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Chapter 144: Confirming the Situation
Ronin hid himself about a kilometer away from the Starting Point. He didn't use his eyes to look; he merely waited patiently. He had planted a tracking marker on the decoy using the spell card [Trace], allowing him to constantly monitor the target's location.
Therefore, as long as the decoy returned, Ronin would immediately spot him. The next step was just to wait—wait for the Troupe members to show up, or, if they didn't, move on to step two. The wait was very short.
After all, the decoy's entire job was to arrive and then instantly activate [Return to Start] to come back. Ronin sensed through his Binder that the player had returned to the Starting Point and began to count. At the same time, upon arriving, the decoy pulled another spell card out of his Binder: [Magnetic Force]. His body was trembling slightly.
Having encountered the Troupe members up close, he knew all too well how terrifyingly strong they were. The person who had captured him was undeniably strong too, but didn't exert that same suffocating pressure. He could clearly distinguish a fundamental difference between Ronin and that Troupe trio: Ronin treated people as humans. The Troupe members did not.
He had seen it in their eyes—they looked at him like he was cargo. After extracting his name, they casually threw him aside like trash. But he knew they remembered him. All of his future progress in the game would likely end up as their private property, unless he could either defeat them or simply leave the game entirely.
But whether it was [Leave] or a [Ticket], he lacked the ability to obtain either. And so, he had been forced to live every day in the game consumed by fear. Now, although this job as bait was incredibly dangerous, the man who caught him had already left him a [Ticket]. As long as he completed this task flawlessly, he'd have the chance to leave the game and return to the normal world.
The killing intent rolling in from the horizon actually brought a hint of relief to the decoy's tense heart. He wasn't afraid of the Troupe chasing him; his true fear had been that they wouldn't chase him, because then he wouldn't be able to finish his task. Now, he could finally leave.
Right then, the ringing of a [Contact] call sounded in his ear. It was another spell card ability, functioning exactly like a phone.
"The [Ticket] is on the port guard. Once you get there, just say the password 'Nasudo,' and he'll give it to you. But you need to be fast."
"Understood." The decoy felt his heart hammering wildly. He swapped the [Magnetic Force] in his hand for [Return], a spell card suited for moving a single person to a designated location. The designated location: the Port. The very instant the light encasing Bonolenov's trio touched down, the decoy transformed into a fresh streak of light, rocketing into the sky and shooting straight toward the port.
The second the light around Bonolenov's group dissipated, all three immediately took defensive stances. Because the moment the decoy left, all three felt a bone-deep chill run down their spines, as if they were being stared down by something truly horrifying. It was a very bad feeling! Yet, scanning their surroundings, the trio couldn't see anyone hiding in the wide-open grasslands peering at them.
In reality, Ronin had instantly locked onto their auras and activated his Telescope Technique, switching to observing the three through a crystal ball. The first person to appear in the crystal ball was Bonolenov. According to Ronin's guess, Bonolenov being burned by the Amaterasu was likely the whole reason the Troupe had invaded the game to begin with.
But looking at him now, Ronin couldn't spot any noticeable changes on Bonolenov's exterior. This guy always wrapped his entire body in bandages until a battle broke out, only unraveling them to reveal his perforated body when the fighting started. With a guy like that, even if he really had been horribly burned by Amaterasu, there was no way to determine the degree of his injuries just by looking.
As for Feitan and Phinks, they looked completely fine. Ronin hadn't sensed any other auras nearby, nor did he spot any other anomalies through the crystal ball's observation. He could safely conclude that the only Troupe members currently in Greed Island were the three who had just arrived here. Perfect.
The trio's names hadn't appeared in his Binder. This was the distance Ronin had been testing: one kilometer. As long as he was more than a kilometer away from the target, even if he could observe them through special means, their names wouldn't be logged into his Binder's roster.
This was to prevent the Troupe from utilizing the Binder's interaction-logging mechanic to confirm he had entered the game, or even using the fact that they had "met" to activate [Accompany] and fly straight to him. However, not having the targets logged in his Binder also meant Ronin couldn't simply activate a spell card to jump to their location either. But this wasn't an issue for Ronin. The decoy had already told him the exact location of the Troupe members when he found them using [Magnetic Force]. By starting from that location, it would be remarkably easy to track down someone else who had crossed paths with the trio.
"Feels like a trap, but I don't see anyone setting it. I don't even know what their objective is in luring us out here," Feitan muttered. His hand was gripping his umbrella, looking ready to strike any discovered target at a moment's notice.
"This is giving me the creeps," Phinks muttered, voicing his gut reaction.
Bonolenov nodded in agreement. He too felt an ominous sense of dread settling heavily in his gut, an irrational panic that chilled him to the core.
Should we keep chasing?
Though none of them voiced the question out loud, the same thought crossed all their minds simultaneously.
But that hesitation lasted for merely a single second. Among the three, Feitan pulled out an [Accompany] card and activated it again. He wanted to see exactly how far that little ant thought it could scurry! Once the three flew off, they also vanished from Ronin's crystal ball. They were too far. Even with the recent increase in his strength, his Telescope Technique's observation range was only maxed out at around three kilometers.
Uttering a clear "Book," Ronin pulled out a [Return] card, and his figure swiftly disappeared from the grassy plains. Meanwhile, on the other end, when the light of [Accompany] faded, the complexions of the three Troupe members turned quite ugly. They had landed squarely in the port, and all three of them knew exactly what could be done here: leaving the game!
Furthermore, leaving this way allowed a player to choose which real-world port they wanted to exit from. Trying to track him down across all those different ports would be practically impossible. Clicking their tongues in annoyance, the trio had no choice but to individually activate [Return] and head back to Masadora.
Two days flew by in a flash. Ronin now held a special card in his hand named [List], which allowed him to check the number of players holding a specific item as well as the total number of cards in circulation. Currently, the number of people who possessed [Breath of Archangel] was still zero. That meant that even by camping the spell card shop, the Troupe trio still hadn't managed to assemble the full set.
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