Chapter 417: My Beautiful Stone Angel Servant

Luke sat in a wooden chair inside one of the village houses. A few hours had passed since breakfast, and the tension had finally drained away. Hard to believe that just a short time ago, every single one of them had been fighting for their lives against an army of undead.

The organizers of the settlement were trying to piece together what had happened while contacting authorities from the modern world. Statements were being taken. Most survivors kept praising some mysterious savior, a man wearing a stone mask. According to them, he was the one who had saved them all. Of course, none of them knew that man was Luke. Only Ronan and Luke’s group knew the truth.

“No… move… too much,” murmured Anne, soft voiced as always.

Luke kept still while the doll maid trimmed his hair.

“Not too short,” he warned her.

Anne loved cutting hair.

After his rank up, his hair had grown a lot. Not just his, everyone had experienced their own side effects, but his had exploded in length, falling past his shoulders. He was still adjusting to the new body. His strength fluctuated sometimes; his arm felt heavy one moment, weightless the next.

While he remained seated, he had his rank skill active.

[Soul Infiltration (Rank F)]: Your dense, assassin nature has given rise to this power. You can infiltrate a fragment of your soul into a target’s body. While infiltrated, you can see and hear everything they see and hear. Perfect for espionage, lethal for assassinations. However, the link breaks if your body moves too far from the target. Use with care… and purpose.

Through Jerry’s eyes, Luke watched the area outside. The range of his skill had increased dramatically, almost certainly because of the rank change. Even while chatting with Anne, he was observing the sky above the village, scanning for any sign of Jonathan or Quinn.

Hours passed without a trace of him. But Luke knew Jonathan. He might still be around, maybe wearing someone else’s face, maybe disguised as a member of Haven. Which was exactly why none of them got too close to anyone. Haven was searching for Allison, after all.

At least within their group, everyone was safe. Jonathan hadn’t copied any of their faces, and they had ways to prove their identities, unique skills only the real versions possessed.

Erza was somewhere outside. Anne continued trimming Luke’s hair and would move on to the others soon.

The door creaked open. Eleanor stepped in.

Luke was already tracking her through the Predator’s Mark. If he’d had enough mana during his fight with Jonathan, he could have marked him too. But he was almost certain the rank up would have erased it anyway; Jonathan’s body would have been reconstructed.

“How’s our trip to America looking?” Luke asked.

“It’s basically immigration,” Eleanor said. “First they need to contact the government association in each state. Teleportation only works if the other side approves the entry. They can’t just start sending people over without permission.”

She rubbed her forehead. “And apparently some important government officials want to talk to us. No idea why yet, but from what I heard, a lot of organizations have been waiting for our tutorial to end. It wasn’t just some game that gods watch every now and then.”

Allison was upstairs in one of the rooms. Luke, meanwhile, could think of only one thing: getting back to Maine. Her family could track her down eventually, and the thought gnawed at him. Not immediately, at least, not as far as they knew. Just because a god was aware she’d been in the tutorial didn’t mean that same god would bother contacting her family back on Earth. Gods didn’t concern themselves with mortal problems.

Which meant Allison could, for now, move on with her life. Her name would eventually surface in some report, and nobles would start asking questions. It was only a matter of days before someone discovered where she was.

“You’re really leaving today?” Eleanor asked.

“Of course. If I could leave this second, I would. I want to see my family more than anything,” he replied.

Jack was coming down the stairs, the next one in line for Anne’s help.

“All done,” Anne said to Luke.

She held a mirror out in front of him.

“It looks great,” he said. His long hair was now shoulder length, shorter but still fuller than the hair he had back on the day he accepted the system. He’d gotten used to the longer look.

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Luke pulled a gold coin from his pocket dimension and handed it to her.

“For you, Anne,” he said.

“Anne… has… very much money at home,” the doll replied.

Technically, she was a princess with her own kingdom. Gold wasn’t exactly scarce for her.

“It’s not about the money. It’s for the memory,” Luke said, pressing the coin gently into her hands. “Today is special. It’s the day we came back to Earth. The coin can at least mark the moment.”

“Thank you…” the maid doll murmured.