Surviving The Game As A Barbarian Novel - Chapter 722
Chapter 722: Terminal (1)
Who am I?
A stale question and one that she was sick and tired of asking. And yet, Versyl Gowland found that she asked herself it more and more these days.
Because genuinely…
Who…am I?
It was once an easy question she could answer without hesitation, back when she was first dragged here. Back before she had lived for over a decade with this name.
The answer didn’t come so easily to her anymore.
Am I…
The caucasian woman who worked on New York’s Wall Street?
Or was she the wizard who lived in the labyrinth city?
I don’t know…
She truly didn’t know. That was why she used the process of elimination.
If she was the former, then there were a few sticking points she couldn’t ignore. The woman who worked in Wall Street wouldn’t have gotten angry no matter how many so-called NPCs died during the Ice Rock Expedition. The same went for now. The selfish woman who only knew how to take care of herself would have never been so desperate to guarantee not just her own survival but their survival as well.
What should I do?
Gowland’s gaze drifted to one spot out of habit. However, the only thing waiting for her there was the emptiness that had persistently taken his place for the past few days. He, who seemed to always find the correct path forward no matter the situation, was nowhere to be seen.
And that was exactly why.
“Focus, Gowland! Keep this up, and we’ll all die!”
She cleared her mind before it could crumble under the pressure.
“If you can’t do it, I can take command—”
“Don’t worry.”
“Huh?”
“I’m ready now.”
In a sense, their situation wasn’t that complex. During the war, the main forces abandoned the adventurers at the front line and retreated, and that was why they had been left here in the middle of the battlefield.
“How many are missing?”
“Sven Parav, Lilith Marrone, Auyen Rockrobe, Emily Raines… These four for now.”
She was coming unraveled, worried about the allies who had been separated from them during the chaos, yet at the end of the day, she didn’t have time to worry about that.
I can only hope that they’re safe.
With that, Versyl Gowland steeled her resolve.
“Ahhhhh! S-save me…!”
“The front is closing in on us! We won’t be able to hold out for long!”
“What about reinforcements?! Are we really alone here?”
“You morons! D-don’t run away! Fight until the end!”
Although the many adventurer clans assigned to the front lines were covering each other’s backs, it was clear the line would collapse at this rate.
“Mr. Kaislan, call for any clan leaders… No, it doesn’t have to be the leaders. Just summon anyone with authority who is fighting here with us.”
“What are you planning?”
“Just once…we’ll all join forces and open a path forward.”
She knew that countless sacrifices would need to be made along the way. But what of it? If they didn’t get moving, everyone here would die.
“I see…” Kaislan nodded in agreement. Then he sharply pointed out, “But will they listen to us?”
She was well aware that they might very well ignore their call, but the answer was unexpectedly easy to find.
Because it was the path that barbarians would have chosen.
“Tell them that our Anabada Clan will be at the very front. And do let them know that we’ll be leaving them behind if they don’t follow us.”
Kaislan paused, staring at her as if she’d reminded him of someone. He then asked one more question.
“Then is our plan to break free from the encirclement and head toward the royal capital?”
Rather than asking because he genuinely didn’t know, it was more like he was asking for confirmation. The king was at the royal capital, after all, so the royal capital was naturally the safest location to be during the war.
“No. We won’t be heading that way,” Versyl said with a shake of her head. “We will head toward the holy land.”
“The holy land?” Though he was openly surprised at the decision, Kaislan didn’t oppose her. In fact, his surprise quickly melted into an accepting smirk. “Now I understand why Yandel put you in the vice-captain position.”
She hesitated. “Is that a compliment?”
“Of course.”
Kaislan sprinted off to relay the message to the other clans on the battlefield. As she watched him go, Versyl felt her determination beat true once again.
How rare it was, she thought, to feel so passionate about something.
It must be done…
But she had to return alive. While saving as many people as she could.
***
The screen was so large it stretched wall to wall.
The audio system was perfect.
The video was so lifelike that just watching it made my palms sweaty.
If I had popcorn here, it would’ve been perfect, if not for the fact that it was my allies in that video.
Beep!
The moment Versyl and Kaislan were about to have another personal conversation, the King of the New World paused the video.
“Looks like your underlings have a good impression of you.”
Underlings…
I wanted to push back against that word, but I swallowed the protest. Seeing this, the king smirked.
“It seems you have a lot you want to say.”
I couldn’t deny that.
Why did he play that video? Why did he pause there? And how did he record all this?
There were countless more questions I wanted to ask. However, if I were to choose the question that I wanted answered the most among them, it had to be this one.
“When… When is this?”
Was this a live feed, or was it a recording of something long past?
That was the most important thing to me at that moment.
“Quite a sharp question. Impressive,” the King of the New World complimented, not hiding his satisfaction. However, praising me and answering my questions were two different things. “However, where’s the fun in just giving you the answer?”
This damn hedonist.
As I imagined myself tearing into the king, he asked me a question in turn.
“What do you think?”
Uh…
“No, I’ll change the question. What do you wish it to be?”
I want that scene to be happening right now.
“Hahaha!” The King of the New World let out a mocking laugh at my honest answer. “Because the past cannot be changed?”
I paused. “Yeah.”
The king suddenly burst into another fit of laughter. “Haha! Hahaha!”
It went beyond mocking. It was straight-up ridicule.
As the subject of his laughter, I couldn’t help but feel angry and frustrated, but what could I do?
Crack…
I just had to hold it in.
“Ahaha. Sorry, sorry. It’s been a while, you know, since I had so much fun talking with someone.”
Thankfully, he didn’t laugh for that long. Once he’d calmed down, the king tilted his head from side to side as he muttered, “Alright, what shall I do? You did make me genuinely laugh for the first time in a while. I can’t just ignore that… Oh! Maybe I’ll give you the answer as your reward?”
Uh…
Really?
Without even realizing it, I sent him a look of anticipation through the silk, and he gave me the answer without fanfare.
“What I just showed you before is a recording.”
“When was it made?”
“Let’s see… When was it?” the king mumbled.
The knight standing in front of him was the one who answered. “It was when Your Majesty was playing board games with Baron Yandel.”
“Ah, was it?”
So while I was enjoying my time with him, my allies were fighting for their lives on the front line.
Even as my heart sank heavy with the truth, my mind quickly began to run through the calculations.
I played board games on the second day, and since this is the fourth day…
The video was recorded two days ago. In other words, no matter who died in that video, I wouldn’t be able to intervene.
“You look both regretful and angry.”
I didn’t respond.
“Still, if it’s any consolation, nothing would’ve changed even if that wasn’t a recording.”
That caught my attention. “What?”
“You wouldn’t have been able to change anything.”
When I remained silent at those words, the King of the New World tilted his head again.
“Ah, maybe that was too direct to be consoling? I’m a T, not an F, haha.”
Anger surged from within me. Even though he was just an otherworlder, he casually threw out mention of personality tests as if it was nothing. That was how he talked about everything.
Yet even then, it would be too reckless for me to act like a barbarian.
I kept my mouth and made no move to respond. The king seemed to find that boring, as he resumed the video.
Beep!
The figures in the paused video began to move again, and they continued to fight with all their might.
My heart thumped at the sight.
No, in truth, it had been racing for a while now.
Ba-dump!
I watched, scanning the frame to see if my allies would get hit by an arrow or a spell, if the front line would suddenly collapse and they would be put in the worst-case scenario…
If someone got hurt at the front and died.
“Sven Parav, Lilith Marrone, Auyen Rockrobe, Emily Raines… These four for now.”
And if those four who had been separated from the rest and gone missing were safe.
The thought of it left my fists clenching tighter and tighter. In the end, the more I thought about it, the less I could escape from the realization that it was all I could do.
And so I thought it over again and again, trying to think of anything else I could do right here and now.
“Oh, hey, it’s already the fourth day… You only have to last another three days.”
Three more days until the promised week was over. However, the remaining time didn’t matter.
Why did the King of the New World use one of the five requests he had on me to force me into keeping him company for a week? Was it simply because he wanted to keep my hands tied and see me suffer?
Tap, tap…
Well, that might be the case. However, I had gotten to know what type of person he was in our short time together. I was sure that was not the case.
That meant there was another reason. What was it?
Tap, tap…
When I thought from the perspective of the king, one plausible theory came to mind. I wasn’t sure of it yet, but…
“Guess you just can’t focus. Oh, is it because this part isn’t entertaining?”
The king grabbed the remote again and paused the video.
“Just tell me if you don’t want to watch it,” he offered. “I don’t mind just talking and playing games with you.”
I slowly shook my head, then straightforwardly asked him, “Are there…any among my allies who have died?”
“If you’re curious about that, why don’t you just watch the video?”
“Please answer me,” I implored.
For a moment, the King of the New World was silent.
Since I could only see his silhouette through the silk, I couldn’t read his expression. However, it wasn’t hard for me to guess that he was very pleased.
It turned out that guess wasn’t wrong.
“The way you speak… You’ve gotten more polite now.”
I could tell from his voice that the change was unexpected but satisfactory. It was that tone that made me sure of my previous guess.
“Have any of them died yet?”
“None… Yet.”
He was trying to tame me. That was what he was doing right now.
He pressed me for a reply. “And so he says?”
“I see.”
I nodded quietly while the king sat back and enjoyed the turn of events. Once more, I kneeled and lifted my head to look up at him like a servant would, then asked him a final straightforward question.
“Your Majesty, what must I do to return to the side of my allies?”
It was a theatrical tone, one that I had never needed to adopt since I was born, let alone since I became a barbarian.
A moment of silence ensued, broken finally when the King of the New World answered me.
“Hmm, I expected you’d take until the fifth day.”
I didn’t know why.
It wasn’t as if he changed the way he spoke or as if something changed in our surroundings.
“I mean, seriously… Is this what you get with smart people…?”
So then, why did I feel a chill down my spine when I heard him speak?
There was no telling, but with those words, the silk veil that had gone untouched for the last four days was finally moved to the side.
The King of the New World stepped down the steps through the silk. He then swung his arm in a circle like it was stiff as he headed toward the door.
“Hah… It’s suffocating just sitting around in this room all the time. What are you doing? Aren’t you coming?”
“Uh…”
“Let’s walk and talk. I have something to show you.”
“Oh, uh… Alright…”
I didn’t know how to respond and just followed him in a daze.
It couldn’t be helped.
This…is the King of the New World?
I knew that face.
The King of the New World looked just like someone that I knew.
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