52 – tag

A cold arrowhead pierces my palm, making a hole.

“Kuhuheugh…!!!”

The arrow that pierced the hand at once caused a wind hole in the left hand.

Hand bones and nerve bundles were torn apart, and a terrible pain overtook me.

“Ra, Raiden?! Da, you…! Go, what is this all of a sudden…!”

“headsman!!”

“……!!”

The crew screaming at my injuries and looking at me.

I gritted my teeth and said.

“Because it’s okay… Ugh! Be careful in front of you…!!”

“sh*t!”

The members flinch at the sound of my evil and look forward again.

Taeyang Geum picked up the practice mace that was tied around her waist,

Maharet and Violet were each saving mana and loading their spears.

I stepped back slightly behind them, and pulled out the arrow stuck in my hand.

ㅡWooddeuk! Kwak!!

As the arrow is pulled out, I feel the arrowhead rip open the wound once again, chewing through the bones.

The pain that makes you feel like going out of your mind is a bonus.

“Heo-eok, heo-eok… Four, the status window…”

I held on to my breathing through pain and barely called the status window.

“At the store, hehe…! Lesser Healing Potion…!”

ㅡTitling!

[Buy ‘Lesser Healing Potion’ from the shop!]

[100 points will be consumed!]

As blue windows appeared in front of my eyes, green potion bottles fell from the air.

Receiving the bottle with my right hand, I open the lid and pour the contents into my left hand.

ㅡChii Iik…

When the potion touches the hand, the wound begins to wriggle and seal.

Because it was a low-level healing potion, it couldn’t even heal the shattered hand bones, but it did stop the blood from pouring out.

“haha….”

Fortunately, it seemed that the members of the team did not see me manipulating the status window, perhaps because their nerves were pouring in the direction the arrow had come from.

I took a deep breath and followed the crew members into a stance.

“haha…..”

“The reaction is pretty quick.”

It wasn’t long before the guys hiding behind the trees appeared.

All I could see was black armor and a black sword.

Rotten skin visible here and there through the armor,

Red eyes peering through the tightly pressed helmet.

“Undead…?”

They were 11 black knights with typical undead appearances.

Maharet, who was preparing a chant at their appearance, said in embarrassment.

“Uh, why are the undead in this place? I’m sure I can feel demonic or something like that…”

“Magic is not detected… undead?”

I bit my lip with a blank expression.

An undead that can’t detect magic…

As far as I know… there was only one person in the world who could create such nonsense…

“Four Heavenly Kings, Pyrene…”

Four Heavenly Kings… that’s unbelievable. why already?

Wasn’t it at least half a year later that the Four Heavenly Kings would start to move directly?

Why did the story suddenly change?

“Hey… Raiden…”

While I was in confusion for a while, Golden Sun found something and tapped me on the shoulder.

Then, he pointed somewhere and muttered with a white expression.

“I-that…”

“Haa… haa… What is that—”

I caught my breath and moved my gaze in the direction he pointed,

I couldn’t finish talking because of something that came into my field of vision.

“Am I misreading…?”

“First of all, looking at the reaction, it seems that what you see and what I see are the same…”

“……”

The one pointed by Golden Sun’s finger was a knight who seemed to be the greatest among the 11 knights.

To be precise, something hanging from the waist of the knight.

If our eyes aren’t wrong, that’s-

“Professor Bligh…?”

“Professor Bligh…?”

—-Professor Bly’s neck, neatly severed and dangling.

“Oh f*ck, Tinamius.”

When our eyes met Professor Bligh, who had only his neck left, Golden Sun spat out a curse.

I was no different. Because I was muttering all the curses that were not in my heart.

Cold sweat runs down my back.

If it had been a cold sweat from pain until just now, now it was a cold sweat from trembling tension.

Professor Bligh is dead.

Within the academy faculty, Bligh, who had been counted among the five by force, was staring at us with only his hair remaining.

“……f*ck.”

Things weren’t wrong.

It was just f*cked up.

There is no proper equipment.

I couldn’t sleep for three days, and my stamina was at its limit because I had to move for a long time.

An unknown enemy encountered in such a situation.

An undead created by the Four Heavenly Kings, Pyren.

Force enough to kill Professor Bligh.

An eerie strength that can only be felt with energy.

‘……It’s impossible to fight. never.’

I concluded that, and gently turned my eyes to the side.

My gaze meets the white eyes that were glancing at me from the side.

“……”

“……”

Maybe he was thinking similar thoughts to mine, but Geum Taeyang is secretly starting his body.

After briefly exchanging glances with him, I quietly opened my mouth.

“Golden Sun.”

“yes.”

At my call, the golden sun grips the mace tightly and contracts its body.

I shouted at him like a signal.

“Run away… right now!!”

At the same time as my cry echoed, Golden Sun threw the mace he was holding in his hand with all his might.

The practice mace flew at high speed and crashed into the head of the undead knight in front.

ㅡ bang!!!

The helmet of the knight hit by the mace is distorted, and black rotten blood leaks out through the cracks.

While the line of knights collapsed for a moment, Golden Sun and I hugged Maharet and Violet next to each other.

“Kyaaak!?”

“Huh?!”

The content written on the first page of the academy’s “Practical Combat” subject textbook.

The surest manual to survive the battle, the 4th of them.

‘If you encounter an unknown enemy or an enemy that is difficult to defeat—-‘

—-Do not fight back, run away for now.

“Run, damn you!!”

We turned around and started kicking the ground with all our might.

ㅡChuck… Cheokkuk, Cheokkuk!

And soon after, we heard the sound of the black knights chasing us.

“Crazy! You’re following me?!”

“Then won’t you follow me?! Shut your mouth and f*cking f*ck me!!”

It was the beginning of a chase that took place in a huge forest.

.

.

.

Meanwhile at that time, base camp.

Two professors were standing around a small round table.

Aaron and Kate

The two of them were staring at the clock placed on the table, with slightly flushed faces.

ㅡtick tock tock

The sound of a decent second hand cut through the silence that had settled around the table.

The hour and minute hands tell me, the time is already 2:00.

It was a time well past lunchtime.

“Bly hasn’t come yet.”

Kate, who was showing a serious expression, suddenly opened her mouth.

As if in response to those words, Aaron tapped his finger on the table.

“Lunch time was at 12. Two hours had passed since then…”

“Has Bligh ever been so punctual with regards to work…?”

“……As far as I can remember, not once in five years.”

At Aaron’s confident words, Kate let out a drool.

She asked Aaron, chewing her nails nervously.

“I’m sure Bligh said he felt something ominous just before he went out on reconnaissance…?”

“……okay.”

ㅡIt doesn’t feel good.

Aaron and Kate thought so.

In about five years, they had never seen Bligh late for an appointment.

‘Time is like a lifeline for an assassin.’ Bligh used to say it like a habit.

No matter what appointment he made, Bligh always acted 30 minutes earlier than the scheduled time.

Shall we arbitrarily break our time commitment at a public event such as a school trip…?

“Something’s wrong…”

“……Don’t say such ominous things.”

Aaron gulped down his saliva as he said that to Kate.

It was because he also had similar thoughts.

“……”

“……”

While the two of them closed their mouths for a while, and an awkward silence continued,

Sharon, who was working hard on something with magic tools in the faculty tent, ran out.

“Aaron! Kate!!”

There was panic and tension in her voice as she shouted urgently.

Kate asked, narrowing her eyes.

“What? What’s wrong all of a sudden?”

“Bah, one of the signals from the magic tool for emergency communication just cut off…!”

“What….?”

At the absurd words that came out of Sharon’s mouth, the two people spit out dumb noises.

“Did I check something wrong…?”

“Oh no…! Look at this!”

Sharon said, putting something on top of the round table where the two of them were sitting.

It looked like a box the size of a palm, and it made a beeping sound and flashed a red light.

“A magic tool for communication…?”

“That’s right, this is a magic tool that has a signal connected to Team 1.”

Sharon began to pull out the communicators connected to the rest of the group on the table, one by one.

“Look closely. This is a 2 trillion, this is a 3 trillion, this is a 5 trillion, 6 trillion, 7 trillion…”

“……Why doesn’t the light come on only in the 4th row?”

“Communication was cut off. Due to some outside intervention.”

“Outside intervention…? Are you sure?”

Aaron’s expressionless expression crumpled.

Sharon nodded with a confident look.

“It’s certain. The signal and signal connection were torn apart.”

“……”

“……”

Bly’s Disappearance,

Loss of contact with Article 4;

And something that forcibly tore up communications.

Only then did the three professors begin to realize that all of this was not a coincidence.

“Sharon, where was the last signal from Team 4?”

“Ugh… Let’s see… About an hour ago, the last signal came from the forest near the Grave of Stars.”

“About an hour ago…”

Aaron sighed and got up from his seat.

Then he took out his knuckles from his pocket and began to put on the coat he had taken off.

“I’ll go there. You guys stay here, call all active students back.”

“Okay!”

Sharon gave a strong answer and ran back into the tent.

Kate, who was watching her back, murmured quietly.

“If it’s Team 4, sure…”

“Yes, it’s a group with Raiden and Maharet students.”

“Something must be wrong…”

When Aaron and Kate were exchanging conversations with pensive faces,

Another voice came from behind.

“Joe’s signal with Raiden lost…?”

A voice that is gentle, yet oozes elegance.

Recognizing who the owner of the voice was, the two looked back in surprise.

“What, Princess?”

The first princess of the empire, Lucy, was standing where they turned.

Her blue eyes trembled thinly, capturing the images of Aaron and Kate.

“Tell me, what happened to Raiden?”