Rebirth of the Thief Who Roamed the World

The rewards for killing Necromancer Vorderman were astounding.

Defeating a legendary existence was an unreachable dream for most players. Even Masters were nothing more than ants in front of Necromancer Vorderman.

Nie Yan’s gaze fell on his hand, wondering what he had caught with his web line just a moment ago.

After carefully examining it, Nie Yan discovered it was a dagger about three fingers long. The blade was engraved with archaic and mysterious looking runes. It flickered with a cold light which shook his very soul, like a venomous viper eyeing its prey.

An icy feeling spread out from the handle, slightly numbing Nie Yan’s hand.

The dagger struggled in his grasp, almost like it had a mind of its own.

Nie Yan sensed a spirit residing in the dagger. It was an extremely frightening existence, even more so than Necromancer Vorderman.

Nie Yan examined the dagger’s properties.

Death God’s Edge: Sacred Object

Description: A treasure of Hades. The key to open the gates of Hell.

Requirements: 50,000 Strength, 15,000 Dexterity, 300 Divine Power

Properties: 37,000 Attack, 50% chance to deal 3,000% damage, 60% chance to inflict 30 Rank 20 darkness-type curses through Death Sentence, All Dark Skill Ranks +10

Death God Tempest: Summon a tempest from the day of judgement, wiping out the target from existence. Area of effect is determined by Divine Power.

Note: cannot be deposited into storage; drops upon death.

Nie Yan was dumbstruck. Just what kind of item was this Death God’s Edge? Its properties were beyond overpowered!

Anyone who possessed this dagger would basically be invincible!

However, the Death God’s Edge clearly wasn’t something an ordinary player could wield, with a requirement of 50,000 Strength and 15,000 Dexterity. Even after reaching Level 200, Nie Yan would still be a far cry away from obtaining such stats. As for Divine Power, he had no idea what it even was.

So, Nie Yan didn’t bother too much about its properties. No matter how strong it was, it was useless if he couldn’t use it. His main focus was on the description. A treasure of Hades. The key to opening the gates of Hell. What did this mean?

Could this Death God’s Edge bring him to another world?

Were the rumours in legends true? Did Hell exist, and more importantly could this item bring him there?

Thinking about all these things way meaningless. Nie Yan put away the Death God’s Edge into his bag.

At this time, Nie Yan received a notification.

Seek out Archangel Tallod to learn more clues about the Death God’s Edge. Until then, keep it safe. Many powerful denizens of Hell are searching all over for its whereabouts.

Nie Yan furrowed his brows, sinking deep into thought. It appeared the Death God’s Edge was no small matter. Finding Archangel Tallod would be difficult. Even though he knew Tallod was guarding the passage leading to the underworld, no one knew his exact location.

This was definitely a high difficulty quest. He could guarantee there were even more similarly difficult quests to follow in the chain. So, he opted to leave it on the backburner for now.

At this moment, the Darkwing Dragon slowly landed in front of Nie Yan. It gently nudged him with its head, letting out a sad whine.

Nie Yan inspected the Darkwing Dragon’s condition. It was heavily wounded. Its scales were eroded by the miasma. These weren’t injuries that’d heal in a day or two. In fact, with such severe injuries, it was a miracle it was still alive.

Nie Yan closely examined the Darkwing Dragon’s wounds. Its flesh was scorched black, but it wasn’t quite like ordinary injuries inflicted by death energy. There appeared to be new flesh growing beneath.

Nie Yan’s heart trembled. After thinking for a bit, he decided to recall the Darkwing Dragon back into his pet space for the time being.

At this moment, the surviving players of Asskickers United players returned and started cleaning up the battlefield.

On the mountain peak in the distance, Qin Han stared fixedly at the Cripps Stronghold. Seeing the mushroom cloud created from the bone dragon’s self-destruction, his heart was filled with elation. Asskickers United’s guild headquarters was razed to the ground!

Qin Han knew he’d lost. Before long, he would be hunted down by the forces of the Viridian Empire and Satreen Empire. He would be killed until he fell back to Level 0 and locked up in a dungeon cell. However, he wanted to at least leave something behind for Asskickers United to remember him by!

Though, against all his expectations, Qin Han heard no word of Asskickers United’s guild level dropping, nor of their players being distressed and aggrieved.

About 20 minutes later, the players in the Viridian Empire received news that Asskickers United’s guild headquarters had been moved to Okoron at 7 o’clock sharp.

Calculating the time, it just so happened to be an hour prior to the bone dragon self-destructing.

Qin Han almost vomited blood. All his plans had failed. Even this last act of desperation was foreseen and countered. Nie Yan was always one step ahead of him. An indescribable sense of despair and defeat floated up from the bottom of his heart. “Nirvana Flame, you really are a cruel and ruthless bastard! To even anticipate this!”

Qin Han had thoroughly lost to Nie Yan, be it in scheming, leadership, or the strength of their armies.

Qin Han turned away. His desolate back disappeared into the mountain. He withdrew from the game. If he lingered there any longer, he would be surrounded and killed by the soldiers of the Viridian Empire.

When the guilds originally under the Monet Financial Group learned of the news, they were also thoroughly speechless. When the bone dragon self-destructed, they were secretly delighted. With Asskickers United in chaos, it would give them some time to catch their breaths. They didn’t expect Nie Yan to employ such an unconventional method to escape the crisis.

A skeleton army 6,000,000 strong had been completely wiped out. They realized there was no other guild in the Viridian Empire that could contend against Asskickers United.

「I don’t know if Nirvana Flame moving the guild headquarters was by pure coincidence or planned. But if he did plan this, it’s frightening how far he thinks ahead,」Matchless Divine Sword said.

「It’s no coincidence. Asskickers United clearly planned this ahead of time. They probably predicted Qin Han would try to pull one last stunt like this. So, they made preparations in advance to move the guild headquarters. They lured the skeleton army to attack the Cripps Stronghold. When the enemy was dragged inside, they would make a crafty escape,」Eternal Sin said in an analytical tone.

Thinking for a bit, Divine Flame and the others agreed with Eternal Sin’s assessment. A sense of foreboding welled up in their hearts. Nie Yan’s thoughts were too deep.

「Forget it. The war is over. We lost.」Divine Flame deeply sighed. They had lost too much in this conflict.

All that was left for them was to swear allegiance to Asskickers United, or they would be dealt with one by one. After the Monet Financial Group withdrew their support, according to the terms of their contract, more than half of the assets of their guilds were seized away. Furthermore, Qin Han wasn’t willing to let sleeping dogs lie and was doing everything in his power to make their lives a living hell. They would be spending much of the foreseeable future recovering from their setbacks.

Asskickers United had more-or-less swept away all their rivals in the Viridian Empire. The next step was to rapidly expand their influence and consolidate their power.

Asskickers United and their allied guilds started recovering the lost territory, rebuilding atop the ruins.

It would take at least a month or two for Asskickers United to completely unite the Viridian Empire and take control of most of the strongholds. However, they wouldn’t have to worry about any enemies threatening them for the time being. They could take things one step at a time.

Over the next month, Asskickers United, the War God Tribe, Battle Crazed Alliance, Holy Empire, Sapphire Shrine, and Radiant Sacred Flame started dividing up their spoils of war. 11 cities and 270+ strongholds were up for grabs. Asskickers United took control of 162 strongholds, leaving the rest to the others.

Of these 270+ strongholds, 96 were handed over to the Dragonsoar Financial Group, 130 were handed over to World Bloc, and later on even the Glory Financial Group took part and were put in charge of developing the remaining 50 strongholds. Even with two large financial groups and World Bloc manning the fort, they still didn’t have the financial resources to support and develop so many strongholds at once. So, they pulled in other financial groups and companies, forming a powerful alliance based on mutual interest.

More than half of the Viridian Empire had been taken over by Asskickers United. As for the remaining cities, their influence could be seen there too.

Asskickers United’s operations had expanded to an extent where only Angel Corps off in the Satreen Empire could rival them.

Furthermore, the Starry Night Potion Shop enjoyed their monopoly. The profits they raked in were mind boggling. There was a bit of fluctuation in the beginning, but it quickly settled down to about 7,000,000 gold a day. Nie Yan used this enormous capital to start expanding into other markets, recruiting a large number of Advanced Tinkerers, Enchanters, Engineers, and so on. At present, about 30% of the Tinkerer items circulating in the market came from the Starry Night General Shop. They also occupied 20% of the Enchanting market.

After occupying so much of the market, Nie Yan gained enough qualifications to negotiate with the biggest suppliers. He bought materials for a low price and sold for as high a price the market could bear. Like this, his profit margins were wide.

The Viridian Empire settled down. Nie Yan used his influence as a Great Prophet and the lord of the Abernathy Great Grasslands to elevate Asskickers United to an extremely high position in the Viridian Empire. Asskickers United smoothly advanced into a Level 8 guild. Their membership also expanded to 300,000. At the same time, the NPC army in Okoron grew from 3,000 to 8,000. As for the other guilds in the alliance, they also enjoyed astonishing growth.

In every aspect of the game Nie Yan was invested in, he saw incredibly growth. He felt pleased. Before the inevitable clash with Angel Corps and the Century Financial Group, his capital would rapidly accumulate until one day he could shake these two leviathans of the Satreen Empire.