To Zone 2
What on earth was she trying to say?
After the banquet ended, I returned to my room and lay down on the bed, but sleep refused to come.
Naira’s words kept tormenting my mind.
Was it really just a joke?
I couldn’t tell. Matters like this had always been outside my expertise.
Still, it was hard to dismiss it as a simple prank. In that final moment, her expression had carried a different weight.
Her face had been faintly flushed. Whether from the alcohol or something else, the image refused to leave me alone.
Should I ask Emily about it tomorrow?
I immediately shook my head.
The two of them were friends. Even if she knew how Naira felt, she would never tell me.
In times like these, I needed to force my thoughts in another direction.
Fortunately, the window I had shoved aside after the raid still hovered at the edge of my vision.
I should have checked it right away, but my mind had been too scattered. Who would have guessed it would help me now, of all times.
I pulled the window forward at once.
What it displayed was far more surprising than I had expected.
Level increased!
Status points acquired.
“Whoa! It’s a level up!”
Even with a two-level gap, I hadn’t expected to gain an entire level in one go.
The experience bar was already half-filled with purple. If I hunted hard tomorrow, reaching level ten was no longer a fantasy.
But the window wasn’t finished yet.
“What’s this?”
Highest contribution achieved!
Additional reward granted.
“A-additional reward?”
The standard boss rewards were gold—the currency of Arcadia—distributed to every raid participant, plus special materials that could be obtained from the Forest’s Owner.
I had thought that was more than enough, yet here was another reward on top of it. For the first time, the risk of staking my life felt truly worthwhile.
Heart racing, I pressed the reward button.
“Ooh!”
A pure white light bloomed in my palm.
It was so intense it stung my eyes. The radiance gradually subsided until it coalesced into a single shape.
“Th-this is… the reward?”
I stared at the object that had appeared in my hand, utterly bewildered.
It was a small rod. A white wooden stick that fit easily in one grip.
Flustered, I opened its information.
◈ A small staff crafted from a branch once guarded by the Forest’s Owner. It carries the power of the wind.
◈ Magic Attack Power +5
◈ Enables use of wind-type magic
My mind went ice-cold.
A wand. Of all possible weapons, it had to be a wand.
“How am I supposed to use this thing!”
Tears stung my eyes.
I had been so excited for a proper reward, only to receive this piece of garbage.
Objectively, the specs were excellent. Any player who relied on wands would have gone mad with joy.
The problem was that it was useless to me. I hadn’t invested a single point in magic stats and had zero proficiency. What was I supposed to do with it?
And it was bound. I couldn’t even sell it. A bitter sense of injustice rose in my throat, and tears slipped free.
“Why does everyone keep doing this to me… Hic…”
It was a night that completely broke my spirit.
The next morning.
While I sat listlessly picking at breakfast with exhausted eyes, someone approached.
“What’s troubling our Miss Ian today? You look terrible.”
“Ah, Kate…”
I gave her a bitter smile.
“I just didn’t sleep well last night.”
“You look far more than simply sleep-deprived. Did something happen?”
I could hardly tell her the truth—that the reward had been trash. I clutched my aching chest and forced another smile.
“Oh, right. I’m leaving today.”
“Hmm… I see.”
She accepted it, but her face was filled with regret.
Perhaps that was why she pulled out a chair and sat down across from me.
“I had a feeling it was coming.”
“You did?”
“I’ve run this inn for a long time. I can always tell when someone is about to leave.”
I thought I had hidden it well, but apparently it had been obvious. Just as I had grown attached to her, it seemed Kate had grown quite fond of me too.
My heart felt heavy. While I was still searching for the right words to say goodbye, Kate spoke again.
“It’s been over a week since you first arrived, hasn’t it, Miss Ian?”
“About ten days, I think.”
“That’s quite a long stay.”
Now that I thought about it, I had remained here longer than any other player.
I had stayed because I liked the village’s warm atmosphere and the kindness of its people, but compared to Startia it was hardly an ideal base.
“Actually, before I gave birth to Lian, I once had a daughter.”
“You did?”
“If she were still alive, she would be about your age now. When I first saw you, I thought my dead daughter had returned.”
I had noticed she was unusually kind, but I never imagined there was a reason like that.
Besides, I was originally a man. Realizing I had reminded her of a daughter left me with complicated feelings.
Kate continued softly.
“Back then I still had my husband. You know the inn’s name? My husband chose it.”
Her gaze, clouded with old sorrow, drifted toward the forest beyond the window.
“Ten years ago, that forest wasn’t dangerous at all. Thanks to the guardian deity, children played there freely, and the villagers would offer tributes together.”
I tried to keep my face calm, but inside I was reeling.
Not because learning her husband and daughter had died was shocking. No.
It was because the words “guardian deity” had come from her lips—the same boss I had fought for my life against only yesterday.
“Then one day the guardian deity stopped accepting the offerings. I found it strange, but I told myself it simply didn’t want to burden us. I should have realized something was wrong…”
The rest of the story was the familiar tragedy: the villagers continued entering the forest as usual, only to be attacked by the maddened deity. Her husband and daughter had been among the victims.
But the words barely registered in my mind.
Why didn’t I think of this sooner?
Most players avoided forming deep connections with NPCs.
They were NPCs. They rarely gave good quests. For all those reasons, people instinctively kept their distance.
Unlike them, I had unintentionally grown close to the NPCs here. And because of that, I had learned about the boss—though it was already too late.
To the NPCs, this world was not a game but reality. Of course they possessed more information than players.
If we hadn’t overlooked that fact, could the situation have turned out differently? Could we have prevented some of the deaths?
I didn’t know. The sudden flood of information made my head feel heavy.
I needed time to sort through it, but Kate’s voice continued without pause.
“The people who left with you yesterday went to defeat the guardian deity, didn’t they?”
I nodded.
A faint, fragile smile touched her lips as she gently closed her eyes.
“I see… Then my husband and daughter can finally rest in peace.”
A single tear slid down her cheek from beneath her closed lids.
I lowered my head, unable to look at the raw grief in her eyes. They were far too warm to dismiss as the tears of a mere NPC.
“Miss Ian, if it ever becomes too difficult, you can always come back. I will be here.”
Kate gently took my hand.
I stared at that hand for a moment, then the corners of my mouth lifted slightly.
“Thank you.”
It was an incredibly warm hand.
After parting with Kate and stepping outside, I found people waiting for me.
“You took quite a while. Did you have preparations to make?”
“I was saying my goodbyes.”
It had taken real effort to pry Lian off me as he cried and begged me not to go. No matter how mature he tried to act, he was still a child.
I turned to Emily.
“So you’re returning to Startia?”
“We need to report the clear. There are things to organize. You’re heading straight to Zone 2, correct?”
“Yes.”
No matter how I looked at it, yesterday’s victory had been pure luck. Without the fluke of riding the tiger’s back, that clearing would have become our tomb.
I needed to become stronger. The realization that I required power to decide my own fate had struck me once again with painful clarity.
“But it really is a shame to let you go like this…”
After a moment of hesitation, Emily extended her hand.
“Ian, why don’t you join our party permanently? What do you all think?”
“I’m all for it. Where else are we going to find someone crazy enough to fight a boss alone?”
“M-me too…”
Three pairs of eyes turned toward me. Expectation, excitement, worry—various emotions flickered in their gazes.
But my answer remained the same.
“No. I still want to travel alone for now.”
Even now, whenever I closed my eyes I saw their faces. I heard their resentful voices and felt their accusing stares.
That was exactly why I could not join a party.
I knew they were illusions. I knew I was running away like a coward.
But I didn’t want to drag anyone else into that darkness again.
I never wanted to experience someone dying because of me ever again.
“Why go that far?”
When Naira asked, I looked at Emily and smiled.
“Isn’t it the same reason Emily got angry at Arka yesterday?”
Just as she had her circumstances, so did I.
Understanding dawned in Emily’s eyes. She let out a small sigh and shook her head.
“Sigh… Then there’s nothing we can do.”
Instead, I took the hand she still held out.
“I will still join you for boss fights. Let’s do those together.”
“Deal.”
Our hands rose and fell once in a firm shake.
“Then let’s meet again alive.”
“You too, Emily. And Mugi. And you as well.”
After shaking hands with Naira and Mugi, I stood there until their figures disappeared from sight.
“Right. Time for me to go too.”
With the farewells finished, I left the village and stepped into the forest.
The path to Zone 2 lay beyond the clearing the boss had guarded. Thanks to the aftermath of yesterday’s battle, the ferocious beasts that once stalked players were nowhere to be found.
Before long I reached the clearing where the desperate fight had taken place and came face to face with the boss’s corpse, which had yet to vanish.
So this tiger was the guardian deity Kate spoke of.
I honestly wasn’t very interested in why it had suddenly begun attacking people. Setting aside the emotions Kate had shown, I simply accepted it as part of the game’s setting.
What interested me more was the fact that Kate and the other older villagers had all known about the existence of this boss called the guardian deity.
Judging from that, if I built close relationships with the NPCs in the coming zones, I might be able to locate the next boss much faster.
Not in a month, but in half that time… or, if I was lucky, within a single week?
I wasn’t certain. That was also why I hadn’t shared Kate’s story with Emily and the others.
But if I could prove the connection between NPCs and the bosses, it might become a tremendous help in future raids.
In that case, my goals in Zone 2 were to raise my level higher than anyone else and—
“This time, I have to be the one who finds the boss.”
I walked past the tiger’s body and continued beyond the clearing into Zone 2.
Before long the dense trees disappeared.
The wind-swept fields vanished as well.
What appeared instead was a desolate panorama of dry, towering rock formations that stretched high into the sky.
A massive mountain range now stood in my way.