The Journey #3

Akiro opened his eyes and his bodily senses jumpstarting to action, but instead of rising from the low-quality bed, he summoned his status window and stared at it aimlessly. "Status."

[ Name: Akiro Hiroto / Age 18 / Job: Assassin / Sub Job: Gunman ]

[ Lvl: 7 ] [ ATK: 97 / STR: 56 / DEX: 93 / SPD: 89 / DEF: 15 / INT: 86 / MANA: 100 ]

[ Gunman's Manual / EX ] [ Appraisal / E ] [ Stealth / E ] [ Weapon Master / E ] [ Appraisal / A ]

"I've gotten stronger in just two weeks." Akiro rests his neck against the decent pillow, rubbing his eyes awake and raking his hair afterward in an attempt to fix his bedhead. "It was fast for the first couple of days, but the speed decreased as my level got higher."

"I see, then we need to constantly keep hunting monsters and build enough strength in eight years so we can fight the demon king." He stretched his hand in the air, watching the small callouses that had formed from the constant dagger handling. "I need to keep working hard-- mom--" He clenched his fist, "I'll make it home, I promise."

Akiro exited the bathroom, clothed and fresh. Ayama was still on the bed, clearly awake but uninterested in leaving anytime soon. "Are you seriously that bummed out that Otome-san had to leave?"

[ Name: Ayama Nobu / Age: 18 / Job: Hero / Sub Job: Craftsman ]

[ Lvl: 14 ] [ ATK: 130 / STR: 90 / DEX: 70 / SPD: 50 / DEF: 84 / INT: 52 / MANA: 150 ]

[ Parry / D ] [ Stike / E ] [ Counter-Strike / D ] [ Reinforce / D ] [ Swordsmanship / C ]

Ayama pushed himself up in a sudden burst of energy, and glared at Akiro, "You wouldn't understand! We had chemistry! We've even gone on two dates!" He groaned, falling onto the pillow again, "Not only are we two worlds apart! But yesterday is probably going to be the last time I ever see her again!"

"Sure." Akiro sighed, but he couldn't refute his best friend, as he was right on all accounts. They were both indeed fairly chipper and happy around one another-- comparable to two suns standing side by side, really; and Sume and he never got along further than a strict-colleague relationship, nor were they interested to. "Well not that it matters, my goal is to find a way back home. I have no place in this world, aside from being a tool by that king."

"Today is our last day here in this city," Ayama grumbled, begrudgingly getting up from the bed to fix himself, "I'm going to use my money to buy better gear, how about you?"
"I will be doing the same, but I need to do something first." Akiro simply replied, "Unlike the others, we busted our asses completing as many quests as possible."

[ E rank: 4 F rank: 7 G rank: 9 ] [ Total of points earned: 35 ]

He exited the inn and proceeded to walk down the street, unknowing of the five adventurers of unsavory character tailing from behind.

"That's him."
"I know that," his companion replied, "What do we do boss?"
"We'll follow him. He's one of the rich brats that blonde-bastard brought along with him."
"So we'll hold him hostage then?"
"I like how this plan is coming together, bossman."

After walking outside of the city's perimeter, Akiro arrived at the southern grass field. there were no trees around, only boulders; thus whenever the wind blew the air flowed barely hindered, making it the perfect place to train without being secretly watched.

"Every time I leveled up, I learned a skill-- but I'm guessing that this is only the case in the early stages-- and the frequency is balanced by their incredibly low ranks." He thought. "But I have two high-ranked skills, one I earned myself and one Kaiser-sensei thought me through a magic book."

“Looks like a perfect spot,” he chanted, “[Gunman's Manual]”

A surge of magic power coursed through his body, collecting in the palm of his left hand. It was a heavy, leather-bound book with the color of gunpowder, and decorated with silver-lined edges. It was titled the same as the skill name he had chanted, and Akrio flipped through to the first page.

"I see, so this book is an armory of sorts. Each page holds a weapon that I can summon, only after I have unlocked it, information that is necessary for the operation of the weapon, and the cost of mana used to fire the weapon." Akiro read, flipping through the pages of the large book. All of the pages except the first were blank. "Well, I'm not surprised, firearms do exist in this world but are quite ignored because of magic."

[ Revolver - A humble, single-action pistol with a capacity of six rounds. ]
[ Warning! - During the skill's activation, the body's natural ability to recuperate mana is disabled. ]
[ Each shot will cost 2 mana points and there will be a 10-second reload penalty ]

"Summon Revolver"

At the sound of his command, the page's writing became like water, flowing to the center of the page-- where it emerged from the page, and Akiro received it in his right hand. "It's perfect for my hand-- this is a skill really worth nurturing." The gun in his hand was entirely black, the rubber grip, to the metal, milled to reduce weight.

Snap!

Akiro flinched, the sound of a foot stepping on a dried branch causing him to jump. "Who's there!?" he asked, closing the book in his left hand and gripping the firearm harder than before.

"We're no one special," said the central figure, his hulking frame towering over Akiro even a few meters away, "We just want to chat with you."
"Yeah!" The one on his right agreed, his teeth flashing in an unnerving grin, "We just wanna talk."

The foremost man was about six feet tall, muscular, and scarred, his bald head and arms scared from experience. He was armored in plate metal, a breastplate covering his torso, a skirt of armor wrapped around his waist, and pairs of pauldrons and armored trousers covering his shoulder and shins.

Akiro sighed, "If you really want to talk," He asked, "Why does that guy have a drawn bow?"

The central adventurer, who seemed to be the leader of the band, just shrugged, "You don't seem to be afraid of me, kid."

There were five of them, all in an aggressive, triangle-formation. The leader was the tip of the arrowhead with two damage dealers to either side of himself, and two supporters behind them.

"I'm not that stupid." Akiro swallowed the spit forming in his mouth and steadied his gaze. Setting his foot back, Akiro dropped the book on the ground, drawing the dagger from his left hand, "I have six shots-- therefore I can win!"

"Alright then," The leader just shrugged, his left arm raising up a large shield. "What are you going to do now?"

"What else?" Akiro ground his boot into the soil, his body slowly leaning forward, his legs tensing-- "I'm going to fucking kill you."

"His aura changed!" The leader gasped, "H-He's coming!"

"Kaiser-sensei told us, that when our well-being is under threat--" --Akiro sprinted forward, crossing the short distance with great speed. "Don't hesitate to defend yourselves with lethal force."

Akiro raised the dagger to his head level, making eye contact with the band leader. "M-Mage! Attack him!" he barked, his subordinate fumbling about his spells; but Akiro disappeared from his view. "A feint?! N-No! Bellow!"

Shing!

"M-My foot!"

Akiro slid underneath the man, using his agility to slip in between his stance, barely brushing against his armor-- his blade however glided across the man's left foot, slicing the outermost layer of skin and the Achilles tendon. The summoned assassin was not done either, his gun cocked and ready to fire.

Bang!

Akiro jumped from his slide into a forward-back flip high into the air, dodging the two swordsmen that thrust their swords at the earlier position, barely grazing his armor.

"Take this!" The archer behind the right swordsman yelled, letting go of the bowstring--
Twang!

--sending the arrow away, but Akiro's right thumb cocked the lever again. Suspended high in the air, in an upside-down position, Akiro aimed the pistol, squeezing the trigger without hesitation.
Bang!

After the explosion of the bullet, Akiro tucked in his knees, curling his body into a ball. Releasing his form at the perfect moment, He stretched his legs, landing the balls of his feet perfectly on the ground, jumping forward into another forward summersault before landing cleanly on his feet again.

"Never thought I'd be able to move like this in my entire life, but here we are in another world," Akiro smirked, turning around to the decimated party.

The party leader was immobilized because of his weight and severed tendon, the mage was in critical condition as he was bleeding from his right carotid, and the archer's left arm sagged limply from the significant carving of flesh from his shoulder.

"Y-You monster!" One of the swordsmen yelled, in his arms was the mage bleeding heavily from his shoulder.
"I'll take that as a compliment," Akiro sighed cooly, cocking the hammer of the revolver once more, "Only Monsters can differentiate their kind."
"H-He's dying!" The man rebutted, "Did you have to go that far?!"
His response only made Akiro's blood boil "You aimed your weapons at me first, you have no right to lecture me." he spat back, pointing at the leader, "If you have any quarrels about your situation, yell at him---"

[ You have leveled up! ] [ You have leveled up! ] [ Level 7-> Level 9 ]

[Passive skill "Radar" has been learned] [ This skill allowed the user to detect any living entity in a radius. This skill will evolve proportionally to the user's level. ]

"W-What?" Akiro gasped, his next words unsaid, "L-Level up?! D-does that mean--"

"You Monster!!"

Not even the swordsman's railing insult could snap him out of his shock, only the descending blade of the grieving adventurer did.
Clang!

Akiro blocked the sword, trapping it against the guard, and the edge of his dagger, The adventurer's blade a hair's breadth away from his own shoulder. He looked forward, coming face to face with a man, his eyes bloodshot and lost in the daze of his lost temper.

"I-I will kill you!" He growled, his mouth foaming like a rabid beast.
"I see. Even humans hold experience points." Akiro however recovered, his eyes focusing back on the present. "Does that mean living beings, human or monster, are worth experiencing? What exactly is 'experience' in this world? It can give a goblin half my size thrice my current strength then?"

Akiro thought back on the second mission they had with Otome and Sume, which was clearing out the Goblins as they infested the western forest. There they met a goblin with special tattoos, after slaying it, the basic text they found in a shaman hut suggested that it was a goblin warrior.

"I see, so a living being that slays another living being, or anything with experience points, will then absorb their strength-- adding to their own." Akiro hypothesized, "A price, you could say..."
clang!

Akiro overpowers the swordsman with technique and when the sword was redirected away from him, he raised the firearm, pulling the trigger.
Bang!

[ You have leveled up! ] [ You have leveled up! ] [ Level 9-> 11 ]

The windows appeared in front of his face, the man he had killed being hidden by them as he fell backward. "His death was the price of my strength..." Akiro somberly hummed, wiping the splattered blood from his face. "Nothing is truly free in this world, not even strength. What a terrifying place."

"Y-You--"
Akiro raised his gaze, looking at the leader from earlier, who struggled to keep himself standing, "What? You started this."
"How can you kill my friends like that!" He demanded, "Do you not have a shred of humanity in you? Do you think you're some hero!?"
"Hero, huh?" Akiro hummed, the word tugging a cord in his heart, but the slight effect it had wore off immediately, "No, I never thought of myself as selfless as a Hero."

Bang!

[ You Leveled Up! ] [ You Leveled Up! ] [ You Leveled Up! ] [ Level 11-> 14 ]

[ New skill: "Sprint" has been learned! ]

The man fell backward, his head tilting down to see a hole in his chest, and it was the last thing he saw. Akiro lowered the gun, slowly approaching the bleeding archer and the trembling swordsman.

The swordsman tossed his longsword as Akiro got closer, one of his hands in the air in surrender and the other over his companion's heavily bleeding shoulder. "L-Look-- you won already!"

"If our shoes were reversed, what would you do?" Akiro stood a step away from them, looking down with an expressionless gaze.

The man gasped, his lips and eyes trembling, "P-Please! I-I don't want to die!"

Bang!

Bang!

"They must've been low-leveled since they didn't give me any experience, but they certainly were rich." The summoned hero hummed, crouching low to procure the pouches of currency and jewelry from the corpses. "[ Status ]"

[ Name: Akiro Hiroto / Age: 18 / Job: Assassin / Sub Job: Gunman ]

[ Lvl: 14 ] [ ATK: 150 | STR: 60 | DEX: 130 | SPD: 110| DEF: 15 | INT: 95 | MANA: 118/130 ]

[ Gunman's Manual / EX ] [ Appraisal / E ] [ Stealth / E ] [ Weapon Master / E ] [ Appraisal / A ] [ Sprint ]

"I caught up with Ayama, just like that." He smiled contently with himself. "Since he did most of the work for the past two weeks, it's only natural that he's stronger than me."