Vampire Princess Guide in Progress - Volume 1 Chapter 9

Chapter 9: First Kill of the Morning Dew Wolf Pack (Part 1)

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Nolan and Cross were quickly advancing along the small path in the wilderness, constantly approaching Morning Dew Town.

Although both of their maps were still pitch black due to unexplored areas, Nolan’s memory of this road was very accurate, almost without any deviation. He could even anticipate ambushes from monsters hiding at corners and attack them before they could strike.

Other beta testers without such accurate memories, or new players in the public test, were not so fortunate.

As they moved farther from the main city, the number of players following behind Nolan and his companion gradually decreased. While some chose other villages as their destinations, more were blocked by monsters in the wilderness.

The road and plains, gilded by the sunset’s remaining glow, were signaling the imminent arrival of nighttime in the game world.

“Nolan! Over there, someone seems to…”

“What?” Nolan, still rushing forward, turned his face to look in the direction Cross had noticed.

“Ahhh! Get away! Don’t come near me!”

At quite a distance from them on the main road, a player was being attacked by several hyenas. Due to mistakes or inability to defend himself, he had already been knocked to the ground and was wrestling with the enemies.

Nolan had been leading Cross away from this main road, or rather, he had been avoiding some monster gathering points along the way, finding a safe route that allowed them to smoothly pass through patches of wilderness, encountering only single monsters so far.

“Help! No, no, nooooo—!”

Amid heart-wrenching screams, the hyenas were tearing at the man in beginner equipment, his HP value rapidly decreasing.

Before Nolan and Cross could react, the novice player’s HP had already dropped to the red zone, and he seemed to have no chance to use recovery items — or perhaps he had forgotten to use them in his panic.

Under the group attack, his HP decreased too quickly.

So in the next moment, surrounded by those wild beasts, as the player’s HP dropped to 0, his terrified screams abruptly stopped. His body first froze in place, then with a bang, shattered into crystal fragments.

Announcing that he had forever left this world.

“…!” Cross immediately gasped, her eyes widening.

This cruel scene was also reflected in Nolan’s eyes. The hand that had just grasped his sword hilt slowly lowered again, returning the sword to its sheath.

Without even a chance to offer help, a player had met his end.

Unbelievable… Whether in the beta or public test, because there was no pain sensation and unlimited respawns, he had never seen any player express such miserable sounds when defeated. At most, they would joke after respawning in town, saying something like “Damn, why is this monster so hard to beat?”

And such incidents would happen more and more frequently in the future. Perhaps starting from the first day, many players would be eliminated.

The pack of hyenas that had defeated the new player, after his disappearance, just casually turned around and wandered leisurely toward other places, as if they had just engaged in an ordinary battle according to the system script settings.

Yet just moments ago, they had killed a person.

“Let’s keep moving. If they discover us, we’ll be the ones in trouble.”

Nolan’s face darkened, and although certain emotions were continuously condensing in his heart, he could only remind his companion that they couldn’t linger here.

“Y-yes.” Cross responded with a trembling voice, her gaze still fixed on the distant scene while her feet had already started running again.

Following the route planned in his memory, they finally saw the buildings of the town on the horizon. But just then, in the middle of the previously unobstructed road, a flash of light shimmered, and three wolves suddenly materialized in front of the two.

Cross immediately became alert, “Nolan, monsters!”

“Tch, they spawned right in front of us… I’ll handle this, stay behind me!”

Nolan didn’t slow down; instead, he accelerated, charging forward with a running start, his hand tightening again on the sword hilt at his waist.

With a metallic sound, he drew his rusted iron sword, facing the three wolves displaying Lv.5 above their heads. Unlike the boar monsters, wolf-type creatures attacked fiercely and quickly, often overwhelming new players.

Watching Nolan stride directly toward the enemies with his sword drawn, Cross anxiously glanced at him, then at the monsters. Comparing the battle strengths, the enemies were 2 levels higher than them, and there were three of them.

Although they had improved since the beginning, with their level increase raising various stats including HP to a maximum of 200 points, earlier when Cross was level 1 facing a wild boar, she could only withstand 2-4 attacks at most.

Her hands trembled slightly as she gripped her magic staff. The only spell she had mastered was a basic magic attack — “Single Magic Bullet” — and sometimes she couldn’t even cast it, not yet understanding the logic behind using magic.

In other words, she might not even count as combat strength right now!

“Be careful!!!” Seeing the distance between the two sides close almost instantly, Cross’s heart immediately tensed up.