East Ruins (5)
A desolate wind swept through the ruins as battle cries rang out across the broken ground.
My nerves stretched taut.
And, as always, the moment before a fight sharpened every sense in my body.
My head cleared. My heart hammered faster. A strange, electric thrill wrapped around me like a second skin.
I forced my Qi Sensing wider.
Agony split my skull as if it were cracking open, and half the ruins painted themselves inside my mind.
What I needed were living things. Everything else I discarded.
Thick fluid dripped from my nose.
“Noah! Your nose is—”
“I-I’m fine... just be quiet a little...”
The gnolls’ positions etched themselves into my thoughts.
Hearing the noise of battle, the gnolls began gathering toward a single point.
An elite magic beast. The gnoll leader howled. The pack answered.
More than five hundred magic beasts converged on one place.
Then they all turned and started barking toward a single direction.
The first group charged this way. The second wheeled around behind. The third took the left. The fourth claimed the remaining right.
They were coming from every side. Nowhere to run.
The people below were still locked in combat. Some already looked incapable of fighting.
I clenched the greatsword. The rattling hilt bit into my palm. The dulled edge scraped the floor.
Blood surged up my throat and spilled from my mouth.
“Noah!”
“I’m fine, so... just be quiet.”
The two men were strong. Probably Platinum. The ones who looked like knights weren’t bad either.
But no matter how skilled they were, they could never handle a gnoll pack led by its leader—not with numbers like these.
I sketched a plan in my head. Something that would draw their attention and let us face the gnolls.
I took Aileen’s hand.
“Aileen.”
“Y-yes...?”
“The gnolls are coming.”
“What...?”
“The pack led by their leader is heading this way. Roughly five hundred. Thankfully, Carpeng isn’t with them.”
Aileen’s hand shook violently. I squeezed it tighter.
“So stay right here.”
“You’re... you’re going out there right now?”
“Yes.”
“N-no. Noah, stay here with me... I’ll, I’ll cast from far away... or better yet, we should run—”
“Aileen.”
I stroked her cheek the way my father used to when I was little. I had to stretch my arm up a little to reach.
“I’ll come back for sure. Just have a meal ready.”
Because anything I cook tastes terrible.
“What... wh-what are you...”
“I’ll be back.”
I smiled at Aileen, then leapt out the window.
I narrowed my Qi Sensing and focused. I needed to draw every eye.
I pulled Aileen’s handkerchief from my clothes and bound the greatsword to my hand.
The stench of horse drool hit my nose. The nauseating reek unlocked my rigid body.
Damn horse bastard. Someday I’ll eat you for dinner.
“Hoo...”
I concentrated. Even if it shattered the bones in my hand, I had to do this. As long as I made it back to Aileen, she could heal me. Trust the walking potion.
I sprinted toward the battlefield and widened my Qi Sensing again. The gnoll army was closing in. I pulled back the terrain data I had discarded earlier.
A stone wall. A half-collapsed barrier of stone came into view.
The clash of steel on steel grew louder. One, two—idiots started staring at me. I didn’t stop running.
A knight in armor blocked my path. I slammed the flat of the greatsword into his gut. He flew limp into a corner.
Another stepped in front of me. This one looked strong. I hesitated for a heartbeat, wondering if I should stop—then the man with the halberd beside him shoved the knight aside.
Thanks to that, I kept running without slowing.
I reached the front of the wall. The gnoll horde was close enough to see clearly. No time left.
I raised the greatsword in my right hand until it lined up with my shoulder. My left hand gripped the butt of the hilt.
In about ten seconds the vanguard would reach us.
“Hoo...”
This isn’t a game. Can I do it?
This isn’t a game. This is reality.
So...
It’s doable.
This world has no status windows. No level-ups. No experience, skills, mana, or traits. Nothing but pure reality.
And I know exactly what Qi Sensing can do when pushed to its absolute limit.
I can do this.
I focused every scrap of Qi Sensing onto a single point. Blood streamed from my nose. I discarded every other piece of information around me. Bloody tears leaked from my closed eyes.
Only one place. Only the wall. I took in nothing else.
Blood burst from my mouth. The shape of every stone, every carved pattern, every piece that made up the barrier burned itself into my mind.
My heart pounded as if it would explode.
Grrrraa-!!
And then, at the very end—
“Found it.”
I swung the greatsword. Not slow, not fast. Simply endlessly precise. Slowly. I traced the line drawn inside my head.
Seogeok—
A sound like wood being cut. A tiny crack appeared on the wall. That tiny crack became a fracture racing through the entire barrier.
Kururung-!
With a roar like the sky collapsing, the massive wall that had once protected the village came crashing down.
It crushed dozens of the vanguard flat.
Too early to celebrate. I turned and opened my eyes.
Every single person was staring at me.
Just as planned—I had drawn their attention and smashed the vanguard.
I opened my mouth. Blood sprayed out. I gathered the clot in my throat, spat it, and forced the words free.
“You see them, right? The gnolls are coming. Five hundred of them. They’re spreading out, and their leader’s with them. So—”
I swallowed the rising blood and continued.
“Kill them all, or keep fighting each other. Your choice.”
“Kill them all, or keep fighting each other. Your choice.”
I stared at the girl in front of me.
The tiny girl I’d seen in Alrba. The girl who reminded me of my dead little brother. The girl I was supposed to protect.
And the girl who had just brought down Habron’s wall.
That enormous magic beast—Carpeng—had barely managed to crack that wall. Yet this small body, with that battered greatsword, had shattered it in a single blow.
I forgot to breathe as I looked at the collapsed barrier.
Could I have done that? Could even Heinzel beside me have done it?
No. Impossible. At the very least, only a Master could pull off a stunt like that.
“Luci...”
“What.”
“Our charge is... strange.”
“I was thinking the same thing.”
“Anyway, it looks like the gnolls heard our noise and are coming.”
“We were idiots.”
“Yeah.”
“But what can you do? They were about to kill Alrba’s mascot.”
“True enough.”
I glanced around. Even the knights from Erden couldn’t tear their eyes off the girl.
I cleared my throat and shouted.
“My lords! The girl’s words seem right. How about we put the fighting on hold for a bit and go hunting together?”
Heinzel spoke next.
“Though I wonder if you soft-handed types have ever hunted magic beasts like these. Kyahahahaha!”
Our voices rolled through the ruins. The knights ignored the two adventurers and simply tightened their formation.
“So they mean to hunt the magic beasts.”
“Good idea.”
I looked back at the girl. Blood poured from her eyes, nose, mouth, and ears—yet her will showed no sign of breaking. Those red eyes reminded me of a merciless predator.
It was hard to believe this was the same tiny girl I’d seen in Alrba.
A moment later she growled,
“If you’re ready, move.”
She turned her back and kicked off the ground, sprinting away.
I let out a hollow laugh.
“Heh... what a piece of work.”
“Luci. No matter how I look at it, we’ve got the wrong client.”
“Tell me about it.”
Heinzel and I kicked off as well and chased after the girl.
My body, still unrecovered from the daytime battle, screamed in protest. Blood churned violently inside me.
Still, I had to fight. I had to protect Aileen. She had entrusted her safety to me, so I had to keep her safe. She had placed her life in my hands, so I had to keep her alive.
I gritted my teeth and swung the greatsword—if it could even still be called a greatsword.
With a sound of bursting hide, a gnoll’s body exploded. Not cut—burst. It took twice the strength, but I kept moving.
Again. Without catching the rebound, again. The hilt rattled and twisted the blade’s path.
A mace swung by a gnoll came for my shoulder. Too late—
Kang—
“Whoa there, that gear of yours is in rough shape.”
The mace that should have shattered my shoulder was stopped by a halberd swinging from behind. An adventurer.
“Amazing how much blood can come out of such a tiny body.”
From the right, a light voice accompanied a sword slash. An ordinary blade—but the one swinging it was anything but ordinary. The silent arc cut down six gnolls at once, then flowed into another dance of steel.
A familiar sword dance. A familiar voice. A familiar blade.
The elegant swordsmanship I had once watched while playing Black Sun.
It was Luci’s swordsmanship.
“One-eyed Luci...?”
“Hm? Hahahahaha! Did you hear that?! She knows my name!”
“W-well then... maybe you know my name too...”
The man swinging the halberd looked at me and fidgeted in a way that didn’t match his bulk. The adventurer who always fought beside Luci with a halberd...
“Bald... no, Baldy Heinzel.”
“Hahahahaha! She called you Baldy! Heinzel! From now on you’re Baldy!”
Luci kept laughing that frivolous laugh while his sword never missed a gnoll’s neck.
“Damn it! That’s just mean!”
Heinzel launched irritable attacks of his own, yet every one of them split a gnoll’s skull cleanly.
Why were they here? I didn’t remember every detail of the story, but I was certain that at this point in time, the NPCs named Luci and Heinzel were never supposed to be in this place.
Grrrr-!
I seized the neck of a charging gnoll and slammed it into the ground, then jammed the greatsword down its throat. Catching my breath, I tried to sort out my tangled thoughts.
The situation was still the worst. Even with two Platinum adventurers—people called superhumans—it remained the worst.
But if those Platinums were Luci and Heinzel, the story changed. Among the Platinum NPCs, these two had always been exceptional.
Watching them slaughter the gnolls, the tension drained out of me. My head grew hazy, and my burning body began to turn ice-cold.
Looks like I came out here for nothing.
I thought of my screaming body and of Aileen, probably stifling sobs back in that room. Like a husband heading off to war. I’d planted every death flag imaginable. Honestly, I’d thought there was a real chance I’d die.
If I’d known Luci and Heinzel were here, I would’ve just stayed in the room...
Ah.
I really came out for nothing.
I should’ve just eaten a meal with Aileen.