Chapter 45: Recruiting (1)

Doom, doom, doom…….

The sound of the drum calling the children together continued to echo.

The children who had finished their preparations began to gather one by one.

Around the enormous campfire, about sixty children assembled.

They naturally divided themselves by gender, and it wasn’t hard for me to spot Tirvaen among them.

“Kal hyung.”

At the sound of his name, Karls flinched.

Then he awkwardly responded to me.

“Uh, wha, what? What is it?”

“Huh?”

“No, what is it, say it.”

I smiled wryly and gestured with my eyes beyond the bonfire.

“Go bring En Nuna over here.”

“Y-yeah. Got it.”

Karls replied awkwardly and slipped away through the children.

That, too, made me want to laugh again.

‘Does he really dislike speaking informally to me that much?’

I had forbidden Karls from using honorifics with me since a little while ago.

Now his language center seemed broken, leaving him flailing like that.

‘Well, considering he spent years as a bodyguard knight for Gilloshian, asking him to speak informally all of a sudden must feel strange for someone as loyal as him.’

But rules are rules.

What else can he do?

As I smiled, a system message appeared.

[A large-scale event, ‘Rite of the Crimson Wind,’ is starting.]

[Qualified characters will join the event.]

The rite had begun.

The first phase of the event: forming teams of five.

The second: each person being assigned their ‘prey.’

And the last, the third…

‘Is to complete the hunt.’

Which meant I needed two more people to enter the Hunting Ground.

I wasn’t sure about one, but at least one was already decided.

“Everyone, pay attention!”

A deep, commanding voice burst forth from atop the dark cliff.

The ground trembled faintly, and the leaves of the trees quivered from the profound resonance of his tone.

There was a mage standing on black rock, looking down at us.

Cloaked in white, the person was a face I knew well.

‘The Revolutionary Army’s deputy commander and chief mage’

…Erek Kaid.

Although he was considered somewhat beneath the Vareshan Emperor, who had long since reached the level of 9 stars.

‘Even so, that man is a monster of the 9-star class.’

Just as Marquis Reith, despite being a little behind the other Three Swords, was superior in pure swordsmanship.

Erek Kaid might lack the Emperor’s combat power, but he was a mage with great strength in blessings and protective magic.

‘Of course, he’s overwhelmingly stronger than any other mage in the Revolutionary Army Camp.’

At any rate, someone of that caliber was presiding over the event in person.

“Ooh, it’s Deputy Commander Kaid!”

“Doesn’t the flow of mana feel different?”

“Just seeing him from afar feels like getting a buff!”

The kids were excited, buzzing with energy.

But I, who wasn’t affected by that, simply stayed in my place.

“……?”

For a brief moment.

I felt Erek’s gaze land on me.

He was tilting his head slightly, as if finding something about me strange.

But there was no need to worry.

[Character] Also called ‘White Flame.’ The Revolutionary Army’s deputy commander was born for magic—devoting his life to magic not of the Empire, but for his own.

He really is an idiot who knows nothing but magic, so he’s just reacting to the ‘Blessing of the Guardians’ I possess.

“All children participating in the Rite of the Crimson Wind, step forward!”

Turning his gaze away from me, Erek Kaid shouted loudly.

At his command, the children began to move.

Except for a few who had come to the camp only to support their siblings.

Step, step.

All the children set to undergo the coming-of-age rite crossed the bonfire and lined up.

Karls, who had brought Tirvaen, and I were now among them.

The pounding of nervous hearts among the children seemed to echo in my ears.

And then, Erek’s solemn voice signaled the start of the event.

“From now on, the Rite of the Crimson Wind shall commence. After overcoming this trial, each of you will be recognized as an adult and become pillars and foundations of our Revolutionary cause…”

Erek Kaid’s speech didn’t drag on like a principal’s address.

True to the Revolutionary Army’s style, it ended with a short but intense message.

“Succeed. Achieve it, even if you must give everything. Then you shall gain glory.”

“……!”

At his words, the flames of desire lit in the children’s eyes.

And someone in the ranks ignited that fire further.

“Let’s go!”

It was probably Hexter.

“Uwaaaaaah!”

But rather than fired up, I felt my blood run cold.

Erek’s words left a strange impression.

…Achieve it, even if you must give everything?

‘What a joke.’

If the goal requires children to give up everything to accomplish it, that’s already a flawed goal.

No goal is worth trading for the values of safety and survival.

At least, that’s the world I came from.

So, once again, I would tackle things my own way.

The way of a gamer.

The way only a Player traveling this world would understand.

“Now form teams of five!”

Erek Kaid’s voice thundered out from atop the dark cliff.

With that, the children began bustling about in earnest.

“Form teams with those you can trust. Once the rite begins, they will be the closest allies responsible for your survival.”

Erek’s words were on point.

The moment we left this camp, the children would be thrown into the wild to face Monsters.

At the same time, they’d each have their own tasks to complete.

‘That’s why you need reliable companions.’

Five was the perfect number.

‘One tanker, two dealers, two healers.’

Or, you could swap the number of tankers and dealers.

Either way, it was a solid team composition.

It was the right size to quietly explore the Hunting Ground, ensure basic survival, and track down assigned prey.

In other words, it was the minimum number for Monster hunting, but still few enough that you could pull out if things went wrong.

So, the children were scrambling to find teammates.

“Anyone know a reliable support for the rear? Someone we can trust!”

“We just need one for the front lines!”

Of course, hardly anyone was looking to form an entire five-man team here.

Most of the wandering children were short one or two people and doing their best to fill those spots.

‘Now that I think about it, that’s only natural.’

Children of the Revolutionary Army Camp wouldn’t have come in blind to the rite’s procedures and contents… In fact, you could easily prearrange a team with others beforehand.

So, most of the children already had teams.

Of course, not everyone could manage that.

Everyone has their circumstances and unexpected situations arise.

“Hey! Get lost! Remarte is in our team!”

…Like now.

People could snatch or lose teammates right up to the last minute.

“Come on, the rite hasn’t even started and you’re already pulling this?”

“You thieves!”

“Hey, Remarte! Join us, and your prey will be our top priority. What do you say?”

“Ooh, really?”

Here was the problem.

A team of five would hunt their prey together—but there had to be a sequence to it.

After all, Monsters’ habitats were scattered throughout the forest.

So what if all five had different prey?

‘Naturally, everyone wants their own prey to be first.’

In reality, success rates dropped from the first to the fifth target.

The longer you spent in the forest, the more exhausted you became.

It was inevitable that strength for the next hunt would wane.

‘If someone was injured or dropped out in the earlier rounds, the drop in success rate would be even worse.’

That was a sly trick built into the Rite of the Crimson Wind.

‘If you received your prey first, then made a team, things would be easier.’

That way, you could team up with those who got similar prey, for sure.

But now it was the other way around, so chaos was inevitable.

But…

‘That chaos is the real goal of this rite.’

That’s how I saw it.

To create greater confusion and more intense conflict among the children.

‘Those who resolve that well will achieve better results.’

That’s what they were aiming for.

Thanks to this, kids without a perfect team were desperately hustling, using this as bait.

Most of the children were finding teams just then, when Karls quietly spoke up.

“Your High—…”

“Ahem! Ahem! Ahem!”

I feigned a noisy cough as if I hadn’t heard, and Karls, hesitating, quickly changed his words.

“Your High— the moon and stars in the sky are so bright and beautiful, Shian?”

Moon and stars, my foot.

Tirvaen, who’d briefly widened her eyes, giggled.

“The stars are barely visible through the clouds, Karls oppa.”

The little witch instantly grasped the situation and teased Karls.

But Karls still struggled to speak informally to me, mumbling awkwardly.

What a cute guy.

I quietly smiled and drew out his real intention.

“Hyung, you want to ask how we’ll fill our team, right?”

Karls nodded furiously.

With the other kids forming teams, he clearly wanted us to recruit two more.

To complete the quest, we needed a group of five to enter the Hunting Ground.

But we couldn’t take just anyone—we needed trustworthy ones.

As Tirvaen said.

Once the rite began, anything that happened would be out of our hands.

‘If you mistook a teammate for prey and killed them… it would just be treated as an accident during the hunt.’

Such risk was unavoidable, because the Rite of the Crimson Wind itself was a great hunt.

So, before the rite started, it was important to get to know the other kids.

To build rapport early and secure the needed roles.

But this time, I skipped that step.

In truth, I had a secret weapon.

One of my future teammates was a peculiar guy, one where getting closer beforehand would actually backfire.

“Where could he be? Ah, there.”

Scanning the camp, I found him easily.

My ‘secret weapon’ was digging the ground in his spot.

A young mage unable to recruit a team or even do anything.

At the same time, a pitiful boy receiving no attention from any team.

His name was ‘Barel Hejit.’

[Character] Also called ‘Lightning’s Master.’ With erratic talent and physical disabilities, he suffered a difficult childhood, but eventually becomes the Revolutionary Army’s strongest mage.

‘Of course, that’s only if this scenario for this faction unfolds smoothly.’

Regardless, he was the greatest prospect in the whole Revolutionary Army Camp.

Even if no one recognized his value now.

‘I know.’

I slowly walked over to the boy sitting alone.

And tapped his shoulder.

Barel seemed to have already sensed me coming, showing no surprise.

He just looked up at me warily.

I pointed at the staff in his hand and spoke slowly, enunciating each word.

“We need an attack mage. Want to join if you’re okay with it?”

No answer, but his small hands fidgeted.

So, I repeated myself.

“It’s fine. Come with us.”

Still, he gestured again.

My response was unchanged.

“It doesn’t matter. As long as you’re good at magic.”

After a moment’s silence, the boy began to cry softly.

“Kkuh, uh, uh…”

As always, his cries sounded odd.

Barel, who couldn’t hear, had never learned how to make sounds.

For a mage, it was an immense penalty.

But this boy would overcome it all and become the Revolutionary Army’s strongest mage.

I knew that.

“Let’s do our best together.”

—Me too.

And so, the voiceless boy mage, ‘Barel Hejit,’ joined our team.