[Bandit Leader - Jay]

[Level - 65]

[40000/40000]

‘I’m fucked…’

I couldn’t help but feel wronged. All this struggling only to find out that the bandit leader was twice my level.

Not only that but I had also lost a hand. The pain was a cherry to top it all.

Looking at the bloodshot eyes of the burly bandit leader, I saw my doom coming.

Glancing around here and there to look for an opportunity, all that greeted me was more despair.

The bandit leader brandished his sword in a diagonal slash towards me, which I avoided by jumping to the side.

[Your right hand has been cut off. Overall body’s reaction would be significantly lowered.]

[You’ve suffered from a critical injury.]

[‘Bleed’ status condition has been applied.]

[You’ll continue to lose HP if your arm isn’t healed.]

[Status conditions don’t work on a legend. You have successfully resisted the ‘Bleed’ effect.]

‘Sigh.’

I couldn’t help but sigh. I didn’t see any future where I would miraculously win this losing game, so I decided to help out someone who can survive.

“Hey old man, run as fast as you can. And yeah, don’t be stupid and run on your foot, take the horses with you. They’ve just been fed so they should run fast.”

I said as I thought about how an NPC had a limited life. We players can respawn again and again without any problems, but the NPCs had a finite life. They would die if they were killed once.

Although they were just artificial beings that didn’t exist, to an extent, they were real people too, in their own world.

They had their own thought process and had their own good and bad. This NPC was around my grandparent’s age, if I had one, that is.

All things aside, I wanted to test out something. Losing some experience points after dying wasn’t a big deal if I could gain something out of it. I wanted to check if the heroic stat that I have would experience any changes if I tried to do something righteous or heroic.

After all, it has been stuck at 0 ever since I’ve gotten it, while I had at least 1 point in each other stat.

The old man gave me a surprised look, his eyes clearly re-evaluating me.

“Man, don’t make me regret my decision so quickly. What’s with that look? Just run away, I’ll get this guy to beat me up till you’re gone.”

I said with a bit of regret. This old man was giving me a pathetic look. As if he had just witnessed the evolution of a rotten bastard into a less rotten bastard.

“Do you really have so much time to worry about others? Since I am going to kill you both, you guys can meet up and chit chat in heaven.”

Bandit leader roared as Bandit B and the gang started circling the old man. Paying me no heed as if I was already a dead man.

“You run away kid. Your arm is injured and you’ll die like this. I’ll hold these guys for you, so run away.”

The old man shouted with continuous stutters, making all the bandits surrounding him let out a chuckle.

The bandit leader again attacked me, and I dodged again to the side, bumping into a healthy rock.

“Old guy, why don’t you run away? Huh? Are you taking my kindness for granted? Let me be a bit heroic for once, yeah? If you die, it’s game over for you, If I die, I’ll be reborn again.”

I said, trying to stuff some sense into his empty hall of a brain.

The bandit leader again struck his sword at me. It seemed like he was in no hurry to kill me because he was certain that there was no way in hell that I would be able to run away.

As the bandit B was about to finish the old man off, I couldn’t help but shout in a loud voice.

The shout seemed to have the desired effect as Bandit B stopped.

“What the fuck are you trying to pull here, you fuckface.”

The bandit leader asked in annoyance as I hurriedly replied.

“Since you guys are going to kill the both of us anyway, I have a death wish. Please kill me first and then you can kill this old guy however you want. I don’t want to see the gross sight of an old man getting butchered by a bunch of brutes with no morals. Your mamas would be so proud in heaven.”

I said, trying to buy some time so the old man can run away.

The bunch of bandits clearly felt uncomfortable when I said that they all were ganking on an old man.

Infuriated, the bandit leader lost all his reasoning as he slashed his sword at me continuously.

I kept avoiding the slashes but it was getting difficult to avoid them as time ticked by.

I activated the [Multi Blades] skill. An exact replica of Eclipse appeared in my mouth as I ran away from the bandit leader. The group of bandits who weren’t expecting me to come out alive from their leader was still circling around the old coachman as they discussed amongst themselves as to who would kill the old guy.

***

Just after the bandit leader had started fighting Shura, the bunch of bandits that had gathered around the old man started talking.

“Please let me kill him, I still haven’t killed anybody till now.”

Bandit V asked desperately.

“No, you’re still young. Let us old fellas do the dirty job.”

Bandit B refuted. How can he give up on a kill count so easily? He had a reputation to maintain, and single every kill count increased the respect he got from the newbies by two-fold. He just couldn’t give up such precious reputation material.

“Senior B, you have already killed tens of people. Please let me do it. I have got a wife and two kids, yet everyone here calls me a virgin because I have never killed anyone. Please let me kill him, sir, please.”

Bandit V begged. He didn’t want to be called a virgin anymore by his fellow bandits, so this kill was very important for him.

As bandit B was contemplating whether he should give up his precious kill count to break the virginity of his fellow bandit or get the kill himself, he suddenly felt a cold and painful sensation from his back to his stomach.

Looking back, a ferocious young man with dangerous eyes looked deeply at him. His eyes alone resembled the depth of the abyss to bandit B. He held a dagger-like weapon in between his teeth. Before he could realise what was going on, blood trickled down from the corner of his lips. He finally puked blood and fell face-first into the ground. His back revealed a dangerous wound.

***

I looked at the fallen bandit B and avoided the notifications in front of me. Currently, I have more important things to do.

As soon as bandit B fell to the ground, all the bandits that were standing guardless deciding who would kill the old guy immediately put their guards on.

I charged toward them without a shred of fear inside me. What would I even lose if I died? Nothing more than some experience, and maybe an item or two if I was unlucky. But that was similar to losing nothing at all when the old guy would die permanently if he gets hit.

As some random wise person had once said, the most dangerous of men are those that have nothing to lose. Since I had nothing to lose, I would fight till their mamas get proud of me for cleaning up such trash from the land of Crisedia.

I kept slashing Eclipse from one bandit to the other. Due to lacking a hand, it was way too difficult to attack and defend at once. Most of the defending was avoiding the attacks rather than taking them head-on. As I was getting Eclipse punctured through a bandit’s heart, I saw bandit V getting close to the old man with a shotgun in his hand.

Maybe he will finally break his virginity today?

As if!

I ran towards him, sliding to the ground just when an attack was about to hit my face. Sliding till where bandit V was trying to sneak around, I stabbed Eclipse at his leg.

“Arghhh.”

He groaned as the unbearable pain made him fall to the ground. I positioned myself in such a direction that as soon as he was about to hit the ground, the replica of Eclipse in my mouth pierced through his neck.

“Fuck, gross,”

I said as blood splattered around my face. Standing up, I stood in front of the old coachman as the replica from my mouth disappeared, leaving an uncomfortable feeling at the corner of my lips. I held the Eclipse in my left hand as my right hand which was cut off kept bleeding.

Unknowingly, a savage smile formed on my face as I screamed.

“Get over here fuckers, I swear I am going to butcher every single one of you before I die.”

A feeling of rush that I hadn’t felt in a long time coursed through my body as I signalled to the coachman behind me.

“Get away now old man, I’ll buy you as much time as possible. I can take care of the small fries but I am nowhere enough to take on their leader. And don’t be stupid, even if I die, I’ll ….resurrect? Yeah, consider it that. I’ll be alive again. So run away now.”

What I didn’t expect was what happened next.

A hand was placed on my right shoulder as a cool feeling embraced me. An unimaginable amount of mana gushed through my body.

[You’ve received Advanced healing.]

[Your health and mana have been replenished.]

[The amount of mana is too much for your current body. Since you can’t utilise it yet, it’ll temporarily give you a 100% stat increase bonus.]

[Affinity to elemental spirit has been unlocked temporarily.]

My hand, which had been aching ever since it was cut off, wasn't aching anymore…. In fact, it had regrown and looked as healthy and vigorous as new.

Not only that, but I was feeling a continuous burst of energy inside me, that made me feel like I could trample over anything in the world.

“Hahaha! I am going to fucking slaughter you all.”

I said maniacally as I felt my right hand. Something snapped inside me. I wielded Eclipse in my right hand and as soon as I was about to rush out to kill everyone, the hand on my shoulder became a tight grip, rendering me unable to move.

“You’ve done well young man, take some rest now.”

I fell butt first into the ground as my whole body jammed like some sort of rusted machine. I couldn’t even move a single finger, or hear anything. The only things that were still functioning were my eyes and my nose. I could see the cloudy sky turn yellowish-orange for a moment, then I could smell the stench of burnt meat. But I couldn’t understand what had just happened and why I was even in such a situation.

Before long, even the rest of the senses I had seemed to have shut down as my eyes finally closed, along with my nose and brain.