Child of Destiny

...…

Somewhere in the mountain ranges near the Eastern Sea Region, there was a village where a tribe of mountain people were living. It was located deep in the mountain range, where only a few people could get through.

This was a healthy village where the people lived peacefully, but their peaceful lives suddenly came to an end as a Demon 'visited' their village and caused a massacre.

The residents of this village followed an ancient teaching that was being passed down from generation to generation. Their tribe was filled with powerful warriors due to these teachings. Even their Chieftain and Shaman were powerful enough to be considered as top experts in the current time.

They just did not like getting involved with the matters of the outside world, which was why they were not well known.

But despite all of these, they were still unable to fight back when this certain Demon arrived in front of their gates.

Despite putting up everything and working together, they could still not protect themselves when the Demon showed his might.

Everyone was massacred mercilessly, and their lives became a nutrient for the Demon as he recovered himself.

Jan Mateo was standing on top of a mountain of corpses while looking at his hands as he opened and closed them repeatedly, checking the changes of his life force.

Not long after, he frowned deeply, showing his disappointment. It seemed like he did not reach his desired outcome. "This is still not enough. It is the fifth tribe already, yet my strength still hasn't reached its peak."

He then touched his left shoulder before stroking the huge wound that was left by Old Ryong's strike. He had already done a lot, but the wound was only growing graver the more time passed.

"Such a strange power. I think I have already learned everything about it, yet it is only getting more and more mysterious the more I study it," he mumbled before the expression on his face turned grave due to the sudden pain.

He tried to lessen the pain by spreading his Demonic Powers within his body before compressing them on the long wound across his torso and trying to suppress the foreign energy on it.

This lasted for a couple of moments before the pain finally disappeared.

Jan Mateo frowned deeply before mumbling. "It seems like I need at least a month before my body fully recover."

He then looked at the mountain of corpses that he was sitting on before continuing. "I guess consuming trash will not help at all. It looks like I need to consume that old man after all."

After that, he turned in a certain direction before standing up. "But before that, I have to create an opportunity where I can trap and capture him."

He then hopped down the mountain of corpses before tearing the space with his strange powers before entering it. He disappeared along with that dimensional tear, leaving the completely ruined village.

A few moments later, a group of people suddenly appeared at the entrance of the village and became shocked at what they saw.

"D*mn! We are late once again! What are we going to do now?" asked one of the people as they walked within the village and looked around.

The other agent, who was traveling along with him, wore a grave expression on his face as he looked around. "This is getting worse the more we try to chase after him."

"Do you think we are going to end up as those people if we continue?" asked another as they continued to explore the place.

Then they suddenly arrived at the center of the village, which made them halt in their tracks.

They stood blankly at the sight in front of them while their brains were trying to process what they were seeing. Not long after, their expression became graver as they finally digested the scene.

"What the f*ck!"

"The heck is this?"

"Urgh!"

The group showed different reactions when they saw the mountain of corpses at the center of the village. Some of them with a weaker stomach even throw up on the side, unable to withstand what they were seeing.

This scene was much more horrifying than the previous villages that they had visited earlier. It seemed like they had to report this to higher-ups and tell them that they had to take this matter more seriously than before.

Not long after, the captain of the team quickly took out a communication device and said to the person on the other side of the line right after the call was answered. "Tell the higher-ups to put this mission in the highest priority. Things are getting ugly."

***

As the real world was getting chaotic due to a certain Demon, someone was doing a similar thing by fighting top experts of the game one after another.

He had been fighting for quite a long time now, defeating all the players who managed to go through his elemental spirits one after another.

Some of them were quite powerful, but most of them were highly skilled. He fought quite a lot of experts now and enjoyed a few thrilling battles, but he had never found any worthy opponent yet.

He was not sure if this was the quality of the players that were chasing after him, or if the stronger ones were still bidding their time and waiting for him to be exhausted and become weaker.

There was also this time when he kept feeling he was being watched by other parties from the dark. Moreover, they were not just a single individual as multiple groups of people were watching from where he could not find them.

He was not sure of it, but he felt that aside from trying to study him and his style, they were also quite wary of one another.

This would still work in his favor.

Aside from this would buy him more time before the timer ended, and it would also give him a decent time to consider the offer that he had gotten from Immortal.

Earlier, during his discussion with Daven, he realized a couple of things. However, since he was still lacking the most crucial information, he could not figure out everything. If he wanted to know the real reason behind the actions of the Supreme Temple and Martial Alliance, he had to agree with the proposition that Immortal was offering.

He could also screw up with the plans of the Demonic Churches and Corrupted Cult if he played his cards right.

The problem was he could not or did not want to, trust the words of such a sly fox. Such a cunning opponent would always be scheming something behind his sweet and alluring words. What happened to the Silent Night was already a lesson.

Shin knew better than to trust the words of Immortal even with the contract overseen by the system.

He wanted to discuss this matter with the rest, but he did not have enough time since the flood of players was starting to arrive one after another.

Despite how powerful his Elemental Spirit Companions were, they would still not be able to stop all the horde of players that were coming after him. There would still be a few routes they could not cover, especially when dealing with other players.

The 'horde' was starting to increase to the point that Shin had to keep on fighting against them without rest. He could try escaping if he wanted to, given his familiarity with the map.

But he used it to his advantage instead and started fighting these multiple groups of people in guerrilla warfare – ambushing them and assassinating their healers and other support players.

He was utilizing most of his skills under the Phantom Swordsman Skillset as well as a few of his Elemental Skills, particularly the two provided by Blackie from her arsenal.

With all of these, people thought that Shin was an assassin, who was highly skilled at ambushing and assassination. He could even annihilate an entire group of elite players and top experts in a matter of minutes.

The moment he appeared, he always took down the supports and other auxiliary class players first before fighting the rest without worrying about them being healed or buffed.

He was able to successfully hide his identity from everyone with this kind of fighting style, and when he was utilizing the teachings of Old Ryong, he was able to hold himself without any problem.

Things were getting chaotic due to his repeated disappearance within the Shunkai Forest before reappearing in a different part where he slaughtered another group of people trying to hunt him.

The moment the elites and experts started flooding the map, Shin took the initiative to attack them – being on an active offensive instead of possibly waiting for the enemies to come and find him.

Things got more and more chaotic as the people realized that Shin was no longer hiding his fangs and decided to reveal them.

Even the people, who were secretly monitoring Shin's movements were starting to get warier, especially when they could see that he was purposely leading them by purposely leaving his tracks so that they could follow while chasing after him.

They knew Shin was already aware they were watching him from the dark and observing his actions.

But what was even scarier was Shin fighting unbothered when he was being watched like some sort of prey, especially when they were trying to set a trap for him.

What these people were feeling was something strange. They felt that they were the ones that were being hunted despite their hiding in the dark.

This was one of the main reasons, why they could not pull the trigger even if they found a lot of opportunities to ambush Shin.

It was as if they were actively being invited to come and fight him, and he would welcome them with open arms.

They could not help but feel that it was some sort of trap.

…

The events in the Shunkai Forest started to spread everywhere.

Given how large the moments of the four factions, along with the strange response of the big and powerful guilds within the Saint Heaven Kingdom, it was impossible for the gaming community to not notice it, especially when there were a lot of people who loved to gossip everywhere.

Some people came from the two major factions and leaked the mission in the official forums.

Naturally, this news quickly spread everywhere, making it another sensational event that idle and bored players would discuss and gossip about.

The videos and photos of people being slaughtered despite outnumbering their opponents quickly followed.

Not only that, the skills and techniques of the protagonist in the video amazed everyone, especially when he was assassinating the support players of the victim group despite being heavily guarded by the others.

Aside from this, the people also realized that the groups that were being slaughtered one-sidedly were composed of famous experts of different classes.

Some of them were Official Rankers with their respective titles while the rest were famous Maverick Rankers, who were quite well-known for their skills and unique techniques.

But despite being grouped, all fell in the blades of their opponent, who fought them alone.

The trend then attracted more attention, and some expert analysts tried to figure out the identity of the mysterious player for fun.

They had listed out quite a lot of players, who were well-known for their assassination methods or famous players that always played the assassin and thief class.

But after a close comparison, they had never figured out the real identity of this mysterious player – none of the listed players seemed to have the fighting style that he possessed.

It was until a famous analyst suddenly pointed out that this person was not a true assassin, but a very skilled swordsman instead.

Then this topic blew up, attracting more people, which also made a lot of curious players head to the Saint Heaven Kingdom and the Shunkai Forest.

This kind of event was quite rare, especially when this era of virtual games was rapidly improving.

It had been a while since a similar event occurred, and it was also the time when the players at the center of that event became very famous and turned into very powerful Godlike Players.

These players were curious to see whether another god was about to be born, and another legend was about to be written – or if this mysterious person was already a Godlike Player, who would solidify his name in the gaming world.

That was also when the true experts and the most powerful opponents started to make their moves.

...