“Uh huh? How about you stop messing with lower levelled players and pick someone your size?”

Sami suddenly appeared next to them. Her daggers positioned in such a way that it interrupts the threat of Slicer’s. 

“Or are you too afraid of facing someone on an equal ground?”

“Shut up, bitch!” Slicer fumed. “You people protecting trash, as if it would make any difference, you are doing it to satisfy your ego.”

Sami’s calm demeanour turned cold when she answered, “Ego or not, at least I don’t make people’s life miserable. But I can’t be so sure about a scum’s life.”

“Lyra!”

Tsalazar, already returned to his original form, shouted at Lyra. Unlike Sami, he still hadn’t moved from his position. The other players who were watching the duel earlier seemed displeased with what Lyra and Slicer did.

“It’s not too late, don’t stay on this way of playing.”

Lyra didn’t answer, she just grunted and walked away eastward. On the other hand, Slicer stabbed his dagger to the wall next to Tier’s head.

“You hands are not so fast, bitch,” Slicer snorted.

Calmly, Sami retorted, “I knew you’re going to miss it on purpose. You are a coward and a sore loser. If you damage his HP, the whole area would be more than glad to turn you to minced meat.”

Slicer angrily pulled out his dagger from the wall. As he walked away following Lyra, he yelled at Tier, “You’re lucky, TRASH!”

Tier just stared at Slicer. He hadn’t moved an inch for he was too busy fighting the storm of emotions swirling within. The mere presence of Slicer already made him want to stop playing right now, yet he still needed to fulfil his promise to his friends and also felt like he would enjoy it if someday he could stomp on Slicer.

Yet, he suddenly felt nauseous realising that he still longed for revenge. In his case, revenge has never been the solution. In fact, it made it worse for him.

“I hope those kinds of people won’t discourage you two from keeping on playing.” Sami returned to her relaxed stance. “Are you boys, okay?”

“No problem, and also thanks for the help,” Renma answered. “There will be those kinds of people everywhere, no need to heed them much. Especially when nice people like you are around.”

“Aww, boy, you’re such a sweet talker,” Sami giggled. She glanced at Tier who was still staring blankly eastward, then commented, “But our boy here might have a different way of thinking.”

“Bro….”

“Oh, s-sorry.”

Tier finally snapped out from the vortex of his own emotions when Renma slapped his shoulder. He did listen to what Renma and Sami were talking, thus he turned and thanked Sami, “Thanks, and sorry for the trouble.”

Accompanied by a warm smile, Sami chuckled, “You are more docile than I imagined from Bingo’s story, Tier. The boss would love to deliver his greetings by the way.” 

“You know Bingo?!” Renma’s jaw dropped as he stared in disbelief towards Tier.

Tier scratched his head, clearly confused by his friend’s reaction. “Ya, I met him when I just started playing. He brought that giant silverback gorilla with him.”

“Did you ask for any advice or anything? Dude, he’s like the best hunter in the game! And I heard that the silverback gorilla is a special companion beast for beastmasters.”

Instead of Tier, it was Sami’s laughter that answered. “On the contrary, it was the boss that was surprised by your friend’s answers.”

Renma facepalmed while Tier kept scratching his own head and looked away. On the other hand Sami tried her best to control her laughter. Nevertheless, the situation helped ease Tier’s heart.

When she finally stopped laughing, Sami put her hands on her hips and questioned, “So, are you guys here to level up together or something else?”

“We want to meet Steven, but got distracted by the awesome duel you two had.”

“As a priest, I bet you were intrigued by Tsalazar’s playstyle.”

“Yes, the Discipline path looks awesome.”

“I know, really,” Sami nodded. She walked into the gate and gestured to the two newbie rakhs to follow, “Anyway, what are you waiting for? Let’s meet Steven.”

Tier and Renma hastily followed  Sami inside the gate. The wall was apparently very thick as they didn’t straight up meet the other side of the wall. They had to pass two short turns inside the wall before being greeted by the full might of Grandar’s rough majesty.

The orcish capital was not ugly as what people would expect from an orc’s capital nor was it beautiful like those typical high fantasy capital cities in games. Grandar… was something else.

The whole city was built among the crevices and throughs among the gigantic cliffs, giving it natural defence against invaders. The roads were not fully paved with stones. Most buildings were made from rough stones and woods with either circular or octagonal shape. Some buildings were built on the cliffs itself and some even towered above the cliffs.

There were barely any paintings on the walls, only some wooden parts being coloured in red. The windows were equipped with removable trellis, and many buildings had arrow slits.

The whole city emanated an immense pressure and aura as if each citizen would fight to their final stand to defend this city. However, like Kallak said, it did also feel welcoming for those who meant no harm.

Near the bank building, there were people lining up to meet an orc shaman with leafy green skin, dreadlocks, and literal leaves as accessories. That orc named Steven, the supposed GM they were going to meet, looked like a shaman with insanity on par with Ril’Dil.

Though he definitely seemed busy taking accounts of the inputs, protest, and requests from players, Steven was working alone. From what Tier heard from his friends earlier, Steven is supposedly one of the three head GMs of Zurefgar.

The only thing that appeared to help him was a tiny winged black dragon that flew around scanning players as if looking for some thief or criminal.

Without heeding the long line, Sami walked towards Steven bypassing everyone. “Steven, hun, brought some interesting talents….”

“Get in line,” Steven grumbled.

“But, hun, they will go for Clashing Realms, and I bet they are good,” Sami insisted.

“Get in line, or I'll ban all of you for three days.”

Steven’s warning immediately froze Sami who gave up and walked back to the two newbies.

She sighed, “Sorry, boys, you are on your own.”

“It's okay, Sami,” Tier shook his head, “I don’t feel right if we have to skip a line.”

“Aww, you're such a cutie. Want me to introduce a cute paladin to you? You two might be able to level together and start some story.”

Tier’s heart skipped a beat at the mention of female paladin. His mind quickly wandered to the person he saw earlier at the entry to Cliff Labyrinth.

“Naw, my bro got his eyes on someone else back home,” Renma laughed. He patted Tier’s shoulder.

“Aw, too bad,” Sami chuckled. “Anyway, I gotta go back and train some more, enjoy the game.”

“You too, have a nice day!”

Sami finally left the two newbie rakhs to start queuing up to meet Steven. Tier didn’t know if he needed to get angry at Renma over the matter of denying Tier meeting the paladin who might be the person Tier was looking for.

While waiting, Renma opened up a conversation topic, “It’s great to see such players moving around helping people.”

Tier quickly erased the recent resentment he had and answered, “They are patrolling.”

Renma frowned in confusion. “Patrolling for?”

“Definitely griefers who aimed lower level players, especially those aiming for Clashing Realms.”

“I understand the Clashing Realms one, but what if those new players are not aiming for Clashing Realms?”

Tier shrugged. “Well, at least there will be more people willing to keep playing and keep the critical mass required to make the game community work well, which in turn makes them have more things to enjoy.”

“Isn't that supposed to be the job of the developer, or publisher, or people in authority?”

“Maybe those people in authority gave benefits for the goody two shoes?”

It took Renma a while to process the whole argument, before he finally agreed, “Now, that sounds appealing and makes more sense.”

“By the way.” Tier stared concerningly at Renma. “You really want to be like Tsalazar?”

“Not exactly, well…” Renma sighed. He stroked his chin several times as his eyes wandered around. 

They advanced twice in the queue before Tier finally lost his patience and asked, “What’s with the cliffhanger?”

“Oh, sorry… I was gathering my thoughts and….”

Tier clapped hands once Renma started to daze out in his thoughts again.

“Ahaha, well,” Renma answered, awkwardly scratching the nose part of his mask. “I mean, I'm definitely going for the Discipline path, it is just that I don’t think I will play offensively like him. It won't feel nice for me. Perhaps more towards the shield part.”

“Well, don’t force yourself if you don’t feel like it.”

“But, that archangel form, man… so cool.”

Tier patted Renma’s shoulder reassuringly. “You still can be an archangel that gives shield, though.” 

 “You have an idea? All I can think is that angels are more towards the paladin kind or healing thingy. Can’t think about shield themed archangels.”

“Of course,” Tier grinned, showing an enthusiastic thumbs up. “Azrael, the angel of death.”

Every bit of eagerness in Renma’s masked face faded in an instant. He protested, “I am a holy priest, not psych priest with dark powers.”

“Why does the angel of death have to be related to dark powers?”

“Because… uh….” Renma scratches his head. “Whaveter, but the important part is I want to focus more on shields.”

“But why? I mean, are there other specific reasons why you prefer shields over heals?”

“Of course. Shields generally have better range and can last after the spell is casted depending on the type of the shield. Also, the Discipline path has a lot to do with MP efficiency. That definitely would be useful in a prolonged battle.”

“Wow,” Tier exclaimed in surprise. “Apparently you do have a brain.”

“Dammit man.”

Tier and Renma continued in discussing priests' choice of path while queuing. Tier had none of the slightest intent to play the class, he was just curious. Apparently, unlike Tsalazar’s character who turned offensive after morphing, there was actually a normal way for priests to play offensive holy spells. By simply taking the offensive bonus in the holy magic related path.

But mostly they would still need to combine Atonement path, which focuses on holy and healing magic,  with Twilight Reach path, which focuses on balance of holy and dark magic as well as the range and variety of spells.

As for the psych priests themselves, Renma mentioned that they mainly have two ways of playing. Players who were focusing on Plaguebearers usually revolve around using curses and damage over time while those focusing on Psychic Agony utilizes psychic power to bend reality and the minds of their opponents.

“Therefore, the angel of death like you said, sounds more towards Plaguebearer doesn’t it?”

“That’s more of a typical and binary way to see it,” Tier answered. “But, don’t you think the angel of death is kinda merciful? Lest, there would be no life.”

Renma frowned at Tier’s words. Somehow the expression on his mask showed the sign that the concept seemed so foreign to his brain, yet he also seemed about to agree with such an idea.

“You know who else is merciful?” Steven called Tier and Renma - who both didn’t realise that they were the next in line to meet with Steven. “It’s a me, Steven.”

“So, before my mercy runs out, you two better step forward.”