Starting from Zero

"Okay okay. I’m going to get my weapon."

I rushed back into the crowd, attracting a lot of curious looks.

"Hey! Are those weapons on your back just decorations??" Wuuyu called.

I didn’t answer. I reached a Dragon Punch cannon, released its fixing bolts, and pushed it back to the temporary arena, aiming the barrel at the Russian man.

He finally gave up his arrogant att.i.tude and panicked. "Hey, hey hey hey! What are you doing??"

I answered him while loading the cannon with powder. "Well, you told me to use any weapon, so I"ll use this. Look, it"s big enough. Hey you, stay still. It won"t hurt much. Show your manliness in front of that lady will you?"

"But, but, who the f.u.k duels people using a cannon??"

He"s now moving side to side, which caused all the people around him to move to and fro as well. Of course no one wished to get involved.

I’m trying to aim at him but it"s pretty hard to do so with all the people around.

"GET DOWN!!" I shouted.

Everyone hit the deck out of instinct. As I expected, the muscled man is the slowest to react. I seized the chance and pulled the trigger.

Bam! The cannon is free on its wheels now without the stationary bolts. Although I didn’t load any solid round in there, the power of the powder explosion still caused it to fly backwards, breaking the side rails and drop into the female pirate"s ship. Her ship is a lot lower than ours, and Dragon Punch is made out of hard steel, thus it easily crashed through the deck board.

"MY SHIP!!" She yelled and rushed to the edge to check the damage. 　　

As for the Russian man... He already disappeared towards the opposite direction. Faster than the cannon, of course. No idea where he is now.

I brushed my hands. "Next!" Then I called to the Russian pirates. "Alright, y"all are on my side now. Come!"

They looked at each other for a while, then decided to follow my word.

One fleet down. Brain is always better than raw strength it seems.

"Hey you!!" The red-haired lady pressed her nose on mine. "Now what do you have to say about ruining MY ship??"

"Don"t worry. It"s mine after I defeat you. Sigh, I have to spend money to repair it myself."

"Very well. Let’s do it!"

She retreated some distance and drew her thrusting sword from her waist.

"Let’s see what you got. And no funny ideas! Summoning is not accepted in duels!"

Looks like no tricks on this woman. I took out my master sword and lowered my helmet mask. With a wave of the weapon, the other eight flying swords lined up above my head. Then I put on my robe hood and activated it. My body disappeared from everyone’s sight.

With the flying swords catching her attention, the woman will have no time to find my whereabouts.

She is already charging at my location, hoping to strike me before I move away. She"s almost double leveled than me, and maybe smarter. One hit could prove fatal.

I quickly rolled away, dodging her attack. The movement caused tiny ripples in the air which can be seen by enemies. She noticed this and stroke at me again. Clang! One of the flying swords was knocked away, diverting her attack from me. Her sword went to the wrong way and stuck into the deck floor. I saw the chance and ordered the flying swords to surround her. I"m aiming at her hand instead of her body, since my goal is to force her to give up her weapon.

She didn’t fall for it though. She bent her sword to one side into a huge arc. I thought she"s going to break her sword when she released her weapon, causing it to swing back and forth. My flying swords all hit the swinging object and were repelled away.

When my weapons are dealt with, she took back her sword and stood there, not moving.

Ha, lost your target?

Again, I ordered the flying swords to attack her from eight different directions. When she’s busy defending herself, I took out two dagger-like objects from my waist, and changed them into two boomerangs. I pinned my master sword into the floor, unleashed the boomerangs using both hands and quickly redrew the master sword. The actions only took about one second so the flying swords didn’t stop their attack. The woman already saw the two boomerangs coming from both sides of her, flying in a strange manner due to their unique designs, and there"s no way she can defend herself now.

I saw blood. Two deep gashes appeared on both of her legs, causing her to scream.

I intensified the attacks of my flying swords, hoping to keep her busy so I can catch my boomerangs without exposing myself. The woman realized my plan. She hurled her swords away, knock off four flying swords from the air. She took the chance and hopped to a safe distance, keeping her eyesight on the returning boomerangs. Obviously she’s trying to use them to locate me.

I gave up on the boomerangs. I transformed into werewolf and jumped onto the high mast. Without anyone to catch them, the two boomerangs made another turn and flew back towards the woman again. Of course I can’t remote control them. They"re just flying in circles until the momentum force ends, and the woman happens to be standing in their usual route. Now she believes the boomerangs are following her. 　　

She has no weapon to block them now so she simply kicked them away with her heel. When she’s recovering from the movements, I ordered the flying swords to attack her again. What I’m not expecting is that she took out two black leather whips from her back, each several meters long.

The flying swords are not sneak weapons so they"re not really fast. With a single whip, all eight swords were swiped down onto the floor, when the woman quickly took off her leather jacket and tied them up.

When the woman stands satisfied with her work, I noticed that my boomerangs already landed behind her. I activated my weapon retrieval ability while jumping off the mast. This will probably give away my location, but that’s not important now.

The boomerangs came alive and began to fly towards me. As I land right in front of the woman, they went straight into the woman’s abdomen from her back.

She looked down at her bleeding stomach with disbelief. When she realized what happened, she pulled them off and threw the boomerangs at me.

Well, not just anyone can use these things as they like. I learned it the hard way.

The boomerangs went back to her before even reaching me. She put her arms in front of her face out of instinct, now another two gashes are on her elbows.

There is no need to hide now, so I took off my hood and charged.

"You...!" She looked at me when my master sword pierced her chest. "You...cheated...!"

"Nah, it"s me." I returned to my usual look. "No summoning right? I didn’t summon anything."

I poured some magic into the sword and activated its lighting damage effect. With some cracks and sparks, the woman"s beautiful red hair became afro style.

But she managed to move her arm and grabbed my wrist.

"Ahhhhhhrgh!!"

I was shocked away by my own attack. You can"t damage yourself with this skill but it still hurts!

"I"m not done yet!!" She steadied herself and pulled my sword from her body. I must have missed her vital point.

"YOU ARE GOING TO PAY!!"

I ignored her outburst and spoke to Rose. "Do you have a mirror on you?"

She tossed me one. Then I put it in front of me. "Hey, check yourself out."

The pirate screamed when she looked into the mirror. "AHHH! You, you, my hair!!!"

"Surrender. Or I"ll post your picture on every city gate around the world, so they can make a new WANTED poster for you."

"You threatening me??"

"Oh yes I am. Give it up if you still want to maintain your image."

I"m trying to be calm because I don’t know if this will work. NPCs are unpredictable, and this woman is worse.

"...Very well. I surrender! But you must promise, all of you will keep this a secret!"

"At ease, my lady. I will. "

Looks like women still consider their looks more than their lives. Even pirates.

"So...who’s next?"

This is obvious. But I still asked, while glancing at the remaining Asian pirate.

"I give up."

Well this is unexpected.

"I’m sure you"re hiding more stuff on you. Is that a top-grade Fire Gem on your helmet? You can transform, and go invisible. If I fight you now it’s probably only 50-50. And I don’t make uncertain fights. Your ship is good, but it ain’t worth risking my whole fleet. Okay now, have fun, I"m out."

He jumped onto his own ship and sailed away. It took a minute for everyone to take in the situation, when an unexpected voice broke the silence.

"...BAH! Finally."

We turned to the voice to see the Russian man, all wet, climbing back onto the ship.

"Someone give me some help here! Aw, aw! My waist!"

I walked to him. "You’re still alive? Okay. Three moves right?" I spoke to one of my sailor. "Give me another cannon, and load it with a REAL shot." 　　

"No, no, NO!" The big beard waved his hands. "I lost, I give up! And I thank you for not using any ammo just now. You saved my life!"

Well that att.i.tude changed too quick.

"Okay okay. Now move side." I walked to the woman. Rose and Red Moon are helping her with her hair. "Sort out your ships for us. We got pirate work to do."

"You mean, right now?" The woman, Rhona, looked at me in surprise.

"I need money to keep you people feed. And how do pirates get money?" I took out a j.a.pan flag I prepared. "From now on we only attack ships with this flag. Seize them whenever you can, until they no longer dare to sent any ship into the water with this flag! Oh make sure you count their shipyards as your targets too."

"Isn’t that a bit, you know, excessive?"

"This is called the tactic of ‘Kill All, Seize All, Burn All’. They used that on us in the history, we"re only returning the favor." Wuyuu explained in an as-a-matter-of-fact tune.

"Got it. I’m telling them the plans now." The pirate lady returned to her own fleet.

I checked the time, almost 8 in the evening. Guess we have to call it a day now.

"Hawk, we need to get off now. Watch over the ships for us. We can return to our usual play time tomorrow. "

"Alright, off you go. I"ll take it from here."

I told them about of the a.s.sault plans tomorrow and logged off with Rose and Zirai. We just have enough time to catch some dinner before the island auction.

We reached the auction hall at 8:30, by which most partic.i.p.ants are already here. Zirai left us to join her parents. She wasn"t the one joining the auction anyway, so she found her sister to read the recent news together. Obaly has occupied every section on the news, also, the reporters purposely mentioned Cindy and compared her with Obaly in the articles, since I hinted them to do it.

When I sat down with Rose I notice Cindy’s follower boy sitting near us. The young master from White Stone Corporation. He noticed us too. He has been believing that I"m just a poor student who happened to be accompanying Zirai"s family here. But now he"s doubting that idea. Besides, I’m wearing my formal suits now.

"You stupid son of--"

I pressed his mouth before he can finish. "Now now, I’m here representing the Dragon Fate Corporation, mister. It’s fine if you have personal matters with me but I suggest you NOT offend my family. We have hundreds of different ways to make you disappear from this world without anyone to mention you ever again. Keep you mouth shut for your own good, we clear?"

I deliberately made myself imposing because this man is a typical spoiled child from a rich family. I need to make sure he"s not going to raise the auction price to unexpected level just because he hates me. I don"t fear him but that’s doesn’t mean I can waste unnecessary money.

The auction is staring. The island owner, Mr. w.a.n.g, is now giving his long and dull speech on the stage, while I kept some attention on this young man beside me. I knew my plan went south when he"s still staring at me with all the hate he can muster.

I activated my earphone and called b.u.t.terfly in a small voice.

"Give me a report of the stock holdings, transaction records and financial overview of the White Stone Corporation. Fast!"

She called back in several minutes. "All looks standard. Most of their a.s.sets have gone into the stock market, ready to make further investments or make cash-outs anytime."

"Can we do something to force them into needing a lot of cash?"

"We can try ordering airplanes from them, a lot, so their manufacture factories will have to operate non-stop, which will require a lot of operational fund to keep them running. These fund will not become free until the order is completed."

"Good. Go and order the planes now, and sign the contract immediately. The more the better. Tell the stock management department to drive down the price of their stock, and make the other shareholders to give up their holdings to us. Give them some benefit if necessary. I want you to freeze up their funds as best as you can. When this is all done, tell our lawyers to file a charge that the While Stone Corporation committed fraud because they took our order without being able to finish it. Get it done within an hour!"

"Consider it done."

I turned off the earphone, took my cellphone and called Mr. w.a.n.g. He"s still giving the speech up there and didn’t answer my call, so I held up my phone and waved it at him.

Mr. w.a.n.g noticed my actions and quickly realized I"m calling him. He excused himself and left the stage.

"Is something urgent, sir?"

"I want you to try to prolong the speech as best as you can. Let’s say, your yearly pay rises by 10 thousand for each extra minute you can keep the auction later than the original schedule. Do you understand?"

I hang up without waiting for an answer.

Mr. w.a.n.g ran back to the stage. Oh this is gonna be fun.

He began to introduce every single entertainment facility and construction on the island, in details, even those that do not exist anymore. He kept it going for an hour before he finally left the stage. He"s a genius, I must say.

"Huff, heh...was that enough, sir?" He ran to me. "That’s the best I can do. Any longer and the audiences will probably drive me off with violence."

I checked the time. "10:20... Good! As I said, we’ll pay you for you time."

"A pleasure, sir! Now if you’ll excuse me, I need some rest..."

He looks drained out. Yeah I’ll probably be the same if I keep talking for an hour without even knowing what to say in the first place, if I can do it at all.

Maybe Mr. w.a.n.g overdid it a little. Now the auctioneer seems even more worried than the partic.i.p.ants. He rushed to the auction stand and downed his hammer without saying formalities.

"The auction begins now! I believe everyone has a sign we prepared for you. Raise the sign means you add another 10 million CNY above the current bid. Tell us your bid loudly if you want to raise it higher than that. The floor price is 500 million, start!"

"One billion!" The b.a.s.t.a.r.d beside me tried to mess it up from the start. Oh f.u.k him.

But the other people are already raising their signs. This is all expected. We estimated the actual cost of the island to be somewhere around 5 billion, so everything is acceptable until then.

"1.5 billion!" He called out and gave me a defiant look.

"1.6 billion!" Someone else competed.

I remained silent.

"2 billion!" The crazy a.s.shole again.

Sigh. I need to do something. "2.5 billion!"

He stood up before I can lower my sign. "4 billion!!"

Then he smiled at me, bigger, as if saying "Finally can’t keep calm, eh? Too bad you’ll never win it!"

My earphone sounded just in time.

"Sir, the White Stone Corporation in now history. They bankrupted 5 minutes ago."

"Good." I made another call to Mr. w.a.n.g.

The auctioneer already hit his hammer. "Deal, 4 billion. The Paradise Island now belongs to this young representative from the White Stone!"

I walked to him and shook his hand. "Congratulations man!"

He stared me blankly, not knowing what I"m trying to do.

When I released his hand Mr. w.a.n.g took several securities and controlled the man who"s still dumbfounded.

Mr. w.a.n.g then announced to the partic.i.p.ants: "I"m really sorry, ladies and gents. We just received message that the White Stone Corporation declared bankruptcy. They do not have 4 billion to buy the island, thus the bidding just now shall be revoked, we re-start from the last highest bid!"

The audiences became restless for a brief moment before they calmed down. These are all experienced people from various financial groups, they soon learned about what Dragon Fate did to White Stone, from their own intelligences. And of course, this also means that Dragon Fate wants this island for some reason, so they made up their mind almost at the same time.

The last highest bid, is 2.5 billion, called by me. This should be a lot lower than the expected price...But no one continued. In the end I acquired the ownership of Paradise Island at this price, when everyone in the hall came and said their congrats to me, by which they are hoping we can a.s.sist their own businesses in exchange. Ha, smart old foxes.

Dragon Fate is famous for its disregard against common rules. We have enough power to act on our own, so getting our help means a lot to them.

It’s already 0 in the evening when the last man let go of my hand. I really need some rest now. The two sleepless nights in succession drained me out.

------------------------　

Rose woke me up the next morning. Yup, I slept in again. The twins are already waiting for us in the living room.

"Tight sleep huh, my cute couple?"

I yawned. "You"re not in the game yet?"

"We’re waiting for you! Now eat something. Hawk drove us away as soon as he learned that we"re staying with you, demanding us to drag you in there asap. He asked if something terrible happened to you since you"re always absent these days."

"Did you tell him?"

"Yeah. I told him a beautiful lady caught your attention these days and made you doze off all the time after all the ‘fun’." She said that while glancing at Rose.

When Rose realized what she’s indicating, she began chasing Zirai around the room.

When we"re ready for the game it"s already 8:20 in the morning. That"s more than an hour later than our scheduled plan.

Hawk yelled the moment he saw me appear. "FINALLY UR HERE!! I thought you were ruined by some woman for real!"

Rose gave him a punch. "Who did what now?"

Hawk chuckled. "Well I didn’t mention the name, heh heh..."

"Ohhhhh....!" Violet and Coin said.

"Concentrate!" I changed the topic. "Where are we now?"

"Here." Two sailors spread open a detailed sea chart in front of us, then Hawk pointed at somewhere on it.

"Where did you find this map by the way?" I asked.

"It"s mine." Rhona, the red-haired woman, came to us. "This is drawn by us pirates, it has every single detail around the globe you may need on it. This is made from whale skin so it won’t break apart even if you drop it in the water."

"But...I can’t read these." I’m sure this is a map of the current game world, but all notations on it are written in unknown letters. It"s not even in English.

"Duh, this is MY map, of course it’s in my language."

"So can you translate it for us?"

"Nah." She shook her head. "Just catch me another whale, and I"ll ask our draftsman to get you another map, with your language on it."

"Nice. But I think we need you to translate for now." I pointed to the location Hawk told me.

"Where is this?"

"The Tsushima Strait."

"So this part up here...is Korea?"

"That"s right. We"re now between S.Korea and j.a.pan. This is always a conflict zone so even us pirates rarely come here."

"Why? Are pirates afraid of something too?"

"Hey, you"re a pirate too now, remember?" She pointed to the flag pole above us. I looked up and saw a giant pirate flag waving in the wind.

"Uh what the-- Who took off our nation flag?"

Hawk shrugged. "They asked us to do it, saying that they’ll only fight alongside us as fellow pirates if we keep that flag up. The flag means our duel yesterday is legit, otherwise they can just ask to duel us again."

"I see. Let’s do this then: put the pirate flag onto the port flag pole, hang the port flag onto our team flag pole, and we still need our nation flag up there to show our ident.i.ty."

"What about our guild flag?"

"Hang it on the nose."

"Alright!" Hawk went to change the flags, while I turned back to the map.

"So we"re not far from j.a.pan now?"

Rhoda spoke: "Only an hour if we went straight to it. But we’ll definitely get intercepted if we do that. There are a lot of other fleets on this route."

"Whose fleets?" 　　

"The Koreans of course. They hate j.a.pan as much as you do. Korea has highly developed naval industry as well so they"re always finding trouble with j.a.pan fleets. The Tsushima Strait we"re sailing upon now is their main battlefield. There are fights almost everyday. Actually I"m wondering why we haven"t run into anything yet."

"Captain! Battleship array spotted ahead!" The lookout warned.

"Jinxed." Violet mumbled.

"Don"t worry. If they’re Korean fleet they should have no reason the attack a Chinese ship."

"But...we have a pirate flag up our heads now remember?" Elfy reminded me.

I looked at the flag, then at Rhoda, who just shrugged.

"...Let’s try our luck." I called to the flagman. "Are we close enough to make flag signals?"

"Not yet but soon!"

"Tell them we"re players from China, now en route towards j.a.pan to play some piracy game."

After a while.

"The people from Korea wish us a safe return with our ship full of spoils!"

"Ah-ha! What did I say? They are friendly."

"I see. Your enemy’s enemy is your best ally." Rhona commented.

We watched as the Korean ships sail past us. They"re all tattered and torn. Hawk ordered the sailors to sound our cannon 12 times as salute, while I told the flagman to sent them another message: We will rob them clean.

"By clean you mean you"re going to take their underpants too!"

Everyone laughed out at the humorous reply.