But the remaining part was just William's feeling. He didn't feel his team was in this fort at all. And they were far, very far away from here.
"Fine, but don't stir trouble when we are waiting for them."
"I'm not a troublemaker."
"Says the one who caused a huge battle the early minutes he sets his foot in here."
"You didn't want me to lead them to crush the enemy?" William smiled, "it was still annoying watching a lot of spirit master teams running and giving their back to the few of the dark spirit masters back there."
The old man looked at William for a long minute, "for your knowledge, the leader of the dark spirit masters in the region isn't weaker than me. And he got lots of dark gold spirit masters than what we got here in the entire fort."
"Then why didn't he attack the fort already?" William raised his eyebrows when he heard this.
He knew the dark spirit master leader here must be strong not only because he was at the same stage of this old man and other fellows like him, but thanks to his darkness element.
And that what made a difference between any normal spirit master and dark ones at such higher stages. When one would reach such a pinnacle of power, only little things could make any difference between two spirit masters.
And that was when the holy triad of the spirit masters would appear in the picture. They'd make all the difference between any two spirit masters in the same stage, like the old man and the leader of the dark spirit master forces in the region.
"I'm just warning you," the old man didn't divulge anything about William's doubts. And that made the latter doubt that there were many hidden things going on here.
For a reason, William felt that most if not all of these secrets were dirty ones.
"Thanks, but I already accepted the task."
"Tsk! Alright then, go and take a rest here."
"Here?!" William was surprised by the old man's offer.
"Sure, did you expect me to let you stay at another place or something? You are like a guest, a valuable one," the old man laughed, took something out from one of his many earrings, and tossed it towards William's direction.
"This is…"
"It's the token of mine," the old man waved his arm, as if he got tired of William's presence, "you can access a certain building using this. And no one will dare to hinder your path at all. It's the common building used for outsiders and guests to stay at. However…"
"I know, I know," William stood up while playing with this token as if it was a coin or something, "I will keep my head low and stay out of trouble."
"I hope you do…" the old man muttered while watching William's back vanish from the room, "tsk! I and these folks never expected that the mission we issued a long time ago would manage to attract such useless and weak kids. What a waste! We should have limited the age and the spirit power of those accepting it back then…"
The old man shook his head, while feeling how regretful it was for the mission, he and his friends left back then, attracted good kids like William and his team.
He didn't place any hope on William's team. But it was a totally different story while speaking about William.
In his eyes, William was a gem, a true gem, one that he dreamt about finding before for himself, and yet failed.
William left the old man, who he didn't yet know his name, and decided to take a stroll here first.
"I met members of such an impact more than once, and that's not coincidence," he muttered while slowly walking outside the door. And when he went outside, he was surprised to find himself coming out from a different building, not the one he entered with the old man before.
"That old man… Was his hideout situated in between two buildings or what?" William shook his head when he saw a different area than the one he entered from.
He appeared just in front of a long corridor, one that looked like a narrow street going between different buildings. He started to slowly walk, and slowly he found the corridor getting a bit wider, ending up opening in a wide diamond shaped plaza.
He came from a path that opened at one angle of this place. And there were three more paths leading to three different angles out there.
This plaza was close to a kilometre square, with nothing in it except for a central large black stone stele.
William didn't find himself alone anymore. The entire plaza was filled with many spirit masters in different grades, wearing various collection of attires and gears, all standing in silence while looking up at a single direction, the direction of that stele.
"What's special about this stele anyway?" William could tell that something big was happening, and yet he was away from the stele to read the little letters written on its surface.
The words were in silver, gold, white, and dark red colours. He couldn't read anything from this distance and needed to get closer to see better.
"Dude, are you new here or what?" Just when he muttered these words, many turned towards his direction, giving him weird gazes, sizing him up and down.
"You can say that," William didn't give a definite answer.
"If you are new, then you shouldn't be here," another dude stepped up, and William could vaguely sense his spirit power to be one rank higher than himself.
"All the new dudes are out there, fighting to join us," another stepped up, while the little space around William started to gather more attention.
"If you are an old member, then you'd have known the value and importance of this stele," a third one approached, and his voice was loud enough to attract more eyes towards him, "not to mention I never recall seeing such a pretty young face here before. And that means you aren't a member of our impact."
"Who are you?"
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