BXBX NOVEL Chapter 300: Btog 300 Adventurer Kleine
Chapter 300: Btog 300 Adventurer Kleine
“N-no, it’s okay. After all, I just hoped someone would find me regarding this.”
Helping the girl who had fallen to her buttocks stand up, they exchanged such a conversation.
(What’s with this girl, isn’t she too light?)
Not her attitude or personality, but her physical weight. It was like lifting a doll made of cotton… or rather, I felt almost only the weight of her clothes, which felt odd, but since it’s irrelevant to the conversation, I pushed the thought to the back of my mind.
“The turn of events was quite… no, very… significantly different than what I expected, but it’s good that it didn’t drag on. Nice to meet you, traveler. My name is Kleine. I’m an adventurer traveling in search of the Black Wolf, Rond. “
“I’m Sukuna. Nice to meet you.”
“Yes, nice to meet you too.”
Shaking hands with the girl in the black hood, Kleine. I haven’t interacted with many NPCs, but my first impression was that she’s a very calm child.
Shortly after the greetings, Kleine looked down.
“Well, there are various things I’d like to talk about, but before that, let’s go down first.”
“How do you plan to get down?”
“There’s an entrance on the roof. I have connections with the person in charge here, so I talked my way up here. Rather, I’m surprised you managed to climb up from the outside.”
“I just used [Air Walk].”
“Ah, I see. You do seem to have a convenient, rare skill.”
It seems she knew about [Air Walk] and nodded understandingly.
Perhaps it’s common knowledge for an adventurer.
“Come on, follow me. It connects to the back door, so no one will know you climbed up here.”
“You have permission to use such a route?”
“No one in the town cared about me multiplying, right? I do similar things every year, so everyone’s used to it.”
“Hmm…”
Kleine’s easy access to the back door of a fancy store and the fact that she can go up to a rooftop, where normally people wouldn’t be allowed, is quite interesting. Also, the people in the game seem to carry on as usual, even though these things are out of the ordinary, and they don’t really talk about it.
Putting these bits together, it looks like Kleine either has been in this town for a long time and is someone important, or she’s done some big things that let her do stuff like this.
“So, you went out of your way to find me, which means you’re interested in the Black Wolf, right?”
“Correct.”
“You’ll see if you calm down and look at your equipment. That gear emanating the aura of the King Wolf so strongly. You must be Sukuna, the first-ever Red Wolf subjugator who recently appeared in the guild, right?”
“You know about me?”
“As an adventurer, rumors naturally reach me. Yeah, this encounter might be fate.”
It’s been over two months since I defeated Aria, and about the same amount of time since I first showed my face at the Fias Adventurer’s Guild.
It wasn’t strange for Kleine, who says she’s an adventurer, to know that.
“It looks like you found her.”
“Ah, Rin-chan. She was on the roof.”
“I was watching through the stream. When I think about it, it indeed seems like the kind of place she would be.”
As Rin-chan returned, saying this while glancing towards the roof of the trading house, it indeed seemed like a logical place to find her if one followed the regular process.
“Is she your friend?”
“my name is Rinne. Whether you want to get along with me is up to you.”
“Ha, what an interesting person. I’m Kleine, an adventurer.”
Despite the words exchanged, Rin-chan didn’t ignore Kleine’s offered hand and shook it, which was a bit reassuring.
It was night and near the back door, so the surroundings were conveniently sparse, making it a good situation for a conversation.
“I’m not good with beating around the bush, so straight to the point. What do you two know about Rond, the Black Wolf of the Symphony <Gunzou no Kokurou – ROND>?” {tl notes! Yes its ROND not Rondo since they missed the o in the OR text}
“It seems to be on par with Red Wolf Aria and White Wolf Fantasia… A notable member of the King Wolf species of monsters, said to be around the Dos Orca active volcano area, I guess.”
“I don’t know much more than that either.”
“Hmm, since you, traveler, started your journey from the beginning town, it’s natural to have that level of knowledge. In fact, you’re quite well-informed, I think.”
After sharing the information I gathered mainly from oni-folk NPCs and Haruru, Kleine looked a bit relieved, then took off her right glove and rolled up her right sleeve, exposing her skin.
“Please look at this.”
“…A tattoo of a bite mark?”
“This is the ‘Black Wolf’s Scar.’ I was marked by the Black Wolf in my childhood.”
On Kleine’s right arm was a large, fang-like series of marks resembling scars. According to her, these were marks engraved by the Black Wolf. Judging by the appearance of the marks, as if they were made while protecting her body, they might actually be genuine scars.
“Surviving an encounter with a ‘Name Bearer’ could be considered lucky. However, this mark not only granted me benefits but also burdened me with a fatal handicap… Try touching my hand.”
“Okay, but… huh?”
As I tried to grasp her hand as instructed, my hand slipped through as if there was nothing there.
No matter how many times I tried, I couldn’t touch it. Though her arm seemed to be there, I couldn’t physically feel it.
“I can’t touch it…”
“Wow, it really does slip right through.”
“This is the effect… no, the curse of this mark. Since being marked, my body has ceased to exist in this world. I’ve become something akin to a ‘shadow person’.”
I didn’t understand the full meaning of ‘shadow person,’ but I grasped the tragic nature of her condition.
I couldn’t imagine how this was possible, but Kleine’s body seemed to have no physical substance, like a ghost.
(The reason her body was unusually light is this. She really only has the weight of her equipment.)
As I was pondering this, Rin-chan threw in an additional question.
“Based on what you’ve said, you should pass through the ground too.”
“No, thankfully not that severe. The earth is filled with the blessings of the creator god, so it’s impossible for the shadow-derived powers to penetrate it. The fact that I didn’t fall into the abyss the moment I was cursed is the only fortune I’ve had.”
“So conversely, does that mean you can slip through walls in the city?”
“Yes, well… But even if I enter somewhere, there’s not much I can do. As you can see, I can’t hold anything.”
Kleine demonstrated this by trying to pick up a stone from the ground and failing to grasp it.
The possibility of intrusion alone might be concerning for the townspeople… But such an obvious issue I can think of instantly must have been resolved with the townspeople long ago. It would be pointless to delve into it.
“The reason you can walk makes sense now, but how come you were touching things normally just now, and even wearing clothes? Is it because your equipment itself is special?”
“You’re perceptive, exactly right. This outfit and equipment are special, blessed by the Holy Maiden in the holy city, designed to suppress the curse of the Black Wolf.”
“I see…?”
“It’s like using the cursed ‘shadow body’ as a mannequin or base to drape the equipment over.”
“Precisely. That’s why if I remove this equipment, I can’t interact with others or the environment. If I take off the hood during the day, my face becomes invisible too.”
Though I can see you now because it’s night, I thought, before voicing an idea that suddenly occurred to me.
“So, you mean you could stand naked in the middle of the town and no one would notice?”
“Well, theoretically, yes… but in reality, if I stand in someone’s shadow, my presence becomes noticeable. Of course, unless someone is a high-level shadow user, they can’t catch me.”
Kleine’s expression twisted uncomfortably upon hearing my words, and the ‘Is she serious?’ look in her eyes was quite striking. Sorry, my bad.
☆
“Now then… There are still many things I want to ask and share, but let’s clarify the objective of this game first.”
Kleine straightened up, tightening the atmosphere that had become a bit relaxed.
“I want to defeat the Black Wolf, Rond, to break this curse. I would like to request the cooperation of you two… and all the travelers.”
Kleine’s earnest expression clearly conveyed her goal, and we nodded without hesitation.
How they found her, how she had been hiding, and other details would be explained later.
Tl note:
Rond, the Black Wolf of the Symphony – ok.. this is a bit stretched in meaning.
Gunzhou 群像 – directly translated as group portrait feels so weird in English, so I alter it to Symphony since the wolves name always music related.