Chapter 101: Conflict

After some time had passed, as Feng Luo hurried to the pile of Bladed Beetle carcasses, another situation arose in the underground parking garage.

The words uttered by the leader of the backup squad sent by the head office had invoked feelings of hatred and disdain in the party members from Nightless City. Due to Feng Luo’s deliberate action just now, this arrogant youth was first enraged. This was followed by a cocky arch of his eyebrow and a loud proclamation.

“He’s going out in such a hurry to collect the loot dropped by the monsters, right? Don’t worry. We won’t fight any of you for it. All of the items on the ground outside shall be our gifts to you. Speaking of which, those are probably worth a few hundred credits if sold, enough to buy a piece of Fine-grade equipment.”

In the city-building mission, the loot dropped by monsters was not bound in ownership to any individual player, so anyone could pick them up right away.

The loot dropped by the 200 or so Bladed Beetles might not have been of much value, but due to their sheer numbers—as well as some Normal-grade pieces of equipment included among them—it would add up to at least 1,000 to 2,000 credits.

This youth had purposely stated the value to be a mere few hundred, in addition to saying that they were “gifts” to them in a clearly mocking tone. Thus, it was clear as day that his intention was to get a rise out of them. Not to mention that he was specifically targeting Feng Luo by saying that, as he must have regarded Feng Luo and Chairman Qian as low-level players due to their Normal-grade equipment. He must have assumed them to be weak players that would covet Fine-grade equipment and place great importance on such things.

“Young Master Lin, please watch your words,” a mature-looking female next to the youth, who was a Level-47 Fire Manipulator, admonished in their party channel. “It’s not appropriate to say such things, as we are supposed to be brothers-in-arms.”

From his title of “Young Master Lin,” everyone could have guessed where that arrogance came from.

In truth, even though the Lu Conglomerate was a family business, there were still outsiders who held stakes in the company. This young man’s father was one of the directors at the main office. Despite not having that much of a stake in ownership, he still possessed considerable wealth worth billions of star coins. As someone born with a silver spoon in his mouth, naturally the youth would not be very considerate while handling matters.

The young man’s tone was impatient as he defended himself in the party channel. “Don’t you know that some of the Nightless City club members refused to be assimilated into the head office by relying on the fact that they have the backing of several of our important clients? This has had a detrimental impact on us. What I’m doing here is establishing the supremacy of the head office. Otherwise, later on, when everyone moves into the new city, there will be problems due to their insubordination.”

Of course, there was no way to prove how true or false his statement was. Whether he was fibbing to assert himself after being ignored or if what he said was genuine, no one could tell. Not only that, but he was openly admitting to trying to establish “supremacy” right in front of these Nightless City VIPs!

Mr. Meng lifted his head, the ever-smiling expression on his face slipping off, replaced with a dark look. “Brat, are you trying to pick a fight?” He slammed his golden broadsword into the ground, causing sparks to fly.

Boom!

A bullet barely grazed the youth’s ear as it whistled by, slamming into the garage wall behind the head office party, leaving behind a dark hole.

“Watch that mouth,” said Sister Rui. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t even know what killed you!”

Her expression and voice were both cold as ice, her right hand clasped around the recently fired golden Desert Eagle that was still smoking. Her golden hair cascaded down in waves, framing frosty blue eyes like chips of ice.

“So, did you guys do that on purpose just now?”

At the same time, Rose Thorns, Orange, Mu Zi, and the rest of the Nightless City employees stepped forward as one, some raising their shields, some arming their rifles, some raising their staffs, their faces clearly displaying their displeasure.

Based on their tone, there seemed to be some kind of concealed situation at play here.

“Weird,” said Chairman Jiao. “With the temper Little Feng has, he wouldn’t remain silent, would he?”

Chairman Jiao’s bemusement was palpable as he peered out of the garage, wondering why Feng Luo wasn’t uttering a single word. He didn’t know that Feng Luo’s mind was currently engaged in thinking about the Zergs, and in his absorption, he had not paid the slightest attention to what had transpired behind him. In fact, even if a monster had appeared behind Feng Luo at that moment, he probably wouldn’t have noticed it at all.

In the underground garage, the atmosphere became tense and hostile. Suddenly, the Fire Manipulator next to Young Master Lin hurriedly stepped forward to diffuse the situation.

“Everyone please calm down! Please excuse us. Young Master Lin has a straightforward personality, so he can be somewhat tactless with his words sometimes. Nevertheless, please be assured that he does not mean it…”

At the same time, she started to speak to Young Master Lin via the party channel. “Young Master Lin, before we came over, Young Master Night Star instructed me to refrain from instigating too much of a conflict with the club members. Therefore, please control yourself. Don’t make things too hard for me.”

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Young Master Lin was initially displeased by her behavior, but after hearing her mention Young Master Night Star, his face soured like a lemon. He reluctantly swallowed the words that he was about to blurt out. Despite this, his gaze remained extremely unfriendly, especially when looking toward Sister Rui who had fired at him just now.

******

As the group left the garage, Young Master Lin walked past and brushed shoulders with Feng Luo, who was in the process of returning to his party.

After meeting the eyes of the obviously incensed Young Master Lin, Feng Luo furrowed his brow and walked back into the garage without a care or a backward glance.

Seeing that Feng Luo had returned, Mr. Meng was the first one to ask in a worried tone, “Brother Feng, are you okay?”

Realizing that everyone was staring at him, Feng Luo was befuddled. “What’s wrong?”

Mu Zi stepped up to explain. “Just now…”

“Oh I see,” said Feng Luo a moment later. “So that fellow tried to utilize the situation to mock me but was shut down by one of Lu Chen’s underlings to prevent sparking a fight with you guys. All right. I get it now.”

After clarifying the situation, Feng Luo did not seem angry at all. He just nodded a few times to signify his understanding.

Orange looked at Feng Luo, her wide, innocent, dark eyes expressing bafflement. “It can’t be, Brother Feng! In my memory of you, you’re not usually this agreeable.”

“What? Do you really think I’m such a vengeful person?” Feng Luo said as he turned to stare at her, his tone light and teasing.

“Of course not!” Orange said, smiling to hide her embarrassment.

“Yeah, I’ll admit that there’s another reason behind it,” said Feng Luo. “I’m not planning to be too calculating with him over what happened. Moreover, revenge is a dish best served cold. I believe that our priority right now is to clear the ruins in the southern area as fast as we can, as the mission is our key focus, after all. Not only that, but since he thinks that we’re incompetent, how about we rub it in their faces by proving our worth? We’ll see if these so-called ‘elites’ of the head office are better than us ‘normal players’ from the club.”

Feng Luo smiled and casually steered the topic toward the mission.

Truth be told, Young Master Lin’s mocking did not trigger Feng Luo all that much, as he hadn’t been there to hear it personally. In fact, it had been more incensing to see that Lin guy’s pretentious and cocky attitude at the start while he was “stealing” their monster kills. Additionally, his thoughts were currently focused entirely on clearing the mission.

More accurately, his focus was on the possible existence of a Zerg “queen” or “hive” at the end of the mission. Previously, while he had maintained a certain degree of interest in the mission, he hadn’t been particularly passionate about it.

Despite the fact that he had decided to use the biochip himself, deep down inside, he was having second thoughts about selecting a beetle as a pet. Even if it was one of the black beetles with abnormal defense that they had run into in the Town of Exiles, that still wasn’t quite what he had in mind for a pet. However, now that he had learned of a possibility of a “perfect” pet right in front of him that might completely exceed his expectations, how could he stay still? He had to proceed to clear the mission area at full speed and scour the grounds to look for it.

“Since you’re okay with it, I have no comment either!” Sister Rui said as her pale blue eyes stared intently at Feng Luo for a moment, followed by her lowering her head to disassemble Death Ripper.

Chairman Qian expressed his view as the tentative leader of their party. “It’s true that we have to settle the mission first. If we delay it for too long, it would be hard to explain to Mu Wu, and we would be jeered at even more by those people just now.”

“Only a few moments of rest, and now we gotta fight again?” Chairman Jiao said. He was someone who preferred to take it easy, as evidenced by his sour expression at the news.

“Say, Old Jiao,” said Mr. Meng. “You wouldn’t be wilting already, would you? We gotta show our true colors to that brat! Heh! While we were playing games, he was still playing in the mud!”

Mr. Meng smirked and hefted his golden broadsword onto his shoulder, before making his way out of the garage.

“Wait, Brother Feng,” said Mu Zi. “You wouldn’t know about this, but regarding this matter, Brother Wu…”

Mu Zi, who was bringing up the rear, seemed uneasy as he shook his head and swallowed the rest of the words that he had wanted to say.

After everyone left, on the wall of the vacant underground garage, barely ten centimeters away from the bullet hole made by Sister Rui’s Desert Eagle, a beetle the size of a fingernail started to materialize. It was translucent, with a unique external body structure. On the front part of its head was an organ that resembled an eye emitting a faint red glow. It revolved twice in the direction where Feng Luo and the others had left. After that, with a buzzing a pair of transparent wings, it flew toward the “statue” that had been partially destroyed by Feng Luo and his party.

Its initial position was barely ten meters away from Feng Luo and his gang. However, none of them—not even Feng Luo, whose sensing ability had strengthened exponentially after enhancement, and not even Mu Zi, who was a Scout with the skill Detection—were able to pick up on its presence at all.