"Well..." Askardia looked at him in a sweaty expression. Sweats dripped at her face. But it dripped opposite from bottom to top, not from top to bottom as usual. As if that she was panicked to the level that she did not know what she should say.
But, she had to accept the fact as well that [Sword of Aorus] wasn't for her. Instead, it was not the issue.
The issue was that she was the one who had slain the monster. Yet, she was not the one who could be able to use this weapon to the full capability,
"'You are a noob, meh! Aorus won't follow you!' That's what the sword told me about you." Aloysius tried to say that without bursting into the laughter.
"Appreciation on you for the effort to laugh at me." Askardia reacted in her red-cherry face that she tried to hold off out of embarrassment.
Rather than laughing, he stopped his intention to laugh as he had found something interesting. Thus, he asked that woman,
"How did you kill this monster and then get the bone, by the way?"
"That was..." Her face blushed even worse compared to the previous. Her face was hot enough to boil an egg instantly at that moment which led him to guess,
"Please don't tell me that it's..."
"KYAA!! SORRY SORRY!! I DIDN'T MEANT IT!!"
"I knew it, KS cunt!" Aloysius replied to her immediately as he looked at her with an unamused expression.
"Woi! Language!! You had stolen my sword, and now you are insulting me, how dare..."
"Oh? Do you want a fight? You are pretty much weaker than me, girl. I'm much younger than you, but I think that I can trounce you. That's seriously pathetic for a mighty goddess like you."
She yelled at herself internally, 'DAMN IT!!'
But, it was a truth as well. The current Askardia was not strong enough to defeat Aloysius, who was a strategy badass, a strong god devouter, and even his battle spirit was ever-kindling. It led her to try to hold her spite, replied to him,
"Up to you."
"It is as to how it should be!" Aloysius laughed at her while he said that. Thus, that woman indeed had muscular endurance despite being bullied by him repeatedly.
She explained to him,
"Since you own my sword now. It means that you will need to learn how to use your spirit sword."
"Spirit sword? It sounds like a certain manga that I had ever read. If I tried to merge my mind..."
Fwoosh!
The intense aura of the sword had embedded into Aloysius's right arm. It shocked both him and the goddess.
"I never awaken that before. But, that is what you called as, spirit mode. The mode that you will have to activate during the match. You can fight bare-handed as well. But, you will get killed first before you managed to land the attack. Now, you can see the system page in your point of view, do you?"
She was too late to say those. Aloysius was observing the digital-looking background in front of him as he had read something carefully.
He observed every single menu on that system page. Thus, he clicked something that piqued Askardia's interest which led her to watch him from below.
"What are you looking at, pervert!" Aloysius responded at her with his violent glare, telling her that she should leave him alone.
"What do you want to..."
[One man army mode]
[Are you sure that you will do it alone? Remember that this is irreversible. And you will potentially ruin the game's ballance]
"That's Isekai Online, huh? It sounds like an MMORPG, but in fact, it's MOBA. Interesting."
"How did you know that this game's name is [Isekai Online]?" Askardia asked him in a weirdly curious tone. Thus, Aloysius looked at her with a disdain expression, shunned her.
[Yes/No]
He observed at that option which colored in green and red. Thus, he clicked the green button, which led Askardia to freaked out.
"Why do you freak out when I decided to went solo mode? MOBA isn't necessarily about team working just like how a web novel had mentioned. Instead, you will need many different mechanisms, metagames, and so on to maintain your winning advantage. That all would be very hard to be operated by a bunch of normies. So I prefer to use the solo way instead."
"That sounds... efficient. But..."
"It's much better than having a shit you need to carry, though. Besides, don't you tell me that every team below the top ten will get killed permanently by the soul and by the body. Do you?"
It was a sense that Aloysius wanted to tell Askardia. To him, as the extreme god devouter, he never once wished to sacrifice anyone. Instead, he prefers himself to offer his life as it had the benefit for him.
"So, I can become the martyr for all-father!!!" Aloysius said that with his sinister laugh. It led Askardia to look at him with a ridiculously unamused expression.
'What a religion freak.' She muttered in her mind that caused him to look at her,
"Why not both of us are fighting toe-by-toe together instead? You are a strategist, and I'm a pro. So we could do it better than if I add four more people together. Do you want to stay as a KS specialist or score a rampage?"
Aloysius was spot on when it comes to that. She remembered herself over what had happened in her past life.
She remembered how her peer badly bullied her for her inability to fighting.
Thus, she also remembered how she managed to become a goddess of war.
"Are you sure that you will earn rampage easily?" Askardia asked him a question that she hoped that he could give her a good sense of direction.
He nodded as he showed her the stats of the opponents from his match menu,
"Looked at mine as the captain."
[Aloysius]
[Weapon: Longsword]
[Skillset: Teleport, Assassinate]
[Life-skill: Dan 1 Judo, Wing Chun, Tactical Genius]
[Role: Role 4]
"Look at their captain's stats."
[XzHantu]
[Weapon: Gauntlet]
[Skillset: Focus Punch, Swift Step]
[Life-skill: N/A]
[Role: Carry]
"Then, look at your stats."
[Askardia]
[Weapon: Grimoire]
[Skillset: Intimidation, Corrupt, Blink Dagger, Teleport, Swift Step, Ironclad Shield]
[Lifeskill: God of war's Intimidation]
[Role: Carry]
"The rest of the opponents were pretty easy, though. Thus, they are not even guarding the left and right lanes." Askardia replied to him as she noticed about their strategic plan, which was not possible to hide as one of the game rules during the match session.
"I have almost absolute chance to win against them. They are all [Carry]. While we are here, I'm an [Initiator], and you are a [Carry]. It's more than enough to push them away in three lanes differently. You owned the blink dagger, and I owned teleport which you had it, then, my assassination is a tactical skill as well. So we can be roaming anywhere without being spotted. Unless they are using the eye of sights."
'He had read the complete documentation to that level... Who is him actually?' Askardia looked at him, questioned while muttering as if she had seen the potential god of war's commander that led her to imagine herself knelt in front of matured version of him after the strategical planning.
"And, here you go. I found it, and this is the suitable weapon for you." Aloysius threw an ancient-colored grimoire to Askardia, telling her that she should try it out in the match later on.
Thus, he continued,
"You have the [Ironclad Shield]. It gives us the super armor to defend ourselves against the more potent attack. In other means, we will be invulnerable for several seconds. It's an emergency skill we can use just in case something had happened."
"Indeed, that's pretty handy for me to use just in case things happened," Askardia replied to him obediently.
At this time, she was no longer required to be dominating like how she used to be. Instead, she had to know that she had her own goal, which led her to mutter,
'Aloysius, I want you to become the commander to do something for me.'
Then, Aloysius clicked something at his menu, resulting in the invitation to the goddess of war to see the invitation menu on her end.
"Don't worry about it. I had read the rules and everything. It's written that the gods can interfere at this match as the replacement, central team, or a coach. But their godly power will be restricted. Thus, this is why I can only see Lil few of your skills."
"Indeed, I relied upon my godly power too much. Thank you for reminding that."
Aloysius smiled for the first time, not with hostility but with hospitality. Thus, he replied at her,
"We are the teammate, after all. Don't forget that you are the only tactical goddess of war here. If I were into someone else, then it won't be as good as this. If you want me to become your commander, then follow me for now. "
He clicked the button that written in his menu as,
[Start Game]
"Let's do it, Askardia. Show me your true capability as the goddess of war!"
She nodded. Then, she clicked the same button, which led to the numerous portal open in their footing.
The portal had dragged both of them to somewhere else. Which led Aloysius to observe into his awe as he had looked at the village.
There were three different NPCs, which led Aloysius to mutter,
'I have 2500 golds. Hmm, speed first.'
Thus, he looked at the little girl, clicking at her through his system menu, which led him to see every item in the menu.
He looked at that menu while observing every shoe he had seen in it. There were four of them.
'Power Treads... It can go with the dynamic option.'
'Swift Boots... It will boosts my movement speed with the click that I could click later on.'
'Teleportation Boots... I will have double teleportation with these shoes. But I will lose my stat, Hmm...'
"Have you bought it?" Askardia asked him when he was diving into his thought.
Aloysius replied at her, "Not yet. I'm still looking at it."
But, he was gone missing immediately towards the empty place where he had lurked.
It was a deep forest with two other opponents. They were lurking at the empty plate in the ground that embedded with the environment.
'Level one with swift boots, level one with the Teleportation boots used with a minute cooldown.'
He prepared his [Sword of Aorus] by grabbing the sword hit on his right hip while he squatted to made his body hidden in the bush nearby. His eyes was focusing on an orc-looking guy with a stern expression. Thus, he chatted with Askardia,
[Aloysius: Askardia, teleport on the middle lane behind of their towers, two towers back, make those creeps shifting their aggressive stance to you, then put them to the jungle to make them kill themselves. Steal the kill so you will earn some EXPs and some golds.]
[Askardia: Ok, but how about you?]
[Aloysius: I will do 1v2 here, both of them were too easy to guess from their movement alone.]
Askardia was worrying about his situation. To her, doing 1v2 is seriously impossible with this kind of game genre. But, she had to put her worries aside.
Realistically said, it was impossible to manage another person as they were only two men team. Thus, she warned him as she had been aware about this.
[Askardia: You will get yourself killed, get back before they killed you, and then, you lost your life for eternity.]
Aloysius smiled as she had worried him so. Thus, he replied at her in the chat.
[Aloysius: Don't worry, ready perfectly.]
======
KS = Kill Steal. It was a term in MOBA that means you are stealing someone's kill. No matter what kind of battle it is, kill stealing is a big no for the carry role character.
MMORPG = Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.
MOBA = Multiplayer Online Battle Arena. (Aloysius mentioned this before in the previous chapter).
Rampage = chain killing for five consequential killings in MOBA.
Role 4= Hybrid roamer / initiator / support. They tend to cover many roles at the same time. Sometimes as the initiator, sometimes as the roamer, and sometimes as the support as well.
Carry = Hitter.
NPC = Non Playing Character