Chương 46: Chapter 45 - Double Humiliation

- Look at the public ledger! You can see it all. There's no way Zhenyu didn't pay Artigan off to spare him. @ Milococo2 (unverified) - Manager's damned, disappointed in him. He has a safety too, should've gone out like a man. @ Ferdinale (Unverified) Chris did not enjoy holding down a Trial outpost in a monster infested forest with just their 'team'. He had told the Guild that, but did they listen? No, they believed that one team of three should be able to handle Sector Two monsters with the firearms available.

That might have been true. It would be less true if the current team attempting the Trial were to completely fuck it up. Then they'd have to flee and he'd be labeled as one of the adventurers who let the outpost fall, costing the Guild millions. Not that the team in the Trial was likely to fail. Valee was a right bitch but at least she was a competent lead with a competent team. Unlike him. He hated his 'team'.

"Oh, you're the [Rogue]," Chris mimed, "you've got [Dangersense] you can handle the guns, we're not Americans, we haven't touched guns before. We're real adventurers." Chris spat. His 'team' hadn't actually said that but it sure as hell felt like it. They were probably having sex somewhere. His senses could sometimes hear it if he focused. Sometimes, he didn't even need to focus to hear them. Humans that picked elves were always the worst.

His own pointy ears twitched as [Dangersense] went off for the third time that day. Chris picked up his bow instead of going for the mounted turret or the multiple firearms that were up here. He might as well grind out some skills. The [Rogue] scanned the cleared area around the outpost. It stretched about 150 feet, enough distance to handle most monsters with ease. Two dog-like monsters with far too many teeth broke into the clearing. They were sprinting full charge at the outpost.

Chris fired twice, two nearly perfect shots to slow both, then he kept firing arrows. They didn't even turn to flee, they kept running like their lives depending on it. It was weird but it didn't stop him from peppering them down until they died, not even halfway to the outpost. Damned monsters, something had spooked them all today. Probably two apex monsters fighting, or it was that damned bullipede bullying everything around. The Rising Yets were supposed to have dealt with that.

Fat chance of anyone else stepping up to do it now. Chris looked at the two dead demidogs and hesitated for a moment. At this point there were seven monster corpses outside and he was tempted. He almost considered asking his teammates to check if they were exchangeable but thought better of it. They'd probably ask for a cut and they didn't deserve it. Chris went down the ladder and left the outpost to check on the corpses. A voice called out as he approached the monsters. Chris froze as he heard it.

"Well, that's just really dumb." All the hair on Chris' neck rose as he felt a deathly chill run down his spine, he saw the figure slip out from the treeline only seventy feet away. They were walking casually towards him, a sinister smile on their face.

"B-blacklister!" Chris croaked, his voice cracking, "Artigan he's here!" All sense left him as he sprinted towards the outpost. He heard Artigan's footsteps ring out in his head. It was the only thing he could hear. Even in his panic it registered that he was doing exactly what the demidogs had done. Not that it changed anything. Run, run to safety, not his team but the outpost. There was a shotgun there- There was a numbing thud at his thigh and he stumbled.

He caught himself before falling as he kept sprinting–another knife hit him from behind. This time, Chris fell forward, in desperation, he spun while using a skill to maintain his momentum. [Backdash Shot] The blacklister raised a club to block it. Chris didn't try to shoot again as the skill regained his footing. But he was too slow; he'd never make it now, he raised his hands up, throwing away the bow. Pleading.

"Please, I thought you didn't kill people that didn't go after you." Artigan scoffed, his unnaturally handsome elven face in complete mockery to a natural elf like Chris.

"Never said anything about killing you did I? You ran before we could talk, that's pretty rude of you." The silver-haired devil grinned at him while holding an ivory club over his shoulder. Chris looked blankly at the club, it reminded him vaguely of that bullipede's tusk. The tusk that was coming down on his face. – Ryan dragged the unconscious guard into the outpost, he'd had to put the man on his shoulder as he climbed the ladder. Now, he was looking for this idiot's teammates.

He raised the unconscious body as a human shield but heard nothing… Then a moan. What?

"Oh yeah, this is going to be hilarious," Gamielle said darkly. Ryan was completely taken aback.

"A-are they doing what I think they are?" This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

"Trash." That was the reason why the guard had been alone in the tower and even tried exchanging the demidog without a lookout. Ryan had worried that it might have been some crazy ambush after they'd realized he was the one sending the monsters. He shook his head while looking at the unconscious guard.

"Poor guy, I feel bad now." It had taken two hits before he had managed to figure out the right force to knock a second realm [Rogue] unconscious. Frankly, he wasn't even sure if the hits were necessary with how terrified the guard was. He resaddled the unconscious body of the guard and went back down from the tower and dragged him through the outpost. The closer he got the louder the sounds became. Almost as if they wanted the entire outpost to hear. Ryan found the offending building and kicked down the door…

to find, yup, two naked bodies going at it. He gave them a brilliant smile.

"Hi!" He dumped the unconscious body on the ground.

"Teamkiller!" They exclaimed in horror.

"Oh nonono." Ryan said, shaking his head.

"I think this time, that's more on you guys," The dark elf woman jumped after a sword by the foot of the bed. Ryan was there quicker, his club coming down on her head. He knew just how hard he needed to hit this time. The more pale elven man put his hands up, shocked. Private bits on display for everyone to see.

"Please I surrender!" Ryan looked to both the knocked out adventurers, then looked at the surrendering elf. Then he shrugged.

"Eh, I think it's only fair to your teammates that I knock you out as well." – Chief Enforcer Ami was lounging on her chair eating an Amperdon Reuben steak sandwich, the cheese was in a perfect state of melt and the high quality meat made her moan. Surprisingly it was old Jecharim that had hand delivered it. As thanks for her role in the hostage situation. She hadn't expected that. She also hadn't expected Jecharim to be so tight lipped about Artigan himself.

One conversation with the old man made her realize there was no chance of her getting more information out of him. Maybe this sandwich was an apology for it. Her phone rang, interrupting her thoughts. Probably more people wanting an interview, Ami idly wondered if she could just not pick up. Then someone sprinted to the door to her office. She sat up.

"Chief Ami! Chief Ami! You need to see this." A Realmer in the employ of the enforcers brought her a laptop. On it was a new video, paused on the face of the elf that had caused the most amount of headache she'd suffered in her entire life.

"What is this?"

"It was a livestream, it ended a couple minutes ago. It was posted from the account of one of the adventurers from the Trial outpost." Ami pressed play, feeling more than a little trepidation. She checked her phone, more calls were coming in. What now? The video started with a display of two elven adventurers kneeling and looking down at the ground in shame. They had the bare minimum amount of clothes on and were chained in thick titanium. Something the enforcers used to restrain lower realm adventurers.

Artigan had his hood off, he marched back and forth between the two kneeling adventurers. There was an ivory club in his right hand and he was slapping it against the palm of his left hand. Like a police officer would with their baton. Artigan looked scornfully at the two elven adventurers.

"Now, I was cleaning up the forest of a particularly annoying insect," Artigan emphasized his ivory club like it explained everything. She finally recognized the club, it looked like the tusk of the bullipede. For a moment her mind went blank. Had Artigan soloed that bullipede? She wouldn't have tried that with an assault rifle. Maybe not even with a bazooka. Artigan continued.

"And I wanted to report my bounty to the outpost," he revealed a bounty poster of the bullipede he'd stolen from Zhenyu's team.

"But what do I find? A nearly abandoned outpost with only one guard on the tower." The unnaturally handsome elf shook his head full of silver hair.

"So I took it on myself to teach the Guild a lesson. You can't just leave your outpost undefended like this! What if some nasty person with ill intentions comes in and takes all your stuff?" The said nasty person changed the video from selfie mode to the rear camera. It was pointing at another guard, this one was at least standing with actual clothes. He was glaring daggers at the other two adventurers. Not daring to match eyes with Artigan.

"And so, like a good samaritan, I came to help test out your defenses and oh boy, I got to say." Artigan shook his head in disappointment, "Fail." He switched to selfie mode, it was in position to show both himself and the kneeling elves again.

"These two idiots," he kicked at the kneeling elves, "left poor old Chris here alone in the tower while they were… what's the word? Oh yes, banging each others' brains out." Artigan kneeled between the two adventurers and zoomed in on their faces.

"Seriously, Chris was here yelling and shouting for help and they didn't hear him at all." The two mostly nude adventurers blushed and looked away. Artigan changed the camera to look at Chris. The guard didn't stop glaring at the two.

"Now," Artigan continued, "my services for revealing such a major vulnerability and dealing out justice isn't free." Ami's heart clenched, hostages again. Fuck.

"So I decided to take these two lovers' money. I put half of that into Chris' account as an apology for his troubles." Ami blinked. That was unexpected…? She had been expecting another repeat of Ulverra's ransom situation. She paused the video as she looked at the Realmer.

"How much money was sent from their public wallets?"

"Over six hundred realmcoins." Ami coughed in surprise, then she understood. Nobody in leveled zones expected to get robbed, scratch that, no adventurer at lower realms expected to get mugged. Ever. The technology used was a public ledger, every transaction was public. While it was possible to launder the money. There was never a need to mug each other. Why bother stealing a couple coins when it would be a pittance compared to simply climbing up in realms?

This confidence had led to complacency, that complacency led to adventurers leaving the equivalent of hundreds of thousands of dollars in their public accounts. She continued the video, sighing, she made a mental note to make a public service announcement about that stolen money.

"I hope the public understands this and doesn't take away Chris's well deserved coins. He was the only one doing his job!" Ami sorely doubted Chris would get to keep any of his ill gotten gains. That was probably going to be a public headache on its own. Fortunately, that would be a Guild problem, not hers.

"But really," Artigan paused for effect, he gave the camera a wicked grin, "the fault of all of this lies with my biggest fan. Latarro." Her jaw dropped.

"Latarro, if it wasn't for you, this outpost would not have been so undefended." The silver haired, impossibly beautiful elf spread his arms and spun around slowly. The phone in selfie mode showed the outpost's entire arsenal lying neatly behind him. Holy fuck, they were going to need military drones to take back that outpost. Artigan spun faster, clearly enjoying himself amongst an arsenal fit to handle a Trial break.

"Rifles, shotguns and snipers! All of it here! There's even a mounted turret on the tower!" He laughed and grinned at the camera, continuing his monologue, "I would have never, ever have been able to take this outpost if Latarro hadn't lured all the adventurers away," Artigan put his free hand to his chest and gave the camera a heartfelt expression.

"From the bottom of my heart, I thank you so much." Ami was still open mouthed, Artigan was mocking an eighth realm adventurer and he was doing it well. Poor Latarro was going to be a laughingstock. Artigan switched to a more casual grin. Ami wished she could beat that little bastard's face black and blue with her own baton. The video cut to the blacklister placing the phone down. It stayed in a perfect angle to record him walking up the steps and into the Third Trial portal.

He looked back and gave the camera a graceful smile. Then he gave an exaggerated bow, a performer's bow, he looked up and nodded at the camera. Then he winked.

"See you in the next Sector, Latarro." – Gamielle cackled like mad as she recorded Ryan's bow. The arrogant little [Rogue] had some good ideas after all. Stupid as shit, but even so, this was the funniest thing she'd done in far, far too long.

"See you in the next Sector, Latarro." The [Mage] was holding the phone up and livestreaming the video, it had been flagged almost immediately, but she would just upload it everywhere else later. She was giving the smiling Ryan five ghostly thumbs up and making sure her own laughter wouldn't make it into the video. She was still watching the camera, making sure the angle was perfect as he turned around and heroically- [Instant Dodged] at full speed and into the portal. Gamielle's cackle stopped and she blinked.

There had still been more than thirty minutes left in their agreement.

"THAT MOTHERFU-"