Mastermo finds out the name of his new partner

"Aunt Su, watch out!" BBtrash warned as he saw a face-sucking leech—seconds away from landing on the woman's face.

"Aaaaaahhhh!" Aunt Su equipped her heavy axe and swung it forward, chopping the creature in half, all the while screaming.

Andy, "Nice one!"

For the split second where BBtrash got distracted, three more leeches attacked from above, aiming for his face.

BBtrash jumped a few feet high and landed on the tree branch, he changed his armor into a new one that also had a helmet with it. This new armor was a comparatively expensive armor that only a handful number of people owned and this handful number included BBtrash. The armor was made of pure silver and was known to be impenetrable. It increased the agility and defensive stats of the player.

Wang GuiYing equipped a hammer and without missing a beat, smashed down the three beasts into the ground.

BBtrash, "Damn it! I really didn't want to dirty this armor."

Aunt Su laughed, "We don't always get what we want."

A face-sucking leech sprang out of the trees, and somehow, having sensed that BBtrash was dangerous, it aimed towards Andyzz, before it could attach itself to the player, it was gruesomely cut in half by an axe.

Andy's head was now completely covered with blood, really disgusting slimy blood that needed to be wiped off from the mouth in order to say a comprehensible word, "Thank you."

BBtrash saw the scene and felt the need to burst out laughing, "Clean that shit off. Hahahaha...."

Aunt Su tittered, "Sorry, I didn't mean to do that."

Andy wiped the slimy blood off his face and it stuck to his hand, "It's okay. It's a good thing I haven't had dinner yet."

Aunt Su, "I'll treat you to some great gravy dumplings after this."

"...."

Andy, "I'll decline that offer."

BBtrash looked up at the trees once again, sensing that this was far from over.

Wang GuiYing, "Aunt Su, I think we walked into its nest."

Aunt Su frowned, "I think so too."

The second wave of leeches came.

The face-sucking leeches that aimed at Aunt Su were cut down by her axe and the ones that attacked Wang GuiYing were smashed by his hammer. Andy seemed to be the person who was being protected by the two, but in reality, this was not the case. Andy had activated an item that made it impossible for the leeches to notice him. The leeches stopped attacking him just because they couldn't see him. In terms of defense, this item was much like the moon goddess spellbook.

The face-sucking leeches attacked one after the other, raining on top of them with speed.

After more than 50 leeches were smashed and cut in half, the three players were covered in slimy blood and the floor was in a mushy mess of dead leeches.

BBtrash flicked off the blood and changed his armor back to the previous one, "These beasts are not cute at all."

Andy, "You don't say."

Aunt Su, "This is why I wanted to get the treasure and get out of here fast. I don't want to deal with these ugly creatures."

BBtrash, "I didn't get to ask, What is your assigned treasure?"

Aunt Su, "We got a rather easier riddle, but we can't find it anywhere."

Andy nodded, "It was a turtle."

BBtrash thought about it for a moment, "I didn't see any turtles on the way over."

Aunt Su sighed, "I bet you didn't. Turtles live underwater and so far we haven't seen any waterway."

BBtrash, "Maybe this one lives on land?"

"...."

Andy, "Wouldn't that be a tortoise?"

"Don't think about it too much, I'm sure we'll all complete the mission as we go." Wang GuiYing beamed.

Aunt Su put away the axe, "I know."

This group was sadly unaware of the fact, Mastermo and Li Ling had discovered; that all the treasures were inside the cave where they had met each other and unfortunately the devil team didn't seem to have any plans on letting them know this.

BBtrash, "Let's keep on moving."

The group of three carefully stepped over the corpses of the creatures and continued on their path.

On the East side of the forest, Zhou XinYi and Li Ling had met up with a wild beast; A beast with the head of a yak and the body of a bear or at least the bones of one. It was twenty feet in height and attached its head was dark brown fur, sticky and long, the rest of its body was stripped off from everything and anything that could resemble skin; it was bones—clean white bones.

This was a mystical beast known as a bone yak, the reason for the name was self-explanatory...

The beast had two poisonous horns, used to attack Zhou XinYi—who jumped high and evaded the attack smoothly. From behind the beast, Li Ling took out his spiritual sword named Huo. The sword glowed a flash of crimson as it moved forward and cut one of the horns off.

The beast did not seem to be pleased by this action as it puffed a hot breath making Zhou XinYi and Li Ling wonder; Where the breath was coming from? The creature clearly had no lungs and no organs in sight.

The bone yak didn't seem to be in pain, it was just angry, extremely angry. It re-oriented its attack towards Li Ling, who stood in place. The beast's head stopped just a few inches away, in front of him. Its neck was restricting it from moving any further, this restriction was done with the help of a rope that Zhou XinYi had sneaked past its neck, resembled a leash on the beast's neck.

Li Ling smirked in approval, "Nice one!"

Zhou XinYi nodded and with a clean swing of the sword, the head was removed from the body, there was no splatter of blood, making it seem like he had cut a mere prop.

Zhou XinYi jumped forward and kicked the head away, separating it from the body.

"Let's go." Li Ling beamed.

The duo took a few steps further into the forest, leaving the dead corpse of the beast behind, however, it seemed that the beast didn't want to part with them so soon, as they heard rustling coming from behind them.

Li Ling turned his head with an evil grin that, he wasn't aware, he was displaying. The head had somehow been reattached with the bones.

Zhou XinYi chuckled sarcastically, "I love it when they do that."

The bone yak once again stood up and charged towards them without fear. This time, Li Ling jumped up and landed on top of its head, his sword Huo stabbed downwards and the creature's head was impaled by the sword.

Zhou XinYi's eyes twitched, "How do we beat this thing?"

Li Ling stepped on top of the seemingly, dead head, and pulled out Huo, "I don't think we can."

The two waited in front of the corpse, almost sure that the beast would wake up even with such a fatal wound.

The beast indeed stood up once again. It shook its head and looked at the enemies that had already killed it twice.

Li Ling, "What if we mince his head into bits?"

Zhou XinYi, "Useless."

Li Ling grinned, "Why is this beast still alive?"

"....."

The beast's bones made a cracking sound as it got ready to attack once again. This time Li Ling didn't move and made a slashing movement from the bottom to up—from right to left. This slash was followed by the sound of the second heavy horn falling on the ground.

"I just realized something: It cannot regenerate or reattach its horns." Li Ling beamed.

Zhou XinYi looked down at the hornless creature, "What do we do now?"

Li Ling looked down at the detached horn, "Doesn't that have poison?"

Zhou XinYi shook his head, "I'm sure it's immune to its own poison."

Li Ling carefully picked up the horn and when the beast attacked once again, the horn was stabbed through the center of its forehead—Killing the creature once again and making it look, almost like a deformed unicorn of sorts.

The two stood in front of the creature for a minute, waiting to see if the creature was willing to stand up once again.

Zhou XinYi tilted his head in amusement, "Is this how a unicorn was created?"

"...."

Li Ling frowned, "No. That's not even funny."

Zhou XinYi glanced at the blank face of Li Ling, "Are you sure about that?"

Another few minutes passed and the creature showed no signs of moving. This time it was dead for good.

Somewhere else in the forest was another group consisting of Mastermo and Kaze17 that had luckily not met up with any hard-to-deal with beasts.

Zhihao summoned Shuang and checked the area for any beasts that might be hiding in the shadows; this was another use of the sword. It could detect any type of beasts, ghosts or ghouls, almost anything with immense yin energy.

Zhihao looked back at his teammate, who had not talked much or to put it more clearly—hasn't said anything at all, "What's your real name?"

Kaze17 jumped, startled that the guy had taken the initiative to strike up a conversation with him.

Zhihao looked at him, expectantly.

Kaze17 took a sharp breath in, "It's Kaoru."

"Kaoru?" Zhihao repeated the name, "It sounds Japanese."

Kaoru, "I'm Japanese."

Zhihao, "Ah! That's awesome."

The atmosphere was once again quiet as nobody dared to strike up a conversation. They walked for a couple more steps and came to the conclusion that they had entered a region that was avoided by the beasts for some reason.

Zhihao crouched down on the ground and asked as he looked at a certain plant, "System, what is this?"

[Answering player's question: You are currently looking at poison lilies.]

Zhihao chuckled as he withdrew his hands that were ready to pluck the flower, "Let me guess, It has an incurable poison?"

[Poison lilies are spiritual plants that spray out a distinct type of poison-like-substance that is colorless and odorless. This poison affects both humans and beasts alike. The poison clogs up the windpipe and the prey dies due to lack of oxygen circulation.

Zhihao warned, "Hold your breath."

Kaoru looked back at the man, "How?"

Zhihao realized this major problem, a little late. Weren't they inside a game?

He let out the breath that he had instinctively held. It didn't matter how much he held his breath in the real world, his in-game character would still breathe normally.

Zhihao cursed under his breath at his own stupidity. Though, he could not be completely blamed for it. Inside a VR game, reality and gaming were a bit confusing to distinguish. After you put on the VR headset, your brain gets accustomed to the world inside the game and for a second, may even forget that what you see is not reality.

Kaoru stepped back, "Let's turn around for now."

Zhihao yelled out, "Don't move."

Kaoru, "Huh?"

"Look down carefully."

Kaoru did, just as he was told.

"See that tiny opening in the center of the flower, keep your eyes on that." Zhihao moved forward and nudged the flower, this small movement caused the opening to grow bigger in size, "I think it releases motion-triggered poison. As long as we don't move, we'll be alright."

Kaoru listened to the man and immediately froze up, "What do we do now?"

Zhihao looked at the young player then back at the poison lily, "Let's think of something."

The two stood in place not daring to move for a few minutes. Two to three minutes passed, Zhihao seemed to have gotten an idea, "The moon goddess spellbook!"

Zhihao took out the defensive equipment and threw it away with force and at the same time, he activated it; the two players were automatically sucked inside the flying book and when the book landed somewhere far away, Zhihao deactivated it. They were saved.

They drank a health-boosting potion to regain their health stats that they had lost when they were in the region filled with those poison lilies.

Kaoru thanked Zhihao, "My health was depleting so slowly that I did not even realize it."

"Don't worry about that, I didn't see that coming either." Zhihao scratched his head, "I asked the question on a whim."

For the first time, Kaoru giggled, "I guess you really are lucky."

Zhihao smiled, "Really? I don't think so."

Kaoru, "I'm certain. During the last mission, weren't you the one who met the Gamemaster by chance?"

"You heard about that?" Zhihao chuckled awkwardly.

"It would've been more shocking if I didn't hear about it." Kaoru shook his head, "You're like the only gamer who got to meet him so early on. To be honest, I look up to the Gamemaster. I want to meet him too and if I do, I don't want to kill him at all."

Zhihao smiled, "I guess that makes two of us."

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