Chapter 80
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 80
Chapter Title: The Church's Vault (2)
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Jun had entered the church's vault numerous times while playing the game.
Not only that, but thanks to the vast big data accumulated by community users, he knew the effects of all sorts of equipment.
Jun picked up a pair of short swords that had been placed in one corner and said,
"These are weapons called 'Akanthus's Fangs'."
"Akanthus?"
Maya asked, her voice laced with doubt.
Akanthus was the name of a flower, after all.
Fangs on a flower?
Besides, the twin blades before her eyes had an appearance that evoked nothing floral.
If anything, weren't they rippling with an ominous aura?
"It's the name of a flower, but it was also the name of a woman from long ago."
Jun briefly recited the tale embedded in these two swords.
Not because he was born with a trivia buff's disposition. It was a prerequisite for Maya to wield them.
"It's a pretty common story, if you think about it. A woman named Akanthus who worked at a tavern one day caught the eye of a noble's son. Captivated by her beauty, the noble took her that very night."
But the noble didn't take Akanthus with him.
Instead, when he later heard she was pregnant, he sent assassins after her.
After twists and turns, she survived, only to succumb to poison in the end.
Time passed, and as she faced her death, the story reached the ears of the child she had barely managed to save.
"The child grew up to become an assassin."
He built his fame as one, and eventually received a certain commission.
A request to wipe out his own father and that entire family.
"The client's name was Akanthus. The legendary assassin drew his blade of vengeance, borrowing the name of his long-dead mother."
In the end, Akanthus's child massacred his father and the family, but sustained a mortal wound in the process that led to his own death.
Akanthus. The flower's language is revenge.
"Those swords were the ones wielded by the protagonist of that tale."
"What a terribly melancholic story..."
Aiden, who had been listening from the side, made a sorrowful face.
After all, it had ended in tragedy for everyone involved.
Maya's expression, on the other hand, didn't change in the slightest.
"But why tell me the story of these swords?"
"They're your exclusive weapons, and the ancestral spirits needed to hear it."
"...What might you mean by that?"
"Most people who wield these swords can't hold back even the slightest spark of vengeful urge."
"Is it anger management disorder?"
Jun let out an exclamation of admiration upon hearing Maya casually drop such a complex term.
"You even know that phrase?"
"I learned it from Braden."
"That guy's got knowledge on everything. Anyway, there's one excellent way to cure that anger management disorder."
"And what might that be?"
"Violence."
"That's exactly what Braden said."
The mercenary branch chief. What the heck had he been teaching her?
Jun thought that, but in truth, he wasn't much different himself.
"To sum it up, these swords are possessed by an evil spirit. The original owner of the twin blades."
"You want my ancestors to give it a good thrashing?"
"Exactly."
"Understood. Looks like it needs a proper scolding."
With that, Maya reached out toward the twin swords.
Her eyes were subtly gleaming.
At a glance, those two swords looked sharper than any weapon she had ever seen.
"Alright, then. Aiden, you're up next."
"Uh... Yes, sir."
Aiden, who had been listening beside them, broke out in a needless cold sweat.
"If I really grab those swords, I'll turn into some crazed murderer?"
"That's what would happen if an ordinary person picked them up."
The church had recovered those swords precisely because they had to physically send the maddened wielder to the afterlife.
"Heh heh... You truly have vast knowledge."
Roschin outwardly expressed admiration at Jun's explanation while rapidly turning things over in his mind.
Since becoming the vault keeper, had there ever been a mage here? He reflected.
This mage was navigating the vault with expert ease, as if someone had given him a full tour.
And his actions were just as bold.
After that, the mage selected a suit of armor for the golden-haired, blue-eyed warrior, picked out a single glove for himself, and wrapped up their vault visit.
"Now's about the time to cash in on some item RNG."
The mage muttered that just before they left the vault.
By the time they returned from the vault, the sun was already dipping low in the sky.
With the breathtaking scenery as their side dish no matter how many times they saw it, the group finished their dinner.
And so the next day dawned.
Bern spotted Aiden wearing an old leather buff coat.
"Heh heh. So you've brought it with you."
"Yes..."
It was a buff coat fashioned like a shirt.
"You don't look too satisfied with it."
Aiden shook his head at Bern's words.
"It's something my senior gave me, so it must have that much utility."
A musty smell wafted from the worn shirt-like buff coat, and cracks were visible here and there from how long it had been since the tanning.
Of course it wasn't to his liking.
But.
-If you use it right, it'll become tier-3 defensive gear.
Since it was the word of the senior he respected more than anyone, Aiden believed it with ironclad faith.
"It's defensive gear that suits the beastly aura flowing through your veins well."
"You know about this?"
"Didn't the mage tell you?"
"He did say... that a ferocious beast sleeps within, and to awaken it."
That was when he could draw out the buff coat's true power, apparently.
"But since he couldn't resolve it himself, he told me to ask you, Sir Bern."
"Ha ha ha!"
Bern laughed heartily for the first time in ages.
"If only I could peek inside that mage's head!"
Aiden spoke as he gazed at the chuckling Bern.
"It seems you know all about it, Sir Bern."
"Of course I do. It was gear I once wielded myself."
"Pardon?"
"Ha ha! You look shocked. But don't be disappointed. I let it go because it no longer suited my temperament. Or more precisely, my temperament had changed. So it left me and ended up in the vault."
Aiden couldn't quite follow what Bern was saying.
It wasn't like this old leather armor had sprouted legs and walked away from him, right?
As he tilted his head in confusion,
"You'll understand once you experience it yourself. You're more than fit to wield it. If you awaken it properly, it'll be like gaining another incredibly powerful weapon."
With those words, Bern unleashed his fighting spirit.
Aiden's body reacted instinctively, and he drew his sword into a stance.
"I wonder if Aiden's doing alright."
As gear once used by Bern, its performance had to be nothing short of phenomenal.
If Bern hadn't changed his own temperament back then, he would still have it.
'It's that aggressive of an item, which is why it suits Aiden.'
Aiden often wore that cheerful smile, but one shouldn't judge him lightly by that.
Jun knew the true nature of Aiden, the game's protagonist.
'Anyway, Bern will handle that side of things.'
Putting Aiden out of his mind, Jun turned his gaze to Maya this time.
"..."
Maya stood holding the two daggers rippling with ominous energy, staring blankly into empty space as if entranced by something.
She was probably sensing the ancestral spirits.
"Monstrous."
The evil spirits dwelling in those two swords had no memories of past lives left.
Their souls had already passed on; only the history of their lives remained.
And that history was nothing but vengeance soaked in blood.
From the moment Maya gripped them, the spirit-infused swords tried to manipulate her by conjuring images of her greatest object of revenge.
But there was a problem.
'That there are prior guests already.'
Jun couldn't see spirits like Maya could, but if he borrowed her gaze,
'The evil spirit getting a group lynching?'
The ancestral spirits had stepped up to protect Maya's mind.
They were probably giving the sword's evil spirit the beating of its life, down to the last speck of dust.
She was lost in the spectacle.
It was the first time the ancestors had stepped up like this, after all.
'The clan ancestors are all positive toward Maya.'
There was no way she'd fall to the evil spirit's curse.
'Without the evil spirit, those swords are tier-3 blades. And they're growth-type items to boot.'
Not quite on the level of Jun's [Tear of Tayia].
'But for revenge, they'll be a huge help to Maya.'
In the end, vengeance was essential for Maya's growth.
And those two swords would vividly depict her greatest growth arc: revenge.
Anyway, that side would sort itself out with time.
'Now then.'
It was time to handle his own.
Jun looked down at the pair of gloves resting on his palm.
They were called 'Predator'.
True to the name, they were gloves that devoured anything.
Gloves eating stuff? Sure, but.
"Ow, that stings."
He slipped them onto both hands and clapped once. A sharp pain shot through his fingertips.
The pain was greater than expected, making his shoulders twitch slightly.
"Hm."
Used right, these gloves were incredibly useful. The reason they were stuck in the church's vault was precisely because they lived up to their name.
Artifact, Predator.
True to its name, the thing devoured anything.
From junk items to all sorts of gear and jewels, even the wearer's blood or mana.
It was a glutton with no limits.
In fact, wearers who had everything sucked out withered away like mummies and died, so Predator was naturally deemed a cursed artifact.
'But that's just because they didn't know how to use it.'
The catch was that the proper usage was extremely restrictive.
"Nngh."
Jun willed the Predator to stop as it began devouring his blood.
It threw a tantrum at first, but when Jun supplied mana instead, the thing instantly became docile.
Sluuuuurp.
It ate.
True to its name, it devoured an absurd amount of mana.
It was already overwhelming at his current level, so Jun undid his Speech Seal as well.
The surrounding mana rippled... only to be sucked into the Predator moments later.
'Still got a ways to go?'
Judging by the ferocious suction, it didn't seem like it'd finish in short order.
Instead, he closed his eyes and focused his mind.
Predator was an artifact that chose its master.
The process was simple.
Keep supplying it with something until it was satisfied, just like now.
Blood, food, mana—it didn't matter what.
But most people couldn't sate its gluttony.
Jun could.
He was a man who harbored mana as vast as the sea.
'I'll make you a body that can't live without me.'