The tension hanging over the shoulders of the Silver Lotus members began to dissolve within just the first few hours inside the Astralis Requiem tree headquarters.
Sitting on the leaf sofas of the main hall, Skye, Devon, and the other Lower Zone members still kept a defensive posture, their eyes constantly scanning for any sign that the friendly treatment was just a front.
They had grown up in a world where any Upper Zone member saw them as disposable cogs, let alone when it came to true Elite like the fox Lisa in front of them, and the shock of being welcomed with smiles and genuine hospitality was hard to process.
Dee, the veteran warrior Alice had brought along, approached Zach with a steaming mug of nectar, offering it with total naturalness, which left the Silver Lotus mechanic frozen for a second.
Zach looked at the mug and then at Dee’s face, searching for that glint of superiority every Upper Zone Player he’d met in Aethelgard wore like a medal.
"Here you go, Zach. Looks like your trip to our base was pretty intense, I love drinking this nectar to loosen up my muscles after battles." Dee remarked, sitting on the arm of the sofa with a satisfied sigh. "To be honest, you all fought way better than we did in our first week together haha, when Alice first put us together, we all acted like headless ants."
Zach took the mug with hands still shaking a little. "Thanks, Dee. But honestly, we were expecting you guys to... well, give us orders or something. In Aethelgard, if a level 14 group saw a level 11 scout, the treatment was more like ’be my subordinate or get beaten down.’"
Samantha, who was cleaning her dagger at a nearby table, let out a short, friendly laugh. "Seriously? That waste of time doesn’t surprise me at all... Don’t worry, in Astralis, Halon and Lisa made it clear from day one that we grow together or we don’t grow at all. There’s no room for ’Young Master’ egos here. If you’re under our emblem, you’re family."
Skye, or Lotus as she was known in the game, listened to the conversation with deep curiosity.
She looked at Alice, who was laughing at some joke of Devon’s, and realized that Astralis Requiem’s culture was something that defied the logic of Eden-3. Here, no one had to constantly prove they were better than someone else just to make sure they wouldn’t be tossed aside at the end of the day. There was a lightness in the air that Silver Lotus had never experienced, not even during downtime at the Sector 4 hangar, constantly worrying about tomorrow.
"This is so different from the novice villages," Jenny remarked, walking up to Samantha. "There, the Players acted like they owned the universe just for having an uncommon class. Here, you all have uncommon or rare bases and high levels, but you seem... normal."
"Pfft, it’d be foolish to act arrogant with an Uncommon, Double Uncommon, Rare, or even Double Rare Base while standing next to two monsters like Lisa and Halon." Samantha shot back, winking at the berserker. "And even with such powerful abilities and Bases, neither Halon nor Lisa, despite her ice queen face, are the most decent people I’ve ever met in Elysium. If even they, as incredible as they are, act with such humility, what right would we have to act arrogant around them?"
The adjustment happened so smoothly that, by the second day, Silver Lotus’s initial wariness had been completely replaced by vibrant excitement.
Lohan and Lisa set up a rotation system where the veterans paired off with the newcomers to explore the edges of Mythlorien. The goal was simple, teach them the forest’s secrets and make sure Silver Lotus’s vanguard could level up without the risks of an ambush.
During one such hunt, Lotus and Samantha moved like shadows through the canopy of the colossal trees. The target was a group of level 12 Crystal Fang Panthers prowling around a stream.
Samantha signaled with her hand, and Lotus understood the silent command instantly. The sync between them, forged so quickly through a compatible personality match, turned their combat into a lethal ballet.
Lotus leapt from the branch, her swords gleaming with a subtle tone of golden energy.
She didn’t shout the name of any technique, she simply guided the energy to flow into the blades, and in midair, she unleashed an arcing strike that released a cutting wave of pressure, hitting the flank of the first panther.
Samantha appeared right behind her, her daggers becoming blurs of motion that pierced the creature’s vital points as easily as cutting through butter with a hot knife.
Meanwhile, in another part of the forest, Devon and Tunder dealt with Cockatrices.
The veteran mage fired off bolts of bluish energy to destabilize the monsters, while Devon used void magic to practice controlling the birds on the ground.
Lohan’s fragment, accompanying each group, acted as a silent catalyst, strengthening their magic and providing a passive protective net that made the Cockatrices’ attacks harmless, ensuring no one got hurt in the process, while he took the chance to see how this separated leveling method would work out for him.
Every pair’s battles were quick and efficient.
When the last monster fell, experience notifications appeared in everyone’s vision.
Skye smiled seeing her bar move forward significantly, but the real moment of shock came at dusk, when everyone returned to the tree headquarters for the loot selling protocol.
Lisa sat on the wooden pedestal Lohan had formed, feeling surprisingly comfortable with how that new structure wrapped around her body.
She received the hides, cores, and rare ingredients the Players had gathered throughout the day, while Lohan, in slime form, watched contentedly from her shoulder, processing the data of each material handed in.
Given that it was now time for payment—when each player would finally receive the money corresponding to the work they had done over the past two days, Lohan was excited to see their reactions as such a large sum hit their accounts.