Chapter 77: Toxic to the Core

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Marni Wilf trudged through the snow with his caravan.

He was leaving Lancaster City.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t move directly from the city to the underground stronghold. What he was worried about was that he might have attracted some unfriendly attention after he began selling those two new potions. If he took too direct a route to where he was going, then although he might appear to have vanished at first, it was likely that someone would eventually discover the secret entrance to his hide-out, and that could be a real problem.

As such, every time he’d finished with his business within the city, he’d take the long way back around, and access Lancaster City’s sewers from the outside. As one of the players, he had a map of the subterranean tunnel network, so there was no fear of getting lost.

However, after doing things this way several times, events nevertheless began to progress towards his worst case scenario.

A faint shadow flitted past Marni, and gave him a little nod.

“As expected, someone suspicious is following me?” he sighed.

The spirit began pantomiming various gestures. Marni watched for a moment, then cocked an eyebrow. “That’s a lot of people. Three dozen? Mostly a bunch of hired vagrants? That’s fine, then.” He grinned, and a nasty sort of light flashed through his eyes.

If it had been something like the Holy Corps of the Brilliant White Church coming after him, he’d definitely be running for dear life right this very moment, and he would never bring his wares to Lancaster City again until he’d risen in level some more.

But if it was just some random collection of bums, that indicated the person pulling the strings was of limited means.

After Marni parted ways with the Silver Chimes Merchant Guild, he’d made some changes to his caravan: Now, all the drivers and guards were players too!

Although Ivan was the only one among them who’d even gone through a class change, the rest of the newer players had nevertheless been seasoned with time, and they were now at an average level of 10. Never mind a rabble like this—even if they were up against proper troops, equal to them in number, they’d have the upper hand all the same!

Before long, the leader of the pursuers noticed that Marni was meandering aimlessly in circles, and understood that they’d been spotted. Rather than beating around the bush any further, they decided to just make use of their superior numbers, and quickly surrounded the caravan.

Although Marni had already been informed by his summoned spirit about how most of the pursuers were nothing to worry about, when he saw them in their rags, shivering in the snow, yet shouting and posturing in a desperate attempt to appear menacing… Marni couldn’t help but sigh.

“Mister Wilf, I congratulate you on the success of your new Cola products.” The one in the lead had some nice stuff on him, and so did the two henchmen flanking him. It was a stark contrast from the rest of the motley crew.

They outnumbered Marni’s people at least three-to-one, and so they probably felt like they were in full control of the situation. With a flippant smirk, the leader of the pursuers continued, “I wonder if you’d be interested in becoming partners? We could make it rich together.”

“Ah, not interested.” Marni couldn’t be bothered to banter with him like this, and gave him a curt reply.

The other man’s expression darkened instantly. Examining Marni’s cold indifference, he snarled, “You’d better give it some careful thought. At the moment, I’m still willing to let you be somebody, moving forward. We can each have a slice of the pie. If you really don’t know how to count your blessings, I may have to resort to a slightly more direct approach, in order to persuade you to share all your secrets with me!”

“Alright. After much deliberation, I remain uninterested.” Marni felt as though he could see a puff of smoke rising out from the other man’s head, but couldn’t decide if it was from rage or shame.

Whichever the case, this signified a breakdown of negotiations.

“Beat them up! Take whatever you want from their bodies and their wagons!” With that, the horde of hobos attacked.

“I feel sorry for you guys, but I must warn you nevertheless: Lay a hand on any one of us, and you’d better be ready to die—” Before Marni could finish, some of the vagrants charged in at him, eyes on the fine jacket he was wearing.

Marni could only sigh again.

“Well, you brought this upon yourselves.” As though refusing to defend himself, he laid down both hands. Then he whispered, “I’m Iron Man.”

Next instant, red and gold armor plating flew in out of nowhere, assembling themselves upon Marni’s body with resounding clangs, forming a full-body suit of metal armor!

This startling development left the attackers stunned. Even the one commanding them, not far away, was gaping in shock. Then, he was looking upon Marni’s armor with undisguised greed.

“Jarvis!” Marni called out, and his spirit wreathed the armor in an ethereal blue glow, the light shining from the seams between the armor plates.

This was something amusing that Marni had discovered through experimentation: If a Spirit Swordsman progressed down the Evil Blade skill tree, their spirit would attach itself to their weapon, enhancing the damage done with their skills.

And yet, here and there were Swordsman skills which involved foregoing the blade to attack enemies bare-handed. One key example was ‘Shoulder Throw’, which was available at Level 3.

If no sword was equipped, what would that spirit enhancement technique do? The answer was that it would be applied upon one’s armor, if that could somehow be perceived as a ‘weapon’! This greatly augmented the properties of the armor—and when using Brawling skills such as Shoulder Throw, the damage would be greatly increased as well!

This was the personal configuration which Marni had arrived at through his own initiative. It might also be worth mentioning that when he first formed a pact with his spirit, ‘Jarvis’ was a name suggested by the system, and since he thought it sounded alright, he’d kept it.

“Iron Palm! Meteor Slam! Dragon’s Fang! Ora-ora-ora-ora-ora! You’re already dead!”

With frightening speed, the red-and-gold armored figure unleashed a series of attacks upon the hobos leading the charge. Their leader only saw Marni’s fists as a blur, a storm of shadows, and then the men closing in around Marni exploded in a shower of blood!

Marni was one of many players who had come from a similarly humble background as their adversaries. It was precisely because of that, that they understood how precious their new lives were. They wouldn’t let anyone take it from them just for the sake of a bit of pity, and struck down the oncoming vagrants without hesitation.

Both sides had barely made contact for a moment, and the enemy forces had already suffered grievous losses.

Not even the bodyguards, for all their fancy equipment, were any match for the players. One could tell that they’d been well-trained, but they little experience with real combat. The players, hardened by actual life-or-death battles, made short work of them.

“Wait, you can’t kill me… I can give you money…” The leader of the pursuers had finally realized the gravity of his situation. Seeing that his pleas were falling upon deaf ears, he turned to flee, but Marni easily pinned him down.

Knowing there was no escape for him now, he roared furiously at Marni. “Just you wait… my father will avenge my death!” With these words, his body expanded rapidly, like a balloon.

Sensing danger, Marni tried to get away, but when the man’s body exploded, if not for the full-face mask he was wearing, he’d be splattered all over with black blood.

“Well I’ll be… I didn’t judge him capable of such viciousness,” Marni muttered soberly.

Having mopped up the last of their opponents, Ivan walked over and took a look at Marni. “Eh, why is your health falling?” he wondered aloud.

“What? Holy crap! When did I get poisoned? Ahh… that guy was toxic to the core! Damn it, I’m dead again…”

Before he could finish that last thought, Marni keeled over to the ground.

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Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

The excitement in Lancaster City changed nothing in Grey Fjord Port, many miles away.

Now that she understood the significance of Warty Tidal Flat to the frogmen tribe, Princess Leah abandoned her plans to lay an ambush for their enemies there. After some discussion with the leaders of the various player parties, they decided to attack from the woods about two kilometers away from the cliffs. According to Edward, who’d infiltrated the Society of the Secret Eye to provide information on where they were gathered, unless the enemy forces purposely extended their route by another fifteen or sixteen kilometers to go around the woods, they would definitely be passing through there.

The scouts they’d sent to spy on the Secret Eye’s camps had been discovered by the enemy, and immediately slain. Things were really getting exciting now.

Currently, the players still lacked the ability to exchange instant messages over long distances, but party leaders were able to monitor the status of their teammates. When those scouts fell afoul of the enemy sortie, they used a code that had been arranged ahead of time, applying a certain series of buffs upon themselves in a specific order. With this rudimentary coded message, they were able to inform their team leaders—a dozen kilometers away—that the enemy was on the move.

In response to this alert, the players leapt into action.

Transportation methods in this setting were generally unimpressive. Ordinary people travelling in such weather should only be able to move at a crawl. At best, they could maybe get some sleds, and somehow find some Huskies to pull them through the snow. The warrior-type classes were unable to use magic to summon up any mounts, but they could run at the speed of bullet trains, and easily surpass the speed of sound. Inclement weather meant nothing to them.

The members of the Society of the Secret Eye couldn’t come anywhere close to such superhuman feats. Even Black Whip, the mightiest among them, was only comparable to a player at Level 40 or so. Without any high-level divine gifts, he probably couldn’t even go toe-to-toe with a high priest of the Rotten Bones. All things considered, the very fastest he could go was only at about the speed of a horse-drawn chariot.

Moving out immediately upon receiving that signal from the scouts, the players were easily able to find good ambush positions, and lay in wait to catch the Secret Eye troops by surprise.

Xi Wei himself granted all the participating players a limited-time consumable item, Eggnog: Even if they had to lie in the freezing snow for half the day, one mouthful of that Eggnog and they’d be back on their feet at full strength, untouched by the cold!

Besides that, perhaps inspired by the players’ astounding abilities, the normally sedate frogmen had become alive with energy, positively swarming from the nest to assist the players with their ambush on the Society of the Secret Eye!

Even the frogman elder had produced some long, crooked staff from a corner of his great conch shell of a home, and came following after them along with Croakatoa. In his own words, this ambush would do little to help their situation, but he would come along anyway, and support his fellow frogmen with combat buffs.

This meant there was no one in the frogmen village at the moment.

To the frogmen, this would be a last, desperate stand. Removing themselves from their homes meant distancing themselves from distractions. Whatever might happen to those empty houses was of no concern to them now. They’d left nothing of value behind besides some salted fish.

It wasn’t as though the Society of the Secret Eye was after their material goods. Their only interest was in the land. Even if they somehow got around the ambush and occupied the village, it wouldn’t serve any purpose. It was hard to imagine that they’d go to so much trouble for something that would gain them no merit.

However, this presented a delightful opportunity for Xi Wei.

Descending to the mortal world straight away, he strolled through the frogmen village.

Truth be told, the players had already turned over the soil three feet deep, all throughout the village. Not even a metal detector would find you any treasures here—besides the salted fish.

But Xi Wei was looking for something hidden much deeper.

“I knew it. This ain’t no ordinary village.” He’d already had his suspicions: The frogmen shouldn’t have the ability to bring down a monster over ten meters in length, and even use its shell for a home. As such, the massive structure at the center of the village raised certain questions.

Prior to their alliance, the frogman elder had told them that it was this Aquatic Lord of theirs who had helped their ancestors settle the land here.

Nearly a thousand years ago, these frogmen had to have been little more than primitive cavemen. How had they all been anchored to a specific spot like this? What would have been the simplest way to accomplish this?

By creating a highly conspicuous landmark.

And what sort of landmark would inspire the frogmen to willingly take residence upon this sandy beach?

The answer was as clear as day: A ready-made home with many rooms within, which could endure for millennia.

“It’s more than a landmark…” Xi Wei knocked upon the chitinous walls, and sensed faint traces of magic flowing through them. Realization dawned upon him. “It also serves as a magical focus. Ah, the patterns on the surface are actually runic symbols… Interesting. A shell like this would already be infused with magical energies, and should be able to repair itself to some degree. Channeling the power of their faith, it could lure an abundance of fish to the shallow waters nearby. Maybe it wards off sea monsters, too?”

Whichever the case, this leviathan seashell was a landmark not just for the frogmen ancestors, but for Xi Wei as well.

It didn’t take him long to figure out the pattern behind the enchantments. Judging by the alignment of the shell, he was able to locate the nexus point. Standing at that spot, he opened his senses to the world.

In an instant, his perception pierced through the earth below.

Approximately one thousand and five hundred meters below the surface, there was an altar. It wasn’t something humans could have made—it looked like a holy symbol which had somehow manifested into a physical thing, and it was still emanating a faint hint of divinity.

There, at the center of the altar, lay what Xi Wei was looking for: The body of the Aquatic Lord!

Not shattered remnants, as Xi Wei had assumed at first; it was a whole, complete body!

Well, perhaps not completely whole—examining the body more closely, he discovered numerous defects.

Comparing a divine avatar to a crystal ball, the Aquatic Lord was cracked all over, like a crystal ball that had been shattered all to pieces, and then put back together again.

And filling up those cracks, like the glue holding everything together, was a thousand years of faith from the frogmen!

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