Hikari: Rise Of The Weapons Master

"Why do I feel as though something is wrong?" Lisa muttered as she sat on the floor in Zack's room.

The boy and Emma were seated down on the bed with Hayden standing in the corner.

"It's probably because your head is still hurting from our time travel," Zack replied with a grin before he caught all of them up to the latest changes happening in the world.

Hayden was surprised to hear that the underworld had been taken care of but when he realized what had happened, he wanted to dance and whoop.

"Guess I no longer have to worry about anything there and calmly stay here." He said with a calm face as he decided to not let his emotions appear, fearing that he might explode if that happened.

"Now, it's time that we go into Hikari and actually be a guild for once. Let's stay away from dungeons for the time being. The best thing we can do is guild wars." Zack explained as all of them nodded.

"But before that, you need to talk to Eva." Emma suddenly declared as the black-haired boy rolled his eyes.

Both of them had this discussion after their lovemaking session and Zack had declined. But now, it looked as though he might have to go ahead and do it.

"Tch." Zack then stood up and walked out of the room while Hayden and Lisa looked at Emma with confused looks.

"Don't worry too much. It doesn't matter what he does, he just needs to talk to her openly." Emma replied while closing her eyes. "You guys ever heard of ASMR?"

***

"So, why are you here?" Eva asked while raising her eyebrows as she was sitting in her new office at her home.

Zack stood in front of her desk with a straight expression as he decided to talk about a few things Emma had suggested.

"I want to ask you what you think of the game completely merging with reality?"

"Hmm, no idea," Eva replied with a shrug as she stared into Zack's eyes. "You are here because of something else, aren't you?"

"What do you remember before we kissed?" Zack asked outright as he leaned forward on the desk.

Eva averted her gaze as she thought about that moment. She wasn't bothered by the kiss but what happened before and after that.

"Sitting under a tree with you staring at my face and trying to make me laugh," Eva suddenly spoke up. "Bathing in a river together and giggling.

Eating home-cooked food. Making love. Stargazing. These are some of the activities I see when I sleep and dream. And you are always there."

Suddenly, Eva bent forward on the chair and grabbed Zack's collar. She pulled him forward and brushed her lips over his for a few seconds before pushing him away.

"It feels the same in real life too..." Eva muttered as Zack slowly backed away.

'Aight. That's the perfect way to ask questions and get someone outraged." Zack left the office in a hurry while wondering how many more complications his life could have.

He directly made his way to the gaming pods to see the trio waiting for him.

Zack glared at Emma for a few seconds before all four of them entered the gaming pods and logged into Hikari.

The first thing Zack did was to tell Emma what happened. The go could only shake her head before looking around the white room.

"Let's go and see if Jonathan has a heart attack when he sees us," Emma replied with a smile as the quartet moved out.

They stepped outside the guild just in time to have a fireball coming their way.

"Now that's a good way to welcome us," Zack muttered as he used hydro pump to extinguish the fire.

One thing he managed to learn was that Hikari had become a parallel reality. Hunger and food pills were now the same price diamonds once had.

Gaming pods had become so expensive that it was hard to even get a bronze one.

Most of this was due to hunger and thirst issues since no one wanted to experience them.

"Hey, someone came out of the guild!" A voice shouted as a group of fifty people suddenly surrounded the quartet.

"So these are the top four players huh. Attack!" Another voice shouted from within the crowd and thousands of fire spells were launched toward the group.

Zack just raised an eyebrow before raising his right hand forward and using his blue flames.

The fire destroyed all of the incoming attacks and even roped all the attackers inside it. Zack decided to burn them at a low temperature so that they would feel the pain yet would be able to talk.

"Anyone wants to explain what is happening?" Zack asked all of the people trapped in his flames since he could tell that a few were actually NPCs or rather, were not from Earth.

He had somehow gained the ability to tell who was from earth and who wasn't, allowing him to separate the two groups.

"B-But you have the powers of the world tree. You are supposed to be weak to fire!" One of them said as Zack shrugged.

"You are right and wrong at the same time." He then burned all of them using his blue flames before dusting his hands and glancing at the palace in the distance.

The flag of the Eizenburgh family was still present on the top of the palace alongside the symbol meaning that Jonathan was still the ruler.

But what worried Zack was the condition of the streets. Fights were breaking out everywhere, players fighting the city guards and their captains.

"Everyone, check your quests..." Emma suddenly muttered while clenching her fist as the other three opened their quest screen.

[ Conquest Of Flames: Conquer the capital city do the Eizenburgh kingdom by burning down the guild 'Red dawn' and killing the king. ]

Zack's eyes widened when he read the details of the quest as they felt like a personal attack.

There was no way that was a fair quest especially since it mentioned his guild.

Emma too shared his opinions and decided to release some of her frustration by killing those around her.

She summoned her bow and unleashed get upgraded version of Moon shower which was infinity moon shower.

Mana had been implemented inside the game too so as long as Emma provided her bow with mana, the moon shower arrows would be launched one after the other.

Furthermore, she could control all the arrows to only hit those who she wanted to be hit.

Emma's bow fired ten such arrows that expanded into thousands of arrows and skewered the entire players' side.

The quartet then started making their way towards the palace in such a manner as Zack and Emma fended those in front of him while Lisa and Hayden fended those behind them.

They soon realized that the number of players and NPCs teaming up and battling and battling together dar exceeded their imaginations.

"I wonder how Jonathan is still alive at this point," Zack muttered as he summoned Chastiefol and used its second form to make their way forward clearer.

After fifteen minutes, they finally reached the palace as Zack opened the gates with his hands and walked inside.

Blood was spilled everywhere yet not a single dead body was present in the entire place. No sounds of fighting filled the halls as they made their way up to the throne room.

As soon as they entered it, they saw Jonathan sitting on the throne with his eyes closed and an expression of focus on his face.

Before they could take a better look or ask something, a figure zipped past and landed in front of them.

"Acid bubble!"

"Fire bubble!"

Two shouts, one after the other, echoed around the room as Zack used his flames to cover the group from the acid bubble that had appeared around them.

Standing in front of them was Pearl, dressed in tight black assassin clothes.

She blinked in confusion when she saw the quarter's faces before she saw the bitter smile on Zack's face.

"Where the fck did you vanish?!" The noble girl from months ago had long since vanished and was replaced by a killer bodyguard.

Pearl stared through the group long enough before Zack decided to answer her.

"We met a god who tried to kill us hit we were saved because of another God and jumped in time and are not here to help you and Jonathan," Zack replied as he took out all three of his weapons to prove that he was saying the truth.

Pearl gave all of them a hard glance before taking a deep breath. She had been tricked a few times when protecting Jonathan so she wasn't go3ign to do anything without checking the facts.

But as soon as she brought her hands near the weapons, an invisible force knocked her hand, making her sigh.

"You have a lot of things to catch up on."