Vol 6 Chapter 42

The sight of two men walking through the middle of the busy street holding hands seemed to capture the attention of passing pedestrians quite a bit. However, Kapros's mind was so strangely detached at the moment that he barely felt the usual discomfort and unpleasantness he would have certainly felt from such stares. More precisely, it felt like while his body was walking, his consciousness was floating in the air.

Though he had held out his hand to Caesar saying "let's play," he actually had neither a destination nor any sense of purpose about where to go. Even though Kapros didn't know where he was going, Caesar continued to follow quietly. Suddenly feeling uneasy about this, when he glanced back, he saw Caesar staring intently at the arm he was holding.

It wasn't the murderous gaze he had shown until now, nor was it the sharp sword-like eyes from earlier that had seemed resigned. Though he was just looking at Kapros's arm without expression, Kapros felt a tingling sensation in that arm that he hadn't been conscious of until now.

Caesar must have felt Kapros's involuntary flinch. He raised his head. Kapros quickly turned his head away and continued walking, trying to maintain a composed appearance. He could clearly feel Caesar's gaze boring into the back of his hooded head.

Though he was worried Caesar might say something, fortunately, after staring at the back of Kapros's head for a few minutes, Caesar withdrew his gaze. Another period of silence fell.

How far could they walk together like this? What thoughts had made Caesar grab his arm? What was that emotion, that longing Kapros had seen in Caesar's eyes, for?

Thoughts that couldn't form into words kept endlessly swirling in his mind.

After pushing through crowds of people for quite a while like that, when he suddenly looked up, he saw a couple making a fuss throwing something at a street stall. Though the man standing several meters from the display case kept throwing something while the woman beside him alternated between cheering and disappointment, the scene struck Kapros as very impressive.

"Come on! This is your last chance, so hit it at least once!"

"Ah, okay. Just trust me. Hyah! Fly!"

When the last thing the man held flew but suddenly lost speed in mid-air and ended up rolling on the ground again, the woman made a crying face.

"You really can't do anything right. I said I would do it, but you just had to insist on doing it yourself..."

"No, no. It's not me, it's this dart that's weird!"

"Don't be ridiculous. You couldn't hit anything, so you're buying ice cream like we agreed. Let's go!"

"Wait! J-just one more time!"

Despite the man's desperate resistance, the woman grabbed his arm and dragged him away with tremendous force. Then one of the few people who had been watching the scene with interest confidently went to the stall owner and whispered something, and he succeeded in hitting items on the display stand three times out of ten chances. As he happily disappeared hugging his items, more people started lining up to participate.

Wondering what exactly this was, Kapros looked at the small event notice sign standing next to the stall owner.

[ Special Event! - Lucky Dart Game - ]

[ Want to get a gift for your loved one? Want good items but don't have money? Want to freely release your frustration by throwing refreshing darts? Here's an ultra-ultra-special event for people like you! Hit the display items with darts and win those items. Event cost is 7 gold. But items worth up to 70 gold! Only ten chances! Please find the owner 'Yoni' to participate. ]

"...Should I try?"

After reading the event notice, Kapros suddenly said those words without realizing it. And he was surprised at himself for saying them. Though the participation fee was rather expensive, since someone had won earlier, it seemed worth trying casually.

For the first time since grabbing Kapros's arm and following him, Caesar voluntarily raised his head to look at the notice. Kapros wondered if Caesar would want to try it too, but thought it might be better if he tried first. Then while watching people throwing darts from behind the line, he suddenly noticed something strange.

Every time participants took their stance to throw darts, the stall owner standing in a not-so-noticeable spot would briefly mutter something inside his mouth while staring straight at the darts with open eyes, or fidget with the hand in his pants pocket. After that, strangely enough, as if on cue, the thrown darts would fall to the ground or fly off to the side.

However, occasionally when the merchant kept his mouth shut, the darts would fly properly and stick into the prizes. After watching about five people in a row throw darts in front of him, Kapros became convinced there was some suspicious relationship between the stall owner and the success rate of the dart throws. Though it could be coincidence, his experience as a mage convinced him that those were definitely skill usage motions.

'This is probably...'

It had to be magic, or if not magic, then a skill used similarly. He couldn't help feeling upset when he realized that the event he had wanted to enjoy was highly likely to be fraudulent. Weren't the participants just being scammed out of their expensive participation fees? He was about to turn around and go somewhere else when he stopped at the voices of other victim users behind him.

"Huh? This can't be right? Why does it keep falling like this? With my strength stats... Isn't this a scam?"

"A scam? Haha, you folks must be new to MIST. I'm an executive of the Jison Pico Guild, one of the top 5 guilds in Bala Monyak. What you just said isn't defamation against me, but defamation against the entire Jison Pico Guild. You have evidence to make such claims, right?"