→ Erin Danua (1) ←
****
– Slam!
“Uhk…!”
My body rolled across the dirty ground. I immediately stood back up, but the silver spear still ended up barely grazing past my neck.
Her sense of distance was as beautiful as a piece of art but there was still a complaint I had to raise.
“You said you were going to show me spearmanship; why are you suddenly starting off with a kick?”
I couldn’t believe that her thin legs pushed me back by at least 3 meters, but while paying little regard to my complaint, Erin replied with a smile.
“A fight is about using everything in your arsenal. Why did you assume I wasn’t going to use my legs?”
“You said spearmanship though…”
“An excuse like that is not going to work in a real battle. Spears, swords, fists, legs… You must make use of everything that you can.”
She walked up and reached her arm out, suggesting that she would help me back up. After pretending to accept her help, I quickly threw a punch.
“Fu…”
As if that looked like the retaliation of an adorable little child, Erin received the attack with her palm, and I was the one who actually ended up being pushed back.
“Uaht?!”
My body was rammed back into the ground with my back first. It wasn’t that painful physically, but the mental pain and embarrassment that came with a failed surprise attack were a lot harder to bear.
“Uhh…”
“Student Korin. Your Eight Trigram needs to be supported by footwork and an active body. If you want to use that with your dantian not even fully planted into the ground, you are better off not using it.”
It was my complete defeat. Raising both of my hands into the air, I showed my unwillingness to continue and obediently stood back up.
“I lost.”
“Huhu. But I can tell that you have been going through a lot of practice, and you have a fabulous foundation. It seems that you have based your learning on the Eight Trigram, but is there a reason for that?”
“Umm… I was looking for books related to martial arts in the library and that was the first one I found.”
“Oh? And why did you choose the spear?”
“…I heard it was easier to use than a sword.”
Erin returned a warm smile, while saying that was a rather simple reason.
“Eight Trigrams is not bad. It has been there for a long time, and has gone through plenty of modifications. However…”
She raised her spear and postured herself. Her stance looked similar to one of the ones showcased in the spearmanship of Eight Trigrams, but the resulting attack was completely different.
“Aht.”
Pabak! The sharp tip of the spear quickly grazed past both sides of my head, which I only managed to realize due to the following gush of wind. I couldn’t even sense the attack let alone react to it.
“Looks like the one you learned was for normal civilians.”
“Umm… That just then…”
“It is the Double-Headed Snake of Eight Trigrams. That wasn’t included in the book, was it?”
“I was learning that for over a year though…”
“But in turn you have gained a great foundation, so it won’t be hard to learn them. I will now teach you all the secret moves of the Eight Trigrams spearmanship.”
“…”
Secret moves of the Eight Trigrams… Although learning those would be great, there was something else I was after.
“Teacher. Instead of Eight Trigrams, can I learn your…”
“We can’t do that. Because that… will surely swallow you up from the inside out.”
It had already been 1 month since I got introduced to the named NPC of this world, Erin Danua, thanks to Sihu’s help, but I couldn’t even learn her unique spearmanship.
Six Ways of the Spear.
Those were the super killer moves that were in the possession of one of the strongest named characters of ?Heroic Legends of Arhan?, Erin Danua. One of the super techniques that you could gain in the game when going down the spearman route was this ‘Six Ways of the Spear’.
I was hoping I could learn the spearmanship of the final boss, Tates Valtazar, from his master Erin Danua but…
“Well. I guess it can’t be helped then.”
“Don’t feel down. It should still take at least half a year to learn all the secret arts that are in Eight Trigrams.”
In this world which had now turned into the real world, it was impossible to learn skills just by allocating skill points.
It was times like this when I felt jealous of Sihu. After all, all he needed to do was open his skills window and allocate points to use incredible and magical spells.
………
……
…
“Tai Chi Eight Formation, True Tai Chi, La Zha Formation, Advancing Snake, Double-headed Snake—. That’s all for the eight secret formations including Zha, Lan, Na.”
“Hmm…”
Erin deeply stared at me after I was done with the spearmanship demonstration. She stayed like that for a while before suddenly walking up to me and grabbing onto my wrist.
“T, teacher?”
She then started fidgeting around with my palms. There were so many calluses on my palms that they looked horrendously uneven, but what left her mouth wasn’t a negative remark.
“You worked hard.”
“Umm… Well, of course.”
“Although the secret moves of the Eight Trigrams spearmanship are not hard… they require tons of endless training to master them. When I said half a year… that was already a very ambitious estimate.”
It took me 2 months.
Reducing my sleep time, and turning Sihu down even when he told me to take a rest, I continued swinging my spear.
Even on the bed, I ran simulations of the spear until I fell asleep, because that was the only way that a mere side character like Korin Lork could ever survive.
“Let’s take today off.”
As if she could see through all that, Erin proposed that we take the day off.
“I’m fine. I can recover my stamina with the potion, and a little bit of gel will get rid of all the blisters so… Uaht!”
She forcefully pulled me by the arm.
“Now! Sleep here,” she said while tapping on the bed.
“I have something to do with Sihu in a bit. I don’t have the time to train today if we don’t right now…”
“You need to listen to your teacher! Now, shall I sing you a lullaby?”
“How old do you think I am?”
“Aren’t you still a baby?”
“Well… I guess I am when you are the one I’m being compared to.”
“Zero out of one hundred. Aren’t you going to the royal court very soon? You better learn some etiquette on how to treat a lady.”
“Actually, Sihu said he’ll go there alone and told me to stay out of it.”
That bastard was literally trying to hog everything! I wanted to have a look at the princesses of the game in real life, and one of the things on my bucket list was to kiss a real princess on the back of their hand but…
“You should take a rest for today. You need one.”
“…”
“Now. Feel free to put your head on my lap.”
“Like, isn’t that a bit…”
Without caring a single bit about my objection, Erin continued tapping her lap while tempting me with a coy voice. There wasn’t anyone nearby anyway, so… I went and laid my head on her thigh.
She was the living proof of history who had been alive for a thousand years, and yet her thighs behind my head were still very soft and comfortable to rest on.
Erin calmly gazed down at me as I rested my head on her thighs.
“Do you wish to be stronger?” she asked.
“Well… yeah.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean why…?”
There was no reason for wanting to be stronger. The only reason there was, was that we needed a great amount of force and power to clear the scenario.
“If it is simply about needing power… Isn’t it sufficient enough already with that child called Sihu?”
“…Actually, not really.”
It had been roughly 2 years since we entered this game, and Sihu was already even stronger than Erin Danua, one of the strongest powerhouses of the entire world. He was so strong that he could even hunt alone the King’s Subjects, even though they were supposed to be defeated in a raid with the aid of other party members.
This world was one with the player at the center and a side character like me might be unnecessary but…
“Even though he acts tough and strong all the time, he’s actually quite sloppy.”
I had seen how Sihu almost died while clearing the scenario multiple times. He also made mistakes quite often, such as allowing the opposing knight to approach him too easily.
That was most certainly because we weren’t people that were supposed to be fighting.
Even if we were to increase our stats and get better gear, we were normal civilians that used to live peacefully on Earth. It was inevitable for our mindsets to be different from our enemies, who had been living a life full of struggle.
“That guy will become a hero that saves the world, but even a hero needs a sidekick. At least I should drive the carriage for him and stuff, right?”
“Looks like you cherish him quite a lot.”
She was right and obviously so, because Sihu was the only one here who had come from the same place as me. Plus, he was a newbie who didn’t even know the game called ?Heroic Legends of Arhan?, so it was obvious for me to help him.
“And besides…”
“Besides?”
“If I get stronger, there will be fewer people dying.”
Marie Dunareff, Alicia Arden, Hua Ran… I was unable to save any of them.
The people of this world were NPCs. They were characters in a game, but… even so, it was still painful for me to see them die.
Dorron, Beazeker, and Kranel… although they were NPCs of a game, the connection and bond I had carved with them had become precious to me by the time I noticed it.
So… it would be very sad to see them die.
Sihu told me I was way too emotionally invested in a game, but what can I do about it? I had already started to consider them precious.
“It will be great if there are fewer people dying.”
“…You are a very kind-hearted boy.”
“Pretty normal I would say.”
“Very different from that boy called Sihu. If it’s you…”
“Sorry? What was that?”
“Nothing.”
After mumbling something, she began pinching my cheeks.
“Let me tell you an old and boring story to help you go to sleep.”
Erin started a story from a long time ago; from the time of gods.
The time when everything was in harmony and peace.
“A long, long time ago, there used to be a race called Danaans.”
They were the race of immortals, who used to look after the world after the Sky Titans who had pretty much gone extinct.
Their job was to make the world beautiful and harmonious.
Although they did not call themselves gods, they were powerful enough to be so. In peace, they decorated the paradise, Tír na nóg, and did everything for the good of the world.
“One day, a group came to the paradise of gods. They were a race called Goidels.”
Everything was abundant in the paradise with nothing they were short of, so the Danaans gladly accepted them in. They taught them civilization and spread magic.
“We used to have a connection that was beneficial for both of us.”
At a glance, it looked like the Goidels and the Danaans would live in harmony. However, I already knew about the history of this world; the background story of the game, ?Heroic Legends of Arhan? as well as its tragic nature.
The Goidels gradually increased their numbers and started ruining the paradise. They cut down trees where the spirits and druids used to stay; in greed, they hunted the fruits of nature and even started killing each other.
“It didn’t take long for their spearheads to start pointing at us.”
What happened next was quite straightforward.
The Danaans lost, and the Goidels took possession of these lands.
Before me was the last Danaan survivor carrying their legacy.
Erin Danua.
The Queen of the Shadow Kingdom of the Paradise, asked me once again.
“Do you wish to be stronger?”
“…Yes.”
I replied without any hesitation.
****
“Hmm…”
Erin raised herself from the bed with a long stretch. It seemed that she had gotten so used to this city full of zombies and ghouls that she could nonchalantly fall into a deep sleep like that.
“Good morning.”
“Yes. Everything should be over today, yes?”
“Yep. I worked on this side overnight.”
The building we were in was filled with a bunch of runes, most of which were the same.
『?』 — Sowilo.
Sun.
Runes of the Sun were filling the entire building. We were in a room with engravings of thousands of Suns.
“With this, we are done with everything including the Eastern District.”
“That was quite fast.”
“Thanks to all the runes you carved, Erin.”
Over the period of 300 years, Erin Danua had carved various rune letters across the City of Nazrea. Most of them were Sowilo and Kenaz, because those were the best runes when fighting against the undead.
Thanks to that, the strategy to engrave runes all across Nazrea was finished a lot quicker than planned. In just 10 days, we were ready to use a massive grand spell despite not even being a mage ourselves.
“Wasn’t expecting you to come up with an idea like this. You seem experienced as if you’ve done it already.”
“I had this idea for a while, actually.”
In fact, this was something we had used in the last iteration. After defeating the Divinity of the Sun, Eochaid Bres, we used the Sun we obtained to cleanse this city.
The reason for that was obviously because we wanted to take treasures from the Grim Reaper.
“All that is left is the Central District.”
“Tonight is going to be the last night. Let’s carry out the ritual after getting Gerolge.”
We had killed all the stage bosses already. Erin used to be doing it all by herself, so it wasn’t difficult now that I was with her on top of that.
“Sure. Then during the day…”
“Erin. Erin Danua.”
Standing up, I walked towards her; to the clone of my Master… who I would only have business relations with after tonight.
“Hnn?”
She took a small step back after seeing me approach her. However, she didn’t tell me to stop and instead, she simply tilted her head with doubt in her eyes.
“Would you like to go on a date with me?”
“Hnnn?”
Her eyes turned into large, blinking circles.
****
“Damn it. How did everything turn out like this? Just why? This isn’t right. How can my calculations be possibly wrong…
“Huu. Huu… Weird. That was the best timing; a miracle, even. So how could this…
“Strange. Who is it? Who interfered? Why has it come to this? How has it come to this?
“Witch. A witch. A witch. The witch.
“Witch! Witch! Witch!”
A Rune Mage with a silver spear and a black mage who brought a nightmare unto Nazrea.
After a long fight lasting 300 years,
“Everything is being repeateddd! You are the one who made that happennnnn…!”
Despite the tongue failing to enunciate words properly; and despite his vision turning blurry;
Despite being buried in a swelling chunk of flesh, the rationality of the black mage stayed clear as he continued staring in a certain direction.
『?』 — Othala.
The letter looked way too utterly crooked for it to have been written by the only Rune Mage of this city, and instead, it looked like it was forced onto the wall by a thick and chubby flesh.
Such runes were all over the place… Right before the rationality of the great mage completely disintegrated to nothing, after thousands of enlightenments and hundreds of attempts, the black mage finally perceived all the letters that completed a sentence.
『Connect to Prime』
His gaze turned towards the sky. The grand magic circle that should have been cast by himself contained a pollutant, the rune, 『n』.
That was the proof of the fragmented paradise. He reached his fingers out at that first and primal language.
“Huhi, huhihehehe… It will be different…! This time, it will be different…!”
3,209th enlightenment.
897 strokes.
After a 300-year-long history of strife, things were about to hit a new turning point.
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