Chapter III.

Sanzetsu took a deep breath after a moment's thought, stood up and looked at all the members. His gaze was deep and it seemed as if he was scanning each of them.

Anxiety and rage were eating him up inside. He hadn't expected this to happen when he wasn't prepared for it. He hadn't raided guilds, taken any invasive actions against surrounding player territories, or plundered villages in a long time. On the contrary, he had maintained good relations with the other powerful guilds. Their trade agreements benefited all guilds, even the smaller ones, so why? Why now? Was..... any of his friends a spy? A traitor? These questions kept running through his mind, and he still couldn't find the right answer. At the same time, he couldn't believe that any of his friends were traitors.

"At the moment, our forces are too small to stand against a human invasion army. But I'm not going to let this city be easily conquered by the enemy. Therefore, Safflower, as much as I hate to say it, I grant you permission to hold off the enemy forces while the others evacuate the inhabitants. But you will not be alone. Adachigahara, bulletheart and Kami Kaze will be your companions. You also have permission to use the god item."

By the time Sanzetsu finished, everyone present returned smiling and disbelieving looks, but only one person remained neutral and silent throughout the meeting, and that person was Hisame. The others did not believe that Sanzetsu would allow an object of unimaginable power to be used. That was because Sanzetsu was of the opinion that world-class and god-class items were only to be used in extreme emergencies, when their main fortification, the Nine Towers, was truly in danger of being destroyed, not the city.

"That's absurd!"

Suddenly, after long hours of silence, Hisame spoke. Hisame stood up from her chair and angrily slammed the table with her full strength, unexpectedly a blue icon in the shape of a square appeared above the table and the defense system began to calculate the damage of the attack. The system calculated attack damage 0.

"What's wrong, Hisame?"

Sanzetsu asked.

"We can't use our best members as shields!"

Hisame was right, even though the guild called Lightningstars seemed to be strong and each of the members excelled in PVP battles, it didn't mean they were invincible. Adachigahara was known among her friends for her elementalist class. Her class was powerful and it could be said that she could summon and control any elemental. Bulletheart was known for her Fighter class this class was dedicated to melee combat and depended mostly on the combat skills of the player. And Kami Kaze, his class was Doomcaster. This class was special in that it depended mainly on the player's mana, the player absorbed this mana and could use it to shoot a huge onslaught of red lightning or control bodies with their mana and manipulate and shape them at will. The player could also absorb mana from their enemies by simply stunning them with their special skill for a few seconds and then draining their mana.

"Hisame, we respect the decision of our leader, and friend. We will do everything we can to keep our people safe. We will gladly lay down our lives for what is precious to us. These servers will be down in less than a day, so we want to dedicate our last moments to the defense of our country. We have given much of our time to this, and we will not let our enemies do so without a fight."

And Bulletheart was right, the game's servers were about to shut down in less than a day.

Although Hisame seemed disappointed with the answer she received, she didn't let it show. She just quietly lowered her gaze, and sat back in her seat.

"Alright, we can get started."

Sanzetsu said. As he finished speaking he raised his pale hand uttered some strange words in an unknown language and his body began to disappear; he teleported. It was one of the abilities created by the Ligningstars themselves. It was a handmade obsidian ring that guaranteed teleportation between fortresses, cities, and even their own conquered territories.

When Sanzetsu teleported the others remained seated as if waiting for a hint of disagreement with his decision and his attitude. However, none of those present had words, so everyone decided that everything was fine and everyone quietly left except Bulletheart and Hisame, they remained sitting in their seats, unmoved like stone statues.

As the huge double doors slammed loudly behind the last departing member, Bulletheart reached out her hand and cast her [Mirror of the past] spell, and a transparent mist like a round mirror formed in front of her and Hisame.

This spell contained a lot of stored data, which was the players' memory of them for past battles or other important events.

When the fog cleared fully, the stored memory of Hisame and Bulletheart began to project in her image.

They stood deep in the swampy forest, alone and surrounded by many enemies, but they didn't seem to feel that way. There were wide smiles on their faces and they were laughing loudly. Their plate armor was all damaged and Hisame was surrounded by glowing circling knives while Bulletheart had summoned swamp elementals in front of her.

"I remember that, it was our mission together....it was a good time... I miss it."

Hisame said.

"Yes, me too."

"Are you coming back? I mean... if-"

"Hisame, I'll be back. We have fought many battles, always outnumbered, and this time will be no different."

"It is, but we own several high level players. You can't match these players."

Hisame said, then stood up and reached across the table.

"Yes, there are many players using super level magic, we can't match those....we'll try to kill as many players as possible, then we'll retreat."

"Promise?"

Hisame said with pleading eyes, hoping Bulletheart would give her word of his return. Bulletheart didn't answer though, at that moment a loud and booming horn sounded through the room announcing the start of their mission.

Bulletheart stood up from her chair walked over to Hisame and took her hand in hers, looking at her with a smile.

"I'll be back."

She raised her right hand one last time and sent out a teleportation spell. At that moment, she disappeared and only Hisame remained in the room. Hisame felt abandoned, though she masked her sadness well, she couldn't do it this time.

[Hisame, it's time to go]

Suddenly, she heard a very familiar voice in her mind. It was a [Message] spell that many players used to contact their counterparts.

"Friends... how ridiculous."

Hisame sighed as she stretched out her hand, uttered the spell, and suddenly disappeared.