Identification

The next day, Five woke up as the first rays of light hit his tent. It was still 6:00 and everyone was sleeping in the camp but it was also the opening time of the town. From 6:00 to 18:00, the town was open and people could freely enter and leave.

The first thing Five did when waking up was to check his interface. He closely monitored his DP and was surprised to see that his DP current amounted to 12489. Over the past few days, he found that the DP he generated daily had increased to about 1100 after he leveled up. From that, Five easily concluded that the higher level he was, the more DP he would get.

With this balance, Five was tempted to level up to level 10 but he chose to restrain himself. Leveling up would cost 4500 DP, but considering his situation, he could not afford to use them now. He was entering an unknown territory and might need gold to pay for his expenses. With the Dungeon Shop, he would need 1000 DP for a single gold, it was clearly not profitable. But when facing the unknown, it was better to have enough money just in case, 4.5 gold did not sound like much but it still represented more than 30% of his current "fortune".

"It looks like the harpies are facing some difficulties... They killed quite a lot in just one night..."

After checking his balance, Five bought a light breakfast via the dungeon shop before leaving his tent. When he came out, he saw a few men standing near the toilet, loudly grumbling. They quickly noticed Five and could not help but look at him in disgust.

However, the latter did not mind, he was not disturbed at all by the smell. The Smell Sensory Inhibition Potion was very effective and was still active. The only inconvenience was that Five had to wake up in the middle of the night to drink a second one due to the relatively short duration of the effects.

Five quickly made his way through the camp and walked towards the town. The camp was very quiet since most players were sleeping but a few people could be seen here and there, coming out of their tents and walking towards the town.

Many merchants were already preparing their carts to move in; they needed to quickly enter to set up their stall at the market.

When he arrived at the gate, Five effectively saw that the bridge has been lowered. There was already a relatively long queue of people waiting to enter.

A few guards were blocking the way but no one seemed to mind. A few seconds later, a large crowd of people could be seen walking out of the town.

The crowd mainly consisted of adventurers and merchants going on a journey. They needed to leave quite early if they wanted to come back before the city was locked again. And so, to maintain the order, the guards were stopping people from entering for a moment, allowing the crowd to leave the city first.

This process did not take very long and quickly, Five's queue started moving. There were about 20 people before him but the queue was moving very quickly.

He could see that those entering the town were briefly stopped by the guards on the bridge and then allowed in.

2 minutes later, it was now Five's turn.

As he arrived in front of the guards, one of them stopped him and asked: "Halt, present your identity crystal and pay the entry fee please!"

Puzzled, Five asked, "Identity crystal? What is that?"

The guards immediately frowned, "You don't have an identity crystal? Did you not register at the city?"

Behind the line, the players were curiously looking at him. An identity crystal was generally the first item one would obtain when they arrive in the open world. Not having one was definitely abnormal.

"Ehhh, I did not go to the city... I wandered around and eventually found this town, so I decided to come," awkwardly answered Five. He could not just tell that he was a dungeon master and spent the previous week learning how to manage monsters to kill all the players that would ever come to his dungeon.

The guards paused for a moment but a tinge of hostility appeared on their face. A few seconds later, the captain of the guard stepped forward.

"What is happening there? Why is this queue not moving?"

"Sir, this man says that he does not have an identity crystal, we cannot allow him to enter like that..." said one of the guards while keeping his eyes on Five.

The latter was in a rather awkward situation. He did not know how to react, it was especially embarrassing since the whole queue was now looking at him and more and more people were joining that queue.

"Then bring him to register! We prepared a post for that. Didn't we?" said the captain.

"I know we were told to prepare for this situation, but isn't it strange that someone actually did not go to the cities first?" argued a guard.

However, the captain was short-tempered, "Enough, there are always a few idiots that get lost... Bring him in and issue the identity crystal. Don't block the queue anymore."

The guard that just spoke grumbled but he could not answer to his boss. Instead, he turned towards Five, "Follow me, we'll do the necessary procedures, no need to block the queue."

The latter nodded and quietly followed, he did not like the idea of having dozens of people angrily staring at him.

And so, Five crossed the bridge escorted by 2 guards. As soon as he passed through the gate, the guards turned right where a small building could be seen. The building looked rather old and dirty, it was clearly not frequently cleaned and some sort of tags could even be seen on it.

When he looking on his left, Five could see the town. It was similar to one of those medieval towns and was actually quite lively considering that it was just 6:10. He could see some smoke coming out of the different chimneys and even some people walking out of their houses.

"Stop wasting time, go in!" roughly said one of the guards behind Five.

"Hmmp" Five quietly entered the building and was brought in front of a floating crystal ball. One of the guards went to ask the person in charge to come and quickly after, another guard came.

"Just go and place your hand on the crystal ball and wait a few seconds." declared the guard with a tired expression.

"Is that it?" said Five to himself.

He quietly walked forward and place his hand where he was told to. Strangely, as his hand came into contact with the glassy surface of the crystal ball, he did not feel anything. Literally, it was as if his hand was not touching anything but yet, Five could see his hand on the surface.

"How strange..."

A few seconds later, a reaction occurred. A greenish mist suddenly appeared inside the crystal ball and rotated like a small twister. From the corner of his eyes, Five could see that the guards were not alarmed; it meant that it was a completely normal behavior.

But suddenly, the green mist stopped rotating and started to darken. The green color quickly disappeared and was instead replaced by a deep dark color. The mist restarted spinning but this time, in the opposite direction.

Five did not know what was happening but something was clearly wrong. He could see a shocked expression on the guards' face. Without saying anything, the guard in charge of the building stepped forward and grabbed his sword.

"This might just be a mistake! This sort of things has a chance to happen. Just remove your hand and place the other" said the guard with a cautious voice. Five clearly saw the change in behavior of the guards but he did not know what was wrong.

He could feel the nervousness and hostility coming from the three guards. The fact that they all drew their weapons especially alarmed him.

However, he still did as he was told. Five removed his right hand and placed his left hand on the crystal ball. As he did that, he also readjusted his position. "I have a bad feeling about this... Maybe I should not have come here," said Five to himself.

The greenish mist once again appeared and started to rotate but a few seconds later, the mist once again turned black.

Immediately, Five cautiously looked at the guards.

"You demon! You dare to try to infiltrate Etora Town!" loudly shouted the guard as he aggressively raised his sword.

Behind him, the two other guards also raised their blades and started to move to surround Five.

The latter frowned, "D*mn... They can tell that I am a dungeon master and want my core? This crystal ball..."

However, there was no time to think. He needed to get out of here fast but the exit was already blocked! The worst part was that he was only level 9 while the three guards were all level 20.