Chapter 89 - 89. Take One For Tribute

The lockpicks dissolved in his hand.

So I still lose a lockpick even if I succeeded? Jack thought in his mind.

The treasure chest then emitted some mechanical sound, not long after, the lid clacked and opened ajar.

Men of Solidarity who saw it soon jumped in excitement and yelled, "it's open! It's open!"

Jack stepped back to let them open the lid. It was after all their share.

The Man stepped forward and put both hands through the gap which was created when the lid was unlatched. He then heaved the lid hard and made it swung open wildly. The lid rotated one hundred eighty degrees on its hinges and stopped with a bang. Blinding golden light poured out from inside the treasure chest, causing the visions of those who were looking at it to blur.

After the light dissipated, they could at last, see the content of the treasure chest. There were seven items inside and a pile of coins.

"We have struck it rich!" One of Men of Solidarity yelled. Just from the pile of coins, it had at least ten silver coins.

"Damn, so treasure chest content is so generous, I shouldn't have forfeit on it from the start," John commented from the side.

"Piss off," The Man said to him rudely.

He then Inspected the items inside the treasure chest. Out of the seven, four were uncommon equipment, one was uncommon blacksmith material, the other two were common equipment.

He stored all the coins and the uncommon material and the two common equipment. "we will decide how to distribute it when we meet up with the others," he said to his men.

He then turned to Jack and said, "boss, please pick one of this uncommon equipment."

Jack shook his head, "I'll tell you again, I'm not your boss. And we had already agreed on the loot distributions, the things inside that treasure chest are yours."

The Man laughed, "everyone here knew that if not for you, we would have been wiped out by that Horned Ogre. And you had already spent all of your lockpicks for us. We haven't even compensated you yet for that. Please, make a pick."

"We defeat the Ogre together, and I used the lockpicks to increase my proficiency. There is no need to give me any compensation."

"Please don't argue anymore. A strong man such as you have to be more straightforward. Stop wasting time and just pick one," The Man was adamant.

Jack was helpless by his attitude, he shook his head and then took a peek at the equipment. There were chest armor, a belt, shoes, and an armguard. Out of those four, his armguard was the most lacking, still at level 1. He inspected this uncommon armguard.

Steel Vambrace, level 10/20 (uncommon medium armor)

Physical Defense: 16

Magical Defense: 12

Durability: 40

Strength +2

"I'll take this one then," Jack said.

"Great!" The Man exclaimed, "Now that boss had accepted our tribute, our relationship can be considered sealed."

"Wait, what tribute?" Jack turned to him.

The Man either pretended not to hear, or honestly didn't hear Jack's words. He stored the remaining uncommon equipment. He then sent Jack a friend request and said, "don't worry, boss. We won't disturb your matters. You go do whatever you want. But if you need help, just give me a holler, we will come running."

"Can you please stop calling me boss?" Jack uttered, but he still accepted the friend request. From what he had seen, The Man was an honest and upright person, he was just a bit rough on the edges.

"If I need help, can I give a holler as well?" John asked.

"Piss off!" The Man repeated his previous words to him.

"Now that our business here is done, let us return to the capital," Jack offered.

"Before that…," Bowler said, then extend his hand towards John with his palm facing upward.

John seemed to understand the gesture as he took out something from his bag, and placed it onto Bowler's hand. It was a small blue flower. Bowler stored it in his storage bag. Now they only need to go back to the capital and handed the flower to complete their quest.

"Shall we leave now?" John asked.

Everyone agreed since they had no better things to do anymore around the area. Since they decided to go back together to the capital, they stayed using their current Party system.

The sun was still high up in the sky when they emerged from the cave. When they entered the cave, there were seventeen of them, now there were only ten. Men of Solidarity lost six of their men, John's group lost Weird Trap, only Jack's group was still intact with three people.

Their group of ten walked down the hill with ease. After fighting the level 20 Elite Boss, the creeps that they met along the way felt like child's play. Men of Solidarity especially walked at the front with a swagger, as if they were the kings of the hill.

"Hey, I received messages from the ones who died," The Man told the others. "They will be waiting for us in the city."

"Why only sent now? Didn't they resurrect sometime ago?"

"No," The Man told him, "they said they were in this strange place called Limbo for half an hour before they were sent back to the capital."

"Half an hour? So there was a waiting period before reviving?" Jack murmured.

They continued to chat as they proceeded on their way back. Bowler as usual was especially talkative. He got along well with all in the Party except for John. He intentionally avoided the fellow. In fact, almost everybody avoided John, only Pointy Tip stayed close to him, while Jack and Flame were indifferent. John, however, was oblivious of their treatment.

When they were about an hour more of walking distance from the capital, Jack noticed several blue dots on his radar. They were coming up to a small upslope, and those blue dots were behind that upslope. He didn't give them any thought at first, but as they continued forward, he felt strange. The blue dots were separated some distances away from each other, and they were not moving. They just stayed there in fixed locations away from each other. After some thought, he couldn't help but felt uneasy.

"Halt!" He said to the others.

The others looked around, thought that there were some monsters coming at them, there was nothing. They looked at him weirdly. "What's wrong?" Bowler asked.

Jack was hesitant for a bit, before saying, "I'm not really sure, but I think there might be an ambush not far ahead."

"Monsters?" Bowler asked again.

Jack shook his head. "Players," he said.

"And you know this how?" John asked.

"If Storm said there are people in front, then there are people in front," Bowler defended Jack.

"Oh, I didn't say I don't believe him. I'm just curious as to how he knows," John said. "I noticed that you had also detected me and my teammates' presences when we first met. Do you have a tool that can detect people's positions?"

Jack didn't give him an answer.

"Well, at least can you tell us the position of this supposed ambush?" John asked.

"They were scattered around," Jack answered. After looking around, he then copied John's method. He picked up a small branch lying on the ground and found a patch of soft soil. He then made some drawings on the soil. He used circles to symbolize them, and crosses to represent the players in front.

"This is where we are," he pointed to a collective circle at one side. "And these are where those players are," he pointed to the scattered crosses around the soil.

"They just stay there unmoving?" John asked.

"Yes," Jack answered.

"So you really do have a tool that allows detection of others!" John exclaimed.

Jack was peeved. "Do you have a suggestion regarding this situation or not?" Jack asked him sternly.

"Sure," John replied. "From the look of it, there really is an ambush in front. But I am wondering if they are just bandits targeting people that ventured out of the capital, or one of you got an enemy among the players?"

The Man gave the question a thought, "I did offend some people here and there, but I'm not sure people will waste time to organize this kind of ambush for me."

"They are probably after me and my friends," Jack said.