Second World

Jack's auxiliary skills had received many upgrades during this short stay. No wonder Wilted came here so early for his Diplomacy skill. Her diplomacy must have skyrocketed if she focused only on that during her thirty days stay in this village.

Aside from Diplomacy, Influence, Lockpicking, Runecraft, and Blacksmith, Jack also did Cooking every day for their meals. He also used Inspect every now and then. These two auxiliary skills had also improved. They were now both at the intermediate expert level.

A few of his game skills were also upgraded. Amongst them, Penta Slash received its second star, Roll at four stars, Myriad Ensnaring Chains was five stars, while Adrenaline Rush reached the sixth star. The Phantom Blade skill gained its first star. Each star of Phantom Blade increased its damage further by 2%.

That night, he was again with Grace and Jet practicing game skills while conversing with Captain Whitebeard, Shortpaw, and Oldeye. Jet and he only had two days left before they had to leave the village. Jack determined to not let the remaining days go to waste. Since he was no longer doing any blacksmithing work, he could fully focus on training his combat skills and spells.

He used the Organic Seed that night. After much consideration, he decided to use the seed on the Myriad Ensnaring Chains spell. Peniel mentioned that the seed would turn his skill or spell alive. It was a rather vague description. His Myriad Ensnaring Chains could be said to be half-alive considering the chains auto-targeted opponents in their vicinity, but their grabbing mechanism was too straightforward. Those with fast reflexes and excellent body control like his grandfather could still easily avoid capture. Maybe turning them into real-alive would erase this weakness.

Jack activated the mechanism and selected Myriad Ensnaring Chains as the target of the Organic Seed. As before, the name of the spell changed after a seed was used. Its name was now Myriad Venomous Vipers.

'Vipers?' Jack thought. He was about to open the skill description before a sudden blaring sound rang in his mind.

"What the heck!" He uttered.

"What's wrong?" Grace asked.

"You people didn't hear that?" Jack asked when he saw everyone looking at him with a questioning expression.

A notification then sounded in his mind.

"Oh…," He uttered after hearing the notification. Looked like he didn't have the chance to utilize the remaining two days left here.

He took several things out and said to Grace, "I have an urgent matter that requires me to leave right now. I will have to leave something with you for Wilted who is coming here." Jack had told them about his encounter with Goddess Serenity and about the items that the Goddess gave.

"Leave? Why?" Grace asked.

"No time to explain, I'm in a hurry," Jack said. "This is the Goddess' whistle and the Pipe of Monster Control. Please pass them to Wilted when she arrived. Oh, right, please give her this as well."

Jack gave her the Chris Memory Stone. However, as soon as the stone left Jack's hand, it vanished from Grace's grasp.

"Huh?" both of them were confused.

Jack sent his consciousness to his bag and found that the stone was back inside the bag again.

'The description does say that this stone can't be discarded. So, giving it to anyone other than Wilted is considered discarding the stone as well?' Jack thought. Since it was so, he thought that he could only give this stone to Wilted the next time they met face to face.

Jack gave her something else in exchange, two bottles of Grace of Tranquility potions. He also gave Jet two bottles. Now he had five bottles left in his bag. Once he was done, he disappeared with a flash of light.

Grace watched where Jack was standing a moment ago with a look of sadness.

Jet who saw her expression sighed. He said, "He is one free kid. He has always been like that since small. Come and go as he pleased like the wind, causing headaches to his grandpa as well. Falling for a kid such as him, you are sure to get such headaches as well."

Grace didn't say anything for a long while. Captain Whitebeard and the others also stayed silent after feeling the atmosphere. When Jet was about to give her some space, she said, "In that case, I will also have to be strong enough to be able to follow him without slowing him down."

Jet saw the determination in the girl's eyes. He was moved by it. "In that case, let me help you. You use a mace, right? I will teach you martial art using short sticks. I used to be hired by the police force to teach them this art. They practiced it using their batons. Though a mace is much heavier than a baton, with the unnatural stats we possessed in this world, you should be able to handle a heavy mace as easy as a light baton."

"Teach me!" Grace said.

"Excellent. Now watched closely. I can only stay here for two days so I will teach you its basic principles," Jet said, "Once I left, you have to practice it diligently to familiarize yourself. Now, borrow me a mace or any other short blunt weapon."

Grace lent him her mace. Jet then got into position. He performed some moves in slow motion and said, "This art is called the Phantom Beating Stick technique."

As he continued making repetitive short but fast strikes, he explained, "The version that I thought the police force was the modified version which was less lethal. I can't exactly teach law-enforcing officers a move that is mainly designed to kill the lawbreakers now, can I? But I will teach you the full and deadly version. This move prioritized fast and short movement with accuracy on the opponent's weak spots. This art is actually more deadly if you use two short sticks on both hands, but with the right application, one hand can be fatal as well."

Grace watched with concentration as Jet explained the essence of the art. After Jet was done displaying the move, he asked Grace to give it a try. Jet gave her pointers when needed. He could see that Grace was truly serious about learning the art.

As Jet paid attention to Grace's training, a voice asked him, "Do you have a move that uses twin daggers?"

Jet turned and saw Oswald was the one asking.

---------------

Next to the Busculla Plateau, where Jack once did his exp farming, was a plain called Swordhill Plain. It was a mostly flat plain but with several areas consisting of low hills. On this plain, a group of thirty players was riding their mounts. The lead of this group was Red Death.

"Faster! We need to get to Prince Rhemos' camp or our guild chain quest is as good as over!" Red Death uttered. She was urging her steed to go faster, but there was a limit to how fast a rare-grade steed could run. The others with her were all riding rare steeds as well.

As they proceeded, Red Death saw another group of people to her front. A larger group than hers. She was alarmed at first and slowed her steed's speed, but soon relaxed after seeing the people of that group. She approached that group and asked, "Yellow, what are you doing here? Are you the reinforcement I have requested?"

She had requested reinforcement after finding out a piece of crucial information regarding the second prince. The three princes were currently out of the capital on their trips around the country to gather influence. Rhemos had almost completed his trip and was currently setting up camp not far away from here. She was heading there to meet the prince and warned him about the information she had learned.

She was expecting reinforcement to come from her back since there was no closer city they could teleport to for reaching Rhemos' camp. Hence, she was rather surprised to find her reinforcement arrived here before she did.

"I am," Yellow Death answered. Behind Yellow were Bigarm and Grimclaw. The group with Yellow numbered almost a hundred.

Seeing the large number, Red Death felt much better. Perhaps she could still help Prince Rhemos escape the ploy that targeted him. If anything happened to the prince, it would be a serious blow to the quest that they had been focusing on for so long. She had also sent a message to Scarface to ask for reinforcement from any of the coalition's players in the vicinity, but she didn't put much hope in that. The relationship between the coalition was not exactly harmonious at the moment.

"All right, lets us head immediately to–" She didn't finish her sentence because she sensed attacks coming from all around her.

Her fast reflexes allowed her to make a jump to escape. While somersaulting, she saw her steed receive countless magic and range attacks. It died shortly.

When She landed, she noticed everyone around her had their weapons at the ready.

To add to her consternation, a notification informed her that she had been expelled from the Death Associates guild.