Chapter 304
Seojun waited with the frontline pushed in until Daran’s two nobles finished making forged identification cards and returned with them.
The two moved together. One of them alone would have been enough, so why bother?
“What if I just push through while they’re gone? Aren’t you worried about that, everyone?”
Of course, even if he simply left, they still had some time to spare. But shouldn’t they be keeping watch anyway?
“Or perhaps…”
Seojun thought of that person.
A hero belonging to a guild from Daran.
“Lady Aba the Hermit must be keeping watch.”
He was certain of it.
Just as Seojun expected, the moment he muttered those words, a person appeared in the scenery some distance away.
“Please stop talking like Asius! I mean… hello.”
“Hello.”
She was not a professional player. She was an amateur.
Since she was a female streamer, he had called her “sister.”
Aba was originally a woman, too.
“Hello, Sister.”
“Ugh.”
Seojun chuckled.
Her gimmick was amusing.
No other participant had played along like this.
“Since it’ll take them a little while to get here, shall we have a conversation in the meantime, Sister?”
“Sounds good.”
“Before that, though, don’t you think we should be a little closer physically if we’re going to talk?”
“I’ll have to politely decline.”
Seojun realized that Aba did not know his movement speed.
If she did, she would have kept her distance even more.
“Understood. Then could you perhaps tell me how far along you are with the quest?”
“I’ll politely decline that as well.”
There was nothing else to ask.
Seojun shrugged, then closed his mouth.
And after about three minutes, she spoke to him again.
“So you’re Kael, negotiating with the hostages—the people of Daran. Isn’t Asius usually more of a defensive type?”
Seojun gave a faint laugh.
“I’m going through a rebellious phase. Ah-ah.”
“Gasp.”
“I’ve fallen.”
“…Your smile is quite refreshing.”
“It’s because I feel liberated.”
“Really?”
“It was part of the gimmick.”
“Yes.”
Even as they exchanged pointless remarks, she was trying to investigate Seojun as thoroughly as possible.
So Seojun remained completely still.
He did not want to give her even the slightest clue.
Fwoosh!
Then, to test the waters, she sent a light skill flying at him.
She seemed intent on checking his health, at least.
A small, cone-shaped mass of magic flew toward its target at high speed, and Seojun immediately drew his sword and slashed downward from above.
At an intentionally ordinary speed.
The spell would continue homing in until the orb was destroyed.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“It seemed like it would be all right. If it wasn’t…”
“If it wasn’t?”
“I’m sorry!”
Her instincts were accurate.
Seojun had no desire to fight right now.
No—he did not want to engage until he had resolved the very last problem, if possible.
The reason was simple: he could not kill people.
The chances of her deducing that were low.
But if they kept fighting, even someone slow on the uptake would eventually realize it.
“I’m truly sorry!”
Seojun returned his sword to the sheath hanging at his waist.
“Please be careful, Sister.”
“Understood. Ah. A notification just appeared saying that two participants have arrived in Atura.”
So it was the Thieves’ Guild after all.
“They arrived quickly.”
The nobles must have requested and obtained the forged identification cards from the Thieves’ Guild as well, so she had probably known about that, too.
“Yes. Fortunately, Daran won’t be destroyed.”
“Then let’s protect Daran from the forces of evil together.”
“……”
“Shall we go to the destination together?”
“……”
Are you really a psychopath?
That was the look he felt coming from her.
Seojun saw the two professional players approaching from the distance and added one final remark.
“It’s possible that I’m not actually the mastermind. You should take that into consideration as well.”
***
Aba the Hermit glared at the back of the shrunken Kael as he leisurely walked toward Daran while wearing a disguise mask.
Then she snorted.
“There’s no way he isn’t the mastermind.”
As far as she was concerned, Seojun was unquestionably the mastermind.
Judging from the information they had gathered, Seojun was by no means an altruistic person.
Various related incidents were currently occurring in several places.
Daran had been the first to resolve its quest, but still.
He had deliberately come to Daran.
‘Could he perhaps have one foot in Daran’s quest?’
The possibility was almost nonexistent.
That was because the quest had been carried out solely by her and the other two participants from Daran who were not here.
They would need help now, but still.
“But what if he heard something in Train? We know that he placed first in that quest and received the reward.”
Syeon, a brilliant American professional player and one of Daran’s nobles, asked her a question. She answered.
“I couldn’t bring this up earlier because we were in a hurry, but do you know Lord Divine Sword?”
“Yes.”
“I heard that Lord Divine Sword caused a disturbance in Train.”
“A disturbance?”
“Yes. He said he had seen through an artifact that Lord Kael was the mastermind. He caused quite a scene.”
The advantage of being a participant affiliated with a guild was that one could access, at very little cost, most of the information uploaded within the guild, which had spread its web across the entire continent.
Of course, one had to be an executive rather than a low-ranking member for information access to be easy and inexpensive.
A low-ranking guild member could hardly be a hero, after all.
There might be new heroes like that, but there had not been any so far.
Among the fifty participants in this History Book, only one was a direct guild executive.
And that was her.
“Ah… If Lord Divine Sword said that, then there’s a ninety-nine percent chance…”
Smoke did not rise from a chimney without a fire.
“Lord Seojun must know, too, that we wouldn’t believe him anyway.”
“He must have accepted all of that. If so, why didn’t he kill us? Once he had obtained the identification cards, it wouldn’t have been strange for a battle to break out.”
“We can only assume that we managed our distance well. We made certain that a fight would never occur.”
“Hmm.”
“Now it’s Daran’s turn to take action. You’ll help us, won’t you?”
“Of course.”
“Let’s move. To stop that one man.”
The first battle between ordinary heroes and the mastermind.
“Even if we can’t kill him this time…”
The side that secured victory would gain the advantage.
“But where are we supposed to go? Where is that passage we’re supposed to destroy?”
“Lord Syeon’s territory.”
“What?”
“Let’s go. The last remaining participant is there as well.”
***
“So I’ve entered Daran.”
Seojun used the teleportation magic circle at Atura on Daran’s side.
The fee was five points.
The normal price was around two points, but since Seojun had entered illegally, it seemed an additional charge had been added.
His destination was Cabero Territory.
It belonged to the participant Syeon.
[Hahaha! They really gave you forged identification cards of their own accord. You’re insane! You’re insane! Hahaha!]
For some reason, Seojun felt as though the AI was pouring all the things it wanted to say at him through that Fragment.
‘It’s just my imagination, right?’
It was not just Seojun’s imagination.
-That guy lmaoooooooo Is the AI actually cursing at him in real time? LOL
-I’d be cursing too if I were the AI lmao
-The calculations keep throwing errors
-Even the AI couldn’t predict this
-Wow! Did you see how calmly he’s threatening them? The host really is the god of abusing his authority
[So now your true identity has been completely exposed! There’s no other possibility! It feels strange for me to say this when I’m the one who placed restrictions on you, but you can’t even silence them by killing them now. What are you going to do?!]
“What do you mean, what am I going to do? Now that I’m in Daran, why don’t you explain the situation properly? I understand that I’m supposed to stop them from destroying the passage, but how exactly am I supposed to stop them?”
It had said that it would explain the details once he entered Daran.
Getting inside had been the problem in the first place.
The quest had been designed that way.
‘The mastermind usually doesn’t have this many obstacles to overcome.’
Normally, the mastermind started with a tremendous advantage and was allowed to continue playing under favorable circumstances. That applied to every quest.
But once again, Seojun had the feeling that this time was different.
It had to be his imagination.
Perhaps this History Book was simply a little more difficult than usual.
[Fine, I’ll tell you. If you head north from Cabero, you’ll find a large mountain. I hid a passage there and sent the Hounds through it in advance. But it seems they’ve discovered it. That force known as the guild.]
Hound was the term used for the monsters from another world.
Everything in that world was directly or indirectly connected to the Fragment’s main body, and all of them were bodies that could do nothing but move according to the will of the main body.
In that sense, Hound, meaning a hunting dog, was an appropriate name.
“And?”
[That alone would have been fine, but they captured the Hounds and experimented on them. Then they began to guard against the power of my main body.]
“You mean the Thieves’ Guild did that?”
[Yes. They also extracted power from the Hounds, stored it, and made bombs that released it in an explosion. Those bombs are powerful enough to destroy the passage and cause it to close.]
“Hmm. So you want me to interfere and prevent them from capturing any more Hounds?”
[Exactly. The Hounds’ ability to hide is excellent, but they will soon complete the development of a device that can detect and track my energy.]
That must be the next round.
Seojun nodded and organized his thoughts.
He had to interfere and keep them from capturing all the Hounds.
But he could not kill them.
He would have to engage in a fierce battle of wits and somehow prevent the opposing side from fulfilling its quota.
‘Interference. A battle of wits. Hounds. Four people.’
The balance was right, wasn’t it?
“Then let’s move on to what happens if I fail.”
[What are you curious about?]
“What price will I have to pay if I fail?”
[Hahahaha! Are you afraid you’ll fail?]
He had clearly put the AI in its place earlier and told it to stop saying useless things and just answer him.
Apparently, that had not been enough.
[Don’t worry too much. This body will never abandon a mere fledgling like you. Still, you’ll have to pay a price.]
Was the price merely a suitable nerf to maintain balance?
Seojun inferred as much from the conversation and began moving north.
“This one seems pretty difficult, everyone. Still, I think there’s a way.”
And following behind him, three participants arrived at Cabero, where they received their equipment and quests.
And so, Day Eight came to an end.
***
The following day at noon.
“The outline is finally beginning to emerge! The quest about the missing villagers, which may have seemed insignificant to the participants! The monster-subjugation quest! The caravan escort quest! All of them may be connected to the passage to another world! The participants need to step up!”
The Ark’s stream was brimming with excitement before the start of Day Nine.
“And then—Daran! Two factions are going to clash in Cabero, Daran! Of course, one side can’t kill anyone, while the other side can’t be killed! Who do you think will win?”
-Why can’t the host kill anyone? LMAOOOO
-The host just can’t be killed through skill alone
-Lol, now that the host can’t kill people, they need to drive him out lmao
-They’re going to have one hell of a battle of wits
-Possible?
-The host says it’s possible. He said he has a way
-Impossible. How could he have a way?
-Please, just once, I want the pros to realize that the host can’t kill people and start acting like jerks lmao PLEASE!!!
-I kind of want to see him get bullied lol
-You know what? Most people will probably realize now that the host is far more skilled, right? They’ll be thinking, “Why am I not dead?” lol
-LMAOOOOOO
And then.
The appointed time arrived, and the participants began logging into Pangaea.