Chapter 103: Merlin, huh
「After a long and arduous journey, Artoria kept dying and reviving from the respawn point.」
「At last, you finally reached the Promised Land.」
「Your guide has been waiting here for a long time.」
Although the progress had barely just begun, Baobhan Sith was already exhausted.
This newbie Artoria was way too fragile — just one careless mistake and she'd drop dead on the spot!
"It wasn't easy at all…"
Baobhan Sith gripped the controller tightly and complained:
"Thankfully, we're finally about to meet the guide — maybe she can help us level up…"
In the game screen, a mysterious figure wearing a hooded cloak was walking toward the two of them.
「So you've finally arrived, O future King of Lostbelt.」
Seeing the slender, tall figure, the long hair peeking out from under the hood, and the half-revealed fair, delicate face——
"Who is that…?"
Artoria looked at the mysterious hooded figure that had just appeared, then turned to Baobhan Sith with a puzzled expression.
"You idiot, you've never seen her before?"
Baobhan Sith immediately recognized the person acting all mysterious under the hood,
"This is the guide every player must meet at the start of the game. Her class is Fire Keeper, and her name is Melina!"
「That's right, it's me...」
The figure suddenly lifted the hood and smiled brightly——
「I'm the male version of the Fire Keeper, it's me, Merlin!」
"Wha— what the hell, who is this supposed to be?!"
Even Baobhan Sith was stunned.
「Ha ha ha ha!」
Merlin in the game laughed loudly while twirling his staff, cheerfully saying:
「All right, all right! Under my guidance, let's climb the steps toward becoming the King of Lostbelt together! We'll happily burn down the Fantasy Tree and head toward the world's destruction, shall we?」
What kind of nonsense is this?! How did a scammer like you end up as the guide?!
Who the hell wants to follow you to the Fantasy Tree?!
Bring Melina back right now — at least she's much prettier!
"This is a new character in Rune Ring's DLC, Merlin," Gawain explained seriously.
"He calls himself the teacher of the King of Paradise. According to the lore, he's twice as strong as the original Melina."
"A bastard like that was worth adding to the DLC? If they're adding Merlin, they should be paying the players instead!"
Besides, he's just a low-rank Fire Keeper, a non-combat character — even if he's a hundred times stronger than Melina, what's the point?!
Baobhan Sith was speechless, but she quickly accepted reality.
"Whatever, it doesn't matter who the guide is — he's just a tool anyway…"
Then, she gave a mischievous little evil smile.
"All right, now I'll pretend to say some nice words to win over this bastard, promise that I'll become the King of Lostbelt, then once he's done helping us, I'll go find Eresh and tell her to lock him under Kur forever..."
Perfectly calculated, keikaku doori!
Eikou couldn't help but feel impressed. He gave a thumbs-up and praised her:
"To come up with such a filthy plan — truly, it takes evil to deal with evil!"
"Heh heh..."
Click!
Before she could finish her words, a message suddenly popped up in the game——
「Artoria dealt a critical stab to Merlin!」
「Merlin is dead!」
「Merlin is dead!」
「Merlin is dead!」
「Important things must be said three times! Hell Yeah!」
"What the hell?!"
Baobhan Sith jumped in shock.
Merlin, why the hell did you die already?!
You're the newbie guide, how could you die in the first stage? Who's supposed to handle my character upgrade now? How am I supposed to continue without a Fire Keeper?!
"You… you damn boar, what the hell did you just do?!"
Baobhan Sith was on the verge of going insane.
"S-sorry…"
Artoria explained pitifully:
"The moment I saw him, my hand slipped, and I accidentally triggered the straight sword's battle skill, and while cancelling the recovery animation with my shield, I might've hit him by mistake."
A recovery-cancel technique that advanced, and you call that a slip of the hand?!
Just as Baobhan Sith was about to explode, another message appeared in the game——
「...Phew, that was close.」
「Turns out it was only Merlin's illusion. He appeared beside you once again.」
「Please don't attack me again, or I'll really get angry, okay?」 Merlin said with a smile.
"Whew… I knew it, there's no way a guide could die that easily…"
Baobhan Sith sighed in relief, about to interact with him again——
When Artoria suddenly appeared behind Merlin and stabbed him once more, hard.
"Ah… I slipped again!" she said quickly.
"You're obviously doing it on purpose! Just how much do you hate Merlin?!" Baobhan Sith yelled.
「...」
「You have entered a hostile state with Merlin.」
「He threw off his cloak and drew the Sword of Promised Victory from his side.」
「And immediately after, you discovered his true identity —— the Sword Saint of Avalon, famed throughout Britain!」
In the game, Merlin calmly drew Excalibur,
「Big brother here also knows a bit of swordsmanship...」
「Don't be surprised, my strength is ten times that of the King of Lostbelt, and even twice as strong as Melina!」
Is the King of Lostbelt in your game just some low-tier mob or what?!
Why can everyone in this damn newbie village step on the Lostbelt King's head?!
By your scale, one Melina alone could beat five Lostbelt Kings already!
If you're that strong, why don't you just go burn the Fantasy Tree yourself, huh?!
「You are now fighting the Sword Saint of Avalon.」
「Empowered by the Sword of Promised Victory and his unmatched swordsmanship...」
「You were swiftly defeated.」
「Dead.」
"Damn it, how dare you kill me?!"
Baobhan Sith turned red with fury, frantically mashing the respawn button on her controller.
"To think I'd be killed by a shady-looking magus using swordsmanship… This is an unprecedented humiliation! To harm me — the heir of the Fairy Kingdom — is to disgrace the honor of Mother-sama!"
"It's not that serious, is it?" Eikou complained.
Baobhan Sith turned to look at Artoria beside her:
"Hey, boar, have you respawned yet? Come with me, we're killing him!"
"Kill Merlin!"
Artoria shouted furiously.
[You realize that when playing games, Baobhan Sith is extremely short-tempered — just one death and she completely loses composure, stubbornly fixating on the enemy.]
[The Boar Princess beside her isn't much better — she's equally determined to fight Merlin to the bitter end.]
[And so, two hours passed.]
[The two of them — revive, die, revive, die, revive, die...]
[By the time drowsiness hit you and you decided to unroll your futon and sleep at Morgan's house, the two finally managed to defeat Merlin together!]
[Though even until the very end, you still couldn't understand what benefit they gained from teaming up to kill the newbie village's guide.]
"Well, as long as the two of them are happy, I guess that's fine."
[Night of May 30.]
[You've spent a bizarre yet joyful night gaming together. The bond between you deepened, and you received an Encouragement Dice.]
...
(Note: I know the game "Rune Ring" is a parody of Elden Ring, but I don't play Elden Ring or souls-like games in general, so I'm not entirely sure how this should be edited...)