Masteria Online: Shattering the Dark God's Grand Scheme-Chapter 126 - Returning
Randy lifted his head and considered the situation. "Okay."
He took a deep breath, and trying to be practical, changed to a question he had. "Okay. If you’re the only hope the world has..."
He gestured vaguely to where Renan’s bedroom was. "Should you not be in there right now? Every second you spend here is a second you’re not doing whatever it is you need to do."
"The game has an eight hour daily limit," Renan replied. "I can’t stay in indefinitely no matter how much I want to. I’m forced out after eight hours."
Randy deflated slightly. "Oh."
Renatta had been quiet for a moment, but now she moved closer to Renan. She lightly held his hand, staring into his eyes. "Why didn’t you tell us sooner?"
Renan met her gaze. "I apologize, but there were two reasons. The first was evidence. When I woke up here, I had no powers. I had my memories, but nothing I could show you. If I’d sat down and told you everything I just told you without a single piece of proof, you would have thought I was having a breakdown."
Renatta didn’t argue with that.
He stepped back, taking a gaze at both Renatta and Randy. "The second reason was the two of you. In my past life, you both survived. You made it to the end. You were alive when I died. I didn’t know what telling you would change. I didn’t know if involving you earlier would protect you or put you in danger. I didn’t want to find out the hard way."
Renatta paused at the answer for a moment, and then she pulled him into a hug.
"Wha-" It caught Renan off guard. After the initial surprise, he wrapped his arms around her as well. "Ma..."
"I’m sorry," Renatta said quietly. "That you had to carry all of that alone."
After embracing each other for a moment, they seperated. After a small silence, Renan stepped back and spoke. "I have to go back in now." He looked between them both. "The soul damage I took can only be repaired in Masteria. I have to go back."
They both nodded. Neither of them moved to stop him. Then he turned and walked to the pod.
...
Masteria.
As if he wasn’t sure his Nitro messages were flooded, even his inbox in Masteria was flooded. Messages from his friends, from players asking about his guides, from various contacts he’d built up. He’d deal with them later. Right now, none of that was the priority.
He tried to recall the last clear moment before everything went blurry.
Rena. Rena had just escaped and killed the Elite Guard.
After that...
Lumi wracked his head, trying to remember the details. He knew some things, but they were mostly impressions. Something about Merath’s library and his soul being with Empress Aria. Other than that, he only held vague shapes of sensation that his drifting soul had picked up while being collected. He couldn’t piece together exactly what had happened or where his body had been taken.
But he didn’t need to piece it together from memory alone.
He opened his eyes.
Brown.
That was the first thing his eyes saw. A simple wooden ceiling. He felt that he was lying on something soft, a bed. He turned his head and recognized the interior immediately. It was the Silver Wind’s cabin. It was empty at the moment.
He sat up slowly, checking himself over. Physically, he felt fine. He pulled up his health.
[HP: 855/855]
He could immediately tell something was wrong. He was intimately familiar with the system, and his health should not be that high.
He pulled up the rest of his panel and saw the reason why immediately.
[Lumi - Level 34]
"Oh?" He understood now. He must have gotten a massive amount of EXP from the Elite Guard dying. He honestly hadn’t believed that he would get any credit for it.
Judging by the amount of levels he received, his best guess was that the Elite Guard had been in the early stages of the Fourth Rank. By the metrics of the system, perhaps around level 110.
He felt something strange. He put a hand over his heart, feeling the void. It was a faint feeling, though strong enough that he couldn’t ignore it.
He slowly put his hand down.
The feeling wasn’t from his body, but his soul. Now in Masteria, his soul felt different. He felt a pull, faint but unmistakable, something tugging at the center of his chest from a distance. If he followed it, he already knew what he’d find.
His soul. The other half, the fragment that had been collected and stabilized.
He’d expected it to feel distant. Herene was too far from Mora for him to feel the pull this close.
He stood, walked to the cabin door, and pushed it open. The beautiful sky above Herene spread out in every direction. He was already there.
He stood on the deck of the Silver Wind, docked at Herene’s port, and pieced it together quickly.
After he’d lost consciousness, he must have been flown out for medical attention. Herene was the logical destination. Then at some point, the forced logout had triggered and he’d vanished from their perspective, leaving them with an empty ship and no explanation.
He stepped off the dock.
Two young knights spotted him almost immediately. Lumi ran a quick check on them, and found they were Level 24 and 25 respectively. They snapped to attention, saluting despite not needing to.
"Please wait here," one of them said quickly. "I’ll inform my superior."
The other stayed with Lumi, maintaining a respectful distance and not saying anything further. A few minutes passed before the first knight returned, accompanied by an older man. He walked much more casually, looking Lumi up and down.
[Semter - Level 56]
"Please allow me to confirm your identity." Semter spoke. "Would you allow me to inspect you? This will involve close-up physical touch and possibly pain."
Lumi nodded. He had no reason to reject it.
