Chapter Fifty-Six: A Knight Has Never Perished Unarmed

Page 1 of 3

PS1: My occasional odd behavior is just my intermittent eccentricity acting up. Please read this with a calm heart.
PS2: I’d like to try applying for a contract—does anyone support me?

Hao Ren, his cheeks still red and swollen, found himself holding a new card.

After stealing a kiss from Xiao An, Hao Ren had offered no resistance when she beat him up, especially focusing her attention on his face.

Rather than a beating, it was more like a display of affection.

How envious, jealous, and resentful! Damn it! I want to be beaten up too, damn it!

At that same moment, Saya, who had just arrived at City Hall and was drinking tea on the sofa, suddenly had the porcelain teacup in her hand shatter.

“A foreboding sense…” Saya felt lost regarding her ability to control the economy, though in reality, the broken cup was a warning that someone was sneaking food behind her back.

Name: Golden Darkness
Profession: Mindreader
Attributes: Strength 42, Agility 47, Constitution 39, Intelligence 31, Spirit 40, Charm 17
Loyalty: 90
Relationship: Intimate
Contract Card: Id Drawing Diary

Talent: “Eye of True Names” (no level), passive skill, allows identification of the true name of any existence.

Talent: “Whisper at the Ear” (no level), passive skill, can convert designated text into sound.

Skill: “Bioweapon: First Generation” Lv1 (0/500), allows any part of the body to transform and simulate the properties of the transformed object, except for firearms. As a skill appended to those with the bioweapon identity, it consumes no LP points to use. The higher the skill level, the stronger the objects that can be simulated. LP points can be spent to upgrade it.

Same ability as Kazuka Miyazaki.

Was it because Xiao An loves to read that she gained such a skill?

Page 2 of 3

As for these talents called “Eye of True Names” and “Whisper at the Ear,” they must have appeared to complement the “Id Drawing Diary.”

Wait a minute! If Xiao An can consciously monitor me, wouldn’t I have absolutely no privacy left?

Hao Ren glanced at Xiao An, who was shrinking into herself under the teasing gaze of Nemesis and Mei’a.

Well, even if she knows, it’s no big deal. Knowing Xiao An’s personality, she probably won’t gossip carelessly.

Just pray she doesn’t throw away my hidden “Dragon and Leopard” magazine stashed between the floorboards.

“Master, we want hush money,” Nemesis pulled Mei’a over to Hao Ren and stretched out her small hand.

“Whatever you want, just say it.” The truth about the contract with Xiao An would eventually come out to Saya and the others anyway, but if the girls had requests, he would fulfill them.

Nemesis understood this perfectly well herself. She was just looking for an excuse to act spoiled.

“You have to take all three of us out shopping!” Nemesis, who had long wanted to experience a shopping trip, made her demand.

“No problem.” When the Archangel lands on Earth, he’d take the three of them to Tiger’s territory for some fun.

If the girls are happy, Hao Ren is happy. Especially with the occasional sidelong glare from Xiao An, which only made Hao Ren feel even more elated.

“Enemy sighted! Enemy sighted! First combat configuration! All members with military status, report to your positions immediately!” The Archangel’s alarm sounded.

Looks like Captain K and his team have appeared. Battle is imminent.

In the original plot, the ZAFT forces should only have four G-units, but no one knows which faction the mysterious Zaku from earlier belongs to—perhaps it’s ZAFT’s as well, and there’s no ruling out the possibility of other players among them.

On our side, we have the Strike, Moebius Zero, and the base model LoliCon. The base LoliCon can only bully some Zaku at best; going head-to-head with four G-units is just suicide.

Speaking of which, the guy who was killed should also have a mecha, unless he was an idiot who gave it away or discarded it at the start.

Let’s try our luck.

Hao Ren activated the “Black Badge” and selected the 50% item option.

“Player ‘Black Flame Dragon’ has obtained the following items: ‘Slave Contract,’ ‘Knockout Powder,’ ‘Assassin’s Creed Training Card,’ ‘Sonic’s Running Shoes,’ ‘Astray Red Frame Gundam.’”

Item: “Slave Contract,” costs 50 LP, forcibly contracts a female NPC as your summon, with a 1% success rate. The weaker the target, the higher the chance. If the target is unconscious, the chance doubles.

Damn it! He definitely has designs on my girls. I’ll try to corpse-whip him later.

Hao Ren shot a sinister glance at the corpse in his frost-patterned bag.

Mecha: Astray Red Frame Gundam

Stats: HP 11100/11100, EN 116/116, Attack 22, Defense 20, Mobility 26, Movement 6

Page 3 of 3

Adaptation: Space B, Ground B, Underwater C

Skills: Kiku Ichimonji, Automatic Vulcan, Beam Rifle, Beam Boomerang

Oh! The Red Frame! It’s so cool it blows me away! For the Red Frame’s sake, I’ll spare your corpse.

Hao Ren took out the Red Frame in its model kit form and started fiddling with it.

If memory serves, in the original story, the Red Frame was picked up as junk by a scrap dealer, then ended up doing things like rescuing Lacus or transporting vaccines. Lowe, couldn’t you have just stuck to your job as a scrap dealer? By taking all the mercenary work, how do you expect the leader of the mercenary unit Serpent Tail, Gai Murakumo, to make a living?

Though he wanted to try piloting it, he simply lacked the ability. Hao Ren played with the Red Frame for a long time, feeling deeply resentful about having to hand it over for someone else to pilot.

His only hope—Sharp—also admitted he could only control one machine.

What to do?

Almost as if possessed, Hao Ren’s eyes fell on the earthen jars in his inventory.

“…” Hao Ren considered for a few seconds and then pulled the stopper from one of the jars.

The jar shattered, releasing a jet of black smoke. The smoke spread rapidly, enveloping Hao Ren before he could react.

Nemesis and the others, unsure what was happening, dared not approach and could only hover anxiously nearby.

The black smoke gradually concentrated on Hao Ren’s arms, then seeped into them.

Black magical patterns, like tattoos, appeared on Hao Ren’s arms, faintly visible.

“Player ‘Black Flame Dragon’ has acquired the skill ‘A Knight Never Dies Barehanded.’”

Skill: “A Knight Never Dies Barehanded” (no level), allows the wielder to endow any weapon in hand with the attributes of a Noble Phantasm and command it. The item must fall under the skill owner’s concept of ‘weapons.’ The lowest Noble Phantasm level is D; those higher remain unchanged. Each activation costs 10 LP.

Long live the hand of fate! Hao Ren’s dumb luck strikes again.

“Sorry for scaring you. I just opened a jar and got a new skill,” Hao Ren waved to the three girls, signaling that he was fine.

The three girls let out a synchronized sigh and, catching Hao Ren’s apologetic gaze, attacked the tender flesh at his waist.

“Don’t let it happen again!” Under the girls’ murderous glares, Hao Ren could only gasp in pain and promise compliance.

Looks like no matter how high my stats get, my waist is still defenseless. Is this my ‘Achilles’ heel’? (The heel is the Achilles tendon at the ankle—Hao Ren is a bit of a dunce.)