0.01 Second Sword Master

0.01 Second Sword Master Episode 97

“I think it was somewhere here…”

Every place in Shana Kingdom is made like a maze.

Magic is planted everywhere, giving intruders a vision of hell and a beautiful garden for guests.

However, I always had to be careful because it was a place where I could get lost all day without someone giving me directions.

“Here, Hariel.”

At that time, Hariel turned around at the enchanting voice he heard from behind.

There was Natasha, exuding an aura that even shook women’s hearts, just like in the old days.

“Oh, if I hadn’t called you, you would have been lost.”

“It’s been a while, Natasha.”

“yes. You are still as cute as you were back then. Do you really want to bite that cheek?”

“Is that so?”

“Ho Ho. Even the embarrassment is the same as before.”

Natasha stroked Hariel’s hair gently.

“Perhaps he received plenty of blessings from the proud Rahal at the temple, his hair is very fine. Unlike me, you have an innocent charm. Maybe he likes you for that too?”

“······Yes? What do you mean by that?”

“Ho Ho. If it’s the guy I’m talking about, don’t you know it well? The one you serve as your lord right now.”

Hariel flinched.

“So, how are you? Do you like him as much as he likes you?”

“Mu, mu, what m, m, are you talking about!”

“Looking at your confusion, you also passed on in the end. but. Aren’t you the one who abandoned the church you’ve served your whole life for love?”

“That, that’s that, that’s the reason!”

“You don’t have to hide it from me. Because I am a wizard who has lived for over 100 years. It’s not even a matter of penetrating people’s emotions. You really like that person too. At that time, the guy who avoided me saying he didn’t like it.”

“…”

Hariel couldn’t refute anything.

Because nothing Natasha said was wrong.

“Why, why did you call me?”

“Huh~ Why? Do you just want to see your disciple after a long time? or not······. Are you jealous?”

“Yes?”

“If you get older, Hariel. Someone becomes wiser, but on the contrary, someone is more nasty. Think about it. If that lofty egotism and greed had been dormant for 100 years, how much worse would it have become?”

It was an incomprehensible word, but Hariel could feel it.

The eerie and chilly aura that emanates from Natasha.

“Unfortunately, I am the latter, not the former. To be honest, I didn’t care about the interests of the continent or the cause of the kingdom. It’s just a means to keep my place. From the time I was born until now, I have lived according to my greed. And even when I get older, that doesn’t change.”

“Why did you say that to me… Ugh!”

Natasha tore a few strands of Hariel’s hair without permission.

“What is this!”

“Huh. be fragrant I can smell your pure scent strongly even from the sparse hair like this.”

Natasha’s mad behavior while smelling the scent of her hair gave Hariel goosebumps.

“What are you planning to do? Stop playing around here.”

“Well. to do something a little bit creepy. As I said before, I am a woman who lives according to greed. And now there is one thing I want that makes my body hot.”

“…?”

Natasha continued talking while gently touching Hariel’s cheek.

“That’s Aslan, who longs for you dearly.”

“······to?”

Embarrassed for a moment, Hariel was speechless.

“Ah, what about Aslan? But he doesn’t adore me…”

“Ho Ho. Do you really think so? Aslan will be sad. Since the day he confessed his feelings to you, he has never been close to a woman.”

“!?”

“It is truly an amazing spirit. Even a naive you can guess how difficult it is for a man, who wields the most power in the kingdom, not to get close to a woman, can you?”

“Is that because of me?”

“yes. Is Aslan still close to a woman? Are you married?”

“…”

Hariel’s face grew redder at Natasha’s words.

It was a strange thing.

Aren’t you a person who has everything?

However, he was not married and had no family.

If so, really-

‘because of me?’

Natasha didn’t miss it.

“I am, Hariel. I want to have Aslan’s upright heart, the innocence he wants to protect.”

“······Yes?”

“What I am greedy for is the very heart that Aslan has. I want to crush it thoroughly and trample it on and see him drown in my beauty.”

“What is that…”

“I needed a little of your hair to do that. Forgive this poor teacher.”

Sensing a threat, Hariel quickly put her hand on her waist.

But-

“The sword…”

The two daggers that were always hanging from her waist were not caught.

“You are too rusty, Hariel. Still, the child who was once the sword of the church is so defenseless. Or did you trust me too much? you that’s the problem I trust people very well because my heart is pure.”

Hariel’s two daggers floated above the ceiling.

Natasha snapped her fingers and the two daggers disappeared like smoke.

“Do, give it back!”

“Nope?”

“…!”

Hariel stretched out his hand.

Then, divine power gathered in the palm of his hand, and soon a golden sword was created.

Natasha examined it with interest.

“It’s a sword made with divine power—this is precious.”

“Come on, give it back. This is the final warning!”

“Whoops. Is the disciple trying to play tricks in front of this master? Shall we see how much it has grown?”

Hariel bit his lip and ran towards Natasha.

However, her sword collided with Natasha’s red shield and broke.

“This, so easily…!”

“My dear Hariel. I’m sorry, but I haven’t been idle for over 100 years.”

She flicked her hand once more, and the red chains rising from under the floor pulled Hariel’s arms and bound them together, wrapping around both of his legs.

Natasha said while looking at the divine power that was scattered in the air.

“Isn’t light magic really amazing? It is said that the source comes from Rahal, but Rahal has long since disappeared. But the light magic still works- so it wasn’t Rahal who created the light magic, but did the light magic create Rahal?”

“Please release me quickly!”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t release you right now. ah! Of course, I’m not trying to harm you and Aslan. Do you just want to quench my terrible desire? Ho Ho. So just stay locked up here until the job is done.”

“What are you going to do now… Yep!”

Natasha sealed Hariel’s mouth and went outside humming with her hair.

“Wait a minute, Aslan. I’m going to bring you joy.”

Behind her giggles, a black shadow with two horns swayed.

* * *

There was really a lot to see at the magic festival.

As befits a mysterious magic festival, it was fun to see things I had only seen on the monitor actually unfold.

“I think this will be of great help to our magic research!”

Raphael wandered around with me and found several magic tools.

All of them seemed to be helpful in studying kingdom magic.

“Hmm. buy them all If it helps with research, you don’t have to spare money.”

“Yes!”

Raphael shouted hurrah and bought things necessary for the kingdom.

If that would make our magic corps a little stronger and create useful things for the kingdom, I wouldn’t waste my money either.

“Oh, it’s cheap, it’s cheap. Please take a look at the things I have specially developed!”

There were also wizards who were selling things hard like a general store.

I went through them one by one.

I didn’t know any names, so I just tried to pass them by…

[Fedrid]

I stopped at a certain name.

It was an old man sitting helplessly on the floor wearing a hood, his head bowed.

‘The hermit wizard, Fedrid!’

It was a name I knew.

A character who looks lousy from the outside, but sells useful items to players!

I approached the old man.

Even though I pretended to be there, the old man still kept his head down.

“The old man.”

“…”

did you die

“Look, old man!”

Then the knight behind me called out to him as if shouting.

Fedrid raised his head in amazement.

“Oh, I didn’t even know the guest came.”

I must have been asleep.

I took a close look at the items Fedrid had put out.

He had a total of 5 items.

Four of them were of no use whatsoever, and one stood out.

[Ore of Runes]

Runestone?

Is it the raw stone of that rune that can be transplanted into an item?

“I want to buy this. How much?”

The old man smiled and replied.

“200 million gold.”

······Should I kill it?

I narrowed my eyebrows at the ridiculous amount.

If it was 200 million gold, it was half the amount of tax collected in our kingdom for a year.

“It’s a price without conscience.”

The old man said again, perhaps feeling my life.

“That stone is imbued with the power of runes. Ordinary people can never use it. Even wizards who use magic cannot handle its miraculous power.”

“So you’re saying you won’t sell it to me?”

“I’ll sell it for 200 million gold, but if you think the price is too high, show me proof that you can handle the power of the stone. Then I’ll pass it on cheap.”

Then Raphael intervened from the side.

“The power of runes? Is the power of runes really dwelling here?”

“hahahaha. Did you live deceived? Would this old man lie about something like that?”

“Well, then I’ll check whether I’m real or not.”

Raphael took the rune stone and examined it here and there before injecting magic into it.

Then, the gemstone burned red and strongly rejected her power.

“Ugh! It was real, wasn’t it?”

Raphael started talking excitedly.

“Runes have mystical powers. However, until now, little is known about its use. When a wizard like me tries to absorb the power inside, the rejection reaction happens like now. So I know that research is still active.”

Does that mean that even a mage the size of Raphael can’t absorb rune stones?

“Legends say that only the chosen can absorb this power. Of course, I don’t know if it’s a real legend or not.”

is it?

It’s a story I never knew.

Rune stones are an item that players have always absorbed when farming, so I thought of course that a character like Raphael would be able to absorb gemstones.

However, it turned out that this rune stone was an item that the developer made for the player.

An item designed so that only the player can absorb it.

the problem is,

‘Couldn’t I be rejecting it too?’

If this game doesn’t recognize me as a player but recognizes me as Aslan, doesn’t that mean that this gemstone also rejects me?

“Hmm.”

I took the raw stone from Raphael and held it in my hand.

[Ore of Runes]

-You don’t know what kind of power you have until you absorb it.

If so, should I try it here?

What does this game think of me?

I gripped the stone hard and tried to absorb the power within it.

OK,

Fire-!

The raw stone resisted strongly and burned.

“Oops! It’s a rejection! Hurry up and put down the gemstone!”

The rune stone was rejecting me.

In other words, this game didn’t recognize me as a player, but it really meant that it recognized me as Aslan, one of the NPCs in this game.

I was about to put the gemstone down.

However, the intense heat had already pierced the skin and the gemstone stuck to the palm.

‘I’m going to go crazy.’

Did you say that the pain of burning is the most painful?

I became acutely aware of it.

The flames spreading from my hands were about to burn my whole body.

The tremendous pain rose up, but the morbid bravado did not allow even a small moan.

“Standby division commander! Let go! Or just destroy it!”

“The rune stones cannot be broken by human power. It cannot be destroyed by anything. That is why it is called a mysterious gemstone.”

I bit my lip at the old man’s kind explanation.

And the fire opened its mouth to burn every single strand of my hair.

That moment,

Whoaaah-!!

Divine protection was invoked, shielding me from the raging fire.

The problem was that if this fire was not extinguished, the divine protection would soon go out, and my body would disappear along with it.

‘If this happens, really…!’

The thought of dying crossed my mind.

so vain?

how did i get here

“Greed always rises like a fire and consumes people. It’s a pity, but your luck seems to end there.”

It was then.

“Don’t say anything funny.”

“…?”

“Who dares to decide my fate? Do you really think this flame can devour this Aslan?”

What burned more fiercely than this hot flame was my bravado.

“Not even heaven can decide my death. Nothing can kill me unless I allow it. How much more do you think a lump of stone like this can do that?”

I squeezed the gemstone in my hand.

The old man said as if nothing had happened.

“Stop it. Human power can break it…”

But before he finished speaking,

Kwa-kwak-! Kwajik-!

“!?”

The gemstone clinging to my hand slowly cracked, and before long it shattered and crumbled, and the powder fell to the floor.

Kwaaa!!

Then the flames that seemed to devour my body soared high into the sky, and soon penetrated into me and was absorbed.

“…!”

A moment of silence passed.

I said to the old man who was staring at me stunned.

“Is this enough for a price bargain?”