Emperor of Solo Play - Chapter 69

Chapter 69 Helm Ogre (2).

Chapter 69 – Helm Ogre (2)

“If you change your mind, this is our voice talk search word, and password.  Please join us.  Let’s help each other out.”

He thought about the words spoken by the Alto Family’s leader.  He recalled the address given to him by the user named Neal. Hyrkan’s memory wasn’t that great, but it wasn’t too hard remember the address. The search word was Parung Forest, and the password was 991.  If he couldn’t remember that, there was something severely wrong with him.

Moreover, he recalled how he looked as he turned down their offer.

Hyrkan lowered his head.

‘I guess I was a bit cold at that time.’

He had coldly refused their offer, and he recalled how unpleasant he had looked.

Moreover, he now desired their help, so Hyrkan could only let out a sigh.

‘Will I be able to join the community now?’

Of course, Hyrkan knew the characteristics of a community, and what role it serves. A community was a lubricant-like existence for Warlord.  The communities were unexpectedly of great help in numerous situations.  They were sometimes more helpful than a guild.  The guild took a long time to give help, but the community could give immediate help, since it was composed of users in the same region.

It wasn’t uncommon to see a community evolve into a guild.  Sometimes, the community was on equal footing with the guilds.

This was the reason why he turned down the offer to join the community.

The members of a community had a deep and hard to break bonds.  Once he dipped his foot in, it would be inevitable he would leave behind his footprint. What would happen if they became close?  It was fine to become close to them.  Hyrkan was afraid of what would happen after they became close.

“Ughhh.”

Hyrkan let out a moan.

Kwahng!

Hyrkan’s worries disappeared suddenly with the sound of an explosive boom.

Hweeek!

Hyrkan turned his head towards where the noise emanated. It had detonated from a pretty far distance away yet the sound of the explosion was quite powerful.  Hyrkan, who was far away, heard it with his ear, but he could also feel the explosion with his body.

“Oh!”

Hyrkan reflexively let out a short exclamation.

If such an explosion happened in reality, it would cause widespread fear.  However, the sound of an explosion occurring in Warlord was like a beacon indicating there was something worth watching for the spectators.

“The power used is quite considerable?”

In truth, the powerful magic used by high level magicians were quite the spectacle.  This was the reason why there was a program showing only high level magicians of the 30 Great Guilds using magic.  It only showed them using magic, but the number of people tuning in was quite considerable.

However, the magicians didn’t like to use magic of this caliber.

‘So why are they using such magic here?’

They especially almost never used it against regular monsters on a Field type hunting ground unless it was a Boss monster.

Basically, the magician’s Magic Stat was on the low side.  When one levels up, most of the bonus points was invested into Intelligence.  If one had a lot of disposable income, one could use Recovery Items to cover up the short supply of magic power.  In that case, the user would invest all the bonus points into Intelligence.

It was obvious to say this, but the powerful magical spells required incredible amount of Magical Powers.  It wasn’t something one could use easily.  The worst situation a magician can be in was when one was short on Magic Powers.  One would be literally sucking on one’s thumb for the duration.

Also, the really powerful magic could change the tide of the battle.  This was why there were some positives and negatives.  The magic couldn’t differentiate between allies and enemies.  Even if one was in a party, the swung sword or the magic thrown by an ally could cause others damage.  This was how the game, Warlord, worked.

So what happens if one’s allies get swept up in the area of effect of the powerful magic?  It wasn’t something one could forgive by buying the other party member a dinner.

However, that kind of powerful magic had made an appearance right now.

‘Mmmm…….’

Hyrkan didn’t dismiss this fact.

‘It happened when I first came here, and then…….’

Usually,  normal user would dismiss such an event.  A really strong magic had gone off! The user wouldn’t think any further than that.

However, Hyrkan was different. He was pitiable and worthless in the real world, but inside Warlord, Hyrkan had more knowledge and experience than anyone.  His instincts were more outstanding than a wild beast.

It was like that right now.

Hyrkan’s mind instinctively organized the situation.

‘Four days ago.’

Hyrkan had witnessed an enormous explosion when he first came to the Parung Forest.  The explosion that occurred at the time was also the result of powerful magic.  When he looked into it, a party fighting the Boss monster Red Eye used the magic to buy some time.

The Red Eye was killed on that day.

This had been 4 days ago. Now the loud sound of an explosion had rang out once again.  It may be that the Red Eye was newly regenerated, and some group was trying to take it down.

However, there was an important fact he knew.  The Red Eye Ogre took one week to regenerate.  If the Red Eye was killed 4 days ago, then why was there a such a deafening roar?

‘There should be no Red Eyes here.’

He was sure of that fact.  The Red Eye wasn’t currently present in the battlefield nor any other place inside the Parung Forest.  This current situation was a prime example why Hyrkan was thinking about joining a Community. Once the Red Eye regenerates, it would be much harder for him to hunt and search inside the Parung Forest.  He had to get his answer before that happened.

So why did someone use such powerful magic?

Of course, someone could have used it to blow away a large number of monsters with a single blow.

‘No.  There aren’t any users here, who would hunt by kiting.  There aren’t any irrational users here, who would try hunting a group of monsters.’

Hyrkan recalled the parties and guilds he saw in this place, and he hadn’t seen anyone who would have tried kiting the monsters. This place wasn’t ideal to try such a group hunting method.  This place was overflowing with monster yet someone wanted to kite the monsters?  One would fail at least once or twice in ten tries.  Moreover, that one or two failure will lead to a Game Over.

‘Then it means something strong has appeared?’

This was the conclusion he came up with.

Hyrkan put on his Shadow Dog Set’s hood.

[Shadow Hunting Dog Set’s Special Effect ‘Shadow Hunting Dog’ is activated.]

His presence became faint, and his body became light.

Hyrkan started moving swiftly like a Shadow Hunting Dog.

When the Toon party sent out a request for help, the first one to arrived was the Alto family, who had been the closest to them.

However, when the Alto family saw the Toon Family surrounded by a group of monsters, they didn’t immediately rush in to help them.   Instead, they hid between the black trees as they assessed the situation.

They had a gut feeling as they viewed the sight.

‘Ooh-ah.  Isn’t this going to be really hard?’

‘If we join in, won’t we be killed?’

‘What the hell?  What are those bastards?’

The situation was much worse than expected.

At a glance, they saw at least 8 Black Trolls.  Moreover, smallfry monsters were surrounding the Black Trolls.  There were over 20 of them, and they weren’t monsters that could be ignored.

“Hey.  Why are they suddenly wearing armor?”

“Maybe they formed an alliance with the monster in the Bulkas mountains.”

“Do you think this is an appropriate time for a joke?”

“I’m sorry…….”

Moreover, the monsters were armed.  The gears were quite good….  It looked better than the gears worn by some users.  Their gears were clean, and shiny.  It didn’t show any signs of battle.  Also, the Black Trolls didn’t have their customary thick wooden clubs for weapon.  Instead, they possessed blunt steel swords.

There was more.  There was a being that drew their gaze more than the group of Black Trolls.

“That’s the one.”

“It’s an ogre wearing a helmet.”

It was 5 meters tall.  Normally, an ogre would explicitly show off its muscles, but this one wore a silver armor. Its most memorable feature was the eyes that could be seen beneath the horned helmet.  Its eye was a mixture of red and black.

There were 30 of them in total.

The 5 members of the Toon party was surrounded by these group of 30 monsters. The Mage and the Priest was within the Shield Magic.  The tanker had received a full Buff, and he was trying to block the advancing monsters in front of his party members with his last-ditch effort.

This formation wouldn’t last long.

If they were going to help, they would have to help them immediately.

However, they had never seen these types of monsters before.  Moreover, there were 30 of them.  The Alto Family merely had 5 members, so they probably would be able to do nothing even if they did step forward.

Even during all of this, the Alto Family closely observed the situation.  They were trying hard to gather as much information as they could.

Eventually, someone made an observation.

“The ogre’s eyes isn’t red.  I think it is a mixture of red and black?

“Black?”

“Was it exposed to the power of Corruption?”

“I thought the Corrupt Count was killed?”

“Even if the Corrupt Count is dead, it doesn’t mean the power of Corruption would disappear.  At a glance, I can tell it is a Quest Monster that appears in the Main Scenario.”

Even during all of this, they were able to recognize the clue.  The Alto Family were most definitely worthy of reaching level 100.  Of course, if they stepped forward to help the Toon Party, they would reach level 100 at a later date.

“If we could open up a path…….”

“Let’s say we succeed in opening a path.  If their aggro is drawn towards us, who would take on the aggro of that many monsters?”

“Of course, the tanker should head out..”

“……seriously.  Next time I start a new game I will unconditionally become a magician.”

The Toon Party was trapped within the group of monsters.  If the Alto Family wanted to save them, they would have to risk a Game Over.  First, they had to open up a pathway, but the aggro would land on the Alto Family.  Afterwards, they had no idea how the situation would turn out.

The important part was the gravity of word, Game Over.

It wasn’t light at all.

Moreover, they were at the cusp of level 100.  The 48 hours would feel like 48 days to them.

The Alto Family looked at each other.

‘Ah.  I really don’t want to die…….’

‘Should we just ignore them and head back?’

‘Still, it isn’t as if we are acquainted with the Toon party for only one or two days.  When we said we ran out of items, they even shared their healing items with us.’

‘They are good guys…….’

They didn’t want to step forward.

However, they also didn’t want to run away.

As they were thinking hard about the situation, the priest who had been in voice talk with the Toon Party spoke.

“The members of the Toon Party saw us.”

They were seen?

Everyone’s face hardened. Now they couldn’t just run away as if they hadn’t seen anything.

“What did they say?”

“They said they won’t be able to escape from this place easily. They said to run.  They don’t want us to die in vain.  They don’t want us to suffer a Game Over.”

The moment they heard those words, the Alto Family easily came to a decision.

“That son of a bitch.  He really knows how to butter up a person.”

“It would be bad form to run away after hearing those words..”

“Let’s not over do it.  We’ll used some magic to open a path for them.  We’ll help them only up to that point.

The Alto Family were gamers, who knew romanticism.

The situation was already a pandemonium when Hyrkan arrived. Ten users were in a confrontation against a group of monsters.  Hyrkan noticed the 10 users were divided into three groups, and each group was fighting independently of each other.

This wasn’t a normal formation.

This was…

‘They were attempting a rescue, but instead they were swept up into the fight.’

Basically, they hadn’t intended to join the fight, but the result of the battle had turned out unpredictably.

‘While they were trying open a path with magic, a portion of the party became cut off by the monsters.  Moreover, the ones that went into help the other group became surrounded…’

Hyrkan quickly assessed the situation.  Truthfully, he didn’t need to assess the situation.  That wasn’t the important part.  The important part was coming to a decision on what he would do.

Hyrkan kept a low profile as he watched the scene. Thanks to the effects of the Shadow Hunting Dog set Hyrkan’s sense of presence was very faint.

This was why…

‘If I just stay still like this…….’

Hyrkan’s thoughts were very devious.  He imagined staying in place and doing nothing.

It was bad manners, but it wasn’t illegal or against the rules to pick up their loot. It was up to the an individual if one wanted to take the dead’s possession.  Moreover, there were going to be 10 users on the cusp of level 100 dead in the near future.  The items dropped would be no worse than level 80.  If a rare item came out, he would easily be able to sell it for over 1000 gold for each one of them. He had the chance to pick up money that was equivalent to a one month salary of the department head at a large company.  Would anyone turn such an opportunity down?

If these users had caused even a little bit of hardship for Hyrkan, he would have waited for their death in comfort, while listening to music.

‘That doesn’t sit right with me.’

However, the current situation was a bit different.

First of all, the users over there had never harmed Hyrkan.

‘I’m sure.’

The group of monsters facing them was definitely the group pointed out by the Maeung.

‘These were the troops of Corrupt Monsters that the Immoral Prince had wanted to create.’

Hyrkan was pretty familiar with these troops.

Warlord users had fought a historically large scaled battle with the Corrupt Army controlled by the Immoral prince.  Hyrkan didn’t play a main role in this battle, but he had fought with the Hahoe Mask Guild.  He had fought against numerous smallfrys like them.

Hyrkan agonized over what he should do.

‘I have to catch that one.’

The thing he was sure about was the fact that the ogre with the helm had made an appearance.  If he didn’t catch it now, there would be no next time. When those users fall today, the news about the Helm Ogre would spread.

Even the users here probably new about the Main Scenario Quest in progress, and they probably knew about the special characteristic. The moment they catch sight of the Helm Ogre’s eyes, they will recall the story about the Corrupter’s Power.  They will immediately realize that this was a clue for the new Main Scenario Quest.

If this truth was spread, the 30 Great Guilds would move.

If he wanted to act, this would be his only chance.  Moreover,the ten users over there in danger weren’t weak.  They were all users at the cusp of becoming level 100.  They were plenty strong, and their desire to stay alive was stronger than anyone else right now.  If they could live, they would probably be willing to accept anything.

In the end, these were people, who knew manners, and they had a sense of romanticism.

‘If I join the fight… I’ll be able to capture it.’

Hyrkan took off his hood.  The darkness disappeared, and his face with the Hahoe Mask equipped was revealed.  The power of the Shadow Hunting dog receded.  His feet became heavier, and his presence strengthened.

‘Still, they are users, who possess romanticism. Anyone could tell this would be a very hard task, yet they are helping their Community.’

Hyrkan smiled beneath his Hahoe Mask.

‘They are users with such upright characters.  I’m sure they won’t greet me with empty arms when I save them from the brink of death?’