After teleporting myself and the delusional student who calls himself the protagonist of the world, into the dark room, I leaned against my chair and focused on his thoughts.
[I am going to die...]
'Well, well I am still contemplating if killing you would be beneficial in the long run or not. Don't be too hasty to die.'
[Shit! How did I even attract this NPC's attention of all other NPCs?]
'This again…'
I was curious what this guy meant when he was calling me NPC. Was it a curse word? A term? A secret code for spies?
His mind was filled with mysteries that I didn't know.
'What is this game he was talking about?'
'Who are these people called players?'
'Why did this guy play this game countless times? Didn't he get bored of it?'
Most importantly, why was he so fearless towards the people who reached Master rank, let alone Grand rank? Was he just fearless or a complete idiot?
'Though he seems to hold a great deal of fear towards me.'
This guy was a complete enigma.
He was saying terms that I hadn't heard in my entire life, calling himself the protagonist of this world while possessing the strength of cannon fodder, giving himself the ridiculous surname 'Lightbringer', and lastly he was thinking of creating a harem with my sister included...
'Should I kill him– no, I should first castrate him.'
My hand leisurely shifted toward my belt where my dagger currently was.
[I am fucked up! I didn't even do something that would attract this most troublesome NPC, the Executioner Caelum Achard, who is known as the hound of the empire and the traitor player killer. He will kill me if I show disrespect towards the empire!]
"..."
"..."
Silence overtook the room as even the self-proclaimed protagonist's mind turned quiet. As if his thoughts ceased to exist, like a dead man, or someone fast asleep.
'It isn't surprising to know that I already killed people called players, but where did those titles come from? Like really? Hound of the Empire? Traitor player killer? Such lame names. I am not even a loyalist, just a noble born citizen who works for the empire.'
[...!]
[Oh, shit!]
'What happened to this guy again?'
[I forgot that according to the lore, Caelum Achard could read minds! This wasn't an obvious game changer in the game, so I considered it useless information, but this is reality now! What if this crazy NPC currently reading my mind?!]
'What the actual fuck?'
My brain stopped functioning in that momentum and my instincts took over. The dagger in my hand flew through with an inconceivable momentum, the target was the self-proclaimed protagonist's forehead.
The dagger, packed with enough power to blast this guy's head up, suddenly disappeared right before the cold metal of the dagger touched his skin.
'Huh? Was he hiding his power?'
I gave strength to my legs to make some distance between us, yet, my legs didn't budge. Not just my legs, suddenly I lost control of all of my muscles.
My eyes began to shut down and gradually my upper body fell on the table.
Though, strangely the self-proclaimed protagonist, Lars also lost control of his muscles and his head fell on the table.
"Zzzzzz..."
'Huh? He fell asleep?'
I didn't understand anything about the current situation. I thought this guy was hiding its strength but no, he fell asleep instantly unlike me. I was still resisting the sweet temptations of sleep even though I was the one who wanted to sleep most.
'You lucky bastard... Unlike you, I have the sense of when to sleep or not…'
While Cursing at Lars, I tried again to move my limbs, but it was futile. My body felt like I was just a child who trained hard and now enduring muscle pain after a night's sleep.
'I didn't want... to do this... but... I don't have any choice…'
While my consciousness was beginning to close, I willed one of my Mana crystals to let out the Physical Mana it was storing.
Physical Mana wasn't like Spiritual Mana. Physical mana only had one use, it was to strengthen, toughen, and sharpen things. Basically, it was a physical enhancement.
I planned to enhance my muscles to escape from this strange binding.
However, this wasn't the only face of the plan.
The second option was to wake my mind with pain. Yes, pain.
I have a unique constitution. Healing magic, sleeping magic, or any other magic that directly manipulates my body is greatly inefficient and painful for me.
The body-strengthening magic of knights is also an agonizing thing to bear, though I am already used to it, but this doesn't mean that the pain is useless.
"...?"
When the physical mana was about to reach my muscles, I sensed an existence behind me.
The existence had a great aura. It was a cold, lifeless but strangely gentle aura.
"Don't."
The existence's voice was surprisingly familiar. The Fallen, the goddess, Mother.
I immediately stopped manipulating the physical mana.
'Why did she come here?'
'Why did she stop me?'
'Why did she prevent me from killing this guy who knows I can read minds?'
'Why?'
I wanted to raise my questions to the goddess but my lips couldn't move. Yet, as if she understood my questions, she offered me the answers.
"You will regret it."
Her voice which was a mixture of contrasting sounds of soft merciful melody and hateful cry, had a hint of warmth.
'What will I regret?'
Her long, pitch-black hair that absorbed the light around fell over my head and partially closed my vision.
A smooth and soft hand caressed my face without answering my question. My eyes felt like a thousand-ton rock and was about to close.
DON'T LOOK!
DON'T LOOK!
DON'T LOOK!
My extraordinary intuition warned me of great danger but this time I didn't listen to it and opened my eyes as much as I could while resisting sleep.
A dark bone hand. Countless things were wriggling under it as if the bone was the cage of those things, and the bone hand was engraved with strange symbols. Seeing these things and symbols made my mind go blank and bleed my eyes.
The last thing I saw before I lost consciousness was that the mysterious bone hand touched Lars' temple and took out an ethereal thread.