Building My SSS-Rank Universal Empire: From Trash to Cosmic Overlord-Chapter 30: Things that’s not Imps

I had a lot to think about at the end of the session, but not really about the history that Kren told me. What I was thinking about was why I hadn’t been taught all this while I was in the Athrimir Clan.

’Maybe I really shouldn’t blame the clan because even I was never interested in actual history. What I was always interested in were the bits of heroic deeds of the Emperor and how to swing a sword.’

At the end of the session, Kren told me that the operation would happen in three weeks’ time and that I should start preparing. The information had made me stiffen as I remembered the Forbidden Order Mark said to be on the ruin.

The Forbidden Mark was named forbidden because all the people who tried to walk the Knighthood path under the mark failed. Horribly. They either got twisted and turned into monsters or lost control in some way and slaughtered the people around them. It’s as if the power has the ability to corrupt in a kind of way.

I had believed the Knight Assembly then. Of course, I had even blamed the sorry person who got the mark. But now? I smiled bitterly as I thought about it all. ’I really was naive then. I thought I was some golden shit.’

To be sincere, I didn’t care much about losing control, but I knew I must first try to understand how to control the power of the Forbidden Mark. I didn’t even know the type of power I’d be granted. "But to really know if I’m going to lose control, then I have to first advance to official Knight. And better if I can do that before the operation."

I promised myself to bring the matter up to Kren during our last session, and for the meantime, I was going to continue doing what I was doing.

Sleep, eat, break more rocks, and then go deeper into the tunnel and train with the imps... kill the imps. I’d gotten used to my Squire rank powers so quickly that I was beginning to get suspicious that maybe I was just skilled at killing the imps. After all, the imps were one of the weakest monsters, and their only advantage was their numbers and their ability to pass through things.

I just had to predict that and overpower them with raw power.

So at the end of that week, a day before my lesson session, I didn’t go deeper into the tunnel as usual. Instead, I went in search of Kade.

I found the man in his tent, cuddling with a woman who left immediately when she saw my face. "Must be nice to be the leader of a gang."

Kade smirked and pulled on a shirt. He didn’t seem too offended that his fun was disrupted. "You don’t know half of it. So what is it? I know you’re not here to just see my handsome face."

I steeled myself. Kade reminded me of how I had been years ago, and... I couldn’t believe how cringe it was to behave like an arrogant ’young master’. I explained my problem to Kade, and the man nodded slowly.

"I can see what to do. The Nyxori usually retain some teams to look for specific monsters for them. Wait here. I’ll see if they haven’t left yet and if you can join them."

I stood alone in the tent, which was bigger than my own with a large bed. It was cluttered with clothes, and most of it didn’t seem to belong to a man. I grimaced at the smell too, but fortunately, I didn’t have to wait long before Kade returned.

"Lucky you. They’ve not left for the hunt yet, and Arvas permitted you to tag along. They didn’t want to take an unfamiliar, but they know me."

Kade led me out of the tent after putting on black leather armor with a longsword on his back. He shrugged when I gave him a raised brow. "Arvas only allowed you after I said I’d tag along. You might be powerful, but I’m assuming this is the first time you’ll be hunting in the Borderland.

"I’ll show you how it’s done here," Kade said.

We soon left the camp behind and entered the layer proper. We passed ruins and made our way to the occupied ruin that the Nyxori were using as their base. In front of the building stood a team, three men and a woman. They wore black and red leather armor of the Steelclaw and carried weapons.

They were older than me and Kade, and as we got closer, I heard one of them mutter, "So we are going to be babysitting some brats today?"

Snorting laughter followed.

I twitched, and I resisted a sigh. I wasn’t really in the mood to watch some people ’put me in my place.’ I was there simply because I wanted to learn how to fight things that weren’t imps.

Kade smiled and threw his arms wide. "First layer, team 98 of the Steelclaw Alliance. This is Vale, and we’ll be joining your hunt for today."

Frank, flat stares turned to me, and I looked at them in turn. They weren’t that impressive. They looked... ordinary. And maybe that’s normal for a team 98. I had learned a while ago that each layer’s teams are ranked in terms of strength for each Flagbearer’s teams.

And the Steelclaw Alliance teams in the first layer numbered 107, so making 98 wasn’t that impressive to me. They must have thought the same of me because they grunted in answer.

The man who was obviously the team leader crossed his arms over his muscled chest and said, "I’m Garran, the team leader, and you listen to my every word. I don’t have time to baby a br... newbie, so just stay back and watch."

Then he turned to Kade, his lips curling. "I’d rather the two of you not follow me, but this was directly from the Captain. Just don’t fuck this up, or I’ll fuck you up."

"Let’s go. We have some monsters to hunt. I won’t be waiting for anyone."