-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The dungeon exploration club members ran along the village's main street.
The village entrance, visible far in the distance, was already a shattered mess, and the houses along the road had large holes punched through their walls.
Then.
콰앙! (Kwaang!)
The village's outer wall burst open.
A dozen trolls wielding massive clubs charged in.
"Vice-President Sunbae!"
Nabeiro, who was preparing an attack spell towards the trolls, turned around.
"I'll take care of them. The rest of you, find the villagers!"
"Ah...!"
Only then did Nabeiro realize that he hadn't encountered a single villager on the way here.
"Davian, are you sure you'll be alright?"
"I can handle this much on my own."
Nabeiro nodded.
"Alright! Davian will handle this. The rest of us, search for the villagers!"
"Yes!"
After the sunbaes and Samantha left.
"Shall we test this out in a real battle?"
파지직 (Pajijik).
Light flashed from Davian's outstretched hand, and then.
콰앙! (Kwaang!)
The chest of one of the trolls, struck by a Lightning Bolt, was charred black.
The troll didn't even manage a proper scream before tumbling forward, exactly as it had been running.
He had just casually fired it off.
And a giant troll was dealt with in one hit.
"Not bad."
파지직 (Pajijik).
콰앙! (Kwaang!)
Not only was it fast and powerful.
Its mana efficiency was great too.
It showed a sufficiently strong power, even with a small amount of mana.
That meant.
The time needed to gather mana was drastically reduced compared to fire elemental magic.
파지직 (Pajijik).
콰앙! (Kwaang!)
파지직 (Pajijik).
콰앙! (Kwaang!)
It didn't even take a minute to deal with a dozen trolls.
Davian slowly looked around.
The village entrance, the outer walls, the buildings.
Everything was destroyed.
But there was no trace of a battle between monsters and humans.
Not a single body torn and bitten by monsters could be seen.
'It's as if the village was already empty. Did they notice the dungeon core amplification and evacuate in advance?'
There was no way such a thing could happen in this small village.
At best, the guards protecting the village entrance would ring the bell when they saw monsters in the distance. That would be the entirety of the defense system.
If that was the case, there should already be corpses lying around here.
'They didn't evacuate. Nor were they harmed by monsters.'
Davian leaped into a random house and examined the inside.
On one side of the kitchen, dishes were neatly hung to dry after being washed.
스윽 (Seueuk).
He ran his finger over the dishes.
No dust came off.
Meaning the village hadn't been emptied long ago.
As he came outside, the sound of battle could be heard from one side of the village.
'Let's help the sunbaes for now.'
"Hah, hah. I think we've taken care of them all?"
"Yes. At least the monsters in the village."
"But it's strange. Why can't we see a single person?"
"There aren't any bodies either, Sunbae."
"That's what I'm saying."
Davian spoke.
"Let's split up and search. Unless they kidnapped all the villagers, there must be some kind of trace somewhere."
Nabeiro asked Grady George, a 5th grader.
"Grady, how many people live in this village?"
"About 50."
"It's not a lot, but... it's still quite a number to disappear all at once. Let's look for more clues, like Davian said. If a monster appears, don't fight alone, and immediately ask each other for help!"
"Yes!"
Davian, who was exploring the outskirts of the village, stopped walking.
Davian walked backward.
'Underneath this. There's empty space.'
The feeling he felt on his soles was subtly different.
통통 (Tongtong).
When he lightly bounced his foot, he felt it more clearly.
휘이잉 (Hwiing).
The wind elemental magic Davian created became a whirlwind, scooping up the surrounding soil into the sky.
An old stone door on the ground was revealed.
'It wasn't recently made.'
He looked for a handle, but couldn't see it on the stone door.
'Then it must be nearby...'
Based on his mana affinity, he read the surrounding mana flow.
And, with his senses sharpened by increasing his inner strength, he surveyed the surroundings.
A subtly awkward tree.
'That's it.'
He placed his hand on the tree and pushed mana into it.
드드드드 (Deudeudeudeu).
The floor vibrated, and the stone door opened.
At Elton Academy, it was nothing special.
But such a magical device was hard to see in a small mountain village.
It wasn't 100% the case.
But, since mana affinity was somewhat genetically inherited.
Even a small village could have at least one magician that passed it down through the generations.
Davian looked into the space below the floor through the opened stone door.
"Damn it."
Samantha, who had been searching nearby, approached.
"Don't come this way. Samantha."
"Why? Davian... Kyaak!"
Below the opened stone door.
Dozens of people who had been.
Were hundreds of chopped-up corpses, piled up haphazardly.
Davian's expression hardened as he carefully looked down.
"I have to go down."
"Da, Davian!"
Davian, having lightly jumped, entered the space inside the stone door.
철벅 (Cheolbeok).
The pooling blood soaked Davian's shoes.
Davian's brow furrowed as he looked around.
Of course.
It wasn't because the chopped-up corpses were scary.
Or because the stench of rotting corpses was disgusting.
Or because the severed cross-sections were cruel.
The severed cross-sections were smoother than those cut by an aura-infused sword.
And there were no traces of battle.
Not even traces of resistance or attempts to flee.
으득 (Eudeuk).
Davian clenched his teeth.
This trace.
Was the trace of dozens of invisible threads simultaneously severing people's bodies.
Some villagers had proper weapons.
But the arms holding the weapons were simply cut off.
Or the weapons were cut off entirely.
This trace.
He had seen it before.
In the 3rd playthrough.
It was when he went out on a normal quest performance evaluation.
The scene where the local aristocrat's private soldiers were annihilated.
Knowing the vast difference in power.
Davian, who had been watching from afar, had no choice but to flee in haste.
The quest was, of course, a failure.
After Davian fled.
All the domain residents who remained there were massacred.
'This bastard. It's you.'
Team 2 went to the dungeon entrance where Team 1 was and helped with monster subjugation.
The club members who had dealt with all the monsters coming out of the dungeon returned to the clubroom.
Of course, Team 1 had also confirmed the villagers' corpses.
Vice-President Nabeiro asked.
"Did they gather them all there and kill them? Or did they kill them and then put them all there?"
"They gathered them all and killed them at once."
"How do you know that, Davian?"
It was too simple, but.
"Because there are no traces outside."
"Ah...!"
"And when I went inside. There were sharp marks left here and there on the walls."
This time Ariel asked.
"But wasn't that a secret place for the village? It looked like a space that was made a long time ago."
"That's right."
"How did an outsider push all the villagers into the village's secret place?"
He knew that method well.
"There was another threat nearby. They probably persuaded them with words. That if there was a safe place, they should go in there and take refuge."
3rd-year Freddy Kizanir shouted.
"Ah! They could have said that monsters were starting to come out of the dungeon, so they should go in there and take refuge!"
"Oh, that makes sense?"
Emma Baidy said in a trembling voice.
"So, they pushed them all in there and then... slaughtered them so cruelly?"
Everyone's expression turned gloomy at Emma's words.
They had urgently set out to protect even one more villager.
They went and took down all the monsters.
But the villagers were already gathered in one place and dead.
Ariel said calmly.
"I think we should report this. It doesn't seem like a normal matter."
"To the academy? Or the royal family?"
"Both. We have to write a report first."
While the sunbaes were talking.
Davian's mind was filled with other thoughts.
'It's too fast.'
Of course, it was around this time that the frequency of dungeon core amplification started to increase.
But that guy's appearance was too early.
Originally, it was a guy he should have encountered during a 5th-year quest.
Had he appeared early as the main story changed?
Or, as always, had this damn game automatically entered difficulty adjustment?
Had he originally started his activities around this time, but he had only encountered him 3 years later?
He couldn't know yet.
All three reasons could be mixed together.
'Who cares.'
Whether the story changed as he entered the dungeon exploration club.
Whether the game difficulty went up and the quest was brought forward.
Whether he had discovered his actions but he was originally scheduled to appear 3 years later.
It didn't matter.
This time.
I will find him first and kill him.
I won't be powerlessly defeated or run away like last time.
Solvere Linea.
The Marino Empire's troubleshooter.
Specializing in murdering entire bloodlines.
Specializing in massacres using silver threads.
Her main task was, to trigger dungeon core amplification.
And, among them, eliminating witnesses.
'I'll find you first. Solvere Linea.'
Somewhere in the forest between the western mining area and the city of Kanzar.
"Is it here?"
"That's right."
"Tch. If the dungeon is in a place like this, there won't be any witnesses this time."
"Isn't it better if there are no witnesses?"
Solvere Linea's pupils, already unusually small, became even smaller.
"It's no fun."
Eyes with only white, instead of large pupils.
Eyes that made anyone who saw them feel a chill.
Proton, who had been dispatched with her to the Alkanzia Kingdom for a month, was no exception.
'I can't get used to those eyeballs no matter how many times I see them.'
It was fortunate that her long hair covered even one eye.
Her long silver hair reached down to her waist.
She wore tight black leather clothing, top and bottom.
And silver threads were densely wrapped around her arms.
If it weren't for her unusual eyes, anyone would have thought she was pretty.
But.
No one in the world would think that Solvere Linea's face, as she said it was no fun because there were no witnesses, was pretty.
'They say the eyes are the windows to the soul.'
Proton, having unnecessary thoughts, quickly turned his head.
"We'll go into the dungeon and come back, so you stay here, Solvere."
Solvere strode next to Proton and stuck her chilling face up to his.
"What if we made witnesses?"
"What?"
"I could just wander around and make witnesses. Then we can kill everyone related to those witnesses."
"Crazy human."
Solvere laughed so hard that her back arched.
"Just kidding, just kidding. Hurry up and come back. I'm bored."
"Don't forget your role. Our mission is to quietly, without attracting attention, trigger dungeon core amplification."
"I know. I'm just kidding. Hurry up and come back. If you keep nagging..."
Solvere stuck her chilling face up again.
Her pupils were even smaller, barely remaining as small dots.
"I might want to kill you too, Proton. Got it?"
If he backed down here.
He would be completely dragged around by this bewitching woman.
The grand task in the Alkanzia Kingdom was something that could take years.
"Get your face away from me."
Originally, the adjective "chilling" should have been attached to the word "face."
But he couldn't bring himself to utter those words.
Even just saying "get your face away" without the adjective made cold sweat run down his back.
Sararak.
The silver threads wrapped around Solvere Linea's arms unraveled in an instant.
The unraveled silver threads danced as if they were alive, occupying the space.
Before he knew it, the silver threads tautly stretched around Proton's body, densely positioned.
Solvere Linea smirked.
"Do you want to die?"
Comments
Post a Comment