A Strategic Victory and a Claimed Reward

Twitch, twitch.
Animal ears move on top of her pink hair.

Pupils narrowed and sharpened like almonds, and nails elongated as if wearing cone snacks.

“You were a beast-kin?”

At the dumbfounded question, the female character swished her pink tail instead of answering.

…What the, she definitely didn’t have those ears or tail until just a moment ago?

BerserkerCries blinked in bewilderment, then realized.

“Wait, then that male character is a beast-kin too! There’s no way he’s a real Varg….”

• ▒▒▒ ▒▒▒. (I am a Varg.)

“Damn it. No wonder he was so strong.”

• ▒▒▒▒? ▒▒▒. (Are you okay? Did it hurt.)

“…I don’t know what you keep saying, but hey punk, don’t look at me with pity! I’m going easy on you! You guys are just food to me! Huh? Do you know who I am? If I set my mind to it, right now…!”

BerserkerCries, who flared up at the gaze looking at him somewhat pitifully, suddenly felt a wave of reality hit him.

…Damn it. What am I babbling about to an artificial intelligence?

Just as he ruffled his hair in annoyance and was about to turn around.

“Uh, huh?”

The female character, who appeared right in front of his nose, threw a punch at his face.
Flustered by the sudden attack, BerserkerCries reflexively raised his guard.

“…Ugh, seriously, you startled me.”

Crash!
A loud noise echoed again, but this time BerserkerCries didn’t fall helplessly.

【Awakener ‘BerserkerCriesAriver’ casts the <Iron Wall> skill. (※ Guaranteed nullification of all skills. Cooldown: 600 seconds)】

“It won’t work twice, kid. Thinking you can pull the same trick on me.”

BerserkerCries triumphantly shook off his fist, which had turned white.

It was a waste to use such a broken invincibility skill—one that could even withstand a turn of the vicious ‘Janus’s’ instant-death attack—so easily, but since the opponent was a beast-kin, it didn’t matter.
It’s not like the Coliseum has a time limit, and if he stalled appropriately, the skill cooldown would return.

…Or so he thought leisurely.

【UNKNOWN ‘Shinbi-jui’ casts the <Cherry Blossom Spiral> skill.】

BerserkerCries was flustered by the pink petals swirling around him.

“What? No, what is this?”

【Awakener ‘BerserkerCriesAriver’ is under the effect of UNKNOWN’s <Cherry Blossom Spiral>.】
【Inflicted with <Burn> status ailment. (※ ‘Physical Defense’ is drastically reduced until the status ailment is removed. Health continuously decreases.)】

BerserkerCries’s class, ‘Berserker’, has the highest health among all classes.
Their defense is also top-tier, so most melee attacks just tickled.

Their only weakness is ranged magic-type skills. Among them, fire-attribute magic.

“Hey, how can you, you’re a beast-kin, why, magic.”

But beast-kin are a race without magic power itself, so he wasn’t worried even after vainly wasting his broken invincibility skill. What is this.

“Wait a minute! Don’t tell me you. …Is that why you intentionally showed me you were going ‘Berserk’?”

Is that why she only dodged at first and didn’t counterattack? To lower my guard by pretending to be a weak beast-kin?

…Surely not. It must be a coincidence, right?

If it was intentional, it makes no sense. A mere artificial intelligence is this smart?

BerserkerCries got goosebumps and stared at the female character standing quietly.

Twitch, twitch, the pink ears on top of the woman’s head moved cheerfully again.

“H-hey punk! You! Just what is your true identity?!”

What kind of beast-kin had pink fur like that? Rabbit-kin? But those definitely don’t look like rabbit ears.
There shouldn’t be any monsters with naturally occurring pink fur in Legacyth….

So no matter how much he thought about it, there was only one conclusion.

“You, you’re actually a player, right! A roleplayer! That’s a headband, isn’t it? Huh?!”

Even though he pointed his finger sharply, she tilted her head and her large eyes curved slightly in a smile.
…He sort of understood why everyone flocked to the Coliseum they usually ignored.

“Well, what is it, um, a bit….”

BerserkerCries stared at the sight with his mouth agape, then muttered without realizing it.

“…She is kinda cute.”

Then, the female character with her eyes wide open chuckled softly and opened her mouth.

• You too.

At the playful voice, BerserkerCries’s eyes widened.

…What was that, just now. She definitely spoke, didn’t she?

While he was making eye contact with the brightly smiling pink-haired female character with a dumbfounded face.

“Wah! Ah, damn. You startled me. I thought you were a mob…. You are a mob. What is it?”

BerserkerCries, who had been sitting down, flinched at the huge shadow cast over him.

• ….

Beneath the disheveled silver hair, a male character with fiercely glowing eyes stood there.
With the same look he had seen earlier, as if he would rip his innards out at any moment.

“What, you punk. Why are you glaring again? If you have a problem, say it.”

Of course, BerserkerCries wasn’t one to be intimidated by that. He dusted off his shoulders, stood up, and faced the guy.

“It was a compliment. Punk. That she’s cute.”

• ▒▒ ▒▒ ▒▒ ▒▒ ▒▒? (Who are you to say such things?)

“What are you blabbering about? Should I just grab her and run?”

Being a mere mob but quick-witted, the way he immediately glared just because he showed some interest in his lover was an eyesore, so he added a few more words.

He thought he wouldn’t understand anyway.

• …▒▒▒▒ ▒▒▒ ▒▒▒. (You’re begging to be killed.)

The coldly speaking male character began to emit whitish mist from his hands.

“What, you use magic too? I thought you guys were beast-kin. Goodness.”

【<Wolf that Swallows Gods> Passive – The <Frost Mist> skill is continuously applied to the current field. Evasion rate and movement speed drastically decrease due to the <Freeze> status ailment.】

A look of bewilderment flashed across BerserkerCries’s face, but he soon smirked.

The guy’s skill was obviously ‘ice attribute’, and his armor was fully enchanted with freeze resistance options.

“You can’t catch me with that petty ice attribute, kid. Do I look easy to you? It’s my wish to try dying in the Coliseum once….”

【This status ailment ignores ‘Freeze Resistance’ options with a 100% probability. (Related Title: God Slayer)】

…What? No. What the.
BerserkerCries’s face, which had been sneering at the expressionless face, froze solid.

• ▒▒▒▒ ▒▒▒. (I’ll grant your wish.)

“H-hey, hey, hey, punk. Wait, wai….”

【’Karvan Baharga’ summons <God-Slaying Sword>.】

BerserkerCries, miserably crushed and expelled from the Coliseum, looked at his record despondently.

【Coliseum Challenge Record: Round 1 – Defeat】

Looking at the red text, he felt more dumbfounded than embarrassed.

To suffer a first-round defeat in the ‘Coliseum’, which even most newbies clear.

What kind of beast-kin uses magic anyway? Hissing, BerserkerCries began to dig through the combat log.

【Nameless Beast-kin and 1 other】

…What the, when I looked with the scouter earlier, both of them definitely had individual names?

Puzzled, BerserkerCries clicked ‘See More’.
Normally, after a duel in the Coliseum, you can view the equipment, skills, and specs of all the monsters you faced.

【▒▒▒▒ (UNKNOWN)】
【▒▒▒ ▒▒▒▒ (‘Wolf that Swallows Gods’ Varg)】

However, because they were mobs generated by an error, their information didn’t seem to display properly.

But this dead game doing this wasn’t a first or second time, and BerserkerCries was someone who made a habit of doing eccentric things like ‘Winning the Coliseum without using weapons’ or ‘Defeating boss mobs with lvl 1 weapons’.
For such a rank 1 player to be crushed in the Coliseum by just two nameless mobs.
He was too embarrassed to even talk about it anywhere.

…Argh, this bug-ridden dead game!

Muttering out of habit, BerserkerCries scratched his head vigorously.

【Victory】

“…We won!”

Seeing the electronic board flashing gold and the retired BerserkerCries disappearing with a pop!, I jumped up and hugged Karvan.

“Karvan! We won! Kyaa!”

I thought we would definitely lose, but it’s a good thing the ranker let his guard down.

By intentionally not using any skills and only showing ‘Berserk’, he predictably thought I was a beast-kin and vainly wasted his invincibility skill.

Thanks to that, I could easily inflict the ‘Burn’ status ailment.

The only weakness of the Berserker, known as a ‘health pig’, is fire skills. This is because the ‘Burn’ status ailment drastically reduces the physical defense, which is the Berserker’s greatest strength.

So if I had used a fire skill from the beginning, he would have saved his invincibility skill until the end, but the strategy of pretending to be a beast-kin worked perfectly.

Karvan also followed my instructions, only dodging and taking hits, and once the ‘Burn’ status ailment was successfully applied, he finished it off cleanly.

【’Karvan Baharga’ casts <Ice Shatter>.】
【’Karvan Baharga’ casts <Ice Shatter>.】
【’Karvan Baharga’ casts <Ice Shatter>.】

…Of course, it seemed a bit, driven by other emotions. But anyway.

“We won! Karvan!”

“Yes.”

“That person is incredibly strong! In Varg terms, he’s a Valta! He’s the strongest Awakener like you, and we beat him?!”

We beat a ranker, a ranker! Rank 1, the most rotten of stagnant water, ‘BerserkerCries’!

Too excited, I jumped around waving his arm wildly, but stopped jumping at his quiet gaze.

“Sorry. I was just so happy without realizing it…. Ah!”

Ahem, clearing my throat awkwardly, I tried to subtly let go of his hand, but the man snatched my hand and pulled me into his embrace.

Caught off guard, I blinked with my cheek pressed against his chest.

Thump, thump, thump.

I didn’t know if the fast-beating heartbeat was mine or his.

“…Right! By the way, are you okay where you got hit earlier?”

Glancing up at his face in awkwardness, I was startled.

His lips, which had taken a few hits from BerserkerCries’s fists, were badly busted.
Normally, thanks to his broken skill of turning into mist, he shouldn’t have even gotten a scratch, but he silently took the hits because I said we had to lower his guard by pretending to be mobs.

“Do you want to apply this at least? It’s a top-grade potion, so it’ll heal in a few minutes.”

I held out the elixir I received as a prize, but Karvan didn’t even glance at it.

“…I participated in the duel as promised,”

He just stared intently at my face and spoke.

“And we won.”

He cupped my cheek, which must have been warm since I had been rolling and running around until just a moment ago, and stroked my lower lip as he continued slowly.

“Now, I want to receive it.”

Leaning in close, his whispering voice was suggestive.
My flustered reflection wavered in his darkened eyes.

“Something good.”