Chapter 111 – The Dwarf Merchant Caravan
The Dwarf Merchant Caravan was the easiest of the three.
‘The monsters that show up are mostly orc packs. If you’re a player at the current level—over level 20—you’ll block them without trouble.’
But only Ryu Min, the regressor, knew that fact.
The players who chose the Dwarf Merchant Caravan wouldn’t know what the difficulty was.
So the tension showed clearly on their faces.
“Is this the Otherworld?”
“Whoa, this is amazing.”
“Idiot. Not just here—everything up to now has been the Otherworld.”
“Ah, right. It was, wasn’t it?”
A rocky mountain range visible far away, stone towers thrusting up here and there.
Faced with an environment different from the scenery they’d seen so far, the players looked around, swiveling their heads.
“Huh? But you guys, I can’t see your nicknames?”
“Seriously? I can’t see my nickname either?”
“Yeah, it’s not showing.”
The nicknames that should have been floating above their heads were gone.
But there were players who didn’t panic.
They were the traitor group who’d gotten a tip-off from the angels.
‘If they stay that calm, aren’t they basically showing they’re traitors?’
Ryu Min was calm on the inside too, but just in case, he put on a startled expression.
Once you get suspected as a traitor, you tend to be suspected the whole time.
‘I need to be careful so I don’t get suspected as much as possible. Of course, if the traitor group exposes who I am, I’ll be found out immediately.’
Even if others didn’t, no traitor who’d heard of the famous Black Scythe would fail to recognize his face.
‘Before they start shouting that Black Scythe is a traitor, I need to deal with those guys.’
By “deal with,” he didn’t mean he planned to kill them.
He wasn’t some quest-crazed murderer, and whether he killed them or not, there was nothing to gain and nothing to lose.
‘I just need to read their thoughts and block them in advance—that’s all.’
He already knew the faces of the 28-member traitor group, so there was no need to worry.
He just had to control the situation well.
Ryu Min looked around and roughly counted heads.
‘Looks like about 200 people chose the Dwarf Merchant Caravan.’
Of course, that was excluding the traitors, so in reality, around 230 people would be gathered here.
Sure enough—
“Oh? Look at this.”
A message appeared in front of the players.
[Escort the Dwarf Merchant Caravan]
└Escort the Dwarf Merchant Caravan safely to the destination.
└If the escort succeeds, everyone will receive an EXP reward.
└One person who makes a high contribution in punishing the traitors will receive a sub-quest reward.
└If you punish every last traitor, everyone will receive an additional reward.
The quest they were seeing didn’t apply only to the normal group.
‘The traitor group can also get the EXP reward if they succeed at the escort.’
But there wouldn’t be a single traitor who wanted to let it succeed smoothly.
If they failed this time, the success rate at the next caravan would drop to something monstrously low.
‘And the Human Merchant Caravan goes without saying.’
If the traitor group fails the dwarf caravan and even the elf caravan?
They’d suffer a 20% stat drop twice, and then they’d have to stop the escort at the hardest one—the Human Merchant Caravan.
‘They’d probably think it’s impossible.’
But Ryu Min was confident.
Not only was this a Round he’d cleared many times—more than once or twice—but above all, his current condition was at its best.
‘Even if you suffer two stat drops, hunting isn’t a problem. And it’s a debuff that disappears once this Round ends anyway.’
As Ryu Min nodded and watched the progress window, the players were reacting in shock.
[Current Headcount Status]
└Participants: 230
└Traitors: 29
“What is this?”
“It shows the number of traitors?”
In other words, the headcount status was being displayed in full detail.
“There are 29 traitors among us?”
The players looked at one another.
They couldn’t tell who was who because nicknames weren’t visible, but one thing was certain.
‘There are traitors in here. And there are 29 of them.’
With 230 people total, that meant roughly one out of every ten was a traitor.
Naturally, they started looking at each other with suspicious eyes.
Well, to Ryu Min—who knew their faces—it was obvious exactly where, in which gaps, the traitors were mixed in.
“Oh? Black Scythe-nim?”
At that moment, Ryu Min turned his head at a voice that spoke to him like it knew him.
The owner of the voice was none other than Min Juri.
“Waaah! I can’t believe I’d see you here! You chose the Dwarf Merchant Caravan, huh? Don’t tell me you followed me?”
“Well… your buff is pretty useful.”
She looked so happy to see him that he couldn’t bring himself to say no.
But that answer seemed to sound a little different to Min Juri.
Seeing her suddenly blush and get flustered, that much was obvious.
Maybe she felt embarrassed, because she hurriedly continued.
“Uh, um, but Black Scythe-nim. Why can’t we see the players’ nicknames?”
“Who knows. I wouldn’t know.”
After pretending not to know, Ryu Min turned his head—and locked eyes with one traitor.
Heh—
The guy gave him a meaningful smile, then turned away.
Reading his thoughts, it seemed he’d wanted to act familiar out of a sense of kinship as someone in the same group…
‘Crazy. Was he trying to show we’re in the same group?’
He couldn’t just openly get angry.
All Ryu Min could do was let out a dumbfounded laugh.
“Two hundred thirty people for the Dwarf Merchant Caravan… That’s fewer than I expected.”
“Yeah.”
Out of 2,166, 230 was definitely a small number.
If only 10% chose this, it meant the other 90% had piled into the other two caravans.
It was also proof that the Dwarf Merchant Caravan wasn’t popular.
‘The Human Merchant Caravan probably has the most. It was like that before, too.’
Maybe because there weren’t many people—
Someone who recognized Black Scythe approached cautiously.
“Uh, excuse me… you are Black Scythe-nim, right?”
“Huh? Seo Arin?”
Seo Arin’s eyes went wide like a startled rabbit, and she smiled with her eyes as if she was glad.
“I didn’t think I’d meet Black Scythe-nim here. I’m really gla—”
Seo Arin’s gaze naturally shifted to Min Juri standing beside him.
As if it were a lie, her eye-smile vanished.
“But Ms. Democracy is here too?”
“Actress Seo!? Hello! Nice to meet you!”
“Yes.”
Unlike Min Juri, Seo Arin didn’t look very pleased.
For some reason, Min Juri—who was always sticking close to Black Scythe—had been bothering her eyes for a while now.
‘I don’t even know why I’m like this.’
Of course she’d feel goodwill toward Black Scythe, who had saved her—but only up to that point.
There shouldn’t be anything beyond that, yet for some reason she felt jealous of “Ms. Democracy.”
“But where’s that person who was always glued to you?”
“Ah… Kyung-ho—no. Mr. An Sang-cheol? He went to the Human Merchant Caravan.”
“The Human Merchant Caravan?”
When Ryu Min asked back as if it was strange, Seo Arin also made a face like she didn’t know why.
“For some reason, he said he really wanted to go there, so he went.”
“I see.”
He spoke calmly, but inside, Ryu Min was surprised.
‘Even after I told him it’s the hardest difficulty, he went to the Human Merchant Caravan… That’s unexpected.’
Did he want to hunt stronger monsters and get more experience?
He’d have to hear the reason, but for Ryu Min—who’d been underestimating An Sang-cheol—it was an unexpected choice.
Just then—
He turned his head at the sudden murmur of voices, and a line of wagons was approaching.
Clop-clop-clop—
There were only ten wagons, not that many.
With 230 people, it was more than enough to cover them and then some.
Seeing fewer wagons than expected, the players relaxed.
From the look of things, those wagons were clearly the ones they had to escort.
Soon, the wagons came to a stop.
“Ohohoho, so you were here? Warriors of the Otherworld.”
A short, bearded dwarf—exactly like the image you’d expect—chuckled heartily as he climbed down from the wagon.
“Nice to meet you. I am Blacksmith Heimer of the Dwarf Merchant Caravan. From what I can see, you look like the warriors of the Otherworld who will be escorting us… is that correct?”
When the players nodded, Heimer slapped his knee with his stubby hand—smack.
“Knew it! My guess wasn’t wrong! I thought you looked different from a band of thieves from the shine of you—so you really are warriors of the Otherworld! Kwahahaha!”
Laughing loudly, Heimer pointed proudly at the wagons.
“The cargo here consists of various iron ores and metal materials that must be transported to the Kingdom of Alvitz beyond the mountain range of Kargago. But monsters appear in great numbers along the road, so we had no choice but to ask the temple for help like this.”
Even though it was clearly a language they’d never heard before, the players understood the dwarf’s words.
They only realized how that was possible after seeing a message.
[Round Trait ‘Interpretation’ is activated.]
[You can converse with races of the Otherworld.]
A kingdom, a temple.
Listening to the dwarf’s explanation, it felt surprisingly detailed.
‘What is this? He’s not a real person, right?’
‘No way. Like monsters, he’s probably a fake that was created.’
With angels already existing, whether Otherworlders were real or not wasn’t important at this point.
For the players, they just needed to complete the quest and leave.
But Ryu Min knew it wasn’t that simple.
‘Round 8—the first time you face an Otherworld race. You need to start building reputation now so that later, when you meet the races, you’ll get preferential treatment.’
Most people would neglect relationships with Otherworlders, saying they were just passersby…
‘But Otherworld races don’t appear only in this Round. They show up from time to time in the future, and the reputation you build now keeps carrying over.’
That was why they said the first button mattered.
Once you got marked as unlikeable, reversing your reputation was no easy task.
In that sense, the traitor group was bad news.
Killing the dwarves so the caravan can’t arrive?
If they did that, the traitor group’s reputation would inevitably drop to the worst possible level.
‘Then later, when you meet dwarves, pointless fights will break out, and in many ways it’ll be disadvantageous for getting special treatment.’
Dwarves sometimes provide legendary-grade arms and gear, or even god-grade materials.
No player with any sense would throw away those benefits and have the guts to become enemies with dwarves.
‘They wouldn’t know that, so the traitors’ eyes look like that right now.’
Where Ryu Min looked, traitors were glaring at the dwarves with murderous intent.
Like they’d stab them to death at any moment if they got the chance.
But the traitors also knew it.
If they killed them in front of everyone, it would be the same as advertising that they were traitors.
That was why they couldn’t move rashly and could only stare like that.
Thinking about when it would be best to kill the dwarves.
‘If possible, it’s best to assassinate them where others won’t see.’
There were twenty dwarves in the Dwarf Merchant Caravan.
Two were seated on each wagon.
If all of them died, the traitor group would win.
‘But if even one dwarf remains, the caravan can still reach the destination.’
And then the traitor group would have no choice but to aim for the next caravan.
The Elf Merchant Caravan, specialized in spirit magic.
‘It’s easier to target dwarves who don’t have combat ability than elves who set spirits to keep watch.’
While he was thinking that, the dwarf shouted loudly.
“Warriors of the Otherworld! Then, we humbly ask for your escort!”
[Time until arrival at destination: 04:59:59]
As if the quest had begun, the remaining time appeared.
Now they had to protect the caravan for five hours until the destination.
From orc packs.
‘Orcs are nothing.’
The players who didn’t know that were tense, wondering where and what kind of monsters might jump out.
Meanwhile, Seo Arin, Min Juri, and Ryu Min all looked completely relaxed.
Clop-clop-clop—
As the wagons started moving, the players lined up on both sides and began walking.
Not long after, the players—holding weapons and keeping watch in all directions—encountered an orc pack.
“Screee— screee—!”
“What? They’re orcs?”
“These bastards—aren’t they the guys we saw in Round 5? Nice to see you again?”
The tension vanished from the players’ faces.
In Round 5, orcs were on the strong side, but now they weren’t.
Most players had reached the high twenties, and they now had the skill to clean up orcs with ease.
As if to prove it—
Slice— slash—!
“Screeeek! Screeek!”
“Squeek!”
The orcs collapsed with screams.
Those tough muscles got cleanly cut by a level 30 sword.
“But there are kind of a lot of orcs, aren’t there?”
“How do these guys just keep coming out, endless?”
The orcs kept popping out nonstop from all over, to the point the players were already getting sick of it.
After about five minutes of battle, the situation ended.
Countless corpses piled up like a mountain.
Ryu Min knew exactly how many there were.
‘4,600 of them would’ve come out.’
Orcs appear in proportion to the number of players.
With each wave, a number twenty times as large lines up and spawns.
‘So basically, each person has to deal with 20 orcs.’
And this kind of monster assault continues for thirty waves.
In other words, monsters show up every ten minutes.
It might seem like a lot, but the players’ faces darkened.
“This EXP…”
“It’s coming in like a mouse’s tail, isn’t it?”
The smaller-than-expected experience disappointed the players.
Because the orcs’ experience was being distributed fairly among 230 people.
Because it was a party.
‘Strictly speaking, 29 of them are excluded, though.’
The traitor group wasn’t a party—it was individuals.
So the EXP and items from monsters they killed belonged entirely to them.
That was the case for Ryu Min.
[You have slain an Orc!]
[EXP x3 buff is active.]
[Title effect increases EXP by x1.5.]
[EXP +0.18%]
[Gold +40]
[Current kill count: 463/100]
[Due to the Rune of Slaughter effect, all stats increase by 100%.]
Seeing the message floating at the edge of his vision, Ryu Min smiled faintly.
‘So I’ve already killed 463.’
After slaughtering overwhelmingly on his own, he alone had killed 10% of the 4,600.
And as a result—
His level had already gone up.