Chapter 126
"Keeeaaaargh!"
"Kyoohhh!"
Inside the sprawling dojo, ear-splitting shrieks echoed without end. Honestly, it was loud as hell, but I didn't hate this kind of atmosphere. If anything, it sharpened my focus in a good way.
"Gonzaemon, here I come!"
"Oh, bring it!"
Oops, there was no time to space out here. The opponent facing me was an oni wielding a huge iron club. I'd forgotten what Race it was, but its base stats were higher than mine. Naturally, since it had me beat in levels!
"Nnngh!"
"Too slow!"
I narrowly dodged the roaring iron club as it came at me and slammed a low kick into its knee. But an attack like that couldn't even deal proper damage. The more oni evolve, the more their HP shoots up.
"Not yet! I'm just getting started!"
"Come at me!"
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After training with some other oni and yokai for a while, I joined up with Genjuro—Gramps—who had gone hunting with the others, and we sat down to eat together. The Great Tengu was there as well, the leader of the yokai and the de facto boss of Mount Tenrei.
"Ah, honored guest. You are working hard."
The voice came from directly behind me without a sound. It was the Great Tengu. Apparently, this old bastard sometimes went wandering off alone and didn't come back for a while. Was he some kind of wandering old man?
By the way, the Great Tengu looked exactly like The Tengu. Red skin, a prominent nose, long, silky white hair, and a white beard. Three pairs of crow wings sprouted from his back, and he was dressed like a mountain ascetic. In his right hand was a fan made by binding together several feathers, while his left held a shakujō that rattled with every movement.
His clothes and equipment were all top-of-the-line. I'd handled some pretty good things made by Iris, so I could tell more or less. I'd heard his level was 100, and with first-rate gear on top of that... Of course I couldn't beat him. For now.
Yeah. I'll get stronger soon and beat you into the ground, you damn old tengu."
I'd challenged that damn tengu to a fight as soon as I got here. But the outcome was decided in an instant. He merely waved his fan once, and my body stopped moving altogether.
I couldn't do a thing. No, the bastard hadn't even moved, you hear me? I hadn't even made it into the ring. He'd shown me just how far apart we were.
I didn't even know what he had done, or what had been done to me. I needed to figure that out, or I wouldn't be able to do a damn thing.
"Ho ho ho! That spirit is commendable! Work as hard as you like, mighty wanderer."
"Enjoy acting so smug while you can. I'll definitely make you cry."
"Oh my, how frightening. This poor old man, shouted at by a youngster, shall make his retreat."
The damn tengu pretended to be frightened, then flew off somewhere. Always teasing me... What a bothersome old man.
"Still picking fights, Jigorou?"
"Yeah, old man. You here to lecture me too?"
This time it was the other old man. Genjuro had gone hunting with the yokai he'd hit it off with. The food we were eating now was what the old men had brought back. Apparently it was giant rats, insects, and the like, but game food was tasteless anyway. As long as it restored my fullness, I didn't care what it was.
"No. I too still have what it takes to scale a towering wall. Why, I am most surprised to find that I have not yet withered away."
"Isn't that just an old man's recklessness? Though I guess age doesn't matter for avatars."
One way or another, it seemed Genjuro wanted to fight the damn tengu too. But I wasn't giving anyone the right to be the first to beat that bastard down!
"Indeed. More importantly, it seems Izamu-kun and Ruby and the others have made some fine new acquaintances."
"Oh, you mean new clan members? Sounds good to me. Those guys aren't gonna let any weirdos into their inner circle."
Izamu did outrageous things, and sometimes he said things that sounded like they came from a kid. But I trusted him quite a bit. Our fighting styles were complete opposites, yet for some reason we got along. Or maybe we got along precisely because we were opposites?
"I have no doubts about him. No, I mean Ruby and the others. When I checked social media just now, I recognized the people they had met."
"Huh? You mean they're famous players?"
"Just so. They are also people with a bit of history with you."
"History?"
What was he talking about? When he said history, did he mean a player I'd killed together with Izamu? That was about the only thing that came to mind.
"The two players are Raga and Kanna. They won the pairs division in the first Fighting Tournament, and Raga is the first cavalry player you defeated during the labyrinth event—the one who ended up in a promotional video."
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To describe the Hua Kingdom in the Aqualio Archipelago in a single phrase, it is a country with a distinctly Chinese atmosphere. The people walking through the streets wear clothes that look Chinese, and the designs of the buildings are similar as well. I suppose you could say it is a mishmash of the worlds of the Three Kingdoms and Water Margin.
"Ahhh... It's nice being able to walk through town openly."
"Yeah. Birdie Perch is technically a town too, but not a single human lives there."
We were walking openly down the main street of that very town. In the Hua Kingdom, any Race could enter the city as long as it demonstrated enough intelligence to answer a few simple questions. If only the first city had been somewhere like this, there would probably have been many more monster players.
"Oh my, so it really is true that monster players have a hard time."
"Seems that way, Kanna."
Two players we'd met after coming to this country responded with wry smiles to the words Ruby and I had let slip about our hardships: Raga-san, a Magic Horse, and Kanna-san, a Human. Apparently, the two of them had won the Fighting Tournament. They were truly amazing players.
The two of them were married in real life and played together. Kanna-san's hobby was horseback riding, but she was busy with work and could rarely find the time. So she had thought, 'If that's the case, why not go horseback riding in a virtual world?' That was why she was here.
Raga-san, her husband, had started the game for his wife's sake at first, but now he seemed to be completely hooked. He said that racing at speeds no human could ever achieve was becoming an incredible thrill.
"Shii-chan has final checks to make for the 'Trial of the Azure Moon,' so it can't be helped... But what are we going to do about that quest?"
Shio, who had come with us, was preparing to challenge the 'Trial of the Azure Moon' alongside the Birdians who would be challenging it with her. If her Race Level rose too high, she would lose the right to challenge it, so instead of killing monsters, she was endlessly raising her Skill Levels in the training grounds. Some of the Skills she used often had already far surpassed her Race Level.
Actually, with those Skill Levels and Shio's skill, couldn't she clear it alone...? She was completely different from me, since I had relied on Genjuro and Ruby for everything.
In any case, Ruby and I happened to run into Raga-san in town, and we hit it off immediately. We were wandering around together when a local NPC suddenly called us over. And not just any NPC—it was someone who seemed to hold a considerable social position.
At first, I thought they were after Kanna-san and the others because they were famous, but for some reason they wanted me and Ruby. Why us? Even so, it would have been a waste to ignore what looked like a quest flag. I was a gamer, after all.
The request was a hunting quest called 'Heaven's Mercy.' The two people who had been with us at the time accepted it as well. It was a quest for two parties of two.
"We'll give it everything we've got!"
"I've spent every last coin, including the advance. If we fail, we're sunk."
Before attempting the quest, the requester gave us some information about the opponent we would be fighting. At the same time, everyone received a large sum as an advance, but Kanna-san had already spent every bit of hers.
"Ahh... It's so cool... this fangtian halberd..."
What she had spent all her money on was the weapon Kanna-san was still stroking lovingly: a fangtian halberd. It was a masterpiece forged with all the heart and soul of the Hua Kingdom's finest blacksmith. At least for now, I couldn't make something like it. But I hoped that someday I would be able to!
"You didn't know? Well, my wife wanted to use a ji and things like that so badly that she carried a halberd around. She loves long-handled weapons."
"Long weapons are perfect for mounted combat, so I suppose our hobbies just happened to mesh?"
"Exactly. And she's oddly good with it, right? Before we knew it, she'd joined the ranks of the famous players."
Raga-san said this with an expression of utter exhaustion. Apparently, after winning one division of the Fighting Tournament, he and his wife had been relentlessly recruited by various parties, and things had become even worse after the clan system was unlocked.
As a result, the two of them had left the continent as quickly as possible in search of a place without other players. Kanna-san seemed to have been purely enjoying horseback riding, but Raga-san had been working hard to escape those troublesome entanglements.
"To begin with, because I turned into a monster, it would have been difficult for my wife to keep operating on that continent. That's another reason I can't thank Iris-san and the others enough for letting us join the clan."
That was why 'Nightwalkers' was so convenient for both of them—or especially for Raga-san. It was a clan composed entirely of nonhumans, currently the only one with a base outside the Luxresia Continent. Since it was an organization isolated from disputes between players, there was no need for them to worry about offending anyone.
Besides, the annoying recruitment attempts could be turned down with 'I'm already in a clan' as an excuse. Raga-san seemed to be quite a shrewd person.
"No, no! It isn't settled yet!"
"But I think it'll be fine. Jigorou and Gramps would welcome strong people, and Izamu, for all his quirks, is a good-natured guy."
I couldn't say so with certainty, but inwardly I agreed with Ruby. None of the three would object to them joining the clan. Two of them wanted nothing more than to fight, while the leader always wanted to stick his nose into anything that looked interesting.
"Ha ha ha, that's reassuring. We could become companions of the 'Nightmare of the Northern Mountain' and the 'Silver Mask.' Then let's do our best—to slay that monster serpent."