บท 25: Life brief candle
"You sure are tight lipped."
Arkenta commented as he looked at the battered body on Len laying on the floor. For the past ten minutes, starting from a weak beating, he even gone as far as breaking Len's bone on every move he made. However, everything he did proved useless. This human has an unyielding spirit, totally worthy of respect. The current Len had all his limbs twisted in weird angle, all broken.
"Len… Len…"
Not only Aria and Nova, even Miur muttered Len's name in trepidation.
As if he got a new idea after he heard the voices of these girls, Arkenta walked toward those three girl.
"Ahh… Sorry that I forgot about your existence. Since that person over there was too stubborn, I guess I could make him talk using you people."
Arkenta grabbed Nova's hair as he walked back toward the heavily injured Len. This time, he even unsheathed his vile looking cursed sword and placed it at Nova's neck.
"Truth be told, I can ask these people about the information I wants but too bad I've taken a liking to your stubbornness. I want to see how long can you hold that useless determination of yours hahahhaha."
"Now… Speak before I cut this wrench's head off."
As if he was in a good mood, Arkenta started talking in a cheerful tone. It really have been a while since he last had a chance to torture such a firm hearted character. Most human he captured these few months either submitted readily or commits suicide right away.
"…"
Even after being threaten, there was no response from Len.
"Oh really? It can't be helped then."
"Plop!"
Nova's head rolled on the ground in front of Len.
"NOVAAAAA!"
"…"
Both Aria and Miur shouted in unison while Len maintained his silent. Arkenta once again walked toward the girls and this time he dragged Aria with him. With the same pose as before, he asked Len again.
"Feel like talking now?"
"…"
Still no response.
"Len! Just… just tell him everything you know!"
Miur who was nearby shouted with all her might. There was still no response from Len though. His tattered body didn't even twitch. If not because there was still a faint breathing sound, others might assumed that he was already dead.
"Please no more!"
Miur shouted in agony. She was even sobbing heavily but nobody present cared at all. Hell, those vampire might even laughed at her pathetic state.
"Stop this already. I'll tell you everything you want to know. Just… just… just stop."
Miur pleaded.
"Plop."
Another head dropped onto the ground despite the desperate plead. Miur's eyes were bloodshot. Aria and Nova were both her caretaker and her bodyguard ever since she was a child. They were more like family rather than her own father who rarely spent time with her. The moment they both died, her mind went blank. Her sight blurred as she lost consciousness right away.
"Master, the other one fainted."
Allear who sat a few meters away from them commented. She was observing the area while her master doing all the torturing and killing. As for Horiga, he was currently engaging Merle in a fierce fight quite far away from them.
"Tch, weak humans. Not like I expect anything from them though. Anyways, I'm satisfied already. Can you wait here and guard these two for now? I'll drag Dimes here."
"Lord Dimes? Ah, master want him to just soul scan these people. True that's the best way to avoid misinformation."
"That was my intention from the start. I just played with this guy because I feel like it haha. It's been so long since last I find a human worth playing with."
As if he was concentrating his focus, Arkenta's face distorted for several second before a pair of demonic wings popped out from his back. It was a large human sized bat-like wing. After flapping it several time, Arkenta shot out to the sky and disappeared into the dark night right away.
"Aaaah, there goes master. With that speed, master might take around two hour to come back here. What should I do then?"
She stood up and walked toward Len with disgust. She even kicked him several times before she muttered something and walked away.
"You weakling should be grateful that master took a liking and played with you for ten minutes. Bleh, maybe I should check on Horiga."
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Fifteen minute passed yet Merle was still holding his ground against Horiga. Despite the clear difference in their stamina, endurance and strength, Merle was doing really well being able to stay alive.
Merle was using one handed sword and dagger while Horiga was barehanded. Horiga's fist was way harder than metal though.
"Seriously, you exceed my expectation. What is your name, human?"
"Merle. Just plain Merle."
"Merle huh? I'll remember your name."
Even when they were talking, they clashed against each other as if it was nothing. Merle was always on the disadvantaged side with accumulated injury after every clash. He was indeed inferior to the vampire in front of him. If not because of his polished technique, he might had been defeated long ago.
There were there categories of boss class. These vampire were on the second category, the intermediate level. Rimau Kong who Mays killed back in Jora city was just a normal level boss. As for insane level boss, even Mays couldn't defeat them alone.
As for Merle, he actually fall in the normal boss category. Albeit rare, humans with decent talent like him did appear all over the world. There never was a case where human of intermediate boss category were born though.
"What's taking you so long Horiga? Watching you fight bored me the same as watching over those dead meat over there."
Allear was irritated by the sorry fight in front of her. She had been leaning on a tree nearby since the last five minutes, watching Horiga. She knew that Horiga didn't use his full power in the fight but it was still a shame for an attendant of same rank as her to fight against a mere human that long.
"Eh… is it really that long? Sorry, I'll wrap this up right away."
"Yeh, good."
Nodding in satisfaction, Allear was pleased when Horiga finally turned serious. From where she stood, she could sense the magic power condensing around Horiga.
"Sorry but… ill end this soon."
As if he really meant it, Horiga apologized.
"Heh, bring it on."
Merle who was gasping for air looked tired. He had been fighting with his all. It could even be called a miracle for him to last that long. His magic power had long been exhausted during the first half of their fight.
With his magic concentrated fist, Horiga let out a destructive punch which broke both Merle's weapon on the spot. Merle was even sent flying a few meters away after that single encounter. He laid down on the ground, unconscious.
"There, I'm done. Satisfied?"
Dusting off his clothes, Horiga glared at Allear who urged him to finish his fight.
"Tch, barely."
Allear harrumphed as she started moving from her current location. Horiga however walked toward Merle and picked up the unconscious body of his opponent before he walked toward the direction where Allear moved to.
"YOU DAREE??!"
Horiga who walked leisurely was surprised by Allear sudden shout. He who was quite far away from Allear didn't know what actually happened. After he finally arrived behind Allear, he clearly saw the figure of Allear stomping on someone nonstop.
"DIE! DIE! DIE! YOU PIECE OF SHIT DIE!!"
She was also cursing nonstop. Under her feet was a living female human, Miur.
"Calm down Allear. Master need at least one of them alive. I don't think these two male would actually stay alive till master arrive."
"BUT…BUT… THIS INSECT DARED TO ATTACK ME!! THIS PUNY LITTLE INSECT DARE!!"
Allear couldn't even listen to reasons. Her rage clouded her mind. This was not the first time this happened either. This kind of thing happened so many time already that Horiga gave up trying to calm her down. They both had around the same level of strength, silver ranked intermediate boss. He couldn't constrict her using brute force even if he wanted to.
"Ugh… Len… Aria… Nova… Sorry. I… I'm useless… ugh. If… if only Mays… was here…"
Miur muttered in pain. Allear was still stomping on her without restrain. Unable to do anything with her weak body, the only thing Miur could do was to pray for a miracle to happen while she clung on the golden locket gifted by Mays a few days ago.
It was totally coincidental. Allear who was still in her fit of rage stomped on Miur stomach which resulted in Miur accidentally pressing the dragon scripture on the golden locket as hard as she could.
"Kloooong!"
Allear was sent flying way farther than when Merle was punched earlier. There were currently remnants of space distortion turbulent all over Miur. Something had appeared for sure.
"Allear!!!"
Horiga who was dumbfounded at what just happened immediately regained his sense.
"I'M OKAY I'M OKAY! WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK HAPPENED?"
Uncertain of how to answer that question, Horiga once again observed the surrounding area. He knew that something appeared earlier but he didn't know what or who it was. The only thing he was sure of was that this thing should not be underestimated.
"Looking for me?"
"Ha?"
Even before he managed to look behind him, he had been kicked a good distance away from behind. At the very least, now he could clearly look at his assailant, a male humanoid figure with a long pointy pair of ears. It was without a doubt someone from the elven race.
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Inside one of the guest hall within Spirit Society main building, two people stood in the middle of the hall, facing each other. They were Mays and Ria. With both his hand on Ria's shoulder, Mays stared at Ria without blinking. Ria had long ago turned bright red from Mays's sudden approach.
"I… I…"
Mays stuttered as if he was nervous.
"I… I fucked up big time!"
"Haaaa?!!"
Ria was stupefied momentarily before she regained her sense. She was actually hoping for something different entirely but Mays had no way of knowing that. Mays did look troubled enough at the moment though.
"What happened?"
After she took a deep breath, Ria who already calmed down asked Mays about the problem.
"Silvia got a debuff out of nowhere. At first I thought someone might be targeting me since this place was full of player. But then, she said something I couldn't let slip by. The name of one of my other spirits."
Mays explained in details. Ria just nodded as she listened to the story.
"Don't tell me… you wrote some kind of story about them in their description?"
"Yeh that's true. And since you come to that conclusion, I bet there was already a case similar to this right?"
"Yeah."
Ria nodded. In fact, there were quite a number of cases like these since five years ago. These problem ain't that apparent at first, but the longer one lived here in this world, the more it happened. These cases were bound to happen after players started summoning more and more of their spirits.
"We need to get to the core of this problem first. Can you explain in details about their circumstances?"
"Sec, I don't remember their exact backstory. Let me recheck."
Mays immediately summoned his archive cube inside the guest hall. There were nobody else in that hall beside him and Ria. He trusted Ria hence there were no problem on revealing the content of his archive to her.
"Ah, the inside of the archive cube was the same for every player."
Ria who followed Mays into his archive cube commented. This was the first time she ever entered another player's archive cube.
Under the empty slot on the spirits rack, there were names of the spirits written on them. Also within the empty slots were parchment inscribed with description of the spirits on each slots. Mays already noticed this parchment since the first day he summoned his spirits.
"This one is the full description for Silvia."
Mays handed the parchment to Ria. At the moment, Ria knew more about this world than him. Without a doubt Ria would be able to came up with better solution than the current him. Or so Mays thought.
In the description, Silvia and Golia were blood related siblings, a pair of twin with a dark past. Due to reasons, Golia killed the member of their whole village leaving only Silvia alone. Silvia who was left in the dark harboured plain hatred toward her twin brother without knowing the reason for her brother's action.
Golia was the last remaining member of her Forest Elves clan, her twin elder brother. A spirit connection between them automatically established whenever the two of them were summoned at present world.
That was how Silvia suddenly knew about the whereabouts of her older brother. That [Confused] status might also resulted from that sudden spirit connection.
Mays remembered during his leisure student life, he was quite the hard-core fan of a certain anime. Ninjas with dark past was way too cool. He just couldn't help but admire those kind of background story. If was also normal for people to imitate those backstory in their own imagination. Never would he had thought that the backstory he wrote out of his admiration would actually turned into a real complication later on.
"Another blunder of mine maaaaaaaaaaaaaaan! I so wanna turn back time and smack the head of my younger self. Why the hell did he put so much effort into every spirits he ever used? To even include a tragic family tragedy inside their spirit tablet description was way too much damnit!"
Obviously Mays could only cursed his former self inside his head. It was his own fault after all. Now that it already came to this, the only thing he could do was to figure out the best way to solve this problem.
"Ahh… You're lucky."
Ria nodded as she alternately looked over the two parchment in each of her hand. She had been reading the description of both Sylvia and Golia for a while.
"Meaning? You already got the solution for this problem?"
Mays asked eagerly. He couldn't hide his excitement any longer.
"Hehe of course. I won't lie to you, ever."
With a charming smile, Ria answered.
She then explained to Mays that the problem he was facing right now was simple. After she studied the description of both spirits, she was delighted when the scenario described was actually too cliché. There was even a case with someone whose spirits having that exact same situation despite the story differed a little.
"You just need to bring those two together and clear their understanding. Simple as that."
"Ehhh… just that?"
Mays was quite shocked upon learning the method. He even imagined that he needed to either produce a unique potions or look for some limited cash shop item to solve this problem. He never thought his problem would be solved over a simple talk.
"Yep. Just so you know, or maybe you already know… these spirits were exactly like us humans. Surprisingly, they were exactly the same in every aspects… conduct, emotion, psychology and even thought."
"Ahh… I get it. No wonder San and Jace emphasized about that when we talked previously. I did noticed that these spirits of mine had been acting like a real human but I didn't think that it would be the same to that extent though. This means that things like misunderstanding could easily be solved as soon as both sides can open up to each other willingly."
"Now you know hehe. Only their absolute loyalty was different than human. Considering how people throughout history keep backstabbing each other, we can't deny that can we?"
"Yeah right."
"Anyways, let's go meet this spirit of yours. This Golia was that spirits which you vowed yourself to never use right?"
"Yeah."
The two of them immediately left the guest hall and walked into the lodging area where Sylvia and the rest of Mays's spirits were at. All five of them were inside the room while Silvia was still on the bed with her weary look.
"Welcome back, master."
Syaitona and the rest of the spirits greeted Mays as usual. Even Silvia welcomed his master despite her tiredness. At the very least, Silvia showed no sign of going out of control anymore.
Thanks to prior explanation by Ria, Mays acknowledged the probability for the spirits to get another debuff even after they drank clarity potions. This kind of thing would happen several time as long as the root of the problem still existed.
"Truth be told, it might take several days to look foo…"
Before Mays finished with what he was about to say, Ria handed him one plain looking silver rod.
Rod Of the Spirit Master.
This plain rod was without a doubt, a cash shop item. It had only one use which was to open a spatial door to connect spirits with their far away master. Truth be told, this kind of item was literally useless back in the game since player could directly command those spirits even when they were far away. Their usefulness in this world was indefinite though.
Ria really was one of the top spender in HeavensTale. She had almost every useful cash shop item in bulks. There were also lots of useless freebies such as this rod inside her space belt. With how much she spent monthly on the game, nobody knew what else she had stored inside her space belt.
"Hehe… Don't stare too much or I might faint from too much love."
"Sorry what did you say?"
Mays replied whimsically toward the blushing Ria.
"Meanie!"
Bashfully, Ria tried to walk out from the room but Mays stopped her.
"Sorry… My bad. I love you the most okay. Stop sulking already."
As Mays patted her head, Ria immediately turned bright. Her mood stayed nice as Mays held her hand without letting go.
"Now then, let's get going."
With a swing of the rod, a space crack appeared in front of Mays as the silver rod disappeared into thin air. A space hole of two meters radius opened within a blink of an eye. On the other side of the hole, several silhouette were present, staring blankly at Mays and the rest on his side.
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