Chapter 73

Villain Hides His True Colors

Chapter 73

“I was wondering what kind of vagrant bastard had crawled in…But it had turned out to be you brats?”

The mysterious person walked slowly towards us with a relaxed look on his face.

Because of the dreadful aura emanating from him, my muscles contracted stiffly, regardless of my will.

Looking to the side, Elizabeth’s forehead was covered with sweat, while in Jane’s case, her whole body shivered and she breathed heavily as if even standing was difficult.

“Hey, why are you guys really here? Did you come here by mistake? Hehe…”

He let out his long tongue with a snicker.

A thin body covered with red scales, dark green hair like seaweed, and even a strange face as if a dog and a lizard were mixed together.

His appearance was like the common Kobold found in RPGs.

At a first glance, his very unsightly appearance made him look like a miscellaneous mob.

But…

I could never think of him as such.

Rather, after starting the second round, I was feeling a sense of crisis more than ever.

Damn it…to think I would run into him so soon.

Although I didn’t meet him in person, I definitely remember seeing him on the news in the first round.

I had some expectations that I was mistaken, but his appearance was so unique that it was hard to forget.

Without realizing it, I uttered his name out of my mouth.

“…Old Drakedog.”

“What? How do you know my name?”

Old Drakedog looked at me with a startled expression. As expected, my guess was right.

In the first round, he was one of the eight Apostles of Angra Mainyu, and an A-Rank villain notorious for brutally killing civilians.

Old Drakedog, ‘Dragon Dog.’

(TN: Drakedog is a reference to a famous player from World of W*rcraft.)

In particular, he was the most well-known figure among the Apostles of Angra Mainyu.

Because he, unlike the other Apostles, had a habit of showing off his atrocities.

In the midst of indiscriminately killing civilians, he would keep reporters alive and have them broadcast it, or sometimes would appear on the news to interview his thoughts and philosophy.

To put it simply, it could be said that he was an attention-seeking individual.

In fact, thanks to his past interviews, many aspects such as the existence of Angra Mainyu and the seven other apostles were made public to the media.

It was really messed up. I never thought I would meet an Apostle here…

I cursed in my head.

Since it was a Challenge related to Angra Mainyu, I thought I would encounter the Apostles sooner or later, but…

I never could have imagined that I would meet one right here today.

It felt as if I was meeting the final boss right at the start of the game.

As I thought as such, Old Drakedog tilted his head.

“Hmm…have we met before? No. You look too young for that to be the case. Hmm…well, it doesn’t matter anyway.”

“More than that, it’s bothering me that you’re next to the relic.”

“Why don’t you come this way on your own? I’ll be kind enough to kill you without pain.”

From the way the Old Drakedog spoke, I could still feel an unshakeable relaxation.

It was as if he was looking at a bug he could kill at any time.

Fucking…

I didn’t like his attitude very much, but it was too risky to face him in the current situation.

If I risked my life here, I didn’t know what kind of collateral it would cause to the luggage I was carrying for the Challenge.

Huu…the priority should be to get out of here.

I’ll put off destroying the relic until later. For now, the priority was to find a way out of here.

I picked up Angra Mainyu’s arm that was in the sarcophagus and put it straight into my inventory.

But…

“Huh??”

The arm I had put in my inventory instantly bounced back and a message appeared in front of my eyes.

[ This item cannot be stored in the inventory. ]

What was…this?

There were items that couldn’t be stored in my inventory?

I looked at the message with a dumbfounded look.

Naturally, sometimes there were restrictions with synthesizing items and skills, but this was really the first time I had run into an item that couldn’t be stored in my inventory.

Was it because it was a special quest item? Or was it because it was related to the existence called God?

I didn’t know the exact reason, but one thing was certain…

Damn it! I had no choice but to bring it with me and run away.

It was unknown whether I would be able to escape with this kind of baggage, but if I left this item here it would be the same as throwing away all of the efforts I had made so far.

And if I passed it up today, I didn’t know how much more thoroughly Old Drakedog would guard it.

It would really be the end of the reward if that happened…

As my mind became filled with many thoughts, he calmly spoke.

“I thought it was suspicious that you had unsealed it…As expected, you’re not ordinary rats. How dare you try to steal the relic.”

“Or was it an accident? In that regard, I had already prepared for such events.”

“So take it if you can. Hehe…”

He flicked his finger.

Bang–!

The arm of Angra Mainyu, which I held in my hand, was drawn into the sarcophagus like a magnet.

A shallow pool of blood was formed around the sarcophagus and it sank in an instant.

Where the sarcophagus had disappeared, there was only a little trace of blood left.

The sarcophagus was nowhere to be found.

“I’ve been guarding it for years. You don’t think I’ve prepared that much? Hehe.”

“…”

He looked at me with a grin.

According to the memory of the first round, I had thought he was a martial artist who mainly used hand-to-hand combat.

When did he prepare this kind of magic?

As a result, far from destroying the arm, even the location of the sarcophagus was unknown.

Along with it, the option to escape had now disappeared.

It was either me dying, or him dying and I would be able to recover the quest item.

If only one of the two Challenges was at stake, I might have reluctantly given up, but unfortunately, the arm was a massive reward, so there were two rewards on the line.

This has become really troublesome…

***

***

I frowned and stared at the place where the sarcophagus had disappeared. Old Drakedog grinned.

“Hehe, I would like to take the time to ask each of you what you’re doing here, but…”

He pulled out a long iron skewer hanging from his back.

There was no decoration and it just looked like a plain toothpick.

But from the skewer came a powerful aura surging with destructive power.

“…That would be tiresome. So you can just die now.”

At that moment, his figure disappeared from my view in an instant.

?!

The hairs on my whole body stood on end and an alarm rang in my head.

At the same time, I instinctively flung myself to the left.

Then, where I was standing, the iron skewer full of qi intent dug in.

Boom–!

I had barely dodged the fearsome force as it brushed my side.

However, the sound that couldn’t keep up with the speed one step later turned into a sonic boom and hit my eardrum.

Bang–!

Meanwhile, I widened the distance from him and pulled out Red Velvet Curse.

Psk–!

The wound on my side opened and through the gap, blood burst out and flowed like water.

Even though it wasn’t a direct hit, I was bleeding quite severely.

But now, more than that, I was more concerned about the fact that I couldn’t see his attack.

I naturally wasn’t prepared for such an attack, but his speed was so great that I had missed the instant he had moved.

“Euhahaha! Aren’t you a really interesting guy? How did you avoid that?”

“…”

Instead of coming after me, he just looked at me as if he found me interesting.

Like a monkey in a zoo…It seemed he was taking me lightly.

As my irritation soared, I activated < Inner Heart >.

Along with a burst of mana circulating my body, a red haze fluttered around me.

“Huh? All right, let’s see what you can do. I was bored because I was stuck here, but that’s great.”

He still looked at me with a relaxed look.

Let’s see how long that expression will last.

Taking advantage of his carelessness, I gathered my mana to the limit.

And then…

< Wolf Hour >

The blood in my body pumped like crazy and the world turned red.

In the slowed world I sprang forward like lightning.

But even in this slowed world, he was still moving at a high speed.

I could see him aiming at me with the iron skewer raised. At the end of it was a murky black aura surging.

There was no chance of me winning at this rate.

No. I had to end it here now.

I quickly gathered my thoughts and once again accelerated myself.

< Wolf Hour >

I felt a heavy burden on my body, but at last, his figure began to slow down.

His shocked expression was clearly visible.

And…

I cut off the head of such a person.

Swiik–!

I could feel a clear taste on my hand. Along with it, his head rolled to the ground.

Soon, the world that was dyed red slowly regained its original color.

“Huu…”

I let out a long sigh.

It was a fairly hard catch, but I was lucky enough…

But at that very moment,

Puuk–!

[ Absolute Defense activated. ]

In response to the message that had appeared, I immediately rolled to the ground and moved away from the direction of the attack.

What the hell was going on here? I was sure I had killed him, so why the message…?

The answer to my question was solved as soon as I saw where his body was supposed to be.

A decapitated scaly monster with a hideous appearance stood with a skewer in his hand.

“?!”

Red smoke was rising from the cut cross-section, and then the head that had fallen on the ground flew up like a magnet and rejoined it.

Old Drakedog bent his neck from side to side and laughed.

“Hehe…it’s been a long time since I’ve had my head cut off. It’s rather pretty good.”

I stared blankly at such a guy.

What kind of ability was it?

In many cases, even if a person had excellent regeneration, it wasn’t possible to regenerate the neck if it was cut off as it is now.

It was also the reason why I preferred to cut off the necks of my enemies…

So how did he do it?

On top of that, there was no trace of him being cut at all. On the contrary, he was more lively than a moment ago.

“I was caught too quickly. Now that you know I have an immortal body, you’re going to lose your will to fight.”

“…”

“I thought I would be able to enjoy myself after a long time, but it’s a shame.”

He smacked his lips with a heartfelt regret. As for me, I slowly pointed my sword at him.

“Oh? Don’t tell me you’re still going to try? Well, that’s good for me. It’s hard to find someone like you…”

Swiik–

I used the last < Wolf Hour > charge and split him, who was chuckling to himself, in half.

However, again, between his split bodies, red smoke rose and his body rejoined into one.

After returning to normal, he looked at me with a deep smile.

“Keuhehe…It’s no use.”

Indeed, as he said, such actions may not work. However, I looked at him and spoke.

“Then…let’s give it a try. How long you’ll be able to survive.”

And so, a drawn-out battle began.

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