There was a momentary silence after all the commotion in the store. I could hear the clinking of the armor from behind me. Subsequently, dozens of heavily armed guards showed up to the place.
“Don’t move!”
“Lord Veluce is watching you!”
Standing still in the corner of the store which he caused a huge mess in, the man quickly threw himself towards a broken wall in the store. The guards chased him shortly after.
After having a grasp on the situation, I quickly got up from my spot and threw myself towards the broken wall that the guards went over with no hesitation.
And for a moment, the background around me seemed to stretch as if I just pressed down on my pedals on a bicycle.
This was the first time that I’ve sprinted with all my might in , so I was honestly pretty surprised.
When I threw myself over the broken wall, it was outside of a very high building.
However, I was able to land on the floor by putting force on my ankles without much panic even when I was falling straight to the ground.
I didn’t even have enough time to be surprised and impressed with myself.
Minutes have passed since I calmed myself down from the shock and started running through downtown. I’ve already passed by most of the guards.
The darkness from the alleys welcomed me after taking a turn from the streets with floating lanterns.
I continued my pursuit after the man to the place where I heard a guard who was chasing him until the very end.
“Huff, Huff!”
And the pursuit ended right there.
Because the guard which was the last trace of that man was nowhere to be found.
That was the very moment when my dreams of getting a clue to the rare class was shattered to pieces.
And at that very discouraging moment, a hand suddenly burst out from the dark alley and grabbed me.
“Kurgh!”
Thud!
In an instant, I was grabbed by my neck guard and was slammed down to the ground. And at that moment I noticed a blade aimed precisely between my helmet and the armor touching my throat.
“Why are you following me?”
A man with short black hair, and bags under his hollow eyes stared at me menacingly. But that didn’t last long,
“Intriguing.”
After swishing and swooshing his thin blades around me a few times, he skillfully pulled my necklace out to his hands.
“You, where did you get this?”
Just as his stare was starting to become more intense as if a beam was about to shoot out of his eyes, I could hear the rushing footsteps of the guards from the distance.
The moment he heard that he pulled out a pebble from his pocket, with his face slightly grimaced.
“To Astani!”
He shouted. The pebble shattered the moment it touched the ground, and branches of lightning spread out in all directions and a long oval object that seemed to be a mirror appeared.
The object reflected the dark endless deep sea.
You could tell from the first sight that it was a portal. The man covered me with his cloak and instantly bursted up and when I touched the ground, the forest floor welcomed me with scents of grass instead of the well organized stone floor.
A map entry notice appeared in front of my eyes. It turns out I was moved to a completely different area. As soon as I got up from my seat, barely holding onto my nauseous head, his thin blade was pointed at my throat once again.
“Answer my question. That was, without a doubt, the Polorun’s Star.”
“I got this… from a gamble…!!”
“What?”
His eyes rose at my words, and soon after he took a few steps closer towards me with a terrifyingly cold face.
“You better tell me the truth.”
“So I got this thing from buying a piece of a relic from an old man in this one sea village called Linduroak…”
“You, do you remember how he looked and what he was wearing?!”
The man seemed to be so shocked that I could almost feel his murderous intentions.
Unlike reality, the virtual reality of allows a player to be affected by any kind of imaginary force, and thanks to that I was able to go through a terrifying experience of my chin and tongue getting petrified from his murderous intent.
“W-well… It happened all so quick, and I wasn’t really able to focus on the old man at all so… Ah!”
At that moment, I had an exhilarating thought pass through my head which caused me to exclaim involuntarily. I could see his shoulders quiver at my shout.
“There were two heavily armored people guarding the old man from both sides.”
After hearing my words, the man withdrew his blades from me and slumped down to the ground.
“He was in Linduroak the whole time huh, it feels like I got hit in the back of the head.”
“Who in the world…”
He pulled out a strangely shaped pipe out of his cloak before I could even finish my sentence. Then he naturally created a small flame on his fingertip to light his pipe and exhaled a heavy cigarette smoke.
When he opened his mouth I could see the sparkling patterns inside his throat.
“He is the prey I was chasing after. ‘Gambler Lairo’, he is wanted criminal in four different continents, and considered a ‘special A rank criminal’ in information guilds.”
“… What?”
I couldn’t believe what I just heard. That old man was a bigger thing than I ever imagined.
My mind was starting to go numb at the shocking fact that I just heard and the sparkles inside this throat.
“He is the one that knows about the ‘disappearance of Langerus Cavalry’ which is considered the 4 Great Mysteries of the continent of Asparagan.”
“ Lange…rus…”
I’ve heard this name a lot somewhere
Yes, I remember now. I saw this name from the information window from an item called the Polorun’s Star!
“It was a case of the Langerus Cavalry, which is considered the strongest cavalry of all time, who disappeared right after they left for their campaign. Soon after the incident, an investigation team went to check the area they disappeared in, but all they could find was a ruin that suddenly appeared there.
“Then, this necklace which came out of that ruin is…”
“Yes, it belongs to the Commander in Chief of the Langerus Cavalry, Commander Polorun.”
“Why did the old man start selling these relics…?”
There was no end to my questions. And also that man was using honorifics when he referred to the person named Polorun. I came to the conclusion that he is deeply related to the commander for whatever reason.
However, he did not say anything after that.
He just stared at me, silently starting to scan my armor all around.
“I guess I lost my cool the moment I saw that necklace, I said too much.”
“What…?”
“And you’re an adventurer so I guess I can’t keep your mouth shut forever. “
Consider yourself lucky that you are favored by Bellica. I will find you and kill you over and over again until you swear that you won’t tell anybody about this matter.”
Soon, he started to point his thin blade at me. Surprised by the sudden change in his attitude, I involuntarily took a step backwards.
I could tell that he must be on a completely different level of strength than someone like Gilutin who was withered by a curse, or Python who had a considerably low level. It was clear that I couldn’t have beaten him even if I poured everything I had on him.
But it was true that there wasn’t really a way out of this, so I decided to quietly lower my body. The only advantage I have with Sharma is that I can lead the battle with my opponent being unaware of my weapon.
I can at least give him some damage if I attack him with a unique level item!
“What are you doing without a sword? Don’t tell me you’re going to use magic in that heavy armor of yours?”
He soon rushed at me with his cloak flapping. The soil from the ground flew through the air behind him, and the grass flew wildly around him.
He leaped with tremendous force, and he was so quick that I had to turn my head to confirm his position when I had my eyes half opened.
“Die!”
His blade reached towards my side. I barely managed to dodge his attack after exhausting my bones and muscle to the point they’d want to scream.
And at that very moment,
“Sharma…!”
I whispered softly, and waited for the touch of the sword that was about to appear in my right hand.
And the moment I felt it!
I swung my sword at him with all my might.
Klank!
The sound of both swords colliding made my arms numb and my head dizzy. It was just two blades colliding but the recoil was enough to make me slide tens of meters as if I was on an ice.
“ Ugh…!”
Pain rose from my elbow and I let out a heavy breath without even realizing it. But that wasn’t the important thing. When I hurriedly turned my head to the front,
His blade has already arrived right in front of my eyes.
“Kurgh…!”
I clenched my teeth and swung the Sharma upwards with all my might to block his strike, but he was so strong that my body was launched away and the momentum finally stopped when I knocked down the tree behind me.
It felt like every blood vessel in my body was exploding. The moment I let out a breath from my mouth, I felt a stabbing pain all over my body from the broken ribs.
“Cough!”
The blood I coughed out of my mouth,
And my vision was starting to get blurry,
But the red texts that came to my mind were clear as day. The Polorun’s star will heal me up as time passes, but my opponent is tough enough to make me unsure if I can withstand even a few seconds for the item to activate.
I could see the man walk up to me through my blurry vision.
This hidden quest turned out to be much harder than I thought. Or maybe, the quest was too much to handle for me in the first place since all I have are good items.
Not to mention this excruciating pain, making me want to desperately give everything up and escape from this situation.
So he raised his sword high and swung it towards me.
I closed my eyes tightly, and my vision was filled with darkness.
***
***
However,
I felt that hazy darkness become clearer, and when I carefully opened my eyes, the thin blade pointed towards me was impeded powerlessly by a greatsword.
The middle aged man with the huge sword, his white hair neatly tied up waving around him glared at the man with bags under his eyes with his scary hawk’s eyes.
“Master Robin…!?”
The man in the black cloak had his face crumpled up the moment he saw the man with a greatsword.
And soon after,
“Anyone who reveals the secrets of our mission will be eliminated.”
“Well, that’s…”
I’d rather trust a goblin than trust you. I told you countless times about the rule and still you couldn’t keep your damn mouth shut?”
“Y-you see…”
The middle aged man who spat out profanity swung his swords at a speed which my eyes couldn’t even follow. As my vision started to clear up even more, I could see the both arms of the man in the black cloak get cut off.
“A-Aaaaah!”
The man in the black cloak, who knelt down on the ground squealing in pain looked at the man called Robin with a desperate look on his face.
“A ‘Sworder’ asks truth only to his blade.”
“A sworder swears his life to his blade. You leaked our secret and tried to cover the evidence, and betrayed your oath to the sword. Therefore, you are a traitor.”
“N-No I…!”
“You leaked the secret of our mission so naturally as if it was nothing. Not to mention that you spilled our secret to an ‘immortal’ who doesn’t even die. In other words, you are deprived of the position.
“N-No!”
He cried out with a desperate expression on his face, and his head was soon cut off by a greatsword that swung so quickly that I couldn’t even see it.
After witnessing a shockingly violent scene clearly with my eyes, I couldn’t keep my legs from giving up, causing me to collapse down to the ground.
Honestly, I was proud of myself for not pissing my pants after seeing such a violent scene you would find in a gore movie.
The middle aged man looked at me without any expression on his face.
On the top of his head there was,
A flaming text box.
He grabbed me by my collar to put me back on my legs.
“You have learned a part of the secrets to our mission. Choose, immortal. No, you call yourselves users, or players, correct? I know you get revived no matter how many times you die.”
Sputtered Robin with his heavy voice in front of me. I could sense his deep concerns from his face and wrinkles.
“The first choice you have is to be killed in such a painful way that you would break your own eardrums with your own scream. It’s an easier job to find you than finding a leaf on the ground in autumn.”
He paused for a moment and looked at the poor headless corpse that was lying on the floor spilling blood.
“However, nobody knows how far you can extend your life for, so instead of such a hopeless painful path, you have a second option to choose from.
It’s to join us. A sworder is not selected this way usually… but honestly, I never imagined that our secret would leak to an immortal ever. Thanks to that bastard over there we get to add something new to our history.
The man spat on the ground as soon as he finished his words. I couldn’t stop my trembling as if I was biting a vibrating phone in my mouth. I barely calmed my lower jaw down and carefully spoke out.
I knew what I was going to choose. And if I were to be targeted by a man like him I would be forced to stop playing the game which is the worst situation.
“I would like to join your group.”
He smiled when I barely managed to finish my words.
“Goodness, I never even imagined that we would have an immortal join us sworders. It’s as absurd as Bellica shivering in the cold.”
His reaction made me regret my decision a little bit.
I never knew the clue to the rare class would lead me to some lunatics like these guys.
A moment later, he let go of my collar. I immediately dropped to my knees onto the grass since I couldn’t keep my legs straight anymore. The man opened his mouth, stretching the scar on his lips.
“Anyways, it’s a good thing I was able to fill the empty spot in the group immediately. Nice to meet you.”
He reached his hand out to me.
Reassured, I raised my arm carefully to grab his hand.
And at that moment,
“It’s another matter if you can become a sworder or not.”
With an evil smile on his face, unlike before, Robin clenched his fist with the hand extended towards me,