MMORPG: Crowd Control

Samantha was in a complete daze when she saw a system prompt appear, notifying her of the skeleton soldier's death.

[Skeleton Solider's Health Point had depleted to zero and will return to nothingness.]

She had watched as the third skeleton soldier used his life to deflect the fireball that was launched at her in shock.

They were just about to celebrate and be named by her. Yet everything was ruined by a fireball that came out of nowhere.

"Who did it?" Samantha shouted and glanced at her surroundings.

Soon, a few nearby people came out from the high grasses that covered them.

Despite seeing them directly, Samantha noticed her map function didn't indicate their position at all, meaning they had equipped an item that concealed their position from being detected.

And what this meant was that these people have been watching her for quite a while and had only attacked her now.

At first, she thought it was the people that had tried to recruit her in the town earlier because of how suspicious they were acting, but to her surprise, it was a group of new people. People that she had never even seen before, much less crossed paths.

She narrowed her eyes and stared at them, keeping a calm composure. She wasn't mad that they had killed her skeleton soldier but was confused that they ambushed her without a reason.

At the end of the day, this was just a game, but there are still people out in the world, willing to commit evil things because that was who they are.

'Truly, this world is indeed hopeless.' Samantha thought to herself.

Meanwhile, the group of people started to laugh wickedly at Samantha.

"Hoho, I've told you that it's a new class from Magnolia. If we can capture her and extract all the information needed, then we're going to make it big." One ugly-looking man said tauntingly to his members.

There were a total of four people, but each one of them had shiny gears and exuded a powerful aura. It was clear that they are not beginner players at all, but had come here to hunt the beginners.

"Shut up with your taunt and hurry up and detain her. Otherwise, it would be bad if she escaped." One of the men snorted, reprimanding the ugly man.

"Alright, let's go-"

Before the ugly-looking man could continue his words, he realized Samantha had long disappeared from the scene during their bantering.

Unlike these buffoons that had the time to banter with each other, Samantha had long escaped. She would be a fool to wait for them to continue their wicked idea that they were trying to do.

After running for a safe distance, Samantha began multitasking, unlocking the [Saved Summon] skill, and instantly saved Skelly, Skarl, and Skully.

Once that was done, Samantha logged out of the game, effectively running away from those unknown groups of people.

And although she didn't know who or what they were doing, Samantha had a feeling that they are plotting something big in Magnolia.

By the time Samantha regained her vision, she was back in the real world.

"Hmph, those people really managed to ruin my mood and I'm usually the calmest person. Could gaming really make people rage?" Samantha muttered, still feeling a bit angry at the previous incident.

Sometime later, Samantha went to wash her face and began texting Lei Zhen, informing him of the situation. She was not the type to provoke others, but she also wasn't the type to swallow provocation and not do anything about it.

In her text message, she told Lei Zhen that she was being bullied and harassed.

She wasn't a liar, but exaggerating a little bit in terms of her perspective was not considered lying.

A few minutes later, loud footsteps could be heard across the hallway.

"Which faggots attack you?" Lei Zhen opened the door and asked in fury. He knew that Samantha might have texted him in a joking manner, but whenever she did that kind of thing, it meant that the opposing party had irritated her.

Meanwhile, Samantha calmly pointed at her chair, seemingly telling him to take a seat first.

Understanding her implication, Lei Zhen could only take a seat and wait patiently once again despite it being her that basically told him to come over.

When he read the text message in Magnolia world, he didn't even waste a single second and dropped everything to log out.

"Alright, tell me the description of those people and why they ambushed you." After taking the seat, Lei Zhen quickly asked for the most important information.

"Well, it all started once I left the town to start grinding levels," Samantha said and began to explain her encounter with those unruly men. Her description of them was flawless, especially when she mentioned how hideous one of them looked.

A few minutes later, Lei Zhen rubbed his chin, seemingly in deep thought.

According to Samantha's words, Lei Zhen had reason to suspect that this group of people aren't the usual robber. Normally, robbers wouldn't target beginner players because they don't even have much equipment or items to rob from.

Hence, low-level environments are usually safe from the player-killing type of event because no one would waste their resources to gain even fewer resources than they had started.

"Samantha, when they were bantering, are you sure they mentioned capturing you and not looting you instead?" Lei Zhen asked again, trying to confirm something.

Samantha nodded her head.

"I'm positive that they mention capturing me and something about avoiding being caught. From their tone of speech, it doesn't seem like they are trying to rob me, but detain me." She said, feeling unsure of their actual motive.

"Refrain from logging in for a while and tell me the precise location of your last logout. I'm going to inform Kate to send some guards to your area to protect your safety. At the same time, I'm going to do some research." Lei Zhen said solemnly.

Just like Samantha, he had an instinct that this matter was not as simple as it seemed and that they had intruded into some big conspiracy.

They targeted Samantha because of her unique game class that had not appeared in the Magnolia world. However, the problem was how did those people realize Samantha had a unique class and not just a simple summoner subclass.

"I understand," Samantha agreed to his suggestion and decided to stop playing for a while. She had her fill of excitement with the skeleton soldiers already, and she still needed to head to work tomorrow morning for her shift.

"Good, now shouldn't you honor your promise and cook some dinner for us? It's getting quite late." Lei Zhen pointed at the clock that was hanging on the wall and said smugly.

"Fine, a promise is a promise." Samantha sighed and got off the bed, making her way to the kitchen.

Right when she left the room though, Lei Zhen's expression turned cold as he opened his phone.

"Aura, are you connected?" Lei Zhen asked the AI who used to stay hidden in the secret underground. Now that things had become this way, Lei Zhen had decided to stop staying low.

"Yes, what does the Young Master want?" Aura responded.

"Go hack through every system you can and get information on crimes related to Magnolia. I want to know the current crimes that police are trying to cover up."

"Understood, Young Master."

With that command done, Lei Zhen then began to warn Tang Qiaolian, Griselda, and Tie Longkun about the recent discovery and if they had noticed something was amiss.

Crimes that happened in the real world because of Magnolia were not uncommon. In fact, it was the most common crime committed lately because of how much profit Magnolia can bring in.

'Did the criminal find a faulty bug in Magnolia and began to abuse that loophole?' Lei Zhen wondered silently, feeling unease about the situation.

Alas, even if he knew something was amiss, there was nothing he could do at the moment since he lacked the information and Aura isn't going to obtain the information anytime soon.

Time slowly passed by, and Samantha soon called for dinner as she placed the final dish on the dining table.

"Holy smokes, three dishes and one soup in such a short amount of time?" Lei Zhen was astonished when he saw the colorful dishes and steaming hot soup being served.

"What? Did you really think I can't cook?" Samantha placed her hands on her hips, acting displeased about Lei Zhen's reaction. His reaction was like there was no expectation of her cooking skills.

"Haha, of course not." Lei Zhen chuckled softly and quickly took a piece of chicken and ate it, causing Samantha to smack his arm lightly for the unhygienic way.

"The chicken is cooked right and just perfect." He laughed heartily, running away from Samantha's smacking this time.

"Go wash your hands first before eating," Samantha scolded coldly.

"With soap and at least 30 seconds of rubbing too."