“Mhm…”

“Hey, wake up.”, a harsh voice spoke into my ears, but my subconscious mind ignored it.

“…”, I continued my sound sleep, as if nothing has ever bothered.

“Wake up—“

Thump

“Okay, okay I’m sorry!”, I instantly woke up, upon the cold hard feeling pressed onto my neck.

I looked up at the person behind my awakening to find out it was—

“What’s your deal…. Wait, you knocked me out unconscious you bastard!”

The guy I was speaking to, was the Knight of the Roundtable known as Yami, if I remember his name correctly.

“Yeah, uh… sorry about that. Should’ve aimed for you rib cage instead.”

“How does that make it any better?!”, I questioned his sanity on many levels, while scratching the back of my neck.

“I’m going to report this to Levi.”

“Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait! Let’s not get ahead of ourselves!”, he immediately went into full out defense mode, and prostrated himself before me.

“Are you at least going to apologize?”

“Hell no, you one hundred percently deserved that.”, despite the clear threat, his stubbornness saw its way through, or perhaps it was his pride?

I looked at him with pity in my eyes, his expression didn’t change.

“Let me explain myself, I won’t apologize to you because you took my week off.”

“And is that a reason to kill me?”, I asked raising a brow. “Hey! I wouldn’t have attacked you, if I wasn’t sure that it wouldn’t kill you.”

“So you were going to hurt me either way!”

“Well yes, that is true.”, he laughed behind his statement.

Soon after, he sighed and stared me in the eyes.

“Look, I am mad at you taking my week off, the reason why it’s because of my intense lack of sleep.”, he shortly explained.

“I haven’t slept in nearly three months, I’ve been up everyday, and every night. No sleep, maybe a little rest, but not anything else.”

“…”

Had someone listened to this, they would’ve probably marked it off as a lie or a cruel joke. After all, no human could survive over a week without sleep or much of a rest.

However, we’re in a world of magic and monsters, so anything could possible. Or at least, I want to believe so.

“Let’s put this matter aside, I’ll apologize… not really…”, the last part of his sentence was spoken in a low voice, to make sure I won’t hear it.

“I’ll formally introduce myself, my name is Yami, and you?”, he formally introduced himself, like he had intended to.

For a moment it felt like he forgot everything that he had done, but I too felt like this conversation wouldn’t lead anywhere if we were just to dispute about something as trivial as him knocking me out…

‘… if I remember this, I’ll report it…’

“My name is Shiro, and I still won’t forgive you.”, my spite took better of me, and the last part of the sentence came without my consent.

“I can live with that, now Shiro.”, he stood up from the bench were were sitting on.

We were back in town, he must’ve carried me here and placed me on the bench to rest, people must’ve glared at him quizzically.

“Come with me, I’ll explain you some things.”, he made a hand gesture, to make me follow him.

I followed him, like a parent and child.

“I’d like to ask, how long was I out?”, I raised a question. “You were out for about one hour.”

I released a soft sigh of relief, it was less than what I was originally expecting, thinking about the amount of times I’ve been out cold.

“How much do you know about Zeltram, Shiro?”, he asked me, while walking down the street, his eyes focused forward.

“I don’t know much, I came from Dawnwell.”, I disclosed as little information as possible.

I only told him information, that wouldn’t affect things too drastically. If I told him that I had no knowledge about Zeltram, he’d be suspicious of me, however if I told him that I was from Dawnwell, it’d make more sense.

But that would also make me even more suspicious.

“I see…”

‘Man I don’t wanna explain him history, I’ll just explain the essential parts…’, Yami thought, his eyes dropping even lower than before.

“Okay, if you use your brain, you can easily guess how many members there are in the Roundtable. There are a total of Seven members now, you’re the Knight of ‘Patience’, I am the Knight of ‘Diligence’ and Hollou is the Knight of ‘Charity’.”, he explained.

“The remaining four knights are currently working on super important stuff that I won’t tell you… yet. But, you can easily guess what knights they are, ‘Chastity’, ‘Temperance’, ‘Kindness’ and ‘Humility’.”

“The knights are well known throughout the kingdom, there is nearly not a single soul that does not know our names, even those outside Zeltram have at least heard of the knights of the roundtable.”

Yami finished explaining and threw a look towards me, as if awaiting for questions now.

“Once you become a Knight of the roundtable, you receive this particular skill, what do they do exactly?”, I asked him, curiously.

I have received the skill opposite of my other skill, ‘Patience’, I questioned myself as to whether I should be allowed to acquire such a skill along side the skill ‘Wrath’.

“Now you’re asking the real questions.”, he turned towards me. “Since you already have the skill, I’ll have no other option than to tell you what I know.”

“The holy virtues vary in effects and use, however all they have is one thing in common, is that they only have one ability, which makes them sort of useless cheats.”

“I don’t know what ‘Patience’s' effects are, so you’re gonna have to figure that out yourself.”

In short, they’re like the sin skills, but they only have one effect.

“Do you know where they come from? Actually, I’d like to know where all skills come from.”, my voices noise was slowly reduced so that he would be unable to listen to the last part of my sentence.

“Hmm, I don’t know much about it. So, I can’t tell you any further than this.”, he said in a apologetic manner, which now it sounded like he really just didn’t feel like he wanted to respond.

“Okay, and one more question.”, I told him.

“Where are we going?”

We have been walking in some sort of pattern that I paid no mind memorizing since I was following him.

We aren’t in some sort of secluded area, but instead were walking among the streets filled with people. They’d occasionally send glances towards us two, whispering to each other.

It must be due to Yami being a Knight of the roundtable, I doubt that you see one on a daily basis.

“Oh yeah, forgot to tell you.”, Yami dug into his pockets, the sound of metal and paper rustling on each other reached my ears.

He took out a paper ball, he unfolded the paper and handed it over to me.

The language was in the same language as mine, so I was able to comprehend it.

‘To the Knights of The Roundtable,

A previously issued quest has officially been deemed impossible. The quest, put up by one of our clients, to either exorcise or get rid of the ghost haunting a manor has failed numerously.

The guild has made a administrative decision, to request you, the knights of the roundtable to take care of the situation.

Please do the following, either recover missing files that are to be found within the mansion, inside an envelope with a sign of a dragon or to exorcise the ghost within the manor.

The rewards will be handed respectively depending on the outcome.

Under the circumstances that set quest cannot be accepted, please report to the guild as soon a possible.

From the Adventurers Guild.’

I turned the parchment around, to check if there’s a second page, but it was blank as I expected.

“As you can see, this quest has basically fallen out of the guilds hands, and that’s where we come in.”, he took out a map, and showed it to me.

It was the terrain of the entirety of the capital, in the very center was the humongous castle and the buildings surrounding it.

“This is how the roundtable works, we are mainly employed by the king himself. Meaning, that if says something, you have to listen and do as he says. We are also employed by the guild under the circumstances that either the quest has become a mess or that the quest is related to the kingdom, like for example, some documents that the public shouldn’t know needs to be retrieved, those types of quests are for us.”

He now pointed on a certain spot on the map, it was in the middle of a forest and one square brown spot in the middle.

“As you can guess, from reading the letter. This is the scenario, where the situation is getting out of hand.”, he explained.

“Why didn’t they just hire a high classes adventurer, instead of bothering the knights?”, I asked him, while looking him in the eye.

“You’ve got a point on that, the reason the guild doesn’t higher high classes adventurers is because the demand on them are really high.”, he explained with a bored expression. “The main reason we’re called it’s because those prideful bastards are like ‘Why should we bother ourselves with something so trivial, why won’t you let someone else take care of it?’. Tch, if I could I’d kill them right this instant.”

His eyes were practically pointing daggers at whoever he hated, even thought there was only me, him and the people on there street here.

“Though there are other reasons to that, such as the very fact there is actually some important documents that could be found within. But they allowed low classes adventurers take it, since in… uh well…”

He struggled to form a sentence, he looked fidgety as if what he was about to speak was mildly offensive…

“Even if the low class adventurers were to find something controversial, they’d probably be ignored.”

‘So that’s how it is…’, I understood him completely.

There are some things that never change, even if it is in another world, if a random adventurer, low classed and run of a mill town were to publicly announce some controversial information about perhaps, let’s just say they’d find some information about a murder caused by a well known Noble.

Even if he’d have concrete evidence, the crowd could be easily manipulated by those with standing and power, as well as a name for themselves.

After all, who would listen to the rookie adventurer and not the ‘Hero’?

The same case was on Earth, however it manifested in different ways.

“Well, that’s pretty much it. Now about the quest in itself.”, Yami sent a sharp gaze towards me.

“A ghost has been haunting some nobles mansion for about 100 years, recently some of their relatives found out that some important document was within the mansion."

He placed the map and quest information's in my pockets without warning.

“You go over there and take care of it, once you’re done come report to me, and also if it reaches night time you are free to return to your Inn or house, not that I care what you do, Bye bye.”

Then—

He disappeared.

“….”

“…..”

….

What?

 

 

 

The sounds of carriages passing by the plains spread throughout the area.

The whole atmosphere was dead, there was no sound or people speaking, only the sounds of the gallops caused by the Horses.

“That bastard… I’m so going to report him…”, I cursed below my breath.

Soon after Yami ditched me, I threw a little tantrum inside my mind, because it would be too embarrassing to do one in public. And then, I decided to take a carriage and head towards the mansion.

There was also, the other option: Leave and do nothing.

I could’ve just went back to Athena and others, however—

‘The sense of obligation won the battle…’

So, how went my day?

I pulled out the holy ‘Excalibur’, changed race, gained a bunch of skills.

Fell out unconscious due to overuse of mana, and am now being forced into some sort of quest I didn’t ask for in the first place.

Whoever asks how my how my day was, my response will be…

“Yeah, today was a great day.”, I sarcastically laughed off a utter lie, I looked outside the carriage, my eyes flew all over the place seeking entertainment.

‘Well, this is better than school…’, I reconciled back on those hellish days, years of academy training wasted!

“How long is it until we reach the destination?”, I asked the driver. “Almost there, just a couple of minutes and we’ll reach it.”

“Ahh….”, I sighed as heavily and loudly as I could, as if to describe my sheer boredom.

There were several carriages outside, I hired one of these carriages that were going to pass by the mention to give me a ride, I bought it with the funds I had in hand.

Just as I thought that this ride could get any more boring, the driver suddenly spoke.

“Uhm, sir.”, his voice sounded hesitant as if he were about to ask a risky question.

“Uhm, with that attire of yours… are you a…”

I immediately realized what he had meant, I was wearing my armor out in the open as care-freely as possible.

Normally I never pay midnight to what I’m wearing, even back on earth, I would just wear anything as long as I felt comfortable.

And now it seems I have gotten used to this armor.

“Uh, this is…”, I struggled to answer, it hasn’t been officially announced that I became a Knight from the roundtable, especially since this whole day felt rushed.

And there was also the fact that I didn’t want to sound… well, rude.

“Are you by haps a new Knight?”, he asked as if he had already known.

I became silent and nodded.

“I see. It’s great to see that they’re still goin' at it.”, he said with a nostalgic tone.

“The last time I gave a ride to one of the knights of the roundtable was twenty years ago.”, he said as he looked at the sky. “We the people owe them a lot.”

“Why is that?”

“The knights have been around for years now, with the passing of one, comes another’s. And so, the knights kept on helping the people.”

“An example would be soon after the war, the knights of the roundtable were formed and they were sent throughout the kingdom to assist with everything.”, he explained, a small tear flowing down his cheeks. “I am not so old that I remember all the way back then, it’s just what my parents once told me.”

“Oh, I see.”, I responded with a monotone voice. “The knights used their magic to give life to dead fields, fought off remnants of the demon king and even went as far as assisting with the rebuilding of the destroyed towns and villages.”

“How do you know that it is true?”

“Because if it weren’t, I wouldn’t be here.”, he looked back at me, smiling happily.

“…”

 

 

 

We arrived at the outskirts, right before the mansions main entrance, the other carriages continued their way to wherever they needed to go.

“Thank you for bringing me here, here’s the payment.”, I offered him a one silver coin. “Is this enough?”

“Yes, I will be taking my leave now, having a nice evening young lad.”, he turned around and went back to the carriage and left.

As soon as I heard the galloping of the horses stop, I turned back around and faced the mansion in the distance.

‘I could leave, if I wanted to…’, the battle still pursued in my mind.

It was either my sense of obligation that would be the victor, or my will, it was an intense battle truly.

“Well, let’s take care of this.”, I sighed, having made up my mind.

And set foot forth into the mansion.