Inside the SSA, Rio's group.

After the three newbies recovered from the shock of Rio's splitting a peak B rank monster along with a hill in two with a single attack, they all looked at Rio with reverence in their eyes, like in any other place strong are always respected, the same is true here, now the three of them respect Rio quite a lot after seeing his strength.

They gathered up their courage, became excited all of a sudden, and bombarded Rio with many questions:

"Senpai, since you are ranked no.2, then could it be you can fight the 'berserk warrior Link' equally?" (Npc no.1)

"Hmm, well I can fight him equally you could say, but I have yet to defeat him properly, all the fights I had with him ended up with a draw.." (Rio)

(Indeed, after the New Year event Rio and Link sparred against each other many times, but no one got the upper hand in the end and all the fights ended up in a draw. If you look at it this way, even the fight during the New Year event was a draw too.)(The New Year event was around ch 30)

"Wow! You are so amazing Rio Senpai! You can go toe to toe with such a strong person!" (Npc no.1)

Listening to Rio mention that he can indeed fight Link equally, the three of them were even more amazed and looked at Rio with eyes that seemed to be shining with stars in them as if they had seen a great treasure.

(Link is extremely famous in the human empire, first of all, he is exceptionally strong and talented himself, second, he is the only son of the SS-ranker Ashtel Rex, and lastly, the SS-ranker Raji Croft is his sister-in-law, has the support of two SS-rankers make him extremely famous. It would not be wrong to say that Link is the crown prince of the Human Empire. Countless young men are jealous of him but they don't even dare to compare themselves with him.)

(Link was born into a super-rich family with amazing talent, he was trained by one of the strongest individuals of the human race since childhood and he has studied in the best academy possible, you could say he is so blessed that even the heavens are jealous of him. Moreover, unlike you single otakus, Link has had an extremely cute and beautiful girlfriend since childhood.)

(Thus Rio being equal to him is a big deal.)

While the three of them were staring daggers at Rio, Rio glanced at the date on his smartphone:

"Hmm, it's already the night of the third day, we don't have much time let's go to the central area now.." (Rio)

Hearing Rio mentioning going to the central area, one of the three newbies said:

"oh, yeah, Rio Senpai, aren't we already too late now, with the speed of us three, it will take at least two days to reach the central area." (Npc no.3)

"Yeah Senpai, moreover we can't travel during the night due to the presence of several monsters in the forest... Sigh~ we should have gone to the central area from the start.. sigh~" (Npc no.2) historical

Hearing them say that they couldn't travel during the night, Rio had a devilish smile in his mind, he used his storage ring and brought out a rope from it. Before the three of them could understand what Rio was going to do. They found that all three of them were tied tightly to each other and the other end of the rope was tied to the handle of Rio's blade.

Rio turned his blade into a broad sword and used his aura to make his sword float.

"W-wait, wh-what are you trying to do se-senpai, do-don't tell me-" (Npc no.1)

Before the sentence could be finished Rio jumped on his broadsword, which was floating horizontally in the air, and after Rio stood on the sword he looked at the three of them, gave them a thumbs up, and said with an expressionless face:

"Good luck!" (Rio)

[Sword intent: wind type!]

In that instant the sword flew into the night sky like a meteor, the air pressure created by the take-off created cracks in the ground and destroyed the rest of the trees that were still left after the previous attack.

(Apparently, after Rio reached Rank B+ he could now use his Sword intent to fly in the air and soar into the sky. Rio was planning on carrying Lia princess-style while flying like this but since Lia already has her spirit wings now, he couldn't do that yet. But perhaps it could be possible in the future.)

The speed of sword was incredibly fast but Rio could control it properly like it was a part of his body, also he used his sword intentionally to protect the three newbies from dying due to wind pressure, but of course, he let them suffer a little bit just for the sake of training them.

"Waaaaaahhhhhhhhhggggggggggg...." (Npc no.1)

"Sttttttooooooooppppppppppp, I am dyyyyyiiiiiiinggggggg!!!!!" (Npc no.2)

Hearing them scream Rio said:

"What? I can't hear you up here at all~" (Rio)

Rio shook his head and rushed towards the central area with incredible speed.

...

...

Outside the SSA, General's Residence, Meeting hall..

Three holograms could be seen in front of the General and all the other high-rank officers.

"It seems only three of the 'Special ones' are here, can I ask why the last one didn't attend this meeting?" (General Bismoil)

Hearing his question, Raji said:

"Hmm, that arrogant guy Jin... He is busy taking care of Anna.. I already informed him he refused to attend, he's just being arrogant since he became an SS ranker..." (Raji Croft)

"Well, you shouldn't say that Raji, anyone would be distressed when their loved ones are injured..." (Neo Aldif)

"You are in no place to lecture me, so just shut up... Ugh, why do I have to attend a meeting with an old fogey like you, tsk" (Raji)

"Okay, okay, now calm down you too, we still have a very important thing to discuss here..." (Ashtel Rex)

'Seriously! When will this girl grow up, this is why I said that you should marry early, at least you could learn how to be patient from marriage.. if nothing else...' (Ashtel)

"Don't try to act like a good person Ashtel, I know you must be mocking me in your head!" (Raji)

'How does she know that!?' (Ashtel)

"W-well let's forget about this and complete this meeting first, okay?" (Neo)

Hearing all three of them bickering General Bismoil had a complicated look on his face, it's not every day you meet all three SS-rankers of the human empire all at once so it was a shock for him to see them bickering, it is like seeing gods you revere behaving like ordinary people, so of course it is quite shocking.

The outside world might think of the SS-rankers as gods and higher beings that are totally impossible to imagine, but they are still humans and have their own personalities and emotions. There may be many differences between the three of them, but, one thing is the same, all three of them are the greatest protectors of humanity, and without them, the existence of humanity would be in danger.

In this cruel world, Without an SS-ranker to protect, the race can only be a vassal race of another stronger one. Over the years, many SS-rankers have sacrificed their lives to protect the human race from extinction and the never-ending invasions of the demon race.

Thinking that all three of them are not planning to stop this endless bickering, General Bismoil had to interrupt it:

"Ahem! Well let's start the meeting now, we will inform the results of the meeting to Mr. Jin later. For now, let's talk about the main topic of why we have gathered here.. Let's talk about the 'Meeting of gods' that is going to be held this year.." (General Bismoil)

Hearing the name of the 'Meeting of Gods' all of the people's faces turned serious and even the three 'special ones' turned serious now..

..

..

Author's notes.

Yo! Your beloved author is here on the stage! So recently I saw many comments praising that the book is good, so thank you all. I am very happy to find that you all liked my writing so much.

Question of the day:

Compared to Link how much pathetic your life is? (Today there are no options since all of you have different stories to tell..)

(Personally, if I compare myself to Link, you could say that if Link is a dragon then I am a common fly, there's basically no comparison between us. Actually, I am a lot jealous of Link myself. This might be the reason why Link was originally a villain, he literally has everything that an ordinary person dreams of.)

By the way, don't forget to use those power stones and also leave a review if you like the story. Comment your opinion about the chapter. Your support is my motivation.