Part 1

“By the way you two look terrible.”

“Wolves…”

“That wolf pack seemed more like a wolf army…”

After chuckling at Godou and Ferrex’s responses, Lexus then got back down to business, giving them more instructions.

“Come to the armoury and we’ll give you some defensive gear and also pay Mark a visit and get him to fix your swords, he might not seem like it be he was once a famous blacksmith you know. Hmmm, it’s also starting to get pretty late. You need to depart by tomorrow so get some rest as well. ”

Then as they turned to leave he called out.

“Ah wait, I have to give you this as well.”

They turned around. Lexus was rummaging through a box that Godou hadn’t noticed before. From the box he pulled out 4 flasks filled with strangely coloured liquid. 2 of them were red while the other 2 were a bluish-purple colour. Godou recognised them as health and mana potions.

“And also…”

After giving one of each potion to each of them, he pulled out 2 golden pendants out of his pocket and handed them to the duo saying:

“These pendants will show that you have been recognised by the church of Freya. They will at least get you some sort of privileges if you go to another branch. Do not lose them.”

Godou stared at the pendant, noticing that it had been shaped into the symbol of the church of Freya. Thanking Lexus, he placed it around his neck.

Next to him, Ferrex did the same thing, the Freya pendant jangling noisily as it clashed with his other golden pendant.

“Okay that’s all. Now, go to the armoury.”

Following orders, the two made their way to the armoury to get better defensive gear. Ferrex had only ended up taking an outfit identical to his original one saying:

“I am a priest, I shouldn’t wear such cumbersome protection.”

Likewise, Godou had refused to take a full set of armour since he made his movements too slow and clumsy. In the end, all he took was a leather bracers and leather boots.

Both of them were forced to take a white hooded cloak which somewhat resembled a coat with them which they equipped right away.

Afterwards, they wandered around until they reached Mark’s Pub which was bustling with customers. It seemed that the pub remained noisy regardless of whether or not it was day or night. Godou was starting to feel sorry for the residents of nearby houses.

Upon entering the pub, Mark greeted them with a hearty yell saying:

“Well would look at that! You guys sure look the part now! What can I do you?”

“Lexus told us to get you to repair our swords”

Saying that Godou unsheathed the iron sword he wore hung at his side. Upon seeing the dents and scratches on it, Mark exclaimed:

“This is a hard iron sword from the basic training isn’t it? I thought these were supposed to be durable, just what the hell did you do to it. That looks like you’ve been bashing with a rock or something.”

“Well, the mission we were given was harder than we thought…”

“Humph, your sword doesn’t look in any better condition either, give it here I have them both fixed up by morning. Hehehehe I look forward to charging Lexus on the repair costs… This would make up for my lack of sales in the pub…”

Pretending not to hear the last part of Mark’s scheme, Godou bid them both good night and logged out.

It was morning by the time Godou logged back in. He made his way to the entrance of the Mark’s pub to find Ferrex waiting for him with both of their swords. After greeting each other, Ferrex returned Godou’s sword and the duo made their way out of the town to begin their journey.

Looking back, Godou was starting to feel regret about how he had lost self-control and not only destroyed a wolf pack but also rampaged around the training field as well. Although he knew that the mobs were only bits of data in Virtual Reality, the AI they processed made them seem so life like.

In fact the only way he could tell whether or not someone was a player or an NPC was the fact that NPC’s had a past history in this world. Ferrex, Lexus and Mark all had their different personalities and experiences just like people in reality. Was it really right to consider them as expendable pieces of data?

“Skill Window”

Trying to distract himself from these thoughts, Godou opened a window to view a list of his currently learnt skills.

Cooking Mastery Beginner 1 (17%)

Identification Beginner 1 (0%)

Handicraft Beginner 1 (2%)

Mana Weapon Creation Beginner 2 (61%)

Sword Mastery Beginner 3 (93%)

Throwing Weapon Mastery Beginner 2 (23%)

He hadn’t remembered when he had picked up the identification skill but he assumed that he had learnt sometime during the basic education. Likewise he didn’t remember where he obtained the Sword Mastery skill either. Must have been during the basic training. Vaguely, he remembered getting the cooking and handicraft skill from helping out with the church during his first 3 weeks.

After exiting the town, they followed a path which headed towards and through the Senbain Mountains. It was a wide dirt path which Ferrex had explained to be a popular trading route.

Trees grew wildly along the sides of the path, surrounding it with a mountain forest. The air tasted colder and fresher to Godou than it ever had in town. Occasionally, he spotted a fox leaping through between the trees.

On the morning of the 2nd day of travelling Godou, noticing something strange, asked the question.

“Hey, how close are we to Naidiriv?”

“We should be able to see it by noon and we’ll reach it by nightfall.”

“Then I’m assuming that this smoke isn’t coming from the village right?”

Godou pointed to the rising trail of grey smoke he had spotted. It seemed as if it was coming from a large fire.

“That’s strange I’m pretty sure that there aren’t any other settlements around here apart from Tellap and that’s in the opposite direction.”

“Should we go and investigate?”

“Hmmm… I think we should, but we’ll keep our distance and see if we can spot them from up there, I have a bad feeling about this.”

Ferrex voiced his unease whilst pointing to a distant ledge further up the mountain path, directly above the source of the smoke.

The duo travelled silently after that brief exchange. When they got to the ledge they cautiously went and peered over it.

Godou could see numerous figures running around a camp below. A large camp fire had been set up in the middle of it. Surrounding the camp fire were a few crude wood shelters. The disturbing thing was none of the figures looked human.

“This is…”

“Kobolds. Those are kobolds. But why are they out here, it can’t be a monster raid because there’s too few of them unless… Crap we have to get to Naidiriv as soon as possible!”

Startled, Ferrex moved back and tried to walk back to the path, a sense of urgency obvious in his loss of composure.

“Wait, what’s happening?”

“We have most likely found the scout group of a monster raid. If they’re this close to Naidiriv then that means that the main force will be, at most, a 4 days march behind. ”

“Oh”

Realising the seriousness of the situation, Godou turned to follow Ferrex.

A loud snapping sound rang in the forest around them. Jolting, both of them tense and drew their swords.

“Tch humans.”

“We’ve been spotted.”

“Kill.”

5 kobolds came out of the forest. They wielded a variety of different weapons. They were armoured lightly to move around better.

“Damn it looks like they had guards set up as well. Get ready to run.”

Quietly, Ferrex muttered that aside to Godou and then

“Slow!”

Without warning, he cast the slowing curse on one of the kobolds. Instantly, the targeted kobold’s movements became slow and sluggish.

“What the-”

“A caster?”

“No it’s a priest! Take out him out first!”

Though obviously unprepared by the strength of Ferrex’s curse, the kobolds quickly regained their order and rushed at him.

Godou moved to block them off but 2 of them managed to get past him. One of the kobolds, armed with a hammer swung at Ferrex, aiming for his side.

“Divine radiance that grants protection, Barrier!”

A solid wall of light appeared in in front of Ferrex forming a vague circular pattern, ready to block the attack.

SHATTER!

“Such a weak barrier can’t stop me priest!”

“Shi-”

The kobold’s attack completely shattered Ferrex’s barrier. Taking advantage of this, the kobold followed through with its mighty swing at him. Barely managing to block it with his sword, Ferrex staggered and fell off the side of the mountain. Straight towards the kobold’s camp.

“Ferrex!”

Godou tried to dive forward, intending to grab Ferrex’s before he fell. However, the kobolds in front of him blocked him and shoved him back. Powerless, Godou could only watch as his friend fell off the mountain.

- Crap I got careless. Stay alive until I reach you again.

Ferrex’s voice sounded in his ear in the form of a whisper. Relieved, Godou calmed down and reviewed his current situation after giving the brief reply.

- Roger

He had been separated from his only companion and was currently surrounded by kobolds, 3 behind and 2 in front of him. Each of the kobolds appeared many times stronger than a wolf. In other words, they seemed beyond his ability to defeat. All in all, it seemed as if he was in a hopeless situation. Though if he died then the worst that could happen was a forced log out for 24 hours.

“That’s one down one to go”

“Hehehe now that the annoying priest has been taken care of how should we play with you human?”

“We won’t let you escape!”

However, Ferrex had told him to stay alive until they regrouped so if Ferrex were to make his way back up the mountain only to find Godou dead and also get ambushed by the kobolds as well then… The outcome of that seemed rather cruel. Running away from the kobold until they regrouped also seemed rather troublesome.

He needed to get rid of the kobolds. However, Godou’s chances of doing that right now were rather bleak. Therefore he just had to change the battlefield.

Having decided that, Godou observed the kobolds who were now carelessly approaching him in a circle. They probably didn’t expect him to put up much of a fight.

Exploiting this, Godou charged at the kobold who seemed to be the strongest and therefore the most careless. Coincidently, this was also the hammer wielding kobold that knocked Ferrex off.

“Create!”

The startled kobold failed to react in time as Godou charged in and stabbed it with a mana sword. The sword shattered as was smashed against the kobold’s armour. By that time, the other kobolds had caught up with Godou and were about to drag him away from their comrade, sneering at his broken sword.

Then the sword exploded. They were all knocked off their feet. At the same time, a blinding flash of light erupted from below. Godou, who had been anticipating the explosion, was the first to recover from it.

Seeing all the kobold’s lying on the ground, he decided to take his chances and run.

Conversely, he had noticed that the kobold hit by the mana sword had ended up being blown off the mountain as well.

(Well, that’s karma for you… One down four to go. )

A savage light seemed to shine from Godou’s eyes as he began to count his own tally.