FPS 202

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Posted byKayJuly 5, 2022Posted inUncategorized

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“Hum – What do you intend to achieve by chasing me alone… Do you want to die?”

“… Not only did you destroy the Druhm Fortress alone, you seem to understand our language.
In any case, you have no place to escape to, undead!” 

The adventurer party had unexpectedly appeared near Druhm Fortress.
Most likely due to the noise and smoke clouds.
Ophelia’s pale pink hair fluttered in the wind while it reflected the rising sunlight.
She slowly pulled out her rapier from her waist.
She stood proudly and truly looked like a Valkyrie. 

Face with this much destruction — even in the face of inevitable death — she still stood before me.
I wouldn’t claim that I knew how she must’ve felt, but at least I understood that, as the daughter of Margrave Dragrange, she couldn’t simply let an undead with enough power to destroy a border fortress alone to be left free to roam. 

I knew her strength because I have been observing them for a while as I followed them.
If we fought at medium to long distances, I’d have the edge.
But when it came to close quarters, I honestly doubt I could keep up with her.

“So, you can speak our language.
Undead, did you come from the labyrinth in the Devil’s Mountain?” 

“What if I did?” 

“Nothing.
I merely wanted to confirm something.
Perhaps you stumbled upon humans who lived inside the labyrinth?” 

“Ah, indeed.
I saw humans settling down on the 10th floor.”

“I see…” 

“However…” 

“However?” 

“They were overrun by these soldiers.
None survived.”

“Ah..
And you simply watched from the sidelines, undead?”

“Of course.
Why would I need to interfere in the first place, this Jonah, the enemy of all that live?” 

I held the grenade ax in my left hand, observing Ophelia’s movement.
In response, Ophelia raised her rapier as it was covered in fluttery hoarfrost .
She began to slowly approach me. 

“Jonah? Fuhn – Of course.
Then, why are you here now?” 

“… To preemptively strike them down, for they were trying to get down into the labyrinth that will soon become mine.” 

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“An undead conquering a labyrinth? Just how crazy are you, undead –, no, Jonah!” 

With that, Ophelia moved in first to strike.

“!” 

At the same time as the piercing strike, the hoarfrosts that fluttered around the blade came flying as icicles around pinky size.
At that instance, I grabbed the riot shield hidden beneath my cloak with my free right hand to defend myself.
The attack was stronger than I expected.
The shield’s durability gauge fell quickly before it burst into particles of light.
Her attacks didn’t stop there, so I tried to restrain her by stretching my right arm to grapple her neck while at the same time, redirecting her rapier with the ax.
But she dodged, even covering herself with a stab as she did so.

 This was bad… If this went on too long, the others would get here.
The dots on the map had already started to move.
They’d be here in a few minutes.
Once they did, it’d be hard-fought to escape.
What awaits at the end would be just a full-blown fight.
But right now, I would only have to take down Ophelia… 

I slid-jump away from the attack.
Once I’d looked back at her, she’d brandished the rapier again— From my perspective, she might’ve used something opposite of .
My melee attack won’t hit her if I made a mistake, so I approached in a way that I could defend myself reliably and swung my grenade ax with all my might. 

“~~~,~~~!” 

Ophelia muttered something just as I swung my ax down.
The hoar frosts that floated around the blade gathered and formed a thin ice blade over the rapier.
She used her now enlarged rapier to block my attack and prevent me from overpowering her with my enhanced body.
But the result was within my expectation  – Ophelia’s feet were slightly buried in the ground due to receiving the full – Ophelia’s feet were slightly buried in the ground due to receiving the full brunt of my power suit’s strengthened ax swing.
This means that her next action would be slightly delayed.

I reached out to the PSS silenced pistol in my holster with my free hand. 

In response to my movement, Ophelia attempted to retreat back like she did just now.
But, since her feet were lodged inside the soil, she ended up losing her balance.

Right there――

I took another step to close my distance with Ophelia, pushing my grenade ax against her crumbling posture. 

“Wha――”

There were only our weapons, locked into each other, between our bodies.
We were pushing at each other, but actually, I was using that to hide my pistol from Ophelia’s sight――

“Pardon me.
Playtime is over.”

“What are yo —?”

Ignoring Ophelia’s words, I shot her thrice on her leg before disengaging and taking off to escape.

“Kuh—” 

Somebody jumped up from behind and over Ophelia, who was at the same time moaning in pain.  

“!”

When Virginia, who jumped over  Ophelia, struck the ground with her wand, the land cracked in a pattern similar to that of a spider nest.

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“Ophelia-sama, are you alright?!”

Virginia stood like a shield in front of Ophelia, who was kneeling on her knee as she was shot through her left foot.

“I-I’m alright.”

There were four light dots just behind――I really don’t have time anymore.
Ophelia’s unyielding eyes remained bolted at me.
However, the injury she suffered won’t allow her to move right away.
As soon as I landed, I flew further back and made more distance, then disappeared from both Ophelia and Virginia’s sight. 

“The undead has escaped.”

“How is Ophelia-sama?”

“Y-yes, Frau.
I was stabbed by something, but otherwise alright.”

“This wound… just what did that undead use as a weapon?”

“A one-handed hatchet.
I couldn’t see what hurt my leg, but it’s probably a dirk or a dagger.”

“I see….
Did you hear anything when you were hurt?”

“Excuse me? It was silent――no, I think I heard the sound of swishing air.”

“I see…”

While keeping a distance from them, I made a big turn around what was the Drum Fortress, and ran through the wilderness at once and returned to the Devil’s Mountains.
Although their voices were heard halfway, it may have been wasteful to shoot through the legs without showing the firearms.
They wouldn’t think that the undead Jonah was the same person as Schwartz, but she might have guessed that the undead used a similar skill――the pedigree skill .

Despite such concerns, I set my priority on returning to the royal capital and running through the wilderness towards the labyrinth of the mine.
Switching the information that was displayed in my field of view on the way to the mini-map that was recorded by AN / GSR-9 (V) 1 (T-UGS).
What I saw on the small screen was the underground warehouse of Daikokuya.

I counted the number of dots wandering on the minimap as I continued running.
Checking whether Flik had successfully brought Koti in.
One extra dot――staying still at one end of the Continental, the bedroom area, was probably Koti… In that case, all I had to do now was to return to the Capital…

My original plan was to move between my store in the Capital and the guardian room on the tenth floor of the Mine labyrinth with the transfer circle.
However, when I recalled Ophelia’s gaze――shining with such a strong will that I couldn’t even miss it if I wanted to.

Recalling that gaze of hers… I can’t afford to let the transfer circle that I installed in the labyrinth stay unguarded.
Ophelia and her group would probably be forced to retreat back to the forest city Dragrange first after witnessing the destruction of the Drum fortress.
But I have no idea what she will do next.
She may just do as I expected, or instead choose to chase after “Jonah” right away.
I don’t want my transfer circle to be found if the latter happens.

In the end――I chose to take a safety measure.
All the while taking note of the time while making my move.
I recovered the transfer magic circle from the Mine labyrinth and headed to the forest city Dragrange while watching the GPS reaction from Miche-san.
I decided that it’s safer to just use the transfer office in Dragrange.
Switching back from Jonah to Schwartz, I infiltrated the city without being noticed, then secretly transferred back to the Capital, making sure that my passage was not registered by making use of the special permit I received from Chancellor Bergman.

It took several days to return to Daikokuya.
Fortunately, I made sure to leave a sizable amount of food in the warehouse, be it Hiryu meat or Marida company’s bento.
But being trapped in a closed space like that basement without nowhere else to go isn’t good for anyone.

Setting up the transfer circle to Daikokuya second floor, I proceeded to do a seemingly wasteful very short distance transfer from the second floor to the basement.

A curtain of light ran through the field of view, and a dim basement spread out in front of me.I looked around and first checked if there was a problem with the basement that I had been away from for a few days――maybe they were saving light, so they kept the warehouse dark.. 

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“Ah, Jonah-san, you’re back!”

“You’re right! He’s back!”

The remnants of the fugitive slave and the phantom thief “Nekoyanagi” were silent as if they had forgotten to breathe when I suddenly appeared on the transfer circle.
The only moving dots were only from the inside of the Continental.
Then, two slave girls ran down with a loud voice breaking through the silence.
However, perhaps because they realized about the air in the basement, their momentum diminished with each step they took, and in the end, they lined up in front of me with a slower movement than walking.

“I… I mean, the Princess is here.”

“Tha-thank you very much.”

“Save your gratitude, for I only act to fulfill my part of the deal.
Now it is your turn to fulfill yours.”

While returning to the words of gratitude, my eyes were not directed at the slave girls, but to Koti and Flik who were standing behind them.

“I thought you were making things up when you said you made a deal with an undead.
Now I can see that you truly did-nya.”

“Pardon me for taking such an extreme measure.
But back then, this was the only way I could think up to rescue Princess Cortine…:”

Koti closed her eyes as she listened to Flik’s words.

“Jonah, is that truly your name-nya?”

Koti asked once she opened her eyes again.
Her mannerism was completely different from what I remember when I met her back in the The Pavillion of Tranquility.
Princess Cortine, the seventeenth princess of the Kingdom of Drak … Why was the Princess of a country so despised that the Division Commander of the fortress called her a beast slave?

Also, why did she go up against slavery, which was one of the basic policies in Drak Kingdom, even to the point of helping fugitive slaves to liberate them?

Once, the founding king of Kurtmerga kingdom established a new country for the people suffering from slavery, abolishing it to the point that the word slave was erased from the entire nation.

Unless one is willing to go that far, it won’t disappear completely――both in the system and in people’s minds.
I don’t know what Koti thought that she decided to help these fugitive slaves, but it has nothing to do with me.

I was just an FPS game player when I fell into this world.
Perhaps to be made into a labyrinth master of some unknown labyrinth.
I was not sent here to become the savior of this world.
I can’t save everyone, nor am I an idiot who believes that I could.
It’s always simply――I do what I can and only if I’m sure I can.

“Indeed, I am.”

“My name is Cortine le Drak….
No, not anymore――it’s simply Koti now-nya.”

While saying so, Koti slowly approached me step by step.
Only the light leaking from the Continental car was overflowing into the dim underground warehouse.
The light illuminates Koti from behind――giving an impression that she has a glowing halo.
If it weren’t for my skeleton face with a white bone that wouldn’t move, I might have exposed a stunned face that was overwhelmed by Koti’s appearance. 

The fugitive slave men and women who had lived in the basement for several days, including the two slave girls, were quietly moving to the corner of the underground warehouse as if they were trying to get out of sight as me and Koti facing each other. 

“Have you heard of the terms of my deal with Flik?”

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“Yes, I have-nya.
To be honest, I didn’t believe him at first.
But, I was indeed rescued, and I saw the Drum fortress crumbling behind us as we made our escape-nya.”

“Drak will temporarily lose their eyes on the Devil’s mountain after the fortress collapses.”

“That’s right-nya.
Otherwise, the presence of such a powerful undead in the Devil’s Mountain cannot be ignored.”

“The Frontier Knights of Forest City Dragrange will invade the mountain in an emergency response.
Leaving the Devil’s mountain, a buffer zone, to be temporarily under Kurtmerga’s supervision.”

“Then… they’ll discover our secret hideout-nya…”

“Indeed.
That place will be recognized as the living place for the people of Devil’s mountain, which does not belong to any country.
And they have been making a living by mining the magic ore at the labyrinth.”

That is the scenario I wrote.
Whether I was lucky or unlucky, I had an environment where things could easily go as I expected.
But, it’s not like things can go as expected all the time.

First, the first obstacle, the Drum Fortress, was crushed.
Battling Ophelia was unexpected, but I was able to inform the Dragrange side of my existence.
Recalling Ophelia’s gaze, I had no doubt that the Frontier Knight would definitely act.

Regarding the phantom thief “Nekoyanagi”, which was Ophelia’s original target, I was originally intending to spread the false info to her via Schwartz, but I was unexpectedly able to tell her the lies as Jonah.
Ophelia should consider that there was a high possibility that the Nekoyanagi had been destroyed, and would prioritize the subjugation of Jonah.

The second obstacle was to create a village in the Devil’s Mountains.
And it has to be pretty convincing either.
The biggest problem is building the village itself.
This depends on how quickly and long you can create a living environment. 

“As of now… even if we want to, we cannot break the deal-nya.
We..
we will follow the conditions you presented.
The phantom thief “Nekoyanagi” will dissolve, never to appear again-nya.
We will also stay in the village in the devil’s mountain, and provide 50% of magic ores mined from the labyrinth to you.”

“Good.
Girim, can you build a village quickly with magic?”

“Wha? W, well, yeah sure… but it’ll be impossible to build a full village from scratch alone.
There aren’t enough hands and materials.
However, we dwarves usually carve out a cave through the mountain for living space.
That should be easier.”

A cave dwelling… that will also make it easier to defend…

“Very well.
I shall provide you with what you need.”

After that, we exchanged opinions with Koti and Gilim about the preparation of the village, and confirmed that there were no missing items or problems.
Food was still okay, but there was only one problem.

A few days ago, he heard numerous footsteps and noises in the underground warehouse.
The voice of a man seeking something――the voice of a woman rejoicing in something――was echoing in a frenzied voice as if a demon beast feast was being held.
Did it open on business days without me?――It was true that Amy and Presera had been instructed in advance.
They’re allowed to open the shop during business days while I’m not available as I was working as an explorer..

I handed them the key with that intention――but probably because I had separated the key from the basement, none of them had come down here. 

I once again advised the fugitive slaves that I couldn’t guarantee their life once they got out of the basement, then I used the transfer magic circle to move upstairs.
Reverting my appearance back to Schwartz, entering Daikokuya to overcome the last obstacle.
He should be here soon――the liaison that will report back to Chancellor Bergman.
They should be monitoring Daikokuya in secret despite its irregular business day.

And notice the footsteps walking here――not the footsteps of passersby walking down the street, but the sound of footsteps that go to me on their own initiative.

Looking at the source of that footstep――I saw Remi-san, the General Guild researcher.