[VRMMO] Dead One

[Level Up! You have reached level 220.]

"Okay. I’ve reached level 220." – said GreyHunt.

"About damn time. What about you Blueberry? What is your current level?" – asked Shri.

"I-I’m currently level 207."

"Hm... Well you did had much lower level than us, but It’s still good, considering that you were 25 levels behind u before. But it shouldn’t bother you too much since we will be fighting alongside you, or do you want to level up bit more and get to the level 220?" – asked Oron.

"No. Its fine. I will probably most of the time making items, so not being the same level as you guys won’t bother me too much." – replied Blueberry.

"Well, if you are fine with this then its finally time." – said ClownFrog.

"Its time for us to finally departure to the dessert."

"Nice! Then are we heading straight to that queen resting place and revive her?!" – asked Rampage.

"Yea, about that... It’s impossible to go there from get go." – said ClownFrog while taking out a map from his inventory.

"According to the Amaran notes, the undead queen Arrianhi Umil is stored in the ancient temple that was known the temple of the death sun god. Amaran manage to pin point an area where the temple is located based on the past records that he manage to get his hands on by illegal means, so with that being said, we will go to this area and have to look around." – said ClownFrog while pointing to the spot on the map with a giant circle on top of it.

"Huh. So, we just go here and look around? Doesn’t seem that hard?" – said Rampage.

"Well, here comes the hard part. While looking around the royal library I found out something really bad."

"Apparently, the location market by the Amaran is one of the most dangerous part of the kingdom called the "Sands Of Death". This place is apparently swarming with an army of the undead monsters that."

"Apparently, people say that the reason behind those undead monster existence is because of the Arrianhi Umil power went berserk after her death and those monsters were created as the result, however nothing was confirmed. There is a lot of theories about those monsters existence, but none of them were proven to be true yet or anything."

"The kingdom once tried dealing with those monsters and clear the area, but there was just too many. So, in order to retake that entire area, the kingdom would have to dispatch a lot of soldiers or something."

"However the undead monsters there doesn’t leave the area no matter what apparently. You can provoke them and just run away and they will not chaise you outside their territory according the books."

"In the end, the kingdom decided to gave up about that area since it would way too much trouble reclaiming that area without even knowing if there is anything worth in there." – said ClownFrog.

"The area its self is said to be just a normal oasis with a lot of trees that is surrounded by the dessert from all directions. The place its self is quiet far away from any settlements or have any interesting resources there. So, losing that place will not hurt anybody in any way or shape."

"Makes sense. They could deal with those undeads, but in could end up with them gaining nothing and instead having their soldiers just die for no real reason." – said Oron.

"Since these undeads don’t even leave that area, there is no need to monitor or even keep the watch of that place."

"However, there is a good chance that these undeads were created by the Arrianhi Umil fallowers that tried restoring her. I think those undeads may be the guardians of that place where Arrianhi Umil is located." – said Oron.

"Yea. So, we will have to somehow get through those undeads while looking around the temple mentioned in Amaran notes. We may end up having no choice but to search the entire area." – said ClownFrog.

"However, there are two problems. The first problem is that we have yet to confirm how strong those undead monsters are and the second is the location. This place is located quiet far away, so we will spend few days traveling again unfortunately."

"Oh, for fuck sake!" – sad Rampage.

"Won’t the developers do something about this finally? I mean I get that they want to be realistic, but spending the entire days just traveling?" – said Oron.

"I get what you are saying. We can travel much faster compare to the before since our agility and stamina stat got increased by a lot, but it still takes quiet some time to reach our destination. Maybe the developers will add something like an summon mount that everybody can use so they can travel faster or something?" – said ClownFrog.

"Then again, this world is ginormous, so its not like we are traveling very pace slow, but it’s just takes hell of time traveling that kind of distances."

"I don’t think developers will do anything about this. If anything, the players maybe be left with no option but to research their own way of traveling. We did disused before having Shri tame some monsters or ClownFrog killing them and raising them as undead so we can get some means of transport." – said GreyHunt.

"True. Anyway, lets get going already. Id like to get to at least some village or something when we get to the dessert so we can have safe log out spot." – said ClownFrog.

The party returned back to the fortress city in order to begin preparing for their travels.

While the party were preparing their things, Oron and ClownFrog were asking around different people about something.

"Ride you say?" – said the guard.

"Yea. I’ve been wondering but is there anything like maybe a merchant going through here or something that we can pay them to get a ride, or just anything that can get us to some settlement in the desert. We are planning on going there for the personal reasons." – said ClownFrog.

"Actually, there is a lot of merchants that travels between this city and the city called Red Sand that is located in the desert." – said the guard

"?!"

"Wait, really?! I was just trying my luck." – said ClownFrog.

"Oh. Anyway, the merchants often travel between the two cities in order to sell the goods from one part of the kingdom to the another and vice versa." – replied the guard.

"The merchants kind of goes in and out nonstop, so catching somebody and asking them for the ride shouldn’t be much of a problem for you, but it will be obviously bit more pricy because these merchants travels between the forest and the dessert."

"Huh. Would you look at that? We somehow got lucky?" – said ClownFrog.

"Yeb. I’m going to inform the others about this right now." – said Oron.

That guard we talked with did not lied. After all of us gathered up we went looking for some merchants that do trade between the two cities and before long we somehow manage to instantly got a ride. Well, we obviously had to pay, but we got the ride to the city called Red Sand.

Before long the merchant caravan we were riding on departure.

"..."

"Excuse, but I’m wondering something but how long it will take us to get to the Red Sand city? This is our first time traveling to the dessert but from what I heard the traveling on the dessert takes bit longer compare to traveling on the solid ground." – asked GryeHunt.

"Hm... Well, the road we will be taking is consider relatively safe. There are no cases of something like bandit attacks or anything. The merchants like me that do the trade between the two cities use monsters called sand running lizards. They are kind of like camels, but much better in many different ways. So over all it shouldn’t really take us that long to get to the city. We should be able to get to it today before it even gets dark." – replied the merchant.

"Reall? Huh. I though it would take or two, but we can get there before it gets dark? How good are these sand running lizards?" – asked Shri.

"They are pretty good, but also expensive. Mostly only merchants or nobility are only able to afford them." – said the merchant.

"Huh. Say, I’m a tamer. Is there any of these guys out there in the wild or something?" – asked Shri.

"Hm... Well, it’s hard to say."

"Since they are so valuable, people are keeping close taps on them. Any found are instantly captured and put into the farms. Then they breed and are sold afterworlds. If I’m being honest, it will be extremely hard for you to find any wild sand running lizards and even if you find one, catching it is a completely different matter. They are named sand running lizards for a reason. The only real way to get one is to buy one and the cheapest one you could get would be probably sold for around 2000 gold coins? But if you want some proper one than at least 4000 gold coins or more." – said the merchant.

"Jezus. That is a lot of money!" – said Shri.

"Well, they are extremely valuable in the first place, so obviously they will cost a lot." – said the merchant.

"But if they are so valuable, won’t the merchants end up being target by the bandits in order to steal those lizards?" – asked Rampage. 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

"Ohohoho! Don’t worry about that. The sand running lizards are very loyal. So, if you would kill their current owner right in front of them or try to steal them, they will just run away and try to find you their owner or if their owner is dead they will just run away from the assailants. They are usually trained in the way to recognize their new owner when they are being sold to somebody, so there is no need to worry about getting scammed by somebody who sells you their sand running lizards only for it to run back to the seller." – said the merchant.

"..."

(Well, that sucks. I was honestly thinking of killing some merchants and stealing their lizards, but I guess it wouldn’t work.) – though ClownFrog.

(Killing them and turning them into undeads would probably not the best of ideas. Since people would realize that the reason why I have the undead sand running lizard would be because I killed the owner and resurrected their lizard since they wouldn’t fallow my commands willingly.)

(Fuck me... Well. At least we have an option of buying those lizards, so this is at least a plus. We still have a lot of money after selling the materials from the swamp and we also have some money from the treasure chest we got while staying at the Emerald city.)

"Say. If we by any chance were wondering about buying those lizards, how many should we buy?" – asked ClownFrog.

"Hm... One lizard should be able to easily carry at least two of you, so I say you would need three lizards in total." – replied the merchant.

(So, about 12,000 gold coins huh? We should somehow manage, but obviously we will end up spending all of our money. I should discuss this with the others before deciding to buy one or not.) – though ClownFrog.

Pretty much, we continue talking with the merchant, asking him various things about this part of the kingdom and before long, we finally entered the dessert.

"..."

"Fuck me... Why in the bloody hell they recreated the heat?! It feels like I’m in real dessert!" – said Rampage.

"I-I get what you mean...... Maybe for realism?" – said Oron.

"Fuck "Realism"!" – replied Rampage.

"I got to agree. This is quite annoying and considering how dessert becomes extremely cold during the night, we may end up experiencing something like that as well." – said GreyHunt.

"Well, you are not wrong. During the nigh the dessert indeed becomes extremely cold. I’m being you, all of you should find some shop that sells some clothes that would help you out during the day and the night." – suggested merchant.

"Fuck me... I didn’t though it would be that bad..." – said Rampage.

"Hahaha. Don’t worry youngster. You will slowly get used to it if you spend quiet long time in this place." – said the merchant with cheerful voice.

"But for now we have no choice but to endure it?!" – said Rampage.

"Well, does any of you knows ice or water magic?" – asked the merchant.

"...Nope." – replied Rampage.

"Then you will have to endure it."

"Fuckkkkkk... Please at least tell me that the whatever sand city is at least close by?" – asked Rampage.

"Nope. It will take us hours to get there. At least we won’t arrive before it would start getting dark, so this is at least a good thing." – said the merchant.

"..."

"I think I will despise this place." – said Rampage.