Upon hearing they would be handed over to the Sword Saint, the "Imperial Knights" felt their will to survive rekindle in their desperate hearts. The Astrea Family held immense prestige in human society.
That was the great reputation accumulated through the righteous deeds of successive Sword Saints helping the weak. Although they knew their identities were a disguise, if it were the Imperial Sword Saint, known as the most perfect knight, surely she wouldn't drive them to a dead end over this, right? In any case, it was better than falling into the hands of a Magic Caster who controlled the Undead.
However—. After observing them for a moment, the Sword Saint shook her head and said, "I have confirmed they are not Imperial soldiers. I doubt interrogating them myself would yield more information. Besides, I am not skilled at interrogation. How to deal with them, I leave to your Excellency and these victimized villagers."
No, please no! Hearing the Sword Saint's words, the flame of hope that had just risen in the eyes of these knights was struck by a bone-chilling wind, looking as if it might collapse at any moment.
Moreover, their military quality was not high to begin with; under such pressure, the expressions on their faces held no secrets. If the Sword Saint were to ask them anything now, they would surely confess everything without reservation. However, the Sword Saint seemed not to understand the human heart, failing to notice their abnormality at all, and instead very seriously handed the decision-making power to the Magic Caster and the victims.
Hearing the Sword Saint's words, complex thoughts flashed through Ainz Ooal Gown's mind. First, he was very concerned about information regarding this world, as it was very likely a world within the "Yggdrasill" game background he knew.
To mention it here, Ainz Ooal Gown is a Transmigrator, a Transmigrator from Japan, who traveled to this world with the game's guild NPCs and character attributes.
Based on his preliminary understanding of this world, he knew it possessed the classes and skills from the game. Combined with the vast world-building of the game he played, he internally suspected if this was a world within "Yggdrasill."
However, his initial thought was to gather information from the villagers; as for these knights, he originally had other plans. Now, he was even less likely to ask about this world, because the rhetoric he had prepared to persuade the villagers would never fool the Sword Saint, and a single mistake might unknowingly reveal their true identities to her. Based on the villagers' previous reactions, he concluded that the Undead in this world likely followed the traditional setting of evil monsters. Currently, his identity could still be a Magic Caster who uses Necromancy Magic, but if his true race was discovered to be Undead, he would likely be viewed as an evil monster.
He was not confident whether he and Albedo together could defeat the Sword Saint. —[Spatial Slash] was an exclusive skill of the World Champion class. The World Champion class, as the name suggests, was a special class in "Yggdrasill" that only players who won the world championship in competitive matches could obtain. Since the requirements to obtain this class were so difficult, the class attribute bonuses and skill strength were naturally extremely powerful.
Ainz Ooal Gown's guild was ranked very high in the game; even later, when basically no other guild members logged on besides him, they could maintain a rank in the top thirty.
In this guild, only one member held the World Champion class, so Ainz Ooal Gown knew very well how strong a World Champion was.
He himself was a strategist-type member in the guild; PVP was not his forte.
Although Ainz Ooal Gown's own arena ranking was not low, there was still a significant distance between him and the top-tier PVP players in the game.
The Sword Saint might not necessarily possess the skill level of a top-tier PVP player like his friend. However, since she possessed this class, her strength would certainly not be weak.
Furthermore, the combat techniques she displayed just now left Albedo with no way to fight back. Although Albedo appeared unharmed now, in that instant, Albedo—who was wearing various top-tier equipment and divine artifacts—had her defense broken by the opponent without the latter even using full strength.
Albedo's defensive power was among the top tier of NPCs in Nazarick. Without using "that one" kind of item or buff skill enhancements, Albedo's defense far surpassed his own as a magic-type class. The Sword Saint's strength could be seen from this; even if she didn't have the strength of Touch Me, she wouldn't be much weaker. One could tentatively assume her strength was above his own.
Therefore—. Ainz Ooal Gown did not hesitate for long before choosing to let these knights go.
"Knights, for our first meeting, my name is Ainz Ooal Gown. As you can see, I am a Magic Caster. Go back and tell your master—your owner. Do not cause trouble nearby. If you do not heed this advice, next time even your country will perish. Begone. Be sure to relay this to your master."
The trembling knights nodded repeatedly, trying hard to show they would comply, and then, upon receiving permission to live, they immediately scrambled up and rushed out of the village.
Tsukasa simply watched this scene from the side, analyzing this person's character through the Magic Caster's words and deeds. Her current conclusion was that this Magic Caster must have once held a high position and was definitely not a good person. After all, despite her having specifically looked out for the Kain Village villagers before, he completely ignored the will of the victimized villagers when dealing with the knights.
Furthermore, his opening statement was the domineering remark "your country will perish," which was enough to demonstrate the foundation of his strength and his attitude of disregarding human life.
This behavior increasingly perfected the image of the Demon King in her mind; she could already imagine the cold skull beneath Ainz Ooal Gown's somewhat ugly mask.
But the name Ainz Ooal Gown seemed... as if she had heard it somewhere before.
Her memory was too blurry; it wasn't that she knew the name, but rather that she had heard it somewhere. She couldn't help but enter her Sword Saint state to flip through her past memories. Finally, in her earliest memories, she had heard this name from her roommate during her university days, though back then her roommate said "An Yi Zi Liao Gong." According to the information in her memory, this was the name of the protagonist in a certain work.
From her roommate's introduction, it wasn't hard to see that the genre of the work was an "invincible flow" story. The general content seemed to be about a protagonist who was super strong in a game and traveled to another world as their game character. This theme was very popular at the time, but back then she was following another work with an isekai setting. Plus, hearing from her roommate that the protagonist Ainz Ooal Gown was a character with an evil alignment, she, who never liked reading "dark flow" works, didn't get into it.
If the Ainz Ooal Gown before her really was the protagonist from that work, then that meant he was not only potentially the Demon King who once almost destroyed the world but also the protagonist of an invincible flow Transmigrator novel. And the most crucial issue was that he might now be the Demon King who, after the novel's plot had concluded, had entered a life of seclusion with his beautiful followers.
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Webnovel updates will still be daily, as usual.
It might not seem tempting right now but who knows what the future holds?
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