Chapter 52 - 52. Retreat
Flame who was nimbly evading Bigarm's attacks immediately broke away from the confrontation after receiving the order. Bowler also bolted once he landed on the ground. Previously Jack had asked him to use up all his remaining free attribute points to fill up the Dexterity stats. He was the slowest among them, so this fleeing strategy would be harder for him.
Luckily, there was no opponent pinning him down at the moment so he was the one with the most head start when the order to retreat was given. The two rangers who went up to the terrace didn't see when Bowler jumped down, they were still looking around up in the terrace for him. Scarface wanted to chase but since he didn't invest any point in Dexterity, he soon lost sight of Bowler.
Scarface yelled at the two rangers in irritation, "get down here, you two! He has already jumped down!"
Red chased after Jack as he removed himself from Stonecleave. In the group, only she could barely match speed with Jack hence they soon found themselves some distance from the rest of the group.
Seeing the opportunity, Jack said in team chat, "Bowler, look at your map and come to my place. I got an enemy expert in our tail. If we manage to get rid of her, it would be a great blow to our opponents. Flame, you are too far away, continue onward to the rendezvous point."
After giving the instruction, Jack stopped his running and turned back to face his pursuer. He looked at his radar and found out the rest of the enemies didn't scatter to chase them, instead they gathered and stayed where they were. Red Death who was chasing after him stopped several meters away from him. She wore a conflicted look. She then glared at Jack and said, "don't you think this is over. We will settle this another time."
After saying her piece, she turned back and left.
Jack was confused at her retreat. From his radar, he could see Red Death reconvened with her group. He continued observing them on his radar to see what kind of move they were planning, but instead, they started to move away in the direction back to the safe zone. Bowler arrived at this time and asked, "where is the expert?"
Red Death who had regrouped with the rest of her team, asked Scarface in dissatisfaction, "why are we retreating?"
"Can't you see the size of our team? We lost almost half from when we originally set out," Scarface replied.
"We can still take them on. Are you going to just let those who had lost their lives die in vain?"
"Wrong and wrong. We will settle this debt once we find a better opportunity. And about taking them on, if we continue now, we risk losing the whole group."
Red Death gave a disdainful expression, "I don't believe it. They managed to take out almost half of our group because they were targeting our weakest members. The rest of us are not that weak, if they come at us, we can still win over the three of them."
Scarface gave a sigh, "that might be true if we are holding the initiative, but as you had experienced, we kept on being ambushed by them. As if they know our every move. It is possible that they have equipment or item that can track us. And also, there might not be only the three of them."
"What do you mean?"
"It is possible that there is still another Magician hiding someplace else. The same Magician who sneak attacked us before we arrived at the shopping mall."
"Isn't that the Magician up on the second floor of the shopping mall?" Bigarm asked in bewilderment.
"I originally thought so," Scarface replied. "But after seeing the damage done by that Magician on the second floor. His damage was lower than the one before. Also, his Energy Bolts only shot out four bolts, while the previous one had five bolts in one spell. They couldn't be the same Magician."
"Who was it?" Bigarm asked again, "as far as we know, their team only had three people."
"It could be an expert from White Scarfs, sent here to give them a hand in secret."
"That White Scarfs, so they really intend on making enemy with us!"
Scarface added, "if we continue pursuing them and got caught again in an ambush by the four of them. We might be the ones that got wiped out. I must admit, I have underestimated them. I would have brought more people if I have known so, I didn't because I don't want to attract the attention of White Scarfs. Now that it had come down to this, we can only cut our losses and make a better preparation next time."
Red Death was silent after hearing this, she no longer vehemently protesting. She just swore in her heart that she would get her revenge someday.
Jack and Bowler met up with Flame at the place Jack had specified. Jack had picked the area because it was devoid of monsters' presence.
"They retreated?" Flame asked. "Why? They still outnumber us by twice."
"I'm not sure," Jack said. "Maybe they decided it's not worth it to keep on losing people in order to chase us."
"Well, I know the reason, it's because we are AWESOME!" Bowler exclaimed with ardor.
"Don't get too excited," Jack told him. "I know their kind of guild. They won't let go of this matter easily. They will strike again once they got the opportunity or after they assembled more members."
"Oh? Does that mean they will come back again soon with more people?" Bowler was back to his worried look.
"For today, I don't think so," Jack replied. "But you may never know. Let's not let our guard down."
"We are not going back yet?"
"Why? There are still several hours before the sunset. Let's continue hunting monsters for experience."
"You are not worried that they really will be back with more people?"
"Don't worry, if they come with more people, we will just run away," Flame interjected. "After all, our leader here will know if they got near us. Won't you, leader?"
"Oh…," Jack scratched his head. "Yes, my hunch will let me know if they come again," he said.
They continued to hunt monsters for the remainder of the days. Although Jack was vigilant and continued to monitor his radar, Death Associates people didn't show themselves anymore. Flame finally reached level 11 before the day ended. They received several iron ores and copper coins from the monster drops and split them evenly. Bowler and Flame wanted Jack to get a bigger portion as it was clear he killed monsters more efficiently compared to them, but he insisted on even distribution.
They returned to the safe zone as the Sun was setting on the horizon. They avoided areas with other players when going back, and sneaked through if the crowd was unavoidable, as Jack couldn't know if the blue dots he saw on his radar were from Death Associate or other people.
He had asked Peniel if their enemy dots would remain in black color after the fight was over, she informed him that the color would change back to blue. She mentioned that there would be a function where he could list players as enemies, but that would be in the future she said.
One such function was when one guild declared another guild as an enemy, then all the members in that guild would be seen as black dots in Map. She also mentioned that the current guilds they saw in this tutorial period were only people grouped up together based on their allegiance in what Jack called real-life or past VR games. They were not proper guilds recognized by this world's system.
They only relaxed after they arrived in the vicinity of the City Hall building, where White Scarfs members were hanging around. When they entered the building, Silverwing was seen talking with another member in the main hall. When Silverwing spotted them, he immediately disengaged from the conversation with the other member and approached them.
"I heard you have been busy today?" He said with a smile after coming near.
"Were that your eyes and ears telling you as well?" Jack replied.
Silverwing laughed at the comment, "don't worry, I didn't have anyone tailing you guys. I, however, did have people monitoring Death Associates people, and they heard a piece of rather interesting news. Something about a team led by Scarface going on a mission, but came back several people short. I originally wanted to send out people to check on you guys, but then again, I think if my allies are someone who are so easily taken out, then there is no benefit in continuing the alliance, since we don't need weaklings for allies."
Jack nodded, "I am glad we didn't disappoint you then."
"Yes, you didn't. Now that you have made it clear to us of your capability, how about we formalize our cooperation?"
"Oh? How do we formalize?"
"Game style of course," Silverwing made a gesture, Jack then heard a notification.
"Silverwing had sent you a Friend request. Do you accept?"