‘This is it.’
I couldn't help but marvel at the sight before me.
Cutting through magic with a few strokes of a sword.
'No. I've already cut through the magic used by Carl Jackson.’
That's because the [skeletal spear] was made of bone, so it was cut, and the smoke-like thing was cut with a sword wind. That's what I thought.
But cutting a shadow with a sword?
Of course, it's not a real shadow, it's just magic, black magic.
I was surprised that it was possible to do this with a sword.
'You can't do that in the original in-game PVP.’
The game is basically a single-player RPG, but you can enter other players' worlds and invite them to yours in online mode.When you meet them, of course you chat with them or run dungeons with them.
But the main thing you do is play against other players, or PVP (Player Versus Player).
As the game's lore goes, I boast a high PVP ranking.
No. 1 in Wandering Knight PVP rankings.
Not to brag, but I've never met anyone better than me.
‘I played a lot of PVP.’
That was a fun memory, too.
The problem is, I don't know if the word got out or what, but no one came to my world even when I invited them.
So I would just barge into other people's worlds and just kill them.
If you force your way in, you have to take quite a few penalties, and I've never lost a game with those penalties.
I didn't do it for long because it was boring.
Anyway, when facing a mage in PVP, a knight had only two options.
Block or dodge.
Blocking wasn't a good option.
You can block magic with a shield, but you lose health. In the game's numbers, there is no such thing as 100% resistance.
So against mages, you had to work hard to dodge their attacks.
But now that it's a reality, a new approach is possible.
"The best defense is offense," they say.
I like that one.
I pointed my blade at the warlock in front of me.
*
The warlock responded to Osian's taunt.
His voice gained a bit of strength in its dullness.
"......I'll be right there."
The warlock lifted the staff in his hand and struck the floor.
-Thud!
A hand shot out of the warlock's shadow and lunged toward Osian.
The shadow's touch was like a tidal wave, filling the narrow alleyway.
‘Within expectations.’
Osian was unimpressed and prepared to swing his sword at the approaching shadow's hand but just as he was about to make a well-timed swing, the shadowy hand changed.
Poof-!
The giant hand split in two.
‘Split?’
The change didn't end there.
The shadowy hand split into two, then four, then eight.
The shadows were smaller as they split, but their numbers were too numerous to count with the naked eye.
The spreading shadows, like unraveling threads, wrapped around Osian.
The warlock deliberately timed his hand to split them before they reached the range of his sword.
In that split second, he had analyzed the range of Osian's sword and its speed.
The shadows quickly enveloped Osian and Carl Jackson like a spider's web but it didn't stop there; it wrapped them in a circle, binding them in a cocoon.
That was enough, the warlock thought.
It would be impossible to escape the cocoon.
Leave the fixer, who would pass out in that cocoon a moment later, retrieve Carl Jackson, and the mission would be complete.
The Warlock approached the shadowy cocoon but immediately, the Warlock stopped in his tracks.
His body reacted, not his mind.
"......?"
It was a puzzling response, even to himself, but it was the right one, given what happened next.
The black cocoon split open vertically like split firewood.
The warlock looked at Osian, who was still standing inside, and asked,
"How?"
An attack that sends you into a panic just by touching you but he was unharmed after being trapped in it?
It was impossible, unless one's mental strength was abnormally strong.
Unfortunately, Osian's Mental Strength was cranked up to a numerical maximum of 99, making him nearly immune to this attack.
-Kwang!
Osian's upper body lowered slightly and his body shot out like a bullet.
Immediately after his body disappeared, the ground he was standing on just a moment ago rumbled and a cloud of dust rose up.
The transcendent angular force instantly closed the distance between them.
Osian's sword flashed and swung horizontally.
The warlock was unable to react to what had happened so quickly.
He had won.
Osian was certain of it.
-Kaang!
‘Hmm?’
The sword was blocked by something.
Upon closer inspection, a glow was emanating from the goat bone mask the warlock was wearing.
‘A defense circle? An artifact, not just a mask?’
He couldn't see inside through the mask's gaping pupils, so he assumed it had magic engraved on it but he hadn't realized that it was engraved with defense magic on top of that.
Even if he'd swung with all his might, he would have been lucky to block it, given his superhuman physical prowess.
The warlock tried to cast another spell just in time.
This was an opening, and he would take advantage of it but Osian had no intention of letting himself be fooled by such an obvious trick.
Osian increased the power of his sword that the warlock was trying to push away.
-Kagagak!
The magic circle and the blade rubbed together and the blade sliced through the magic circle but it didn't stop there, the blade even reached the bone mask.
Tsk-.
The bone mask was cut off along with the half-cut magic circle but the cut was shallow.
Only the mask was cut, but the warlock was still intact.
Osian retrieved his sword and was about to bring it down again when he stopped himself.
The bone mask had been cut away, revealing the warlock inside.
The warlock behind the mask was a woman.
With her doll-like appearance and silver hair, she was so cute that it was no wonder if she was a noblewoman.
It was quite a shock to Osian, who thought it was an old man with a small body.
‘In this day and age, a kid like this is learning black magic?’
Osian thought back to the warlocks he had seen.
In the game, warlocks were always a bunch of sullen, grotesque-looking guys.
Not that there weren't female warlocks among them but even then, they looked like warlocks.
‘I mean, horribly ugly.’
But the fainted girl didn't look like a warlock, no matter how badly he tried to look at her.
It would be class discrimination to say so, but the warlock in front of him was a straightforward negation of Osian's own view of the world.
'Normally, an NPC that looks like this in a game would have an important role in the story.’
That thought gave Osian's sword a moment's hesitation.
"Stop! Stop!"
Lorraine, who had come running down the alleyway, shouted at him.
Lorraine's soul was almost drained from her body as she watched Osian about to swing his sword.
That guy. Wasn't she from the Warlock's Union? Someone who should never be touched, no matter how much they clashed on business.
"You're lucky."
Osian sheathed his sword as his excitement had cooled.
Since his opponent had no intention of killing him, he figured he might as well finish the job here.
‘In the old days, you could just kill a warlock.’
Even now, his body was twitching with the desire to swing his sword.
The word warlock had touched the [chivalry] deeply imprinted in his flesh.
However, Osian's rationality was that of a modern man, so he was not about to attack unconditionally just because his opponent was a warlock.
"Hmph. You didn't touch the warlock, right?"
"As you can see. Why are you so late?"
Osian asked, looking at Lorraine reproachfully.
Lorraine was momentarily dumbfounded.
Of course she was late. How could she not be late when she'd been running until her feet were sweating?
But before she could think about it, she spotted Carl Jackson, who had already fallen to the ground and passed out.
"......You got him for real?"
"Well, do others catch fakes?"
"And that warlock over there......."
Lorraine's expression hardened.
"Why? Do you know her?"
"I don't know her, but I recognize her face."
"She must be quite famous."
"Famous? Not on that level. Elise Denarova. She's a once-in-a-century black magic genius."
"A black magic genius?"
"At such a young age, she's already a 4-star warlock, and she's also the head of the Warlock Academy!"
"Wait. The Warlock Academy?"
Osian asked, as if he had heard something he shouldn't have.
"The Warlock Academy is a university that teaches black magic, of course. Haven't you heard of [Caligo Biblio]? It's very famous."
“……Is there a place like a gang academy here?”
“What nonsense are you talking about? Where in the world would there be something like that?”
That's exactly how he felt right now after hearing about the Warlock Academy.
Osian's disoriented gaze fell on the warlock named Elise.
Elise had awakened and was staring off into the distance.
Lorraine must have felt it too, because she whispered to Osian,
"Are you sure she's okay, did you hurt her or something?
"I swung my sword, but the mask blocked it well, so I don't think she’s hurt.”
"What? You crazy......!”
Lorraine looked down at her anger and thought.
'How did you defeat a 4-star warlock?’
Even as a mutant, is this even possible?
Judging from his condition, it didn't look like Osian had taken her by surprise.
Plus, there was Carl Jackson on the ground, and traces of black magic all around him.
It was clear that they had already been through a battle.
‘Where the hell did he come from?’
Lorraine stared at Osian in disbelief.
The alleyway became cluttered, and a group of broad-shouldered and heavily armed men emerged.
Osian and Lorraine recognized them at once.
"Ah, those guys, now that the work is done they show up."
Lorraine muttered in annoyance.
Of the people from the Blossom Tear company, a man who appeared to be the head honcho stepped forward.
"The Fixer?"
His tone was high-pressure and his gaze was condescending.
He made no attempt to hide the fact that he was looking down on her.
Lorraine bristled slightly, but held it in while Osian was still.
"Are you a fixer?" he asked.
"Yes."
He said yes, because he was the one who had gotten the assignment in the first place.
The corporate team leader looked at him and gave him a look that said, "What is this guy?”
He was a little embarrassed that he had stood up and spoken up, even if he didn't want to bow down.
His gaze swept over Osian from head to toe.
"How did you do it? Did you get lucky?”
Osian's attire was in no way suitable for fighting a warlock.
He wore plain leather pants, a shirt, and a vest.
How could a fixer hired to be an arrowman capture the fugitive Carl Jackson?
‘He was carrying a capsule with level 3 black magic in it, so we decided that our team was too much for him.’
That's why they sent a fixer to 'consume' the capsule for them.
The fixer was successful and the team leader, who decided that a good thing is a good thing, said.
"Well done. We'll take Carl Jackson with us now. We'll send the money straight through the broker."
Behind the team leader, his men began to carry the unconscious Carl Jackson away….If Osian hadn't stood in their way.
"What?"
The team leader glared at Osian, demanding to know what the hell he was doing.
Osian turned to him and said
"Didn't we still have some calculations to do?"
The team leader's face stiffened.