Chapter 62: [62] Invitation To Death
Ark stared at the seal on the paper as though it would change at any second...
"Did I really get invited... by Harrow??"
Although he had considered the possibility of being invited by one of the top guilds, thinking it would happen was a lot different from seeing it happen in reality.
He did have reasonable feats in Eden... but at the end of the day, there was no solid proof of all his accomplishments.
All that was available was word of mouth, and the guilds were not the type to make decisions solely based on that.
No one would want to believe a skeleton could take out a dungeon boss, regardless of if he had help or not.
The normal thing to do would have been to test him, or perform some sort of preliminary assessment. But Harrow did not seem interested in that.
Ark glanced around to where the other men stood. Just like he suspected, there were no other big shots among them.
These were just beginner guilds...
Just seeing him get invited by Harrow was enough to break their morale. Most of them had already begun to leave.
’So only Harrow took interest?’
Ark was sure most of the top guilds were currently throwing invitations to Darius and other survivors, trying to convince him to join them.
But as for Ark, he had only gotten one major invite and nothing else because of one simple reason...
He was a skeleton.
Even with whatever they had been told about him, it seemed the top guilds still did not consider him as someone worth investing in.
As for the other major guilds, it was not like they had access to information about what had happened in the tutorial.
It was confidential information only privy to the association and top five guilds.
"And yet, Harrow invited me." Ark stroked his bony chin. "Maybe Harrow felt some sort of kinship with me?"
It was a guild majorly filled with undead, so it wouldn’t be much of a shock that they would go out of their way to recruit talented undead.
’Well...’ Ark shook the thoughts off. ’They must have their reasons...’
He broke the seal and pulled out the paper. It was the exact words he had expected to see. A poem nearly as old as the cataclysm itself.
__
Shadows sway along with the morning breeze, fantasizing the allure of night.
But the cold northern breeze blows, bringing with it the stench of the dead.
Let the dead bury their dead?
The dead will always be among us.
__
To Ark, it was an invitation to join Harrow, but to them, it was a mantra, a way of life if you would go that far.
They would recite it like a prayer before they attempted any dungeon, sing it after their victories, and recite it the moment before their deaths.
The members of Harrow recited this Mantra so much that they probably said it even before taking a shit. That was just how dedicated, or rather extremist there were.
Harrow was basically a cult...
Ark folded the paper and stuffed it into his pocket.
But that was not the reason he would not be joining them. Deep in his gut, it felt like the wrong decision to make.
Ark was not satisfied with it, and he was anything but desperate.
There was one good thing about this at least.
’It seems they haven’t caught on....’ Ark mused.
Whenever he used Dark Harvest, the ability he stole usually had a modified appearance, like the hero’s blade turning black, or Olivia’s lightning turning blue.
Because of this, it was possible to avoid suspicion the first few times, but in the boss battle, his classmates must have realised.
Those were their skills...
Ark was not exactly trying to hide it, but that did not mean he was willing to reveal his hand either.
That kind of power would only bring unwanted attention, after all.
But if his classmates knew, that meant the guilds knew as well... well, except that wasn’t the case.
If any of the guilds knew he could steal skill and talents, then it wouldn’t matter if he was a skeleton or not.
They would have been chasing after him from the very first day.
There was only one possible reason they would think otherwise...
’They must think I have ’Mimic’.’
It was a B-ranked skill that allowed the user to replicate another person’s skill for a set duration, and although it was not bad, it was very inefficient.
It drained far too much mana, and the skills were nothing but cheap knock-offs of the original.
Ark chuckled.
"Good... it’s better to keep them guessing."
He took one last glance at the poachers to see if any of them still had any courage left, and when neither of them made a move, he took a step forward, and like a wisp of smoke, vanished into thin air.
<•••>
When players arrived in Eden, there were three very popular choices among them.
The first and most popular option was to join a guild...
There were many advantages to joining a guild, such as a steady salary, protection and pride from belonging in a group, and the vast training resources guilds had.
Since they were always on the forefront of war in towers and dungeons, it was one of the fastest ways to grow stronger.
The second option was to join the association...
And finally, since it was like an RPG game, players could choose to become adventurers and form a party to hunt monsters and level up.
They were even number of notable parties that bore power on the same level as guilds...
Still, regardless of whatever option the player chose, there was one challenge in Eden that all sections banded together to battle.
Ark turned around and realised his gaze. Far in the distance was a colossal tower made of white stone.
The building was so tall that it embedded itself in the clouds, and so robust that Ark could see it from whatever thousand or so meters away it was.
No matter what Continent you visited, the tower would be there, slowly watching like a quiet sentinel.
The Central Tower.
While smaller dungeons and towers periodically sprang up all over Eden, the Central tower was the only constant.
One hundred and fifty floors, and in more than four hundred years, humanity had only gone as far as fifty nine...
Thankfully, there had never been a tower break from the Central tower. The day the central tower split open, the world would crumble...
"I wish they would allow me in."
Even if it was just to take a peak at floor fifty nine...
He would die in the first ten seconds if he tried to challenge it, so just a peek was enough, but the guild masters forbade lower ranked players from participating.
He turned his gaze away from the tower and walked towards the guild.
The adventurers guild was so large that it could be spotted from the other side of a busy street.
Players went up and down, going about their daily business. Some sat on benches by the guild, chugging down alcohol, while some dragged large monster corpses along with them to sell.
"One step at a time..." Ark muttered as he stepped in.
His eyes surveyed the room for a moment before landing on the quest board at the other end of the room.
Ark walked up to the quest and began to look through it. The adventurer’s guild ranked their quest using a star rating from one star, the lowest, to seven stars, the highest..:
Beginners were often advised to take only one star quests, but Ark had no interest in them.
A one star quest would barely benefit him in any way and the pay was often low. Ark needed something at least two stars or even three stars...
But as he began to peruse the board, a ringing sound filled his ears.
[Incoming Call...]
[User ID: Tristan]
Ark hissed. "I just left that place. Why is he calling me? And how did he even get my contact information??"
’Answer...’
"Oh? You actually answered?" Laughter came from the other side.
"For a second I thought you would hang up without allowing me to speak, heh..."
"So? What is it?" Ark asked curtly.
"Hmm, nothing too serious, but it will take a little time to explain. Are you busy right now?"
"Very."
"Great, you have time!"
"Huh?"
Then his honeyed voice suddenly switched to the cold, vindictive tone Ark had begun to associate with the vice commander.
"Right now, you’re trying to complete your beginner quest aren’t you? There is something I would like you to investigate."
"You see..." He spoke so calmly, that for a moment Ark thought the change in tone had been for show.
"A few players have gone missing, presumed dead..."