Marni Wilf felt a headache coming on.
The five brats who had helped him chase off the goblin horde a few days ago said that they would be joining their merchant group.
He would naturally welcome them with open arms since the five brats who claimed to be believers of the God of Games had undeniable ability despite their weird behavior. With them, it was not impossible for the merchant group to fight even if they were unlucky enough to run into a magical beast.
Moreover, he didn't have to worry about them having any improper thoughts about his goods. To put it bluntly, if the five brats had any thoughts about his goods, they could have killed the other members of the caravan before taking the goods. After all, the merchant guards were either dead or injured, and they were no match for the brats who became spirited after beating up the goblins.
With that thought in mind, Marni Wilf did not hesitate to agree to Edward's request to travel with them.
But after just two days, he realized that he had been taking things for granted …
The five brats had been harassing the merchant group every day, almost always preaching about the deity they believed in — the so-called God of Games.
As a well-informed traveling merchant, Marni naturally knew about the God of Games. After all, the Kingdom of Tierra had fallen less than a decade ago, and it had been a paradise for merchants back then. Marni had earned his first bucket of gold by selling wooden chess pieces in Tierra.
He was a little nostalgic about that country where its citizens were so kind that they would treat even lowly traveling merchants as equals.
Still, he had heard that Tierra's belief in the God of Games had left its citizens addicted to games and gambling without any thought to improve, weakening the nation and leading to the siege of surrounding nations.
The God of Games that Tierra's citizens believed in did not help at all in the war. In the end, Tierra's capital was taken, and its king, Yakaran the Eleventh, died in that battle.
The other nations that divided Tierra said that they would use Tierra's fall as a negative example, forbidding their citizens from worshipping the God of Games.
The country they were in now was one of the nations that destroyed Tierra, and the place they were now was once Tierra's territory.
One way or another, the God of Games was an immeasurably weak deity in most people's minds, one that had no benefits and was not worthy of worship.
In fact, many believed that the God of Games was a figment of Yakaran the Eleventh's imagination and that there was no such deity.
In the first place, Marni was one of the supporters of the theory that the God of Games doesn't exist. When the five brats mentioned that they were believers of the God of Games, he simply assumed that they were trying to hide their identity and not reveal their true deity.
After all, the priesthoods of many gods themselves had flaws, causing the priests who believed in them to have some weaknesses that could be easily targeted by others. It was normal for them to be careful when they went out.
Still, he didn't expect that these people really believed in the God of Games, and were even preaching to the others in the merchant group!
At first, one or two of the merchant guards couldn't stand the constant pestering and pestering and agreed to worship the God of Games, even imitating them and praying every day.
At first, Marni thought that they were just putting on an act because it was troublesome. Who knew that in less than two days, even those two brats were preaching about the God of Games to the others in the merchant group!
Moreover, such a crude preaching actually worked. Now, more than half of the merchant escort had run off to worship that God of Games or whatnot!
Moreover, Marni also noticed that the guards were behaving strangely after they converted to the God of Games.
It was as if they had given up on their daily practice of learning combat aura and training, but it wasn't entirely accurate to say that they had become lazy. Each time the merchant group encountered beasts along their path, they would actively go and get rid of them, even going as far as two to three miles to kill them. As a result, there were no ferocious beasts in the forest that dared to appear before them …
They would even gather together and say things like 'What the hell, how could you steal my monsters!', 'No monsters to kill, only quests to earn EXP', 'Which class is better? If you don't decide, I'll have to change class to warrior by default 'or other weird things like that.
Marni even heard one of the guardsmen who converted to the God of Games talking in his sleep, hoping that the goblin horde would attack again …
What kind of God of Games is that? It's an evil god that corrupts people's hearts!
Moreover, over the last two days, there were many guardsmen who came to him, hoping to learn his swordsmanship.
Though Marni was a traveling merchant, being a merchant in a land filled with beasts and even magical beasts meant that he must have some skill aside from being brave.
While Marni's ability couldn't compare to the guardsmen captain, he did have a swordsmanship passed down in his family.
Though it was passed down in his family, it was just a normal swordsmanship modified by his ancestors from the battlefield, and it wasn't really a secret.
In fact, his grandfather had always hoped to spread the swordsmanship he modified, which was why Marni taught the guardsmen captain it when they exchanged swordsmanship.
In the end, the guardsmen captain whom Marni had high hopes for was brainwashed into believing in the God of Games on the fourth day. Not long after his conversion, he suddenly told the other believers of the God of Games that 'Mister Marni Wilf's swordsmanship can be leveled up!'.
The consequence of that was that there would be guardsmen coming to him every other day to learn the swordsmanship …
Even more infuriating was that whenever he showed them the swordsmanship once, they would nod and say that they learned it, before immediately brandishing a swordsmanship that was more skillful and more powerful than Marni's … If Marni didn't know that none of them had learned the swordsmanship, he would have suspected that they were here to play a joke on him.
Those people had tried to preach to Marni, but Marni had refused their invitations time and time again.
"I'll never betray Gaglomeia, the Goddess of Riches, even if I have to die and jump off that tree!"
Marni sighed at that thought, and finished the rations in his hand in a few bites. Then, he rose from the ground and continued on his way.
According to the plan, they would be out of the forest in two days and reach their destination, Salt Mine City.
That was when one of the guardsmen who had converted to the God of Games yesterday approached him.
"You want to learn my swordsmanship too?" Marni excitedly drew his longsword and was about to show him the swordsmanship that was passed down in his family.
"Ah, it's fine. Mister Edward did an experiment before, and the swordsmanship you taught me wouldn't compare to the level 1 Divine Earthbreaker Blade in the skill tree even if it was leveled up to level 2 … "The guardsmen refused Marni's teaching without hesitation.
"…" Marni's expression kept changing, and he asked, "Is that Divine Earthbreaker Blade that you mentioned difficult to learn?"
"It's not. You can learn it at level 3, and I learned it yesterday."
The guardsmen answered.
Marni was silent for a long time before he finally spoke with much difficulty.