Martial Arts Encyclopedia - Chapter 12

Interlude 1 - Interrogation

Cornell

We brought the stupid brat to our infirmary through the side doors. Most adventurers don’t use this service since they either heal their wounds by themselves, or by the time they arrive it’s too late. Nevertheless, it managed to save lives since the day the room was set up.

“Artoria, can you fetch our first aid kit from home?” At her child's request the goddess nods and leaves with surprising speed for a descended divinity.

My junior looks scandalized at the lack of respect shown by Andrew, which just shows how green she still is. Despite her initial reaction, she met Andrew with a more pertinent question.

“Why did you ask for a first aid kit, Andrew-san? Shouldn’t you be asking for healing potions instead?”

Only unblessed mortals still use more archaic methods of healing here in Orario, due to the disparity of prices. If it were anywhere else, availability of stronger medicine might be an issue, but in the City of Adventurers it is normally logical to ask for stronger potions right away.

“Oh, I will also take whatever you have, it’s just faster for her to bring my stuff here too. Also, I wasn’t kidding when I asked for an Elixir.”

As he said that he started to take off his armor, and much to the young lass' horror, the jacket tied at Andrew waist was holding back his intestines in place. With one hand he holds some of the intestines spilling out, while the other hand tears off his brigandine jacket followed by taking off his pants and boots, displaying his semi-naked body.

His appearance changed like day and night compared when he first showed his back to register with us. His body wasn’t particularly strong and his skin was free of any scars, typical of someone born in a big city to wealthy parents, and those types when they receive the Falna go and gain a more ethereal beauty to them.

Now he grew several centimeters and is now taller than his goddess including her heels, his body filled up with larger muscles without looking exaggerated, and those same muscles are now visibly defined even behind the layer of fat under his skin. Whenever he moves his body, I can almost see the individual muscle fibers contracting and expanding like the individual fibers of a tightrope. I only ever saw that kind of effect under certain types of the Berserk skill. It makes sense, since despite his casual demeanor he’s fighting for his life.

“The Guild doesn't have any Elixir in stock, unfortunately. You will need to buy from the pharmacies directly or ask for another adventurer to trade with you. Due to the emergency, the Guild can authorize a loan for you to purchase an Elixir.”

Most new adventurers, however prepared they think they are, will balk at the idea of being charged while in a desperate situation, but that’s the nature of the business: for Orario to continue to prosper, things need to be “fair” for all gods.

Instead of reacting like expected, he tosses me one of his belt pouches while he grabs some towels to clean himself off the worst filth.

“Does a Jack Bird’ Golden Egg cover the cost of an Elixir?”

Indeed, inside the pouch there was the famed golden egg. “It should. Eina, go to room 103 and tell them the situation.” 

To the little girl's credit, she just takes the golden egg and rushes away, though she almost collides with the Goddess of Rhongomyniad at the door. She looks between us and the returned goddess and simply shoo her away.

Andrew takes out a couple of items from the bag: bandages, towels, a tweezer, two large glass bottles and several potion vials. Watching him work was an interesting experience, as I can only imagine what sort of Skill he possesses that allows him to perform an improvised surgery on himself without screaming in pain. One of the bottles is high proof alcohol he uses to clean up his body around the injuries, while the other bottle contains distilled water, which he uses to wash his insides of mucus and other detritus. Surprisingly, neither his intestines, veins, arteries, and other vital parts look damaged.

By his smell I thought his organs had ruptured inside the dungeon.

He drinks all his potions, but as expected the larger injuries remain.

“I am Ganesha!” The door violently slams open, “who is the brave adventurer in need of assistance?”

“Hail Ganesha!” The idiot man salutes the newly arrived god, “it is I, Andrew, who called for aid.”

The god ignores the still smelling man to inspect him together with his Familia aide. “What do you think, Kshema?”

The tall, bronze-skinned adventurer peeked of Andrew’s injuries with a dispassionate look before nodding. “By a miracle nothing important was damaged, neither intestine, arteries, nor veins. The area is also surprisingly clean, meaning if it weren’t for the hole on his body he could make do with just healing potions. The elixir will help with closing the wounds and making sure he has a full recovery.”

“Very well! I, Ganesha, give this Elixir to Andrew of the Rhongomyniad Familia for his act of bravery and endurance!”

“Thank you Lord Ganesha I had a whole routine set up about how this would go complete with jokes philosophical discussion and flexing my bachelor’s degree until I realized that my blood loss is making me delirious so gimme gimme gimme!”

To his credit, the foolish boy waits until Ganesha hands completely releases the vial before downing it in less than a second. Right before our eyes the flesh knitted itself back, and even the internal organs shifted back into their proper places. Some of the color returned to Andrew face, and his whole body shuddered before sagging in relief.

“That’s much better, thank you.” He slowly opens his eyes so he can finally realize the situation he’s in.

“… can I clean myself first? I don’t want to make a report to the Guild while smelling like shit.”

With the crisis over, we all remembered the stink on the discarded clothes. Thankfully, we have interns for that.

…

“… and that’s how my day went so far.”

I finish taking notes on Andrew’s day, which is one of the most memorable I have seen in a while for a level one. Almost reminds me of the Golden Age of Power, or as the Freya and Loki Familias insist to call it, the Dark Age of Orario.

Like my senior once told me, “same shit, different boss.”

“So, was this irregular monster that wounded you like this?” Kshema asked, as the story didn’t quite add up.

“Oh no, the one that turned me into a donut,” Lord Ganesha and Lady Artoria almost choke on the provided tea, though the god of the masses is far more dramatic about it, “is the adventurer that came after that. He came from nowhere, one moment I’m trying to catch my breath, and the next there’s this guy in a costume writing in a book right next to me.”

Shimmering cloak, common leather armor, pitch black skin contrasting a tarnished skull mask, it honestly doesn’t remind me of anything.

However, “maybe They aren’t as dead as we thought.”

“They?” Lady Artoria asked, and Lord Ganesha took the initiative to answer.

“Evilus. They’re a group of dangerous gods and their Families that once caused chaos and destruction in Orario. Eventually we managed to kill their executives and banish the gods back to Tenkai. A bunch of contemptible parents leading their broken children.”

“Are they behind this? What about the irregular monster?”

“Excuse me, Lady Artoria, but regarding the irregular monster, I can give you an insight.” She turns to me, and I suppress the urge to swallow. “Back in the day, one of Lady Hera’s adventurers was experimenting with the Dungeon monsters, force feeding magic stones to low level monsters to make them stronger to help their rookie adventurers quickly gain strength.” 

Everyone in the room turned to listen to me intently, even Lord Ganesha who was present at the follow up meetings.

“Soon, the captain of the Zeus Familia heard of the experiments and proposed a joint project, making it one of the few the Hera and Zeus Familia cooperated, until they decided to make the same experiment using Juggernauts, capturing a few spawned from the upper floors and experimenting on them. When word reached Lord Ouranos ears, he threatened to kick both Zeus and Hera back to Tenkai if they didn’t stop their Familia members, and after Lord Zeus saw the kind of experiments being conducted, he put his foot down against his captain. Zeus ordered the data gathered on those experiments to be sealed and given to the guild, which Hera reluctantly agreed. If the results of Project Typhon leaked somewhere, then that might explain the irregular monster you met, and the potential Evilus adventurer.”

“And why would they target my Andrew, twice in a row?”

“They’re grifters,” Andrew answered, drawing attention to him, “if you call the current culture and society developed after the descent of the divinities a ‘game’ with the gods and goddess the ‘players’, then the Evilus affiliated gods are ‘grifters’, players that derive enjoyment from causing trouble and suffering for the other players and mortals. They don’t use suffering as a method to advance their goals, suffering is the goal.”

Lord Ganesha nods in agreement, while Lady Artoria's expression is more complex, and the stupid brat follows up with something even more egregious.

“At least, I hope that’s the case.”

“Why do you think so, V- young man?” Lord Ganesha almost slips, probably wishing to bestow a title to Andrew on the spot. He must be genuinely impressed with the boy if that’s the case.

“For all that grifters are little hate gremlins, they still engage with the game in the way it's intended. They might cheat, exploit, and make playing a living hell to other players, but they still interact with the game, and are still invested in the continued existence of the game despite deriving enjoyment through a vile method. It is when someone looks at the game and decides that no one should play that things get crazy and unpredictable: petitioning the government to ban the game, sending law enforcement to raid the players homes hoping people get killed, up to setting the house on fire.”

Both god and goddess slowly turn to Andrew, staring wordlessly at him.

“Didn’t happen to me,” he defended himself, “but I know examples of those cases.”

“’Deceptively wild era’, he says.” Lady Artoria mutters under her breath, while Lord Ganesha simply shakes his head in bafflement.

“Back to the original point,” Kshema started, “how did you deal with the new adventurer? Did you also miraculously defeat him?”

Andrew turns to his goddess with a pitiful glance, and she pats his hand in understanding. Appearing to have no other choice, he recounts how he survived.

…

“Huh, he went down way faster than I thought. I was expecting him to at least struggle a little bit more. Well,” the mysterious adventurer takes out a knife from his belt, “I better finish the… wait a minute.”

He kicks the fallen man on the ground, who flops to the side like a puppet with its strings cut. The masked man kneels to feel Andrew’s pulse and breathing, finding both gone.

“He died, just like that. No way. I don’t believe it.”

The masked man decides to stay there, watching the body to confirm what he saw.

“His bowels should be, no, there it is.”

The suspicious corpse voids his bowels at the right time, leaving a nasty odor on the Dungeon. Yet, the mysterious adventurer remains watching the body, as if expecting it to rise at any moment.

“Wait, shit, I *** a ***** right now, ** **** *** .. … .. … ….!”

A few seconds after the masked adventurer leaves, Andrew suddenly gasps for breath, coughing some blood and the bleeding near his stomach flowing once more. He forcefully clenches his muscles to try and staunch some of the bleeding in certain areas, to limited success. He looks after the other fallen adventurers and scavenges one last potion he kept there in case of an emergency, regaining some of his vitality. Afterwards he takes off their shirts that are relatively clean to help keep his organs in place, before moving towards the dungeon exit with as much haste as he can bring.

…

“You faked your death?” I find myself exclaiming. What kind of birdbrain tactic is that?

Lord Ganesha isn’t disturbed by Andrew’s tactic, while his goddess expression I calm save for a small tick around her lips.

“What, you expect me to defeat him or something? I know when to fight, when to run, and when to stay very still.” He takes a deep breath before looking at us. “Right, I think I’m still missing something, but honestly, I rather sleep it off before trying to remember it. Unless there’s anything else the Guild wants from us?”

“No, this will be fine. Thank you for your cooperation, Andrew. Until next time.”

He extended his hand to shake hands with everyone present before his goddess scooped him under her arms. He tried to protest before giving up and making himself comfortable and leaving the room.

…

“I am Ganesha!”

The God of the Masses child sighs in fond exasperation, already used to his god's random outbursts.

“What do you think about that boy, Andrew?”

Kshema pauses to consider the question. Ganesha is a wise god, despite his flamboyant attitude, thus the adventurer decides to focus on practical insights.

“He’s stronger than his Falna suggests.” Ganesha motions for his child to continue, and the child proceeds to give a more thorough explanation to meet his god’s expectation.

“Andrew matched my polite grip strength with ease, so I decided to test his prowess. As I slowly increased the pressure, he followed suit, and since he didn’t seem to mind the test, I continued until reaching the B rank strength with some effort. I realized that going beyond that would be outside the bounds of politeness and kept it at that level.”

“Did he use a skill to increase his strength in response to yours?”

Kshema ponders the question for a moment before shaking his head. “If he did, it wasn’t done in a traditional manner.”

“I felt how his muscles moved, it reminded me of matching strength with a Boaz or a Weretiger with how strongly his muscles tightened. If he has a skill, it is one that alters his body to make it stronger than one that enhances the power of his blessing.”

“Interesting,” was Ganesha's only reply before changing the subject, “I hope they work out in the end.”

“Huh?”

“That girl is still young and needs to experience the world a little. Maybe Andrew will help her let go of the past or forgive herself.”

“Lord Ganesha?”

“After all, not everyone can be me, Ganesha! Let’s make haste my son, I still need to engage in serious negotiations with Buddhi and Riddhi if we should incorporate Siddhi into our alliance!”

“Oh god no.”

“Oh Ganesha Yes!”