Hero's Disguise

Slumping next to a tree, Kaden heaved and panted with his hand on his chest. He had only just now managed to lose the two city guards who were hell bent on chasing him to the end of this world.

Last time he used a bandit camp but this time he only managed to lose the two guards through sheer luck.

What the hell was happening? Why was he being chased once again?!

As Kaden caught his breath, his mind raced to make sense of the situation. He understood being chased out of Willowbrook. He was a Dark Legion affiliated player and hence was not allowed in the city.

But why the hell was he chased out of Light Wind city?

He knew for a fact that Dark Legion players were allowed inside. His mark made him a Dark Legion player so he chose this city and was set to enter it and do the quests inside. Everything made perfect sense except for the fact that he was chased out once again!

Did this mean he wasn't 'friendly' to the Dark Legion also? So he wasn't liked by either of the factions?

Kaden shook his head at this frightening thought. How could something like this be possible? Just what the heck was this damned title?!

But then he frowned as he thought about another possibility. Perhaps there was a third faction in the game? Was he missing something?

Hmmm. He knitted his brows, contemplating this theory.

As he pondered the possibility of a third faction in the game, he couldn't recall any specific information or hints regarding such a faction. As far as he knew, there were only two factions, and players by default belonged to one of these two.

Nevertheless, Kaden couldn't ignore the evidence before him. Something was amiss. Perhaps there were hidden factions or secret allegiances within the game world that he had yet to uncover?

If he was hated by both sides, then that had to be the reason!

But right now the reason did not matter. If he was indeed hated by both sides, then he was completely screwed!

Kaden slapped his face with both his palms. "Let's not go there just yet." Though everything was going against him, there was still some silver lining even in this ridiculous situation.

The more troublesome his title was, the higher the chances of his class being overpowered!

This better be the case. Kaden gave a rueful smile.

However, whether it was overpowered or not, the question still remained. What was he supposed to do now?

If he couldn't enter both sides, then… neutral cities it was!

Hmmm… Kaden closed his eyes and took a deep breath, contemplating his various options. He could think of two right off the bat.

One was the small city in the kingdom where the monk temple was located. That was one of the neutral places in the game where both factions were allowed. However, the city itself was really small. Even the newbie village was bigger than that.

Also, that place had been combed through from top to bottom in his previous life several times by several players, hoping there would be something amazing hidden there.

Unfortunately, nothing like that existed. It was simply a neutral place in the middle of a high-level zone meant for players to rest and recuperate. There was even one in every kingdom.

With a sigh, Kaden chucked that place out of his mind. As for the second option, it was the complete opposite of the monastery.

It was the place where anything and everything went. A place so chaotic that if he entered, he wouldn't stay alive even for 5 seconds. The dark underbelly of the Kingdom's capital!

It was a lawless place where survival was a constant struggle. However, it also possibly had a solution for his problems. There was a particular item from the underbelly that Kaden remembered from his previous life. A mask.

In his last life, this mask was rather famous. It was an item that was a must-have for all PVP players.

In 'Apocalypse Online' PVP was very much encouraged. There were several PVP quests that were very rewarding, both money-wise and experience points-wise.

But at the same time players who had other players' blood on their hands were also penalized severely. With each round of killing, they were punished with longer timeouts during which they were labeled as criminals and couldn't enter the city just like he couldn't.

Naturally, this was an extremely troublesome situation as it affected gameplay a lot. Everyone cursed and complained about this nerf and PVP even became something only idiots pursued.

However, that was until one player discovered a shop located in the underbelly where they freely sold a unique mask, called the 'Hero's Disguise'.

With this mask, no matter how red one's name was, they were able to happily enter and exit every city without any problem.

As long as they did not enter the key places of the city where the kingdom officials resided and were guarded heavily by the higher-level kingdom guards, they could do whatever they wanted.

At least Kaden would finally be able to unlock his mana skill tree this way, thereby finally giving him some real combat skills.

It was weird that his summoning skill 'Obsidian Oath' did not naturally unlock this skill tree but then again everything about that skill, and the accompanying quest and title were abnormal.

Perhaps after getting his hands on this mask, he would finally be able to get a better idea about everything.