CHAPTER 54: A JUST AND NOBLE PERSON

Deklan hurled the spear as hard as he could.

A spiral of mana swirled around its tip, lessening the wind resistance significantly.

It managed to block his spear earlier, but not this time.

As he fell back to the ground, he watched the spear impale the Ghost from behind.

A ragged, pained shriek tore through the air as the Ghost lost its balance and crashed forward, stumbling through branches and undergrowth before slamming into the earth not too far ahead. For all its uncanny senses that were sharp enough to detect and parry Deklan’s ambush, it was still only a one—or two-star bronze-rank Ghost.

Deklan might still technically be iron-rank, but the fruits he had eaten pushed him to around that rank.

His body was comparable to the early bronze-rank Ghosts.

Coupled with the skills in his arsenal, handling an early bronze-rank Ghost was well within his reach.

Deklan landed on the ground with a light tap.

"I think I pulled a muscle," He thought aloud as he stretched his right shoulder. "But still, I was right to go hunt more Ghosts. I think I kind of get what the shadow property’s effect was."

Basing it on the name, Deklan thought infusing the Breeze Affinity with the shadow property would mean his breeze would turn into darkness or something. It’d be cool if he could weave darkness around like those dark main characters he’s read in the past.

But that wasn’t what the shadow property provided.

Since it was only a property, it doesn’t change the nature of the targeted skill.

Changing breeze to darkness is changing the nature of the skill itself, and that’s not how it works.

Instead, the shadow property only gave a natural trait of a shadow to the skill.

In this case—the breezes Deklan commanded no longer needed his constant focus. Once he marked a target and willed an action, the currents clung to it like faithful shadows, moving on their own without further guidance.

Earlier, Deklan wanted to make the air currents press down on the Ghost.

His aim was to make it more exhausting for it to fly, or if he could, drop it down from the sky.

And as soon as he willed that, the shadow property kicked in and locked onto the Ghost.

Until Deklan manually dispersed it or he ran out of mana, the air currents would keep pressing the Ghost down. That’s exactly what happened to the Ghost earlier, "Does that mean if I use the Shadow Orange on my weapon, it’d blend with the dark or maybe become more silent? Interesting."

"Regardless, it’s time to harvest that thing," Deklan put his thoughts on the back of his mind.

Since there was no notice from the system, the Ghost is still alive.

Probably lying somewhere near death.

"Kyaah~!"

"Someone help!!"

Deklan halted mid-step.

He heard people, a couple of them in the distance, and they seemed to be distressed.

"I should really ignore them," Deklan folded his arms and rubbed his chin with one hand. "Minding my own business is the best way to survive, that’s what a wise man once told me. But fortune—also favors the bold! Let’s check it out!"

Deklan rushed towards where the commotion came from.

An excited smile could be seen on his face as he sprinted through the undergrowth.

Since the Ghost he speared was dying anyway, there’s no harm in checking the commotion.

Besides... Normally, in a case like this, there will be a hottie to be saved! How can I waste that chance?

Meanwhile, not too far away from the waterfall, a group of people wearing black and red robes could be seen. Most of them looked like priests from Deklan’s previous world, but they were all holding what seemed to be enchanted traditional weapons.

The glowing outlines of their weapons alone made it clear that they weren’t regular weapons.

Each one was infused with mana.

Emerging across from them was a burning monstrosity.

A Ghost that takes the form of a skeleton with a sword and shield—but its entire body was on fire.

Seeing the Ghost, this group of five people’s complexion turned pale.

Most of them were already wounded and exhausted.

It was clear that they had been battling for quite some time now, and they’re at the point of exhaustion.

Leading the group was a middle-aged man with trimmed blonde hair; his features were fierce, and there were battle scars across his arms and face. He was panting heavily, clearly exhausted, but he raised his sword to the side of his face anyway, going to his battle stance.

"What do we do? We can’t keep running!"

"We have to. Our Spirit Talismans are running low on mana already—we can’t fight it head-on!"

"It was clearly chasing us because of the skull! Let’s ditch it and run!"

"No," the leader clasped the hilt of his sword tighter, determination flashing in his eyes. "We have to bring it back. We came here exactly for this, and you’re suggesting we ditch it? Do you hear what you’re saying?!"

"What else are we supposed to do?" Another refuted in anger. "Die here?!"

Roar!!

As the group was arguing, the burning skeleton roared loudly.

It was activating its minor presence, unleashing a fiery aura straight towards the group.

Every hand flew to the Spirit Talisman hanging at their necks, triggering its protective veil in a desperate attempt to shut out the crushing aura. But their barriers barely held for a few seconds. It took no longer than two seconds for them to splinter apart.

And the area immediately erupted with ragged screams of pain.

Looking at his comrades, the leader’s eyes widened in horror.

He saw two of his men staring at their own hands and shrieked—their skin reddened, blistered, bubbled as though they were being boiled from the inside. No fire lingered or even touched their bodies, yet they looked like they were being cooked alive.

Giving no time for them to breathe, the burning skeleton lunged.

It cleaved its burning sword horizontally with vicious intent

Before the sword struck, the leader reacted on instinct alone, yanking the two closest men down.

As the burning steel breezed past overhead, they could feel the flames burning the air.

And the other two who felt their bodies were on fire were cleaved in half.

Blood sprayed—the gore hit the ground with a splash.

Seeing this, the leader’s heart thundered, terror clawing up his spine.

He was scared, but he had to keep moving.

Channeling mana into his feet, he kicked off the ground hard, dragging the survivors with him.

All three of them skidded backward until their backs hit a tree.

Oblivious to them, someone was watching their battle from above the tree where they crashed.

Deklan sat on a thick branch and looked down at what was happening below.

His presence was light thanks to the Small Ghost trait, so the people down there didn’t even realize that he was watching. Heck, forget about the men who were fighting for their lives; even the burning skeleton didn’t notice him.

"Just a bunch of dudes? Man, I lost my will to help." Deklan picked his ears nonchalantly.

Earlier, he had high expectations.

But now, seeing that there were only dudes, he doesn’t feel like helping.

[Wow... How shameless can you be, host?]

"Shameless? What shameless?"

[You’re only helping if there was a girl there?]

"Precisely. And I think it’s not shameless at all. Every man has a white knight syndrome, and those who don’t are either pussies or swing the other way. What am I going to do after helping them? Have a bunch of dudes thanking me? No, thank you."

[Should I issue a sudden quest to force you to help them?]

"No, the fuck you’re not!" Deklan smiled forcefully, holding back his anger. "Don’t do that, please."

[Since you asked it so nicely, I can’t help but let you off this time.]

"Thank you, ma’am!"

[Good boy.]

"Fuck you say to me?!"

Deklan clenched his jaw—so hard it ached, itching to strangle the damned system if it had a throat to grab. But he forced the fury down, losing control now would only drag him deeper into whatever trouble this was. And judging by the uniforms these people wore, they were anything but ordinary.

Probably Exorcists belonging to a faction.

A faction that Deklan didn’t want to know about.

He stood up and turned around, deciding to go back and deal with the Ghost he was hunting.

"Go on ahead and bring this to the young lady..."

Deklan halted mid-track.

"What about you? What are you going to do?"

"I’m going to hold this thing back. Just find the young lady, the skull is important for her."

"But... But we c—"

"Go!!"

Hearing the conversation of the people below, Deklan straightened his posture.

He heard something interesting, and it seemed helping them wouldn’t be meaningless after all.

"Come to think of it, every Ghost in this forest should come from the inner area. I have never seen this one before," Deklan muttered, glancing a sharp look over his shoulder at the burning skeleton. "It must be a Ghost from the other Null Zone... and if that’s the case, it might have skills or traits that are worth devouring—something that could help me defend the Shadowed Town."

[Host, you’re pulling a reason out of your ass, aren’t you? Just admit you wanted to help because there’s a young lady behind them.]

"Come on, of course that’s not the reason," Deklan smirked. "I’m not that kind of person at all. I’m a just and noble person!"

[Bleh...]

...

[Sudden Quest!]

Description: Defeat the burning skeleton ghost and rescue the group of wandering dudes!

Reward: 100 Spooky Dollars and 1x Major Mana Candy.

Penalty: 100 hours of spanking.

...

"Bro... That’s a lot of spanking hours, the fuck?" Deklan rolled his eyes, but he wasn’t discouraged.

It’s not like he was planning to fail.

"I have one more throw in the chamber," He summoned his Albino Spear again. "One strike is enough."

Below, the leader stood up and pointed his sword at the burning skeleton.

Even though he knew that death was waiting on the other side, causing the dread of fear to wrap around his heart, he faced the Ghost anyway. He stood strong, protecting the two men behind him, "Go, now. I will buy at least half a minute."

"You damn lunatic..." One of the men cursed, tears rolling down his cheek.

It was the same for the other, looking at the leader through tears.

Even so, they couldn’t waste this opportunity as they turned to run the other side.

On the other hand, the leader’s eyes bulged, "Come at me, you monster! I’ll kill you right here!"

CLANG!

A loud, steely sound rattled the eardrums.

Just then, a sudden gale blasted through the clearing, forcing the leader to throw his arms up to shield his face. When the wind died, and he lowered them, his breath hitched at the sight of the burning skeleton nailed to the ground by a spear that buried deep in its chest.

"What—? How did that happen? Who threw that?"