The Clown Riders

Without wasting a second we made it to the other player, however, so had the clowns they'd moved slightly quicker than us. They'd managed to wound the other player, the knife that one of the clowns was wielding had managed to cut into the stomach below the ribs of the player.

Royal not wasting a second, uses his tail and slams the clowns away, while he bites down on the clown that had knifed the other player. Blood gushes like a fountain from Royal's mouth as he chews on the clown, the lower half of the clown falls from his mouth onto the ground.

Leaving a gruesome-looking scene as the black blood began to spread out across the ground.

Now arriving closer to the other player, I could tell that they were male, although, their features were quite feminine.

Blood was pouring out of their stomach wound, and his body shuddered before he coughed, and blood began to bubble up out between his lips. The spear in his hand was dropped and he began to press his hand into the wound.

The wound looked painful; the knife had been removed.

"Are you okay?" I ask as I slide off of Royal, the remaining clown had been crushed, and the counter was down to three, but I knew that it was too late.

Moving towards the other player, they look up at me, their eyes were violet, and they had a slight glare on their face. Without hesitation began to stagger backward slightly.

I pause, and he stops moving as well. It was like he was keeping a safe distance from me, looks like he wasn't the trusting sort.

"I don't plan to hurt you, I was only coming to help you," I tell him softly.

A dark look paces across his features, but he seems to calm down at my words a little bit. However, that doesn't dispel the look of distrust sewed onto his face.

"Matthew," he grunted as he returned to look at the wound that was still gushing a fair amount of blood.

I open my mouth to speak but a loud buzzing sound goes off all of the sudden.

'Alert to the players! The King Clown's court will be summoned in less than a minute, please prepare yourself!'

The voice echoed all throughout the area, and I felt the air turn sinister at the announcement. I look towards Matthew. His whole face has gone pale, I can't tell if it's from the blood loss or the announcement.

Either way, I knew that what was about to befall us was anything but good.

"We need to leave!" He says all of the sudden, he'd pulled a set of bandages out from somewhere and quickly bandaged his wound.

"Where do you plan to go?" I ask him.

He raises his head and another dark look was situated on it. With a quick stride, he arrives in front of me and grabs my shoulder. His fingers sinking deep into it and I wince slightly in pain.

"Anywhere but here, that over there is where the King resides, that means that his court is going to be coming out from there as well, and I don't know about you, but I don't want to fight Advanced monster!" He grounded out as he slowly released my shoulder.

Advanced Monsters?

I don't know what he meant by that but from the sound of it; it was anything but good.

"Okay, come on," I say as I reach for Royal. He quickly helps me onto his back, the man named Matthew looks a little wearing of Royal. Without any thought, he involuntarily took a step back from him.

I cock my head at him, he was complaining about leaving and now he was afraid of my snake?

"We nee- "I was cut off by a sharp scream.

Jerking my head up, I saw that the doors to the castle had been opened and a woman was standing at the gate. She was in a huge ball gown, but that wasn't the most striking thing about her.

It was the fact that she had a giant battle-ax strapped to her back, and she was smiling. Well, smiling was putting it nicely.

Her face was split from ear to ear and it created the look of a smile, her eyes were gone and nothing, but black blood poured out of them. Atop her head was a crown and she had a wild mane of hair that was white as snow.

A sinister aura poured out from her and I couldn't help but shudder. It was like I was looking at something evil, and it was looking at me with nothing but pure malice.

It was as if I was a mouse staring down a lioness.

My body told me that we needed to leave… NOW!

"Get on NOW!" I couldn't help but scream at Matthew.

He seemed to understand the urgency in my voice because he didn't hesitate any more and grabs my outstretched hand. Without wasting a second, I haul him up onto Royal.

As if sensing my intention to flee, the woman raises her hand.

"Need!" The sound of a horse entered my ears, and out from behind her pours out three knights on horses. But these horses weren't like normal horses, they're head was a skeleton, and their body was made up of dripping flesh as if they were decaying.

"Shit!" Was all I could breathe out; these undead horses move with freighting speed.

"We need to go!" Matthew urges and I agree.

Royal quickly begins to move, we soon pull away from the castle, but the horses and their riders were still hot on our trail and they were gaining.

Just what the hell are these monsters, I got the distinct feeling that they were different from the clowns that I'd encounter before.

"We'll have to take out the clown riders, that'll at least buy us some time," the curious man, Matthew told me.

"How do you suggest that we kill three of them? Your wounded and I'm a new player," I couldn't help but tell him.

"You're a new player?!" He half yelled as his hands around my waist tightened. He was holding on for dear life.

I was about to speak, but Royal jerked to the left all of the sudden.

And along the path where my head just was a javelin flew past, I felt all the hair on my body rise up and a cold sweat ran down my back.

That was close!

"It doesn't matter, that your new, we need to slay these monsters, their weak spot is their head, once you sever the head from the rider they'll die." He explains.

"Any suggestion on how to do that without getting cut down in the process?" I ask him.

"Cut it off!" He growls.

"Bright idea," I mutter.

Turning my head, I look back at the three riders, the first one was getting closer and closer. I could smell the stench of death wafting off of him. It made me want to gag.

I had no choice; they'd soon catch us. I could tell that this mad dash was taking a toll on Royal as well. We'd begun to slow.

Sucking in a deep breath, I reach for the sword that was attached at my waist, I'd have one shot to get this right.

In my mind, I'd formulated a plan to take off the head of this first rider.

It was risky but I didn't have any choice.

They were coming up on my right, taking a steady breath, I place my hand on Royals head.

"Royal, when I say I want you to cut sharply to the right and stop," I tell my buddy.

His giant amber eye holds concern, but I give him a soft smile to reassure him.

Readying myself, I firmly grasp the hilt of the sword in my hand.

The rider was even closer.

Three hundred Feet…

Two hundred Feet…

One hundred feet…

Fifty feet…

He was so close, I could feel the smell of death assaulting my nose, I could see the soulless in the horses gaping eye sockets.

"Do it!"

Royal cut right, and I jerk the sword from its sheath, and without a second of delay, I swing it towards the head of the rider.

The sudden turn of Royal took the rider by surprise, and without wasting a second, I cleaved my sword towards his neck.

At that moment, my mind was focused on nothing more than severing the head of the rider from its body. It felt like my arm was an extension on my blade, my whole essence was focused and boiled down into that moment.

A ding went off in my head, as the sword made contact with the neck of the rider, it was like cutting through butter, the head flew off from the rider's body, and my face was splashed with black blood.

The horse, no longer being controlled by its rider smashed into the stilled body of Royal. But without a rider, its body crumbled into dust.

I release an even breath of air as I lower my arm.

「Level Up! 」

「Level Up! 」

「Level Up! 」

「Samurai's Determination」

「User is granted increased focus and accuracy due to this state of mind. This skill is passive and activated when the player reaches a hyper-focused state of mind. An agility stat has been added for the player. 」

An agility stat?

What did that mean?

I didn't have any time to ponder what that meant, because I had two other riders that were quickly approaching me.

"Twang!" The sound resonates from next to me, turning my head, I find that Matthew had drawn a bow.

Quickly turning my head, I see an arrow streaking through the air, flying in a perfect arch towards one of the other riders, the arrow finds home in the head of the rider.

The force of the arrow was enough to toss the rider from its perch on the horse, the horse bucks madly with the loss of its rider and it also evaporates like the other horse.

The third rider continues forward, and I quickly push myself to a standing position atop of Royal, clearing my mind, I prepare from the third rider.

Although at the last second, the rider halt as if hearing something, it turns and begins to ride back towards where we'd just come from.

I felt torn between chasing the rider, but looking towards Matthew, I see that he's ghostly pale. It looks like he'd keel over at any moment. Shaking my head, I quickly reach down and wrap an arm around his body supporting him.

Between the still somewhat bleeding wound and the arrow that he'd shot it looks like he didn't have much left in him.

"We need to keep moving, they'll come back with even more and overwhelm us. There is a cave near here we can rest there," he explains.

Nodding my head, I sit back down on Royal and we quickly make our way towards the cave. He weakly directs us, and we soon arrive at the cave. It's not too far away from the castle, but it's located in a bit of forested area, providing a bit of cover.

I help Matthew off of Royal and lay him against the wall of the cave. The bandages that he'd wrapped around his wound were dyed a thick red, it looks like the wound was still aggravated.

He sucks in a deep breath, and produces a small bag from around his waist, it wasn't that large, but he reaches a full hand into the bag and pulls out a vile that's a deep green and pops the top off and pour the mixture down his throat.

As the liquid slides out of the vial and down his throat, the color begins to slowly return to his face.

He cast the vial to the side, and it shatters into nothingness.

Reaching a hand down, he pulls the bandages off and I can't help but stare wide-eyed as his wound began to knit itself close.

"You really are a new one aren't you, acting wide-eyed over a simple HP potion, but you've got some monstrous strength, to be able to cleanly cut the head off of a「Clown Rider」.

He raises his head to look me in the eyes, Royal was standing guard at the entrance of the cave and it was just me and this feminine looking man.

"That's right, I am new. How exactly do you know some much about these monsters?" I ask him.

He scoffs lightly and leans his head back against the wall of the cave.

"Seeing as I owe you my life, and now that it seems like we'll have to partner up. I suppose I'll tell you. I came here after a lot of research; I've been in this game-like world for a little over a year now.

This Minigame, that we're in right now has something that I want. It's a special minigame, that gives out a handsome reward. I was on track to complete the easy version of the minigame, to just slaughter all the clowns before the time ran out.

However, unfortunately, I ran into some difficulty there. Which as I'm sure the system told you, a second part to the game if you don't complete the first part. The second part is the releasing or awakening of the Clown Court and the King Clown," he pauses to let me take in the information before he continues.

"The second part of the minigame is on a completely different level from the previous part. You've now got to take on a large number of advanced monsters, but also a boss level monster. These aren't like your average monster, that has some intelligence, these bastards are on another skill level completely," he grounds out each word.

A look of utter contempt runs over his face.

"What's an advance monster?" I can't help but ask.

I followed what he was telling me, but I'd only just woken up in this strange and fucked up world. He was going to have to explain a few things it was the least that he could do, considering I'd saved him from a tight pinch.

He didn't put up much fuss and explained.

"It's a monster, that's got some thought, you could think of its intelligence of that as a child, around seven or eight. It's immature but smart enough to pose a threat. The「Clown Rider」 is an example of a small budding advanced monster. They're nothing like the woman that you saw, that was a 「Clown Queen」with the attribute of greed. Meaning that not only is she an advanced monster but a special monster.

She a special monster, because she possesses a trait, such as greed. There are also named monster. Outside of that there are other ranks for monsters, but that's not important right now. We've currently got to think of a way to survive the advanced monsters and kill the Clown King, who will most likely be a named monster," his body was shaking.

I believe in partly because of fear.

From the information he told me, he'd only entered this minigame because he believed he could clear the first part, but not the second.

We now find ourselves in the second part of the game, I'm sure that he's experiencing a great deal of shock and mental anguish.

I felt oddly calm…