He Opened the Status Window

He opened the status window.

A full two hundred and four unallocated points had piled up, and hoarding them until now had paid off. Yujun assigned every last one.

This is a level 157 status window?

The numbers were absurd enough to drag a hollow laugh out of him. Not even No-Pay Casual Gamer, who had poured money into War of the Gods without end, had reached anything like this. Stranger still, the Primordial Player title's twenty-five percent increase to every stat wasn't even reflected on the window.

Yujun's hand paused, then moved again. Right. Agility's the one. He fed more points into Agility than anywhere else. In the situation he was in, it was the stat that would buy him the most.

About time I got moving.

More than three hundred jiangshi were still out there. He wasn't particularly worried. He was a completely different man from the one who had walked into this fight.

Clang! Kraang!

The players crashed into the jiangshi again. The undead pressed hard, and the line was driven steadily back. In the waves that never stopped coming, some players were butchered where they stood.

"Paranet."

"Yes!"

"Corpse Explosion ready?"

"Yes!"

"Pick a jiangshi in the middle and blow it. I was watching earlier — you were wasting that skill. Corpse Explosion only needs to go off once a cast. Don't try to detonate a whole crowd at the same time."

"Understood."

"One at a time, starting from the center. Okay?"

"Yes!"

With no face to read, it was impossible to tell whether the order had actually landed. He followed commands well enough, though. He'd manage.

The instant Yujun kicked off the ground, a jiangshi exploded.

Boom!

The body burst, and the torn chunks of flesh punched into the jiangshi around it. Five seconds passed, and Paranet triggered Corpse Explosion again.

Corpse Explosion is disgusting. In a good way. Covetable, even. If it were mine, I know I could use it better.

Shhk! Ssk!

Without spending a single skill, Yujun cut down three jiangshi in a breath. His movement was far keener than before. They never even saw the sword. Neck and body simply came apart.

This is no joke.

His body felt light. The moment he meant to swing, the blade had already taken a head. Thought and result arrived together, and a sharp thrill ran the length of him. With his physical stats finally underneath it, the Swordsmanship trait began to show what it could really do. The sword only got faster.

The jiangshi packed around him dropped in a rattling heap before they could so much as blink. Yujun kept turning through them, and without using a single skill he cut them down five and six at a time.

Boom! Bang!

Paranet was making a conspicuous mess of his own with Corpse Explosion. Players who had magic skills were dropping a fair number of jiangshi as well.

The problem was the vanguard, whose attacks simply didn't land. All they could do was throw themselves in front of the jiangshi and hold.

"We need support over here!"

"And who's supposed to support you!"

Jiangshi don't tire. Players, superhuman bodies or not, still run into a limit. The longer the fight went, the worse it would get for them.

Then the battle started to slip away from what any of them had expected. The jiangshi were vanishing at a startling pace, and before long fewer than fifty were left standing. The players, who had been hard-pressed just to stay in front of them, finally had a moment to look around.

"Huh?"

"Why are they all down?"

"Every one of them had their head cut off."

"Wait..."

"Look over there."

Even while they stared, Yujun kept hunting. It wasn't a duel with his life on the line, and it wasn't a desperate struggle. It was a hunt, nothing more.

Another three minutes or so passed.

Every jiangshi Paranet had killed, it seemed, had been credited to Yujun.

"..."

"..."

"Hold on... what is that?"

"He killed over three hundred? By himself?"

"Is that even possible?"

"Hah..."

The ranking window hanging in the empty air dropped the battlefield into silence. Shock had taken the words out of them.

Second place, Min Yuri, felt it harder than the rest. She belonged to one of the Four Great Guilds, and she carried A-rank flame magic.

That man... I don't think he even used a magic skill.

For a moment she wondered if the system had simply announced the wrong thing. One look around killed that hope. The system hadn't erred. Jiangshi with their necks sheared clean lay strewn in every direction.

The undead has to be his summon too.

There had been a skeleton setting off blast after blast, each one enormous.

I thought my eardrums were going to split. I had no idea he'd done this much.

A single player under level 300, and three hundred and sixty-nine jiangshi. Today, for the first time, Min Yuri felt a wall she couldn't see.

Yujun's eyes lit ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠up at the hologram.

So I get paid twice?

All that running around had been worth it.

"Ah, I got a Rare item this time."

"Same."

"Mine's just a Common item..."

Even the players who had missed the rankings received a piece of equipment, or something like it. The quality, though, fell well short of what the ranked players were getting.

"What I need is something I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠don't already have."

Equipment was useless to him. He already owned most of the gear that existed in War of the Gods. A consumable would be better.

Yujun's mouth fell open.

They're handing out skills as rewards?

This was the first time he had been given a skill outright, rather than a trait pill, a skill pill, or a manual. The grade was A, and it was a magic skill besides.

This is the first-place reward?

Entering the Species Tournament had been the right ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠call. He swallowed the Essence of Agility on the spot and used it.

"Excuse me!"

"Hm?"

Five of them. Players with familiar faces came up to Yujun — the ones he had pulled out of trouble a few times while the jiangshi were still coming. One of them spoke first.

"Would it be all right if we talked?"

"Ah? Sure."

He had nothing to do until the next mission started anyway.

"Talk about what?"

"Are you with a guild at the moment?"

"I'm not."

"Then, perhaps..."

"Sorry. I'm not looking to join a guild just yet."

"Ah... I see."

The woman who had asked looked disappointed. Then her eyes brightened again.

"Then would you be willing to exchange messengers?"

"Hmm..."

That one actually made him pause. Trading messengers wouldn't cost him anything, but if he started accepting just anyone, things would get noisy for no reason. Well. There's still plenty of room on the list. Yujun nodded.

"Sure."

"Oh! Me too!"

"Could I ask as ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠well!"

The ones standing behind her, as if they had been waiting for exactly that, fired off messenger requests of their own. Yujun scratched his head and accepted every one of them. He regretted it immediately.

I can always delete them later.

They rested for a while. Then, without warning, a massive hologram window unfolded in front of everyone.

Again?

A warp took hold, dragging a vicious dizziness with it.

Wuuung. Wuung.

The scenery changed. One moment it was a city street under a punishing sun; the next, a labyrinth sunk in heavy dark. He knew it was a labyrinth because the hologram told him so.

"A rescue mission? Hmm..."

One thing was certain. This was not his specialty.

He looked around. He was the only one here. They had been scattered through the maze, each of them alone.

Yujun summoned Paranet again.

"You called, Master!"

"Yeah."

"What would you have me do?"

"Just walk with me. Oh — and you're good at finding the way, aren't you?"

"I beg your pardon? I am not."

"Last time you pinned down exactly where the pillars of fire were going to show up."

"That was my instinct informing me... Finding a path would seem to be quite another matter."

"Then we'll find out this time."

"...If you expect overmuch of me, it weighs rather heavily."

"I heard you. So talk. Where do we go?"

Three paths split off from the very start. He didn't know this place at all, and he had no feel for which way was worth taking. That was why he was leaning on Paranet.

"By my judgment, we ought to take the rightmost path."

"Why?"

"The wind. It blows especially hard from that side."

"Hm? You can feel that?"

Yujun's Agility was high, and he held the Keen Senses trait at A-rank. He couldn't feel a thing.

"Yes. I feel it. The right-hand path connects to a greater number of ways."

"And how would you know that? You've got Survival Instinct. That shouldn't have anything to do with a sense like this."

"I do not rightly know myself."

Well. The undead might simply perceive things differently.

"Then we go right."

"Truly? You mean to go on nothing but my word? To do so is..."

"Wherever we go, it's a gamble either way."

"Understood."

Yujun put Paranet in front and walked straight down the right-hand path. He didn't trust the skeleton blindly, though. He bent his hearing and his sense of smell as far as they would go and took in everything the corridor offered.

Huh. There really is wind coming from more than one direction.

Just as Paranet had said, a faint breeze was there. Far too vivid to write off as imagination. Watching the smooth back of that skull, Yujun felt a flicker of something like pride.

He's been more useful than he lets on.

They walked on until the way split into two again.

"Which way?"

"Hmm... From the left path I have an ominous feeling. As though we must not go that way under any circumstances..."

"Oh."

So Survival Instinct had kicked in.

Yujun didn't hesitate. He stepped onto the left path.

"Th-that way will not do, I tell you!"

He looked back. Paranet was standing rigid, his whole frame locked stiff.

"What are you doing? Not coming?"

"It is dangerous. You will die."

"That's why we're going. Stick to the safe roads and we get nothing."

"But..."

"You come back even if you die. What are you so scared of?"

"Are you not in danger as well, Master?"

"I'll be fine. And this isn't the first time you've decided something was dangerous. Or the second."

The first mission had given him a fair read on the Species Tournament's difficulty. He couldn't assume the second would be identical, of course. But this was an event only players of level 300 and below could enter. They wouldn't hand out a mission of absurd difficulty.

Yujun didn't stop. Paranet, with no other choice, hurried after him.

"It truly does smell of danger..."

The summon muttered it for no particular reason.