by Park Saenal
It was the day when Grid’s subordinate fostering program began.
At the same time, Khan’s smithy.
“…When is Grid coming to work?”
Vantner had arrived at the smithy since early morning and had been waiting for Grid for five hours. He had been too agitated about being deprived of Irene and lost his temper. Therefore, he wanted to apologize to Grid for being rude and ask him to make the armor.
It was the moment he had been waiting 40 days for. He hoped that Grid would come to the smithy as soon as possible. But Grid never showed up at the smithy, even when lunchtime passed and it became night.
‘He is enjoying his honeymoon and not even showing up to his job… That bastard… He isn’t even responding to the guild chat or whispers…’
Vantner’s expression turned dark.
Chapter 141
Chapter 141
During the three day journey towards the Grey Forest on the outskirts of Bairan, Grid constantly worked Jude and the soldiers.
He instructed them to fight the monsters who were drawn by Malacus’ Cloak. However, the Bairan monsters had a minimum level of 100, while the Grey Forest monsters had a minimum level of 120. It was hard for the level 70~80 soldiers to fight them. There were the sounds of suffering.
But Grid was firm. He never gave orders for the soldiers to retreat. They were forced to fight, even if they had to die. He gave almost no breaks. In the end, the soldiers couldn’t refuse his commands and were forced to fight with a real determination to die. Indeed, they almost died several times.
The soldiers no longer regarded Grid as a hero. They thought he was the devil.
Initially, the soldiers thought that this expedition was to torment them. But none of the soldiers lost their lives to the monsters. Every time the soldiers were on the brink of death, Grid and the knights saved them.
This repeated for three days, and the average level of the soldiers increased to 90. Jude always fought in the lead and managed to reach level 110.
‘Certainly… NPCs are different from users.’
Grid realized some new facts. Users gained 10 fixed stat points every time they gained a level, while NPCs randomly acquired a minimum of 6 to a maximum of 20 stat points. Every time Jude levelled up, he got at least 16 stat points. Indeed, Grid was interested in a Grade A NPC.
Grid was encouraged.
‘Yes Jude. Grow quickly. Then become my faithful dog.’
The next day, the party finally reached the Grey Forest. From here, the atmosphere became strange. The spirits of the soldiers that had grown under Grid’s direction faded away in an instant.
“I-I’m sorry but we can’t move any further.”
The start of the forest was covered by a poison fog generated by the poison flowers. A radius of 300m was filled with poison. The soldiers and knights naturally shrunk back. They were five meters away from the poison, but their skin was already irritated. They could feel their health deteriorating in real time.
Romeo judged that stepping into the forest without a Rebecca priest was nothing more than suicide.
“It is unreasonable to beat the Guardian of the Forest with this group. It’s impossible to reach the Guardian of the Forest itself. It’s great that we reached here, but we can only turn back…”
The knights and soldiers stood still and didn’t move. Grid didn’t force them.
‘The poison flowers’ poison fog does 350 damage per second.’
Putting aside the knights, the soldiers had less than 3,000 health. If he forced them into the fog, they wouldn’t even be able to move 100m before dying. Grid worked hard to train them, so he didn’t want to lose them like this.
‘I have to go ahead.’
The poison flower wasn’t simply a poisonous plant. It was a level 160 carnivorous plant that attacked anything that came into its range with its tentacles. It was the object of complete terror for travellers and monsters.
But the flowers weren’t a threat to Grid. The tense Grid put a hand into his inventory. He was planning to take out Dainsleif in order to get rid of the poison flowers.
“Jude?”
Jude was silent as usual as he walked forward towards the fog. He was heading towards the poison fog that scared even the knights!
‘Indeed! He’s a person that I am paying attention to!’
Grid was filled with anticipation. What would Jude use to break through the poison fog? He watched with curious eyes. Then Jude finally stepped into the fog. Jude’s health gauge started to decline at a tremendous pace.
But Jude didn’t care. He groaned and kept advancing. Then he fell down onto the grass.
“…Eh?”
Grid was perplexed by the unexpected development. Then the soldiers were in an uproar.
“Ah Captain! He moved without thinking and is digging his grave!”
“Let’s go rescue Captain quickly!”
“Shit, we have to go into that poison fog? We’ll die as well!”
“Uhh… Will Captain die like this?”
Jude’s poisoned gauge was falling quickly. The helpless soldiers were forced to watch as their captain died in front of their eyes. Grid noticed his mistake.
‘Wasn’t he stupid?’
Despite repeatedly gaining levels, Jude’s intelligence was still stuck at 11. There was also the unknown skill with the ominous name of ‘I have no Idea.’ The reason Jude went into the fog wasn’t because he had a means of breaking the fog, but because he had no idea. Grid belatedly discovered this face and hurriedly moved.
‘I can’t lose him like this!’
“Viscount!”
Romen and Deck cried out. A viscount was throwing himself into poisonous fog just to save a mere captain? They couldn’t understand Grid’s behavior.
Deck shouted in an urgent voice, “Sir Romeo! If the viscount dies, then we are finished!”
“Come on…!”
But it was too late. Grid’s movement speed was superhuman. The moment Romeo and Deck thought to stop him, Grid was already in the middle of the poison fog.
“Drink it quickly!”
“…?”
His vision became cloudy. A terrible pain filled his body. Jude thought he would die like this. Someone suddenly ran up to Jude and raised his body. Then Jude was fed a potion? The person was Grid.
“…?”
A noble was willing to risk his life to save a commoner? Didn’t nobles consider soldiers to be meat shields on the battlefield? Grid was different from the nobles that Jude had met. Why was he different? He was curious, but Jude’s intelligence couldn’t infer the reason. So he was just thrilled.
Then he made a stupid look as tentacles from the poison flowers flew towards him. The tentacles were like flying birds, but none of them could reach Jude. It was natural. How could level 160 monsters exert their power in front of Grid?
“Pagma’s Swordsmanship, Wave!”
Swords of light moved in all directions around Grid. The tentacles flying towards Jude were destroyed and dozens of poison flowers screamed. Then the poisonous fog started to disappear like a lie. Jude made a stupid expression and admired Grid’s skill.
‘Strong.’
Clean air started pouring into the poisoned lungs. His innate health meant Jude was quickly freed from suffering and he raised his body. Then he bowed to Grid.
“Thank you.”
These words were too simple towards someone who saved his life. Grid was embarrassed for a while.
‘He really is stupid.’
He told Jude, “It’s good to be brave, but you should think before moving forward. You don’t have 10 lives, right?”
“…Um.”
Jude nodded like he understood. But the expression was too subtle. It was like he didn’t understand what it meant. Grid felt uncomfortable. He couldn’t help feeling anxious. It wasn’t a difficult demand. Grid just asked him to be careful. But how stupid was he to not understand?
Then the knights and soldiers ran up to
them.
“You’re safe!”
They gazed at Grid with admiration.
“It’s amazing that you can sweep up dozens of poison flowers all at once! This is the majesty of the hero who defeated Malacus!”
“The acting of rescuing the captain is the epitome of all nobles and knights!”
Romeo and Deck started to praise Grid. The soldiers who misunderstood Grid as a devil once again recognized Grid as a hero.
“Viscount is the best!”
“Thank you for saving the captain!”
The cheers from the soldiers and knights! Grid smiled at them, but it had an ominous feeling.
“How is it? If you are with me, you can easily defeat the Guardian of the Forest.”
“…No, that…”
Despite the fact that Grid had shown his greatness, the knights and soldiers still reacted skeptically to beating the Guardian of the Forest.
Grid didn’t care. He was willful from the beginning, so he just started moving forward again. The knights and soldiers were forced to follow him. Then the party encountered something in the center of the forest.
“Humans! No humans in forest! Humans pollute forest! No forgive humans!”
It was a goblin lord. Most goblins were around one meter tall, but he was around two meters tall. And his strength was beyond imagination. As a level 180 field boss, he was an intermediate boss that had to be defeated before meeting the Guardian of the Forest.
He summoned dozens of hobgoblins. Grid identified this and began conducting his troops.
“This is the final training before we defeat the Guardian of the Forest! Three soldiers will mark one hobgoblin, while the knights and Jude will look at the entire battlefield and help those in danger. Once the goblin lord starts acting strange, it is the precursor to an earthquake. At that time, spread out and minimize the damage!”
The goblin lord had the same attack pattern as the Guardian of the Forest.
The goblin lord summoned hobgoblins while the Guardian of the Forest summoned golems. The goblin lord also possessed the same wide range earthquake technique as the Guardian of the Forest.
That’s why Guardian of the Forest raid parties tended to meet the goblin lord before meeting the Guardian of the Forest. Grid had familiarized himself with the process and responded as calmly as possible.
Then!
The knights and soldiers marked the hobgoblins according to Grid’s instructions, while Grid approached the goblin lord. Then he used Pagma’s Swordsmanship, Kill, in order to suppress it.
[Critical!]
[The Holy Light Gloves option effect is activated, causing you to attack the target five times.]
[You have dealt 302,555 damage.]
[You have defeated the guard of the Grey Forest, the goblin lord!]
[2,600,100 experience has been acquired.]
[The Goblin Lord’s Club has been acquired.]
[The Goblin Lord’s fang has been acquired.]
[Your level has risen.]
“…Ah.”
The critical strike combined with the Holy Light Gloves’ option and Kill was a blow that managed to cause the level 280 griffon boss monster to fall into a critical state. Therefore, it easily took care of the level 180 goblin lord.
Of course, this wasn’t his intention. Why was the power of his items applied at such exquisite timing?
“Hiik! Humans! Scary!”
The hobgoblins ran away with fear while Grid was feeling embarrassed. Grid grasped the situation.
‘Damn, I should’ve taken off the gloves.’
Grid felt regret over missing the opportunity to train the troops, while the knights and soldiers were baffled.
‘Is that a human?’
‘Ridiculously strong…’
“The Guardian of the Forest. It’s time to hunt it.”
In the midst of the chaos, only Jude was moving forward without thinking.
Chapter 142
Chapter 142
A few months ago, Grid had owed money to creditors. He suffered all types of persecution under the Mother’s Heart is Happy employees.
He did hard labor every day in order to pay back the interest and practically lived as a slave with no signs of a better life. He couldn’t even dream of being loved by others, or enjoying himself over a bottle of soju.
But now it was different.
Grid had got a legendary class and barely succeeded for a while. However, now the debt had been completely cleared and he became rich.
Since the Malacus raid, he produced the Thorn of Deep Grievance for Ibellin and earned 4.61 billion won in revenue. He still had 2.95 billion won left, despite paying 5% of the gold sales commission fee to the item trading site, paying off his family’s remaining debt, and purchasing a car.
Nowadays, Grid could eat chicken once every two weeks. He could eat one chicken in one meal without having to share. Now that he could enjoy such luxuries, he wanted to collect 10 billion won to buy a piece of land and build a residence!
But before starting that, he thought he needed to produce Failure first. Then he moved to purchase blue orichalcum, which was the main ingredient of Failure. However, there were no blue orichalcum at the auction site in the game or on the Internet.
It might be because no users had raided the Guardian of the Forest, or the drop rate of blue orichalcum was low, or another blacksmith had bought the blue orichalcum. Grid didn’t know the exact reason why there were no blue orichalcum for sale. But he knew the answer to obtain blue orichalcum.
Wasn’t it a simple task to collect them directly from the Guardian of the Forest raid?
‘I obtained three blue orichalcum when selling the Sword of Self-transcendence to Administrator Vladi… I need 12 more blue orichalcum to produce Failure.
And…
Grid was currently in front of the Guardian of the Forest.
“Here.”
The deepest part of the forest. There was a huge crater where the forest used to be. Grid started to observe all the topographic features, including the trees tinged with grey ash.
‘The soldiers don’t have enough cover to depend on. The trees will be crushed like cookies… It will be a frontal confrontation.’
Grid wasn’t particularly worried. As long as the knights and soldiers marked the golems summoned by the Guardian of the Forest, he could defeat the Guardian of the Forest in that gap. But the knights and soldiers were afraid.
“E-Excuse me Viscount… Shouldn’t we go back now?”
“Please save us! If I die, my wife and children will be sad!”
“I’m still young…”
Despite Grid showing his strength on the way here, the morale of the knights and soldiers was still low. In the end, Grid threw off the broad-brimmed hat he had been wearing. Then he wore the Holy Light Crown and pulled out the Commander’s Sword to raise his dignity stat.
“The Guardian of the Forest? Didn’t I get rid of Malacus, who filled the world with terror? You just have to believe in me. Yes?”
“O-Ohhh…!
Grid’s current dignity stat was 364 points. If he added 200 points from the Holy Light Crown and 30 points from the Commander’s Sword, his dignity stat neared a huge 600 points. This was comparable to the dignity stat points held by the top NPCs that represented each nation, even if they weren’t kings. The general soldiers as well as the knights, Romeo and Deck, couldn’t help bowing to Grid.
“I have great faith in the viscount. We will follow you with no more complaints.”
“Okay.”
The troops fell silent. Grid felt satisfied and started to look around again.
‘By the way, why isn’t the Guardian of the Forest appearing? Shouldn’t it appear now?’
Grid had confirmed the raid timetable through a website in advance. Today was the day that the Guardian of the Forest was supposed to respawn, and the timing was right as well. He also had to be careful of other raid parties, so he had deliberately hid his face and identity wi
th a hat.
But when he arrived here, there were no raid parties and the Guardian of the Forest couldn’t be seen.
‘Don’t tell me the site is a scam?’ It was a paid membership site. Grid was angry since he had paid 130,000 won in order to check the raid timetable. ‘I trusted it because it has a lot of members…!’
Grid was convinced that he had been cheated of the price of six chickens and kicked a rock furiously. Then the small rock started to shake loudly.
Jude clapped with wide eyes, “Amazing. The rock you kicked is dancing.”
“That’s not it…”
The knights and soldiers became frantic. The rock that Grid kicked was moving and growing larger? Like a turtle hiding inside its shell, it was the moment when the crouched up Guardian of the Forest fully emerged.
However, it was a little strange.
“What is this guy?”
Grid was confused. Originally, the Guardian of the Forest should be over 5m and large. However, this one had a height similar to Grid and was sleek looking.
‘Isn’t it like a human?’
There were five fingers and toes on each extended limb, just like a person. Except for the back that was made of hard rocks, the whole body was composed of transparent ores and flashing above its head was the name ‘Awakened Guardian of the Forest.’
“You, what are you?”
He tried to measure the combat power but it was ???. There were only question marks. Grid instinctively perceived the danger and became alert. Then the Awakened Guardian of the Forest narrowed the distance in an instant.
Kwaang!
There was a storm in the aftermath of his movements. The ash scattered all over the place and the roots of the trees were shaken.
Peeng!
It was like watching Regas. The Awakened Guardian of the Forest aimed a sharp kick. Then Deck, standing next to Grid, coughed up blood and turned into light.
[The knight Deck has died.]
“Crazy!”
Killing a level 185 knight in one blow? Grid hurriedly exclaimed, “Avoid it! Especially Jude! You absolutely must survive!”
The knights and soldiers wouldn’t be any help. The tense Grid put a hand into his inventory. The black greatsword was pulled out and Dainsleif showed its majestic appearance.