Rise Online: Return of the Legendary Player

Verzano appeared with a book in his hand and asked Kaizen, "I shouldn't tell you this kind of thing, and I know it's silly to question, but would you be willing to live in an old house that is said to be haunted, sir?"

Hearing that from the broker's mouth made Jayaa take two steps back. "No, no, no! I'm definitely not visiting a haunted house." Then, he said.

"What's the matter, Jayaa? I'm sure it can't be as bad as you think. Let's at least let him tell you what the place is like... Can you tell me what the place is like?" Kaizen inquired to Verzano.

The old broker, with gray hair and round glasses, was once again wary. He had instructions not to tell clients when a property was haunted, so he thought this would scare Kaizen enough to make him give up looking for other properties and buy the one with 5,000 gold coins. So Verzano was surprised that Kaizen didn't seem to care about this and was wondering if he should try to sell this haunted house to get at least a good commission or if he was going to be ethical and not present this haunted house to the client who was clearly desperate. This was a dilemma for an NPC who had the Neutral alignment.

As Kaizen watched Verzano's conflicted face of disturbance, a screen appeared before him.

[Psych Class Effect activated.]

[Thanks to your knowledge of paranormal existence, you have obtained the opportunity to unlock a hidden mission.]

[If you wish to unlock this mission, convince the realtor Verzano to take you to the mentioned haunted building. If you succeed, you will get the following rewards:

- +1000 XP]

Kaizen was very shocked. All these screens that appeared to him in sequence were totally new to him.

'Class Effect? What is that?' He frowned and asked himself mentally. 'I don't know, but the best I can do is try to convince this old man to take me to this house.'

After taking a few steps forward and approaching the counter again, Kaizen used the best way to convince someone he knew. Then he leaned forward and whispered in a threatening voice near Verzano:

"Pay attention to what I'm going to say to you, man."

Kaizen placed both hands on the counter, causing Verzano to immediately step back, startled.

"You're going to introduce me to this house, and I don't care if the house is junk or if it's badly haunted, because if it's for sale and it's cheap, I'm going to visit it. That is, if you don't do as I command, I will take my friend's lute here and beat you so badly with it that even the beautiful oak wood with which it was made will beg for mercy. Then I will take the remains of the lute and stick it there where the sun doesn't beat."

"He's talking about your ass." Jayaa clarified for the broker. Although she didn't understand what was going on, she was finding it amusing.

Verzano's former confused expression was gone, and now his face was filled with fear. "A-all rig-right, gentlemen! No n-need to be so aggressive, I will introduce-ce you to the house today."

[You have found a hidden mission].

[For using a class effect for the first time, you gained some rewards.]

[You gained '+1000 XP'.]

[Quest Name: The Haunted House of the Royal City

Many years ago, rumors arose that a building in the center of the Royal City is troubled by ghosts. Visit this location.

Possible rewards upon completing this Mission:

- +1000 XP.

- Mysterious Reward (1x).

Do you wish to accept? YES/NO]

Immediately, Kaizen clicked YES.

"So, we don't have a problem right now. Take the key and let's go soon we don't have all the time in the world." continued Jayaa, pointing his finger in the broker's face.

"Y-yes, sir!" Verzano stooped down to get the keys from behind the counter.

As the man searched for the right keys, Kaizen gave Jayaa's right shoulder two taps and said with a nervous smile, "No need to be so mean to him, we're not robbing him."

"Oh, but... why are you bullying him anyway?" the bard asked, whispering back.

Kaizen pulled his group partner a little farther away from the counter.

"If the house really is haunted, I can get a very good discount on it. Maybe, I can even buy it for a pittance, but I won't be able to know that until I get there."

"Man, I get that, but I can't understand why you would want to set up a business in a house haunted by ghosts. No one is going to want to come to your blacksmith store, store and fruit market."

"Fruit market?" Kaizen inquired, confused.

"You want to become rich, don't you? Sell fruit. All the players buy it."

"I'm not going to set up a fruit market, okay?"

"If you want to set up a nightclub, I can sing there for you too. However, it won't be for free, and if you want to pay up front, I'll accept." Jayaa held out his right hand to Kaizen, who was at a loss as to how to properly answer him.

"Forget all that, Jayaa. You trust me, don't you? I have a plan to get rid of the ghost in case there really is one in this place."

This information made the bard curious, however, he didn't want to be nosy, so he held his questions back for now.

Since Kaizen already had experience dealing with ghosts, with one ghost to be exact, he was confident that he could handle other ghosts.

Just as he had dealt with Therkara Ironstone, helping her to complete her last wish in the material world, he thought that this was also what motivated all the other ghosts, the last wishes. Also, although Therkara's mission was a bit long, he got a lot of great rewards, so maybe the same would happen now with this haunted house mission.

After the realtor took the keys to the haunted house, at Kaizen's request he revealed more details about the place they were going to visit.

This time, determined to complete the sale, obviously Verzano began to count for the positives of the place, especially when he discovered Kaizen's goal of setting up an integrated blacksmith store and store.

"You're going to love it, sir. The rooms are spacious and the house has two floors plus attic. Also, the building is not twinned like most in the business district, meaning the walls are not divided with other buildings. It's ideal for a blacksmith who doesn't want to disturb anyone, or even if you want to tear down and build the way you want."

"It looks like a good location." Kaizen commented after hearing the particulars of the property.

"For ghosts and spiders." said Jayaa and then hid a little behind his tall, broad-shouldered partner because they were getting close. "Mr. broker, how long has this house been closed?"

"Well, about thirty years. It was the grandfather of the current owner of the real estate company where I work who bought the house about sixty years ago. Since then, a few people tried to buy it, but none stayed in the house for a long time, until the rumors about the house became popular and no one even wanted to visit it anymore..."

It was still dusk in the Royal City when the trio consisting of Jayaa, Kaizen and Verzano, the real estate broker, arrived at the haunted house in the business district, which was a wide, giant mountain.

Surprisingly, the surroundings were empty, which was unusual for such a busy district, but was also understandable because of the spooky building.

The haunted house had two floors as pointed out by Verzano, and all the windows on the second floor were sealed with wooden boards. The walls of the building were made of grayish bricks and the roof was made of ordinary red tiles, but which had not been repaired for so long that they were falling apart and were full of slime. Since there were no gutters either, there was vegetation growing in several areas on the outer walls of the house, as well as mold.

However, it wasn't all bad news for Kaizen, because the second floor part of the house was close to the ideal he was looking for.

Unlike the windows on the second floor, which were of normal size and their panes were partially broken and sealed, on the second floor the windows were wide like real store windows. This excited Kaizen, for if he wanted to set up a gun store he should have somewhere to put some of his creations on display and these windows were perfect for this. At the moment the curtains on these windows were closed, but Kaizen could already imagine what he would do in this place.

Just as it was described by the realtor, the house in question was not terraced like any other building and was practically the only one on the entire street in this way, because the taverns, restaurants and other gun stores basically followed a pattern. This was good news for Kaizen, because it might not attract many NPCs because of the ghost stories, but because it was different from the other buildings it would attract many curious players, or so he hoped.

...

Edited by: DrHitsuji

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