185 – Divergence (1)
“…”
Kim Hyun-woo opened his eyes at dawn.
He turned his gaze and saw Charlotte sleeping soundly beside him.
He stared blankly at her for a moment, and then Hyun-woo realized anew that he was enjoying a great luxury.
Apart from falling into the game, if Hyun-woo had stayed in the present day, he wouldn’t have been able to talk properly with such charming women, let alone have an affair with them.
‘Well, that doesn’t mean it’s good to have come to Arteia.’
After a brief thought, Hyun-woo stared blankly at Charlotte, who was sleeping with her eyes closed and breathing evenly, for a while, and recalled what she had said yesterday.
‘Possibility…’
Possibility.
Hyun-woo knew what kind of feelings Charlotte had, and what she was aiming for when she spent her first night with him, and so did the other heroes.
In fact, there were now many more heroes who had spent a night with him than those who hadn’t.
Excluding the Five Swords of Calan and the Four Heavenly Kings brought by the Red Eye, there were a total of nine heroes of Arteia who were in a serious relationship with Hyun-woo, and Hyun-woo had already been with five of them.
He had also been with Adria, who was not yet in his territory.
…He laughed in vain for a moment, feeling that the promise he had made to receive the heroes of Lartania one by one had long since flown away.
“…Are you awake?”
“Ah, yes.”
Charlotte, her voice a little hoarse, perhaps because she was thirsty, sounded sweet even though her voice was hoarse.
It would be more accurate to say that it felt as if her voice had been coated with honey.
Coo-
Charlotte stared at Hyun-woo with a blank expression for a moment, then approached him with a slight smile and rested her head on his chest.
“I’ve been dreaming of being like this with the Lord for the past 10 years… It’s nice.”
“…Really?”
“Yes. Really.”
She smiled for a moment as she snuggled up to him and rubbed her head against him, and then looked up at Hyun-woo’s face and asked.
“But I can see that you’re worried.”
“Worried, not so much.”
“If you’re worried about me, don’t worry. As I said, I just wanted to gain the possibility, just like the other heroes.”
Charlotte caressed Hyun-woo’s hand.
“I can say for sure. Even if the Lord chooses another hero, I will not leave your side.”
“…”
“Really. No matter how many other heroes the Lord chooses, my most precious thing will not change. In the past, now… and.”
Chuk-
“In the future, it will never change.”
Charlotte ended with a short kiss on Hyun-woo and smiled gently.
As if in response, the rising sun began to shine over the terrace and illuminate Charlotte.
The sight of her again was more beautiful than he had imagined.
####
Kim Hyun-woo had just decided to outline how to deal with the proposal ring.
To be exact, he had just decided to outline how to sort out the relationships between the heroes after meeting Charlotte.
Unfortunately, the problem that came to Hyun-woo as he was clarifying his thoughts stopped him in his tracks.
“…The black things…?”
“Yes,”
At Elena’s report, Hyun-woo sighed and began to speak as if he was sorting out the situation.
“…So, the black things are advancing into Lartania?”
“Yes, the ones I told you about last time are coming down, destroying all the territories in the east.”
“How long will it take them to reach here?”
“…If we estimate based on the rumors we’ve heard… about 8 days. But even that’s not certain.”
“Why?”
Elena paused for a moment at Hyun-woo’s question, then said.
“According to the rumors, the speed at which the black things move each day is changing dramatically.”
As she spoke, Elena placed a map on Hyun-woo’s desk.
“…What’s this?”
“It’s a map I brought to explain.”
Elena said, marking the north with her words.”There’s no one who’s accurately measured the time it takes to get from here to the northeast, and there aren’t many rumors, so we can’t make any inferences, but it’s different from here on out.”
“The distance from the territory of Coliham to Falden is about 3 days at a generous estimate. If you consider that an army is moving, it would take about 5 days. However, those black things attacked Coliham and arrived at Falden in just one day.”
“…So they’re fast without any countermeasures?”
“No. On the contrary, after Coliham, they attacked several territories and headed to the territory of Mateo and then to Balkan. It would normally take about 2 days to move from here to the territory of Balkan, but this time it took over 10 days.”
“You mean their marching speed is all over the place.”
“Yes. So, based on a rough estimate, I don’t think we can be sure when exactly they will reach this place.”
“Hmm…”
As Kim Hyun-woo pondered, Elena continued.
“And, there’s one more thing I’d like to tell you.”
“What is it?”
“…There’s a rumor that one of the wizards saw those black things. He’s asking for money and wants to sell the information. What should we do?”
“How much is it?”
“About 50 gold coins.”
“…50 gold coins.”
It wasn’t that much money for Lartania, which spends and earns tens of thousands of gold coins a day, but it was a lot of money for an individual, so Kim Hyun-woo, who was contemplating, said.
“…Call that person first.”
“I understand.”
####
A moment later, Elena brought a wizard who looked like a mercenary.
He had been a mercenary for a long time, judging by his worn-out robe, but his eyes shone sharply, apart from his tattered clothes.
“Nice to meet you, Lord of Lartania. I am the wizard Gert.”
“…Nice to meet you, Gert.”
“Let’s get down to business. You offered 50 gold coins for information, so I will give you information that is worth it.”
As he said that, he took out an old crystal ball from his pocket.
“This is…?”
“I’m a wizard who makes a living selling information. This is a video to add credibility to my words.”
Gert began to pour magic into the crystal ball with those words.
Soon, the image of a dark night appeared inside the crystal ball, along with numerous black things walking in it.
Some were crawling.
Some were walking on two legs.
Some were walking on four legs. The crystal ball, which captured the black things moving all at once to somewhere, soon cut off.
“This is a video of what my familiar saw. I think this is enough to prove that I’m not talking nonsense. What do you think?”
“…I trust you enough.”
Gert made a satisfied expression at Kim Hyun-woo’s nod and began to tell him about the black things one by one.
Starting with the story about the black knight who seemed to be the leader of the black things, and how the black things increased in number.
“…After slaughtering everyone in the territory, they throw a sword, a black pillar rises, and then the black things are born by dividing the corpses in two…is that right?”
“You understand correctly. I’ve never seen anything like it before, but that’s how the black things are actually born.”
“…Have you seen how fast they move?”
“I was going to tell you that anyway. When I observed them, they sometimes moved along the ground and sometimes moved through a black door that moved somewhere.”
“…A black door?”
“Yes. Of course, I don’t know exactly when they use it because the rules are unclear, but they reach other territories in an instant through the black door.”
The more Kim Hyun-woo listened to Gert, the more he was filled with strange questions.
In fact, they were somewhat convinced that it was the other world that the merchants had mentioned, but at least that other world was a little different from the ‘other world’ that Kim Hyun-woo had thought of.
‘…The other world I was thinking of was the disasters I saw in Arteil.’
The information about the beings of the other world that Gert was now explaining was completely different from the information about the other world that Kim Hyun-woo knew.
The only thing they had in common was that they suddenly appeared through a door.
That’s why Kim Hyun-woo, who was contemplating, soon asked a question.”Then, did you say that the black knight and the woman following him seemed to be the leaders? Do you have any information about that woman?”
He asked a question, recalling what Gert had said earlier, and he replied with an ambiguous expression.
“…I only know their names. The man’s name is Lancelot, and the woman’s name is Arthur…”
“…What?”
Kim Hyun-woo, who heard the words, couldn’t help but make such a sound.
It would be.
“…Are you sure it’s Arthur?”
“First of all, I heard them call each other that in a few short conversations.”
‘Arthur’ in Arteil.
‘…Continent Raid Boss, Arthur of Black and White…’
It was because it was the worst raid boss in Arteil.
Arthur? Woman? You guys know what I’m thinking about right?