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＜ 12. Into the crack (1) ＞
“ I don’t know what happened either… When I thought I was going to die like this again, I decided not to die obediently, but to try my best, and suddenly my strength surged .”
The blue aura had faded, but Marco was still excited about the battle. Sitting on the altar, Marco glanced at the remains, still unable to believe that he had destroyed all the golems .
Andrea guessed that Marco gained more strength by overcoming something. It hadn’t been seen in the game, so he couldn’t really pinpoint why this happened, but .
Anyway, this time Marco’s performance was dazzling. Andrea walked up to Marco and patted him lightly on the shoulder .
“ Anyways, good job, Marco. Thanks to you, for the first time, I passed the boss monster safely without anyone getting hurt .”
“ Ah! Come to think of it, it is .”
A soft smile spread across Marco’s face. A face that is genuinely proud of what it has done. It was a look that only those who faced their weaknesses and overcame them could have .
Trisha also came over and said a word to Marco .
“ Daddy, that was great. I didn’t know it was to that extent .”
“ Thank you. Trisha, you shoot a very good bow too. I was honestly amazed when I hit the nucleus from a distance .”
” It’s me, well… I didn’t do much .”
Marco waved his hand as if he was overly humble. After that, there was no further conversation as if there was nothing to say. However, Trisha did not back down and continued to stand in front of Marco .
Tricia hesitated for a while before finally opening her mouth again .
“ Um… uh… I mean… I just wanted to say thank you. When the golem was throwing rocks at you, didn’t you take the risk to draw attention ?”
“ It was nothing. You don’t have to thank me for that .”
“ Oh, I don’t know! Anyway, thank you !”
Trisha then strode towards the treasure chest in front of the exit portal. Marco looked away at Andrea as if asking why. Andrea had a guess, but shrugged her shoulders and pretended not to know .
‘ He did that to me the other day, and this time it’s Mr. Marco… It seems that he kept in his heart the question of whether he could trust Marco in the past .’
There was no need to tell Marco. Andrea turned to Marco and said .
“ Let’s go and check the rewards too .”
“ It is .”
Andrea walked around the altar and pulled out a card from her deck as if she had remembered something. It was ‘Summon the Hounds of Hell’ .
‘ I was going to use this when the golem got stronger, but thanks to Marco, I saved it. I’ll have to use this only when I meet elite monsters on the 40th floor .’
The reward placed next to the portal was once again a gold-rimmed treasure chest. The platinum-framed treasure chest, which is a higher level than this, seemed to be seen only when you caught the boss monster on the 50th floor .
Trisha, who went first and opened the treasure chest, tilted her head. As soon as I saw Andrea coming, I held out the object in my hand as if it was good .
“ Andrea, how does this artifact work ?”
It was a hemispherical glass membrane with a round pedestal attached to it. The inside was divided into something like a board, and each compartment contained one model of a sword and one of a shield. Underneath it was a ring that could be turned like a music box .
Andrea raised her eyebrows slightly. It was a relic that he liked, but Trisha seemed to think it was an insignificant relic .
“ It’s an alternative hemisphere. It’s a unique-grade artifact, and its effect is to choose between attack and defense in the deck and eliminate them all .”
As expected, Trisha’s face was full of disappointment. It seemed that he was expecting something flashy or something with explosive performance .
Still, I couldn’t help but use what I had already acquired. Andrea advised me that it would be better to turn the ring on the side of the sword model to remove all blows. Trisha followed his advice .
“ Since I reduced the number of cards by 4, I should be able to complete an infinite shooting cycle deck soon. Don’t be so disappointed that there isn’t a card with destructive power that can destroy everything .”
“… who said he was disappointed? It’s just… ah, okay .”
Andrea let out a big laugh at the disingenuous response. Trisha left for no reason, saying that she would look around one more time to see if there were any missing arrows, whether she was embarrassed by the situation .
Andrea turned to the side. After checking all of Trisha’s things, it was now her turn to check her treasure chest .
When the box was opened, a brilliant light poured out. It wasn’t a card. Andrea also got the artifact this time. Carefully lift the items inside .
It was a very disturbing jar. It was large enough to be wrapped around with both hands, and on the outside, there was a relief of a fat man with a wide open mouth and distorted facial muscles .
Contrary to the appearance that you want to throw away right away, it was an epic-grade artifact with very usable performance. Andrea repeated the name of the artifact to herself .
‘ It’s a pot of gluttony .’
It was a relic that paid homage to the famous pot card from a certain card game cartoon .
The effect was terribly simple and powerful, just like the original designated banned card. That is, draw one more card each turn. It was an artifact that boasted an effect beyond deck compression to draw the desired card .
However, Marco approached me with a worried face as if the appearance of the relic was too bad to see .
“ Is it a good thing? No matter how you look at it, it looks like a cursed pot .”
Andrea suddenly had a playfulness. He frowned and put on a serious expression .
“ Um… that’s a big deal. If you hold this artifact, you must now sacrifice all food in the rest area to it. Now, even if hard-boiled eggs are served, no one should eat them .”
Marco looked at it with his eyes wide open, as if this was a thunderclap from the sky. Realizing that it was not an adult act, he soon changed his complexion, but .
“ Hmm, what about boiled eggs? That little thing, if you have it, eat it, if you don’t have it, it’s enough .”
“I ‘m kidding. In fact, there is no such disadvantage in this jar .”
“… really ?”
“ Yes. It just has the effect of drawing one more card every turn .”
Marco was visibly relieved. After showing such a rich response, I couldn’t help but wonder why the hard-boiled eggs had so much resentment .
Hearing Andrea’s question, Marco raised his head and looked into the distance. It was a look that was somehow filled with melancholy. Andrea hurriedly looked around, thinking she might have asked something inappropriate .
“ Well, if it’s difficult to answer, you don’t have to say …”
“ No, no. It’s not like there’s such a deep story. I always liked hard-boiled eggs, but the day before I was drafted into the holy war, my wife gave me hard-boiled eggs to eat .”
“…”
“ When I eat hard-boiled eggs, I think of that time… and it’s still my favorite food. That’s why I just made a fuss about it .”
Andrea was speechless .
‘ No, there was a f*cking deep story …?’
A heavy silence fell. It was a moment when I was extremely embarrassed that I was joking around. After a while, Andrea was able to pick and choose what to say, barely able to speak .
“ Um… Marco. If you want to eat hard-boiled eggs in the future, just tell us. If there is a chance to save it, let’s try .”
“ Thank you for your words .”
Marco scratched the back of his head, embarrassed. After collecting all the arrows, Trisha came late and asked .
” What, what’s wrong with your expression? what happened ?”
“ No, it’s nothing. Are you done with your work now? You ‘d better leave soon .”
Marco leads the way towards the exit portal. However, as if he didn’t have the courage to cross the portal alone and face Arpan alone, he stopped in front of him. It was still too early for the anxiety after seeing him crush the black dealer the other day to subside .
Andrea had no intention of sending Marco first. Tricia was looking at her curiously as if she couldn’t understand what they were talking about, but Andrea turned her back .
“ Let’s go to the waiting room first. Because I can’t keep Marco standing like that.”
Tricia nodded reluctantly. Following Andrea’s footsteps, she also moved .
Just before stepping into the portal, Andrea suddenly recalled the promise she had made with the Earth Priest on the 25th floor .
‘ Come to think of it, we were supposed to meet here. If something didn’t go wrong, Priest Emilia would probably be waiting in the waiting room first .’
I was worried about the difficulty level increasing, but I was looking forward to the strength being reinforced. It was a bit daunting considering that Emilia would have to farm again from scratch like Tricia did, but .
Leaving their backs on the ancient temple forgotten by people, Andrea and the others entered the portal side by side .
*
“ This is …”
“ f*ck, what is that ?”
As soon as they entered the waiting room, Tricia and Marco frowned and shouted. Although they didn’t scream together, Andrea was also surprised .
“Looks like you got through the 40th floor safely, congratulations, Miss Andrea .”
As usual, Arpan was sitting on a stone chair with an iron cage on his back. Andrea couldn’t afford to say hello like that .
“… Where is Priest Emilia? You must be waiting here .”
“ Ah! The person Andrea-sama picked up as a colleague was Emilia-sama! This is a pity .”
When Andrea looked up to see what that meant, the goat-headed guide tilted her head to the side .
“ It looks like Emilia-sama entered this place first .”
On the other hand, there was something that surprised everyone as soon as they entered the waiting room .
At first glance from a distance, it looks similar to the portal you passed through when you entered this place. However, if you get a little closer, you can clearly tell the difference .
A passageway as if a window through which one could look out into another world had been shattered. There are a lot of cracks around the edges, and fragments fall and scatter around them. It looked precarious, as if everything would collapse at any moment .
Andrea clenched her fists. There was a faint hint of anger in his voice .
“… what the hell have you done? What did you say to Priest Emilia so you went in there without waiting for us ?”
“ Wow, calm down. You must have misunderstood something, Miss Andrea .”
“ A misunderstanding is a misunderstanding …”
“ I couldn’t even meet Emilia-sama. When I met the black dealer on the 39th floor, didn’t Andrea-sama briefly summon me? Emilia-sama probably entered the waiting room at that time .”
“ What ?”
Andrea opened her eyes wide. It was such a staggering coincidence that I couldn’t easily believe it .
“ Does that make sense? No, aside from that, then, did you mean that Emilia just jumped in blindly when she wasn’t even informed about that place ?”
“ Well, I don’t know what Emilia-sama was thinking when she entered this place. You may not have been there before. What is certain is that I did not have any involvement in Emilia-sama entering this place .”
Perhaps it means that he is innocent, Arpan spread his hands out and shrugged his shoulders lightly .
Andrea glared at Arpan. Even though I still had doubts, I had no choice but to believe in a certain order. This is because although Arpan often causes confusion by twisting the truth, it is extremely rare to lie .
Something got complicated. Andrea touched her temples and guessed the number of cases .
‘ Have you found another colleague…? Or is there an urgent situation that has no choice but to go in…? He was seriously injured and went in because he was in danger of dying immediately because Arpan wasn’t there, or he didn’t go in right away and got information that he couldn’t resist .’
However, none of them were just vague speculations with no solid evidence. Now that the situation has come to this, there is only one way left to confirm the truth .
Following Priestess Emilia into the passageway of that twisted space, the ‘Crack’ .
Andrea is drawn into a deep conflict .
＜ 12. Into the Rift (1) ＞ End