Chapter 48

“So, it is a no after all. In that case, it cannot be helped.”

‘What?’

“It is too bad. We are disappointed, but since we can’t force you about this, we understand. Are you going to go slay Sarantis now?”

“Uh, yes. I was going to go say goodbye to others first, and…”

“I see. In that case, I guess this will be the last time.”

Filder raised his hand. It was out of the blue, so Vulcan awkwardly accepted his handshake. The rest of The Six each gave Vulcan a handshake.

“Hey rascal. Now that you are finally going back home, live well there, all right?”

“Kulhulhul… You will start to miss this place after living peacefully for about 200 years.”

“Of all people I have met, you are the best. It is disappointing, but please be happy in your home world.”

Folken, Beruneru and Meruham gave good words to Vulcan.

The atmosphere was far friendlier than Vulcan ever imagined. He put up an awkward expression on his face because of that, but still, he couldn’t afford to inquire and say, ‘just what do you have up on your sleeve?’

“Are you going to go now? It would be fine if you stayed a little while longer…”

“Ah, yes. I’ll be going right away.”

“I see. Afterall, farewells are better when it is shorter.”

Filder said with a refreshing smile as always.

“Please have a safe journey back home.”

“…”

Vulcan bowed properly and opened the pub’s door.

A loud bump noise was heard as the pub’s door closed.

Looking at the firmly closed door, Beruneru said,

“He left.”

“He did.”

“Kulhulhul. Well, I figured he would not accept it right away, but it is too bad.”

Beruneru worked up his appetite and said again. On the other hand, Filder received Beruneru's words without a trace of disappointment on his face.

“Afterall, we all knew this was going to happen, didn’t we? He isn’t some old man that had enjoyed everything that life had to offer. He isn’t someone obsessed with becoming stronger either. His choice was obvious.”

Filder swung his hand and used telekinesis. Various drinks and teas that were to The Six’s likings were placed.

Logweed said,

“Well, I wonder how long it will take him. Well, I am sick of waiting, but…”

“Hm… Maybe 100 years will be enough?”

“Each dimension has different time frames, so I can’t know for certain. If we have foul luck, we may have to wait several hundred years. If we are lucky, it could be just 10 years before he returns.”

“Well, whether it is before he dies or after the lower dimension disappears, someday, he will come back.”

“That’s right. As long as he doesn’t go to the enlightened world, that is. Still, I don’t think we will have to worry about that possibility at all.”

Filder said as he smiled.

“No matter how late, he will probably come back within five thousand years.”

***

Having left the pub, Vulcan cringed and mumbled.

“What the hell?”

Until just a moment ago, the atmosphere was not like this at all. The expressions on their faces were desperate. They were enough to make Vulcan worry that they might force him if he refused.

It was to the point Vulcan was wondering if he should use the Beast Transformation and Spirit Form together and run away.

However, on the contrary, they let Vulcan go in a clean manner.

When he looked back just before he left the pub, The Six all had peaceful expressions on their faces to send him off as if they practiced beforehand.

‘Do they have some kind of scheme?’

Vulcan agonized over it for a moment.

However, no matter how how hard he thought about it, there wasn’t anything strange that he could think of.

‘Ah, that’s right. I decided to not think too hard about things to such convoluted details.’

Vulcan shook his head very hard. He emptied his thoughts and walked toward Jake’s residence.

When he opened the door, as expected, there were Jake and Dokgo Hoo greeting him. It wasn’t just them. There were also Lee Jung-yup and Jang Ho waiting for him.

“Oh, you got out of there so fast!”

“Huhu. Looks like the master went easy on you.”

“Please cut the nonsense.”

Vulcan dove into the sofa as if he was being sucked into it. He said as he looked at Dokgo Hoo.

“I’ll be leaving this place now.

“Is that so?”

“Um.”

“… Already.”

Dokgo Hoo received Vulcan’s words as if it wasn’t hard to accept it.

In the contrary, it was Lee Jung-yup and Jang Ho who were more agitated.

‘Could it be because they were tied to the Beloong City for a long time?’

Vulcan couldn’t tell. He didn’t actually want to know either.

“After all, it looks like you have become extremely powerful. I don’t think I will be a match against you. I always thought you were like a fiend since the first time I saw you, but you really are a crazy bastard. Kuhahahaha!”

“You certainly are incredible. Everyone that I have invested in eventually graduated, but… You are the first one to grow so fast.”

The atmosphere suddenly turned into full out flattery toward Vulcan. It was making him blush, so he changed the subject to the Order of Virtue.

“Anyway. What will happen to the Order of Virtue and the Holy Denomination of War? It doesn’t matter to me since I’ll be leaving, but what about you, Big Brother? Will there be something like them attempting to seek revenge against you?”

Lee Jung-yup, the one who was keeping silence until now, explained.

“That probably won’t happen. There’s hardly anyone that knew about the bad-blood between you and Bellon. The Denomination will probably continue with another as the leader.”

“Hm.”

“As for the Order of Virtue… All of the people that had bad-blood with you were its core figures, so the Order is in quite a chaos right now. They are lacking focus at the moment. Since everyone that hated you or Dokgo Hoo are dead, everything will be fine once Ho-Gwang is dead.”

“Looks like you are about to go kill Ho-Gwang any minute.”

“That’s obvious. Since you started on your vengeance spree, you should see through it to the end.”

Vulcan looked at Lee Jung-yup directly.

The expression on Lee Jung-yup looked very confident. It looked like he had the whole battle against Ho-Gwang already planned out.

‘In the end, is he the one that is the happiest in this situation?’

It looked like Lee Jung-yup also had quite a few followers. It looked like he could take over the Order if he wanted.

Vulcan didn’t like that about him.

It was true that he helped Vulcan, but Lee Jung-yup’s first impression was not that great, and even now, Vulcan and Lee Jung-yup were not in great terms either.

It was just a temporary joining of forces with a common goal.

‘Also, I won’t know for certain, but… In middle of all this, he may have worked his scheme somehow.’

There was no proof.

It could be that Vulcan was thinking about such things because Lee Jung-yup was such an eyesore to him. Still, it felt like it would frusturate Vulcan to no end if he left things as it was.

Vulcan stood up from the sofa abruptly. He took steps to walk to the front of Lee Jung-yup and said to him,

“Lee Jung-yup.”

“Huh?”

BAAM!

“Kuurrc!”

“What the hell! What are you doing?”

Lee Jung-yup’s chin was struck by Vulcan’s fist. Lee Jung-yup’s head tilted up toward the sky.

After seeing three of his teeth flying off, Vulcan felt so much better. The frustration he felt inside was relieved.

Vulcan turned his head and looked at Jang Ho once and redirected his gaze again to lock it on Lee Jung-yup.

Shivering in fear, Lee Jung-yup looked at Vulcan. With a confused face, Lee Jung-yup asked Vulcan,

“W… Why?”

“It’s just that you are an eyesore.”

It was too much of a bother for Vulcan to explain every little detail. Instead, he threw him a question.

“You have something you have done wrong to me, don’t you?”

“…”

Lee Jung-yup glared at Vulcan without saying a word.

Looking at the expression on his face was not enough to figure out if Lee Jung-yup was hiding something or not.

“Well, if you don’t want to tell me, that’s fine. Let’s just say it is now all even with the punch I just gave you.”

“… All right.”

‘This runt. Looks like there really was something.’

Vulcan retrieved his gaze away from Lee Jung-yup. Now, Vulcan started talking to Dokgo Hoo, the one who was laughing on the side.

“Big Brother.”

“Yeah?”

–    It’s possible Lee Jung-yup could do something shady, so please always be careful.

Hearing the telepathic message all of sudden made Dokgo Hoo’s eyes open wide.

–    What is it. Is he scheming something?

–    It’s just that he is a real eyesore. I could never tell what he is thinking too.

–    That’s true.

Dokgo Hoo cringed for a moment. However, he broke into a big laughter again and slapped Vulcan’s back loudly.

“Haha. I’ll take care of my own business, so, Little Brother, you do what you need to do.”

“Well, I guess that’s true.”

Afterall, Dokgo Hoo have lived for a much longer time than Vulcan. Although Dokgo Hoo looked like a simple man, he lived as a mountain bandit for several decades. Vulcan figured Dokgo Hoo will be able to handle things on his own.

Vulcan looked at Jake.

It just occurred to him that Jake was the very first person that he ran into first in Asgard.

“Anyway, it looks like everything was concluded well, so I’ll be going now.”

“All right. By the way, give me all of the items you found in the Underground Graveyard before you go.”

“Ah, right.”

It was as expected of a merchant. He was meticulous.

Vulcan opened the inventory and handed over the items that he didn’t have the chance to give until now.

Afterall, they were items he won’t be needing once he returned to Earth. He poured everything to the floor except the best equipment he currently had on. Looking at the items made the tips of Jake’s mouth to tilt up.

Jake smiled as he gathered the items.

After collecting the very last item, he brought out a human-sized item from his inventory.

It was sparkling magnificently.

It was gold.

“Huhu. Huhuhu.”

“You like it that much?”

“Of course. How could anybody not like gold?”

“People that don't care for gold are all here. It’s useless in a place like Beloong City.”

“That’s why I’ll put it to a good use. Looks like I won’t have to worry about money ever again once I return home.”

It was a perfect give and take.

Vulcan, excited and happy, placed the lump of gold in his inventory.

With a somewhat awkward face, he put forth his hand to shake Jake’s hand.

“Thank you for all of your help until now.”

“Well, instead of calling it help, it would be right to say we had a clean trade.”

“Is that the case?”

“That’s right. I profited a lot from it, and you gained everything you wanted in the process as well.”

“Anyhow, still, thank you. I can’t think of anything in particular to say in this kind of instance.”

“All right. Live well when you return to your home world.”

Vulcan and Jake exchanged a firm handshake.

Having said his very last farewell, Vulcan looked back for the last time as he opened the door.

“Everyone, please take care.”

Jake and Dokgo Hoo waved their hands to say farewell.

Vulcan closed the door.

“Phew…”

After leaving Jake’s residence, Vulcan, out of nostalgia, watched Beloong City’s streets.

He was here for close to six years in this city. He was sick of the place, but now that he was about to leave the place, in a corner of his mind, he felt like he was going to miss this place just a little.

Like that, Vulcan watched the streets for a few more minutes. It was right around when he made up his mind and started to walk.

There was a man that was approaching toward Vulcan.

“Vulcan.”

“… Uruo.”

It was the most unexpected.

Vulcan went straight to the point.

“I don’t think the things between us ended very well. Did you come here to see me?”

“How did you become so strong?”

“…”

Uruo went straight to the point faster than Vulcan.

When Vulcan just stood there without saying anything, Uruo asked again.

“I know we have bad-bloods. Still… If you are going to leave Act 1, that means all connections you have to this place will be gone. As a Player… If you could give me one last advice, I’ll be grateful for the rest of my life.”

At first, Vulcan thought this was ridiculous. He also was getting annoyed a little. However, in the end, he could understand Uruo a little. Vulcan thought it was strange that he could, but he did nevertheless.

‘Could it be that he was so desperate?’

Excluding Vulcan, among all Players, Uruo was a figure who was overwhelmingly stronger than others. He would be losing face if he sought advice from someone that was ahead of him or some other places.

Vulcan steadily fixed his gaze on Uruo.

Vulcan was still annoyed a little, but Uruo was someone that Vulcan would never have to see again after this.

Out of whim, Vulcan decided to be generous to Uruo.

“Go beg Beruneru for a whole day and ask him to teach you the traditional magic, starting with the basics. If you are lucky… you might be able to gain something.”

Having said it, Vulcan was just about to walk past Uruo, but he turned around. Vulcan punched Uruo on the pit of the stomach.

“Kuuk. Kuurk!”

“You are an eyesore just like him, so let’s call it even with this.”

Vulcan said to Uruo who was suffering in pain. Vulcan turned around.

Pazizizik

Vulcan activated the Thunder God’s Might and quickly got out through the north gate.