3:00 PM.
Around the time the alliance members began engaging and taking down the monsters advancing toward the Great Tree at each designated point —
I arrived near the Great Tree together with the Eclipse members.
Peering out from among the Eclipse members who stood holding their breath between the tall buildings, I looked at the monsters lined up in formation before the Great Tree.
Beyond the countless monsters standing in neat, military-like rows, I could see the Minotaur Lord — a massive, hulking figure with a colossal axe strapped to its back.
The Eclipse members were only watching from a distance, hidden between the buildings, yet they already seemed to feel a suffocating wave of pressure radiating off of it. Regardless of level, even Heo Yunji herself wore a tense expression.
The only one among them who was completely calm was me.
What happened to its arm?
The Minotaur Lord was missing one arm — unlike before, when it had smashed the Special Supply Station to pieces.
The spot where its shoulder and part of the joint had been cleanly severed was now firmly covered over with new flesh, and given its apparently remarkable natural regeneration, it looked so natural that you wouldn’t have thought it strange if it had been one-armed from the start.
“Lee Jaea, are you really sure about this?”
Heo Yunji stepped closer and whispered. Gone was the confident expression she had worn when standing at the podium — her complexion was now so pale it wouldn’t have been strange if cold sweat were already beading on her skin.
“Tell me now if you don’t think you can do it. We’ll need to revise the plan.”
Having come face to face with the Minotaur Lord in the flesh, she apparently couldn’t ignore the overwhelming pressure blanketing the entire area any longer. She was saying this even knowing it was too late to revise the plan now.
That just went to show how much she didn’t want me getting hurt.
She’s a good person too.
Not knowing that she’d received quite a fierce warning from Jeong Euijin — who wasn’t present — I was simply sitting here thinking what a good-hearted person she was, even in a world like this.
I deliberately gave Heo Yunji a smile.
“I’m fine. I’ll be back soon.”
At the breezy tone of someone saying they were just stepping out for a walk, the Eclipse members each wore uneasy expressions. To them, I must have looked frail enough that even a single punch from the smallest beast-type monster in the front line — let alone the Minotaur Lord — could end my life, so the reaction was understandable.
Leaving their worried gazes behind, I passed through the Eclipse members and walked out of the building alley into the open.
As I walked toward the hundreds of monsters and the Minotaur Lord —
Unlike the Eclipse members watching from behind, growing increasingly tense as I drew closer to the monsters, I was busy worrying about other things entirely.
Whether Alt, left back at the villa with Jeong Euijin’s pet, would behave himself without causing trouble.
Whether my teammates, who had been fretting over me all night and asking if I’d been threatened, were fighting well by now.
Whether Jeong Euijin, who had gone to finish his Awakening Quest and then receive “that quest” I’d told him about, would be able to make it back in time.
Well, they’ll all manage fine on their own.
Alt was only two days old, so that depended on whether Roks could play babysitter — but the others were more than capable of looking after themselves, so there was really no need to worry.
All I have to do is my part… except there’s genuinely nothing for me to do.
One by one, the monsters that spotted me began to turn their gazes in my direction. Even under the near-hypnotic control of the Minotaur Lord, their eyes were full of curiosity, interest, and goodwill. Just as expected — not a trace of hostility toward me.
Sniff, sniff.
Grrrmmm—
Ki-ki, kii—!
The monsters were so varied in kind that the sounds they made were all different too. Some sniffed at the air toward me, some perked up large ears, and some waved their hands or split their mouths into wide grins, as if attempting a clumsy imitation of a human.
For the Eclipse members watching from here, it must have been nothing short of a bizarre, unsettling sight.
Before I knew it, I had reached the front of a formation of roughly five hundred monsters. Even then, not a single one had made any move to threaten me.
I raised my head and met the gaze of the Minotaur Lord in the distance.
Pfff— Grrrr.
The Minotaur Lord let out a long exhale through its nostrils and began walking toward me. The monsters that had been standing in orderly rows parted simultaneously to the left and right without any visible command, making way for the Minotaur Lord to pass.
When the Minotaur Lord came to a stop, a long shadow fell over me as if I were standing before a towering building.
I smiled up at the Minotaur Lord.
“The weather’s nice — want to take a walk with me?”
The surroundings were hazy, barely any sunlight getting through, making for a gloomy overcast sky — and they were in the middle of gathering for battle — so it was a remarkably carefree suggestion.
On top of that, the one being addressed was a raid boss monster that had descended to slaughter countless Players.
It would have been no surprise if I’d been hurled to the ground by its massive hand right then and there.
The Minotaur Lord, which had been staring down at me steadily, reached out its hand.
If someone who knew nothing about what was happening had seen this moment, they would have imagined me being crushed and burst under the Minotaur Lord’s enormous grip.
But the Minotaur Lord’s hand only patted my head with the utmost care — not a hint of threat in the gesture.
Grrrr, grr.
A sound like it was trying to speak rumbled out from between its ox-like muzzle. A moment later, it lowered itself as if kneeling on one knee, then supported me under my thighs with an arm far thicker than my entire torso.
The care with which it rose back to its full height was so deliberate that I half thought I’d stepped onto a lift.
Abruptly picked up and held in one arm by the Minotaur Lord, I soon found myself moving away from the Great Tree in time with its unhurried gait.
There was no need for me to set the direction at all.
The Minotaur Lord moved of its own accord, gradually distancing itself from the monsters standing at the ready in formation, and turned down a ruined road.
In that instant, an overwhelming smell of blood hit me.
All along the road it had turned down were unmistakable signs of fierce combat and countless bloodstains. The majority of the stains, long since dried, were red — but scattered here and there were patches of yellow and green as well. It seemed Players and monsters had fought a fierce battle here at some point.
The Minotaur Lord walked on steadily through that stretch of road, where bloodstains and pulverized debris lay strewn everywhere. Come to think of it, perhaps the reason it had chosen to carry me in the first place was to keep me from treading on all of this.
“Where are we going?”
Seeing that the Minotaur Lord had deliberately brought me to a place like this, it didn’t seem like it had any intention of simply taking a stroll as I’d suggested.
Grrrr, grr.
It made a sound as though trying to say something, but as expected, I couldn’t understand it.
Just then —
From far away came a thunderous battle cry, the roar of monsters, and the sounds of various weapons clashing, along with the boom of explosions. It seemed the Eclipse members had begun fighting the monsters that had been standing by near the Great Tree.
I glanced at the Minotaur Lord, but even though it had surely heard those sounds, it showed no reaction whatsoever.
As if whatever it was doing right now — taking me somewhere — mattered more.
I’d been gripping the horn on its head, ready to do whatever I could to stop it if it tried to turn back — but it seemed there was no need for that.
The place where the Minotaur Lord came to a stop was an alley drenched particularly heavily in red bloodstains. The spattering across every surface, as if something had burst and died there, was truly gruesome. Even so, thanks to Trait: Mental Stability, I was more or less immune to trauma and barely capable of feeling discomfort — but I was still relieved there were no corpses.
The Minotaur Lord stopped over the dried bloodstains, then set me down on a patch of ground that had been relatively spared from the splatter.
“Why here…. Huh?”
I was wondering why it would stop in an alley like this —
When I noticed an item glowing brilliantly near the bloodstains. It was a gold-colored box, small enough to hold in one hand.
<Mystery Box>
— Put a useless item inside and give it a shake, and it will transform into something appropriate and useful for its current owner.
— No one can know what will come out.
— Cooldown: 24 hours
“This is….”
It was an item of tremendous popularity among Players.
The very famous box that they said could spit out an expensive potion even if you tossed in a pebble you’d picked up off the road!
For Players who were constantly scrambling for every item they could find just to survive day by day, there was nothing more tempting than this.
Grr, grr-grr.
The Minotaur Lord pointed back and forth between the item and me and nodded.
“What? You want me to take it? This is an insanely valuable item.”
As far as I knew, it was a high-priced item that traded between Players for hundreds of thousands of Coins. To just hand something like this over to an NPC out of nowhere — was it serious?
It seemed to understand what I said, because its nodding grew even more emphatic. It was as if it were insisting I take it.
It’s a good thing, but… would I ever have use for something like this?
Even as I thought that, I was already thinking — my subspace bag already had things like Runestones and Communication Ear Cuffs that Players use, so what difference would one more good item make?
If I have no use for it, I’ll just give it to Jeong Euijin later.
Thinking that, I reached down to pick up the box — and a small scrap of paper dropped out. I thought it was trash, but when I picked it up and unfolded it, I couldn’t help but pause.
The writing on the paper was crooked and jagged, as if the letters had been broken apart and reassembled haphazardly, making it quite difficult to read at a glance — but not that hard to actually make out.
[Act like an NPC.]
I knew instinctively.
The note was unmistakably addressed to me.
Someone other than Jeong Euijin… knew that I was an NPC.
I have a feeling it’s seo wonil. he’s been acting pretty sus ever since his intro. he’s clearly hiding his actual level and I’m predicting he’s the hidden leader of eclipse.