Chapter 44: Chapter 40: “Are You Scared?”

CHAPTER 40: “ARE YOU AFRAID?”

 

“Could it be because you were the one who declared your quest to Tirto?”

Ai had thought about that as well. That was the only thing that differentiated the two of them. Ai had been the one who answered Tirto when being asked about what they needed, so it made sense that he was the only one who got this quest because the NPC recognized him as the player who continued with the conversation. 

In a traditional MMORPG, he would be the one who clicked continue on the dialog box while Morion clicked out. Maybe if Morion had answered Tirto’s question as well after Ai, he would’ve gotten the quest but that was just speculation.

They could go and try to find Tirto again but because of [World Symphony]’s dynamic NPC AI, the quest probably wouldn’t be triggered for Morion because he and NPC already met and interacted.

“In any case, we should try and walk around.” Ai suggested. “What do you think we should be looking out for? The quest said ‘survive for the night’.”

Morion shrugged, appearing nonchalant, but Ai saw the tips of his fingers shaking. Could he be...

“The only danger we know so far is the dragon, but I don’t think-”

His words were cut abruptly as he grabbed hold of Ai’s wrist then pulled him back, the momentum causing both of them to land on the dusty floor with a hard slam. Ai wasn’t sure of what happened but he saw a part of his HP had dropped, meaning he had taken damage. Looking up, he only saw a wisp of white shadow vanishing into thin air.

“It was a woman with long hair, she slashed you with her nails.” Morion explained, wincing slightly from his rough landing on the floor. “Did she get you?”

“Only a bit of HP.” 

“Any poison or debuffs?”

He might’ve forgotten that they were in a virtual world because of panic but the man actually tried to check if Ai had been injured, touching and patting places on his arms to find out where it hurt. Ai almost laughed.

After he seemed satisfied enough, though he wouldn’t find any injuries in the first place, he gave Ai a short pat on the head then pushed him up. Ai withdrew a sharp breath and looked away once he realized that he had been sitting on the other player's lap all that time, almost in his embrace.

“Are you sure nothing’s wrong?”

Ai cleared his throat and wondered if his voice sounded a pitch higher than normal. “It’s a virtual world anyway, even if I got slashed…”

His voice trailed off as he looked at his HP status once more. A quarter of the green bar should’ve been replaced by grey, telling him how much HP he had lost, but now the color was black instead of grey.

Ai took out a minor HP potion from his inventory and used it. A sense of dread entered his system when he saw that the HP potion wasn’t recovering his HP at all. Sure, the potion he used wasn’t at all strong, but it should’ve recovered some of his health. 

Was he cursed?

This time, Ai took out his dagger. Closing his eyes, he pointed the blade towards his palm and made a shallow cut. Though he didn’t feel any pain, it still didn’t feel good mentally to cut himself on purpose.

“Ai, what are you-?”

“It’s a curse.”

His HP bar said it all. After he did damage to himself, his HP lowered again but this time, the newly reduced HP was displayed in grey rather than black.

“The damage that the mob gave me, I can’t heal it. The bar is black instead of grey. Have you heard of something like that?”

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“Yes but…” Morion hesitated. “Not in a low leveled area like this.”

Then he proceeded to explain. 

The debuff was called [Stone Curse]. It would prevent a player from recovering a certain amount of HP. No class could learn the skill to cast the debuff and there were no skills that could remove it. The [Stone Curse] was a special debuff that only appeared in certain quests for a number of uses. Sometimes as restrictions, sometimes as timers, and sometimes as punishment for breaking rules. In Ai’s quest, it seemed like it was there as a difficulty multiplier. Morion noted that it was odd for the debuff to appear in a low level area since it was a known fact that the [Stone Curse] was a high difficulty [Ranked Quest] specialty designed to make things challenging and interesting for high leveled players.

“Ai, can you see the quest level?”

Ai shook his head. The [Quest Log] only displayed three question marks where the level should be.

“It might be the case that your current level is much too low to be able to read it.”

Ai felt a gust of wind against his back. This time, he was much more prepared and jumped out of the way before the claws could damage him further. Athens swung his claws at the spirit but his paws only swung at air as the entity vanished once more, leaving only a lingering cold feeling in the air.

So they couldn’t be attacked either since they were spirits, which made things difficult. Their only option was to defend and evade.

“Let’s get out of here.”

Ai didn’t refuse the idea. The longer they stayed there, the more frequent the attacks would get and no doubt the other spirits would catch wind of their location as well which meant that they would have to deal with more than just slashing nails that inflicted [Stone Curse]. 

The spirits also seemed to only target Ai, so far none had even tried to attack Morion. He might not even get inflicted with the [Stone Curse] if the spirits’ attacks did end up hurting him.

As the three left the building, Ai quietly looked back to see an elderly person leaning against one of the windows. In their hand was a lit cigarette, the smoke from the nicotine swirling up into the roof. Once Ai blinked, the person was no longer there. Ai shuddered and huddled a little bit closer to Morion.

He had never been the type to get scared of ghosts and the like, but seeing one with his own eyes was an entirely different feeling than just hearing about it through ghost stories or watching actors act like one in movies.

Not two steps out the door and Morion already pushed Ai behind him once more while he swung his sword upwards. The creature he faced was tall, much taller than Morion but it couldn’t be called a giant. Aside from its size, its features were vague and wispy but its sharp giant teeth glinted under the moonlight.

Its large mouth opened wide, showing another row of sharp teeth. With a hiss, it managed to slither past Morion and would’ve devoured Ai’s small body instantly. Quick on his feet, Ai managed to leap away as the creature’s giant jaws smacked against the ground. 

Morion charged at the creature and swung his sword, the miasma expanding and curling around the wielder’s hand and the creature’s body. At the last moment before the sword could hit, the creature turned around and met Morion’s eyes. Its gaze was terrifyingly cold and eerie. Because of the surprise at the creature’s sudden movements or, Ai suspected, fear, Morion faltered and the creature vanished into thin air just like all the other creatures from before.

The night turned quiet once more.

Still breathing heavily, Morion lowered his sword and recalled the miasma to float around the dark blade as it always did when it was inactive. Meanwhile Athens gently nudged Ai to his feet. 

He worryingly gazed at Morion. That monster had been the scariest looking one so far. Though its form wasn’t very definite, its eyes and its bloody sharp teeth made it an extremely terrifying sight that couldn’t be forgotten so easily.

“Let’s leave immediately.” Morion’s voice was the same as always, if not a bit higher.

“Morion,” Ai spoke up suddenly. “You could just not help me…the spirits are only targeting me anyways. You can just stay here and wait until dawn.”

Ai had been thinking about it quietly, about why Morion kept protecting him in this quest even though he really didn’t need to. He was the only one who got the quest so it made sense if he completed it on his own. The two of them weren’t exactly close, they haven't known each other for long.

“We got here together after all, it wouldn’t be fair to leave you to deal with it alone.” A brief answer and he was once again nudging him to leave the area together.

Ai managed to catch Morion’s hand on his own, pulling him back. Now that he was holding the bigger hand directly, he felt it. The subtle shake and the coldness of them.

“Morion, are you scared of ghosts?”

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