Taking a Mission

After breezing through his finals, Zhou Sining stared at the gloomy sky, his mind awash with worries.

Seeing his troubled expression, Zhou Min, who had been in the same exam room, walked over.

"Zhou Sining, what are you thinking about?"

They had finally made it through a whole semester, and New Year was just around the corner. Everyone else could barely contain their excitement, so why was he looking so glum?

Zhou Sining shook his head. "Nothing. Now that the exams are over, the teachers are on break too. I'm just worried I won't be able to go up to the Outer City Wall to kill undead."

As students, they weren't allowed onto the Outer City Wall without a teacher leading them.

Without access to the Outer City Wall, he couldn't kill undead. Without killing undead, he couldn't earn Life Points.

How was he supposed to redeem a Soul-Consolidating Heart Chain to nourish his soul and refine his spirit without Life Points?

Zhou Min was utterly stunned.

Seriously, dude? I thought you were sad because you had no family to spend New Year with, but you're actually sad because the break means you can't kill undead?!

You've been killing undead all semester, and you still haven't had enough?

Look at the students around you. Every single one is happy they don't have to pull guard duty over the break, and you're the only one sighing because you can't go bother the undead...

Amazing. No wonder you're the genius who killed ninety-six undead on your very first shift. Your brain really does work differently.

The corner of Zhou Min's mouth twitched. "I don't understand, but I'm deeply impressed."

After all, even standing atop the Outer City Wall and throwing spells down below carried a very real risk of death!

"I mostly want to train. I need to get stronger!" Zhou Sining clenched his fist.

He really did want to kill undead to save up Life Points and prolong his life, but his desire to grow stronger was just as real.

Whenever he thought of the mangled corpses he had seen upon opening his eyes, and the row of red crosses on that list, Zhou Sining felt that this world was fucking awful!

Zhou Min fell silent.

After a moment's thought, she said, "Why not check out the Hunters' Alliance? Mo Fan got his Hunter License and joined the City Demon Hunting Squad back then. That's how he gained far more combat experience than any of us. With your abilities, joining a hunter team shouldn't be a problem. Then you could kill monsters and earn money at the same time."

That's right!

It suddenly clicked for Zhou Sining. Why hadn't he thought of becoming a Hunter Mage?

He was already an adult, so applying for a Hunter License shouldn't be a problem.

"All right. Thanks, senior." Zhou Sining smiled.

"You're still calling me senior?" Zhou Min smiled helplessly. "If you get lonely over New Year, you can come hang out with us. Didn't Mu Bai open a commercial street? A lot of people from Bo City work there. He said he was planning to get everyone together for a New Year reunion dinner. Still, he's the one who's really changed. Apparently, the main family only took in Mu Ningxue and Mu Zhuoyun. Mu Bai had to support the family at such a young age, and he even opened that commercial street to provide a livelihood for the people from Bo City."

"He really has changed a lot." Zhou Sining couldn't argue with that.

His first encounter with Mu Bai had been during the Bo City disaster, when Mu Bai had already begun to show signs of maturity.

Although he couldn't rule out Mu He having interfered, the fact remained that after the Bo City disaster, the surviving members of the Mu Family had been abandoned by the Mu Clan in the Imperial Capital before they could even get back on their feet. Mu Bai and Mu He had been forced to hold everything together themselves.

Mu Bai had grown visibly haggard during that period. Fortunately, he had pulled through, becoming increasingly steady and composed.

Having personally witnessed the growth of the original story's eventual third male lead, Zhou Sining couldn't describe how strange and wonderful it felt. His fondness for Mu Bai ran deeper than anything he could have gained from simply reading about him.

They walked out of the school side by side, and Zhou Sining raised a hand to hail a cab.

"I'll head to the Hunters' Alliance, then. Let's get together when we have time."

"Sure. Have a safe trip." Zhou Min waved.

The Hunters' Alliance was located in the city center. The building was essentially a combination of a government service center and a shopping mall, with official offices occupying the top two floors.

The middle two floors housed shops and a dedicated service area offering one-on-one assistance with taking Advanced Level missions.

The Hunter Hall on the lowest floor was the part that served everyone, resembling a bustling marketplace.

Although it looked noisy and chaotic, all the hall's operations were divided into separate sections and proceeded in an orderly fashion.

Zhou Sining first went to a service window to apply for a Hunter License.

"Hello, sir. Here are your Hunter License and Hunter Badge. Please keep them safe. This is our Hunters' Alliance app. Scan the code and log in, and you'll be able to view mission acceptance and submission updates from the Ancient Capital Hunter Alliance in real time. The app can also recommend suitable missions based on your circumstances, and we'll post all notifications there as well."

Putting away his hunter credentials, Zhou Sining scanned the code, logged into the app the staff member had mentioned, and tried its automatic recommendation feature.

Perhaps because he had only just registered as a hunter and was a complete novice, and had also specified that he wanted missions he could complete alone, the app took a very, very long time before finally displaying a suitable mission.

[Mission number: 91125635]

[Mission rank: beginner]

[Posted by: East City Wall Second Line]

[Mission details: serve on guard duty for fifteen consecutive days and kill 30 servant-level undead]

[Mission requirements: Beginner Level 3 or above; one or more participants; Beginner Mages restricted to the Light, Fire, and Lightning elements]

[Mission reward: meals and lodging provided per person; 200 per day]

"Only 3,000 for spending half a month out in the wind and rain on the Outer City Wall, and you have to kill thirty servant-level undead too. Anyone capable wouldn't want it, and anyone who'd want it isn't capable. No wonder nobody's taken it after a whole week."

Looking at the exploitative mission, Zhou Sining was utterly speechless.

Because of the undead, the Ancient Capital had plenty of similar guard-duty missions, many of which Beginner Mages could complete alone.

It was winter now, with little sunlight, and both the numbers and strength of the undead had risen steadily compared to summer. With New Year approaching, there was an even greater need to recruit available low- and intermediate-level mages for guard duty to ensure the entire Ancient Capital made it safely into the next year.

As a result, the terms offered by both official and private missions were generally decent. At least either the pay or the benefits would be satisfactory.

But this mission offered neither. The pay was lousy, and so were the benefits.

Anyone who accepted it now wouldn't finish until New Year's Eve. What mage had so little to do that they'd skip the celebrations to go stand in corpse-laden winds on the Outer City Wall?

Not to mention that the Warrior Level undead had slept through the entire summer and were now taking advantage of the falling temperatures to crawl out for some fresh air.

If someone happened to run into them, whether they would make it home alive for the reunion dinner was an open question.

"You're lucky you ran into a good person like me who doesn't expect anything in return. Anyone else would've kicked you to the curb."

Indulging in a little self-admiration, Zhou Sining tapped "Confirm acceptance."

A deduction notification immediately popped up on the Screen.

Once a basic guard-duty mission like this was accepted, its data would be synced to the Hunters' Alliance's central system, and deposits would be deducted from both parties.

After the mission was completed, the system would refund the deposits. If either party was at fault, the system would instead use their deposit as part of the compensation paid to the injured party.

This deposit system effectively protected the rights of both mission issuers and Hunter Mages.

Zhou Sining understood the reasoning, but looking at the notification for the five-thousand deduction, he still found it hard to stomach.

A deposit nearly twice the mission reward was certainly unusual. It was only because the issuer was an official organization that the Hunters' Alliance had approved the posting at all.

Immediately afterward, the issuer's contact details appeared on the Screen.

Zhou Sining noted down the number and called to ask about the specifics.

"Hello. This is the Third War Zone of the Second Defense Line at the East City Wall, Ancient Capital Military District. I'm the commanding officer, Su Zhe."