Absolute Shopping Addict

Despite leaving a trail of blood, none of the other awakeners in Brino noticed Emmanuel slowly making his way out of the village, thanks to his "Stealth" skill.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n it. This was something I never expected from him," Emmanuel thought as he took a moment to breathe, all the while replaying the incident in his mind, while it was still fresh.

Jake moved in a way that was beyond anything he expected or planned for; not only that, the awakener"s outward appearance hid both sharp insight and swift determination.

"Swift enough that he could feel me out immediately… and I fell for it," Emmanuel thought as he looked back to Jake"s last move.

"Despite suspecting me for the murders, he didn"t go out of his way to seek me out. He only looked like he was blundering, all the while setting a trap for me."

Despite Emmanuel easily falling for it, he still had reason to be optimistic.

"I still managed to escape – hiding my "Stealth" skill was worth it."

In the end, Emmanuel was able to get away with it.

For those with the kind of personality Emmanuel had, that was the only thing that mattered: survive, and find better opportunities once you can.

In this case, hiding his skill ended up saving his life, as while Jake"s sword did inflict grievous damage while he was using the skill, he was able to avoid any fatal injury.

Still, though, he considered himself an outcast from Brino, and thus made his way out of the village, looking for a safe spot to tend to his wound. That sword nearly killed him – a wound like that would take time to heal, but eventually recover.

He was already out of the back door of Brino when he was reminded of how he failed.

"I thought I could kill him by using my Focused Strike while I was in Stealth…" he muttered, surprised by how strong Jake was.

Emmanuel"s character cla.s.s was much different from the others: the a.s.sa.s.sin cla.s.s gained more experience from killing other awakeners than by killing monsters, even earning newer skills as a reward for killing other awakeners, such as the Focused Strike.

He acquired it by snuffing out the lives of Seamus and his party.

"I was this close to leading everyone in this town…d.a.m.n it!"

Another benefit of killing Seamus and his party was the change in social dynamics that was a result of one of the stronger parties being removed, which resulted in him becoming a powerful and influential awakener in Brino because of it.

Unlike Seamus, he did not a.s.sert his dominance over the others; he preferred to slowly and quietly influence others into following his lead.

It worked; many other awakeners were beginning to discreetly follow his lead.

Unfortunately, it all fell apart in the wink of an eye; his hard work and effort completely wasted.

He was out of Brino"s immediate vicinity when a sudden noise made him turn around.

"What was that?"

As he was leaving, he heard more of the same noises, like houses collapsing, only much louder.

"A sudden monster attack on Brino, and the outer wall falling apart?"

An even louder sound of collapse reverberated throughout the night.

It must be the town wall.

Also, monsters just don"t show up in town without warning; something unusual must have happened.

"Not my problem anymore. I hope this kills him – wouldn"t want to spend the rest of my time here looking over my shoulder every so often."

***

The fear in the awakeners of Brino was palpable the moment the walls fell.

First, cracks began to appear, as if a large object was thrown against the town walls repeatedly.

And then, when the walls of Brino finally fell down with a terrible crash, the night was filled with the clattering of bones, as a horde of reanimated skeletons began to pour into the town like a colony of ants.

"Skeleton army!" the scouts shouted, and the defenders were onto the first wave of skeletons, the crashes before the walls of Brino fell rousing the awakeners from their slumber.

Brino is a town designed for novices, and situated in a location where monsters cannot easily breach it.

It was made for awakeners who had just begun their quest: since they had not been accustomed to this place, Brino was meant to be a sanctuary where they can rest and recover, while learning how the world they were in worked, and preparing for what may come next.

Of course, should they fail to defend the town, they will have no choice to abandon it. However, any invasions on the town are always preceded by announcements, and all attacks on the town focus on the front gate, allowing the awakeners to prepare for them accordingly.

Moreover, these attacks were meant to be difficult to defend against, but not impossible.

If the awakeners within this town were not strong enough by the deadline imposed upon them, they would surely be wiped out, but this incident has only happened in a few novice towns.

"All offensive spell casters, stay behind our knights, ready spells on my mark!"

"Everyone stay in formation and focus!"

There simply was no time to think about how this group of monsters attacked by besieging the walls of Brino, but for those who did, they found the idea ridiculous.

This attack began without any warning, and from a different direction instead of the front gate.

"The walls have been breached, everyone form up! Exercise extreme caution, the dust is thick!" one of the stronger knights shouted, his voice clear in the night despite the dust of the collapsing walls obscuring their vision. "Stay in groups and watch each other"s back!"

With the first wave of the skeletons repulsed by the awakeners standing shoulder to shoulder, the dust finally settled.

That was when a chilling sound pierced the night, as the first wave of skeletons, now reinforced by another group of their companions, began to laugh, the rattling of their skeletal teeth spreading fear once more among the gathered awakeners.

Clack.

Clack.

Clack.

While they clattered, they raised their swords in unison.

And then they all charged at once, smashing against the defenders like a wave of locusts.

The defenders withstood the charge easily, but during their counterattack, found that any of their strikes just bounced off the skeletons" weapons, as if all the strength they gathered over the past few weeks had been for naught.

"Knights, hold the line! Funnel them into the alleys and stay in groups!" the scouts called, the awakeners" combined experience allowing them to maintain their composure despite the strength of the skeletons they were facing.

In fact, as they were being pushed back, the magicians and commanders were helping support the others, all the while devising ways to fight back.

This was proof that they had all grown as awakeners and were hardened from their experiences – but despite this, the skeleton army has proven to be quite the challenge so far.

"Clean hit on one with my Skill – no damage! These guys have reinforced their defenses!"

"Also got one with my Fireball! Pushed it back, but no damage!"

The defenders were at a loss as to what to do aside from get pushed back, and just when they had lost all hope when counterattacking...

Something crashed into the midst of the skeleton army; the scouts had seen something that looked like the vague shape of a man flash across the moonlight before the crash.

From the smoke, a shadow emerged, and when a familiar-looking weapon parted the smoke and knocked several skeletons back with a gigantic swing, that was when the awakeners breathed a sigh of relief.

One of the first scouts called his name as soon as he caught a glimpse of the man sowing mayhem in the ranks of the skeletons.

"It"s Jake!"

"About time!"

As Jake got right down to business, his stronger presence was like a flame to a moth, drawing the skeletons towards him.

And he did not disappoint both the awakeners he a.s.sisted, and the skeletons looking for a challenge from him.

The way he was battling the skeleton army was different from the other awakeners caught up in battling the skeletons… by an entire order of magnitude.

Though he had yet to defeat one, he was pushing multiple skeletons back, all at the same time.

The clattering continued as Jake pressed the attack, not missing a beat as his style shifted from pa.s.sively drawing the skeletons" attention to aggressively attacking them.

Jake mercilessly unleashed his power on the skeletons; his aggressively brilliant twist on the Cherry Blossom sword art was less a fight and more a visual spectacle, to the point where other awakeners took a moment to stare open-mouthed at the sight before them, before returning to the battle, their morale renewed.

It only took him a few moments before the awakeners heard a most wonderful sound.

The crack and clatter of bones breaking and falling onto the ground brought another turning point to the fight, as Jake had drawn first blood against the skeleton army, managing to take one down.

The monsters stopped, eyeing their enemy warily, and he took the chance to shout at the gathered awakeners.

"Go for the joints, it"s their weakness. Strike at the joints, that"s cash money for sure!"

"Cash money?"

The awakeners only took a moment to tilt their heads in confusion, but soon digested the information – they were used to Jake"s eccentricities at that point.

What was more important was that they knew the weak point of their enemies.

"Their joints? Attack the joints as their weakness, huh?"

It was a ray of light in the gloom of the fight; scouts spread the word throughout the besieged town, being proven right as they managed to take down a few pursuing skeletons thanks to Jake"s advice.

"It works, everybody! Go for their joints!"

"Wizards, aim your spells towards their joints for maximum damage! Knights, hold your shields high and use your swords as levers to expose those joints to our spell casters!"

"Form up, let"s clean up this town!"

"YEAH!"

From there, the atmosphere of the battle began to change, as all the awakeners began to focus their attacks on the skeletons" joints.

"Avoid the bone!"

"Aim for the joints!"

The bones that the skeletons were made up of weren"t normal – stronger than steel and used as both weapon and armor.
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The skeletons also use their arms and legs to block attacks from the awakeners; even if they were caught off guard, the unpredictable movement of their bones allowed them to defend themselves instantly.

However, the moment their weaknesses were finally revealed, the tide of the battle was quickly reversed – as the parts connecting their bones together were now the awakeners" target.

Skeletons began to collapse en ma.s.se as the defenders began to fight smarter, causing them to rally back.

"Shields up, swords out! Pry these b.a.s.t.a.r.ds open!"

"Wizards, line "em up and light "em up on my signal!"

"Fire!"

Everywhere in Bruno, the awakeners were beginning to take back their town.

"Alley teams, converge at the crossing and let"s push forward!"

As the skeletons got disa.s.sembled by the awakeners, their morale began to rise – it was only a matter of time and effort before the skeletons were thrown out of Brino.

Things were finally beginning to look up, but as the scouts and magicians sent messages throughout the battlefield, there was often a boss at the end of engagements like this; they had to be cautious.

Still, though, being able to drive off this wave thanks to Jake"s information, they were in high spirits.

"This is our town, and we"re going to defend it!"

"Your kind are not welcome here!"

"You stupid bone b.a.s.t.a.r.ds – get the h.e.l.l out of here!"

"And stay out!"

The first stage of the battle was about to close with the awakeners successfully defending Brino, and they had the right to be excited as they continued to cut down the next wave of incoming skeletons.

In the midst of all this, Jake was finally able to slow down a little, only cutting a few skeletons down at a time instead of during the heat of the battle.

"That was dumb," he thought. "I let that b.a.s.t.a.r.d Emmanuel get away – I underestimated his Stealth skill."

As he regained his composure, he continued to aid the defense, all the while thinking of what happened.

"This is going to end up as my fault and my fault alone – can"t believe I made such an amateur mistake there, looking back at that noise instead of finishing the fight… even if I"ve never been in this situation before, it"s still an unforgivable error on my part."

He was filled with self-loathing for dropping his guard – no matter what situation developed, he should have stuck around and finished the job.

That was the more important than the invasion for Jake -- but he couldn"t get it done properly.

He could start making excuses, because despite every bit of advantage he had, he was practically a novice within the world of Nohas.

A very powerful novice – but still a novice: someone unused to other skills and traps alike.

"Nohas is not a place where excuses work," Jake told himself. "This isn"t a place for excuses: it"s where you pay for your mistakes with your life."

As Jake cut down another skeleton, he could not help but feel annoyed at this – in hindsight, he should have seen the evil someone like Emmanuel possessed.

"Someone like that? Hiding and stabbing in the back?

It was bad enough back in the real world, and with words, but here?

Also – what should I call that skill? Transparency? Hiding?"

"Emmanuel has a Stealth skill – it can"t get any worse than this. I can"t believe he was hiding a skill like that…" Jake thought, never expecting that Emmanuel would hide such a great Skill such as that.

No, he didn"t even know that such a Skill existed in the first place.

The full weight of that revelation felt like a splinter in Jake"s throat; he would never know when Emmanuel would invisibly approach him.

"Those attacks of his bypa.s.sed my physical defense. It would be dangerous if I was attacked while asleep, for example."

He cut down yet another skeleton.

"Next time, I"ll never let my guard down. I have to be perfectly prepared – whoever interferes with my shopping is a loose end I have to dispose of," Jake vowed to himself, ensuring he"d never make the same mistake again.

Not only when dealing with Emmanuel, but also with any other situation or circ.u.mstance.

"This is the first, and this will be the last. I"m not going to buy anything with problems again, for sure," Jake thought.

"It"s almost like the 5th principle of shopping. If I run into a defective brand, if it doesn"t reimburse me for my trouble, it loses my business, no questions asked."

It"s like shopping – Jake never buys anything from a brand that manufactures defective products again.

There are a lot of other options besides that brand, so to him, if the brand can"t inspect their products properly for defects, it"s their problem and their loss, not his.

This is one of several principles Jake had regarding shopping; and thanks to these principles, Jake had little to no regrets when shopping.

So, as he cut down yet another group of skeletons, he found that his confidence was renewed.

"I know better than anyone else on how to take care of defective products like you," he thought, antic.i.p.ating the moment he"d find Emmanuel again.

"Don"t be happy thinking that you"ve bought some time away from me."

As he dealt with the skeleton army, Jake was still thinking about the details on how to catch that slippery murderer.

Even then, there was still a fact he overlooked – this battle wasn"t over yet.

The enemy he has to deal with has yet to make its entrance.

And near where the walls of Brino were breached, where the majority of the skeletons were defeated, that was where the true enemy appeared.

The bones of the defeated began to rea.s.semble themselves, converging as if by an invisible force.

"What"s going on?" a scout asked.

"They"re putting themselves back together!"

The awakeners braced themselves as the bones of the skeletons they defeated all began to levitate off the ground.

When Jake made it to the remains of the wall, a random awakener voiced everyone"s thoughts out loud.

"The skeletons are back!"

The Skeleritter, the tutorial"s third Boss Monster emerged; that meant the tutorial was approaching the end.

Several hundred skeletons opened their mouths and roared as one.

***

The end of the tutorial means that the actual adventure will begin.

To begin as a true awakener and abandon the mark of a beginner.

"The third Boss Monster has appeared."

"Oh, does that mean they are near the end of the tutorial?"

"How long has it been since this tutorial started?"

"I don"t know; not too long ago, but why would you ask that?"

"The third Boss Monster seems to have come sooner than expected."

"That"s not possible – the pattern by which they appear is predictable, almost scripted. They show up in almost the exact same way."

"That"s true."

The unknown ent.i.ties began to move, in celebration of the tutorial finally coming to an end.

"Let"s prepare ourselves for the greeting."