Reincarnated Hero System

"Is this for real?"

"...Yes."

Although there was a short pause, the high demon gave her affirmation, making Eliza question why someone with this kind of skill even needed a 'Level'.

"He still does. This skill does make it so that the richer he is, the stronger he becomes, but there needs to be a basis for that strength.

The increase in power he gains because of this skill scales according to what he originally has. This just makes it so that he can easily battle people higher than his level with relative ease.

It's just like how my stat boosts make me able to confidently take on people 10 levels higher and have no problems whatsoever."

Evan replied to her question as he dismissed the skill description board before opening his inventory and continuing.

"Naturally, there's a limit to the amount of power he can gain with this, after all, too much power would overload his body and start damaging him instead."

Pulling out a juice pack from his inventory, he turned to Pride and asked.

"It's the same as yours, isn't it?"

"..."

"...?"

After a short silence, Pride heaved a sigh of exasperation and asked back at Evan.

"Evan, why are you openly discussing the limitations of someone's skills like it's nothing?"

She gestured to the other three people in the carriage as she spoke, causing Evan's gaze to turn to them as he pulled out three pieces of magic-imbued paper from his inventory.

"Because I have means to make them never speak about what they're hearing."

â—‡ â—‡ â—‡

After ensuring the silence of the three others in the carriage using the magic contracts he acquired in Kasteblum, Evan continued analysing the story Leana had told him and pointed out one strange thing.

"Ever since the start, you had always said the 'Acting Guild Master', not 'Guild Master'.

So, I'm assuming that this acting guild master is the person who's supposed to be the vice guild master and the real guild master is elsewhere?"

"...yes.

The Guild Master of the adventurers' and mages' guilds, along with most of the high-ranked adventurers in Osto are out on an expedition to investigate a dungeon that emerged just a few weeks before Terence surfaced."

"Makes sense. After all, there's no way that a dungeon city like Osto only has one adventurer at the level 190 range.

I'm guessing all the B-ranked adventurers are with the guild master too, right?"

"That is the case."

Evan nodded upon hearing Leana's reply before suddenly realizing something wrong.

"Wait up! Did you say that a dungeon emerged in the Viscount's territory?!"

When Leana nodded in response to his question, Evan narrowed his eyes and spoke.

"That makes no sense. There should not be any newly emerging dungeons around Osto.

How come this dungeon suddenly appeared and it held monsters powerful enough to require the guild master and all the B-ranked adventurers of Osto to leave, right before someone who could only be defeated by a B-ranked adventurer showed up to terrorize Osto?

It's too suspicious!"

Evan's words caused the expressions of all those who heard it to turn strange. When one looked at it that way, it did seem too coincidental but at most, it would just be summed up as an unfortunate coincidence.

However, Evan knew of the future of Aidos, and he knew about Osto very well, after all, it was where Greed in the game began his own trail of destruction during the 'Seven Deadly Sins Massacre' and had Hobha was the unfortunate country that he had destroyed.

So, Evan was sure that there wasn't supposed to be another dungeon with monsters that required an entire team of beings above Level 200 led by one close to level 300 to face in the area, except the Tower of Avarice.

Even the very existence of a person named 'Terence Stickels' was foreign to Evan, but he had treated this as a result of his action of preventing the 'Seven Deadly Sins Massacre'.

"This whole situation suddenly feels like one big plot."

The young hero clicked his tongue in annoyance, deciding to go to the adventurer's guild and get all the information they had about this newly emerging dungeon.

â—‡ â—‡ â—‡

The group's journey back to Osto continued without a hitch.

No randomly appearing monster hordes, or template bandits springing up from the sides of the road much to Evan's dissatisfaction.

And when Eliza asked him why he was annoyed that their journey was unimpeded, his reply made the battle priestess stare at him slack-jawed.

"I want to do a bit more experiments with that skill, so either case would do just fine.

Though I'd prefer a group of monsters, they're easier to deal with for me."

The young hero then proceeded to pull out a bunch of random things from his inventory, ranging from torn-up pieces of paper to literal gold bars.

"Why do you even have gold bars on you?!"

"I'm not gonna lie but I don't remember exactly where we got it.

It's either in Shad Glua or in some other city, possibly the ones with the casinos."

He placed a hand on his chin as he reminisced about their experience in the capital of Uswil, where he discovered that Pride apparently had more than just a knack for gambling.

"You were so good at it that it was terrifying.

Did you gamble a lot in the demon world?"

When the high demon nodded in affirmation to his question, Evan made a strange face before saying.

"You guys have casinos too, huh?"

His words made Pride's brow twitch in annoyance as she glared at him and spoke.

"I really don't know what image of my home world you have in your head but it's most definitely a wrong one."

Meanwhile, Eliza just watched the two discuss Pride's home world while petting the head of Kayla who at some point, had transformed into a cat and was resting on her lap.

They continued in this manner until they met with a group of Knights on horseback speeding in their direction.

The knights had the same armoured crest as Leana's guards so Evan assumed that they were also knights of the Viscount too.

It turned out that the Viscount had discovered that Terence took action and had sent another squad of knights after his daughter.

Unfortunately, it seems that the second squad had been held back by another group of Terence's goons whose sole purpose was to delay the knights long enough for the first group of goons to finish the job.

And all would have worked out according to Terence's plans if Evan's group wasn't passing that route today.

'Still, the Viscount doesn't seem to be a pushover either, given that he figured out Terence's movements quickly.'

After meeting up with the second group, Sir Enro explained the situation to them before they split up once more, intending to enter the city in different ways so as to prevent Terence from knowing his plan had failed.

However, Evan's next words threw these plans out the window.

"It doesn't really matter since he can sense that two of his 'Thralls' have died."

"Thralls?"

"That's what the ones who have that same strength absorbing power are called. If his thralls die, he'd be able to tell so he already knows the plans have failed."

Evan replied to the knight as he gazed at the walls of the city in the distance.

"And how do you know this?"

"Do you really think it's a miracle that his 'power' doesn't work on me?"

The young hero shot back and held up his hand, letting the knight see the crest on the back of his palm before going back to scouting the surrounding area.

'If I fight him there, I'd be able to go all out without wrecking part of the city in the process.'

He ignored the strange expression on the knight's face as he analysed his potential battlefields with a pensive look on his face.

If only he knew that he would not use them as much as he had planned.

Despite Evan's words, the knights still split up and entered the city through different means, with the intention of preventing the citizens from realising that the Viscount's daughter was ever out of the city in the first place.

Evan didn't understand the reason for this but he just let them do what they wanted.

Upon arriving, the carriage went straight towards the back entrance to the Viscount's estate, entering from there and heading straight to the Viscount's mansion without being noticed by the residents of any of the other mansions in the estate.