The hidden dangers finally coming to light

A/N: The last 4 lines of the previous chapter have been modified a bit. Re-read that part, just in case.

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[Name: Herbert Carwel

Age: 34

Gender: Male

Race: Human

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Tier: 1(Foundation grade: Tin)

Talent: None

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Obedience/Reputation: -70/5

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Remark: Impatiently waiting for you to sit inside the carriage.

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Status: Anxious, Impatient, Hazy, Enamoured, Zealous, Tainted.]

The driver, who seemed normal on the outside, was clearly not according to the strange Status ailments he had.

I tried to inspect the carriage next, but the 'Observe' didn't have any useful insights into that. It appeared as a normal carriage. It didn't mean it was safe though. I found out a while back that 'Observe' wasn't as useful for inspecting non-living things as it was for living beings. Especially in cases where a complex structure was inspected. It was an inferior version of the seemingly all-powerful 'Appraisal' skill. Too bad that skill didn't exist in this world. Or at least, not the one I was talking about. There was weaker Appraisal Magic. Not as useful as my 'Observe', though.

"Wait!"

My sudden exclamation halted everyone on their feet.

"Young Master? What's the matter, sir?"

One of the knights asked in confusion.

I paused, wondering how should I deal with this problem. The carriage driver was clearly one of 'them', but I had no means to prove myself. It would be strange if I just pointed a finger at the man and claimed him to be one of 'them'. Especially since 'their' existence was not supposed to be known to the world for at least another year or so. But it seemed 'they' had already started showing themselves.

'Damn it. Why are they showing up already? Is this because of me or is there something more to it? Either way, it's not good. It'll ruin my plans. Fuck.'

Why were 'they' already in public, I couldn't help but wonder. But I could think about that later. For now, I had to deal with the problem in front of me.

'I need to find out his motives. No, wait, it's already hinted in the 'Remark'. For whatever reason, he wants me to get inside the carriage.'

So, I quickly pulled my leg off of the steps and started making some distance.

"What's wrong, Young Master?"

"Check the carriage, first."

My order confused the knight who was currently acting as the leader.

"Just do it."

"Understood, sir. Check the carriage!"

I walked to the carriage driver who had gotten off the thing and seemed confused and nervous by my actions. We were now a safe distance away from the thing, surrounded by the knights and magicians.

"What's your name?"

I asked the ordinary-looking guy.

"Herbert, my lord."

He replied, nervously.

"Why are you so nervous?"

"That's… forgive me if I've made any mistakes, my lord. I'm just an ordinary carriage driver assigned to escort you today. I just feel the carriage isn't suited for someone of your stature."

As part of the cover, an ordinary carriage was booked especially to escort me today. I'd assumed they did a background check on the guy. And Iris too hadn't spoken anything till now. So, something happened between the time I exited his carriage an hour or so ago and the present.

'How could a guy turn into one of them in such a short amount of time?'

I gained a sudden realization.

'Right, I can try that.'

"Can you show me your hands?"

"Pardon?"

He looked at me, bewildered.

"Your hands. Show me."

"Y-Yes."

He showed me his sweaty hands. I grabbed his forearm and pulled up his sleeves.

On his forearm lay an eerie red tattoo that seemed almost alive by the way it glowed. It was in the form of a circular magic circle with a few more concentric circles inside it, filled with 2 bands of runic language that I wasn't able to read, but knew the origins of. 4 distinct symbols on top of it seemed to make an imperfect diamond shape. Attached to the lowest symbol, a sword-like symbol was carved below it.

(Image)

"What is this? Care to explain?"

Whatever stoic façade he was maintaining crumbled down as his nervous eyes instead started glaring at me.

The guards who were carefully listening to our interactions quickly jumped in and captured the man.

"You! How dare you show that attitude to your lord? Do you have a death wish?!"

"Curse you, you believers of those fake goddesses!"

"A heretic!"

"Why is a heretic assigned as Young Master's driver?!"

The guards seemed to mistake him for a simple heretic.

Anyone who didn't believe in the 13 goddesses was labeled a heretic and was shunned, even punished. But they didn't know that he wasn't just a simple heretic. He was much worse.

"Where's Sir Erik? He's still not with us yet."

I asked the current acting captain of the knights.

"Apologies, sir. We've not heard from him for a while now. I sent 2 of our men to search for him, but there's no news."

That seemed awfully suspicious. He was supposed to be my main guard. Why didn't he come back to me when the explosions started happening? A creeping suspicion made its way into my head.

'Wait, was Erik in it too? No, that can't be. He's one of the elite knights that are directly under the knight commander. And I know for a fact the Commander is loyal to us. Besides, I checked his 'Observe'. He was normal. Still though. Was this really a pre-planned attack to kill or capture me? Damn it.'

The more I thought, the more messed up it seemed to get.

'I need to get back home quick. The outside is not safe. Going to the festival was a fucking mistake.'

While I was cursing my bad luck, the knights had finished checking the carriage. And lo and behold, they found a bomb inside it.

"Sir! There's a Mana Bomb rigged inside the seat of the carriage!"

"Quickly, leave this place! And create a separate protective barrier around the carriage!"

The magicians started creating another barrier around the carriage.

"Your heinous plans have failed, heretic. Soon we'll find out how you managed to slip past the security check."

"Damn it! Since it's come to this…"

At that moment, my senses seemed to tingle. I knew something was going to happen by the way he was speaking.

'No. I'm not gonna let you use your trump card or whatever, damn it!'

"He's gonna do something! Stop h—"

"… Ąᵵἧ󠇈󠇈♦ʧ︢︢ﺨ."

Alas, I couldn't stop it from happening.

*BOOOM!*

One moment I was standing, trying to warn the knights that he was going to try something. The next, I found myself on the ground, looking at the light blue sky with a blurry vision.

"Ugh."

A jolt of pain came a moment later. But thankfully it wasn't as painful as I expected it to be. But my ears were ringing like crazy. I tried moving my hands and legs. I could, thankfully, move them. I woke up and sat on the roadside that I was laying on, shaking my head and rubbing my eyes to get rid of the blurry vision and the ringing in my ears.

Once my vision cleared, I looked at my body to see if I had taken any damage. Meanwhile, I tried to remember what had just transpired. My body was perfectly fine, thankfully, and soon I remembered what happened.

'Right, the mother fucker exploded.'

I winced at the memory of him saying a bizarre term and then immediately exploding. It was a case of suicide bombing. A typical last-ditch effort from 'them' in the game.

Luckily for me, one of the knights immediately shielded me with his body. Another, a magician, had tried to contain the blast, but couldn't make it in time.

'Fuck, I should have warned them faster.'

Curious if I had taken any damage, I pulled my Status page.

'Ah, I lost some HP. Not much though.'

I had lost 20 points in HP, the most I had lost since coming to this world, incidentally.

'I think this might be the first time I lost any HP, actually.'

Once I ascertained my safety, I immediately looked around.

'What happened to that knight? Where's Sera?'

Looking around, I immediately found the knight lying on the pavement. A quick Observe told me he was hurt, but not severely. He was still conscious, as he started getting up a moment later.

Moving my gaze away from him, I found a few knights stumbling as they too stood up one by one. The magicians seemed worse off than knights, but still not dead or severely hurt.

Looking around, I also found Sera, who was protected by one of the knights.

'Phew. Thank goodness, that didn't do as much damage as I had hoped.'

If the guards here were like people from earth, they would have died from this suicide bombing. But they were far more durable. Same for me, though, I was also protected.

'I'm going to increase my training after this. I'm also not leaving my home anytime soon—'

As Iris had said a while ago, I shouldn't have jinxed myself, as the very next moment, I lost consciousness.

***

Important A/N: This is a bit of a personal inquiry but can my dear readers please let me know how many active readers I currently have on my story? Just comment a "." or "Me" or "I'm reading this" or anything to let me know you're an active reader, either on this paragraph's comment, or in the chapter comments. Preferably in the chapter comments. This is kind of important to me.