 3 Kings from Boundless.

Awakened - Fellows who had awakened a special talent. It may or may not be an Eternal talent like what Draco, Eva, and Shuangtian had, but could be normal talents like the dude who could manipulate fire. Going with him as a basis, this meant Awakened had power on par with Rank 5 fellows from Boundless.

Master - Fellows who had trained their talent to a certain threshold and could display it at a larger and stronger scale. Since Shuangtian had yet to discover anyone of this description, she could only assume they would probably be as strong as Rank 7 fellows from Boundless.

Grandmaster - The obvious uptick from any Master. These fellows were practically the mainstay of this Plane and formed the upper echelon of most forces that were non-governmental. Shuangtian estimated them to be somewhere between Titled Gods and True God-level power.

Origin - The same as the Origin Rank from Boundless, the pinnacle power in a 'lower' universe. However, they represented the upper-middle echelon here. Same power level as the namesake.

Pseudo-Eternal – Someone with a normal or special talent that they had trained to the cusp of the power of the Plane, almost breaching on Eternal level but never being able to take that gap simply because their Talent wasn't on the Eternal level. Low-tier city lords reside here.

Semi-Eternal – Someone with an Origin level Talent who has been trained to the peak, and is slowly upgrading their Talent to the Eternal level through hard work and perseverance. Mid-tier city lords are here.

Eternal - Barring the various rankings within the Eternal level (like weak, average, elite, etc) this was the pinnacle power in this world and none could touch them from the lower ranks. Eternals spoke to Eternals, they fought Eternals and they fucked Eternals. Anyone below this rank was basically worse than a worm to an Eternal.

As far as Shuangtian knew, being an Eternal opened many doors for her if she wanted to blend in. When she compared this knowledge with the various factions in the city, she made the obvious choice to find a war-like one that could get her what she needed; money, stability, and murder.

She sure as hell wasn't going to reach Level 10 by twiddling her thumbs.

Naturally in a world where there were Demons and Demon beats roaming about and challenging the rule of humanity, there would be factions based around the hunting, killing, and trading of such enemies.

And so it was that Shuangtian found herself before the bustling gates of the Mercenaries Pavilion. There were other forces like the Auxiliary Association, the Merchants House, the Adventurer's Group, and the City Hall that could also fulfill her needs, but this one was the best choice.

Auxiliary Association required Tradeskills and only Draco was good at that. Merchant House required mercantile skill and probably Eva excelled there due to her abilities.

The Adventurer's Group was the flipside of the Mercenaries Pavilion, but it was more formal and by the book. As for City Hall, that was governmental and if you had common sense, never join any governmental body unless it's a top position.

So the Mercenaries Pavilion was obviously her best choice. Not only did it grant her freedom, but there were no charges for members, and the employer paid the fee to the Pavilion.

Likewise, if you died in the process of a mission or got into trouble, it's your own problem. Freedom comes at a price, and that's security. If you want security, don't expect or desire freedom either.

Shuangtian entered the building resolutely and noticed that no one stopped her, though many naturally took a second look. However, she curly released her aura, which caused many faces to change greatly as a great divide was formed.

Everyone gave her way and stayed the fuck away from her, which made Shuangtian raise an eyebrow. Immediately, she noticed that a few Eternal auras were rushing down to her, and she waited for them silently.

Soon, three women and four men came down before her, all of them dressed differently, but looking like they were part of one group. When they appeared, they sized her up curiously and their eyes shone.

"Tsk, tsk, such potent Eternal Power. She must be a newcomer from a Lower World or off-Plane, because someone this talented would not be a new face here." One of the women commented as her eyes lit up.