Terminally-Ill Genius Dark Knight

Chapter 25

TIGDK C25

A beast that resembles a snake and an earthworm, it is believed that the undeveloped dragons of the Inner Lunatic take on this form.

They are known for being extremely strong, though they do not use magic.

Even with dozens of ogres swarming around it, the wyrm is hard to catch.

However, I was looking for him.

That is to say, I walked on foot, turning the ground over with my staff.

Naturally, no one here knows about it.

The soldiers would be horrified if they knew I’d been trudging through the ground looking for a demon to come out, but of course, there’s nothing they can do about that.

The little guy knows a lot.

“Everyone get ready for battle and hide in the grass, and sprinkle all this mud around.”

At my words, one of the soldiers, who had been handed the mud by Zitri, began to scatter it nearby.

The funny thing is that Grine started throwing dirt too.

I found it quite amusing that they were listening to me.

Krrr…….

The wyrm scurries around and cries low.

He’s surrounded by soldiers, spreading out in all directions.

It’s hard for him to know where to attack first.

I have a plan in my head to get out of this situation.

The answer is simple.

‘Hit the enemy with the enemy.’

I smirk, remembering my conversation with Grine earlier.

-So…… what are you going to do about the ogres that are probably chasing us right now? Are you going to be able to shake them off?

-Of course. But that might draw the attention of the other beasts, so let’s just try to break through as fast as we can, and as long as we get out of the forest quickly, we should be fine.

-…Hmm, okay. I’ll take your word for it.

Grine quickly complied with my words here.

Without realizing it, he now believes I’m right.

He is now much weaker as a leader of these soldiers.

It’s a funny thing.

He pays the bills, but I’m the one in command.

Another thing,

I have a confession to make here. I had no intention of shaking off the ogre in the first place.

Why?

Because it’s about beating the enemy into submission, as described earlier.

In other words, to subdue it.

“Master…? Is it okay for us to hide like this? The soldiers are fighting like that…….”

“Don’t worry. I have a plan.”

Woooooo…!

At that moment, the scream of a beast that had been waiting behind them was heard.

Zitri grabs my arm and looks up at me with goosebumps.

I’m not sure why, but I think she’s expecting me to do something about it, and if not, she feels like I’ve done something…

I think it’s a little bit of resentment.

“You really shouldn’t worry, there’s always a way.”

“Would it be less painful to be killed by an ogre or a wyrm? It’s still a wyrm, right? It’s a gobbler.”

At Zitri’s words, I shook my head and patted her on the shoulder.

Then I began to say something reassuring.

“Zitri, do you know what wyrm’s favorite and least favorite food are?”

“…What?”

“It’s the ogres. They’re the wyrm’s staple food, and they get along pretty badly, so good explorers know how to use them to their advantage.”

That’s right, get them to fight each other.

With that, I trudged along the path and picked up the rocks I’d picked up along the way.

There were plenty of them, thanks to the sacks I’d packed and scattered through the subspace.

“Any chance the ogres will attack us first?”

“No. That’s why I spread the mud. Those ogres probably already think the wyrm ate their friends. Ogres are especially sensitive to smell.”

“……But what are you going to use that stone for?”

“Oh, this?”

I pulled a small stone from my sack of stones and crunched it in my hand, grinned, and began to hurl it indiscriminately at the worms and ogres.

“Master?!”

“I brought them for this.”

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Zitri was horrified.

But there’s a reason I can’t explain, even to myself.

What I’m trying to do is level up.

If I’d told her I was going to throw rocks, she wouldn’t have let me.

I know one very important thing from what I’ve seen on the internet.

If you’re going to do it again, it’s faster to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.

Sorry, Zitri!

I continued to throw stones, hitting every single one of them.

Suddenly, it occurred to me.

I’m… a pretty good shot, aren’t I?

* * *

About an hour had passed since the soldiers had faced off against the wyrm and ogres.

In the meantime, Grine is hiding in the bushes, lost in thought.

The other soldiers are in front of him, and he realizes that being the commander, the academy graduate, and the one doing this is, of course, quite problematic…

‘I hired the Knights of Ron for moments like this, they’ll take care of this!’ {1}

He had spent an astronomical amount of money to make up for his lack of power.

Therefore, he believed this time would pass quickly.

However, after about another hour.

“Brother, the battle ended a long time ago… are you still going to stand there?”

He heard the voice that wasn’t his, but his damned youngest brother’s.

Grine looked up and saw a smug face.

Ron is nowhere to be seen.

This bastard… how dare he run away without protecting me?

However, shame is greater than anger for Grine right now.

Feeling his face flush red, he shook off his brother’s hand as it reached out to him and turned away.

He disappeared without so much as a whimper.

Nox smirked at the unworthy figure.

“Looks like you’ve been properly frightened.”

“Well, Young Master, it seems that the rumors about you being a bastard weren’t entirely untrue.”

“Is that what you call being my maid?”

I shrugged off Zitri’s remark and watched Grine scurry away.

* * *

I’m sure many of you are wondering why I was throwing stones at the wyrm and ogres earlier.

But the reason is surprisingly simple.

A conclusion that anyone who has played the game can easily draw in their sleep.

To get the bonus stats from “hitting”.

In Inner Lunatic, you’re often partying and hunting with troops.

In a normal game, you’d have a contribution system where those who do more damage, or heal more, get more stats.

This means more experience, but…

What kind of game is Inner Lunatic?

It’s a game about growing units to kill demons.

In other words, the stat proficiencies distributed for faster growth of your teammates are the same!

I decided to take advantage of this gap.

Every time I throw a rock at the demons, they do very little damage.

So it would do 1 damage each.

But when they die?

I’d gain the same amount of skill as if I’d killed one.

So I came up with a plan.

I throw a rock, deal 1 damage, hide, and watch the worm and ogre fight and die.

Then I can keep eating stat proficiency and sucking nectar from a place that isn’t dangerous. The reason I baited the ogres was for this.

[Strength stat increased by 0.1].

[Strength stat increased by 0.1].

[Strength stat increased by 0.1] [Strength stat increased by 0.1].

And that’s not all.

[Ogre kills increased lifespan by 8 hours].

[Killing a wyrm increased your lifespan by 10 days].

[My remaining lifespan is now 122 days].

I was able to add dozens of days to my lifespan.

No… I should probably call it a stat bonus.

After all, with others doing the hard work and soldiers protecting me, all I had to do was throw stones, and I had no risk.

In many ways, the deck is stacked in my favor.

” Zitri, this is the way it is.”

“……Is that really so?”

Phew!

Carl nodded his head in agreement and came to me.

I petted him and smirked.

At this rate, he’s going to grow up pretty fast, even with the penalty.

Just as I was thinking that.

I heard the same system sound coming from the blue sky.

[Your physique stat has reached 5].

[The talent ‘Blessing of Growth’ has run out of effect].

The blessing that corrected my health growth rate is gone.

Ha, what can I do?

I thought moderately and looked at the cleared battlefield.

I calmly cleared my throat and spoke.

“Now that the battlefield has been cleared, let’s move on.”

“Yes!”

The soldiers responded and followed me.

Carl skillfully guided Zitri and me to the front of the procession. It was always a thrill to be at the front of a long line.

* * *

Another two days passed.

In the meantime, subtle factions had begun to form among the soldiers.

Those who continued to follow Grine, and those who saw my leadership as a Pathfinder and began to follow me. Two factions in total.

They were subtly checking and balancing each other.

It was all part of the plan.

If I can take away a little bit of Grine’s power, I’ll have plenty to use later.

Anyway, after all this time.

Finally, we reached the edge of the South. We made it to the Chasers.{2}

“We’re here, brother.”

I said, looking toward Grine.

He furrowed his brow and looked around.

I’d been here many times in the game, but this was the first time I’d actually seen it, so I began to take in the area of Chasers.

It was a wasteland, as I’d first expected.

There were no roads, and the ground was littered with trash.

There’s also a lack of commerce, with people selling their wares on rags, and only one inn in town.

As we walked into the village, we scanned the neighborhood.

“I… I was wondering if you could give me something to eat?”

A young girl walks up to us and asks.

She hadn’t eaten in a long time. Her color was dull, and she couldn’t have been more than ten years old.

Grine turned his head quickly.

It meant he wasn’t paying attention.

Hagiya.

He was born into a good family and had never gone hungry.

So he wouldn’t understand.

Besides, what is the color of the girl now?

She’s dirty, unwashed, and possibly carrying some sort of disease.

As such, Grine sees her not as a human being, but as a germ or its carrier.

That disdainful stare was proof.

“Please….”

Now the girl’s gaze is on me.

In that moment, I feel my heart stop.

What am I supposed to do here?

Zitri’s wistful gaze drifts to the girl for a moment, then back to me.

But I shake my head and ignore her, too.

“Let’s go.”

With that, I turned on my heel and headed into town.

Zitri clenched her jaw and bowed her head.

Soon after, the captain of the guard waiting in the village greeted me.

“Greetings, I am the captain of the village guard. I’ve heard the rumors. You are Grine von Reinhafer, a graduate of the Eldain Academy, and your brother, Nox von Reinhafer, are you here for the request?”

“Yes. We are here to stop the wave of demons.”

Grine said, and I bowed appropriately.

The captain of the town guard continued.

“My name is Taigan. It’s quite late today, so I’ll explain the details of your mission request tomorrow. Please make yourself at home in this dingy inn.”

It wasn’t traveling, but since Taigan said so, Grine nodded graciously. Inwardly, he was quite troubled.

Ron did the same.

I watched, then looked away.

Then he gave me a room, too.

Rooms 304 and 305. Right next door to Zitri.

“Get some rest then, we’re on the move again tomorrow.”

As I said goodnight to Zitri and was about to close the door to go into my room, she glanced at me for a moment as if she had something to say.

I quickly recognize it, but shake my head.

“I know. But it’s not something we can do anything about.”

I already know what she’s going to say.

But that doesn’t stop me from saying it more firmly.

“Yeah… I guess it is.”

Zitri is persuaded and enters her room.

“Huh… I can’t do this anymore.”

A sigh escaped me.

I slammed my room shut, a little too loudly on purpose, and stepped back outside.

As I walk through the darkened streets of the town, my mind wanders.

This is definitely a game.

No matter how real it is, it must be in my head.

I still think of it as a game, and that’s why I used to enjoy it so much.

But now, I have to admit, I’m starting to realize that it’s not.

The Inner Lunatic is now a reality.

And I’m…….

The youngest son of the Reinhafer family.

“Hey you.”

I call, as coldly as I can, to a group of kids huddled around a campfire in front of me.

It was the girl and her friends I’d met earlier, at the beginning of the village.

I think the setting said they were war orphans.

There are very few boys in this demon-infested land. They’ve all been drafted and sacrificed as boy soldiers.

What about their parents?

They must have been killed by the demons in droves, with no place for them to go.

For some reason, I found myself chewing on my lip.

Finally, I spoke up.

“Did you say you needed something to eat?”

I pulled out the myriad loaves of bread from my subspace pouch and handed them out, one by one.

“Go, thank you!”

I watch as they gobble up the bread with gusto.

Ding.

The bonfire blazes.

I throw my thoughts into it.

And I think to myself.

‘If I’m going to continue to live as a spoiled brat, I’m going to have to deal with situations like the one before.’

Even though I was able to find them and help them again now…

Next time, maybe not.

As I desire.

I need strength to do what I want to do.

To do that.

First, I need to survive this chaos.

I reminded myself, and staggered back to the inn, past the blazing fire.

Meanwhile, a girl’s hair is carefully uncovered as she watches.

Green hair, no gold in it. She wears a thin smile.

“So… it was all an act, huh?”

Zitri watched the children eat their bread with a smile that this time was not fake.

They were not abandoned.

She thought to herself.

TN/

{1} : these mercenaries/knights for hire can be called Ron/Lhorne/Rhone

{2} : there’s probably going to be a better name for the frontier than Chasers but I haven’t seen it yet