Surviving the Game As a Barbarian [EN]: Chapter 321

“Sister, we need to go back quickly!”

“Didn’t you see? She’s a woman who uses aura. And that man, Ruehenphraha, is an even bigger monster.”

“But…!”

“There’s nothing we can change by going back. This is the rational choice.”

Amelia gritted her teeth at Laura’s words as she pulled her along, practically dragging her.

She felt like she was about to cry.

“Rational choice…? Are you crazy? How is it a rational choice for you to die and me to live?!”

When Amelia shook off her arm with all her might, Laura, who had been running ahead, stopped in her tracks.

Laura sighed.

“Amelia, listen to me. We don’t have time for this—”

“What is it! Don’t talk like it’s the end…!”

“…It’s not like that.”

“Then what is it? Why aren’t you even trying something and just running away?!”

“Because this way has a higher chance of survival!”

Laura, as if scolding her disobedient younger sister, continued her words rapidly.

“Amelia, that woman didn’t kill Felix Barker. She used a paralysis needle. She even carried him away like she had business with him. She doesn’t intend to kill him right away. And I’m still alive and well.”

“Ah…”

Amelia couldn’t help but exclaim.

Her sister had thought of all those things even in that urgent situation and made her decision.

“It’s unsettling, but this is the best we can do. Rather than dying a pointless death by recklessly attacking that woman, this way has a better chance.”

“…”

“Now, if you understand, hurry and follow me.”

Laura resumed moving as if she couldn’t afford to waste any more time, and Amelia quickly followed behind.

How long had it been?

The Rainwales sisters encountered familiar faces.

“Huh? Laura, Amelia? You guys are alive?”

“…Lord Derbon.”

The clan members who had abandoned Felix Barker and ran away.

In the meantime, something must have happened, or they had scattered, as only half of them remained.

“Hey, you came at the right time. You guys are lucky. We were just about to escape this city.”

“Yes…? Escape?”

“Can’t you tell? What does it mean that Ruehenphraha, that man, came out of the east? It means that the east is all taken care of, and he’s going to attack the lord, right? This city is already finished.”

As Derbon finished his explanation, two men next to him added, as if they had chills.

“That traitor, he’s not human. Did you see him slaughter dozens of people without changing his expression? Just thinking about what I saw earlier still gives me goosebumps.”

“They say that when the traitor licks his lips, he’s really angry.”

“If this city falls into his hands, we, who were on the lord’s side, will be the first to have our heads cut off.”

It was a sudden proposal, but Laura calmly asked for the information she needed to confirm.

“But how do you plan to escape? The main gate is—”

“Yeah, that gatekeeper is guarding it. But apparently, there’s a hidden side path. It’s a place that the Melta Merchant Guild uses when they go back and forth to the surface, and this guy knows it.”

“…I see.”

“Do you want to come with us?”

Without needing to consider it further, Laura accepted the offer.

“We will go.”

“Huh, sister?”

Originally, the plan was to go to the relatively safe west and hide until the situation was resolved.

But this changes things.

If she were to die, her younger sister would be left alone in this world. She wanted at least her sister to live a life like a human.

Perhaps this was the last chance.

“Ah, and just so you know, instead of taking you with us—”

“I know. If something dangerous happens, I will step forward.”

“Ahem, yeah… you’re easy to talk to.”

The man nodded as if embarrassed, and then began to lead the group.

* * *

Shimmering silver hair.

White skin.

A knight’s armor with the royal family’s crest and a greatsword about 1.5 times larger than the standard size.

They had never met, but he was a well-known figure.

‘Jerome Saintred.’

The head of the 1st Royal Knights and the strongest of the royal family, known as the ‘Knight of Light.’

The problem was why this bastard was here now.

He hadn’t appeared even once in the story Amelia had told him…

“Hand over the fragment of record.”

Still, thanks to this one sentence, the situation was roughly clear.

Why was the Knight of Light, who should be conducting a mop-up operation in the east, here?

The answer was quite clear.

The royal family’s goal was not the eradication of the Orculists.

‘Fighting… it’ll be hard to win.’

He was on a different level from Rick Omanus, whom he had faced on the stairs before. He would have naturally broken through level 5, the maximum level that knights could reach with the ‘elixir’ they consumed…

As a commander, he would have completed the level 6 breakthrough event and even the level 7 awakening.

And even this wasn’t the end.

‘Considering the royal family’s wealth, all seven essences [magical power sources] should be at least grade 3.’

He was outmatched in the number of essences and their average grade.

Not to mention the stat difference, and he was also at a disadvantage in terms of roles, being a tank versus a knight.

However, if he were to find a way to compete…

Whoosh!

It would be his equipment.

Double Numbers items had a basic lower-grade indestructible option.

Clang-!

He received the sword swung without any introduction with his hammer.

Ha, this kind of fight was a first for him.

His basic stance had always been to block with his shield first and then attack with his weapon.

“…?”

The guy frowned as he looked at him, having received his blow.

Like a knight who could cut through anything, he seemed not to have expected his sword to be blocked midway…

“Wait a minute.”

He tried to talk, taking advantage of the brief opening after the blow.

It didn’t seem like it would work, but there was no harm in trying, right?

“Isn’t there some kind of misunderstanding? A fragment of record? I don’t know anything about that.”

“You’re playing games. I heard testimony that you came up from the basement and headed here.”

Hmm, so that’s how it is…

The strategy of saying they had the wrong person didn’t work after all.

However, useful information came out from an unexpected place.

“But… you might have taken it without knowing what it is. The fragment of record… hand over the necklace the lord was wearing.”

A way to dig in seemed to be in his tone.

“If it’s what the lord was wearing, are you perhaps talking about this necklace?”

Just in case, he asked, pointing to the necklace he was wearing, and the guy nodded.

“Yes, if you hand over that item, I promise not to shed unnecessary blood.”

It was a big catch.

Because he had already put the fragment of record into his subspace [a personal storage dimension].

‘This guy doesn’t know what the fragment of record is.’

What he was wearing now was an ordinary necklace.

It had a large refined stone embedded in it, and its only effect was to reduce casting time for mages.

For reference, he had secretly embezzled it during a raid a long time ago and had just been wearing it as an accessory ever since…

‘I’m using it like this.’

They say humans are animals that can talk, right?

He was glad he had tried to talk.

Crack.

He pulled the necklace off with force.

“Well, if you want it, I can give it to you. I just took it as a souvenir anyway.”

“A souvenir?”

“Isn’t he the lord? He told us to go out and fight, but he hid in the basement, and when I followed him, this necklace was the only thing worth taking.”

“Hmm, so it was just for money.”

The guy muttered as if he understood after hearing his words.

It seemed he had seen Rick Omanus, who had been stripped of his equipment, after going to find the lord.

“The goals of guys like us are obvious, aren’t they? Of course, seeing that you want it, this necklace seems to be quite valuable… but no matter how you look at it, it’s not worth risking your life for.”

Most guys who talk a lot have an agenda.

However, this young knight, who seemed to have done nothing but eat and swing his sword, didn’t suspect him.

He just looked at him with contempt.

“The explanation is done, now hand it over.”

“Ah, but before that, I need a guarantee.”

“A guarantee?”

“A guarantee that you’ll let me go if I give you this.”

“I don’t break my promises—”

What was he saying, was he a knight who knew honor?

If he didn’t know how to lie, he wouldn’t even be here in the first place. The lord didn’t know he was being deceived by the royal family until the moment he died.

Therefore…

‘Leap.’

He leaped high, breaking the window in the wall.

Jumping up from the 4th floor, his body floated up, and he could see the entire city centered around the lord’s castle.

The east, where the battle had taken place, was ablaze, while the west was relatively peaceful.

But there was no time to look at it leisurely.

Flash-!

Light flashed behind him, and the guy appeared.

It was a skill that could be recognized just by the effect.

[Gate of Light]

A grade 3 essence and, in fact, the highest tier among movement skills.

Not a half-baked teleport that activates to a random location, but a cheat skill that designates a location.

Ha, it’s been a while.

He used to get this often before he started raising a barbarian.

“Did you think you could escape?”

No sooner had he turned his waist in mid-air than the guy swung his sword, and he blocked it with his hammer again.

Geez, he was in a hurry.

It wasn’t like he had said he wouldn’t keep his promise.

‘Anyway, aerial combat is a first too.’

His body was pushed back further in mid-air by the recoil of blocking the sword.

The distance between him and the guy widened.

Flash-!

The moment the guy closed the distance again with [Gate of Light], he threw the necklace he was holding with all his might.

“…!”

The guy quickly reached out, but he was too far to catch the necklace.

He could see a moment of hesitation in the guy’s eyes.

He was wondering whether to kill him here or not.

Thanks to that, he realized one thing.

‘He doesn’t keep his promises, my ass.’

From the beginning, the guy had intended to kill him as soon as he gave him the necklace.

It must have been for reasons like wanting to eliminate a witness.

Well, it didn’t seem like he was going to stick to that stubbornness even in this situation.

Thud-!

He kicked the guy in the abdomen, who was distracted by the necklace.

The guy didn’t even let out a groan.

But there was nothing to be sorry about.

Because he hadn’t worn it for that purpose in the first place.

Whoosh-!

The distance widened again due to the laws of physics.

Even as he fell, the guy looked at him and asked.

“…What’s your name?”

A voice that conveyed the feeling of meeting an opponent who had purely piqued his curiosity.

Listening to this, he thought.

Why would he tell him that?

“Are you an idiot?”

Ah, he said it.

“…What?”

He regretted it for a moment, but the guy didn’t use [Gate of Light] to come at him again.

Because there was a maximum number of times it could be used at once.

From the third time, he had to wait for the cooldown.

Flash-!

Soon, the guy’s body was enveloped in light and disappeared from his sight. He could see him appearing in the direction he had thrown the necklace, without needing to look far.

‘Okay, I’ve shaken off this bastard for now…’

Then, as he used ‘Transcendent Leap,’ he felt as if an invisible foothold had appeared at the tip of his feet, and when he kicked off with all his might, his body shot out in a straight line like an arrow.

The destination was rapidly approaching.

‘Doing this makes me feel like I’ve become Superman.’

He chuckled and reviewed the short aerial battle that had just taken place.

The more he thought about it, the stranger he felt.

‘It’s like something out of Dragon Ball [a popular Japanese manga and anime series known for its over-the-top action].’

He needed to get stronger quickly.

* * *

The cemetery located on the outskirts of Noark Castle.

Clang-!

He landed in the center and immediately performed a roll.

In other words, to put it simply…

“Waaaaaah!”

He rolled for a long time, smashing tombstones.

“…Agh, I almost died.”

He had come directly from the lord’s castle in the center of the city to the outskirts in one go, but the price was clear.

Was it because he had crashed down from a high place with acceleration?

A sensation of electricity running up his bones, beyond just a tingling in his legs, was blooming.

Considering his pain tolerance, it was practically wrecked.

‘…But I guess I don’t need to use a potion.’

The natural regeneration -40 penalty attached to the Ogre’s essence.

In the past, his wounds would hardly heal without potions because of this…

But the total natural regeneration he had gained from the Stormgush’s essence and the Undead imprint he had obtained this time far exceeded the penalty, and now even minor injuries would heal quickly just by spitting on them.

Swish.

He finished his short rest and stood up.

Looking around, he soon found the place he was looking for.

Because he had visited it in advance before.

A huge tombstone with a passage hidden beneath it, with a height and width that a carriage could pass through.

The first thing he saw was a corpse.

‘It’s the cemetery caretaker.’

The man who resided here under the name of caretaker and acted as a guard for the secret passage was dead, his body covered in knife wounds.

‘I slept for six hours, so Laura’s group must have passed a long time ago… and Amelia should have joined them by now.’

He needed to follow them quickly to arrive before everything was over, so he hurried his steps and entered the passage.

No, to be precise, he was about to enter.

‘…Huh?’

He stopped in his tracks.

Tap, tap.

He could see an old man in neat attire walking from the other side of the passage.

Thump.

The moment his eyes met the old man’s, his heart pounded.

At the same time, it felt like he was dreaming.

Looking at him, the old man greeted him.

“Ho ho, it’s nice to meet you.”

It was Auriel Gavis.