Chapter 31 – Death Transformation – Undead Marshal

Fatty was really not to blame for his ignorance. It was already very nice that he understood how to accept missions as a first-time gamer. What’s more, Recall Scrolls cost a gold coin per scroll, so he might not have bought any even if he knew about it.

“Crap, now we’re screwed cuz of you,” TheFugitive’s face was stark white as he looked around in search of an opportunity to escape.

The battle finished very quickly because the players were still rather low leveled. They had no way of getting lucky and surviving when surrounded by more monsters that were above their level. The four guilds tried their best to break through for a while, but it merely delayed the time of their deaths.

Some of the rogue players tried to use stealth to escape, but all of that was futile in front of a master rogue like Phantom Messenger. The boss monster along slaughtered every single player who tried to escape back to the fourth floor.

In less than ten minutes, the entire cavern became silent. All that remained were the wandering Skeletal Messengers, and the player and monster corpses that haven’t been refreshed yet.

There were about a hundred players from the four guilds in total, and they did kill nearly a hundred Skeletal Assassins. In a way, they did go even.

“Jaja, there are still two cute little insects,” Phantom Messenger looked over in the corner.

Fatty and TheFugitive gulped, then forced themselves to look towards Phantom Messenger.

“Uhm, but bro, you’ve killed so many already, so you should be sated. How about letting us go?” Fatty asked carefully.

“You’re trying to bargain with me? Ridiculous,” Phantom Messenger walked over a step at a time.

Fatty and TheFugitive were frightened. They were not in the mood to laugh at the monster's short stature and merely prepared for a fatal battle.

“But since we are of the same class, I can give you guys a chance,” Phantom Messenger stopped a dozen meters away from the pair.

“What chance?” the two immediately felt a sliver of hope. There’s a chance!

“I'm willing to let one of you go. You two can decide who leaves and who dies,” said the Phantom Messenger.

“What the f*ck, who designed this monster!? Why is he so intelligent!?” The two immediately cursed when they heard that. They understood very well they the monster was just messing with them. If anybody found out about it, then it would definitely tarnish their reputation.

“Since that’s the case, then I will grant you the honor of dying by my hands. I am the greatest rogue in history, Aguero the Phantom Messenger!”

Whoosh. The Phantom Messenger disappeared.

The Phantom Messenger was truly shameless to no end. He still used stealth even when facing two players that were no match for him at all.

“So shameless!” Fatty shouted loudly, then dashed forward with a unique footwork that allowed him to move irregularly. TheFugitive followed closely behind him. Due to all their prior cooperation, they still maintained in a way that would be able to aid each other even when running away.

Zing.

The Phantom Messenger swept past Fatty’s back with a flash of white light.

Then he appeared, chuckled, then disappeared again.

“The cooldown of Invisibility is rather long. If we can waste it, then we will have a chance to escape,” TheFugitive said softly.

“No, we can’t deal with it whether it goes invisible or not. Neither of us can block one of its attack. It hiding and surprise attacking us is actually giving us a chance. We’ll be able to escape as long as we get to the entrance,” Fatty argued.

They were quite a distance away from the entrance of the fifth floor, so it was incredibly difficult to reach there before they get surprise attack and killed by the Phantom Messenger.

“Let’s speed up,” Fatty activated his necklace’s activate ability Rooster Squawk, increase both him and TheFugitive’s movement speed by 30%. His chubby figure instantly sprinted towards the entrance.

“That’s a good item,” TheFugitive praised and followed Fatty closely.

Creak.

The Skeletal Assassins originally wandering aimlessly around suddenly all activated stealth together, as if they received an order.

“F*ck, didn’t he say that he’ll kill us himself? He’s getting his lackeys to stop us now? So despicable!” Fatty cursed, then suddenly stopped in his tracks, narrowly dodging an attack from a Skeletal Assassin.

TheFugitive was rather surprised. He was able to dodge the attack like Fatty did, however, he couldn’t do it as easily as Fatty could. And the reason he could even do it was because he had been through over a thousand assassinations and counter-assassinations in several games. What the heck is with this fatty? I’ve never heard of such a master from any game.

Both of their stealth skills were completely pointless in front of the advances boss, because not only was the stealth of no use. it actually decreased their movements speed. Thus, the two continued to sprint and did not waste their time on the skill.

“Be careful!” Fatty shouted, then came to a halt. He slashed Frostfang forward.

Zing.

The Phantom Messenger appeared in front of them. He actually walked in front of the two before everything happened, and waited for the pair to walk into him.

“Jaja, what great reaction speed. I can feel my blood boiling. Little fatty, you’re good. You were actually able to dodge my attacks twice with your strength. It really is impressive,” the Phantom Messenger’s voice echoed throughout the entire fifth floor.

Meanwhile, the players felt their eardrums vibrate, making everything all the more uncomfortable.

Fatty didn’t know whether he should smile happily or wryly after getting praised by a monster. He and TheFugitive stood back to back and defended against the Phantom Messenger and potential surprise attacks form Skeletal Assassins.

“Old bastard, didn’t you say that you’ll fight us yourself? Why are you telling your lackeys to attack? Tell your lackeys to stay back and solo us if you dare,” Fatty shouted.

“Haha, what a ridiculous statement. A rogue is saying that he wants to solo someone else? Countless people would laugh their teeth off if they hear you say that. Little kiddos, I’ll show you today what is a rogue,” the Phantom Messenger suddenly moved backwards and put a dozen meters of distance between them.

“Crap, he’s going to stealth!” TheFugitive shouted.

Only Invisibility could allow its user to stealth in combat. However, the Phantom Messenger’s cooldown on Invisibility clearly did not pass. So he had to get to a distance and exit combat in order to stealth.

“Chase after him!”

 The two players understood what each other was thinking, and sprinted towards the entrance together.

Zing.

Fatty felt a chill down his spine. He had no time to retreat, so he could only twist his body and dodged, evading one attack. Meanwhile, he also brought his dagger up to block off the attack from another Skeletal Assassin.

TheFugitive wasn’t doing very well either. The Phantom messenger locked onto him. While Fatty was evading the attacks from the Skeletal Assassins, the Phantom Messenger used its strange weapon to slice at TheFugitive’s waist. If it wasn’t because TheFugitive reacted quickly and rolled on the ground, he probably would have been split in half by the waist. Yet, despite his attempt at evading the attack, his health bar still dropped massively, and nearly reached 0.

The Phantom Messenger continued to attack silently. This new weapon didn’t have any glow on it. It was like a poisonous snake hiding in the darkness that leaped up and attacked TheFugitive.

 All of a sudden TheFugitive felt a chilling aura around him as if the end was near.

“Old bastard, take this!” Fatty threw something onto the Phantom Messenger’s weapon in desperation. The sound of glass shattering sounded out, revealing the item Fatty threw as a red potion.

Yet, this was enough to knock the Phantom Messenger’s weapon aside a bit, causing it to merely slice above TheFugitive’s head, chopping some hair off. TheFugitive immediately felt a bit of shock, then rolled over and stood up by Fatty’s side.

“Brother Grubber, we’re probably going to have to return to town for free today,” TheFugitive laughed wryly.

“Hey, don’t worry about it. We don’t have to pay,” Fatty said indifferently.

TheFugitive smiled. Since he was a gamer, he was naturally used to things like dying and dropping levels.

“I’ll treat you to a drink after we get back.”

“Sure. Don’t forget you still owe me money for that rabbit leg,” said Fatty.

“…”

TheFugitive was speechless. I knew the fatty’s like this, why the heck did I offer him a drink!?

The Phantom Messenger stood still in front of them. Only when it moved its right hand in front did the two players realize that his weapon was a pitch black scythe with a unique design, and not a dagger-like most rogues would use.

The scythe seemed to swirl with a dark light. There was nothing special when it was twirled around. There wasn’t even the sound of it cutting through it air. It seems like the white light which appeared when it killed the other players was merely something the Phantom Messenger did for fun.

“Alright, you guys are truly too weak. Playing with you isn’t fun at all. Kiddos, send them off.”

As the Phantom Messenger finished giving his orders, the two players clearly felt a deathly aura around them, which most likely meant at least seven or eight stealth Skeletal Assassins in the surroundings.

They looked at how far they were from the entrance. There’s no chance to escape.

“F*ck this. I have to get something even if I’m going to die!” Fatty made up his mind. He waved Frostfang in front of him and charged towards the Phantom Messenger.

TheFugitive had the same idea and dashed forward alongside Fatty.

“Die!” the Phantom Messenger said emotionlessly and sliced the strange scythe towards the two.

“STEAL!”

The two rogues didn’t dodge at all. As the scythe connected with their bodies, they activated the Steal skill together.

It was an ability that could steal an item off the target with a 1% to 5% success rate.

As the fat and thin hands touched the Phantom Messenger, the two were cut in half through their waist by the scythe. Blood spurt out from its body. However, the Phantom Messenger trembled in anger.

“Damn that rogue skill!”

A pillar of white light rose up, and TheFugitive returned to Black Tortoise City. At the same time, Fatty also waited patiently for his free trip back to town without looking at what he stole. However, even after waiting for a while, nothing happened at all.

“What’s going on? Didn’t I die?” Fatty looked around. The Phantom Messenger had already left hatefully after killing the pair and disappeared back into darkness. The Skeletal Assassins also went into stealth together and prepared for their next assault.

Ding.

A ring of the system notification broke through the silence.

System Notification: The criteria for Death Transformation has been reached. Would you like to transform?

Fatty quickly clicked on his skill bar and saw that Death Transformation was no longer greyed out. Instead, the skill icon was now a blood red color.

Death Transformation: Transform into a being that provided the Soul Spark. The user cannot be healed by priests under its effect. Duration: 120 minutes. Cooldown: 24 hours.

There were two small boxes underneath Death Transformation’s skill. One of it was “Deceased Soul – Knight Commander” and the other was “Deceased Soul - Skeletal General”. However, the one for the Knight Commander was white, signifying that it could be activated, while the Skeletal General’s was still greyed out.

What am I waiting for? Of course I’ll transform. Fatty clicked “Yes”. All of a sudden, the two halves of his corpse begun to move, then stitched itself back together on the ground.

Then, mist rose up from where laid. Fatty’s corpse disappeared, and what replaced it was an armored undead knight riding on a skeletal horse.

Ding.

System Notification: Please name the Knight Commander.

What? I can name it!?

Fatty smiled. “Undead Marshal.”