hi

Shen Yue was first caught off guard slightly, and when she looked more closely, she was utterly stunned silly. "Hey! Are you-" She started to speak, but before she could finish her words, the white-robed woman raised her hand, and the next instant, she was mercilessly tossed away.

Shen Yue's body was flung aside like dirt, and it landed on the wall with a dull thud as her slender figure slowly slid down unconscious. "I did not allow you to talk." The white-robed woman sneered.

And she was not done yet. A golden cage dropped out of nowhere and locked the heavily injured princess in place.

Immediately, all the dot damage on her that was slowly but surely draining her health came to a complete stop. Her health even slowly started recovering, though she was still caged like an animal.

Meanwhile, the white-robed woman did not pay any more attention to her as she walked towards Shen Yue's unconscious figure. She stood in front of her and snapped her finger as a golden strand of energy appeared and started swirling around Shen Yue.

The strands of energy then unexpectedly grabbed her by her throat and gripped her tightly as her body lifted up in the air. Shen Yue immediately started choking. She was an inch away from death, as there was only a sliver of health left.

However, the white-robed woman did not seem to care about that. She simply continued looking at Shen Yue with an indifferent, cold gaze. "Hmmm… Interesting. I didn't expect to find two of you here."

She flicked her hand, which made Shen Yue's struggling body float closer to her. "I was only sent here to capture one, but now I am thinking of taking both." Shen Yue struggled and tried to say something when a healing spell landed on her, only for her to be tossed away once again.

She landed on the same wall, and her health fell to the same last 2%. "Insects like you shouldn't raise your head against me." The white-robed woman sneered. She again healed her and lifted her body to thrash her against the ground.

She did this repeatedly, healing her again and again and again and beating her into a pulp in the most sadistic way. The pain was inhumane and torturous, and it was enough to drive a person insane.

Shen Yue, however, did not break that easily. She withstood everything and kept trying to fight back. She needed to leave this place or at least inform Liam about this.

Ian and Josh depended on her. They were her friends. She didn't want to let them down and become the cause of their deaths.

She should have sent the message sooner, but how was she supposed to know someone would show up randomly in this remote place?

But still, she should have sent the message sooner. Called for backup. Did something. Tears streamed down Shen Yue's face as she held on, refusing to give up no matter what.

"Heh? How dare a whore like you have so much nerve? Filthy demon garbage. The likes of you should be wiped out from this world. If I ask you to be obedient, stay down like a dog. Else, I wouldn't-"

Before she could finish, a sudden burst of wild, raging flames hit her, completely burning off the robe she was wearing and revealing a set of white lace underwear. Her face betrayed her abhorrence and disgust.

The next second, while she was yet to recover from this shock, another punch landed on her and sent her flying away. When she looked up, she saw a huge fox strutting towards her, her feral eyes locking onto the prey.

And standing next to the fox, was Liam.

On the other side, Shen Yue coughed. But she was no longer struggling. She now only had a small, silly smile on her face as her body slumped down, tired and haggard. Liam was here. Everything was going to be okay.

Boom! The white-robed woman, however, was not done. Another robe appeared around her, covering her body as she jolted off the ground and propelled forward.

"You want to clash head-on with me? Bring it on!"

Liam sent a [Dark Cutter] that he conjured and ran right toward her, not afraid of going toe to toe. The person in front of him clearly had a divine affinity, his worst matchup, but today he was ready to see just how badly he would fare against one of them.

Who would come out on top?

He dashed forward, unsheathing the black dragon sword, whose roar filled the entire hall of the temple. The wind whistled a dangerous tune. For a second, the other side slightly faltered, but the next instant, they continued zooming forward.

Boom!

The two of them collided, and unexpectedly, both of them were pushed back. At the last minute, the white-robed woman had pulled a golden staff out of thin air that absorbed the entire attack, almost.

Liam couldn't believe it. A weapon powerful enough to block his black dragon sword? Who was this person? It couldn't possibly be a player, right? Was he fighting against a divine temple NPC?

He gripped his sword tightly as he felt the fighting spirit of the dragons loudly raging inside. He immediately prepared to attack again.

[Spirit Slash]

The other party also did not stay down and once again dashed forward. This time her entire figure was covered with divine energy strands as she started shining like a dazzling golden star.

Liam could feel his skin burning in the presence of the pure unpolluted energy. He had a feeling this time their impact wouldn't be as smooth as the last time.

He quickly began doing his own enchantment as he started wrapping his body in pure mana. His mana core spun wildly.

Before they could fight, though, a huge fireball hit the woman in the white robes, destroying the divine shield she had forged around herself.

Growl! Luna glared at the enemy. She was also here!

Liam grinned as he continued dashing forward. This was the small opening he needed. He zoomed towards her and slashed down the raging black dragon sword.

The woman once again blocked the attack using her staff, but now extra mana backed him up, and only she was blasted away from the impact. Liam stood steady and tall like a mountain. A dangerously high damage number also popped out.

-10,000

The white-robed woman looked furious. The damage was nothing to her. The humiliation was worse.

With the snap of her finger, she healed herself back to full health. She lifted her head up to see Liam's face as she once again got back on her feet to prepare for the next attack.

However, the person in front of her was standing frozen.

A frown formed on her beautiful face as she stared down the enemy and the vile fox. She could sense the strong death aura from him. Was this an enemy she could handle?

While her mind raced, the opponent was still staring at her? Did he not want to fight anymore?

While the woman looked at Liam weirdly, as if a few screws in his head had come loose, Liam did not care and continued to stare at her. His gaze was fixed on the pair of enraged blue eyes. The next attack slipped his mind as he couldn't ignore the familiar face in front of him.

The white-robed woman was…

But why would the enemy wait so long for him to compose himself, the white-robed woman grumbled something and started materializing a spear of divine energy in her right hand. The sheer intensity of it made Liam's skin crawl, and he snapped out of his daze.

"Mia! Stop! It's me" Liam shouted.

"What are you blabbering about?" The white-robed woman scoffed in annoyance, continuing to make the spear in her hand more deadly.

"You don't remember? Alex and Rey? Do you not remember them?" Liam growled in anger, his voice echoing in the otherwise silent hall.

At that moment, something faint simmered in the woman's blue eyes. Liam immediately felt relieved, as he could feel that she wasn't completely gone.

He did not know what happened in the divine realm, but this was not good. She had completely forgotten him and Shen Yue as if she had been brainwashed. She appeared to have forgotten her own name.

Just what the hell happened? Didn't he change her fate this time around? Why was she again in this pit?

And suddenly, a frightening thought crept into his mind. What if the misfortune that befell her had never been about her uncle? What if this was it all along, and in reality, he hadn't changed anything at all?

No, that was not important right now. Whatever the reason was, whatever her fate was, he had the power to change it here and now! He needed to win this fight at all costs, and he needed to take her away with him, dead or alive!

He clenched his fist and prepared to go all out on the next attack. He started churning his mana core wildly and gave a nod to Luna. This was Mia, after all, a born genius with an innate SSS affinity and an insanely high aptitude for mana.

Furthermore, he had no idea what weapon she was holding or how much she had changed since she had gone missing. Without all this information, he couldn't afford to go easy on her, especially when the stakes were this high.

Liam gritted his teeth and tried casting another [Dark Cutter] again, as he could feel the dilapidated demon temple pulse with strong dark elemental energy.

If this didn't work, he would have no other choice except to overwhelm her with his army of soul minions and take this fight by sheer numbers.

He only held back because he was yet to experiment with just how much his soul minions would suffer under divine attacks. But if worse came to worse, he did not mind sacrificing a few to bring her out of this.

"Stop looking at me with pity!" Mia roared as she couldn't stand the sight of the person in front of her. She stomped her feet on the ground as a pulse of divine energy spread throughout the hall.

Liam jumped up to avoid it but it still took a chunk of his health. She then started dashing towards him with all of her might. Liam sighed. He was already prepared for this. He released the [Dark Cutter], which screamed through the air as the attack burned its way to the target.

Liam did not simply wait. He immediately dashed forward as well to deal the next attack and the attack after that personally with his sword to end this fight. Luna growled as the duo worked up the energy to finish the battle in one go.

The entire temple hall was in chaos. Mana was being pulled in from everywhere. The fight was reaching a crescendo. As the two sides got ready for their most powerful attack, which could have destroyed the temple itself, a strong blast of divine energy ripped through the big hall.

And it was not from Mia.

Liam stumbled and lost his balance, causing his attack to miss the target and hit the air instead. Before he could begin to wonder what just happened, a figure landed right next to Mia with a loud boom, spilling divine energy everywhere.

Liam immediately backed away several paces in retreat as he felt a strong killing intent coming from this person. He was decked in golden gear from top to bottom and each of them was engraved in mysterious runes. This person was dangerous.

Liam's instincts and his gut were screaming loudly, and his fight or flight response kicked in. He couldn't see the level of the person standing in front of him, just as he couldn't see Mia's level.

Could he still stand up against him, or did he need to flee from here?

His eyes darted to Luna, who understood him without any words. She blurred as she silently appeared next to Shen Yue.

However, as if her movement triggered it, a violent, oppressive aura started spilling from the golden figure in front of him. The terrifying aura sunk into him and burned his skin. It pressured him to buckle down.

Liam gritted his teeth. He tried to move but he couldn't. Even though this pressure couldn't match the way the old elf had slammed him down every other second, it was still enormous. Only someone beyond his level was capable of doing this.

What was the meaning of this? If this person was so powerful, why not directly kill him, right here and right now?

Instead, this person was… Liam bit down on his lips and withstood it. The golden guy was forcing him to kneel.

However, Liam clenched his fist and held on. I will not. He stood steady, his feet rooted on the ground, not moving even a damn inch.

The golden figure revealed a fleeting look of surprise but the next second, with a blinding flash of light both he and Mia disappeared.

Mia!" Liam shouted but no one was there in the hall. The golden armoured man, Mia and the princess in the cage, all three of them had completely disappeared without any trace. Only an unsettling feeling lingered behind. What was happening?

Liam stared at the empty space for a moment before quickly rushing over to Shen Yue. her condition wasn't all that great. He pulled her onto his lap and gave her a little water from the canister that contained the milky way pond water.

Shen Yue winced in pain as the water that was akin to an elixir slowly dribbled down her throat drop by drop. A couple of seconds later her eyes flickered and some colour returned to her skin.

Liam then immediately gave her a health potion. With that, she slowly recovered and flashed her eyes open anxiously. "Ian! Josh!" She sat up straight in a panic.

"It's fine. I am here. You are safe." Liam hugged her tightly, as a strange glint flashed past his face. What was happening around them? This was just a kingdom quest. Why did it turn out like this?

Shen Yue stared at him and then sighed in relief. "Liam, you are here." She looked around and there weren't any enemies. She once again let out another sigh and smiled sweetly. Everything was fine.

Hmmm? Suddenly the smile on her face disappeared. There was something wrong. Ian and Josh! She immediately informed Liam about what had happened and about how the two had killed themselves. She also repeated the words of the enchantress to him.

"Could it be true?"

Liam pulled up the system interface and it still showed that the status of those two players as dead. "I am afraid that's a very real possibility." He nodded gravely.

He still had a lot of unanswered questions in his mind and several frightening theories about the future but for now, this was more important. He picked up Shen Yue and jumped onto Luna as the three of them got the hell out of there.

Understanding the situation, Luna as well rushed to the nearest graveyard at the top of her speed. She blurred in and out and they were at the destination in a minute.

However, just as they reached the place, they saw both Ian and Josh respawn. At this point, they had probably died a few times so they had lost some items on their person including their weapons.

But that did not stop the duo. They dashed towards the nearby tree and repeatedly banged their heads on the huge trunk. Blood spilt from the injury and their health was dropping by the second. Without caring about it any of it, the duo continued to kill themselves.

Observing this, Liam frowned. "So even death did not remove the skill's effect? Just how powerful is this skill?" He walked over to the duo and then carefully pulled them back.

But the two of them were in no state to respond to him. They did not even seem to recognize him. They had blank eyes and were acting like drones whose only purpose was to die.

Hmmm. Liam saw the situation and immediately summoned two barbarian soul minions. The two big guys held Ian and Josh down, preventing them from doing anything else.

Liam then shoved a health potion down each of their throats and finally, the endless dying cycle stopped as the two remained captive. But the situation was still far from resolved. This was just a temporary solution.

Liam sighed and pulled up his system interface. He then called Alex. Only divine affinity players could probably deal with something like this. Both priests and paladins had [Cleanse] skill and he hoped that using the skill would suffice.

And there was also the other reason why he wanted to meet with Alex.How many people do you need?" A reply instantly chimed in. Crimson Abyss was now so far above every other guild that Alex was able to respond quickly.

Liam stared at the message for a moment and then shook his head. "Bring your group." He marked the location where he was previously farming the beast horde and asked the team to get there as soon as possible.

There were still several confusing thoughts in his mind and he needed to settle everything. For that, he needed his group.

While the others made their way to the location, Liam and Shen Yue also arrived at the spot along with Luna and the two bat mounts they had originally used. Ian and Josh were still held as captive as the group landed on the elevated rocky space.

Roar! Their presence didn't go unnoticed as the beast horde underneath them continued to charge forward and some of them climbed the rocky path to reach Liam and the group.

But before anything could attack, a huge shield pushed them back and Alex jumped on the top to stand next to Liam and Shen Yue. The group of core guild players along with her also dove in as they quickly handled the few beasts that had made their way to them.

When they had a minute, Alex finally turned to look at Liam. The man was unusually very silent and still without jumping into action and she did not like it.

"What happened to them?" She asked pointing to Ian and Josh who were being held captive by the soul minions. "Did they do something to betray us?"

"No. No. Alex." Shen Yue immediately intervened and explained before there was a misunderstanding. She filled Alex in on everything that happened.

"Some sort of curse huh? Let me try." Alex cracked her knuckles and then tried the [Cleanse] skill. The two guys were instantly covered with a divine aura and soon, the blank look from their eyes disappeared.

"Woo! That's about it. I think the Cleanse worked. They should be fine." Alex grinned.

Just like she said, the two guys immediately recovered from their stupor and looked around, having no idea of what just happened.

All they could see was that some of their clothing and items were missing and they were in an entirely different place with all their team members and a shit load of beasts around them.

Their levels had also dropped? Fuck! The duo looked around in a daze.

While Shen Yue filled them both in on what had happened, Alex walked over to Liam. "What's up his ass? Why is he standing like this?" Liam seemed to be in a particularly bad mood but she had something to talk to him so she walked over anyways.Hey! Can we talk?" Alex chirpily exclaimed with a smug grin as if she had a huge scoop and couldn't wait to tell Liam about it. However, the other party was still standing still, not even acknowledging her.

"Hmmm? What happened to him?" Alex walked around to stand face to face with him and snapped her fingers. "Hello! I have something to tell you!"

Liam smiled bitterly. He also had something to tell her, but he was still debating whether or not it was the right thing to do. The person in front of him was extremely capable except for when she was all riled up.

And telling about Mia would definitely get her all worked up. There was no way for him to know what she would do or how she would react.

The enemy this time was not a normal one. Liam had a feeling that he was dealing with someone powerful this time. Very powerful. Much more powerful than him. So they had to be extremely cautious and careful with this. Otherwise, there could be irreparable damages.

But then again, Alex was not someone weak. She was strong and perhaps he needed her strength to deal with this. It was her family after all. She deserved to know.

"What is it?" He asked her, still debating what the right decision was.

Alex could sense that something was off. She frowned slightly and then continued, "So…I told you I formed my mana core right… I got a lot of stats bumps and I decided to check my affinity again. Guess what?"

"What?"

"My divine affinity is now SS-grade!" Alex beamed in response. "I know. Not as good as Mia but I am getting there. Thanks to you. When she finally gets her ass back here, she is in for a surprise." She punched her fist in excitement.

"Good job." Liam awkwardly replied. "About-"

"Wait. Wait. I am not done yet. I have another surprise for you." Alex grinned and pointed to one of the elite beasts charging towards their group. "It's about those guys."

"Hmmm?" Liam raised a brow. "What about them?"

"Well… since we had some time on our hands, I was messing with some elites and trying to figure out how they were so strong and got such huge buffs all of a sudden. Guess what?"

Liam immediately had a bad feeling. He did not have to hear the rest of her words. He could already tell what was coming. "What?"

"These beasts have a divine buff!" Alex exclaimed. "I mean some sort of divine energy buff. I am sure of it. I can just sense it on them. There is a faint mark of divine energy on every single one of these berserk beasts."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, I am sure. They are so strong because they have some sort of divine spell boosting their health and stats."

Liam's face changed. His cold gaze shifted to one of the elite beasts near them. Was this also their doing?

Meanwhile, Alex continued to talk about her conspiracy theories. "So now I am thinking there could be some sort of deeper power play here. Maybe someone from the divine temple is corrupted. Maybe they are trying to take charge of something. Maybe-"

Liam, on the other hand, remained silent. He did not expect this at all.So far, everything was fine and normal as the experience from his previous life dictated but now suddenly in every direction he turned, there was the divine temple doing something from the sidelines. They seem to have a hand in everything.

What was happening? Weren't they simply just another faction inside this world? Or were they the ones governing everything?

Imprisoning one prisoner was a coincidence but all of these things happening around them couldn't be ignored. Everything pointed to the divine temple being the one managing all the events in this world.

But even if that was the case, what happened to Mia? Why was Mia under their grasp?

She acted as if she was brainwashed and all her memories had been removed. Everything about her had changed.

She was cold and aloof before not letting anyone get close to her except for Alex or Rey but she was still a kind person. And now there was nothing left of her previous self.

More importantly, all of this happened only after she visited the divine realm. Just what happened while she was over there? How did everything come to this?

If these beasts were buffed by a divine spell, then were the barbarians buffed by the same divine spell?

Liam silently leaned on a tree nearby. His mind was swirling with questions and it was a lot for him to simply ignore and keep sticking to his original plan. What was he missing here?

And there was also one thing that was mainly bugging him.

In both this life and his past life, he always thought that this game, the tutorial was something that was meant to help everyone. Get them accustomed to mana and prevent them from becoming mindless mana zombies.

,m It was a second chance for everyone. They could be reborn and change their fate. Become someone strong and powerful even if they were poor and helpless in real life.

But… what if that was not case?

What if that was not what the tutorial was mainly intended to do?

Liam couldn't shake this thought away. Whatever angle he thought about things, this tutorial seemed to be doing more harm than good.

For instance, in his last life, everyone's soul was extremely compromised.

This time the news spread sooner that deaths result from the game so people were cautious not to die a lot but last time this information only spread a little later so everyone was weak when the tutorial ended.

If they really meant to help then wouldn't this have been declared explicitly right from the beginning?

Liam had always taken this as an unspoken rule that was intended to be found out by the players or perhaps as the penalty for being weak. But now that he thought about it, he wondered if this was hidden on purpose.

What if this tutorial that was meant to be helpful was secretly meant to be harmful behind the scenes? What if they were all being set up to fail right from the beginning?

Liam couldn't shake the thought out of his mind as everything seemed to suddenly make sense. By the end of the tutorial, they were not supposed to be strong but weak.

Now he also understood why this mysterious beast horde event had popped up in this timeline when something like that was never there in the previous one.

And from what he had heard about the event, the death tally was quite significant in every other kingdom except for the Gresh Kingdom. Thanks to him, the casualties here weren't numerous.

However, that still left the other event, the nether realm event. Coincidentally, it had ended suspiciously soon this time around. At first, he didn't think too much about it but now, it made sense.

The demons this time had a huge upper hand over the humans and were most likely to win the war, once again thanks to him. But the divine temple did not let this happen.

He recalled Alex mentioning that the divine temple personally intervened and ended the war. Due to this, the casualties in the nether realm event this time weren't that much.

Putting everything together, it almost looked like the beast horde event was set up in order to offset this difference. Enough players hadn't died so they had to make sure that this was compensated somehow.

Why? What did this accomplish for them? How did it matter to them if they were weak or strong? How did it matter to them if they survived the incoming apocalypse?

Or did they simply not care about any of that? Perhaps all they needed were souls? What really happened when a player died inside the game? Was their soul being siphoned?

In the name of the tutorial, were these people siphoning the souls of an entire planet?

Liam felt as if he was suddenly able to see everything clearly for the first time. Every single move made in this tutorial was towards the downfall of humanity.

And these were strong enemies. People who could crush him with a snap of their fingers. How could he possibly stand up against them in this world that they created?

It was impossible. They would never let him grow.

Did that mean he had to keep his head down until the tutorial ended and silently grow as strong as he possibly could? Could he not go after Mia or Derek right now?

That means he couldn't tell Alex about Mia at the moment. Shen Yue also did not seem to remember anything so it was convenient.

It was not that he did not want to rescue her but going after her right now would simply be suicide. He first needed to become stronger, much stronger. He probably only had one shot at rescuing Mia and he had to make it count.

As the various thoughts swirled in his mind, Liam tried to recollect everything about the divine temple and suddenly remembered the divine temple's special potions.

"Alex, do you have those divine temple special potions with you?" He immediately turned towards her to ask.

"Huh? Oh, these." She took out a couple of potions and handed them to Liam. "Yes. I gathered a lot of these. They played a big role in our guild war and even in this beast horde. Got us top ranks." She grinned.

"Do you need some more?" She started taking out several potions, some even to distribute to others. Since the beast horde event might end any time now, she figured they might as well use these to get as many numbers as possible.

However, to her shock, Liam immediately hit her hand, causing the potion bottles to fall down on the hard rocky ground and get shattered. "No. Don't use them anymore."

"What… are you doing?" Alex blinked.

"Just don't use anything from the divine temple or the NPCs anymore." Liam quickly replied. Unfortunately, he did not have any explanation for her. This was purely his own hunch.

He then summoned Dimitri and asked if the poison master elf could analyze the potion but that was also a dead end. The elf shook his head and said that the potion was too complicated for him to analyze.

Liam became silent. This left him with only one option. He still had a way to figure things out but it was very risky. However, he had to do it.He then signalled the others to resume the slaughter of the beast horde. The entire group sort of formed a full circle leaving some space in the middle.

Liam, along with Neil, jumped from the overlooking rock platform to this circle. He was in the middle of death and destruction and surrounding him, there were souls constantly drifting away. It was the perfect spot.

"Are you ready?" He asked. Neil nodded and then it started.

Liam closed his eyes and used his soul sensing skill just like he did back at the fort. He tried to remember how he had grabbed onto the lizardman's living soul and did the same to Neil. He focussed his mind and grabbed onto Neil's soul.Ahhhh! Neil shouted and buckled down.

Liam as well winced in pain. This was not easy. He was also suffering.

He still did not have the ability to do this properly but he was trying his best not to hurt the person. Even though Neil had complied and was not resisting, it was not that easy to hold onto a living soul.

There was an enormous mental pressure weighing down on him. But he had to do this.

Liam shouted out loud and grabbed the soul that was twitching like a fish out of water, extremely slippery and hard to grasp.

A moment later, he was finally able to do it. Almost instantly his eyes widened. Neil's soul was not complete. He did not have the ability to determine just how much it was damaged, but he could tell for sure that it was not whole.

This meant that everything that he had contemplated was indeed correct.

Liam immediately let go of the soul. He did not want to cause any further harm. He had already confirmed what he wanted to know. That was enough.

Seeing that he had an unsightly expression on his face, Alex felt very uneasy. Something was definitely up. What was happening? She looked at him and before she could ask anything, Liam shook his head.

"Now is not the time. Let's continue dealing with the beast horde. I will explain it to you after this is over."

That's right. While the beast horde event was still going on, he needed to do everything he could to become stronger. He should not miss this chance.

Liam felt like suddenly everything was making sense and he was starting to see what was really happening. At the same time, there was a noose tightening over their necks. They definitely needed to use this event to power up as much as possible.

"Ummm. Should we all make a party then?" Alex asked.

Liam shook his head. "No, I will be levelling up alone. I need you all to help me do something. Get the attention of all the special elites and keep them engaged. I know this way you won't be able to get many experience points but trust me and do it."

Alex nodded. "That's fine. Whatever you need us to do, we will do it." Liam was different at the moment. More serious than she had ever seen him be, so she did not question anything.

"One more thing." Liam interrupted her as she disbanded the current party and made a new one including everyone assembled over there.

"Do you have any exp boost potions with you?" These were the special potions which alchemy Grandmaster Dante had made and banned their guild from purchasing. But knowing Alex, Liam was sure that she would have still managed to collect a couple of these potions somehow.

And just like he thought, she indeed had a few with her. "Here. I am assuming you need three." She handed over three potion bottles to him. From this, she understood what was Liam's current plan.

She immediately jumped down into the fray and shouted, "Come on. Target all the elites and bring them over to this side. Let's help our boss do some power-levelling."

Liam did not say anything. He silently summoned his soul minions.

The elites were time-consuming and gave out fewer experience points and it was far better to farm the other beasts than touch these magically buffed elites.

Earlier Liam didn't think too much about it but now he knew better. While the tutorial wanted them all to gain power, they didn't want them to gain too much also.

But he was going to do it. He was going to improve his strength by leaps and bounds in the remaining time he had. These few weeks were more than enough. He was almost there and he can definitely get there.

And then he was going to stand against the divine temple with everything he had. He was going to become stronger right under their noses and stand against them on their own turf.

Yes, this was difficult but with his class, he was confident he could achieve it. All he needed was some time.

No longer caring about the consequences of the beast horde event or the rewards given out for the same he summoned his minions and ordered them to slaughter all the beasts in sight.

One by one all the members of the soul army made an appearance. Watching this, all the guild members present in the area stared at him dumbfounded.

What was this? How were these creatures standing in front of them? When they had last seen Liam, he had a big army but it was nothing compared to what he had now!

Wyverns, elves, lizardmen, barbarians so many strong minions appeared and immediately started plundering the battleground. Now they understood why their points were so high.

Their big boss had been gone a long time but now he was back with actual dragons as minions!

Wyverns were not dragons but these players couldn't care less about that distinction. As far as they were concerned these monstrously strong creatures might as well be dragons!

Everyone gulped as they watched this mighty army crush everything in sight. The three-headed wyvern in particular stole the show with three different powerful attacks coming out of its three different mouths. What the hell? How could something be so overpowered?

When compared to Liam, they were all clearly at a different place in the game. Realization slapped them in the face. Everyone quickly got down to work as the number of elites slowly started increasing.

As the soul minions slaughtered more beasts, more elites also started to pool. Alex aggroed all the elites and tanked them efficiently. The group somehow brought the situation under their control.

Meanwhile, Liam was standing still. He did not fight or kill or participate in anything. Instead, he only did one thing. He stood and locked onto all the souls around him.

With the experience points automatically raining down on him, he sat down in the middle of this circle of death and took out a black bead. More than farming experience points, right now his attention was on the multitude of souls around him.

This beast horde was his only chance to forge when he was at his strongest and he needed to forge the remaining dragon souls and the wyvern souls.

Without any hesitance, he took out the first wyvern soul and started forging.

THUD! THUD! THUD! Giant mana hammers banged down on the wyvern soul and when it resisted, Liam hammered it relentlessly.

After forging the three-headed wyvern, the backlash from this single soul was nothing big. Besides, he was at his strongest at the moment.

He gritted his teeth and forged the struggling wyvern into submission.