Starting from Zero

"What do you want?" I stared at the NPC who had grabbed onto me.

"You\'re asking what I want?" The NPC actually questioned me back. "You still dare ask me what I want? I should be the one asking you what do you want!"

"What do you mean?"

"Why did you take so long to come?"

"Me?" I pointed to myself. "Did I set a date to when I\'m coming here before?"

"Stop talking nonsense!" The NPC Priest suddenly extended a hand out to me. "Quickly give it to me?"

I looked at him strangely. "Give you what?"

"The Ring of Light!" The NPC\'s expression was queerer than mine, as though I should have brought some sort of Ring of Light. "Don\'t tell me, you didn\'t bring it?" Seeing that I was staring blankly at him without any response, he opened his mouth wide and pointed his finger at me. "You really didn\'t bring it? Are you serious? Don\'t you know it\'s a matter of life and death? I plead you, don\'t play this joke on me already, can you? Where is it? Quickly take it out!" As he said that, he started to patting my body.

"Wait a minute!" I interrupted his rude behavior. "Can you explain the matter clearly to me? It is my first time coming here!"

"I know that!" The priest actually continued searching my body.

I pulled him off of me. "STOP! Wait for a moment! Can we just clarify the matter one step at a time? Can you tell me, what is this thing you\'re looking for?"

Maybe he realized that he would not be able to obtain the thing unless he answered my question, the Priest immediately stopped. "I\'m looking for a ring."

"What sort of ring?"

"A white ring with six stars on it. Its name is the Ring of Light, originally worn by the Light God."

"The Ring of Light? I\'ve never seen such a thing! Why do you think that I have it?"

"Because you\'re a subordinate of the Dark Shrine!"

F*ck! In the end, I was still caught, and the thought of killing to silence him immediately came to mind. I looked around, only to realize that 2 Level 900 Guards were staring at me!

"This…..! Since you know that I\'m a subordinate of the Dark Shrine, why are you still asking me for some ring? Isn\'t the ring being worn by the Light God?"

The Priest acted as though he knew everything. " The Light God lost the ring in the last God Wars, and it was said that it landed in the hands of the Dark Shrine. We tried to negotiate with the Dark Shrine before and used a number of slots to get purified in exchange for the ring."

"Oh! I understand it now! It was because you and the Dark Shrine already negotiated about it, so they should be sending people over to hand over the ring, so when you saw me, you thought I was the delivery man?"

"Are you not?" The NPC Priest looked at me suspiciously. "Are you not a subordinate of the Dark Shrine?"

"I am!"

"Then why are you not the envoy bringing the ring over?"

"What the f*ck? Why must I be the envoy to bring the ring over? The Dark Shrine has so many subordinates, are all of them, envoys?"

"F*ck you!" The NPC actually cursed at me, howling with his hands in the air. "You are the subordinate of the Dark Shrine if you\'re not the Ring Bearer, then what are you doing running over to the Light Shrine? Our Light Shrine doesn\'t welcome the lackeys of the Dark Shrine, get out! Guards! Guards!"

"Woah, f*ck! The moment you fall out with someone, you get hostile! Wait a minute, what are you guys doing?!"

The two guards to my left and right grabbed my arms and dragged me out. "Let go of me, what are you guys doing?! WHAT! No, don\'t!"

"No…..ahhhhhh.ouch….ouch…..motherf*...I…...you…...F*ck…..yo-...ahhhh…..help…..ahhhh….god…..ouch…..I…..will…..never…..let….you….guys…..go…...ouch!"

To every Single Player\'s surprised eyes, I was pushed from the flight of stairs down, and immediately performed a long theatrical performance - rolling down the stairs! God damn it, It was a flight of steps that consisted of over a thousand steps, causing my face to swell from the fall! "Ah! So many stars!"

Su Mei ran down the stairs.

"Are you ok?"

"Argh!" I supported myself by leaning against a wall. "Why don\'t you try rolling down this stairs! Ouch! I think my bones are broken!"

"Who asked you to quarrel with an NPC? You knew that you\'re in the Dark faction, why did you run into the Light Shrine?"

"I thought that since it was the System\'s Main City, the NPCs would not attack white named Players!"

"Those are all the older games, [Zero] is different, many NPCs do weird things!"

"That is true! But I didn\'t guess wrong. The Guards did not attack me but threw me out! If they really had engaged in a battle with me, I would have died a long time ago!"

While we talked, I suddenly received a system prompt.

"You have been attacked by Player . You have 30 minutes to engage."

"You have been attacked by Player . You have 30 minutes to engage."

"You have been attacked by Player . You have 30 minutes to engage."

"You have been attacked by Player . You have 30 minutes to engage."

"You have been attacked by Player . You have 30 minutes to engage."

…..

"You have been attacked by Player . You have 30 minutes to engage."

"You have been attacked by Player . You have 30 minutes to engage."

More and more warnings came out, I was actually being attacked simultaneously by over a 100 people! But even when the warnings came out, my HP did not even get drained. Furthermore, the closest person from me aside from Su Mei was at least 3 meters away! Many people did witness me rolling down the stairs and thus came over to look at me, but none of them came close! Could it be that the System had an error? Why would I suddenly receive such notifications of being attacked by others when there was no one attacking me!

Seeing my strange expression, Su Mei spoke up: "What\'s wrong with you?"

"I don\'t know what\'s happening, but I received many notifications, saying that I have been attacked by other Players and can retaliate. But clearly, no one is attacking me!"

"That\'s really strange." Su Mei touched her chin and thought.

Suddenly, the both of us shouted at the same time.

"My Companions!""Your Companions!"

I had brought Su Mei into the city but my Companions, Servants and Summoned creatures were outside helping me pick up my swords! According to the long duration given, they should had already found my 8 [Sword of the Flying Dragons], and should be trying to find me. As Companions, they would be able to sense my location no matter where I was, as long as they wanted to look for me, they would be able to find me. At the start, I gave the order to locate my swords, and since they should have found my swords, they would definitely come into the city to look for me!

____________________________________________________________________

Right at that time, it was chaos at the City Gates.

The two Players that I encountered selling equipment by the road while entering the City were currently staring at each other, after fighting with each other, they were forced apart by other players but were still staring at each other with hatred in their eyes. Suddenly, the both of them sensed that something was wrong with the ground. The originally still shops were vibrating gently while the rocks and pebbles on the floor were jumping all around.

They were not the only ones who had sensed the strange phenomenon, the Players around also felt as though an earthquake was approaching, as though everyone was standing on a volcano that could erupt at any moment. The initial quake was gentle that caused only a few Players to stop in their positions and look around. As it got stronger and stronger, it gradually felt as though a great earthquake was occurring, causing all the Players to focus on finding the source of the quake.

"Over there!" One of the sharper Players pointed to the other side of the road, where a cloud of dust was slowly approaching.

While everyone was confused, an earth pocket suddenly appeared on the ground, which started to rush towards the City gates and causing the Players in its path to jump out of its way. Its speed was equivalent to a shark rushing at its prey right beneath the surface of the water, forming ripples on the ground. This earth pocket suddenly stopped in the middle of a crowd, and something started to surge up from beneath. An earthworm with a black crystallized eye popped out. It looked around then suddenly retracted back beneath the ground. This earth pocket continued to move forward.

No one understood what was going on and started to question each around with suspicious looking gazes.

Before everyone could recover from the surprise, a sudden hurricane-like wind swept past the market, and all of those who were caught unprepared were swept to the ground. Everyone only caught a glimpse of a large shadow passing past them at a very high speed. But when they finally saw what had passed them clearly, they were even more shocked. It was a gigantic black dragon that was close to a 100 meters tall that had happened his disproportionately large pair of wings that completely covered the entire market. Everyone saw his arrogant eyes and gigantic claws. Every flap of the powerful and large wings brought about powerful gales that brought about a hidden pressure inside everybody\'s hearts.

After the first shadow passed, a second identical shadow swept past less than 3 meters above the ground, and the remaining few people who managed to maintain their balance from the first shadow all fell. Before the second shadow could fly far away, the third giant shadow also flew at the same altitude above the ground, causing all the sand and stones on the ground to scatter, while everyone stared at the shadows with their mouths opened like carps!

After the three gigantic dragons flew in a black Ryu Dragon that swept past the market at an equally fast speed, its extremely lofty aura made everyone mistaken it for an Emperor touring! Following the mythical Dragon was a large beast completely enveloped in blue and black Underworld flames, which caused a Player to scream out in shock.

"Inferno Phoenix!" This identity caused many people to take in loud breaths.

After the aerial display, a gigantic and black beetle ran over from the ground. It looked exactly like a thorn-clad fortress. On it\'s large glossy and black shell back that could act as a mirror were a few extremely large and long thorns. On its head were small but frightening green eyes that revealed a terrifying light. Despite its size, it was surprisingly fast. The rumblings from this mobile fortress moved above the Players, completely disregarding all of them. Wherever this black beetle crossed, it would leave behind large and deep pits. Every single limb was clad in armor and thorns, adding its immense weight, every step this beetle took would leave meter deep pits of footprints!

After the Black Beetle was a group of Godzilla-looking monsters, with a few black armored Riders on them. All of these monsters charged onwards without any hint of stopping.

After the Godzilla riders were a group of beautiful Snow Demoness that flew past, with a large mass of large silver wasps and even a flight of large and horrifying butterflies!

After the butterflies, the last herd was a huge number of skeletons running information towards the City, their unified pace, and the terrifying bone crackling sound was evidence of its large army.

"Damn it, it\'s a monster siege!" No one knew who shouted it, but it caused the entire City gates to be riled up. "Defend till the end" and "Fight till our deaths", all of these random phrases started to appear.

In reality, this army was my Companions, all those ahead were also my Companions and Servants, while the ones behind were my Summoned Creatures. It was through that they suffered in the war at Hovering Flower City, but Darkness monsters all shared the same unique feature, that was respawning. All the skeletons on the ground started to form up after I left, and the entire Skeleton army was complete again. The butterflies also revived and regained their HP after I left. As for the Silver Wasps, they were completely intact in the first place, it was only the impact of the explosion that blew them away in which they gathered again after I left. The Snow Demoness basically never suffered any drop in HP. As such, these monsters looked as though they were traversing the lands in search of their master!

An impulsive Player took the lead and rushed at the Skeletons. In a couple of minutes, he was hacked to death by the Level 200 skeletons. Although they were not high leveled, to want to kill them is not simple either. While the swaying soldiers were supported by others, the other skeletons would immediately engage the hostile opponent.

With that person taking the initiative, it quickly slid into chaos as a large number of Players started to join in the battle. As the system notification frequently produced irrelevant information, the majority of Players in the city would choose not to open the system notification log, thus the majority of them who started attacking the skeletons did not acknowledge the system prompt of attacking other Players. Although information would still pop up from the attacks, they were already in battle, who could care to look at such things? There were people who did not conceal their system notification logs but due to the chaos of the battle, they did not pay attention to the logs, and some even thought they had mistakenly injured the surrounding Players.

Some Players never activated the PK function, thus they realized that hacking down on the Skeletons actually dealt no damage. But they mistook the situation as fighting monsters in a City Siege was considered a PK, so they started to activate their PK functions and participated in the battle. Regardless of what it was, the battle quickly plunged into complete chaos!

"There seems to be a situation behind!" Aldeina reminded Ling. At that moment, the two of them were seated on Epidemic with Dart in Ling\'s bosom. As Ling used to be the Dark Goddess, she became the leader of the Darkness Companions whenever I was not around.

Hearing Aldeina\'s words, Ling turned back to look and realized that the Skeleton army had been attacked. Summoned Creatures were like Servants and Companions, Players who attacked them would be deemed automatically as PK\'ing, and if I am being attacked, my Companions would come up to protect me. So to Ling\'s understanding, all of them were attacking her Master, which was me. To be attacked meant that we had to retaliate, that was something I had set down. I had set the perimeters of my Companions to retaliate without command if I were to be attacked. They would automatically help and engage the enemies or when I was attacking a specific target, they would automatically come to help me. Now that the system had judged me as being PK\'ed and that all of the people around were the culprits, Ling commanded without hesitation: "Return back to support them!"

The three dragons changed directions in an orderly fashion like that of an aircraft unit, moving in a circle and rerouting back by the side of the city gates. The Phantom Knights that were originally charging into the City had also turned back, causing the City Gates to become extremely rowdy.

Spells littered the sky as projectiles flew in and unleashed smoke and flames, no one knew who had unleashed those spells! Crystal was alone in the air like a strategic bomber releasing many magic missiles towards the ground, carpet bombing Players in the process. All of the Players here were different from the League of Qin, all of the League of Qin were experts to be able to siege a city, but the Players inside the City differed in all Levels, ignoring the fact that their strengths were extremely terrible, their coordination was already a complete mess! Under Crystal, a Faerie Dragon\'s bombardment, many of the lower level Players were instantly killed!

Tank\'s gigantic body was the ultimate killing machine inside the group of people, every time he moved back or forward, a group of people would die.

Either people called for their friends or someone had publicized the event, but all the Players in the City started to run towards the location, and almost half of the Players in the City were mixed into the battle. Originally, my Companions alone would not be able to fight against so many Players, but what made them depressed was that the City Guards betrayed them.

Although I was in the Dark Faction, the City Guards would never attack White named PLayers. Although my Evil Value was high, I had the Shroud Bracelet so to the NPCs, I was a White Named Player. Although my Summoned Creatures, Servants and Companions were monsters belonging to the Dark Faction, they were under me and could not be considered wild, so the NPC guards would never attack them as they were a Player\'s Companion, so the Guards never reacted to them. But all the Players that attacked my Companions were basically attacking me. I did not engage them but they ambushed me, so they were all judged as intent to PK, and all of them turned Red names. Don\'t everyone know what the NPC Guards are for?

The level 800 NPC guards immediately joined my Companions, and all the low-level Players were obviously slaughtered. As there were many of them and not enough Guards, the City system automatically summoned a large number of Guards and started to suppress the PK situation.

Back to me. I suddenly realized that many Players were running out of the City, while wave after waves of Guards was forming up and running out of the city as well.

"Let\'s go and take a look!" Su Mei said.

"Yeah!" I carried Su Mei while running towards the City Gates and praying that it had nothing to do with my COmpanions. But before I could even reach the City Gates, I instantly fell into despair, I could already see three Gigantic Dragons in the sky circling around and spewing Dragon Fire from the distance, Tank\'s huge body also appeared in my vision, while Phiona and Loong\'er\'s very obvious figures appeared in the chaos!

"Big brother! Quickly summon all your Companions back! We should run!"

"You think I don\'t want to? My Equipment is with them, if I summon them back, my Equipment will definitely drop to the ground! They are all my life-saving items, if I drop them, I\'ll cry to death!"

"Then let us go over there!" Su Mei pulled me as we quickly ran towards the City Gates, but we were no longer able to get closer. There were too many people squeezing at the wide road, Sky City\'s population of Players was on average close to 50 thousand, half of them were at the City gate, which was close to 30 thousand Players! Adding that the System had produced an army of 5000 NPCs, the entire City Gates was completely squished to the point that not even a drop of water could flow through!

Although the NPC was a 5000 men strong army, they quickly suppressed the 30 thousand Players. But with the road stuck like that, where even the NPCs themselves were inside, the chaotic battle turned into a complete traffic accident!

Since I had the Shroud Bracelet, I did not have my Red Name, I summoned Nightmare out. To everyone\'s surprise, I jumped over every single one of them. After transforming into a Heavy Armored Dragon, Nightmare was larger than the real Heavy Armored Dragons, this 4-meter tall figure had no problem moving through the crowd, just that it was a pity for those being trampled! Of course, being trampled did not mean that it was definite death, it depended on their levels! I did not know that because of this action, I suddenly charged into the next level.

But I did not notice that while rushing towards the City gate, I trampled on a few NPC Guards. Because of my implementation, it caused my Companions to mistaken me as attacking the NPC Guards, according to the rules of engagement, they also started attacking the NPC Guards. The original alliance between us and the NPC Guards broke down, and it became a three-way battle!

Ling stood on a tall structure and gave various orders to my Companions and Servants. "Phantom Knights, handle the Guards, leave the Players to us!"

"Dark Goddess, you have to be careful!" Scott pulled on his reins and led the Phantom Knights towards the City Guards. The level 850 Phantom Knights cut through the Level 800 Guards easily. Because of my Shroud Bracelet, even when the Phantom Knights attacked the NPCs, I never got a red Name. So aside from the guards that retaliate because I had trampled on them, the majority of the Guards remained focused on the red named Players.

"Aldeina, heal them!" Ling pointed at a few Companions and summoned creatures who were losing HP.

The Snow Demoness summoned terrifying hailstorms on the road which was effective against armies. Inside this large but congested street, it was extremely effective. The snow piled to over a meter tall, causing the chaotic battle to become even messier.

I finally ran to the center of the chaos, upon the way I had trampled on many people, but I could not care about that. With one look, I spotted Ling and Aldeina, then got Nightmare to run over. Nightmare\'s height perfectly aligned to the roof of the building.

"Ling, where are my equipment?"

"Master, your Bracelet Inventory and Helmet are with me" Ling said while handing them over. I accepted the equipment while asking about the others through Phantom. "Bring over all my other equipment!"

Right after I shouted, I saw Scott riding over on his Heavy Armored Dragon. "Boss, your armor is with me." Scott brought all of my Armor over. I quickly took them over and equipped them, only to realize that my weapons were missing!

I handed Su Mei over to Ling, then rushed into the crowd alone and started killing my way through and finally obtained my weapons and the equipment that belonged to God Messiah from the other Phantom Knights. After keeping everything, I quickly ran back over to Ling and carried Su Mei up. I used the Ring of Teleportation and sent the both of us out of the City, then unsummoned all of my Companions and Servants.

Although my Companions had disappeared, the NPCs were attacking the Red Named Players. Many of them were killed and respawned, but many more were caught. All of them still had no knowledge of what had happened, but when they looked back at the system log, they knew that it was because of me that they were being pursued by the NPCs.

In that situation, I had innocently aggravated over 30 thousand Players? F*CK! At that moment, I told myself never to get close to Cities anymore, every time I entered a City, something would happen!

"You\'re really powerful!" Su Mei was still hanging on my neck.

"I\'m powerful?"

"You alone could kill so many people, if you\'re not powerful, then what are you?"

"Forget it! I\'m still thinking about what to do in the future! From now on, I can\'t enter Sky City anymore, otherwise, they\'ll start killing me! I….."

Su Mei suddenly used her left hand to cover my mouth and her right hand to cup her ear. "Do you hear that?"

"Hear what?" I focused to hear for something out of the ordinary, but could not hear anything.

"The sound of horses running!"

I focused again, and truly, I started to hear the sound of horses running from the distance, which was getting louder and louder.

Who else could it be? Players from the City had caught up to us?