[p=center]The world is screaming for my death.
The world is dying by my hands.
Yet I can feel nothing.
Everyone is dead.
I killed them all.[/p]
[p=center]xXx[/p]
“I want to start drinking.”
Those were the words that started it all.
Break!
Eden stared blankly at Alexandra dropping the glass of juice that he was holding completely ignoring the complaints of the waitress next to him. He quickly threw a gold coin at her to shut her up immediately.
Eden gulped his saliva seeing that Alexandra was completely serious and said:
“Alexandra...you trying drinking is like playing Russian roulette where 99 of 100 shots are fatal.”
Alexandra frowned and said, “It can't be that bad....we don't know how much I can take.”
“....”
Eden thought about it and it might end up as Alexandra being an invincible drinker or something like that....however if that was the case then he would be forced to go drinking with her and will likely be smashed dead drunk every time...either way, it doesn't bold well for him.
“Still no. I rather not take that risk.”
Alexandra pleaded with her eyes and said, “Come ooooon. Life is all about risks.”
“And you know every time we take a risk, it somehow gets worst. I don't even know how many times we fallen in some dungeon or be caught up in some scheme that we were forced to fight our way out of it” sighed Eden.
“But I heard rumours of this super top quality stuff that some hidden tribe of dwarves made. Isn't it interesting enough to find?”
Hearing this, Eden now clearly heard what Alexandra wanted to do.
“So...you want the first drink you have to be the very best? Doesn't that make it kinda depressing later on when you always think of other stuff as lower quality?”
“Hey! I'm not...that picky.”
“Says that one who has cooking into the advance level. You can't stand bad food and things that are 'under' your tastes. Well that just means I get to taste good stuff everyday.”
“In that case, I'll cut off the supply of good food from you!” threatened Alexandra.
“Hmp! Who do you think manages the money to buy ingredients? If I'm going down, I'm taking you down with me. Besides, I'm used to eating bad food to survive.”
Eden remembered the time in the underworld. There was literally no food to be eaten there that did not give him some horrible side effect. Then how could he survive there you ask? Simple, eat the monsters living in the underworld. They were surprisingly edible in the end after all the poison, curse and so on effects were ignored.
Hearing that her threat was not that big of a deal to Eden, she pouted and then said, “What do you think Viv? If you side with me, we can all go drinking!”
“Is Viv even of age....?”
Both of them looked at Viv who watched all of this before him. With a cup of tea in his hands, which he got into a habit of drinking recently, he said, “There shouldn't be a problem going. Besides...we have nothing to do which is why Al brought it up to begin with.”
“Yeaaaaaaaaaaah!” Alexandra let out an excited scream while Eden sighed trying to ignore the glances that the other people in this tavern is giving them. For some reason, Eden felt it wasn't just because they were causing lots of noise...
“However, we need to make sure that Al isn't the complete destructive drunk type of person else....that place not exist after we visit. Of course if we are the cause of the damage, we would be forced to pay for it...in the end. I rather not lose money like that....”
“....”
Both Eden and Alexandra nodded to Viv's warning. It looks like Viv was growing up to be a strict mother.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
Approximately 20 minutes after the trio packed up and began to move through the forest to get to the next town. Why would they walk instead of using Eden's ultra useful teleportation spells you ask?
The reason is simple.
“Since I'm not exactly the one to want to do this, I'll be restricting some skill and spells from now on to make my point clear. First, I won't be using teleportation magic at all unless the distance between places are super long.”
“Ehhh?” Alexandra made a voice as if she could not believe him on doing this. She too was, too used to Eden being a convenient travel tool.
Teleportation was extremely powerful in many ways but has a restriction known as mana. Even for Eden, he would be extremely hard press to teleport more than a dozen people at once and there was also a weight and mass limit as well.
But unlike most teleporters that can only go short distances or to teleportation stations, Eden had free control of the location of his teleport...if he had been there before due to calculation limits. He did not want to teleport into a rock after all. Why was Eden not afraid of things being in him after he teleported you also ask?
The reason is simple. There are two types of teleports. The first is the dangerous type where you literally move into the location you please. This is quick and simple to use but have high risks like teleporting into open fire causing it to burn inside you or rocks and other small external objects being in you as well.
The second was the type that switches your body with another thing at the location. With this, even if you teleport into a wall, the part of the wall will also be teleported to where you were and you can survive generally. However this takes a while to calculate and cannot be used in battle due to the long length of casting. But it was super useful for long distance travel, compressing months of walking into seconds of teleporting.
Because of this, even if he wanted to, they couldn't exactly escape from this current situation.
“He he he he”
“These young ones look nice to eat up.”
“I'll take the black haired one for myself!”
The trio looked around and they were surrounded by what seems to be bandits...or slave traders. Most likely the former.
Seeing this, Alexandra looked at me and asked, “Eden, why didn't you tell us enemies were coming?” in a spiteful voice.
Eden shrugged and said, “Didn't want to.”
VI sighed hearing these words as well but Eden continued saying, “Plus these guys are quite weak. I didn't think they would pick on three level 600+ players. I think they're all players since NPCs usually can tell.”
“Ew...so they are those types of people...” Alexandra looked a bit disgusted knowing that people would have this kind of preference playing the villain and making others miserable.
“If you don't like them that much, why don't you get rid of them” asked Eden who had no intention of even moving a finger here. Even if they tried, they couldn't even block them walking.
“No way! They're too weak to play with!” complained Alexandra hitting a rough spot on the enemies that Eden noticed numbered around 100.
“Fuck you bitch!”
“Imma gonna rip ya!”
“Fucking charge now!!”
It looks like the bandit players were completely insulted by Alexandra's words and came charging in just like that waving their swords. Sensing around, Eden could not find even one mage in this group at all nor archers.
It looks like this game had a cruel abundance of sword users to the point that these players were forced to be bandits...else it might be that no archer or mage wanted to join them. Thinking about this, neither Eden or Alexandra did anything in order to combat the bandits.
Seeing this, Viv sighed once again and used his staff to cast a spell.
“Grow Roots...”
BANG BANG BANG BANG!
From the ground, giant roots ripped through and whacked a couple of bandits away while Viv manipulated smaller roots to grab onto them and cut off their escape route. Viv didn't even give them much time to scream until he manipulated roots to a scale that made it look like the forest was attacking them and drag them into the ground and killing them.
Eden was quite impressed on Viv's skills on using this spell. This 'Grow Root' spell was to Viv as Alexandra's 'Sword Wave' and his own 'Mana Shield' in which they were REALLY good at using them.
“Not bad~” complimenting Eden, “If I or Alexandra had to deal with them, we would've had to destroy a fair chunk of the forest to do it quickly. You even killed them in a clean fashion where no one would notice that there was a battle here.”
Alexandra nodded and added in, “Plus the range of your spell increased a lot compared to when we started off. Before you barely managed 10 metres on sight and now you can use it at all range.”
“It's not like....well I trained it properly along with the rest of my spells.”
Viv was properly red in the face due to the compliments. Seeing this, Alexandra leaped in joy and rubbing her cheek on Viv's own in a happy manner which left Viv even more red. Eden could only sigh seeing how they were acting.
“Hmm?”
Eden looked over to where there seemed to be a half buried man and said, “Viv, you missed one” before creating a fireball to kill him.
“Ahhhhh!” screamed Viv, “I was going to practise my interrogation skills with him! I told you before to not kill them off like that!” in the disbelief that Eden killed him without much of a warning.
“....”
Eden and Alexandra could only wonder what he meant by 'interrogation'? Recalling some unpleasant memories in the past....
“Right....really didn't want to remember what happened then” said Eden apologising to Viv.
Alexandra let go of Viv trying to hold her stomach though her armour was in the way. The memory alone was enough to cause her stomach to....well almost. Eden was only disturbed while Viv was perfectly fine with the 'interrogation' that he would perform.
In this sense and in a strange way, Alexandra was the most normal in relation to the pain and torment of others. Plus Viv was the most scary when he is tormenting other...
“Eden.”
“Y-yes!”
As such, Eden wanted to extremely careful around Viv when he was easily inclined to torment others to make sure 'others' didn't mean him.
“Since this was your fault to begin with, teleport us to the rough location of that place.”
“S-sure...”
Eden without thinking much on it, immediately started his teleportation spell but in the middle of it asked, “Alexandra, where exactly is this place?”
Flustered being put on the spot, especially since her sanity was on the line to be 'tormented' Alexandra replied quickly and clearly, “A few kilometres off the town next to that place where a wandering skeleton knight appeared when we fought it.”
“Hmm...”
Eden tried recalling that place and roughly knew of the place within a few hundred kilometres. Well it would had to do for him since he couldn't exactly fail that badly right...?
[p=center]xXx[/p]
“Right, now we need to find out more of these rumours of these dwarves” said Viv seeing that they were in the right place, which made Eden sigh in relief.
Right now, they were in a moderately large town that was a frontier for a couple of dungeons. It really didn't stand out that much compared to other places but it was still a good spot to gain some hunting when you needed. Plus the dungeons weren't that great so it mostly served for players that were not part of a powerful guild to train in.
Since it seems that Viv was taking control of this search, Eden could relax a bit since Alexandra was horrible at those kind of things; even worse than when they started off somehow...
To illustrate this point some more, Viv then said to Alexandra, “Al, make sure you don't try to do something when we're not looking. I rather not fight another group of people for no real reason again.”
“Yes sir” said Alexandra a bit gloomy. It looked like she actually enjoyed taunting others when she's bored and fighting them.
“Eden, you help with the search as well. Just don't talk to people since they run away from you. Earsdrop on them.”
“Yep” replied Eden kinda sad that Viv pointed out due to his insanely high infamy, normal NPCs won't even talk to him anymore unless when they had to and would often run away from him. Thankfully they would not do this when Alexandra or Viv was around due to their fame cancelling out the effects of his infamy.
As such, the three split up searching for information in the town. What could go wrong?
[p=center]xXx[/p]
“Alexanddddddddddddddddddddddra!!!!!!” screamed Eden in rage while fending off several enemies at once.
Even though he was a couple hundred levels above them, it was still quite difficult to defend one self from dozens of blades when you are bare handed like Eden is right now. Fortunately, he was quite good at using hand to hand combat to at least defend himself.
“Why the hell did you have to attack the damn mayor of this town?!!!!!” shouted Eden once again as he leaped from the ground to on top of one of the houses near Viv.
Kinda pissed as well, Viv added in, “Al....did you really not learn your lesson? Should I have to teach you proper manners?”
Hearing this, Alexandra panicked and said rapidly in her defence, “Hey! That old creep was sexually harassing me!”
“Huh?” “What?”
The two could not believe what Alexandra was spouting. That Alexandra who was known to be part of all major churches and minor ones as well. A being that was hailed as the bringer of light and justice to the world. And someone would dare to touch her? With all the powerful churches in this continent backing her up?
“Well not me but another girl!” realising the falsehood of her words, Alexandra immediately corrected herself.
Eden and Viv sighed in kinda relief if the churches found out about this then...this town would not even exist anymore even in history. It would be unknown place was raided due to evil and cleansed by the combine force of light.
That was how much power the religions of this continent had. Each major one literally rivalled the power of a Kingdom and it could be said that they along with the Kingdom's Knights were some of the most powerful forces consecutively in history.
Pissing any of them them off was a bad idea especially since those knights were now united and the churches influence had never been higher.
“However....” muttered Eden before shouting, “Why the hell am I dragged into this again?!” in a fury like every other time Alexandra dragged him into something.
“Not my fault. Everyone practically associates you with me” replied Alexandra not caring much of the attacks that were being thrown at her. Unlike Eden and Viv, she was actually and willingly fighting the enemies that she picked a fight with.
Seeing them now, they were mostly lowly guards that had little training overall in Eden's eyes. In actual fact, they were all reasonably powerful guards of at least level 200 each. It was just that a level 600+ person was too much for them. Even so, they outnumbered her by about 30 to 1 since Eden and Viv really didn't want to be involved with this.
But fate was not so kind.
Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuush!
An arrow flew and truck Eden on the shoulder.
“Damn it, archers!” complained Eden under his breath pulling out the arrow that only managed to pierce through a bit of his armour and set up a mana shield around him and Viv. Several more arrows flew to the two but his mana shields pretty much blocked them all in which, they stopped firing at them and focused on Alexandra.
But Alexandra's armour was way better than theirs in terms of defence especially to all physical attacks. It's only due to Eden and Viv being heavily magic related where their defences were better in that department.
“Light Binding!” shouted Alexandra focusing holy light into her hands and causing beams of light to appear and restrain her attackers all at once.
A few more arrows flew at her once that happened but they were deflected by a half-assed Holy Aura coming from her body. She wasn't even being serious here which was kinda sad seeing the resentment and hatred in the guards' eyes....though for some reason, some of them were directed to him.
“Damn...don't direct your hate to me....I'm not involved in this....” muttered Eden hoping that his reputation doesn't go that low that guards would openly attack him after this.
However things always didn't go as Eden wanted to begin with.
“There it is! Kill the monster!”
'Monster? What monster? Oh...me. I guess I can classify as one....' thought Eden now also dodging even more attacks than before.
“Viv....” said Eden pleading for some help here. Eden didn't have any attack that could 'stun' or 'knock out' since all his magic spells were usually lethal even the ones that shouldn't be lethal. He once killed someone with 'Ice Prison' due to the spell being too powerful and it crushed the person to death while he screamed.
“Right. “Hatred of the Besieged flows through the air, in the rivers and in the depths of the tainted grounds. Curse of Chains!”
“Eh?”
Eden was confused on why 'that' spell was used at this moment.
Then....numerous hands that were countless in numbers came from the ground and started grabbing people by the leg and pulling them down on the ground and them grabbing the rest of their bodies.
“Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!”
“Help!”
“No...NO NOT THE HANDS!”
Eden could only stare dumbstruck at the scene. Who would've known asking for help in relation to defending himself from attack could result in....this. The screams were bad even to Eden's ears who sometimes but not lately turned into some sort of extreme sadist in killing. Though he wished that he did at this moment since 'normal' Eden was quite bad with this kind of scene...though not as bad as Alexandra.
“Vivvvvvvvvvvvvv!” shouted Alexandra with a stiff smile on her face, “Didn't we tell you to NEVER use that spell ever again?”
Viv pointed at Eden and replied, “He told me to.”
“Edeeeeeeeeeen!” Alexandra was now cross with Eden.
Flustered on the accusation, Eden said quickly, “I was asking for help in defending from attacks! I didn't want to...cause this scene again!”
Eden looked over and saw that the 30 or so guards were now on the ground sobbing for dear life. To cause this brave group...who even dared to face a level 600+ person to break down like this...Viv's ability to 'torment' people was increasing again. At some point, Eden would not dare go against Viv at all.
'I think....I should contribute to the search from now on....' thought Eden seeing so many people suffering before him....and he wasn't the cause of.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
“The dwarves are more or less below us...around here” said Eden bluntly after a mere few hours of searching.
“How did you know?” asked Alexandra.
Eden let out a wry smile and then said, “Simple. There aren't that many souls that would live underground and have such affinity to both fire and earth.”
“Affinity?”
“Yep. Fire mage has a good affinity to fire and bad to water. A person with holy affinity will have a hard time learning dark element stuff. Dwarves in general have affinities polarising towards fire and earth and sometimes in rare cases wind. They have a particularly bad affinity to water however.”
“I see....so when could you see this?”
“See what?”
Eden looked away trying to avoid the question.
“You know...if I recall you said you could only see souls and not recognise them at all, just the number and you your telling me you can tell what race or class they have based on their souls as well?” Alexandra leaned forward closer to Eden's face causing him to back away.
“W-well....when the skill grew, it gained new abilities. It actually took me a while to tell that there was a difference between how people's souls are constructed.”
“Knowing you, it only took a month at most to master” added Viv sighing for some reason.
“Actually it took me a week.”
“....”
A full three seconds passed when Alexandra realised something.
“Wait, you can also track people by looking at their souls right? That's how you managed to avoid me more easily then before isn't it?!” she was in an outrage since Eden would use his skills to avoid her like that.
“Oh that's impossible for me to do you know. You must be a monster to tell people based off their souls. Souls are just made up elements which outlines what kinds of skills and spells they can use either way. My skill filters out all the other stuff besides the 'stuff' that living beings have.”
“So....if you trained it enough then you could still see even if you're blind?” wondered Viv. It seems that he found the topic at least interesting enough.
“What? No! Didn't I tell you my skill filters out all other 'stuff' besides the ones that are in living beings?! The reason is that if it didn't then my mind would be overloaded with too much information!”
Alexandra looked a bit disappointed and said, “Oh so you can't exactly track other people then.”
“More or less unless they're alone or in small groups.”
“I see.”
With that, Alexandra and Viv began searching for an entrance to go in to get to the tribe of hidden dwarves.
'Of course....the only exceptions are you two....no, only you Alexandra. Your soul is so bright that I can't help but to see it all the time....'
Eden let a small smile out before changing his expression back to normal to help the two in searching.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
Approximately 5 minutes later...
“Hey did you guys have any-ahhhhhhhhh!!!”
THUD
You took 10 damage
'Damn this message seems to always appear no matter how strong I get!'
The ground under Eden broke and he well a good 5 metres before hitting the floor with his butt. He rubbed it with his hand as he looked around. It was a dark place with tunnels and seemed to lead deeper.
“Eden?”
He could hear a small shout from above.
“Down here! I found it!” he shouted back.
It would take them around 10 seconds to get down here as well. He moved away from the hole above him to not let Viv let alone Alexandra fall for him...literally. But then he felt that something was wrong and his instincts involving this was frightenally accurate.
“Hmm?
He felt that the air around him changed a bit just in time to dodge.
Bang!
The wall cracked as a large arm made of rock and stone slammed into it just where Eden was standing.
'Although I believe my defences and life force is strong enough to survive that hit....it would probably still hurt like hell to be hit!'
With that thought, he dodged the next two hits with ease running around it. Seeing that he didn't want to suffer from carbon monoxide poisoning, Eden did not use fire magic though this creature in front of him was resistance to it in the first place.
“Earth Golem?”
There was a strange creature that was made quite roughly in the form that sightly resembled a person....a fate person that this. The arms and legs were too large. The golems that Viv makes are of much higher quality and taste compared to this one.
But before Eden could dispatch it..
“Look out beloooooooooow!!!”
THUD!
You took 1537 damage
“....”
Eden realised dodging those attacks made him move to where the hole was and...
“How long are you planning to sit on me?! You're heavy!” he shouted flinging Alexandra off him with great strength. Next to him, he saw that Viv landed safety and not on him looking at the rock golem intensely.
“Viv....?”
Viv was still in a trance as the rock golem moved in to attack them again. He was worried since Viv's defences might be high for his class and build, he was still a magic user with generally low defence and speed...compared to Eden and Alexandra that is.
Bang!
Viv sent mana into his staff to directly block the attack and muttered a few things under his breath as he continued to look at the rock golem with a glare. Then after a few seconds, for some unknown reason to Eden, the rock golem shattered into pieces and in the remains was a 'core' otherwise known as a metal sphere to Eden due to it's appearance.
“Viv? Why are you holding and staring at that intensely?” asked Eden a bit frightened if he would retort back at him. But after thinking about it for a second, it's Viv who rarely raised his voice.
“This is....” Viv muttered back to Eden, “Very interesting. This magical core sustains the golem. Look, without me cutting off the mana supply to it, it auto repairs itself indefinitely!”
Viv threw the 'core' onto the ground and instantly, rocks and other materials surrounded it tightly recreating the golem that it was before. Seeing this, Eden was also interested. Golems were not a unique thing in this world. In fact it was quite common in ancient tombs for them to guarding places.
As long as they have enough 'power', they can last for centuries or more. However when broken, they cannot repair themselves without the 'power' of the caster. As such, any of Viv's own golems needs him to repair them if injured. But here, there was a golem that auto repairs itself as long as the 'core' remains safe.
“Hmm...I wonder what kind of things we can do with it” said Eden wanting it a bit more to have some 'fun' with it.
“I agree” Viv nodded his head, “With this, I can continue my golem experiments and perhaps be able to make an army of them to use. There is a limit on how golems I can make and sustain at once but with this...the limit will be lifted.”
Both Eden and Viv wanted to 'core' to play with. However there was still one person who remained unimpressed with it.
“Umm....remember what we were here for?” asked Alexandra while Eden and Viv sealed the core and collected it.
“Of course” “Yep.”
The two carelessly replied without thinking much on it. Alexandra sighed seeing their attitude.
“Why are these two magic freaks....? Why can't I have a normal conversation with a fellow sword lover...?” she muttered under her breath low enough that the two couldn't hear her.
“Well then, let's continue to explore~ There may be some more golems to find and keep!” said Eden now enthusiastic on the trip.
Viv agreed and they led the way with Alexandra following behind them.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
“Somehow....I think we are getting really distracted....” whispered Alexandra once again letting out another sigh.
For reasons unknown to her, they always seemed to be dragged into something else when they decided to do something else. All she wanted to take her first drink....was that too much to ask?
[p=center]xXx[/p]
The trio went deeper into the underground network of tunnels, more and more golems with the strange cores continued to appear. As such, two people were extremely happy to see this unknown magical device for completely different reasons.
'I want to use this tool to make a device that can make it comfortable to sleep anywhere!' one person thought.
'With this....I can finally make an army of golems from my dreams!' another person thought.
'This is so....boring....I want to fight but those two won't let me....' the third person thought.
Eventually without realising it themselves....or just Eden not realising it since he was the only one able to sense souls, they made it to the centre of the underground network. To be precise, they were just outside it with a thick metal wall in the way.
“Hmm....”
“What is it Eden?” asked Alexandra wondering why he was staring at the metal wall.
“Those dwarves you wanted to see are on the other side of this wall.”
“What?”
Alexandra looked excited and licked her lips.
“But seeing that there are these auto-repairing golems around, it's best not to-”
“Sword Wave!”
Bang!
The metal wall was broken down instantly before Eden could finish.
“Hey!” shouted Eden at the action.
Alexandra looked confused and asked, “What? It was in the way” not knowing why he was angry. Eden sighed and explained clearly this time since he didn't exactly have the chance before.
“The reason there is a damn wall here is because the golems are probably attacking them with no end since they can repair themselves indefinitely. By blowing a hole in it, you just caused their safety to be jeopardised.”
“So? We can just destroy those golems easily.”
“But I....no we want to preserve the cores to experiment with them. Destroying them completely is a waste of time” said Eden not pleased of the option of getting rid of such good 'toys' in the end.
“YOU THERE WHAT ARE-THE WALL! THE WALL HAS BEEN BREACHED!!!!”
There was a large shouted. The trio looked and it was a short man with a long beard and generally was wider than the normal person as well being extremely muscular in the end. He was wearing light armour and was holding a hammer that was as tall as, no taller than him.
“This is bad...” muttered Eden sighing as a large number of dwarves, all armed came at them and surround them looking at them and the broken wall, alternating between the two.
Eventually, one of the older dwarves since he had white and grey hair and looked stronger than the rest glared at the three and asked, “Who are you and what do you want to destroy our wall?”
“I want to drink!”
“Shut it you!”
Whack!
Eden hit Alexandra in the head and then took over, “Long story short, this one wants to drink the so called 'best liquor' on the continent and we came here. We found golems that continues to repair itself and somehow got here from clearing them out. This idiot hearing that you guys were on the other side decided to blow up the wall before thinking about the consequence. Did I leave anything out?”
Eden looked over to Viv who smiled and shook his head while Alexandra was rubbing her head while glaring at Eden.
However the old dwarf looked like there were veins about to pop on his forehead.
“You think we would-”
“Chief! Golems! Golems are attacking!” another dwarf interrupted him and pointed. The trio looked back and there were around 20 golems there. All of which were the self repairing type as well which are near invincible in battle.
“More 'cores'!” shouted Eden happily. More was better than few after all.
“Viv, make sure they don't harm the dwarves. Alexandra wants them later.”
“Right.”
Viv started forming a defence line using his nature magic. Roots appeared and obstructed the way of the golems forcing them to rip them apart. Meanwhile Eden charged in alone and chanted:
“Negate Mana!”
The area around Eden was completely devoid of mana using that skill. It wasn't that the mana disappeared...it was just being sucked into his body beyond rapidly. Being in the area where Eden was, the golems' 'cores' which were only active using mana stopped and the golems fell apart one after another.
“Got one!”
Obtained 'Golem Core' x 1
Eden grabbed the core before running to the next one and so on. It didn't even take a full minute before Eden held in his arms, 20 'Golem Cores' which were the size of a small ball. This was probably the main reason why it was so hard to destroy a golem without extreme power even if you can cut them in half with a single swing.
As long as you don't hit the core, the golems will be fine and can attack you later in a matter of seconds. After clearing things up and sealing up the wall again using some magic, the old dwarf finally wanted to talk.
“So...why are you here?” he asked again now not as angry since the trio shown that they can take care of the golems but he was still giving some glances at the cores that were in Eden's arms.
“I told you before. Alexandra wants to drink alcohol.”
“There are other places to drink...too many to count” he replied.
“Buuuuuuuuuuut I heard that the best ones are from here!” said Alexandra excited cutting into the conversation as well.
“....”
All of the dwarves looked at Alexandra silent. And then...
“HAHAHAHAHA!!!”
The old dwarf's laugh boomed all over the place causing some ache even to the other dwarves. He had a happy face and said with utter and complete confidence:
“Well you're right! This place does have the best alcohol, wine and liquor in the whole continent! Come! There will be a drinking party for 3 days and 3 nights from today as a thank you for a visit! Bring out the booze!”
“Huh?”
Eden was completely confused. Was they angry at them or happy about them appearing. The old dwarf explained it to Eden.
“Missy, let me tell you something. How long ago have we had visitors?”
“I don't know...umm....a few months?”
“12 years.”
“....”
“12 years since the last people came here to this underground village of ours. Those golems you see out there; those were made by our ancestors with another short race....umm....they wer called Gnomes I believe. They were used to be miners at dangerous places where cave ins were common. Too bad that they ran out of control and trapped us all here!”
“That was a slight oversight.”
“Yes! We dwarves never forsake the hard works of others but did we do so when we realised our genius made it impossible to escape from this place! We would escape but....centuries of drinks are trapped down here! It's such a waste, plus the blessing of earth is strong here making the wine even better! Now drink!”
The old dwarf took a few drinks and gave them to the trio who stared blankly at the scene around them. The group of dwarves started to drink rapidly and fallen into a trance of drinking and drinking until they faint.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
A few hours later with most of the dwarves out of the count due to fainting after drinking so much, the only people left were the trio and the old dwarf that had a surprising amount of tolerance to drinking.
However the same could not be the same for Alexandra.
“He he....give me another!” she said in a drunken voice hitting the table with the bottom of the empty bottle she held.
Eden sighed and gave her another bottle to drink. While he knew that it was best to not let her drink anymore, it was better to make her faint due to drinking too much than trying to stop her now that her reasoning was gone. But it could also be that Eden was kinda drunk as well.
Even though he really didn't drink that much, his body was warm and had a tingling feeling going through it. For some reason he couldn't help but to stare at Alexandra with a red face.
“Whas is it?” asked Alexandra red faced as well though due to being drunk.
“Well...how does all the alcohol taste?” he asked with a surprisingly unbroken voice unlike Alexandra.
“Greeeeeeat!” Alexandra waved her hand and accidentally dropped the bottle in her hand.
“My drinky....” she said disappointed in a cute voice. Eden sighed again at the sight though also recording it into his memories for later and threw her another bottle to drink from. She drink it down in one go.
“....”
Eden looked over to the other table and saw that Viv and the old dwarf were catting about things. Probably about the 'Golem Cores' that they collected. The main reason why Eden wanted to study them was due to the potential of their use.
According to what he saw, the auto repair feature was a spell being recast over and over again in a loop. If they applied this to other things, then perhaps you could use magic via an item infinitely say teleportation which takes the most mana to use. Such an item could at least reduce the strain of mana supply needed to use teleportation stations at least. Plus it would at least make this world more interesting with magic items being more common and useful as well.
Eden was not at least worried about mages complaining that their roles or jobs were being taken. Mages were more or less short supplied everywhere anyway, no useful mages were being short supplied everywhere. If some magic items out performed them than it was their fault to begin with.
“Whas ye thinking uf?” asked Alexandra that sounded even more drunk than before.
“About how to use the golem cores later on. If I can modify it so that another spell can be lopped around then-”
“Shus it!”
Alexandra banged her bottle on the table stopping Eden from speaking. She took out something from her inventory and placed it on the table. It was some sort of statue of a scale.
“?”
For some reason, he could feel some powerful magical force coming from it.
“Thus is Divene Contactor. Mak a bet wit mee!” she said in a way that made it quite difficult for Eden to translate to proper speech.
Eden looked at the statue and still felt that it was somewhat dangerous to him....
“This thing is call a 'Divine Contractor' right?” he asked not wanting to get the name wrong. He would need to search on what it actually is later on.
“Luts mae a bet!” she shouted.
“S-sure...”
When Eden replied, the statue glowed and took some blood from both of them and held them on each scale.
“Hey what is going on?!”
“Ca't brek bet nows~” she said sluggishly. Eden thought this was extremely bad news. If he was forced to do something unreasonable then what would happen to him?
“Winer of bet makes other obey! One commond!”
The scale glowed once again confirming the content of the results of the bet.
“Bet is.....umm....have to mak mue sai 'no' and noooooo lying!”
The scale glowed once again.
Content of Bet has been confirmed.
You will need to make player 'Alexandra' say no to something you say to her. This can be a question or a command in which she has to obey unless she says 'No' and loses the bet. The winner of the bet will have the power to make the other obey one command no matter what at a later date.
'So....judging from this...either way, I can make Alexandra do something in the end. The only thing to think about is when....well I would prefer I can make her do something later on though....'
As Eden was thinking, Alexandra walked over with several bottles at hand and forced lots and lots of alcohol down his throat which is extremely dangerous and should never be done.
“gufewpypupupupp”
Eden's muffled words were quite literally drowned out.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
An hour passed and now even Eden was completely drunk. His head felt like it was fading in and out whenever he moved a bit. As such, all he could do was sit as still as he could and even that made it harder for him to to feel well.
But there was one person who was laughing at the current Eden. A person even more drunk than Eden who was forced to drink almost a large barrel of pure alcohol.
This person was Alexandra and she had drunk at least three times more than he and yet she was still concious despite Eden feeling that he would black out any second.
“Ha ha ha! Yo lok bad!”
She was unable to structure her speech properly now....not that Eden could as well.
“Ye too.....” said Eden struggling to not make it seem that he was dead drunk.
Soon after this, the two simple dazed around not doing much while drinking a bit more once in a while. Eventually, Alexandra said:
“Edennnnnn!”
“Whaa?”
“Hurri!”
“Ehh...?”
Eden was confused on what Alexandra wanted from him and with his current state, he really didn't care at all.
“The beeeeeeeeeeeeeeti!” she said in a stretched out tone with arms waving.
Not in his right mind, Eden thought of the one thing that he would want to say.
“Marry Me!” he drunkenly proposed to her.
“Yeeeesh!” she responded without much of a hint opposing him.
The bet has finished under the decree of the 'Divine Contractor'
The bet consisted of Eden asking Alexandra to 'Marry Me' and Alexandra responded with 'Yes'. Under the divine rule of the Gods, the two will have to get married within a month to finish the content of the bet. Alexandra will also have the privilege to give one command to Eden which he cannot oppose no matter what.
“Huuuuh?”
Eden stared at the message but didn't comprehend what it meant at all seeing that light gathered from the statue of the scale and bound the two in complete contract now as rings...for their marriage, not that both of them realised this yet.
“Aaaaaaaaa.....”
With that, the two dunk some more and both collapsed on the table at the same time sleeping peacefully.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
“Hey did those two just...” muttered an old dwarf with white and grey hair who was watching the two with some amusement for some time now.
“Yep” replied a young witch who was actually a male despite his class.
The old dwarf looked over and then saw what the two were drinking and actually started laughing. With a puzzled face Viv had to ask, “What's so funny?”
“What they were drinking...one of them made it so that you would speak your deepest desire that you would never say while the other would make you speak the opposite of your deepest desire.”
“....”
“Both of them drink both of each...but the question here is that which one took effect. I bet that both of them will be shocked seeing that they did just now. What do you think lad?”
“I think....” Viv looked over to the wall that was broken and then repaired by Eden. It seems that the Golems were attacking now and would break in without anyone defending. He sighed and took his staff at hand.
“Lad, what are you doing?” asked the old dwarf.
Viv replied, “The golems are attacking and everyone besides us are dead drunk. I have to clean up then.”
The old dwarf that was kinda drunk but not to the point that he was unreasonable said, “The wall is so strong and thick that they won't get in!”
“But Al broke through and Eden made a simple repair. They can get in that hole by breaking through now.”
“....”
The old dwarf was shocked but did not know what to do, at this rate they would all be slaughtered.
“Don't worry” reassured Viv, “I can take care of them....also as for the question you asked....”
Viv thought back on their relationship and answered simply.
“I'm surprised that they haven't confessed before. Watching them wanted me to hit them both and tell them to love each other already.”
The old dwarf looked at Viv with a curious eye and said, “Don't you have a thing for the blonde one?”
Viv smile and shook his head, “I only think of Al as a elder sister at most. For Eden...a comrade or perhaps an elder brother....or sister depending.”
With that, Viv walked alone for a while taking down all of the golems in the underground system allowing players and NPCs alike in the future to come to this small dwarves village that was known to have the best alcohol of all kinds around!
[p=center]xXx[/p]
“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!” a loud scream resounded at the table Eden was at and woken him up. Then a sudden force held him and shook him forward and backwards several times before he was completely awake.
“Alexandra? What are you do-”
“Shut up husband!”
“Huh?”
Eden wondered what the hell Alexandra was saying. Husband? That word usually did not come out often...no never came out Alexandra mouth before.
“Alexandra, what are you talking-”
“Shut up and let me think!” she shouted interrupting Eden again. Not knowing what the hell was happening, Eden looked through the recent messages from the game....and saw hell.
“....”
“Husband?” asked Alexandra.
“Yes wife?” replied Eden in despair.
“....” “....”
The two stared at each other intensely....wanting to hit each other to death. Looking through the messages, they figured out that Eden proposed and Alexandra accepted.
“Why did you propose?!”
“Why did you accept?!”
“I was drunk!”
“So was I when you shoved beer down my throat!”
“....” “....”
'Well thankfully she still has that one command which can probably cancel this marriage...or at least divorce us later on....'
Both of them were gripping each other's collars now with killing intent in their eyes. Eventually both of them sighed and sat down lifelessly not knowing what to do now. Eden looked over and found that Alexandra was staring intensely at something in front of her; probably a message from this game.
She then looked wickedly at Eden which caused him to have a chill down his spine.
“Eden, I command you to wear a wedding dress on our wedding!” she commanded much to the extreme shock from Eden.
Command: Wear Wedding Dress to Wedding is now in effect
- You are unable to oppose this command.
- If you fail to heed to this command than you will be punished until you do.
“....”
“Hahahaha, now you have to suffer more than me!” proclaimed Alexandra.
HIT HIT HIT
Eden started beating Alexandra up seeing that message from the game.
“Ow ow! Domestic Violence already?!” cried Alexandra.
“You....IDIOT! You could've used that command to cancel this marriage! Or at least let us divorce! Without it, now we are under absolute contract to stay married for life!” shouted Eden.
“Sorry! Sorry! I wanted to see you in a wedding dress!”
Hearing that and looking at Alexandra's face...Eden could only sigh and accept the situation as it is. He thought about it and marriage to Alexandra couldn't be that bad....though he really had no clear idea what marriage was in the first place.
Besides...Alexandra was an extremely beautiful woman.
“....”
“What?”
Alexandra seemed to sparkle to Eden for some unknown reason that he hit his head and eyes trying to 'correct' his vision.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
Approximately a month later....
Walking down the aisle with all eyes on him...Eden tried to ignore the glances that were on him...that everyone he knew was watching him with eyes open and muttering how beautiful he was. Those who knew his gender was MALE let out a small chuckle.
At the end of the aisle, there stood a person who he was marrying....in a pure white suit.
Walking and standing next to Alexandra, he asked in a low voice:
“Why are you in a suit? I thought you were going to be in a dress as well.”
“There needs to be a husband and wife. It would be awkward if it was known that the husband wore a wedding dress to his wedding.”
“So you decided the wife should wear the suit instead?!”
“Yep~”
Looking at Alexandra closely, she really look like a handsome man...considering that she was cross-dressing right now. Eden let his countless retorts stay in his heart until he had the chance to scream.
“Beneath the loving gaze of Freya....”
The priest that was in charge of their wedding was someone taken from a high position from the church of Freya after he volunteered seeing that Alexandra was getting married.
This priest was actually the current pope of the church of Freya named Alveron who was actually in his 30s and nearing 40s now though retained the look of a 20 year old.
Seeing that Alexandra was in a suit and quite handsome while Eden was in a wedding dress which was also pure white and he really looked like a beautiful woman in the happiest day of her life; Alveron raised his eyebrow for a split second before ignoring it.
Both of them were considered beautiful so he considered it fine at least if that was how these two wanted it to be. He also gave some strange glances to both of them the entire time though.
“You may now kiss the bride” he ended his long speech on something about the blessing of Freya and such.
As such both Eden and Alexandra moved in to kiss each other and bumped their foreheads.
“Wait, why are you the one leaning in?”
“I'm the husband of course!”
“Says the one with the dress. I'm the one with the pants!”
“That's because you're forcing me to wear this dress, this would definitely look better on you! Give me that suit!”
“No way! It wouldn't be entertaining if that happened.”
“Grrrrr.”
“Did you just growl at me?”
“Who knows, it seems like the kind of things you would do you damn beast!”
“....”
“....”
The whole church which was extremely large and currently housed a few hundred people were silent. They were completely silent on the fact that the couple were fighting each other right before they were officially married and in front of a pope as well.
Thankfully Alveron was silent and still smiling...though his smile was quite stiff.
Eventually, a person called Viv spoke coldly which caused the entire place to be colder by a few degrees immediately.
“Kiss or be punished by me” he said in which case the two passionateally kissed each other not wanting any time to be spared with eyes on Viv the entire time in fear.
Players Eden and Alexandra are now married
That message appeared and everyone cheered as the two walked together to spend time alone.
[p=center]xXx[/p]
Later that day...
In a private room that they reserved for the two....
Eden was lying on the double sized bed still in his wedding dress. He was exhausted to the point that he couldn't be bothered to even change. All he wanted to do was sleep and hope that all of this was a dream and never happened.
“Eden, you're sleeping already? Not a good attitude to your wife” said Alexandra scolding him now.
“Don't care...too tired right now. Had to keep appearances to seem happy about this and this dress is heavier than my armour!” he replied lazily back to her.
Alexandra sighed and went through the things in this room. Since they reserved it, they would at least explore it since it was usually booked for recently married couples.
“Hmm?”
Alexandra looked puzzled at something.
“What is it?” asked Eden.
“It says here 'Use when in trouble of getting drive on'...what does that mean? Hmm? The label here says 'Aphrodisiac'. What is this 'Aphrodisiac'?”
“I don't know but don't-hey!”
Alexandra immediately drank the bottle in which there were several lined up....
“Hey Alexandra....?” muttered Eden seeing that she was completely silent.
She turned around red faced and looked dazed for some reason. Eden had a bad feeling about this....
“Eden” she said while getting closer to him.
Seeing this state of her, Eden backed away as far as he could but she only creped closer to him.
“You are mine right?” she asked.
“Umm...”
“You're mine right?!” she asked again but more forceful now. She immediately restrained him by grabbing his arms with great strength that he couldn't break free.
“Y-yes...we are married.”
“....”
“Alexandra....?”
She started at him for a few seconds and then 'dug in'.
“Kyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!”
That night, Eden lose his 'innocent' and 'chastity' to her that night.
Onwards?PreviousExitNext
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Author's Notes:
- Word Count: 9000~
- Yes! Final chapter of this volume done!
- And this is how the two got married...though not exactly in the most romantic way. Muhahahaha, Viv is the third wheel in this relationship which makes it super interesting to write about. Now to write the epilogue for this volume and arc.