Level Up Inquisitor [EN]: Chapter 17

Apostle (4)

‘N-No way!’

The man’s face turned pale as he exclaimed in shock.

His rapidly decreasing health bar and the sight of fallen users around him filled his vision.

Six players were being overwhelmed by just two.

Especially the man with the longsword, who seemed to be handling four opponents with ease.

He had only watched from a distance as the man took down the boss monster, but facing him up close was a completely different story.

‘I can’t die like this!’

He had just acquired his armor set a few hours ago.

He had spent a fortune at the auction house, even using real money, and he hadn’t even had time to fully enjoy it before finding himself in this bizarre situation, on the verge of death.

Moreover, he was about to lose the levels he had worked so hard to gain and all his remaining money. The man screamed and swung his sword with all his might.

But his pathetic struggle was in vain.

Thwack!

The man, his abdomen pierced by the longsword, slumped to the ground and was forcibly logged out before he could even feel despair.

“Hmm… not bad.”

Aeil muttered, seemingly satisfied after taking out the last remaining user.

He had completely overwhelmed a group three times his size.

He briefly considered capturing one of the users alive to test out his new Apostle-exclusive skills, but that couldn’t be helped.

Even with the abilities of an ‘Apostle,’ Aeil couldn’t afford to hold back while facing so many opponents.

Still, he was satisfied with accumulating Faith and Madness stats by killing four of them.

Furthermore, he received a solid final reward.

[Quest Completed!]

[Kill all six users (6/6)]

[Favor of the Goddess +0.21% (Current: 52.07%)]

[Light Church Contribution +300]

[Faith stat +2.2]

‘Still, her skills are impressive….’

He thought, glancing at Alisa standing next to him.

Even for Aeil, it would have been impossible to face six users alone at this point.

He was only able to win because his opponents lacked PVP [Player versus Player] experience and coordination, he was in the ‘Heretic’ state which granted him title and passive effects, and the effects of the doping potions he had taken for the boss fight were still in effect.

But the biggest factor was the healer supporting him from the rear.

She healed Aeil precisely when he needed it and simultaneously dealt with two users who were targeting the rear.

Thanks to her, Aeil was able to ignore minor hits and aggressively reduce the number of opponents, while Alisa in the rear eliminated the two users with her staff, greatly reducing the burden.

‘Is she perhaps a smurf…?’

He wondered if she was a high-level user playing on a low-level alt character.

However, creating a second character was not common in War Lord.

Given the intense competition among skilled players in War Lord, most were too busy leveling up a single character. Moreover, increasing the character slots to level up an alt required a significant payment to the game company.

Even after paying, there were many penalties to prevent exploitative gameplay that could arise from leveling up two characters simultaneously, so it was rare unless the player had a unique concept or preference.

“Still, was it really necessary to kill them…?”

Alisa said, looking at the scattered corpses of the users.

She hadn’t intended to participate in the fight, but when the users started swinging their swords at her, she ended up fighting back and killing two of them.

She was no stranger to PVP, but something felt uneasy.

“It can’t be helped. They’re the kind of people who might betray us at any moment if we were in the same hunting ground. Especially since I monopolized the boss monster’s items, they would have been looking for an opportunity to ambush me. It’s better to take care of it here.”

“I guess so…”

Alisa nodded, convinced by Aeil’s plausible explanation.

It was difficult to explain to someone who didn’t know the details that the Goddess had given him a quest.

Now was the time to loot the users’ corpses before anyone else set foot in the forbidden ruins, and they needed to discuss the distribution of the loot.

If they were acquaintances or in a party, they could adjust the distribution based on roles or contributions, but this was a situation that arose with complete strangers.

It was difficult to determine the exact contributions, and since the fight happened suddenly without any prior agreement, adjusting the distribution ratio could unnecessarily complicate things.

In such cases, the cleanest solution was to split it 50/50 without causing any friction….

“Aeil, you can take all the items. I just got caught up in it, so I don’t really need anything.”

“Huh?”

Aeil, who had been racking his brain in front of the corpses, asked back in surprise.

“Even so, that’s…”

“No, really, I don’t need it. I didn’t fight to get anything in the first place.”

She seemed uninterested in looting items from the users and offered to give everything to him.

But even for Aeil, it felt wrong to take all the loot from the six users lying before him.

He hadn’t fought alone, and she had been a great help, so he felt it was his duty as a conscientious gamer to give her something.

Aeil, struck by a good idea, took out a staff from his inventory and handed it to her.

“It really feels wrong for me to take all of this… so take this.”

“Oh?”

Alisa’s eyes widened as she checked the item she received.

It was the weapon item Aeil had obtained after defeating the necromancer Rathma in the underground.

“Are you sure you want to give me something like this?”

“Of course.”

The ‘Staff of Rathma’ he handed over was a weapon for all magic-based classes, not just pure mages, and healers could also use it.

Even though it was a low-level item, it was still a boss-named weapon, so its performance and additional options would be satisfactory.

As expected, Alisa reacted quite positively, and from Aeil’s perspective, it was more financially beneficial to settle with a high-grade staff than to split the user loot in half.

“Thank you.”

“I should be the one thanking you.”

With the agreement settled, Aeil began to collect the users’ items in earnest.

As expected, these were users who were over level 15 and had some decent gear, so it was a different story from the users who had died to the Horned Rabbit with only basic items.

Not just the basic equipment given to beginners, but various equipment items, several recovery potions, miscellaneous items collected while hunting, and a hefty coin pouch.

His experience level had also increased quite a bit, making it more rewarding than taking down a decent boss monster.

There was a reason why PK [Player Killing] against users was so frequent in War Lord.

Many users were drawn to it because the rewards were worth the risk of retaliation.

Of course, some did it purely for the thrill of PK, which was different from hunting monsters, but most were after the high rewards.

‘It’s not a very wise method in the long run, though.’

These guys who were lying on the ground, forcibly logged out, were unlucky enough to run into Aeil and Alisa as soon as they ventured into that area, but unless they were highly skilled, they would eventually get reverse-ganked.

Once they got a taste for PK from the beginning, they would neglect hunting, which was the foundation of growth, and would likely stagnate at that level.

By then, the looting was complete, and it was time to choose which of the acquired equipment items to equip.

Daggers, staves, double-edged axes, etc. None of the weapons he had obtained were suitable for Aeil, but armor had relatively fewer types compared to weapons.

Moreover, since he had been hunting with the basic equipment provided so far, there was no reason to refuse the equipment they had given him at just the right time.

The armor sets that an Inquisitor would choose were usually heavy armor, light armor, or leather armor, and Aeil could choose without much hesitation.

‘First of all, heavy armor isn’t my style.’

Heavy armor, mainly chosen by tank-type classes, increased defense but reduced speed.

It was a relatively passive type of armor, and it wasn’t a wise choice for Aeil, who had started late and needed to rely on his skills. Moreover, he hated the slow-paced playstyle, so it was the first to be rejected among the three.

However, it was difficult to wear leather armor, which was known for its speed.

The reason was the low defense, which was the biggest weakness of leather armor.

It would make him vulnerable to unavoidable skills that he would inevitably face as a melee dealer, and he would hardly be able to absorb any damage.

Unless there were teammates to absorb damage and draw aggro in the front or support and heal from behind, it was clearly not a good choice for Aeil, who would mainly be solo-playing in raids or PVP.

With those options eliminated, there was only one choice left.

Light armor, which guaranteed both decent defense and speed.

Head, top, bottom, gloves, shoes.

There were exactly five pieces of light armor available, and Aeil quickly equipped them.

[Equipping the same type of armor activates the light armor set effect!]

[Agility +3%, Defense +10%]

After confirming that the set effect was applied, Aeil manipulated the settings to make the cumbersome appearance of the helmet disappear.

This didn’t apply to other equipment, but for helmets, he could adjust the settings so that they wouldn’t be visible even if he was actually wearing them.

He had heard that some headgear partially blocked the field of vision, so Aeil also set it to be invisible.

Of course, some people chose to show their hats for style or atmosphere, and tank-type classes sometimes set their helmets to be visible to feel stable and not be shaken when attacked.

Either way, it was purely a matter of personal preference.

Even rankers who were sensitive to details often activated it without much thought.

With the looting and settings complete, Aeil carefully looked around to see if any users had touched Tragul’s corpse while he was away, but as the ‘Forbidden Ruins’ was a shunned hunting ground avoided by most users, there were no other users around.

Perhaps Aeil and Alisa were the only users in the hunting ground after those six… no, seven, including the archer who had fallen to his death, were forcibly logged out.

“Then let’s go down now.”