Mutated Pheromones

Although the white chicken was fat and small, it was an attack-type spirit beast. But its attack was not high and with its fragile defence, it could easily be killed—one reason why Yue Ran disdained it. 

However, this was a type of summoned spirit beast that shone when fed the critical hit chance buff, which increased the chance of doubling its attack output.

With this expectation, he followed Jiang Xiao into the arena. When faced with their first opponent, he quickly buffed the white chicken and sent it off to their enemies.

The little chicken ran like a mad bird, flapping its small wings and pecking its target ferociously. Two hundred HP was pecked off.

Yue Ran: “…” 

Mother hugger! This is peanut damage!

Its target was an assassin. In the blink of an eye, the assassin countered with two moves.

Yue Ran’s little summon chichen let out a sad shriek and dematerialized as it died.

Yue Ran: “…”

I’m so making you into a stew as soon as I finish this match!

Jiang Xiao could picture the little summoner puffing up like a pufferfish and his smile deepened. “Stand back, or they’ll kill you in seconds.”

Yue Ran listened to the command as he fell back and brought out his Ice Spirit at the same time to freeze the closest enemy. 

Jiang Xiao followed up with several slash abilities and they easily won the match. 

Yue Ran asked, “Continue?”

Jiang Xiao replied, “All depends on you.”

Yue Ran thought of the wasted arena points, so he decided to continue a few more fights.

His partner naturally had no objection. After accompanying his fated one into a higher rank, he proposed getting materials from the instance dungeon. As it happened Yue Ran didn’t want to join random parties again. So he accepted the offer and exited the arena lobby as his guild leader began to recruit their guild members for a five-member instance dungeon run. 

Qin Xiujie immediately looked over his friend’s shoulder. “Find another healer.”

Their guild leader never concerned himself with the guild’s internal affairs. His only job was taking members to instance dungeons daily.

Now, being more attentive to his wife, instance dungeon arrangements fell to the guild officers. At first, Qin Xiujie wanted to take advantage of this to run the dungeon with Pear Blossom Rain, but she threw an excuse to run at a later time. She was most likely waiting for the guild leader to finish the arena.

Llr oglfcv ecvfgrabbv tlr atbeuta jr DD Obnf, Dijcx, jcv Vagbcufra Y lc Fclnfgrf kfgf rfifmafv. 

[(Guild) Fruity: Leader, leader! Please let us know when you are doing a ten members instance dungeon~]

[(Guild) >Smashing Vault of Heaven: No plans for a ten member runtoday.]

[(Guild) Bashful Rain: Leader, what about us?]

[(Guild) >Smashing Vault of Heaven: Attired Guqin and Ashen Inner Thoughts will organize it, contact them in the future.] 

[(Guild) Ashen Inner Thoughts: I see, gals before pals. Once you have a wife, you don’t care about us anymore (lights a cigarette).] 

[(Guild) >Smashing Vault of Heaven: Yes.]

[(Guild) Ashen Inner Thoughts: …How can you reply this boldly and with that much confidence?] 

[(Guild) Attired Guqin: (rofl) C’mon guys, I will take everyone to run some dungeons. Click on my party ads.] 

[(Guild) Attired Guqin: Pear Blossom, are you coming?

[(Guild) Pear Blossom Rain: Okay.]

Hlc Wleplf’r agfjmtfgber qijc remmffvfv jr tf abbx atfw jkjs klat j rwlif.

Zfjcktlif lc atf rwjii TT gbbw Mgelas jcv tfg oglfcvr kfgf lc… 

Vfnfgji jcugs qfbqif kfgf nfcalcu. 

Ktf ueliv ifjvfg cfnfg ajxfr qfbqif lcab atf jgfcj, rb atf bcis mtjcmf atfs mbeiv rqfcv alwf klat tlw kjr lc atf lcrajcmf vecufbc, cbk atja kjr ubcf jr kfii.

Bashful Rain cried, “Does this mean he will never take us to the dungeon? All for a fake?”

Fruity sneered, “Fake now but might not in the future.” 

F0x sighed, “Then we should just watch and do nothing?”

Fruity was silent for a few seconds and requested, “Pear Blossom, could you try asking Attired Guqin?”

Pear Blossom Rain said, “Okay.”

Bashful Rain was confused. “Why ask him?” 

Fruity said matter-of-factly, “He was the first one that brought up that the faker is guild leader’s partner. Maybe he knows more than he’s letting on.”

F0x questioned, “How about Traceless Water? Have you found out the relationship between him and the summoner?”

Fruity mumbled, “Not for the time being.”

After their brief discussion, they left their small room when they saw their teammates were calling for them. They joined the team’s voice chat one after another. 

At the moment, their group had just arrived at their own dungeon lobby, but they didn’t enter. Because a line of players blocked the entrance. Judging by the golden crown beside their guild name above their head, they were all guild leaders.

[(Local) Eastern Blizzard: Hello, guild leader, Smashing Vault of Heaven, I have something to ask of you. Could I add you as a friend?]

[(Local) Traceless Water: Me too.]

[(Local) Peach Blossom for Wine: Me as well.] 

…

Jiang Xiao looked at a pile of friend requests and accepted them in order.

The next moment, new message notifications began to ring in his ears, as if they were fighting to play the main symphony. He scanned through quickly to find all the contents were the same. They were poaching him and promised him a spot as their guild officer.

He gave them all a two-word reply: [Not interested.] 

Some of the guild leaders left in regret and didn’t insist further. They only replied to ‘please consider them if he changed his mind’, before leaving.

But that was what it looked like on the surface. Behind his back, they were delegating the task to the member in their guild that specialized in poaching. Also conveniently commanded their subordinates to keep an eye out on other guilds’ movements.

The guild leaders would argue that they had no choice. Although they all know that everyone has their own ambitions, the guild still needs talents to grow. 

If they dropped this, then just one session and a rival guild that continued to lobby in secret might have success in poaching. Then it would be them who would cry in the future during guild wars or competing for a raid boss. So they always have to keep on trying. 

Eastern Blizzard had an easier time, because he passed the task to Moon God.

Because in their guild, the only member who had been in contact with the White Koi was Moon God.

After listening to his intention, Moon God dismissed him. “He doesn’t care about the welfare of the guild. It won’t work even if you offer the guild leader position. Since he already turned down your offer, we should respect his wishes and not try to act deviously.”

Eastern Blizzard huffed, “I know.” 

Sunken Moon feared he was all talk and reminded him, “You better accept the truth now, so you don’t find yourself in serious trouble.”

Eastern Blizzard was startled. “What do you mean?”

Sunken Moon shared, “That’s Tempest.”

Eastern Blizzard was silent for an entire minute before inquiring, “Errr, I think my headphone malfunctioned. Can you repeat that?” 

Sunken Moon repeated with a hint of laughter, “Tempest.”

“…” Eastern Blizzard’s voice trembled slightly. “Are…are you saying that Tempest is the one controlling the account right now?”

Sunken Moon understood his emotional conflict, so it was his job to shatter the illusion. “It was always him. There was never a change. And yes, all the lovey-dovey horn messages were all sent by him and only him.”

Eastern Blizzard: “…” 

The fuck! Tempest acted so otherworldly and out of character!

Sunken Moon chuckled. “Now you’re aware, you shouldn’t act deviously. He has a bad temper and we don’t want to piss him off. Understand?”

Eastern Blizzard collected his thoughts, and his whole body shivered.

If they didn’t take Tempest’s strength into account, there was still his popularity. If his identity was revealed and blown up, the fans would definitely come running, including part of his guild. The power of White Koi could reach first in a matter of minutes! 

“Yes,” he quickly replied as he withdrew his other poaching orders. 

While the other guilds were in the dark, their poaching teams held a meeting to research for a countermeasure to deal with their current predicament. At the Phoenix Rune guild, a player named Sugar in Sweetheart listened to her boyfriend ranting about White Koi for hours, before she blurted out in surprise, “Huh? Wasn’t that Vault of Heavens Essence’s guild?”

His boyfriend, who was a guild officer, said, “Yes, you know him?”

Sugar in Sweetheart answered, “Of course! Do you remember when I asked to borrow some throwaway accounts to kill someone, only to be blocked by Traceless Water? Our target was him.” 

The guild officer was shocked.

During that time, he only asked two questions: What was the guild’s size and who was the target? Upon learning it was a small guild of around one hundred members and the mark was an enemy of his girlfriend’s friends, he didn’t question further.

He was so excited that he told his girlfriend about their situation of poaching one of the members, and wanted her to ask her friends for help. 

Sugar in Sweetheart curled her lips. “I can’t, we had a big argument afterwards.” 

Only after the boyfriend coaxed her a few more times and promised many things, did she finally agree.

It turned out what she learned wasn’t a trivial thing, but earth-shattering news—the guild leader’s little lover was fake, and he was most likely someone from Traceless Water’s guild. No wonder Traceless Water blocked them!

The guild officer hissed, “Since Traceless Water has planted a mole, why would he work so hard to get on White Koi’s guild leader’s side?”

Sugar in Sweetheart guessed, “Maybe it was all playing pretend to throw everyone off?” 

“That could be it,” her boyfriend fumed in rage. “Traceless Water is too sneaky. This isn’t good. We have to figure out a way to get rid of Vault of Heavens Essence!”