Chapter 248

Tolbana.

The closest town located from the labyrinth area on Aincrad’s first floor with a size of 200 meters from edge to edge.

The monsters around this town were theoretically the highest-leveled monsters outside the safe zone on this floor.

Because several hundred meters from that town lied the labyrinth area which led to the second floor.

For the players who wished to clear the game and strengthened themselves, the labyrinth area was indispensable.

Since that was the sole way to access the next floor before the floor boss was defeated, the monsters inside the labyrinth area were exceptionally strong, and the treasure chest inside contained a lot of valuable items.

After a month of the gruesome battle, there were quite a lot of players who have reached Tolbana. These players used Tolbana as their base during their exploration of the labyrinth area. They were the current top players, and Rozen was one of them.

When Rozen returned to the town with the Rainbow Butterfly, the notification “Inner Area” popped up in his line of vision

That was proof that the player has entered the safe zone where the criminal act was prohibited.

However, the so-called Anti-Criminal Code Effect Area or usually abbreviated as only protected the player from direct attacks it didn’t protect players from indirect attack.

For example, a player’s gaze and harsh words.

“Hey, that guy…”

“A Rainbow Butterfly on his shoulders…”

“Is he the rumored beta player…?”

“He sure has the guts to enter a crowded city like this…”

Player after players looked at Rozen, who had Rainbow Butterfly with hostility while murmuring.

This was the treatment that Rozen often received after common players knew that beta testers exploited their advantage to procure more resources.

Even if there were only one-tenth beta testers among 10.000 Players in SAO, the hostility toward beta testers didn’t subside.

Some of them were affected by beta tester’s selfish actions, some were just incited by others, and some were just finding a reason to blame due to their fear in this death game. Beta testers became their subject to blame. Because of various reasons, beta testers were persecuted ever since this death game began.

Rozen was the only confirmed beta tester so far, so it was no wonder that he was persecuted by other players.

Compared to the players who stopped Rozen and threatened him earlier, the players in this city who simply glared and threw some insults were far kinder, at least for Rozen.

Facing such treatment, Rozen just yawned lazily and ignored those players while wondering what he should eat.

Rozen was used to this, during his time in Chaldea, at first other masters and staff there wasn’t really fond of him because he was pretty lazy, and he was constantly being compared to Akabane Tenzen when he was in the automaton world.

Rozen did not care about other people’s gaze, he suddenly turned into an alley after realizing a few guys followed him, but when they followed Rozen to the alley, he was nowhere to be found. These people just clenched their fist in frustration.

Rozen actually went inside a small run-down bar in that alley, those players who didn’t know there was a bar there thought Rozen vanished into thin air.

“Hmph.”

The NPC who owned that bar just looked at Rozen coldly without saying anything.

Due to this NPC’s cold attitude plus its remote location, and it was really run-down, this bar barely had any customers, only some loner or an oddball who came to this place.

“Yo! You sure have it hard, huh?”

A petite-looking player suddenly said to Rozen.

She had brown eyes and curly golden-brown hair. She wore full-body cloth and leather armor, a hooded cloak, and also had whiskers on her face. Her weapon of choice was claws, which was hanging at her left waist. She also used Throwing Picks, which she hung on her right waist.

Her appearance slightly resembled a rat, which happened to be her nickname for those who knew her.

Argo, or more known as Argo the Rat, she was an information broker, she sold information such as a place to hunt efficiently, certain NPC’s location and the condition to trigger the quest, and even personal information of the player. She sold almost anything that could be given a price tag. For this reason, it will add all the ability points to the agile.

And Argo was also a beta tester. Let alone female beta tester, even female player was really scarce among the 10.000 SAO Players.

Although she never said it herself, Rozen had met her during the closed beta. However, Rozen and Argo still used their original avatar at that time, and they didn’t know each other’s real face. So when they met again after the official service started, they got along as they used to.

Rozen partly came to this town to meet her.

After sitting in front of Argo, Rozen just went straight to the point.

“So, what do you have for me this time?”