Starting from Zero

Book 4, Chapter 20

Indian A-Sirs (*)

Alert: minor offensive content against India and j.a.pan.

------------------

            "We recovered!"
　　
　　    "Hooray!"　　
　　   

            Peoplecelebrated for getting out of the curse. The newly arrived girl just looked atthe group without knowing what to do.
　　
　　    "You--but, who are you people??"
　　
　　    "Well,I"m [Ziri]," It doesn"t look like the other people are going to answer her."good day."
　　
　　    "Oh,uh. Hi, I--I"m[Shura Violet]."

           She"s stammering. Hasn"t recovered from allthe shock, maybe.

           "What are you...?" She waved her finger at thescene.
　　
　　    Ianswered with a question instead: "Why are you looking for the ox?" 　　
　　   

           "OH!!"She finally remembered what she came for. "The ox!! Did it drop anything?"
　　
　　    Ipicked up the token I just dropped. "This. A black...metal plate, haven"tidentified it."
　　
　　    Thegirl"s eyes are beaming. "Are you selling it??"
　　
　　    "Sell?"I looked at the plate again. "Not yet. I"ll decide after I figure out whatit is."

           Obviously the girl knows something about it. I"m not giving it forfree though.

            "I"ll [Identify] it right now if you"re in a hurry. I"ll sell if I have no need for it."
　　
　　    "Noyou don"t have to! 100 thousand crystals! In cash!" 　　
　　  

            "...Letme think about it."

            Curious. She"s either rich as h.e.l.l, or this thingvalues a lot.

            "Why do you offer like that? We don"t know what it is yet."
　　
　　    "ButI know! Trust me, 100 crys is pretty good price! And I really need it now! Pleaseplease sell it to me!"

            She"s looking left and right when she said that, whichmeans someone else is looking for this thing as well.
　　
　　    Achance to make a fortune.

            I can wait for her compet.i.tors and ask them to bidfor it. Maybe I"ll earn a lot more.

           "No, I"ll get it identified to makedecision. That"s a high price, and there must be a reason."
　　
　　    Sheseems really worried: "Do it fast!" Then she gave me a recallscroll. She"s making sure I don"t b.u.mp into anyone on my way back.

           That"s what I"m hoping for though.

            "It"s not far. Let"s walk it. These scrolls are not free you know."

           Aha. Her face is turning red. And she"s stomping her feet because of theimpatience.
　　
　　    "Whythe hurry? It"s not like I"ll lose it."

           She looks about to explode!
　　
　　    "Stopright there!!"

           Another group showed up.

           Jackpot.
　　
　　    WhenI"m inspecting the new arrivers I suddenly felt a sting on my chest.

           "Yaaaw!Hey what the fuc??"

           The girl wants it so bad and now she"s trying to takeit by force!

            My team immediately came standing in front of me. I hired them asbodyguards after all, they know they shouldn"t slack off on that job.
　　
　　    "What"sthat for?" I pretended to be angry with the girl. That hit didn"t hurtmuch. I was expecting her to do that anyway. "You want to spend time inprison??"
　　
　　    Shejust stared at me in shock without responding to my provoke.

            "You"re not dead??"
　　
　　    "Huh?You"re expecting to one-shot me like that?" I robbed my chest, pretendingto be hurt.

           Of course I"m not hurt at all. The Dark Dragon Lord set counts as heavyarmor, I won"t feel much pain if it didn"t get penetrated. Still, I need to puton an act since I"m a "Wizard" now.
　　
　　    "Butthat was my special skill! Aren"t you a caster?"
　　
　　    "What"swrong with that?" 

　　    "Iused [Mana Burn]! It damages your MP and causes double damage for how manymana points you lose. No casters would survive that!"
　　
　　    Ilooked at my status bar.

           "...It didn"t do anything. The skill failed maybe?"

           Must be the resistance of my armor. It nullified the attack.
　　
　　    Thenew group arrived at the scene. They look...brown. And they"re wearing clothfolds on their heads.

           Indian A-sirs?? Aren"t international routes not openedyet? Why is tourism becoming so popular in China?

           The leading Indian man walkedto me. "Hallo flend. Mai I aska if you took da token from da sacred cow?"

           His language sounds so awkward. The guy didn"t even buy the systemtranslation?

          ([Zero] doesn"t translate foreign languages. You can pay somemoney to buy the simultaneous interpreting system, paid by hours, veryconvenient.)
　　
　　    "YesI did. Here." I held up the black object. "Why? You want to buy ittoo?"
　　
　　    "Don"t!!"The girl yelled from behind. "That"s their Nation Treasure! If we take itnow they"ll have nothing to counter us in nation wars! You are a Chinese playerright?? Sell it to me!"

            She must by panicking since she let out the secreton her own. Still, I think she"s doing the right thing. I tried to rip her offwhen she"s protecting our country...I should apologize.

            Shame.
　　
　　    TheA-sir laughed. "If ya sellit we pay you good plice! Nation war ish notfun if we don play it fair! Come on flend. Giv me a plice, we pay you here!"
　　
　　    Thegirl clenched her teeth. "150 thousand crystals. That"s all I have! Thinkcarefully. Please!"
　　
　　    Myhelpers looked at me as well. They would want me to reject the A-sirtoo.
　　
　　    Iturned to the girl.

           "Take it!"

           I tossed the token over. She caught itand looked back at me, eyes wide.

           I shrugged to the now blue-faced A-sir."Sorry my friend, who pays more gets it. You"ll never pay enough to winour pa.s.sion for our home. "

           It seems they"re about to start violence. Iwaved at the Phantom Knights. "Get into position folks! We got work to do."
　　
　　    Theylined up in front of the nine Indian players. Now that will scare them. We gotover 30 people here if I take my companions into account. They only got 9. AndI don"t think they can survive against the level 850 knights anyway.
　　
　　    Weignored the foreign players and headed towards our destination again. Everyhelper nodded to me along the way and patted on my shoulder.

           "Respect man."

           "Good job back there."

           That satisfied my ego a lot. Though I do hope they could be moregentle next time, cause a dozen hit on my shoulder would have hurt me, if notfor my armor.
　　
　　    "Heywait!" Violet caught up. "You take it!"
　　
　　    "...Whatdo you mean?" I took the token back, not sure what she wants to do anymore."Weren"t you trying to buy it?"
　　
　　    "That"sbecause I didn"t trust you. I don"t want the Indians to have it. You proved yourstanding point so I can let you keep it. It"s safer."

            Umhmm. That smile is sosweet. Now she"s friendly, I can see she"s pretty pa.s.sionate girl.
　　
　　    "Sinceyou two are so modest with it, we"ll help you get it off your hands!"

           TheA-sirs appeared again. More of them this time! I see somewhere near fortypeople following behind. So they were just waiting for backup?
　　
　　    "Iknew we wouldn"t get out of this easily." The unknown girl stepped ahead."This is our land and you will remember it! Go, everyone!"
　　
　　    "Killthem all!!" My temporary mercenaries all charged forward.
　　
　　    "No, wait a sec--" They"re too hot-headed! "Phantom Knights, go helpthem!"
　　
　　    Theywouldn"t send any ordinary people for this job, plus my helpers are not reallyhigh-end players so the outcome is pretty obvious. Three of my team membersdied on the first conflict!

           To my relief, the Phantom Knights are still deadlyto the enemies. These Indians all belong to one cla.s.s called "Pope". Theylook like our Taoists, good at both physical and magical skills. Still, theirlevel is too low compared to the knights. Nothing to worry about.
　　
　　    Violetjoined the fray as well. I already know she"s a melee cla.s.s with all those redarmors on her, what I didn"t expect is that she is 100% damage dealer. None of herskills have any showy effects, every hit of her aims for best and fastest damage. She canalmost take down any of the Indian players with just two hits. That"s impressive!
　　
　　    Withoutclear targets, all the mages and the fake mage (me) have to stay put on theoutside. 　　
　　   

           Thebattle ended after about a minute. It would have ended even faster, but theknights couldn"t use their team attacks because too many players are blockingtheir way.

           We began to clean up the battlefield after all the enemies aredealt with. There are many small bottles scattered on the ground. I picked oneup.

           "[Blessing Oil]?... What"s this?"
　　
　　    Peopleinspected the bottles too.

            "I don"t think it"s healing item."
　　
　　    "Let"stry it then!" The female Warrior is straight enough.

            I thought she wasgoing to use the potion on her own, however she dragged the Swordsman over andstuffed the bottle into his mouth.

           That looks...uncomfortable.

           "How about it?" Sheasked the now mouth-filled Swordsman.
　　
　　    Hedidn"t answer. He just crouched and started to vomit.

           There are letters printedon the bottom but...I can"t read Hindi. I paid for the system translation. ThenI held my stomach and laughed.

           "It"s not for drinking!"
　　
　　    "Really?Thank G.o.d I didn"t do it." A Black Mage from the female Warrior"s teammumbled. "Wow look at Till"s face. He"s green."
　　
　　    Violetasked me. "What does it do?" 　　
　　   

            I"mstill trying to hold my laughter. "This is sold in Indian temples. It"smostly the same thing as those holy waters in western cathedrals. Your pour iton your body to increase your status for a short while."
　　
　　    "Iwas wondering why those people are so strong. But...look at your Swordsman, bah-hahahaha!"

            He"s going to throw his lunch up. His Black Mage teammate is still joking. "HeyTill! Think about it, holy oil sold in Indian temples! What do they call it? IndianG.o.d oil! You just drank a full bottle of it. You gonna pierce the sky! Girlswill scream after you! "
　　
　　    Allthe guys laughed hard. Violet followed them with several dry laughs and askedme. "What is Indian G.o.d oil?"
　　
　　    "Ahso you don"t know?" I looked at her in surprise. "Then why are youlaughing?"
　　
　　    "Idon"t want to feel awkward. Tell me, what is it?"
　　
　　    "Ahem.The oil is used on the..." I whispered into her ear.
　　
　　    Thenshe laughed for real!

           "HAAAHahaha! So that"s why they fought so hard!" (**)

           "Hey what"s this?" The Priest picked up a long stick andgave it to me.
　　
　　    Iused [Identify] and almost jumped. 

           "Holy s.h.i.t! Their other teamarrived late because they were after this thing, and they didn"t even have timeto get it identified!"
　　
　　    "What?What?" Violet urged.
　　
　　    "It"sa Nation Treasure of India, the [Almighty Rod]."
 　　
　　    "Really??"Violet took the item and checked. " They didn"t send enough force after mebecause they were after a bigger treasure!"
　　
　　    While my team pa.s.ses the item around I asked Violet: "But why would TWO IndianNation Treasures show up here?" 　　
　　   

            "Pre-war treasure exchange." Violet explained with an "I know everything"att.i.tude. "Not all Nation Treasures appear inside the original country. Forevery country, there will be four pieces located in foreign lands! This iswritten on the official site. I can"t remember the details. Two pieces of oursshould be in India, another two in j.a.pan. For India, two in China and two inthe UK. As for j.a.pan...two here, one in America, and one in Korea."
　　
　　    "Allunfriendly territories." The Priest commented. "They"re trying tostart a war?"
　　
　　    "Ofcourse they are! The nation war system is coming, they"ll cause more conflictsand attract more players to join!" The female Warrior explained.
　　
　　    "Isee it now." I held my chin. "People will now try to find their owntreasures in other nations. This will create a lot of hostility among playersbefore the incoming wars."
　　
　　    "That"swhat they"re trying to do." Violet agreed.
　　
　　    Iheard my private chat ringing. 

           "Ziri! How"s it going on your farming? Ifound the seller [Arch Necromancer]!"
　　
　　    "Hawk!"I just remembered what I was trying to do. The Hindus distracted us!"Not yet! What about you? What did he say?"
　　
　　    "Goodnews and bad news. He"s a good guy, but he can"t decide because the treasuredoesn"t belong to himself! The good news is he already prevented foreignplayers from joining the auction."
　　
　　    "That"snot enough. You know there are always people who"ll help the enemies! What ifthe j.a.panese hire someone for the job?"
　　
　　    "Oh s.h.i.t...you"re right! Better than nothing, at least it will buy us some time! Ohand, I askedour friends and we managed to collect 100 thousand crystals so far."
　　
　　    "Far from enough." 　　
　　    

           "Iknow! We"re still trying!" 　　
　　    

           "Alright.I"ll work on it too!" 　　
　　   

            Violetnoticed my expression. "Something went wrong?"
　　
　　    "Yes."I nod. "Someone is selling our treasure piece in G.o.ddess City. We don"thave enough money, and I"m worried it would get taken away by j.a.pan."
　　
　　    "Here."She opened up the trade system and gave 150 thousand crystals to me. "All Ihave. For the motherland."
　　
　　    Oh thank you thank you thank you--

           But her following words prevented me from actually saying thanks.

           "I"mglad I met sister today! If you need any help, as long as it"s for our country, I"m allyours, sis!"
　　
　　    Ohfor the-- 

            "I"m a gentleman!!"
　　
　　    "Youare??" 

           Everyone, yes EVERYONE, stared at me. 

            "No kidding?"
　　    "You"rea guy??" 　　
　　    "Lies!"　　
　　    "Idon"t believe it!" 　　
　　 

           Thatexplanation took some more time. Ok, I really need to make a hood for my wizardrobe. Or this will never end!
　　
　　    "Oknow, back to business!" I asked them to continue with our hunting plan.
　　
　　    Nomore surprises this time. Shura Violet also volunteered to join our quest.