Reincarnated Jester: Taming Players-Chapter 96: Mysterious Silhouette

<Quest VI: Get back to the Maskera before the apocalypse hits.

<Reward: My final evolution.

<Note: 368 days remaining. Failure means death.

"Whoaah," Jung exclaimed.

He was still in darkness.

Almost all of his senses were numb, but he was getting them back.

"I missed quests, but hot dangit, I wasn’t expecting that."

The situation didn’t look too good.

Four entire years went by in the real world.

It meant he had lost important time to better progress himself, and only one year remained.

Thinking about his parents and Elara, Jung realized something.

’She was older than me?’

He was reminded of his sister.

According to Lilia, Elara was older than him, which meant that maybe the same thing had happened to her.

"What if she was here, in this realm, before arriving at the academy, but time flowed differently? Is that even possible?"

He asked the system.

[Very much so,] she answered.

Her voice didn’t crack from laughing.

From the very beginning, she planned all of this, knowing what would happen, yet she did it anyway.

"Why did you bring me here?" Jung asked.

"You knew what would happen if I lost precious time, and four years is a long time. You better have a good reason, or I might have to doubt your intentions."

[This is an opportunity. HugeP would have come here, and the guild would have died out over and over until their accounts were crippled.]

She sounded confident.

Believing in her guess and trusting in Jung’s capabilities, she continued.

[But with you here, they won’t be as hopeless. Above all, you can get much stronger here than if you stayed in the real world.]

"It’s too risky," Jung said in a low tone.

[Are you afraid?]

"No way! I love it," he snorted and added. "Last evolution, huh?"

[I can’t wait...] she answered eagerly.

Staying with his thoughts, Jung stood by in silence for the light to return.

Ten seconds later, his vision gained clarity, and his ears caught sounds.

He also felt a fluffy animal on his shoulder.

"You awake?" she asked.

"What the hell do you mean, awake?" Jung questioned. freēnovelkiss.com

"You and these losers black out after we arrived here."

"But I was talking to Vex right now," he replied, lowering his brows.

"Weird," scowled the cat.

As Jung’s senses grew stronger, he stood up and darted his eyes, studying the surroundings.

He was in a snowy field.

Players lay around, and it seemed like they were in a deep sleep.

Snowshade was nowhere to be found. She was lost with no tracks left behind.

Jung noted her absence but couldn’t find her.

"Where is she?" he asked and got no answer from the system.

With no other options, he studied the space, noticing that snow and players weren’t the only things that covered the land.

Broken weapons of various kinds were scattered across the ground, and the sky was hidden by the thick fog.

Even the horizon was cloaked by the smog, and the temperature made his skin crawl.

The smell was absent, but it didn’t feel like Jung had lost it.

It was more of a lack of it altogether.

Instead, the air tasted like iron, making his head throb.

"I fuck with this place," he said.

[Weirdo.]

"Weirdo."

The system and the cat scowled in unison.

Ignoring them, Jung appraised the players, but after seeing their state, he chose to leave them.

For now...

First, he had to inspect the realm, and lingering for them to gain consciousness was asking for trouble.

"What’s there to do?" he asked himself, striding on a snowy hill.

Swords, spears, axes, daggers, maces, and scythes blanketed his every step.

Shattered, cracked, and rusted weapons showed their past glory, along with their present downfall.

They radiated the might of the divine.

Jung touched the coolest-looking axe with a blood imprint on it.

An uncontrolled, fleeting vision surfaced in his mind, but rather than an insight, he saw a person clad in darkness.

"The Ruler."

One thought emerged in his mind, and the longer he reflected, the more convinced he became.

"It was him. There is no doubt about that. Those weapons and this field are the path he left behind."

Sharing his theories with his companions, Jung was about to take another step when a new but familiar presence registered in his mind.

"It’s been a while."

Nero said it first.

She, like a grumpy old grandma and a lazy bum who was full of herself, especially after her curse was lifted, didn’t bother to walk.

Occupying Jung’s shoulder, she meowed and jumped down.

"It’s not as cold as I expected it to be," she said, scrutinizing monsters she and Jung knew fairly well.

"Nightmares," he muttered.

The abominations they had slain on the way to the academy.

Jung had believed that it had been a trial of the institute, but as it turned out, it was plotted by Walt and the ruler god.

It was a good move from them, completely deceiving Jung.

However, he wasn’t so easily fooled, and now that he knew who his targets were, he considered how to punish them.

Jung and Nero were approached by the monsters.

The latter left adorable paw prints on the snow and glared at them with vigour.

She was always unusually motivated when there was something to destroy.

Thus, she didn’t linger.

She hopped even before Jung threw Shadow Star and smacked the towering, dull, and sickening horror on the head.

The mist diminished the range of vision.

Yet, there was enough light to expose almost everything in a 10-meter radius.

Nightmares appeared somewhat different, but their previous inhuman pressure and glowing red circles never ceased to exist.

Jung had enough time to study them and followed Nero’s example.

He didn’t use his axe, though.

There were countless weapons scattered, and he wanted to try them.

Holding a metallic axe and dagger in his hand, his body was mutated to the core, gifting him with tremendous flexibility and power to dominate those lowly tier VI beasts.

Then, a brilliant idea visited his mind.

Slamming the axe to the ground, he tried to send shockwaves to knock his foes off balance.

Even though the snow absorbed most of his power, his strength was abundant, enabling him to perform his out-of-mind strategies.

The closest Nightmares stumbled to the ground.

They lost their footing, and Jung was upon them before they could get their shit together.

The rest was history, and his dagger and axe combo settled it.

’I think it’s about time to rank up my Shifting Cloud,’ he thought after the first kill.