All-Master Player Of The Academy [EN]: Chapter 169

◈ Chapter 169

85. Survivor – 1

Widron led Ian and his group along a forest path.

Gust, wondering why they were being taken there instead of a proper road, asked. Widron replied as if it were obvious.

“There are a lot of those things near the main road.”

“And that thing looked like a demon.”

“Yeah, right. And it’s not just humans who are affected by that mushroom.”

He glanced at Gust.

“And among them, there are some who identified themselves as guardians.”

Gust clenched her fist tightly.

Widron sighed as he watched her tremble with anger.

“This mess started a few days ago.”

At the request of Count Pelle, the Widron Mercenary Corps came to escort the village of Tormbe.

“Tormbe Village is practically a city. I don’t know if everyone knows this, but…”

“We know they grow drugs there.”

“Ah, really? Then that’s settled. Anyway, there are also a lot of monsters, so there are many mercenaries and hunters.”

And there are quite a few mercenaries who reside there under the pretext of monster disposal.

If you include the people who gathered to make money from them, it was hard to see it as just a village.

“It’s almost like a directly controlled territory with so many people… but strange things suddenly started happening a few days ago.”

A mysterious explosion occurred in the inner castle where the drugs were being manufactured.

And with that explosion, the blue powder that the mushroom man had emitted spread throughout the castle.

“And the real trouble started the next day.”

People who were in the castle and injured in the explosion began to change.

Those with blue powder on their bodies gradually became aggressive.

“It was chaos. People who were being treated suddenly started rampaging. Anyway, the request we received was to protect the people of Tormbe Village, so we tried to suppress them.”

And they protected people from those who were rampaging, trying to subdue them without success.

But that was just the beginning.

They suddenly started to suffer and then began to change even more drastically.

The heads of those who were mad with frenzy gradually turned into mushrooms.

And they emitted blue spores, and others who were exposed to the spores turned into mushroom people.

Widron continued, striding forward.

“After escaping with the survivors, we set up a base for them near here.”

“Why didn’t you run away further?”

With Widron’s skills, he could have escaped from here.

He could have led people and run away.

But it was strange that he was still staying.

Trinmere narrowed his eyes and asked, and Widron shrugged.

“First, those guys are wandering around the Gwandos, mountain paths, and other places.”

“But you can take them down.”

“It’s easy if it’s just one or two, but it’s hard with a crowd. And second, if it were just me and my guys, it wouldn’t be difficult to escape even through rough terrain.”

But what about the other survivors?

They were just ordinary people who didn’t even know how to fight properly.

“Are you saying we should abandon those people and run away on our own?”

“Can’t you run away while protecting them?”

“You saw it earlier. They have strong durability and are stronger than usual. On top of that, they emit strange spores, and if you get hit by them, your body hardens, and in the worst case, you become a mushroom person.”

Trinmere couldn’t say anything in response to Widron’s blunt words.

“The only good thing is that they don’t stray too far from the Tormbe Village area. If those guys spread outside, it would be a living hell.”

Their range of movement is about as far as where Ian and his group were earlier, at most.

I don’t know why, but they don’t go any further than that, and even if they do, they go straight back.

“And they don’t attack those who come in, but they chase after those who try to leave, preventing them from leaving. Whether it’s people or monsters.”

As such, they couldn’t take people who couldn’t even fight on an adventure.

All Widron could do was send a few of his men to request support from the outside.

“I didn’t know mercenaries did things like that.”

“I’m doing it because I received an upfront payment.”

Lee Se was surprised and said, and Widron replied bluntly.

While talking like that, he lightly raised his hand.

“…They’re coming.”

In the place he pointed, those with mushroom heads were wandering around.

Lee Se looked at Widron after seeing the chest area of their outfits.

The pattern on the chest of their armor and Widron’s pattern were the same.

In other words…

They were mercenaries of the Widron Mercenary Corps.

“What? Are they our guys?”

Widron said nonchalantly and then picked up his bow.

-Ping!! Ping!!

Each time his bowstring snapped, one person fell.

Widron coldly stared at the corpses of those who used to be his subordinates.

“Once they become like that, you have to consider them dead. Saving the living is more important now.”

With just those words, Widron continued walking.

His back as he walked up looked somewhat bitter.

When they reached the middle of the mountain, Gust grabbed Widron.

“I’m curious. How did you take them down in one shot?”

“Uh… this bow is a bit special.”

He showed his bow.

It looked ordinary on the outside, but it contained powerful magic that Trinmere admired.

“What is this?”

“Sleinger. It’s called the Bow of Kin, used in the desert area on the second floor of the Forgotten City’s Tower. It can’t harm users of the same race no matter how many times it hits them, but it always inflicts critical damage when it hits other races.”

Widron was surprised when Ian explained.

He never thought he would know even this.

“How did you know?”

“I’ve seen that bow before. But you have quite a collection.”

“Haha. We went to that tower every time we had nothing to do.”

He got the bow then.

However, the consumption rate of Aura [a type of magical energy] was high, so he didn’t have much use for it and only carried it around when he had to fight monsters.

“I brought it because monster invasions were frequent in Tormbe Village…”

He never thought he would kill his own subordinates with this bow.

“Well. Seeing them fall to this bow, I guess we should consider them a different race.”

“I have a different opinion. After all, they are…”

Widron waved his hand dismissively as Trinmere rambled on about theories.

As they walked up, a wooden fence came into view.

The mercenaries on the wooden fence waved their hands when they saw Gust.

“Oh~! Boss!! What’s this? Did you find more survivors again?”

“Hey!! They’re not just survivors!! They brought reinforcements who can get us out of here!!”

Widron smiled at Ian.

“Is it possible?”

“It shouldn’t be too difficult.”

He nodded at Ian’s words.

The priority was to get those people out of here.

Widron went inside the wooden fence and saw the people.

They were all people who had barely survived with their lives.

They were all terrified.

Ian nodded as Kirke reported the search results.

“Widron.”

“Hmm? Why? Ah. You need information? Near here…”

“Someone seems to be coming up.”

His expression hardened.

But that was only for a moment.

He immediately shouted to his subordinates.

“Prepare for battle!!”

The wooden fence closes.

He sent the frightened survivors to the cave and shouted to Ian’s group as his subordinates blocked the hole with boxes.

“It’ll be tough, but let’s hold them off!”

“Can we stop them? You said each of them is quite strong?”

“Don’t complain just because you’re a Master!”

As Widron shouted, Gust, who was on the wooden fence looking around, lowered her binoculars and said sullenly.

“…There are so many?”

“Damn it.”

The mushroom people climbing up the mountain numbered over a hundred.

As if to prove that their strength was not ordinary, they were smashing even the trees they collided with.

“Boss!! There are survivors in front of those guys!”

“It’s Vice-Captain Vulcan!! He’s still alive!!”

He hurriedly picked up the binoculars and smiled.

Leading the group of survivors being chased by the mushroom people was Vulcan, the vice-captain of the Widron Mercenary Corps.

He went missing while rescuing people from the inside when the incident happened in the city.

He thought he was dead, but he survived and came this far.

“Yes! Ian!! Help me a little!!”

Widron jumped down from the wooden fence.

As he ran, Ian handed Myae to Semiramis.

“Saintess! It’s dangerous!”

“We have to do more dangerous things in the future.”

Ian, who spoke lightly, also jumped down.

Seeing that, Lee Se frowned, jumped off the wooden fence, and shouted.

“Hey! Tyrant! Trinmere! You guys protect the people here!”

At his shout, Gust, Trinmere, and Semiramis decided to stay for now.

The three who had left the wooden fence immediately ran towards the forest.

“There!”

As soon as they came down a little from the forest, they saw people.

One female knight and one male mercenary.

And one magician was taking the survivors up the mountain.

“Huff… Huff…”

“Just a little! Just a little further and we’ll be there!”

Sending the survivors who were running with difficulty, the giant mercenary, Vulcan, grabbed his axe tightly.

“Cry!! Thunder!!”

When he swung the Axe of Thunder, obtained from Valhalla, electricity was emitted.

The mushroom people who were running were hit by it and bounced off, but the damage was not that great.

But the important thing was to buy time.

The continuous electricity was blocking their progress and allowing the survivors to escape.

“Take the people and go!!”

“But Vulcan!! What about you!”

“There’s no time for that!!”

Vulcan swung his axe again.

Electricity continued to be emitted from the Axe of Thunder, which converted Aura into magical power to use powerful electric magic.

But this won’t last long either.

Perhaps because he was constantly consuming Aura, blood was dripping from his nose.

“Uncle Vulcan!”

“Go quickly!! Get out of here!! Quickly!!”

-Creak!! Creeeak! Squeak!

The mushroom people, facing the wall of electricity, watched the survivors move away.

And…

Eventually, they too began to move.

-Pazijijijik!!

While some mushroom people were enduring the electricity with their bodies, the remaining mushroom people were trying to enter through the gap.

Seeing that, Vulcan gritted his teeth.

“Damn… it…”

It was then.

An arrow pierced the mushroom man who was holding out, and as he fell, other mushroom men were engulfed in electricity.

The moment Vulcan was delighted to see that.

“Ian!! Now’s the time!!”

A boy who jumped out from behind, Ian, fell towards Vulcan.

“You, you are…”

As he drew his sword, Vulcan shouted in embarrassment.

“Those guys can’t be caught with simple swordsmanship!! How tough are those guys…”

At that moment, one of the mushroom people who had broken through rushed in.

Ian swung his sword at him.

“They just have high durability.”

-Slash!!

The mushroom man’s head falls off with his strike.

“Then just cut them strongly.”

With his swordsmanship.

The mushroom people, who had even endured Aura, began to be cut down easily.