Chapter 14

A voice behind my back, so close I could almost touch it.

I didn't panic. I didn't even turn around. There would be nothing there anyway.

No, but I turned around just in case. Again, nothing.

'Instead of a system message, it came in the form of a voice-.'

I recognize the voice. It's not that there's anything in particular there, but it's a special status anomaly called Abyssal Gaze, a gimmick unique to Abyss.

In Abyss, every mob you kill increases your "Attention," and the enemies you encounter become stronger and more rewarding in proportion to your Attention.

─The monsters of the Abyss finally appeared one by one on the purple horizon.

I wordlessly reach out toward one of them. It's quite a distance away, a few kilometers but unlike in the game, each mob was separated by a considerable distance.

I wondered how effective the spell would be from such a distance.

'Snipe shot.'

The first thing that pops into my head is sniper magic, which is supposed to be able to take down enemies at very long ranges.

But that's just how it's set up, and in game it's just a dumb, high-damage, non-attribute attack spell.

It should have been.

-Bam!

Now it wasn't.

A large, colorless blast of energy curled along my fingertips. Like the trigger of a real sniper rifle, the magical bullet traveled with an ear-splitting crackling sound and it hit an opponent kilometers away, at the edge of the horizon, with the precision of a real shot.

It was not just any arrow or bullet, either. It was the pinnacle of firepower, the offensive magic of the Warlock class.

In the distance, the form of the creature hit by Snipe shot crumbled to dust. One shot, one kill. I don't even need to add any additional attributes through Fleshcraft.

'This isn't a game.'

I've said it before and I'll say it again: all the performance magic that seemed useless and obscure when I was playing the game may not be so in real life.

That aside, the Snipe shot itself was a performance pick due to its stupidly high damage.

Apparently, it's going to be a favorite in this world, too.

─After experimenting with a few more spells, I was getting a decent harvest.

I heard the voice again.

"We are watching."

"You."

The voice echoed eerily, even more so than the first, and it wasn't even behind my back. It seemed to echo from within.

-Chak!

At the same time, several blades circled around me like satellites, ripping through the oncoming Abyss Reapers in a rush.

The blades danced as if they were performing a sword dance, slaughtering their enemies. It was as if an intangible swordsman was moving with his own sword.

<Blade Barrier> creates a circle of blades that orbit around the swordsman, detecting enemies and acting on their own. This is also a magic that shines in real life, unlike in the game. It shines a bit too much. The auto-hunting was good, but not great.

'Gauge is almost full.'

I thought to myself as I watched the blade return to slice through the Abyss Reaper.

The Maw's Watcher it's a boss that appears when the Attention Gauge is 100% full.

Defeating him will open the entrance to the next level of the Abyss, and the next level is the same.

However, I wasn't planning on taking on a boss right away.

I've already harvested more than enough from this place.

"Ariadne's Thread."

Finally, when I cast my escape spell to get out of the Abyss, there was no magical bang and I was out of here.

Instead, a thread of magic floated before my eyes.

I retrace my steps inside the Abyss and walk safely to the magic circle.

"...."

It was a very real world in many ways.

*

After safely exiting the Abyss using the magic circle, I was once again greeted by the grimy-looking landscape of the Labyrinth City.

Alice and Aria were there too.

"Oh, Rain...brother, where are the dark...strands?"

"Uh, welcome, big brother-."

"Eh, eh, eh, eh!"

Aria smiles as she skillfully covers Alice's mouth.

The out-of-place appearance of the lady and the girl attracts the attention of a few people but it doesn't take long for their attention to shift.

"Look! It's the Knights Order!"

"The Knights Order!"

An adventurer shouted, and with that, voices erupted from everywhere.

"It's Sword Saint Zerel!"

"There's also a sword lady!"

"I never thought I'd see a real Knights Order in person!"

Amidst the shouting, a few men and women caught the attention of the surroundings.

With their arrival, the eyes of the dead and dying adventurers suddenly came alive.

Five-colored armor and weapons swirled around them. Even a glimpse from afar could tell that this was a fairly high grade of equipment: Heroic to Legendary at the very least.

I couldn't believe that there were adventurers besides me who would come to attack the Abyss. Inwardly, I felt sorry for them. At worst, if I encountered them in the Abyss, I might have to kill them to shut them up.

"─"

It was then. The man who seemed to be the leader of the Knights Order looked over.

"Excuse me."

He seemed to think for a moment, then began to stalk toward us.

"Are you lost?"

He said without hesitation as he made his way through the crowd of adventurers. It sounded very polite and gentle.

"Why do you think we're lost?"

I asked coldly.

"Because you're with a blind lady and have a little girl with you."

"Alice is not a little girl!"

"Haha, please forgive my rudeness."

The man replied with a leisurely smile as Alice protested with a line that couldn't have been more childlike.

"Oh, brother-?"

Aria cautiously hides behind my back as the attention turns to her.

"This doesn't look like a very adventurous party, did I get that wrong?"

"I don't know."

I fall silent, blurring my words vaguely. Apparently he hadn't seen me emerge from the magic circle.

There wasn't really anyone to tell him about it, so what difference would it make?

"-Zerel?"

"Alina."

Eventually, the man was joined by a female swordswoman who appeared to be a colleague.

Apparently, the man is the Sword Saint Zerel, and the woman is a female swordswoman called Sword Lady, both names I've never heard before. Maybe they're new NPCs in the new game.

"What's wrong?"

"I thought they might be lost."

"Oh, surely-"

She turned to look at us and smiled.

"But you have to be sure, Zerel! Because it might be useless nonsense."

"Haha, I hear that all the time."

Zerel grinned, unperturbed by the woman's comment. The teeth beneath his lips gleamed white as he smiled, a hero's smile fit for a hero.

"So, which one are you?"

Zerel asked while I stared at them both wordlessly. After looking at them, I answered briefly.

"—The one you never want to encounter again."

*

Many villains are rich. I don't know why, but it's a good thing.

And in the nauseating landscape of the Labyrinth City, filled with filth and stench, there were places reserved for the rich.

"Ooohhhh, high, high, high!"

It was the sky.

Riding in an elevator powered by magical engineering, we were transported to the top floor of the Eight Dragon Citadel, which soared into the sky.

Below is the bottom of the abyss that leads to the Abyss. Above, a celestial tower, reminiscent of the Tower of Babel, stands tall.

It was an uncanny contrast.

Beyond the transparent glass looking down, you're buried in the clouds and can't even see the ground at some point.

I realized for the first time that I wasn't afraid of heights at this height.

When the elevator finally stopped maneuvering high into the sky, the view that greeted us was unimaginable from the city below.

The highest point of the Eight Dragon Citadel in the Labyrinth City was a place worthy of the name Dragon Citadel.

"You must have had a hard time mingling with the lowly and disgusting things below."

It was a heaven built above the abyss.

As if to flaunt the fact, a man dressed in an ancient robe of freshness that looked like something out of an oriental mythology came out and faced us, carrying several frightened children on his back.

"Welcome, to the Celestial Realm of the Eight Dragons-."

They don't know who we are, they just know that we have a lot of money.