Second World

”This…” Jack was out of words as he stared at the two Second Soul Remnants. He remembered this item was indeed true canʼt be put inside a playerʼs bag, so it made sense to have them stored somewhere safe.

Peniel noticed Jackʼs reaction and flew to his side. ”What are those?” Peniel asked.

”These are Second Soul Remnants,” Jack answered. ”Remember the alien entity I mentioned to have given me my second class? Now you have laid eyes on them.”

Wilted Tree who heard their conversations hurriedly came by. ”You found it!” She uttered after seeing the content of the box.

”These are what you are looking for?” Jack asked.

”Yes. We need to take this to curtail Masterʼs chance of getting stronger,” Wilted Tree answered.

”Donʼt tell me, he was planning to get more class? Good heaven! Are four classes still not enough for him?”

”Four?” Wilted Tree said with a confused expression.

”Yeah, when I fight with Master, he exhibited skills from four classes. Wait… Donʼt tell me… He not only possesses four classes?” Jack asked with trepidation.

”It made sense that he only exhibited skills from four classes. He has only received his fifth class not long ago. It should still be at level one or two, so no obvious skill from his fifth class yet.”

”Fi… five classes…?” Jack was lost for words.

”If he had his way, he would have gotten his hands on all twenty-four classes,” Wilted Tree mumbled. Jack was about to ask what she meant by that when she shoved one of the Second Soul Remnants to Jack. ”Here, take one!” She said.

”Huh? You are giving one to me?” Jack asked.

”I originally wanted to fuse with one and hand-carry the other one back for Anotherday, but it is risky with another task still need doing. I might lose the remnant and let Master get it back. It is probably fate that you are here, better we both fuse with one each so there is no way for Master to get a sixth class.”

”Why didnʼt you just merge with two of them at once? On that note, why Master didnʼt just merge with these two? Why store them here and risk them getting stolen?”

”There is a secret cooldown of thirty days to use each one of these balls,” Wilted Tree explained. ”Master canʼt fuse with another one because he just did it recently. He had been keeping these two for later.”

”Damn it, he was truly not kidding about his ambition to become a God. Someone with all twenty-four elite classes… I canʼt imagine how strong he will become. Not to mention he also has two divine treasures inside him.”

”Two?” Wilted Tree said with the same confused expression as before.

Seeing that expression, Jack said, ”lady, I am truly afraid your next words will be saying that he does not just have two divine treasures but three…”

”Well…”

Hearing Wilted Treeʼs tone, Jack already knew the answer. ”Damn! I am just joking! Are you telling me itʼs real? That Master is a complete cheater! Where is this gameʼs developer? I want to send a complaint letter!”

Wilted Tree scratched her head with a sheepish look.

Jack was confused seeing Wiltedʼs response.

Peniel, in the meanwhile, gave her a different question, ”Itʼs not possible to fuse with more than one divine treasure, but I canʼt deny that he did exhibit two divine treasureʼs ability. Do you know the reason why?”

”There is no time for explanation, there is still another task we need to finish,” Wilted Tree said. ”I promise if we escape from here safely, I will explain everything. Now, hurry up and fuse. It took ten minutes to fuse with that Second Soul Remnant.”

After saying that, Wilted Tree immediately activated the one in her hands. The ball started shining with countless fine tendrils of light that entered Wilted Treeʼs body. Jack looked at the one in his hands. Third class? He couldnʼt deny the excitement when the thought came to him.

Detecting his mental link, an interface appeared above this second soul remnant asking Jack if he wanted to activate it. Jack took a deep breath and then choose yes.

A loading bar appeared. He felt again the pinching sensation in his heart that he felt a long while ago when all this started. The tingling all over his body when the light tendrils touched him. After the loading bar was halfway, it broke into components. Jack clenched his teeth and prepared himself for the pain that he knew will come.

The light from Second Soul Remnant slowly dissolved into his body. Ten minutes after the process was done, a black chest appeared in front of him. Jack looked over and saw Wilted Tree was already opening hers. He also opened his.

”What will you choose this time?” Peniel asked.

”Ranger, no question about it,” Jack answered. ”I want extreme speed. I wonʼt be able to compete with Master in the magic department. He had too many classes focusing on that. Based on our conversation, Iʼm pretty sure he also chose Magician for his fifth class. Although he had the HP and armor from the Paladin class, I believe I can still deal with him as long as I can get him into melee engagement. For that, I will need speed to catch him.”

Jack picked up the dagger and suit from the black chest. He soon heard a notification telling him that he was now a ranger. Jack opened his status window to check. He received 100 HP, 100 stamina, 10 points for each of his attributes, and 1 point luck for starting a new class. He checked on his Immortal Soul, there was no change. Using another Second Soul Remnant did not improve this inherent skill.

After giving the matter a brief thought, he set his experience setting so that all 100% exp went into the new Ranger class.

”What class did you choose?” Wilted Tree who had finished on her side, asked.

”Ranger. You?” Jack asked back.

”Magician,” she answered.

”Oh? What elite class are you aiming for?”

”Healer. I am not sure a Priest or a Druid yet. Healing class is the one I am most familiar with and have always used in my past games. I have chosen Ranger for my first class because I need high mobility as I know I will move around a lot to deal with Masterʼs schemes. What about you?”

”Your robot had tempted me to choose Technocraft, but I donʼt think it suited me. Peniel mentioned developing a strong Techno Golem needs lots of customizations and works. I prefer a simple and more direct class. I am not entirely sure yet which though. Letʼs deal with the matter at hand first, you still need another task need dealing, right?”

”Yes,” Wilted Tree turned to the door at the opposite side. ”There will be stairs beyond that door that bring us down to another part of this towerʼs basement. But before that,” she said as she took out an orb that she had shown Jack before. It was the Orb of Concealment, she did something with the orb and it glowed with blue light. She also took out another device.

”There should be some people where we are going. This Orb of Concealment will hide our presence if one of them wears God-eye monocle,” Wilted Tree explained. ”This other device will block a playerʼs messaging system within an area. This should prevent the players down there from sending a message to Master or other players. However, we still need to deal with them fast.”

”By dealing with them, do you mean to kill them? But if they revive half an hour later at the safe zone, they will notify Master. Is half an hour enough for whatever you need to do down there? It will be even worse if they wear Amulet of Rebirth, they will revive immediately in a safe zone.”

”Remember when I mentioned before that have a device that kept someone who dies to revive at their places of death? I will use the tool. Once they are level one. It is easy for us to tie them up with runic rope.”

”How many runic ropes do you have? If there are lots of people down there, do you have enough ropes?”

”There should not be more than ten people down there. I have that much.”

”Well, I guess you have thought this through. Letʼs go then,” Jack said.

”Follow me,” Wilted Tree said and headed to the door.

Behind the door, there was a very long vertical tunnel going down into the abyss. Long winding stairs circled the wall of this vertical tunnel, going down. Jack could not see the end of the stairs. He followed Wilted Tree descending these stairs.

On the way, he suddenly heard a very loud roar echoing throughout this vertical tunnel. This roar shook his body. He felt as if his heart stop for a beat when the roar was heard. After the echoes were gone, for some strange reason, his mind had a lingering fear of going down the stairs.

”What the hell was that?” Jack asked.

It was Peniel who answered, ”that was the roar of a dragon.”

😉