CHAPTER 99: HARBOR CITY

After the two of them talked for a while, they decided to go in different directions. Ashley had accepted Ethan’s friend request, and her friend panel now appeared in Ethan’s system menu.

There, Ethan noticed another feature that appeared when Ashley’s panel was displayed. A green dot indicated she was online; if it turned gray, that meant she was dead.

There were message, invite, and block options. To send a live location, Ethan could use the message menu and send his real-time location to Ashley.

The duration varied—some lasted fifteen minutes, while the longest one was eight hours.

When the time ran out, the live location would automatically deactivate.

The invite menu was useful for asking Ashley to join Ethan’s party. The invite feature only worked if the person he wanted to invite was nearby.

Ashley smiled sweetly, raising her right hand to shoulder height while keeping her eyes on Ethan.

She waved goodbye happily, genuinely glad she had met him.

Ethan turned and waved back kindly, though Ashley couldn’t see his face.

He watched her as she walked away toward Mavelard City.

Sigh. I can’t join LionArk right now. But helping them from behind sounds like a good move for me.

The Thousand Stars Event had ended, and the results had already been shared among all players.

I’m sure there’ll be some big changes soon.

Right before leaving the snowy white altar, Ethan opened his inventory panel and brought out the three chests he had obtained.

The three items floated in front of him—the legendary chest had a golden frame, the SR chest also had a golden frame, and the rare one had a blue frame.

Ethan wanted to save the equipment and weapon chests, along with the Soul Servant, for last.

He decided to start with the Rare Crystal Spirit chest.

He tapped the Rare Crystal Spirit chest twice, like knocking on it. In an instant, the chest opened and shone with a soft blue light—bright, but not blinding.

Inside were three Rare Crystal Spirits of different elements: two water and one light.

[Congratulations! You’ve obtained the following items:]

[1x Crystal Spirit Ocean Wave (Rare) || 1x Crystal Spirit Reflection of Sea Moon (Rare) || 1x Crystal Spirit Purifying Light (Rare)]

Ethan exhaled slowly. The crystal spirits were random, but he couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed that all of them were just Rare.

Putting that aside, he had received those items because Sword Liberation ranked second, right below LionArk.

If he had pushed harder, maybe he could have reached first place and taken even more items.

For now, Ethan didn’t feel any regret about that. He was grateful enough to be in the top ten—especially reaching second place in the final event ranking.

He stored the three Crystal Spirits in his inventory. Ethan then shifted his focus to the next item—the SR Soul Servant chest.

If his guess was right, the SR Soul Servant inside wasn’t a fragment or any other partial item, but a complete soul servant ready to deploy.

At the moment, he already had three deployed soul servants: Neryss Abyssborn, Seraphelis, and Jack Spearsun. Among the three, only Jack’s rank was below R.

If Ethan got lucky, he could get a higher-rank SR soul servant that was stronger than Jack. That would definitely boost his overall power.

Ethan double-tapped the second item—the SR Soul Servant Chest with a golden frame. Slowly, the chest opened and revealed a bright red card that burned like fire.

[Congratulations! You’ve obtained a Soul Servant]

[Name: Lyodra Vulkanis || Element: Fire || Rank: SR]

[Deploy and change?] [Y/N]

Luck was fully on Ethan’s side this time. The soul servant card showed the figure of a woman with a fiery red dress that glowed like molten lava.

Her black hair faded to crimson at the tips, and her red eyes burned with sharp strength.

Ethan froze. He remembered that he once had the same soul servant—Lyodra.

Her power had always been incredible, especially her AOE ability. Lyodra was a long-range combat soul servant, not close-range or hybrid.

Of course, Ethan wouldn’t waste such a golden opportunity. He opened the system panel showing his list of soul servants.

He selected Jack and replaced him with Lyodra. The replacement succeeded, and the base ATK and DEF panel appeared automatically.

[SOUL SERVANT]

[Seraphelis] [Lv. 500] [Light] [SSSR]

[Neryss Abyssborn] [Lv. 1] [Water] [SR]

[Lyodra Vulkanis] [Lv. 1] [Fire] [SR]

[BASE ATK AND DEF]

[ATK: 30,268 || DEF: 29,335]

His stats had risen—from around 26,000–28,000 ATK to over 30,000.

Not only that, his DEF also increased since Lyodra was now one of Ethan’s three main soul servants.

Maybe this is my best setup for now. I have to raise my soul servants’ levels—and Hissy’s too.

After finishing with the second item, Ethan moved on to the last one—the Equipment and Legendary Sword Chest.

This was the reward he had been aiming for since the start, the reason he joined the event and climbed the rankings.

Now that he had Bloodblade Ashura, he needed a Legendary equipment set to match its rank and keep his power balanced.

Without delay, Ethan tapped the item panel twice. The golden glow brightened before slowly fading, revealing something that completely surprised him.

The chest had chosen a sword for Ethan.

A sword?

[Congratulations! You’ve obtained an item]

[Type: Weapon (Sword)]

[Name: Tempest Reaver || Element: Wind || Rank: Legendary]

Ethan grasped the new sword in his left hand while summoning Bloodblade Ashura in his right.

At first, he was disappointed that the chest had chosen another weapon. But when he looked at both swords in his hands, something struck him.

Dual sword skill? Wait... I think I heard something about that in Class Advancement before.

Wind and fire—two elements that didn’t conflict. In fact, wind fueled the flames. Tempest Reaver could strengthen Bloodblade Ashura.

He had never expected the weapon he obtained to open a brand-new path for him—a chance to become even stronger than ever before.

With all three event rewards opened, Ethan had everything he wanted.

He didn’t plan to stay any longer on the snowy white altar. After storing both swords, he took off into the air.

Originally, he had planned to return to Porco City. But everyone there hated him, even though he could easily kill them all.

Looking down, Ethan saw many towns filled with players moving about their daily activities.

After crossing the strait from the snowy island, he spotted a harbor city on the northern continent.

It wasn’t crowded, but it had shops selling all kinds of useful things.

Right now, he needed Soul Essence to level up his two SR servants, and Pet Essence to raise Hissy’s level.

Ethan didn’t land in the center of town—he didn’t want to stand out. He touched down at the edge of the city, in a small forest near a quiet village.

Fortunately, no one saw him arrive, so he didn’t have to kill anyone.

From where he landed, it took about twenty minutes on foot to reach the city center. The snow melted from his body as he walked, the warmer harbor air surrounding him.

He entered the city from the east village gate. The place was called Lunzigh, protected by a round wall that enclosed the whole area.

Blue guild flags with a marlin emblem hung over every entrance. Ethan didn’t know the guild’s real name, but he decided to call them the Marlin Guild.

As he expected, his PK status drew fear and gossip from nearby players. Some stepped away, whispering rumors behind his back.

They said Ethan had raped women, kidnapped children, murdered guild leaders, even wiped out entire cities. Ethan only smiled and shook his head.

He had never raped anyone—never kidnapped a child either. He hadn’t killed any guild leaders, though he admitted he had once almost destroyed an entire city for a good reason.

So if someone asked whether those rumors were true or false, Ethan could only say they were false.

He entered the city without any guards stopping him, since no one was on duty. The streets were clean and organized, though the air smelled faintly of fish.

The game administrators had made the environment feel incredibly real—they could even stimulate the players’ sensory nerves through VR, making it seem as if they were standing in an actual harbor full of fresh catches.

Ethan’s steps stopped when he came to an item shop—not an equipment or crystal enhance store.

Item shops sold support goods like potions, crystal buffs, soul essences, pet essences, gachapon keys, and skills.

Not many players came there. Ethan entered and was greeted by a red-haired woman.

"Welcome. Do you need anything?" she asked.

"Yes. I need 1,000 Soul Essences, 100 Pet Essences, and I’d like to see the skill sets for the warrior class."

"Of course. We have them all."