Epoch: A Berserker's Rise

Johan jumped up to his feet and said "Your disciple definitely won't shame you master!" Adam nodded, and his gaze fell on Jude's daggers. He asked "Since you are a Berserker, what weapon do you use?"

Johan replied "Unfortunately I don't use the sword like master, but rather the hammer." Adam nodded, Johan was lucky then. He took out [Smash Sorrow], the weapon that dropped from the Troll, and threw it to Johan.

Once he caught it, Johan exclaimed "Thank you for this great gift, Master!" Johan was really happy, despite his father being very powerful, this weapon was one of the strongest of its level, and suited him well.

Up in the air, Henry said "I think we all are finished with our business here, since we are quite far from the city I will bring you back. Johan, will you come with us or Adam?"

Johan looked at Adam, who said "You don't have to follow me at all times, come find me if you need anything. If I need anything, I will call you."

Johan nodded and said "I'll go to the palace then, before heading back to father. I already made the old man worry for long enough."

Henry nodded and his domain spread out, enveloping everyone before making them disappear. The next moment, Adam found himself in front of the Adventurer's Guild along with his initial group and Jude.

As for the Royal Family, they were back in the palace.

Back in front of the Adventurer's Guild, Adam took a quick look at his real time clock by opening his system, and saw it was only 10.30 am. In only 3 hours and a half, so much had happened. He got two disciples, cleared out a whole fortress and opened the Gate of Opening.

Of course he had spent 7 hours in reality, but even then that remained a lot. But now was time was the rewards. Adam looked at Eddy and said "We still have to hand in the head of the two bosses to the guild, do you want to give it to them?"

Eddy shook his head and said "Without you, we would have died in there, you should be the one doing it."

Adam shrugged, it didn't matter to him, his rewards would probably be the same. They all entered the building together, and Adam was surprised to see that most of the people inside were actually players!

He had seen some players earlier this morning, but there were more players than NPCs now. Adam couldn't help but think of how crowded the maps around the city would be right now.

When Adam's team entered, everyone turned their head, be it players or NPCs. Seeing a team of 7 Level 20 led by a Level 17 Player was quite a sight for the players, who all opened their eyes wide upon seeing Adam's ID.

As for the NPCs, most of the ones present were either high leveled Bronze and Silvers of all levels, and almost all of them had opened at least the Gate of Opening. Seeing 8 Iron Ranks who all opened at least the Gate of Opening was a sight they would only see once in their life.

As the players began recording the moment everyone unconsciously made a path for the team to the counter. Even the guy who was handing in his mission, a Level 11 Player, looked at Adam in awe before moving to the side respectfully.

Adam took a quick look at his ID and said while patting his shoulder "Thanks Azudal." Azudal nodded excitedly as he moved back. Adam looked at the secretary and took out the heads of both bosses. When the surrounding players looked at the description of the heads, they couldn't help but pale seeing the level and rank of the bosses.

The secretary looked at the two heads and asked "Are those the leaders of the Goblin Fortress?" Adam nodded and said "My friend behind was the one who accepted the quest yesterday."

The secretary took both the heads and examined them before returning to Adam, and putting a heavy purse on the table and saying "Here is the reward, good job."

Adam picked the purse and looked at the others who immediately said "You helped us more than we could ask for, keep everything." Adam nodded and pocketed the purse. There were 30 Gold Coins in there. This was an incredible reward for a single A Rank mission, but this should have been split in 7 parts normally, or he wouldn't even have gotten anything if he didn't participate.

The group then went outside the guild and headed for the tavern before sitting around a table and drinking together. Adam had a fun time sitting together with them, so much that an hour passed by. Despite drinking a few mugs the sneaky players recording him didn't escape his senses, but he simply didn't care.

Adam was feeling a little tipsy when he excited the tavern, Epoch even simulated this. If one wanted to clear the 'drunk' debuff they would need to ask a cleric to heal them, and that's why Adam was heading for the local church.

On his way though a group of players appeared before him, there were 15 of them, all of them being between Level 13 and 15, which was actually quite impressive. Although grinding as a group was faster, not just any group could reach this level this fast.

The leader of the group, Tarkhu, moved in front of Adam and said "I challenge you to a duel!" Everyone in the street suddenly turned their heads to look in the direction of Adam and Tarkhu. In a city, fighting was prohibited, unless it was a duel.

Adam looked at the man in annoyance and asked "Who are you?" The question seemed to annoy Tarkhu, but Adam really didn't know who the man was.

One of the lackeys behind sneered and said "Don't play dumb, who doesn't know the great Tarkhu, Guild Leader of the mighty Blue Cemetery Guild!"

There were both NPCs and Players in the street. The players seemed to know who they were, but the NPCs were completely confused as to who exactly they were. NPCs would only know of guilds who ere registered…

As this came to Adam's mind, he suddenly remembered he had forgotten something. Creating his Guild! Sarah had told him she would help him create it for free once he becomes Level 15, and he has just missed the occasion when they saw each other in the fortress.

Adam's mind cleared a little, he couldn't waste time with this. The longer he took to create his guild, the more players would miss the opportunity of joining him. Adam looked at the man in front of him in annoyance and said "Move, I'm in a hurry."

Tarkhu's face turned red being shooed off like that, and he unsheathed his one handed sword as he said "Is the mighty Valiant Heart a coward! I knew it, you aren't as strong as people think, co…"

Tarkhu was interrupted in the middle of his sentence though as a fist glowing with a white light hit his temple. This was Adam punching him with [Mighty Strike].

Tarkhu's face was smashed in and sprayed blood everywhere as he fell to the ground, dead.

Critical Hit! -2509 HP!

Right now, Adam's strength stat with the heart on was of 448, using [Mighty Strike] would deal 1254 damage on someone with 0 defense. Tarkhu was a swordsman with 900 HP, so even without the Critical Hit he would have died.

Adam didn't care about the man though and walked past his corpse, hurrying toward the guards' barracks. When he approached the other members of Tarkhu's guild, they all scattered away while shooting for the guards.

It took a single second for a group of guards to appear next to them, and as they began explaining what happened and pointed at Adam, the latter merely showed the Azure Insignia.

The guards immediately bowed and arrested the members of Blue Cemetery, as including Tarkhu who had just respawned at the church.

Quickly a video of what happened began circulating, and people understood two things. First, Valiant Heart was even stronger than what people thought. Second, don't piss him off, especially in a city.