Chapter 22: Wits

At the end of his sentence, a barely audible gasp resounded the chamber from the scythe wielding woman.

Soon after, everyone from the table, including the three new initiates that were standing, turned and stared at Venn's dumbfounded face, waiting for his response.

His current situation was like having multiple guns pointed at his forehead, their chambers ready to be emptied at any given notice.

It was the end of the line for him.

"Fuck me sideways. What is this? A masquerade party? I needed a mask to get in?" Venn was dying internally as he cursed in his mind. 

He was so close.

His expression was like a deer caught in the headlights as he noticed that even the initiates that were standing were wearing masks on their face to hide their identity.

There wasn't any clue or mention that points to him that he would need to get himself a mask in order to crash the blood serpents' meeting. Thus, he was at a loss of what to do.

"I knew it! I knew that it wouldn't be this easy."

At this moment in time, he desperately wanted to know the addresses of Heaven Descent developers so that he could send razor blades to their home for developing such a stupid game. 

After mentally cursing for several seconds though, Venn pulled back his drifting thoughts and began to think of a solution. At the back of his head, he knew that it was useless to think about such pointless things in his mind.

Immediately, his anxious eyes scanned the chamber to look for a solution to overcome the black robe's grilling question.

Within seconds, he found a breakthrough when his eyes rested upon the mask of the scythe wielding woman. 

She was wearing a red fox mask.

With quick reflexes, Venn pulled out a broken mask from his inventory and held it up prominently so that everyone in the room could have a clear view of the mask in his hand.

"My mask unfortunately broke in a fight with a group of skeleton soldiers while I was on my journey here. Nevertheless, I was able to obliterate them in the end. As for why I didn't get a replacement mask, I was already late for the initiation, I can't afford to waste time getting another one. "

Venn nonchalantly explained himself. Thankfully at the last possible moment, he remembered that he had looted Silverfox's broken mask before killing her, and spun a credible lie revolving the mask in short notice.

He even enhanced the credibility of the lie by including the specific monster that he fought.

Skeleton soldiers are level 26 monsters that reside in underground caves near Rosewell. He included them in his lie after he saw the level of the three initiates as they turned hostile towards him.

The levels of the three initiatives were level 23, 24 and level 29 respectively.

When NPCs turn hostile towards players, their levels and health bars of the NPCs would appear and hover above their head as the hostile action is considered as engaging in combat. However, the NPCs themselves won't be able to see players' information.

Hence, Venn used it to his advantage. His words suggested that he was roughly around the same strength as the other three candidates, and there was no way the Blood Serpents could verify that.

Not everyone in the chamber turned hostile towards him though. 

The three black robes that sat on the left side of the long table which included the scythe wielding woman remained seated despite the commotion.

Whereas the other three that sat on the right side of the table were the active ones that were on the verge of attacking him.

Through Venn's sharp observation, he deduced that there was internal strife in the guild. It was too much of a coincidence that there were two polar opposite reactions happening in the chamber.

"Looks like the group on the right has some bad blood with Granhiert… As for the group on the left, I can't tell if their stance is neutral towards me or better."

Venn made a mental note to himself. He needed all the information he could get.

Unfortunately though, he was unable to see the levels of the core members of Blood Serpents. 

The level difference between him and them was too large. All he could see was just multiple question marks.

[Level: ???]

[HP: ???/???]

If the level difference between two opponents is greater than 20 or more, the weaker side will not be able to see the exact level and health bar of the opponent. 

Furthermore, there is a penalty of 50% damage reduction on the damage that the weaker player deals to the stronger side. The rule applies to all monsters, NPCs, and even players.

***

Venn's convincing explanation seemed to have worked. The black robes stopped their attack and returned back to a neutral stance.

However, as Venn had expected, the burly black robe continued to pose troubles to Venn.

"That doesn't prove any—."

"Are there so much distrust between members of this guild?". Venn interrupted him loudly without giving him a chance to finish speaking. By pointing out the obvious problems that existed in the guild, he was forcing the leader of the guild to act.

"But how can there be four new members?" Not giving up, the burly black robe bellowed.

However, someone else interrupted him this time.

"Enough. It doesn't matter. After all, there will only be three left after we are done." The man who had stayed silent all this time finally spoke.

When he said so, the three newcomers who stood by the long table suddenly trembled.

"Prepare a grail for him." The leader who was sitting at the end of the table instructed.

Acting on his instruction, the woman who wore the red fox mask stood up and grabbed an unused grail from the table before placing it down next to the other three initiates.

When Venn stepped forward and stood beside the other three initiates, he saw that there was a grail in front of them as well.