Chapter 218 – Time to go back.

“Here.”

“Thank you, so you are really going to stay behind?”

“Yes, this runic tower will help us against the evil heretics! I must thank you for lending me your runic expertise.”

“Is that so…”

Roland bowed before the golden-haired woman that was now looking a lot better. She was not a tier 3 class holder for nothing as within half a day she had recovered all of her lost health and stamina.

They had remained in the village until the next day. There were many injured people which required them to use up all of their healing potions that still remained. Luckily the next city wasn’t far away and the lands were now protected by the Valerian noble house. Running into bandits would be even less likely than having another cultist encounter.

During this time he had explained about the strange runic device as much as he could. He implied that it was due to his rune related class that he was able to awaken from the strange illusory world. To his surprise, this was enough to get Loreena’s approval. It seemed that she was somewhat able to discover the fake village.

Yet without any way of finding the core rune she was unable to free herself. Instead, she activated the defense mechanism and found herself being attacked by strange monstrosities. Only after Roland managed to disable the tower’s signals was she able to awaken.

“Will this letter be enough?”

Roland looked at a sealed letter that Loreena had written up for him. Due to her secret mission, she needed to remain here. This brought a problem to the table as he still wanted to pass his gold rank quest. If the person that he was required to escort didn’t arrive at the city then he would certainly fail. However, Loreena was thankful enough to write him up a letter that he was supposed to pass to the guild master of Reeka, the city that was his last stop.

“Yes, if you mention my name and give him this then everything will be taken care of.”

“Thank you and as we discussed before…”

“You’re a strange one Wayland, anyone else would be honored to be rewarded by the church your role in this incident was not minor are you sure you don’t wish to reconsider?”

“Yes, that would be best. It would be better if the cult didn’t know that I was involved in this affair.”

This was the only thing that he asked her for. She would be taking credit for everything while he would be left anonymous. He believed that the cult could get their hands on the official report which would point them straight to his workshop.

“As you wish then, I will keep this between you and I, but know this. I will be forever grateful for your help.”

He nodded while slipping the letter into his spatial bag. While he and all the others would be leaving this one woman would remain here. A few hours ago he saw her use a similar letter transportation spell as the cat professor from the magic academy. There were several blue swallows flying in all directions.

In their previous conversation, he implied that runic mages along with runesmiths would be indispensable in examining this relic. He himself wanted to go at it but his skill with tier 3 runes wasn’t quite there yet. In spite of that Roland was not going away empty-handed.

With the help of his debugging skill, he had copied over the schematic of the control medallion that was now in Loreena’s possession. With so many attempts at copying schematics from stores, he had gotten the hang of it now. Both this and the relic’s main schematic was noted down but the more important part was the inside runic structure.

This he did not really have the time to research and copy from the larger relic. The only item he would be comfortable in decoding was the medallion that worked like a remote control. This was already a big step in the right direction as it could help him design countermeasures against that ‘signal’ the main runic item sent.

From what he could deduct the initial spell was activated by sound. Yet the possibility of a combination of sight and sound could not be excluded yet. The pulsating signal was there and it might be enough to block it to be protected from being caught in the illusion.

“I must also thank you for pointing me towards a worthwhile expert, that someone with connections to the magic academy like you was here, is truly a blessing from the goddess.”

“Ah yes, that person should be able to decipher the runic structure if you manage to get them here…”

Roland decided to go with a little gamble. He was not able to get through the complex marriage spell that was implanted into this double helix. There were high-tier runic mages that were more experienced than him and one of them was his mentor. Thus if Loreena managed to yank the cat over here to do some research, he might be able to get the information from him later.

‘Phew, for a moment I thought that she would force me to stay behind and help her decipher everything here.’

As he walked away his pace started to increase. The woman he interacted with could probably slice off his head in one move if she deemed him to be some cult member. Luckily after helping her with the strange tentacle monster he had gained her trust.

While he was able to survive this second encounter with the Abyssal Cult it was yet again thanks to another person. Without Loreena appearing out of the blue he would either be dead by now or running for his life through the forest like the other escapees.

His armor was able to pierce through a high level tier 3 monster but it would only work on an immobile enemy. It was not something he could repeatedly use against a fast-moving enemy or one that could regenerate themselves like this one.

Then there was also the problem of his armor’s runes degrading from overloading and being empowered. After two shots some of them had already degraded from the highest rating into the intermediate one. Without the ability to quickly mend them, they would have probably not been able to function past the second blast.

‘Should I focus on immobilizing my enemies or a more sustainable form of combat…’

Roland was not a battle expert and was limited to mostly encountering monsters in the dungeon. He had the basics down thanks to being trained at the noble household during his childhood. Yet even with a quick wit and battle awareness, there was no possibility of combating people with monstrous skills.

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During the battle, thanks to his parallel thinking skill, he could keep up with some of the monster’s movements. Yet even if his mind could keep up it was not the same for his body. It took some time to inject mana into the armor to boost his stats and then react. Only by boosting himself with various spells was he even able to see part of Loreena’s sword movements.

He did not feel like he would last more than a few seconds during an exchange with that woman. The gap between him and a tier 3 class holder might have gotten a bit smaller but he was nowhere near strong enough to win a proper one-on-one duel. The only way he could see himself winning was by luring his opponent into a drawn-out battle where he utilized golems, ranged spells, and explosives.

His weapons were able to pierce through the monster’s body but this monster was specialized in regenerating itself. Its body was not heavily armored yet still proved troublesome for the high level tier 2 adventurers. The monsters varied in shape and specialization and depending on it he would need to alter his tactics.

“Are you finished with telling your girlfriend your goodbyes?”