One-Eyed Monster

Igor watched it all quietly.

Right now he couldn’t help at all.

The reason he was this relaxed wasn’t that the enemy was so overwhelmingly strong that he couldn’t intervene, but that his companions were simply too capable, not leaving him any chance to strike.

These ambushers were all people adept at hiding their movements. Whether they were using some kind of Stealth Ability or some other method, in any case they had concealed their bodies very well.

But this kind of situation didn’t stump Amoon and Douglas. The two of them seemed to have a kind of innate tacit understanding—one exchanged glance and they were already moving.

Douglas was a Hunter; he also concealed his own figure. He was going to drag all of these people out from within the unseen, to see who they really were!

”Our luck’s pretty good, huh. We were just fretting over not having any leads, and now the clues deliver themselves to our door. The black hand behind the scenes is bound to be dragged out along with them!” Amoon was clearly excited, quite looking forward to these enemies.

Was this attitude because the enemies were too weak? Igor couldn’t help wondering. He kept feeling that at this stage, they shouldn’t be running into any small fry units anymore, so encountering something like this now didn’t seem very likely.

Igor also felt this was a rather suitable moment for him to study in earnest. Right now he wanted to carefully watch how senior Douglas and senior Amoon handled these enemies.

And enemies he couldn’t even see.

These enemies hid their bodies, attacking with ranged weapons; close combat didn’t seem to be their strong suit.

Igor’s Spirit Sensing hadn’t caught those hidden flows of Energy right away. If not for senior Douglas, he very likely would have been hit by that arrow just now.

This was a very serious matter; it showed that his strength was still far from enough, that he couldn’t naturally perceive danger approaching.

He still had a lot to learn!

At that moment Igor suddenly felt extremely muddled, his faint sense of presence being wiped out yet again.

He even started to doubt how he had managed to walk all the way to Mist Town alone before. With so many dangers around, why hadn’t any of them come looking for him then? Why had things become so complicated now? He himself was a simple person…

The more Igor thought, the more tangled it became; the situation before his eyes grew increasingly incomprehensible. Gradually, he felt as if he were drifting outside this world.

His sense of existence was terribly feeble, as if he were being overlooked. Just like in this scene now—whether he was here or not didn’t make any difference at all.

This wasn’t the first time something like this had happened. It had kept happening in the past as well. Back then he felt he still had room to grow, so he hadn’t paid much attention to it.

But now, as time went on, he felt many things weren’t like he’d imagined. Maybe he truly was just not capable enough. Maybe he shouldn’t have had this kind of dream at all. Maybe he should have stayed back home chopping wood with his old man…

All this left him feeling helpless, yet deep down Igor still felt a bit unwilling to accept it. He felt he ought to keep moving forward, but given the situation now he was caught in a dilemma. It was a very conflicted feeling, and with someone as conflicted as Igor involved, everything became even more complicated.

Igor knew this was a good time to learn, but he felt he’d already lost the ability to understand. He couldn’t grasp what the essence of all this was. What exactly should he do? Where had he come from, where was he supposed to go…

It was as if his very existence was superfluous, as if he were just someone optional. That arrow a moment ago should’ve simply killed him outright.

Yet why was he still standing here? That was a question very much worth pondering!

Igor’s head felt like it was about to explode; he felt he was being tortured to collapse by this question.

On the surface, this kind of thing wasn’t a big deal, because Igor himself felt it wouldn’t affect anyone else. It wasn’t as if he had no way to survive on this road; it was just that he was not resigned in his heart, felt he shouldn’t be like this.

The dream of being an Adventurer, sometimes far away, sometimes close at hand—this feeling left Igor even more conflicted. He’d always been a hesitant person to begin with, and now this issue was making him even more conflicted.

While he was mired in these trivial thoughts, Amoon and Douglas were engaged in battle with those ambushers. It was just that these people were all in the dark, he couldn’t see them, and they couldn’t threaten Igor either, because Douglas and Amoon already had countermeasures in place.

Whoever you were, the scene at this moment would definitely look bizarre…

A teenage boy standing there in a daze, a shaggy-haired drunkard seeming to be in the midst of a fit, scribbling constantly on the ground, and around them silhouettes of people would flash now and then, and occasionally one or two beasts would leap out—everything popping out seemed to be falling from the sky.

The dazed boy seemed to have very heavy worries on his mind, not moving at all, like a ghost.

”Hey!” Amoon suddenly called out to rouse Igor from his fog.

The shout made Igor start.

”What are you doing?” Amoon asked, concerned. Igor’s state was clearly not normal, which made Amoon ask him while he had a spare moment.

”I…” Igor obviously didn’t know what he was doing either. He was completely in a bewildered daze; just now he seemed to have been searching for his own sense of existence.

”Quit spacing out and help us lock down these clues. Don’t let this bunch get away!” Amoon signaled for Igor to hurry up and lend a hand.

In fact, Igor knew they didn’t really need his help right now, because Amoon and Douglas already had everything under control—otherwise Amoon wouldn’t even have had time to say these comforting words to him.

But since his senior had given him a choice, he couldn’t just be tactless. He snapped to attention in an instant; he would sort out his own issues slowly later. He couldn’t sink into gloom at a moment like this.

Igor broke into a smile. He felt it was better to stay optimistic; excessive pessimism wouldn’t solve his problems anyway, so he might as well accept everything with a lighter heart.

”Don’t worry, senior, I’ll keep a good eye on these guys.”

As he spoke, Douglas had already come over to them, his arms full of stuff. The title of master thief really wasn’t just for show.

The things in Douglas’s hands all seemed to be artifacts. Clearly he had found where those hidden people were and successfully stolen these items off them.

These things seemed to be their weapons, because after Douglas revealed his figure again, no more arrows came shooting out from the surroundings…