Chapter 174 - The Other Side of the Case (1)

He'd set things up so that the party leader distributed the loot, so the items naturally entered Hyun's inventory.

'Hmm…'

Hyun had started becoming more generous in the few months before then, so he decided not to hide the item from Ain.

「An item dropped.」

「Are you going to use it?」

「No. The wearing restriction is level 350. Not only that, but it's hard to use and too eye-catching.」

Using the weapon would be like publicly announcing he'd killed Shakron.

If he didn't want to be chased by the Knights of the Holy Kingdom, it would be better not to do that.

「It's too good to sell. I'll have to take it apart.」

Metals smelted with Magical Power or Divine Power could later be used in the crafting of other weapons.

There probably weren’t any users who knew more about the process than Hyun.

「First, let's get out of here.」

Once «Possession» expired, he would be deprived of any skills that allowed him to manipulate or suppress the fog, so Hyun quickly moved to a safe place.

He saw a group of Holy Knights moving in confusion while he was on his way back.

"I can't feel the captain!"

"Don't tell me… did Darkness kill him…?"

The Knights, who had lost their commander, couldn't advance anymore—not until they reorganized, at least.

Hyun thought he'd be able to earn enough time for Louise's ceremony to finish.

WHOM-!

Hyun and Ain noticed the change in the altar after the ground shook and a loud sound emanated from it.

"What's happening over there? When did it change so much?!" Ain shouted in surprise upon seeing the altar.

The ground that had been flat when they were planning their battle with Shakron had risen and looked more like a mountain.

"What the…?"

Even Hyun was lost for words.

After taking a closer look, he realized that the pyramid-like altar was at the top of the mountain.

There was a body of Demonic Energy at the top of the altar, and he realized Louise was probably there.

"Isn't something wrong?!"

"No…"

Hyun listened to the voices of devils around them.

Although they had realized by then that he was only pretending to be Darkness, they were just looking at where Darkness's ceremony was taking place.

All of them were rejoicing and singing.

"It seems like this is normal. Although I'm not sure why the terrain is changing."

"Really? Woah, this is quite impressive."

Crack! Crack! More rocks began to split as well.

Hyun thought of a certain possibility.

Could the entire area move out of the Symmetrical World?

While returning from Iluna to Asra, after they reached a certain place in the Symmetrical World, they were forcibly moved toward a certain place in the Holy Kingdom.

Since the Symmetrical World was called Underground, wasn't there the possibility that the entirety of Darkness’s territory was moving to the surface?

'Oops, this isn't the time to think about things like this!'

[Remaining time before Darkness recovers part of her Ego: 82 minutes 43 seconds]

After returning to his senses, Hyun quickly began to follow the next steps of his plan.

Although they'd hunted Shakron, that didn't mean the Main Quest was over.

He had to be wary about the other Knights’ movements, and it was possible that the Heavens would send more reinforcements.

"Ain, move closer to the altar and protect Louise."

"Is the altar at risk of being attacked?"

"I doubt something is going to happen… but we never know."

Ain accepted Hyun's order without hesitation.

"Hmm. Okay. What about you, Hyun?"

"I'm going to check on the rest of the Knights, and there's also the chance that the Heavens will send more reinforcements."

"Are you going to stop them alone if they do?"

"Not alone," Hyun said while looking at the devils around him.

He believed eliminating the Knights who had lost their commander would be possible if he utilized the devils.

Although «Possession» had ended, from then on, he would have to use Louise's name to command the devils.

"If it's dangerous, I'll go to help you. Send a whisper."

"You too."

Ain moved toward the altar at the top of the mountain.

After a while, a lich approached Hyun.

It was the lich that had commanded the devils while hunting Shakron.

"So you… were a shadow of Darkness… the energy is similar… but a bit different…"

In a sense, he had lied to the lich, but it didn't seem to be bothered by that.

Maybe that was because of the Blessing of Darkness.

"Are you going to keep helping me?"

"Yes… As long as your wishes don't go against Darkness's…"

Hyun looked at the lich.

He wanted to see if something he'd be wondering about was possible.

"Then… can you lend me your soul?"

[Player 'Hyun' wants to control your soul!]

[Will you accept? Y/N]

Although Hyun didn't know it, surprisingly, the message that appeared in front of the lich was written in the language of devils.

The Black Town's Quest, which had the first legendary item as a reward…

Since everyone participating in the quest had died, the contribution rate of both the Heavens and Abyss users wasn't made public yet.

Who was going to become the owner of the legendary?

Most users were interested in that, but people on the Heavens’ boards were talking about other things, too.

The users were talking about some ridiculous things that had happened to them.

- Did you guys also get killed by a Heavens user despite being part of the Heavens?

- If you participate in that quest, there isn't a point in distinguishing between allies and enemies, lol. The rewards are going to be distributed based on ranking. Later in the quest, I saw Heavens users killing each other.

- But still, I wasn't expecting to be killed by someone from the same side!

- So… what's your contribution rate?

- 0, you motherfucker.

- LOL

- I also have 0.

Many users complained that they were killed by someone belonging to the same faction.

At first glance, it seemed obvious that you would get killed by someone from the same team because, after all, the rewards would be distributed based on the contribution rate.

- It was my mistake for participating in it despite not having passed level 100.

- I'm level 121 but have a 0 contribution rate.

- What? Didn't you kill even a single one? Even dealing some damage would have made you have more than 0.

- I'm not sure what happened. I feel like I was stabbed in the back.

But if you checked things in more detail, you would be able to find a few peculiar points.

Why was it that, in the Abyss community boards, there were no messages talking about teamkills?

Most people complaining about teamkills were in the Heavens’ boards.

But the teamkill-related topics were quickly buried, so they didn't become a hot issue. The only people who knew what happened were probably those that were present there.

"Hahaha."

Steel Rock, who was resting a bit in Darkness's territory, laughed while browsing through the community boards using the capsule's internet browsing functionality.

After all, among the people complaining about teamkill, there were probably many who had been his victims.

A guild made of people who had been Asra users…

They recently registered as an official guild called the 'Returner's Guild.'

Surprisingly, not a single member of the Returner's Guild had been killed since Darkness's ceremony began.

'Our guild is going to monopolize the rewards.'

The contribution rate of the 10 people of their guild that had participated in the quest was at 100,000 points minimum. The one who had obtained the most had a contribution rate of over a million!

The Black Town's quest reward was given depending on the contribution rate.

Since they had the rankings 1 ~ 10 in terms of contribution rate, they were sure that the legendary-rank item, countless uniques, rare ingredients, and even skill points would become theirs.

They were able to survive for a simple reason…

'Logging out was the right choice.'

The Holy Knight who was capable of doing anything to accomplish his goals, even killing the weak…

「Log out!」

Steel Rock, who’d recognized Shakron, warned everyone as soon as he appeared.

What happened next was just as he'd expected—Shakron didn't differentiate between Heaven and Abyss users; he wiped out everyone.

After that, no other users showed up at the Black Town.

The Heavens’s entry window had ended, and the Abyss’s train couldn’t get through the fog.

'It was our world from that point onward.'

The Knights and Hyun's group left the town. After that, Mayday followed a vampire and also left the town. Tens of minutes later, the Returner's Guild members appeared all together in the destroyed town.

There were a few Heavens users who had survived because they'd coincidentally logged out, but it didn't matter.

Even if there were dozens of them, they were commoners who couldn't even beat Steel Rock.

After killing everyone left, they realized that a huge opportunity had come to them.

"There might be more users who haven't logged out yet."

Everyone nodded at the guild leader's voice.

"Okay. You two remain here and control the surviving users. As for the rest of us… let's earn more contribution rate."

"That sounds good. We're going to rotate the two that stay in town, right?"

"Yeah. Although I'm sure we won't be kicked out of the rankings if we don't control it… we’ll at least do it for an hour."

Those Heavens users who were killed without knowing had been killed by the Returne’s Guild, who had been watching the entrance.

The Returner's Guild, just like its name indicated, was a Guild made of people who had previously played Asra. They were veterans who had developed while monopolizing as much information as possible.

They all had specs above the top 10 rankers. Not only that, but they were each more skillful than a ranker, so there was no way an average user would be able to win against them.

While a few members controlled the road, the rest followed the wall of fog and entered Darkness's canyon.

"Woah, where are we? After only ten minutes here, I've earned half of the contribution rate I obtained in the town in!"

The guild members exclaimed in surprise after checking their status windows.

"The experience is also no joke. Killing a devil here gives almost three times more experience, I think!"

"It's an incredible hunting ground…"

"Haha. Then, from now on, it will be a competition between us for the rankings."

Everyone's expression changed after someone said that. After that, they began hunting devils while competing against each other.

The only one who was walking around in a relaxed manner was Steel Rock.

'Well, I'm okay with just a Dragon's Tail.'

Steel Rock was one of the weakest among the guild members, so he was last place in the contribution rate.

Among the guild members, there were about 30 Heavens’ users, and there were two reasons why Steel Rock was able to enter the list of 10…

The first was that he had quite good decision-making capabilities.

It was thanks to him that they were able to log out the moment Shakron appeared. If it weren't for him, they would've all been killed.

The second reason was that Steel Rock was in charge of recording the guild’s footage.

The Returner's Guild still hadn't made themselves public, but they would eventually have to do so; that's why they had to record as many events as possible.

Steel Rock also knew more about Asra's world than the other guild members, so there was no one more perfect than him for that job.

'Why did the Holy Kingdom start this quest?'

Steel Rock fell into thought while recording the mountains and canyon surrounded by fog.

Red sky… Black sun…

They were places that didn't exist in Asra, but there were things even weirder than that.

There must have been a good reason for why Shakron, one of the top five Knights of the Holy Kingdom, had appeared.

…But he couldn't figure it out.

'Hmm. If Shakron appeared…'

Steel Rock began thinking about how Shakron had died in Asra Online. According to his memories, he'd died while fighting against a demon.

What was the main story at that moment?

'No way… has the story related to Darkness already begun?'

Steel Rock shook his head at the sudden thought that crossed his mind.

'No. It's still too early for that.'

It hadn't even been a year since Asrian opened.

‘That should happen after Deception’s conspiracy… If the flow of time matches, Darkness won’t appear for another four years.’

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