Chapter 2: Master Chen

Thick foilage surrounded the teen as he ventured into the destination of the invitation he received from a day ago. The jungle canopy blocked the sunlight as he gazed around the area to be on alert with his hand by his katana. Sure he was going to meet up with a convoy that was going to lead him to the guild's headquarters, but it didn't mean Hiroshi's Labyrith Jungle was safe for players to wander in alone. Outside of the game, it was the same as in the game, it yielded the labyrith name as it's a maze for its thick foilage to have people become lost in the jungle. And in the jungle were wild beasts to attack unsuspecting players, which was Kai was being vigilant.

The spiky hair burnet kept walking down the dirt road while glancing around to huff in annoyance as he hasn't spotted the convoy that was mentioned in the invitation. He started to wonder if it was a set up and he was heading for a trap. He knew it was too convincing and he took the bait like a fool. The sound of branches breaking caused the teen to stop and quickly drew his sword out, ready to defend himself as he watched two figures emerge from the foilage. His chocolate brown eyes grew wide as he recognized the two figures in front of him, the two players from the restuarant that he fought before. He knew it was a trap now, so they could kill him and take his items.

"Well, well, Krait, looks like our samurai friend has accepted Chen's invitation." the player acknowledged. "I'm surprised actually."

"Same, Chope," Krait agreed. "So player, quite the punches you had back in the village, and we're happy to see that you've accepted Master Chen's invite to join the Anacondrai Clan. Please, state your name."

Kai kept his glare on them, but he carefully loosen his stance to cautiously sheathe his katana. With them saying about the invite and the name as Chen, he realized this was the convoy he was searching for. "My name is Kai." he replied. "And yes, I got this stupid invite, saying to come here and follow a convoy to the headquarters. I'm guessing it's you two then."

A cheeky smirk came from Krait to nod to his statement. "Indeed it is." he said to motion him to follow. "Come on, Chen doesn't have all day. You're probably the last one anyway. We got lots to do today." He turned to lead the way with Kai following behind and Chope tailing them.

The jungle became thicker to the burnet as the three were walking off the trail and had to move the large leaves away to see where he was going. Wherever this Chen was made him wonder why his guild's headquarters was off in the middle of nowhere in the jungle. Even for being the thickest jungle to become lost in. And yet, the name Chen sounded way too familiar to him, like he had heard that name before in IRL. But where though?

After walking for what felt like another half hour, the three finally came to a clearing to have Kai's eyes widen to what stood in front of him. A ruined temple stood in front of him with aged snake statues at the main entrance and thick foilage around the perimeter. Burning torches hung on the stone walls with fire pits underneath the snake statues blazing high to make Kai amazed to the area. Like a hidden temple in any other video game, Ninjago Online had done the same concept.

A hard nudge brought the teen out of his thoughts to see that Chope and Krait were still convoying him to follow with them as they climbed the weathered steps to the thick wooden doors. The doors opened to their presence and all three entered to have the doors close behind them and Kai was lead through the corridor to be in an open clearing where other players meandered around. Krait and Chope gave Kai the push to keep walking to the group and disappeared into another corridor to leave alone with the other players. Kai glanced around to feel a bit nervous as he glanced around at the other players as they branished different weapons than his katana and wore high leveled armor. Made him feel like the new kid at school, but he didn't show his nerves to them.

The burnet stayed outside of the group to keep to himself to lean against a stone pillar and glance around. Some players looked like bandits to others wore full suits of armor and other armor that made them look meancing. Large swords to axes and spears were out on display as the players were bragging of their conquests in the game to make Kai stand out more with his standard armor and tunic he wore. He quickly opened his menu to browse through what other armor he had to blink of the one in his inventory as he had forgotten about it from completing a quest to disappear behind the pillar and donned the armor on. He stepped out in the opening to be in red samurai armor to remove the mask and tied the red bandana around his forehead to glance around as the sound of a gong rang.

Two more of the players that looked like Crope and Krait swung at a metal gong to make the room become silent and have everyone's attention to the wooden doors on top of the center stairs. The gong finally stopped to have the two players stand by as the doors slowly swung open and a man stepped out to gaze at them below. Kai studied to see he was an aged man with black hair and goatee and red eye shadow around his dark eyes. He was dressed in a red ceremonial robe and black cape with an oddly shaped snake skull headpiece with a purple piece around his neck. Another man followed behind him, he too was dressed in a red ceremonial robe without the cape and had black hair and mustache. Kai had to guess that the one with the snake headpiece was Chen, the guild leader, and the other was maybe his second-in-command.

The guild leader gazed at the that came to his headquarters to smile softly. "Welcome, welcome," he said, cheerfully. "to the Anacondrai Clan's headquarters. And thank you for accepting our invitation about joining the guild to lead our conquest of the Overlord Virus." He had an around of applause to raise his hands to silent to continue. "As many of you have noticed on the invite, yes my name is Master Chen, yes the founder of Master Chen's Noodle House in IRL."

Kai's eyes widen in realization now to Chen's name as it came to him now. Chen was the owner to many restuarants in the real Ninjago and even in Ninjago City. There was even a restuarant to his hometown in Ignacia Village, that was how he knew of Chen's name. What was the owner of a large food chain doing in a video game? Maybe he had NeuroGear to have leisure time when running a lot of restuarants.

"Now, before we get into details of everything," Chen continued. "I have a confession to make." There were hushed murmurs among one another to raise his hands to silent them. "In order to join the guild, there has to be a initation. A tourament of sorts to determine here who has the guts and will power, strongest of the fittest, to vanguish the virus. With sixteen of you here, we only have eight openings available. Understand what I'm implying here?"

There was silence to have everyone think of the proposition. "So to join the guild, we must fight one another until you call who is the winner until there is eight of us left." a player with a sickle sword attached to his hip stated. "So you expect us to do it right here right now."

"You're correct about fighting one another," Chen said. "But we're not doing here, can't have weapons scattered on the floor. No, the tourament will be held back in the arena. Come, there are plenty of drinks and food to enjoy during the fights until it is your turn. There will be pre-fights to give the idea of what we are doing. Training our recruits as you would think." He motioned his hand to a corridor have Crope and Krait lead the way to the arena. "Please enjoy yourselves. The tourament will start in a couple hours."

Kai watched the many players nod to his offer and followed after the two members to watch Chen and his commander disappear back to the door. A tourament to join the guild sounded like a way to test a player if they were capable of this guild. The way Chen said it made the samurai suspicious of him. But he had to defeat the virus if he wanted to get out of this game and be with his sister and family. Being the last one in the room, Kai made sure his katana was strapped to his hip and followed after the remaining group.