Chapter 61
Our mission was, just as the branch chief had explained earlier, to go to the back gate west of the academy and draw as many soldiers’ eyes as possible.
That was only our public-facing mission; to maintain security, the branch chief and Daniel went around personally, explaining in detail what each group was supposed to do.
The branch chief was one thing, but Daniel was unexpected. Had the two of them known each other for a long time?
And in Adella’s room, the branch chief told us about an operation completely different from the one he had described in the lobby earlier.
“Forest Keeper of Arseria. Earlier, with so many eyes watching us, I had no choice but to put it that way. But in this operation, you, NoName, are the key. If you hadn’t joined us, we wouldn’t have carried out this operation in the first place. So, Adella, you need to listen carefully this time.”
When I asked why, the branch chief let out a sorrowful sigh and said,
There might even be a spy hiding within the ‘Abyss.’
That made sense. Unlike the Imperial Royal Guard, which could use the Oath of Mana, a hastily assembled organization was bound to have vulnerabilities.
But the branch chief wasn’t foolish, either.
“The only people in District 15 I can truly trust are Daniel, Alpherion, Cisciela, and you.”
“What about me?”
“Yes... you too, Adella.”
“Hmph. Bleh-”
On the surface, Alpherion and Cisciela were supposed to steal the laurel, join up with Daniel, and hand it over to him, but the branch chief had twisted the operation around at this point.
“If the diversion succeeds, NoName and Adella will immediately circle around the academy grounds and wait at the north gate. Alpherion and Cisciela will hand the laurel to NoName there, then escape through the east gate in the same way.”
While the people who had extracted the information were frantically trying to capture Alpherion’s group, the real laurel would be smuggled out through the north gate, which had the fewest guards.
It wasn’t more dangerous than their mission, but it felt as though the difficulty of ours had suddenly doubled.
If it were discovered midway that Alpherion’s laurel was fake, they would immediately begin tracking us down.
“That sounds easy! You can look forward to it, Gestalt!”
Adella slammed her hands on the desk and stood up.
“Show the branch chief a little more respect, Adella.”
Despite Daniel’s scolding, Adella, carried away by excitement, purred in a satisfied voice.
“They won’t be unaware of the possibility of a diversion, either. But to crush even that suspicion, the Forest Keeper’s performance will be crucial.”
Daniel unfolded a map.
“Turn the capital into such a mess that they won’t even suspect a diversion.” That was Daniel’s command.
“Remnant Academy looks as though it’s the only academy in the center of the capital, but there are actually several buildings outside it as well. There’s an observatory to the south, a guard garrison to the east, and a materials warehouse and admissions headquarters to the west.”
All of them maintained close lines of communication with the academy.
Even if we successfully stole the laurel, there was a risk that we would be surrounded and captured from all sides.
”Among them, you need to thoroughly raid the three locations in the south and west.”
So that all the troops would be drawn toward the southwest.
At that moment, Alpherion and Cisciela would infiltrate the academy and take the laurel, while our escape would depend on us doing our best to get away.
And if the academy realized belatedly that it had been a diversion, we would return, join them at the north gate blocked by a massive mountain range, receive the laurel, and flee over the mountains to the outskirts of the capital.
“I almost said something disastrous by calling a bald man stupid.”
“...”
Yes, this operation would work perfectly. At this level, even the Kaizen Central Academy from my previous life would have been fooled.
Gestalt, the branch chief, had traded his intelligence for his hair.
* * *
“Yaaawn. How long do we have to wait, nya?”
After picking at her nose, Adella was now digging at her ear.
Because of the stakeout mission, she couldn’t even stretch as freely as she wanted.
Naturally, our first target was the observatory.
It had the fewest people at night, making it the perfect place to draw out a suitable number of troops.
The Adella who had been so enthusiastic about the operation was nowhere to be seen. All that remained was a cat brat yawning out of boredom.
“You’re bored too, aren’t you, nya?”
“Not particularly.”
“Tell me about your past. It’s not often you get a chance to meet an elf.”
“I don’t know my fellow elves very well.”
Because I was a player in the first place.
I didn’t even know what this body used to do.
“That’s not fair.”
Adella abruptly turned her head.
But perhaps she felt embarrassed, because she soon opened her mouth again.
“Do you know why I joined the Abyss, nya?”
It was a story I had never heard before.
She hadn’t reached any particularly high level, and in the Abyss, she was constantly treated with contempt.
I wondered why she was someone the branch chief, Gestalt, trusted.
“I hate the academy. I hate it so much that I hate everyone in the academy.”
“That’s a little out of nowhere. What does that have to do with anything?”
“It has everything to do with it. I was the last person eliminated from the academy entrance exam.”
“The entrance exam?”
“Hah, you don’t know anything, do you?”
If I had taken Remnant Academy’s entrance exam through the normal route, it would have been common knowledge, but I didn’t have that information.
Adella began explaining without caring.
“The final test in the academy entrance exam uses a score-elimination system. As long as you remain within the top 100 until the time limit, you’re accepted.”
And two years ago, Adella had barely managed to make it into the top 100 in the entrance exam.
Although she had no heaven-sent talent, her experience surviving countless threats to her life in the gutter had carried her through a competition with odds of hundreds to one.
“I grew up without a home, money, or parents, and I got accepted into the academy that only the continent’s best talents attend. Back then, I thought that bastard father of mine would finally acknowledge me.”
“Your father?”
“Apparently, he’s a famous professor at the academy.”
Adella’s origins were humble.
She was nothing more than the result of a night of debauchery.
Her father had no intention of acknowledging her as his child, and even her mother at the brothel had abandoned her without mercy.
In the darkest, dirtiest corner of the Empire, she dreamed of a future as noble and sparkling as her own name, Adella.
She stole valuables from passersby to survive.
She stole glittering jewels from merchants to survive.
It was hardly an honorable life, but she had vowed that if she could only get into the academy, she would live a different life from then on.
“But that bastard rigged the rankings. He clearly didn’t want me to get accepted.”
Just as she was spending the happiest days of her life in the joy of being accepted, she received a notice of rejection the day before the entrance ceremony.
[‘Special Admission for a Hero Candidate’]
Her place had been stolen by some nobody from nowhere, and Adella, who had naturally ranked 100th, was expelled from the academy dormitory.
It took less than a day for her to go from a warm, cozy bed to lying on a cold stone floor.
Adella ground her teeth.
Although it had happened two years ago, she couldn’t contain her anger, as if it had happened only yesterday.
“They could’ve spared me one spot...! Why give it to me only to take it away?! How is that fair?!”
A bird that falls from the highest place can never fly again.
“I’ve waited two years for a chance to take revenge. I’m going to kill them all.”
If Adella couldn’t fly through the sky, she decided, she would break the wings of everyone else.
Her bloodshot eyes were unmistakably those of someone far from sane.
The time for the operation arrived.
As luck would have it, thick clouds covered the bright full moon, making the surroundings suitably dark.
“This is the first time I’ve ever received a proper mission from Uncle Gestalt. If I’m going to repay his kindness, I can’t disappoint him on this mission.”
“Was the branch chief the one who brought you into the Abyss?”
“...”
In the distance, the bell of the clock tower in the imperial palace rang out.
Adella was the first among the group to shoot forward.
“Don’t go dying on the way! I’m not waiting for you!”
She vanished down the narrow path in an instant, shrinking into a dot.
I could only let out an incredulous laugh.
Who was telling whom to be careful?
It would be a miracle if I didn’t end up as cat soup.
* * *
-If she’s talking about a hero candidate, does she mean the student council president?
-She suddenly became so damn pitiful
-We really cherish our Del-nyang!
-Now that I look at her again, she kind of looks cute?
-I want to pet this wounded cat like crazy
-Why do the WoA Gallery folks call her Dark Adella when she’s this cute?
-That’s enough character rehabilitation
People who experienced Nightmare difficulty for the first time said,
“Shouldn’t someone like Adella count as a heroine with a tragic backstory?”
She was a Nightmare-exclusive character who never appeared at all on Normal difficulty.
She was beautiful, and her past was touching enough to tug at people’s heartstrings.
They had already been captivated by her sulky expression, her teary catlike eyes, and the tail that occasionally slapped the floor in accordance with her mood.
But DaeSal, the vice-master of the ‘Korea’ clan—SaveTheGradStudent—who knew the whole story, let out a veteran’s derisive laugh.
[‘SaveTheGradStudent’ donated 1,000 won!]
-The Dark Adella hate stack is only getting started
“Nyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! Forest Keeper, save me!”
Adella came running back down the path, screaming an eerie cry that shouldn’t even be put into words.
At that moment, an unexpected quest window appeared for NoName.
[Remnant Observatory Guards (0/20)]
Nightmare difficulty was not kind.
It was like encountering bandits in the mountains and being killed for no reason at all.
It didn’t tell you what to do or how to do it.
It didn’t provide any information about the enemy or their weaknesses, either.
They were simply all frantic to kill the player.
A dark, gloomy path.
The ominous cry of a crow.
The scraping clink of mirror-scale armor (鏡幡甲) echoed through the night.
When the steady sound of footsteps descending the mountain drew near,
they all drew their weapons at once.
“Intruders must be executed.”
-20 people?????????
-What the hell, weren’t there normally two?
-Nope, I had one.
-Look at those murderous eyes. They look like they could kill a man
-They came here to kill us, dumbassㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Nightmare Infamy is maxed out, so the very first battle is already hellㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-If there are only 20, shouldn’t it still be manageable? Later they show up in battalion-sized units
-Look at their size
“NoName, please...! I don’t want to die hereeeee!”
Adella tripped over a tree root, and the soldier at the front grabbed her ankle and lifted her upside down.
Her short skirt slid down, fully exposing the black underwear beneath her garter belt.
-Whoa, damn, he’s freaking tall
-They all look like they’re at least two meters tall?
-Look at those muscles. Their armor looks ready to burst
-Is Nightmare Infamy 10 a world populated exclusively by alpha males?
-A 160-centimeter WoA player is sobbing ㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ
-Seriously, people talented enough to be royal guards are standing watch at an observatory
-Ooh?
-Aaaaah, no way????
-This is it..!!!!
-Wakya-pyahuknongㅋㅋㅋ
-Damn it... I knew we could trust those guard brothers!!!
-A full-on faceplant is totally possibleㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Black panties... panties, I said...
-Is everyone not paying attention to the game?ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ