After five years…
"Are we going to find him here?"
"Who knows, but at least we will try and convince him to represent us!"
"This place truly changed! I recall coming here ten years ago, and it was just a little spot in the corner of the world. See it now, all these grand buildings, wide streets, huge space that spans to cover hundreds of kilometres… What a miraculous change it is!"
"Don't belittle their turning moment, the alpha battle started all from here. I see they deserve everything they are enjoying now, turning the Scorching Lands fort into the Scorching Land big city!"
A group of spirit masters, cladded in golden white coats and cloaks, were walking in the middle of the Scorching Lands huge city's streets, speaking among themselves.
They were walking in the middle of a wide street, filled with lots of people and caravans. This was the new city of the Scorching Lands, the crown jewel of the entire region, a place people living here felt pride and admiration towards.
Like these spirit masters said, this place started from being a little fort all the way to the huge city it was now. They travelled from areas beyond the Scorching Lands, travelled for months, all to get here and met a single person in particular.
"Wow! Stories weren't over exaggerating then," as the team of one hundred spirit masters arrived at a certain place, one of them said in pure admiration, commenting over the bustling scene in front of him.
This team was made entirely of either late-stage gold grade or early-stage dark gold grade, led by one who was in the mid rank of dark gold grade.
In front of them, the wide street kept getting wider, opening up to some sort of a vast plaza. That wasn't all, the plaza was filled to the brim with many people, merchants who came here from faraway places, travelling for a long time, just to get the wonders of this place they all gathered on front of its doorsteps.
"Tsk! I recall my time when I was here ten years ago. It wasn't like this, not even close!"
"What do you mean?"
"This fort lacked any decent gear or potion, not to mention elixirs. And now look at this… Lines upon lines are standing in front of the many stalls outside this place, waiting for their turn to buy the well-known Black Fox gears, potions, and elixirs… Tsk!"
"I heard it all started with him," the leader of this team said in a deep voice, "I read many records about him. Rumours say he started out as a mere porter, not even a proper spirit master. And now? He ended up creating all this… What a feat!"
"I heard he did all this, and yet his power isn't that much! Truly admirable!"
The team members looked at the girl who said these words. She was at twenty-two years old, a refined and hot looking young lady with such a tight outfit in contrast to what everyone else here wore.
She was at gold grade, hailed from a prestigious family at the place the team came from. "Don't look at me like this, I did my research as all of you," she rolled her eyes, cleared her throat before adding, "I heard he has a team which started from silver and even bronze grades, ending up in mere five years to be at gold and even dark gold grade. As for him, the mastermind behind all this, he is still at the silver grade."
"No way! I heard he is already a gold grade!" another member said, a young man who seemed to blurt out like this out of his envy and not pure facts, "it's impossible for a silver spirit master to do any of this. He must be lying about his power; stories must be lying as well…"
"They aren't lying!" the lady argued back, speaking in a high and arrogant tone.
"We'll see when we meet him."
"See what exactly?"
Just when the two glared at each other, an alien voice came from the side, startling most if not all of them.
They turned and saw a tall and strong looking youth, who was around sixteen years old. He had dark blue hair, with few strands of silver white ones scattered across his head.
He had dark eyes, shimmering with life and confidence. With a deep indentation at his chin, and a faint scar at his forehead, he looked quite ferocious and not easy to deal with.
He wore a black attire, with silver belt surrounding his waist, holding a strong looking glaive in his right hand, and a heavy looking broadsword sheathed at his back.
On the side of his chest, there was an emblem there, one that had a golden head of a fox stitched in brilliant handmade design.
"You are…" the leader of this team asked, while all of his team already guessed the identity of this youth. Just from the emblem at his chest, they could tell he belonged to the Fox guild, the famous name that spread all over the world and shook it five years ago.
And from the golden threads making out this emblem and the black attire he wore, they knew the owner belonged to the closest confidants of the leader and founder of this guild. Ranks in the guild started from white, bronze, silver, and gold. The highest grade there was the Black grade, which was something a bit weird in the eyes of the rest of the world. Daring to use the legendary rank colour wasn't a commonly seen thing in this world.
People admired and aspired for the black coloured spirit power, the legendary grade. But few dared to use such symbol and express their true intentions like how William and his elite guild team did.
But it wasn't the only weird thing about this guild, everything actually about it was weird. Be it the name, the way the guild worked, even the business it ran… Nothing related to this Fox guild looked normal in the eyes of any spirit master.