Nicky and Mia looked at each other and prepared to attack.Hearing what was said, Rowan began to tremble with rage.
"You little idiot… who do you think you are to talk to me like that?"
Rowan raised his sword into the air and swung it at Lucien with all his strength.
Lucien was no longer afraid of Rowan. He calmly stepped back and avoided the incoming attack.
"You're too slow, Rowan. That sword you're so proud of is nothing but a piece of trash.Did you really think you could stop me with an uncommon item?"
Rowan grew angrier and angrier, and the angrier he became, the less he cared about his surroundings as he swung his sword wildly.Sometimes it hit the walls, sometimes the cabinets, and sometimes other students.
Luckily, no one was injured, but if Rowan continued attacking like this, it was only a matter of time before someone would be.
"Give up, Rowan. You're in my field now. You can't beat me in games."
Lucien stopped and threw a powerful punch at the sword coming toward him.
The sword was knocked back as if it had struck a stone wall, and a small crack appeared on its surface.
"You can't break through my defense. Give up already, Rowan. You're weak."
Rowan looked back and forth between his sword and Lucien in disbelief.He was losing. But he was Rowan—he couldn't lose.
"You little coward! All you do is run around! You're no different than a fly!Stop running and fight me like a man!"
Lucien smiled. It was obvious he was enjoying this.
"Alright then, big guy. Let's finish this."
Lucien took a firm stance and challenged Rowan.
Rowan tightened his grip on the sword and charged toward Lucien, raising it high.
Just as he was about to swing, he felt a hard impact on his face.
Lucien had punched his right cheek.
The strike was so fast and unexpected that he barely even saw it coming.
The blow sent him flying backward, and he only stopped after crashing into the wall.The wall was damaged as if it had been hit by a car.
"PUSH is a really nice skill. It lets me deal unexpected damage.Normally, I wouldn't be able to send someone like you flying that far."
Rowan lay on the ground, stunned.His sword, damaged by the fall, was almost completely broken.
He had neither a weapon nor a reason to fight anymore.
"Wow, that was amazing, Lucien!"
Nicky and Mia came up from behind together.
"So what are you going to do now, Lucien?" Mia asked anxiously.
"I don't know. I don't want to chase revenge or hold grudges.There are still goblins we need to hunt."
Lucien walked over to Rowan's body and knelt down beside him.
"Don't mess with me or my friends again.If you do, I'll make it much worse. Understood, Rowan?"
Rowan glared at Lucien angrily, but he had no choice but to accept it.He looked away and nodded his head in agreement.
"Good. Then we're leaving.Hopefully, there are still goblins left to hunt."
Lucien stood up, and together with his friends, they walked down the corridor.
The hallways were almost empty.As they moved from classroom to classroom, they usually found either completely empty, scattered rooms or classrooms with only a few goblins inside.
After nearly three hours, they had explored the entire school building they could access.
Only the top floor and the school rooftop remained.
The paths leading to the top floor seemed to be protected by some kind of barricade.
It was something purple, semi-transparent, sticky, and constantly moving in place, almost as if it were alive.
When they struck it or tried to tear it apart, it took no damage.Whenever it seemed like it was about to be harmed, it immediately regenerated itself.
The three of them thought about how to get past it, but couldn't come up with a solution.
After thinking for a short while, they decided to enter a classroom and rest.
"Ahhh, my god, I'm dying. I'm so tired,"Nicky said, throwing himself onto the teacher's desk and lying there.
Mia sat down on a higher-quality sponge chair she had found in the corridor, probably belonging to another classroom.
Lucien stood by the window, looking both down the hallway and outside to see if anything was happening.
"How do you think we're doing?We've almost explored the entire school, but we still need to kill 102 goblins."
Nicky's question made the other two think.
"Do you think they're all on the top floor?Is it even possible to defeat more than a hundred goblins at once?"
Mia looked at Lucien, hoping for a positive answer, but Lucien was already deep in calculations.
They only had eight hours left to kill 102 goblins.Night was also starting to fall.
They didn't know if the monsters would become stronger at night or if they would respawn.That uncertainty worried Lucien.
"I'm not sure. Nicky's stones and my fists aren't suitable for large crowds.And if they gather in sufficient numbers, they gain the Goblin Swarm trait, which makes them more dangerous."
Lucien let out a sigh.
"And you don't even have a proper weapon yet.The fact that that spear-like thing hasn't broken yet is a miracle."
Mia's face fell. She was clearly upset.She was a FORCED PLAYER, and almost all her options were restricted.
"Isn't there anything you can do as a FORCED PLAYER, Mia?"Nicky asked while sitting up, playing with a small wooden figurine he found on the desk.
"Only we can buy things from the SHOP.Don't you have a SHOP too?"
Mia fiddled with the window. There was a SHOP there, but it wasn't like the others.
"There are papers here labeled 'Mission'.'ARENA OF GENRE TUTORIAL 1','ARENA OF GENRE TUTORIAL 2'…There are almost a hundred papers like this, and each one has a different price."
Lucien and Nicky looked at each other.
"What do you mean? Buy one and show us."
Lucien walked over to Mia excitedly.
"Alright, let's try it."
Mia was unhappy about spending the money she earned from killing only a few goblins.She was risking her life, only to spend that money on a handful of papers.
She bought the paper labeled 'ARENA OF GENRE TUTORIAL 1'.
The paper looked like an old parchment scroll, tied with a white ribbon and sealed with a white stamp.
"Go on, open it,"Nicky couldn't contain his excitement and stood up.
Mia broke the seal and opened the parchment.
The parchment floated into the air, slowly ignited, and vanished.
Then, a mission window appeared in front of Mia.
ARENA OF GENRE – TUTORIAL MISSION 1Basics are everything.A player must first know what their character is capable of.
Objectives:• Walk 1000 steps• Run 1000 steps• Walk 1000 steps while crouching• Crawl 100 meters• Jump 100 times
Rewards:• Beginner Player Rank• Beginner Player Weapon Pack
The three of them stared at the mission.
"This is a tutorial quest.Why didn't we think of this earlier?We know games, so of course they wouldn't make us play the tutorial.But you're different—you need to play the tutorial first, then you can start the real game."
Lucien seemed to understand everything.
There were many game genres, and everyone had found their place according to their own genre.But this followed an MMORPG or MMO Sandbox logic.
"A game within a game,"Lucien muttered thoughtfully.
"I don't really understand much, but if I do what this says, I can get stronger too, right?"
Mia jumped with joy and hugged the other two.
She hugged them so strongly and quickly that all three lost their balance and fell to the ground.
Nicky was on the bottom, Lucien on top of him, and Mia at the very top.
They slowly stood up, half complaining and half laughing.
As they stood up, a cracking sound echoed.
Something had broken.
It was the small wooden figurine Nicky had been playing with.
First, a green, resin-like liquid leaked out from inside it.Then, a purple smoke drifted out.
As the three of them tried to understand what was happening,a horrifying, pain-filled scream echoed from the corridor, deafening their ears.
"Let's go. We need to see what that was."
Lucien immediately ran toward the corridor.
"Wait for us!"
They all shouted at the same time and ran together to see what had caused the scream.