Before the Fruits of Choice (6)

I drew my longsword with my newly freed right arm. I wanted to snap the remaining chains as well, but the demons were already too close.

I impaled the three-headed hound that lunged to sink its fangs into my nape, then hurled the carcass aside. A skeleton caught the flying corpse and toppled backward.

But I missed the second hound. Pain flared through my calf; I clenched my teeth—pure performance, of course. I had already lowered the pain threshold, so it barely registered—and drove my blade between the mongrel’s eyes.

Seogak!

Tadak!

A foreign sensation scraped across my back. A skeleton clacking its teeth had slashed me from behind. Kwak! An axe buried itself in my shoulder next. That one actually stung a little.

Biiiiiiii.

A high-pitched tinnitus flooded my ears, the same ringing I only ever heard when stress hit critical.

Was I going to give up because of this? Hardly. I was a gamer with grit.

Chaeeng!

I perfectly parried the rusty blade thrusting at me from the front and gathered mana for a skill. The damage already taken was water under the bridge; this was just a gambit to keep the next strike from landing.

Power surged into my legs and finally snapped the chains that had been binding them.

“I’ll kill you…!”

My neck and waist were still shackled, but as long as I could turn, it wasn’t urgent. The only reason I’d eaten that backstab earlier was because I hadn’t been able to twist that way.

I checked the HP bar that had already dropped below half, then wrenched my torso around. The sword followed the motion farther than my waist, unleashing a horizontal Chamgyeok.

Kwajik!

The spines of the two skeletons behind me shattered, separating upper bodies from lower.

Puuk!

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Meanwhile the tiniest skeleton managed to stab me in the gut. I wondered briefly whether rusty blades were supposed to be stirring around inside living flesh, then decided it didn’t matter.

Even the most realistic games rarely modeled infection.

Kwak!

I had no intention of getting skewered twice, so I crushed that skeleton’s skull. The same fluid strike continued seamlessly and deflected the final skeleton’s attack.

“…have mercy!”

Then one of those damned demon contractors—the one whose face was laced with black veins—cast a spell on me. Dark-crimson energy seeped into every wound I already carried, and a bizarre sensation bloomed.

It didn’t hurt… yet the feeling of flesh being gnawed from within was crystal clear. Especially the abdomen. Something writhed and boiled inside the dagger wound, devouring my organs.

“Kh—…”

Against my will, a stream of blood climbed my throat and spilled out. The sensation was utterly alien.

Fatigue, drowsiness, tinnitus, even the feeling of coughing up blood—this game recreated every last one. It was far too real.

I would have preferred they left the useless details out.

“Just die already, you monster…!”

And… was it because my fatigue had maxed at 100 and I kept moving, or because HP was scraping the floor?

Either way, the edges of my vision fogged. The world ahead refused to resolve. My already sluggish mind grew heavier with every drop of blood I lost.

“Demon Knight!!”

The thought that I might have to restart this whole mess somehow dragged strength back into my limbs.

I swung my sword to the sound of that booming cry. The last skeleton’s head popped clean off, and my knees folded against my will.

“Damn it!”

“Oh, this is perfect! Our sacrifice—!”

“Receive judgment, you vile traitors!!”

I stared blankly at the window announcing the activation of a skill I’d taken ages ago. What was that one again?

Ah, right. Looking at the window brought it back. It was the final node of the passive tree that raised defense and vitality. I’d maxed it early purely for the death-nullifying effect.

Never expected it to shine here of all places.

I glanced at the restored HP bar, then let my eyelids fall for a moment. Vision went black with a soft blink.

“——!”

Not long after, something hummed and throbbed in my ears.

“—Knight!”

A familiar voice. One that had completely worn itself into my hearing after traveling together so long…

“Demon Knight!”

A hallucination?

“Please come to your senses!”

Ah… wait. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Not a hallucination?

“Demon Knight!”

The great shout finally jolted my consciousness awake. My head began to clear, little by little.

It felt like having my face forced underwater until I nearly drowned, only to be yanked out at the last second—the relief of air mixed with the choking scrape of still-starved lungs.

“Demon Knight!”

Through the muffled cotton of my ears the familiar voice reached me again. Three full beats later I finally recognized its owner.

“You.”

“I’m stopping the bleeding! No matter how hard it is, you must stay conscious.”

I’d thought I closed my eyes for one second, yet minutes must have passed. Suddenly the Inquisitor was right in front of me.

“Hold on tightly to your mind.”

Y-yeah. Right. I should… I really should…

I lay on the ground panting.

Khuk, khuk. Blood kept rising. The pain settings spared me agony, but speaking was still obstructed. I coughed and spat crimson.

“Just a little more strength. Just a little more and you’ll make it.”

The Archmage was here too. Well, of course—those two were practically a set.

With that idle thought I snuck a look at my HP bar. Clear numbers were always better for assessing the situation than the Archmage’s words.

And I discovered HP was bobbing right at the bottom. I’d barely scraped past death by a hair.

Once the bleeding stopped, the recovery would overtake the drain. No more life-or-death worries, then.

“This place… is not it.”

“Pardon?”

Good. Alive was enough. I resolved to do what I had to do.

“Outside.”

The quest had updated. That settled it.

“Not here… outside…”

Ah, shit. Blood pooling in my mouth made talking agony. My head was already foggy; forming the necessary words was nearly impossible.

But if I didn’t say this, we’d probably have to restart.

Not even knowing whether the words were coming out right, I simply moved my tongue.

“Their goal… is to… draw us in…”

“What?”

“What do you mean by—”

“The real one… is out…side…”

Tsk. This wasn’t working.

Why couldn’t this game let a combat-incapacitated person cast a few-second first-aid skill? Same old complaint, so I shoved it aside.

With fading vision I opened the skill window.

Treatment was a skill I’d taken ages ago; Proper Treatment I had just bought with the points from the recent level-up.

With stopping the bleeding the priority, boosting bandage efficiency was the best I could do right now.

“The real threat is outside…?”

“…Inquisitor, leave the underground passage at once!”

“What?”

“There aren’t enough corpses! The sacrificed must number at least in the triple digits, yet that many bodies are nowhere to be found here!”

“……!”

But what good was taking the skills if my arms refused to move?

I gritted my teeth and forced a hand into my inventory. The few remaining bandages came free.

“I will finish treating the Demon Knight and follow. Go ahead!”

“Yes!”

Whew. At least those two had sharp heads. Judging by how the cultists had been talking, we were probably already late, though.

That part was beyond my control, so I tried bandaging myself.

“I’ll do it.”

No—if you do it, what was the point of me taking the skill?

Seuk.

The bandages were snatched away before I could protest. My body simply wouldn’t respond enough to snatch them back. Infuriating.

“I’ll… khuk.”

“Speak no more.”

Even if I wanted to, the rising blood made it impossible. Damn it, at this rate I was going to choke on my own vomit. Why the hell did this game model that, too?

I watched herbs and salve being smeared—or rather, jammed—into the wounds, eyelids trembling. Honestly, I just wanted to sleep.

But then I’d die.

Right. That was why I couldn’t let myself drift off no matter how exhausted I was. If death meant logout I would die a hundred times gladly… but if the world simply granted every wish, what kind of world would that be?

“O Life, seal these wounds and bind life once more.”

Meanwhile the Archmage chanted again. The light spilling from his hands grew stronger. The wounds began to itch faintly.

“I will not ask why you entered alone without so much as a word of consultation.”

At the same time HP started climbing, slowly but steadily. We were finally in the safe zone.

“But know this. Had we arrived even a little later—had the Hero arrived even a little later—you would most certainly have died.”

Mm. That was true. If the Inquisitor and Archmage had been any slower, I would have been gone.

But what of it? Was the difficulty simply too high? I had only been in danger because I didn’t know the patterns or that the trap existed. Objectively the difficulty itself was still within playable range.

If I had to do it again I wouldn’t even get this hurt. Just avoid the magic circle and pick them off from the edges.

And funny as it sounded, even if this had been reality I would have made the exact same choice.

No—if it had been reality I would have had to even more. The enemy wouldn’t stop just because I decided to play it safe.

“…Or was dying the goal all along?”

Of course not. I was doing all this precisely because I wanted to live, in my own way.

But I couldn’t say that out loud. Maintaining the concept was now an essential survival factor. An extremely, deeply regrettable fact.

Krrrk.

Some time must have passed. When HP had climbed to a little under half, the sound of grinding teeth reached me.

A sound that really improved a man’s mood.

“Have they come drawn by the scent of blood…?”

My body felt like lead, yet I couldn’t just leave the ranged dealer unprotected.

Melee dealers needed the tank’s protection, sure, but it was still better than the ranged getting hit.

“You mustn’t rise yet!”

“…No longer needed.”

I forced my heavy body upright. The wounds tugged a little, but by sheer will I managed to stand.

A bit absurd. Fatigue I could understand, but weren’t wounds supposed to heal along with HP recovery?

Did they only vanish at full health? Or was injury recovery on a separate timer from the HP bar?

Sheek sheek.

And that ragged breathing. I had a sinking suspicion it was mine.

I startled at my own breath. Anyone would, hearing the labored gasps of a critical patient come out of a mouth that felt no pain.

Still, I couldn’t afford to waste focus just fixing a sound effect.

I picked up my sword.

The blade that had always felt weightless now hung disgustingly heavy. I had left the two-hander on the ground and was only holding the longsword, yet it still felt that way.

Wow. HP was recovering, so it couldn’t be that. Was this the fatigue? Moving around at 100 fatigue was a bad idea after all.

“You’ll die if you keep this up!”

“I will not die.”

The world was spinning, true, but as long as HP didn’t hit zero I wouldn’t die.

I stripped away the meta reasoning and took one step forward. Right on cue a three-headed hound charged out of the dark.

“Never.”

Was that single step going to make me lose balance and collapse?

“Demon Knight!”

Kung!

Before the Archmage’s hand could catch my arm I somehow reclaimed my footing. I forced strength into the buckling leg ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and refused to fall.

Seogak!

In the same motion the descending blade cleanly bisected the charging demon hound.

“If you understand… then follow.”

Haa. If that demon hound hadn’t shown up I could have rested a little longer.

What did a wrecked body matter? Now that I had proven I could move, staying still no longer fit the concept.

Well, it wasn’t purely the concept either. Even without the act I still needed to go up.

After all, I had sent the Inquisitor ahead and still felt uneasy.

After all this suffering to reach this point, what if the city collapsed without me knowing and I got a GAME OVER force-reset?

I’d cry. I’d actually cry. And if I stayed down here I wouldn’t even be able to grasp the cause. The injustice would make me even angrier!

“Fall behind and I leave you…!”

So even if I rest, I rest up above! So that if a reset happens I can assess the situation and move immediately!

No power in this world comes free of cost. The holy power lent by the gods was no exception.

“O God.”

Did the idle gossips claim it was a power one could obtain merely by catching the divine eye, without effort?

They were not entirely wrong. Catch the eye of a god and one could receive it after nothing more than morning prayers; one could even wield greater power than those who had proven deeper faith.

A force that ran to the extreme of unfairness, governed solely by the standards of the divine.

“Make me your tool.”

Yet anyone who had ever truly handled holy power knew better.

“Make me your weapon.”

That no force in the world was more equal than holy power, and that there was a reason the gods shared it only with a chosen few.

“And thus…”

They could not help but know.

“Establish Your will in this place.”

For the price of a human wielding the power of a god was that, in exact proportion to its use, pain gnawed the flesh and fire scorched the insides—one could never remain ignorant of that.

Kwaang!

The Inquisitor swallowed the familiar agony beyond her clenched teeth and raised her mace high. The demons, already greatly thinned since their entry, shrieked at the dense radiance and fled.

She wanted nothing more than to hunt every last one of them down and butcher them, but this was not the time.

She ran along the trail of corpses they had piled. Even without needing to track, simply sprinting, the exit refused to appear. The place was simply that vast.

“Hoo.”

But no matter how vast, it was only running. Someone had practically cleaned this place out already; she had no right to call this exertion.

There was one who had fought until his entire body was a wreck. She could not speak of weariness.

Kwaang!

The Inquisitor smashed the skull of a demon that dared block her path into the wall and kept her feet moving. The true design of the wicked. Outside. Fragmentary clues floated through her mind, spurring her steps.

“Please… let me not be too late.”

Yet even if she prayed so, could it truly come to pass? She had already fallen neatly into their scheme and wasted precious time. Was there still a chance for her to reverse it?

“Priestess!”

Even if such a chance existed, could she alone uncover the purpose of these cunning demon followers?

“Y-your companions…?”

The Inquisitor sucked in a sharp breath at the sight of those arrayed outside the sewers.

It was impossible. There was almost nothing she could do alone. Even bearing the Hero’s crest, even able to channel vast holy power, she remained nothing more than an ignorant, foolish servant of God.

Just as she had been unable to help the Demon Knight even a little.

“They are still inside. They will simply emerge a little later.”

“Ah, is that so?”

“More importantly—is there anyone who can assist me?”

Therefore she decided not to grow arrogant. Had not God Himself said as much? Alone she would be insufficient.

If she could not discover the truth by herself, she need only borrow the minds of others.

“What do you require of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠us?”

“Everyone who remained in the underground passage has been dealt with. Yet we must learn that their true purpose is unfolding above…?”

Halfway up the riverbank the Inquisitor turned her head.

“That is…?”

Thick smoke was rising from one side of the city. Smoke mixed with red and green mist.