Standing Right Next To You - Chapter 431
Leon’s fingers trembled while reading the comments which were being posted soon after he and Lina entered the waiting arena.
They had formed a clan together, just the two of them and this had attracted too many people’s attention.
How could he not understand their envy?
After all, he was an avid follower of the game and knew that Hellfire never played in groups.
A true lone wolf who ventured into the higher and more dangerous levels alone.
However, today, she was seen with him which skyrocketed his fame as well.
It did not take them too long to figure out who this King Jiu was.
{Wasn’t he publicly kicked out of his clan for dragging them down last week?}
The first comment pricked his heart as what they had said was the truth.
The clan that he had been traveling with and leveling up with was the same group of people who had publicly humiliated him and thrown him out from their clan.
He had treated them well all along and even went as far as using his hard-earned money to help them buy potions, weapons, and charms which might aid them to level up with him.
However, they did not seem to appreciate everything that he had done for them so far.
Forget about gratitude, they went as far as announcing that he was banned from ever entering a clan that was associated with them.
This severe punishment was laid on his shoulders just last week
Why was he kicked out and humiliated? There was a simple explanation for that.
For the last few weeks, his work had been tedious and he had not gotten the chance to play as often as he would before.
His regular absence from the clan matches had caused not only him but also the clan he was associated with to drop by many tens of ranks in the leaderboards.
This had thoroughly infuriated them and he had even borne the brunt of it at first.
They were angry that he had abandoned them and forgotten his responsibility for the clan and for this, he had apologized repeatedly.
However, when they asked him to compensate for the drop of ranks by paying for everybody’s in-game purchases, Leon was quick to disagree.
In the past, he was willing to do so because he felt camaraderie with them as they understood how he felt while playing this game which most of his peers avoided.
Yet when he was busy due to work matters, they ridiculed him for being a burden who always weighed them down.
In their hotheadedness, one of the clan leaders had even let it slip that the only reason they had accepted someone as useless as him in their group was due to the money that he was willing to spend for tools and potions for the clan to level up.
If this wasn’t enough to hurt him, they even threatened him that if he could not even cough up the money for their compensation then he might as well leave for good.
For people whom he had mingled with for many months, he could not understand how they could turn against him and try to exploit him when he simply had more important things to deal with in his office.
They shamelessly tried to demand compensation when half the items they held right now were also paid for from his pocket.
At the limit of his patience, Leon had given them an earful about how they had been taking advantage of his generosity over the months.
Yet they had the guts to say that he had paid for those items willingly and they had no reason to decline when he was giving them out of his own free will.
Speechless at their argument, Leon could not disagree and decided to stop playing with them altogether as this incident had left a bitter task in his mouth.
However, before he could quit, they publicly announced that they were kicking out the player named ‘King Jiu’ from their clan effective immediately.
If that wasn’t all, when he was adamant about not paying any compensation for their drop in ranks, they even banned him from their clan and also incited the others to do so as well.
They assumed that all he could do was come crawling back to them and offer to pay for their progress but he had stuck to his word and not returned ever since that announcement had been made in their nationwide server.
No one would join his clan so how was he supposed to progress?
This had been the source of his pain for over a week now and when he caught sight of his comrade, Lina, his emotions burst out.
Similarly, after Lina had heard everything that he had gone through during her absence, she felt immense anger, and a deep desire to teach these people a proper lesson bubbled up in her heart.
Therefore, the first thing she did was ask for his username and sent him a request to join her clan.
Once Hellfire entered the waiting room outside the lowest level, she had caught everybody’s attention as this was not a place where the top ten players would appear.
The fact that she had formed a clan with a lower-ranked mage who had been recently ostracized by the clan that acted as the big guys of this area only surprised them further.
However, Hellfire did not give them time to react as she and the mage had entered the lowest level without delay.
In DTD, players could either play alongside other players or watch them play, viewing from their vantage point by clicking into their name panel.
The bigger a player, the more their fans would view their gameplay.
Thus, right now, most of those who had seen the notification of Hellfire’s appearance in the low level had clicked onto her stream to view her playing the game.
Usually, if they were lucky, they could hear the clan members conversing with each other.
This was an option only available for those who were outside the level and very only watching her play without attempting to disrupt her game.
Therefore, even those who were leveling up inside had stepped out in order to watch her play today.
Everyone’s eyes were fixed on Hellfire’s avatar which was walking next to King Jiu’s mage’s avatar.
Since it was a lower-level arena, not many enemies were around and Hellfire let King Jiu finish them off without lifting a finger.
Within minutes, King Jiu had single-handedly carried his clanmate, Hellfire, to the next level.
The same scene was repeated in the next two rounds until they were finally in the inner city circle or the Capital city of the Kingdom.
{Wasn’t King Jiu called a useless player who could not play to save his life?}
{Can’t you see how he did all the work and did not allow Hellfire to even break a sweat!?}
{Brother King Jiu, looks like you were being slandered, huh!?}
The other players who had witnessed both the announcement last week and today’s gameplay had seen for themselves just how useless the player named King Jiu was.
If he was as useless as his previous clan had declared he was, would he be able to clear the previous three levels without any troubles as he had done?
The answer was clear for everyone to see and this made them wonder if his previous clan had made such a public display of humiliating him with ulterior motives.
Not to mention that he was able to be in the same clan as the top ten player, Hellfire, which was enough to say that she deemed him capable enough to be playing with him as her teammate.
On the screen, they watched how finally Hellfire began to fight alongside him now that the levels got difficult.
They synchronized their attacks perfectly to increase their moves’ effectiveness.
Some of these players had never been to those higher levels which they were now seeing King Jiu and Hellfire entering and even conquering.
The two-member clan made them widen their eyes as they ventured into the area which only high-ranked clans had been to before.
Those clans had a minimum of five and a maximum of ten players each but the ones who had entered that area were just two in number.
The mage, King Jiu repeatedly healed Hellfire while she covered his back from attacks that he had not noticed.
The two made a great team as they advanced straight from the outskirts of the Kingdom, cleared the inner-city level, and headed towards the noblemen’s households.
The players who were sitting on the edge of their seats, wondering when Hellfire and King Jiu would be killed by the high-ranking noblemen, were in for a surprise.
Not only did these two fight them, but they also defeated them and barged into the first General’s residence.
This game had four generals who surrounded the Palace on four sides.
Only after defeating each one of them would the Palace gates open up to allow the challenger to meet the Final Boss, the Emperor of the Palace.
Sadly, no one had ever defeated all four generals and hence could never enter the Palace.
{Is Hellfire trying to enter the Palace!?}
One comment caught their attention as they leered at the screen which showed that the challengers had defeated the first general.
King Jiu was going all out in trying to heal their injuries before they could head to the next general.
As news began to spread about Hellfire and the mage whom they had never heard of before, attacking and advancing without taking a break, many people began joining in to watch their stream.
This included the clan who had kicked King Jiu out and those who had accepted to never allow him to enter their clan in accordance with the public declaration that had been made last week.
However, their faces were pale now as the very same King Jiu was fighting alongside Hellfire.
The other players who had seen their arrival were quick to mock them for their failure to examine a gem, throwing him away as though he was a dirty rock.
{Useless player, my ass!}
{They must be regretting it now but it’s too late!!}
{They could have played with Hellfire but these fools… Tsk tsk!}
Comments began pouring in as soon as this clan was identified.
Even the other clans who had worked with this one, to shame King Jiu were not spared.
They too were verbally and virtually slapped in the face after watching him clear levels alongside Hellfire.
If all this wasn’t enough to give them a shock, watching the two players standing at the doorstep of the final and most fierce general, General Onn, was enough to make their eyes pop out.