Blade Skill Online: With Trash Job ‘Summoner’, Weakest Weapon ‘Bow’, and Rotten Stat ‘Luck’, I Rise

[Grand Birth of the Devilish Debugger Yuri-kun!]

Seele and I were brought to a huge underground prison where no light could reach.

Then we were forced into one of the cells packed with several people.

“Your execution will be carried out shortly. Until then, you can spend your last minutes trembling in fear here!”

Having said that, the guard NPC locked the cell and left somewhere.

At that moment, a message popped up in front of us.

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You have been sent to the underground prison. In this place, the effects of jobs, skills, and arts are nullified. In addition, you cannot summon monsters, nor can you access the item box. Stats’ physical ability-boosting effect is also removed.

You will be executed in 10 minutes. In the case of death due to violation of the law, your level will drop by one.

・You may get out of this place by:

1: Accept the death penalty and revive at the temple in the Beginning Town.

2: Call the guard NPC and pay bail. If you do so, you will be able to get out of the cell and teleport to the entrance of the city. However, the bail amount varies depending on the city where you were arrested. By decree of the city lord-cum-pope, the bail in this city is set at the highest amount of 30 million gold.

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“Haa~… this is the end. We’re checkmated…” Seele muttered, releasing a deep sigh.

She ruffled her red hair and then looked at the message with a distressed look on her face.

“As a PKer, I’d rather go on a rampage than just wait for death, but our stats, our skills, our everything is sealed—waiting for death is all we can do. Haa, Lord Demon King, I guess this is a goodbye. I mean, why the hell is bail so damn expensive…”

“Well, I can afford it. I happen to have around 30 million gold on me.”

“For real?! …That’s extreme Luck for you, I guess. You can rampage as you please and on top of that your rare items drop rate is envyingly high. Never mind… just leave me behind and escape by yourself…!” Seele shouted with a somewhat lonely voice, sounding sulky.

I pulled her cheeks tightly.

“Wa?! W-wat a yu dowing?!”

“Escape, you say? Are you kidding me? This arrest was unjustified in the first place. You aside, I’m completely innocent! Why should I be sentenced to death?!”

“Hold on, what did you mean me aside?! Don’t you think that’s kind of cruel of you?!”

I ended up coming to this damned city only because I followed you, to begin with?! – Seele began to make a fuss. Glad she had regained her spirit.

Alright—I’d found a hole in the system. All that was left for us to do now was to break out of this prison with spirit and guts. Then as a righteous Summoner, I would bring down divine punishment to the corrupted Pope who said that ‘monsters were evil just by being alive’.

“Okay, playtime’s over. Let’s go get rid of Pope Gregorion.”

“Huh?! What are you talking about?! We can’t even break out of this prison, and HP doesn’t decrease in the city in the first place, remember? I knew I jokingly asked if you would kill the lord NPC when you said you were gonna take over the city, but that’s fundamentally impossible…”

“Yeah, I got into a fight with the skinhead on day one, so I know. Neither of us took damage then.”

“Hm?” Seele-san tilted her head. It was when I was about to call the guards while looking at her sideways.

Other prisoners in the cell muttered:

“How could you still be so energetic… you’re going to be executed, you know…?!”

“How long do we have to stay here… To think I would end up like this just being a summoner…”

“Uu, that damn Pope…! I wanna get out of here, I wanna meet my monster…!”

They were crouching in the corner of the cell, trembling. When I stared at them, windows saying [NPC: Summoner] popped up.

“What’s up with these guys? NPCs have jobs, too?”

“Ah, the patch notes said that NPCs with combat abilities have been added along with the implementation of the guild system.

“And apparently, you can entrust the defense of your guild house to those NPCs. You can make NPCs your ally by giving items to strong NPCs to raise their favorability of you, hire mercenary NPCs, and so on.” Seele explained.

I see, well, being able to hire NPCs was common in games.

…But why were these guys in prison? There was no way to solicit people who were in prison, and no one would want to hire people with criminal records in the first place.

When I brought up those points, Seele answered with a complicated look on her face, “Maybe, just maybe… the devs created them just to die.”

“…What?”

“I mean, look. Wouldn’t it be weird if you got sent to a terrifying underground prison only to find no one there but the guards? The ‘atmosphere’ wouldn’t be right without some prisoners trembling with fear.

“…I’m guessing that these guys were prepared for that exact purpose. And since this city is permeated with monster eradication doctrine, to add immersion, the prisoners were given the job of Summoner, and just like this, be left to rot here until they die, or should I say until the game ends.”

…I see, in other words, these guys were basically just props, huh.

The fact that one of them complained about Seele’s loud voice meant that they likely had a minimum amount of intelligence embedded in them, and yet, they were just waiting for their death here, all to set the atmosphere.

How loathsome.

I approached the Summoners, then I flicked their foreheads with my finger.

“Owie?!”

“Ouch!”

“The hell?!”

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・You have committed a violent act against NPCs. Their favorability of you has decreased from 0 to -10.

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Shut up, system. In fact, a finger flick was nowhere near enough to put some guts into these cowardly men.

“Y-you, what’s your problem…?!”

“Listen here. Regardless of the setting or shit, you’re all Summoners, aren’t you? You love monsters, and you’re angry towards the Pope and the city’s current state of affairs, right?

“That makes you guys my friends! Now, we’re gonna take over the city.”

[E-ehh…?!]

Ignoring their dumbfounded looks, I called over the guard with a loud voice. “Hey, I give up! I’ll pay the bail, so let me out!”

“Tch, how boring. And here I thought I’d get to watch an execution.” The guard walked to the front of the cell with heavy footsteps. The moment he opened the door, a message popped up in front of me: [You have lost 30 million gold. Would you like to teleport to the city entrance?]

I ignored it and punched the guard in the face with all my might!

“Gugaha?!” The guard fell on his ass. I kicked the bastard in the face, sending him flying, and he slammed into the bars of the cell across!

“How’s that? Even if he didn’t take damage, he still got knocked back from the ‘impact’, right? Come on Seele, we’re breaking out.”

“No, no, no, no?! What the hell are you doing, Lord Demon King?! If you did that to the NPC guards—”

Before she could finish her words, a voice rang out, “What’s going on here!”

They sure were fast. Just like when the Pope had summoned them, dozens of guards immediately appeared. They were rushing toward us from the upper doorway.

But I had no intention of getting arrested again. As a hero of justice, I wouldn’t give in to the minions of evil!

“Seele, you’re up next. Cut open a way out for us with your greatsword.”

“Huh?! Didn’t you read the message earlier?! We can’t take out weapons from the item box inside the prison?!”

“Then we just have to take them out from somewhere else, right?”

“Somewhere else… ah, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH?!”

As Seele finally realized the hole in the system, I opened the menu and tapped a greatsword in the ‘Event Point Exchange Page’. Of course, I selected the ‘immediately materialize’ option instead of sending it to the item box.

At that moment, a greatsword appeared in the air, emitting a burst of light!!!

“Okay, take it, Seele! It’s my gift to you!”

“Ku…. Ahahahahahaha! You really are the best, Lord Demon King! You use everything to achieve your goals! To the devs, you must be the devil herself!

“Alright, you’ve got me hyped up. This calls for a great rampage!”

Grabbing the red greatsword, Seele rushed forward! The guards were sent flying like pinballs with each swing of the sword.

This was another loophole in the system. The message didn’t say ‘only players’ would lose stats’ physical ability-boosting effect here. That was to say, NPCs’ physical ability would be the same as players’.

Furthermore, the stats didn’t become zero. That was why Seele was still able to equip a super rare greatsword requiring Strength of 300 or more. With this, we could overturn the difference in numbers with the difference in weapon performance.

Additionally…

“Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?! H-hot, hot, hot, hot, hot?!”

Many of those sent flying by Seele writhed in agony as their bodies were on fire. It was due to the effect of the greatsword.

Inside the prison, arts, jobs, and skills became useless, but the effects of weapons were left untouched.

The devs must have thought, “Players can’t take out weapons from the item box anyway, why make more work for ourselves?” so they left it be.

“Oh, found another hole in the system. It seems that just like monsters, NPCs don’t have a pain limiter. They sure have it hard… I’ll take advantage of this to torture the Pope.”

Saying that, I took the cells’ keys from the guard I had kicked earlier. He was trembling in fear, muttering, “What is this… what is going on… I don’t know how to deal with this situation…!” as though he was broken. Then I went on to open the cells’ doors one after another.

The many Summoner NPCs inside them were in a daze.

“C… can we go out? I don’t know why, b-but I feel like we shouldn’t…!”

“Then just stay. Stay and keep yourselves bound by the rules of the shitty devs, or should I say your ‘gods’, while trembling in fear for the rest of your sorry lives here.

“Of course, if you don’t like that, then follow me! Together, let’s take over this city!”

[—?!]

In response to my words, one by one, the NPCs who were treated as props stood up.

Their number gradually increased, and before I knew it, a large army had formed under me, enough to fill the corridor of the prison.

“I… want freedom!”

“I want to see my beloved familiar! I don’t have any memories of spending time together with him for some reason, but I definitely feel that I love him!”

“I don’t want to be trapped in a place like this anymooooore!”

The NPCs roared. Their roars were filled with a strong unwillingness to remain as mere props.

Facing such a situation, a bright red system message popped in front of me.

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· An unexpected disturbance has occurred in the Helheim Underground Prison. The ringleader is Player: Yuri. Due to this disturbance, the NPCs’ AIs have started acting abnormally.

Reporting to the developer team, reporting, reporting… no response. Hence, the bug-fixing AI ‘Pendragon’ will now start judging.

Judgment – no problem. There is no evidence that the system has been tampered with. Everything is working within the specifications of the system.

We apologize for the inconvenience. Player: Yuri, please continue playing the game with peace of mind.

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“Well, well, now we’re talking! Alright, I’ll start a rebellion with all my power!”

And so, I headed out of the prison with numerous NPCs trailing along behind me.