Chapter 1843: Patch!!!!!!_2

“Lapu wouldn’t have been killed by him, right? No, no way, he’s got the Half-leaf Greatsword, how could he possibly lose to trash like Patch.”

Leon was clearly worrying about the missing Lapu’s safety, yet in his head he couldn’t help replaying Patch that bastard’s glorious track record.

Things like deliberately kicking people off cliffs, running away from the Battle Festival, disguising himself as a thief to mug passing travelers—keep listing them and you’d feel like you could dump all the sins in human history onto him alone. He’s practically a universal scapegoat.

Of course, this bastard’s personality fully deserves being treated that way.

“Could it be that Lapu’s just been locked up somewhere around here by him?”

With that thought, Leon started combing through this area called the cemetery even more carefully.

This place is exactly what its name says: a full-on public graveyard. Follow the steps all the way down; cliff on the left, and on the right are tomb niches carved straight out of the stone wall. One dried-up corpse after another is laid inside, and some of them will still get up and swing at you.

To be fair, these revived corpses are much stronger than skeleton monsters, but in the current state where everyone’s stats have been massively buffed, they’re really not worth mentioning. Even when they try an ambush, Leon can swat them down without effort.

Leon carefully checked every spot along the way that could hide something, but at most he found some white light points. He did pick up quite a few burial goods with a strong exotic vibe—those he could bring back as gifts for Luluwo, as thanks.

With him going all-out, the cemetery was quickly swept clean. The area really isn’t that big, and it’s almost entirely just piles of corpses. Even that clearing at the bottom that looks like it should trigger some kind of boss fight was completely empty.

Leon’s biggest gain this run was the Evil Eye Ring +3; aside from that it was all bits and bobs.

[Evil Eye Ring +3]

[A ring that seals away the Monster that once attacked Astara──the Evil Eye Wraith]

[When the wearer defeats an enemy, they recover their own Life Force]

[The terrifying wraith nearly destroyed Astara, but it’s said it was finally driven back by the “Sword of the Noble Rune Holder”]

“What does the plus three even mean…”

Leon scratched his head and decided this was probably some kind of Sain Dungeon-exclusive jargon.

“Lapu isn’t here either.”

He turned back and walked the route he’d taken in, and ended up actually finding a fork in the path he’d missed earlier.

Follow this newly discovered fork and you can go all the way up; as he walked, Leon realized the scenery in front of him was starting to look familiar.

“I’m back on the surface?”

Turns out this path leads straight out of the cemetery to the outside world.

Could it be he’s already fully explored the cemetery area in one go?

Thinking that, he quickly turned around, found the entrance to the cemetery again, and stopped at the pitch-black underground staircase. Leon took a deep breath, like he was psyching himself up, then finally walked down.

The trek to where the broken staircase was wasn’t exactly short, but Leon felt like he arrived at his destination in an instant.

Even though he still hadn’t finished steeling himself.

Before he got there, he’d already released his Fighting Qi, and sure enough, just as he’d expected, he didn’t sense any living creatures. Patch had already fled.

So there wasn’t any point in him coming back, was there?

Just as that thought surfaced, he saw violet light points appear where Patch had been squatting earlier.

He still didn’t know what those light points represented, but his heart suddenly went “thunk” and a bad feeling hit him.

Leon hesitated for a moment, but in the end still reached out and touched that cluster of light.

The palm-sized light swelled several times larger the instant he touched it, and a scatter of Armor clattered to the ground in front of him.

From the look of it, it was exactly the set of Armor Lapu had been wearing.

[Lap’s Helmet]

[The Iron Helmet worn by the memory-lost Lapu]

[Heavy Armor with excellent defense and no gaps, able to fully protect the head]

[To hide a Wandering Soul’s appearance and true identity, this is undoubtedly ideal. Its owner has already recovered his memory and shed his Wandering Soul state, and thus has no reason to keep wearing it]

“Bang!”

After finishing the helmet’s description, the helmet in Leon’s hand suddenly slipped and fell to the ground, rolled forward a few times, and almost tumbled off the edge.

But even seeing that, he didn’t rush forward to save the helmet.

Because Leon was currently on all fours, kneeling on the ground.

Looking like someone whose every last hope had just been crushed.

“Lapu… really is Patch…”

He’d vaguely sensed the truth a moment ago, but had still been using fantasies like “Patch kidnapped Lapu and stole his Armor to wear it himself” to lie to himself.

But after reading Lap’s Helmet’s description, that pitiful delusion could no longer hold up.

“I treated Patch like a brother…”

Leon shrank in on himself, curling up into a pill-bug in full defensive posture, the light gone from his eyes.

“What have I even been doing these past few days…”

Uh-oh, he’d started doubting himself!

One meaningless mutter after another spilled from his mouth, his body curling tighter and tighter like he was trying to escape this world itself, and in the end.

“What is the meaning of Life, anyway?”

Leon began pondering that philosophical proposition called the meaning of Life.

“Hahahahaha——”

From inside the Sain Dungeon Lord’s room came a burst of wonderfully wicked laughter.

This is exactly that most common Soulslike Game player behavior: “I fell in the trap myself, so I gotta make everyone else fall in it too, yeah.”

No one knows how long passed, but on the screen in front of Gong Qiying, Leon finally climbed back to his feet.

He staggered as he walked, looking like his soul had left his body, as if he’d been dumped by some heartless bastard.

He did bring Lapu’s set of Armor along: he killed an Animated Corpse, stripped its ragged cloth, wrapped the Armor up, and dragged it behind him with a constant clanging rattle.

The expression on his face right now could be summed up as “heart dead, mind gone crazy” without exaggeration.

The “good brother” he’d always believed in turned out to be that evil bald guy in disguise…

It had a strong “recognizing a thief as your father” flavor to it.

No—strictly speaking, you couldn’t even say “in disguise.”

Far, far in the distance, Leon saw Pilgrimage Angels flying in the sky as part of the background. That made him think of his first encounter with Lapu, which had happened because he was trying to escape a Pilgrimage Angel attack.

Sigh, if only a life could freeze at the first meeting.

At least back then, Lapu—no, Patch—was still in a state of amnesia. The kindness he’d shown Leon had been genuine, and calling him a friend hadn’t been a lie.

It’s just…

“I never thought memory could change a person that much, sigh.”

There’s that saying: humans are made of their memories. Leon now wholeheartedly agreed with that.

His heart was a mess of feelings right now, thoughts so tangled he didn’t even know what to say. After straining for a long time, he finally squeezed out one line.

“Sain, why did you have to show me this crap…”

All the feelings he’d had today ultimately twisted into resentment toward Sain Dungeon.

Not long after, mentally and physically exhausted, Leon dragged the Armor out of Sain Dungeon and returned to his place in Bed City.

What he hadn’t expected was that the moment he opened the door he saw Gapar lying comfortably on the sofa, eating skewers of some kind of meat. Seeing Leon walk in, Gapar lifted a skewer and said, “Want some?”

Don’t wave the skewers around, the seasoning’s going everywhere…

Leon listlessly greeted him, then turned to head straight for his bedroom, planning to go be depressed for a while.

“Oh right, I saw that Lapu you mentioned today too. Guy’s pretty good. I really appreciate him.”

Gapar’s comment made Leon stop in his tracks.

“Didn’t you say you were helping him out? How’s that going? Share the story with me, yeah?”

Leon was silent for a moment.

Leon’s eyes shifted.

Leon showed a smile full of malice.

“Sure, sure. Let me tell you, Pa—Lapu is super nice. And trust me, you really have to see his ending for yourself.”