Evan D. Sherden, Training the Core (7)

The summer of that year had been particularly hot. When one leveled up, they could resist the heat and cold to some extent, but there was always a limit there.

It was as if the devil had cast a curse on the world, but that couldn’t be the case. Since if it was a curse, Evan could have blocked it with his curse resistance!

“Evan, I’m so hot.”

“You have an ice slime right next to you, how are you feeling hot?”

“But if it blows cold breath out, then I’ll receive damage. It’s hard to control it.”

It was so hot that Serena had gotten rid of Ruby (Elite Fire Slime) whom she loved, and only hugged Lucy (Elite Ice Slime) as she rolled over on the couch. Rudy (Elite Lightning Slime) was busy comforting Ruby.

They were currently in the lobby of the first floor of the Dungeon Knights headquarters. Evan was sitting on the couch and popping up slimes with both hands as usual, and Serena was lying on the couch playfully pricking Evan’s knees with her toes.

“Can I take off my clothes?”

“Stop behaving like a pervert.”

“I’ll take off just one piece. Okay?”

“What do you mean one, you…”

Serena was only wearing a sleeveless dress. If she took anything off, there would be nothing.

“That’s called public indecency. If it’s so hot, go to your room and do as you please.”

“Okay, come with me then.”

“Can you stop your temptation charades?”

When Evan was astounded and questioned Serena, Serena didn’t seem to quite understand why Evan was upset.

“Why would I take my clothes off if you’re not there with me?”

“Didn’t you just say you were taking it off because it was hot?”

“You know, can’t you pretend to be tricked and follow me?……Owww!”

Evan sighed and flicked Serena’s forehead for talking nonsense.

This young lady was getting more dangerous by the day. For now, it was possible for Evan to treat her as a child and ignore it, but a few years later, he might give in to his natural temptations.

…No, in fact, he could give in any second. The fact that he didn’t dislike Serena’s interest in him proved that. It was because of his indecisiveness that Evan was poked at by so many girls.

‘I have been training so much to control myself…!’

Evan sighed heavily and relaxed on the couch. He knew well that desires weren’t easy to master.

It was clear from the Immortality Project, where it involved the training of the body, it proceeded fine, but with everything else, it was going nowhere.

‘I hope she finds someone good soon…’

If Evan couldn’t shake Serena off, all that was left was for Serena to leave him. Evan put his hands together and prayed quietly.

But perhaps Serena read his mind? At that precise moment, Serena sat close to him and smiled shyly.

“I’m sorry, I won’t play with you, so don’t abandon me, okay?”

“…Who’s abandoning who? It’s hot, so just back off.”

“Hehe, I love you so much.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

But Serena didn’t move an inch from Evan. It must have been a lie about how hot she was. Evan grinned bitterly as he patted Serena’s head who pushed her head into his chest like a cat.

“Master Evan, I’m back.”

“Welcome.”

How much time has passed? The front door opened and Belois entered.

“Excuse me, Master.”

“Oww, that was mean!”

While Evan was admiring Belois’ bold action separating the two, Belois politely handed him the documents she was holding. It was a document bearing the seal of the Marquis.

“I got the permit, Master Evan.”

“.. Whoa, finally.”

It was a certificate that permitted Evan and the members of the Dungeon Knights’ expedition. The organization had not yet been officially established, but he handled it for he was afraid that it might cause problems in the future.

“It is said that Duke Leonine also approved it. His Excellency Duke Leonine himself granted access to Menaton.”

“Well, it was expected.”

Evan skimmed through the certificate and shoved it in his coat. This was precisely what he was waiting for, the reason why busy Evan was blanking out in the lobby with Serena.

“Gather around, Dungeon Knights! We are going on an expedition!”

Evan’s expedition served many purposes. The first was to let the Dungeon Knights members who have only experienced the Sherden Dungeon to experience a dungeon in the West of the Silk Line.

Just before the start of this summer, they led all of them, including Lin and Lan, to the 25th floor of the Sherden Dungeon (Evan, Shine, Belois, Raihan, Arisha, Serena went up to level 35). Despite their young age, it was for sure that they had the necessary strength to try conquering an outside dungeon.

The second was to obtain the Elixir material: the Evil Origin and the Grass of Innocence; which is said to be somewhere in the western part of the Silk Line. It was not likely that someone else would find it first, but it would be better to retrieve it when they could.

The third was to search for the witches. As it was a race that held the key to Yo-Ma Great War Series 5, it was of great importance to find them. It may have been prematurely decided that the witches were in the west based on Anastasia’s existence, but the decision was made by a process of elimination.

‘Most of the other regions have received enough attention in the previous series.’

In Yo-Ma Great War Series 4, the new power of the west Silk Line appeared for the first time. And as you battled them, the game would give hints that they have many more secrets to come, so it seemed likely that they may be here.

‘Well, if they’re not here, we can look elsewhere. Like Beyfeka or somewhere else…’

One of the three dungeon cities, Merdin, was also located in Beyfeka. Evan was convinced that if there were no witches on the west side of the Silk Line, he would be able to find them in Beyfeka.

However, as a characteristic of the Yo-Ma Great War Series, which focused its main game contents on the Silk Line, it was pretty darn sure that they would be in the West of the Silk Line.

‘But actually, the fourth purpose is more important than that—Devil Rune!’

Yes, it was the Devil Rune. The last purpose of the expedition, which was filled with Evan’s desire, was the search for the Devil Runes! Right now, Evan was filled with determination that he would be fine with not finding the witches, but he had to find Devil Runes.

“Young Master, are you handling the devil energy again?”

On the way to Menaton, the land owned by the Duke, Evan nodded at Shine’s question as he saw Evan gazing at his boots.

“Yes, as a result of hours and hours of training, I somehow managed to transform the evil energy, but I can’t connect it to the Devil Rune.”

“Yes, of course. Before, you were crying that you couldn’t make a rune.”

“Hey, I didn’t cry.”

Evan’s evil energy control training, which is rooted from the crazy idea of controlling the evil energy from the boots and converting it to a Devil Rune, was making some progress thanks to his resistance to curse and resistance to evil energy.

He could now control the evil energy in the boots to form a question mark or an exclamation mark that was visible to the naked eye. However, that was all he could do. As soon as he let go, the evil energy went back to its original form, and the curse that restricted Evan’s stats was still intact.

“But being able to control the evil spirit itself is an impressive skill, Master Evan. If you could transfer the Devil Rune to the boots…

“We’ll make it happen.”

Evan nodded and rubbed his boots as he heard Belois’ words.

In fact, the boots still contained a part of the Devil Rune, which was transferred back to the boot from the Scimitar, which absorbed traces of the Devil Rune in the process of absorbing the blood of the Devil Rune Orc.

It didn’t have any meaningful attributes, but Evan could confirm that traces of Devil Rune reacted whenever Evan controlled the evil energy—which meant it was absolute proof that Evan’s experiment was going in the right direction!

‘Since we’ve discovered that the traces of the Devil Rune can be trapped inside the boots, if we can transfer a whole Devil Rune onto the boots, we’ll be able to activate it with the evil energy. If we collect enough Devil Runes, we may be able to create a new rune too…!’

Gathering rare ingredients and forging, isn’t it all a manufacturer’s dream?

It was natural for Evan to be so excited by this feature, which did not exist in the previous Yo-Ma Great War Series. Old gamers always yearned for new content!

But of course, the old gamers would clear all of the updated contents within a day and complain about the game. However, it was different this time.

Devil Rune was a content of the unknown which you could not simply clear with a day or two. So Evan was completely focused on this Devil Rune.

“I hope something like a Devil Rune Orc shows up quickly. No, I will be happy with Ogres, too. About thirty Ogres at a time…”

“I will die trying to stop that, Master!”

“I believe in Raihan’s defense.”

“… I think we should train one more Tank.”

Tanking for a small party is different, but now that many of the Dungeon Knights were accompanying them in this expedition, it would bear a huge burden on Raihan. Especially on his body!

“Well, looking through the talent pool list, there are potential candidates, but it’s hard to locate them. Should we try going to the capital’s pub where I met you, Raihan?”

“You mean Amy’s Kick? Their steaks are great.”

“Are you going there again? I’m going then!”

“Hey, I don’t like you guys reminiscing without me… I want to go next time.”

For recruiting, as a tradition in the Yo-Ma Great War Series, it would be the pub, Amy’s Kick! Everyone seemed to like the idea, but Raihan, who was drunk when he first met Evan there, wasn’t too excited.

“What I was saying was training, not recruiting. Master, our members are largely focused on melee combats. People who have melee weapon specialties are bound to have some shield specialties as well. So I think it’s not a bad idea to teach either Ditto or Melson shield skills…

“Isn’t it just that you don’t want to go to Amy’s Kick?”

“Well, there’s that too.”

Ah, how cute of him! Evan loved that about him, how he was honest and could not lie for a second. He smirked and asked.

“Oh, how far did you get with Serpina? You guys planned on going to the ocean this summer, right? She was blaming me since you guys couldn’t go because of the expedition.”

“Why are you asking about it all of a sudden?! And.. and… it was three of us, not two.”

“Oh, it was three. You’ll need a waistband to tie the two of you together soon. I’ll let Horta know.”

“We’re just going on a trip. Nothing More. It’s not a romantic getaway. I made sure the other two were aware of it too!”

“Ah, of course, it is, for now. But after having fun on the beach under the scorching sun, and when the sun is about to set, and you have a few drinks on you, and then hands overlap and then……”

“Not true!”

Evan wore a malicious grin, making fun of Raihan. Shine knew for sure that those words would come back to haunt Evan, but he knew it could always come to him, too, so he decided to stay silent.

“I also want to go to the ocean with Evan.”

“For the ocean, you could always go to my hometown. I’ll treat you exquisitely.”

“Is Pellati on the shore?”

“Even the dungeon has an oceanic background, didn’t you know?”

“I want to go!”

While they were chatting with excitement, changing the topics, the carriage, which was running automatically based on Evan’s design, gradually slowed down and came to a complete stop. Evan, who rolled up the covers and checked outside, smiled and spoke.

“We have arrived at the first dungeon. Everyone, get ready for battle.”