The Gamer's POV

Aika groaned in agony as she leaned onto the blade embedded in her foot.

While she was still biting her lip in pain, she suddenly felt Cedric’s warm hands on her cheeks, guiding her to look up. When she slowly raised her head, she could see him crouched in front of her, looking at her with deep worry in his eyes.

At this moment, the black in her eyes slowly disappeared until her natural blue eyes became visible once more.

"I’m..." she opened her trembling lips to speak, but then Cedric suddenly pulled her into his chest in a tight hug.

"It’s alright," he whispered in a gentle voice.

At the same time, he willed the blade between them to dissipate into smoke.

"It’s alright," he repeated, stroking her hair to soothe her tremors.

Aika exhaled tiredly as she held onto him tightly. Then she closed her eyes to rest in his warm embrace.

At this moment, her silver hair had begun to darken, until it finally returned to its original black color with teal streaks running through the strands.

By then, Aika had already fallen unconscious.

Cedric sighed.

’She is really breaking free from the Authority of the God of Unearned Misfortune. The fact that she can attack me is proof of that.’

Within seconds, her form slowly dissolved into black smoke that flowed back into Cedric’s arm, re-forming the tattoo of a raven.

Meanwhile, the hundreds of ravens flying around began to vanish one by one. By the time the last bird dissolved into a dark feather, both Cedric and Athena had also vanished.

***

Some time in the morning...

——

Cedric, who had ended up dozing off, finally woke up.

Currently, he was alone because both Athena and Redd had gone back into his inner sanctuary to rest and recover their mana. As for Aika, she was still resting.

Cedric rolled back the sleeve of his kimono and stared at his tattoo for a bit. He had a lot of questions on his mind, and a few things to say, but he would have to keep them for later.

He let the fabric drop, then he stood up and stretched, after which he raised his hand to cover a languid yawn.

He then exhaled tiredly.

’I feel sore and have no motivation today. I just want to sleep on my bed and toss about lazily all day,’ he thought as he reached inward to feel his essence core.

Although he was yet to recover even half of his mana, quite a bit of his essence had been restored.

He sighed as he turned and picked up his nodachi, which had been resting against the wall.

At that moment, Arlo, who had been keeping watch for him while he slept, flew into the ruined cathedral and landed on the ronin’s shoulder.

"Did you sleep well?" the bird asked.

"No," Cedric shook his head as he began to walk out of the building.

"Me too," the bird sighed, almost as if it shared his exhaustion.

Once Cedric was out, the light of the sun washed over him.

"Where are you going now?" the bird inquired.

"Well..." Cedric exhaled, lowering his head. "I’ve not forgotten that this is a game. I still need to go find myself a relic."

He turned slightly to the bird on his shoulder. "By the way, did you keep tabs on the woman I asked you to?"

Arlo nodded. "Yes. Good news is, she managed to get one of those relics."

"Oh?" Cedric smiled. "Let’s go get ourselves a relic then."

***

The sun today shone relentlessly down upon the landscape. For some baffling reason, today was really hot.

Clara, a cadet from the Bastion of Conquest, wiped the sweat from her forehead as she hurriedly rounded the corner of a ruined building. In her left hand she held what looked like a golden necklace. She clutched it tightly, close to her chest, as this was one of the relics the cadets were meant to find.

There was a brown mastiff that kept pace right beside her. After they had moved past the intersection to lean against the wall of the building, the mastiff spoke in an old man’s voice.

"It’s a good thing that you’ve found a relic. But you must be prepared, my lady. Just like how we were alerted to the location of a person with a relic, I’m sure there’s a cadet out there who can see our location too."

The short girl, with blonde hair, exhaled exasperatedly. "I know that, Barnaby."

She was currently looking at a map projected by her whisper-globe in order to avoid running into a nest of nightmares.

"Thankfully, there’s not a lot of time left before the end of this damn treasure hunt. Urgh! I can’t believe we had to spend the night running from those ugly spider-looking monstrosities." She looked irritable for a moment before smiling and turning to the giant hound.

"It’s a good thing you were able to recover our mana. Honestly, I’m not afraid of any cadet that might pop up during this time. As long as it’s not those three, we should be fine."

The girl showed her broken teeth as she smiled, even puffing her chest confidently.

In truth, there was actually substance behind her confidence. Clara was a very powerful Dominant who was ranked second in the top ten among the second-years in the Bastion of Conquest. Her abilities were so formidable that the Dean of her Bastion even had to speak to her himself to represent them.

At this moment, Clara knew that many people were wary of her. Just like people were wary of a cadet like the Ace from the Bastion of Crimson and Silver due to the nature of his insane abilities, there were people who wouldn’t dare approach her even though they discovered she now held a relic. So she was at ease to some extent.

Even if someone were to be foolish enough to confront her, she could take them down.

That was unless they were one of the three that she was wary of.

’I just hope I don’t run into any of them. But then, they are strong. I’m sure they must have secured a relic long ago, so I don’t need to worry about any of them coming for mine, right?’ She tried to reassure herself.

But then, she suddenly noticed that Barnaby’s jaw was dropping slowly, and his expression was frozen.

"Huh? Everything alright?"

She had barely asked the question when she grew alert and spun around. There was no one in sight; however, when she looked down, she was suddenly seized by a cold wave of dread.

A raven was sitting on the ground, looking up at them with its head tilted.

After a few seconds, the raven spoke in a male voice.

"Hey there."

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