Soul Art Online

- Arthas -

The two of us left the room quite late. Thankfully, the rest of the team were also tired from the entire fiasco of the previous day and were still sleeping, having nothing better to do while sailing. There was however someone who was awake.

Grayfia was waiting for us, followed by the girl White Rose, who was looking at Veena and me with a look that could only be described as an atomic blush.

"Oh my, you two are up already? You should have rested more, especially after such an ordeal." Veena said as she sat down.

I occupied a seat beside her and felt Grayfia look at me a few seconds more than normal but didn't comment on it. I knew it must be weird to know about our relationship… Actually, now that I think about it, her room was right beside ours… with the other side being occupied by White Rose… damn… no wonder she was blushing so hard.

I however didn't let my thoughts show up on my face and merely nodded at them.

"Did you two have something to eat?" Veena asked, as she took out some snacks and laid them on the table in front of us. "I am starving."

I was also starving, having worked all night… very enjoyable work. So I picked up one of the sandwiches and took a bite.

Rose's stomach grumbled and her blush intensified. All of us however chose to ignore it and Veena pushed the plate towards her. "Here have some. We cannot waste any food."

The girl nodded and took a sandwich and took a bite of it, before another. A few seconds later, the sandwich was gone. She must have been really hungry.

Veena took this time to look at Grayfia. "So, what did you want to talk to me about?" She asked. Grayfia looked at me and Veena, realising her glance continued. "You can say anything you want here."

She then checked our surroundings and spoke again. "Last night, while talking to Rose, I realised that she knew about the Supernatural world too. Rose is actually a Valkyrie from Asgard. Her true name is Rossweisse."

I felt myself choke on hearing the name.

What the fuck?

Veena passed me a glass of water. "Eat slowly, dear. We are not running out of food."

"I'm sorry." I apologised before taking another look at Rossweisse.

White hair, blue eyes… their looks matched too.

Like what were the chances…?

Grayfia continued. "She heard my name when…" She sent me a look.

"Just call me Arthas."

"When Arthas-sama called out my name and then connected the dots and opened up to me."

"Sama?" I asked, slightly confused.

"It's a Japanese honorific. My daughter has been interested in Japanese culture since she was introduced to it by my son's knight. Since then some of my family members have taken up on these honorifics. Trying something new is always fun. In any case, you can call him Arthas but knowing you, it's impossible to do that. So why don't you call him Mr. Arthas or Master Arthas… technically, he is your Master." She smiled jokingly.

"No no. You don't have to do that. As I have already told you all, I was just trying to help out. Moreover, you are Veena's daughter-in-law… how could I leave you there?"

….

They suddenly looked at me weirdly.

"Eh? Did I say something wrong?"

"Arthas?"

"Hmm?"

"Who told you she is my daughter-in-law?" Veena asked.

….

She isn't?

What does she mean she isn't?

Grayfia was married to Sirzechs, wasn't she? Or have they not gotten married yet? Didn't they have a kid?

"I mean… you did say she was your son's queen…" I quickly made an excuse.

"Oh, the queen I meant was the Queen of his peerage, not wife."

"Eh… I… oh. I apologise, I misunderstood." I apologised while my mind was running haywire. Was I remembering things wrong or was it just different here?

Thankfully they didn't pursue it further.

"Hmm. You are quite famous outside after all. Well, at least it all ended for the best. You are welcome to join the team, Rose… just call us by our in game names. We don't want any enemies to recognize us… at least by our names, just yet."

Rose nodded and I did too.

After all, it was my slip which caused this.

"In our team, apart from me, Elaine and Arthas are the only ones who know about the Supernatural world. I do plan to open up about us to the rest someday in the future though. Not anytime soon. So just keep this information to yourself."

We talked about some more things and by that time, the rest also came out. The other three players we had rescued were badly shaken from the whole ordeal and were taking some time alone. We didn't disturb them either. They needed some more time to get themselves up.

"So Bina, Rose, what Class do you use?" Shiroe asked.

"I am a Scholar and Rose is a Warrior." She replied professionally.

"Scholar. Are you planning to go the Mage route?"

"Yes."

"Hmm, so another Mage. Do you have any other classes we can think of expanding to suit the team better?"

She thought for a while and then answered. "I have gained a Pirate Trainee Class while on the Pirate Ship. I worked for them, cleaning the ship and was given a Pirate Trainee Class."

"That works? Huh, nice to know. What does it do?"

"Melee combat. They can use swords and axes. I think higher levels of this Class can use Guns too."

"Ohh, that's what I was looking for." Star said, suddenly excited.

"No Star. You are a level 29 Apprentice Swordsman. You are not changing to Pirate." Shiroe scolded.

"Hey, a man can dream, right?" Star pouted.

Shiroe however looked at Bina. "Does it also give you navigation skills?" He asked after some thought and she nodded. "Yes. Basic knowledge."

"Great. That could be very helpful with our quests. Anyways, since you are already a level 25 Scholar, we can help you level up instead of using the Mage Class Card. Still, I would suggest levelling the Pirate Class on the side." He finished.

"What about you Rose?"

"I am… just Apprentice Warrior." She answered, slightly dejectedly.

"Apprentice Warrior is good. We needed more frontline fighters. By the way, what kind of Class do you want to play going forward? A full warrior based class or do you want a hybrid Class with Magic mixed in?"

"A hybrid class… sounds better. I have experience…" She suddenly paused, realising her words.

"I see. So you have played Magic Classes in other games. Sure. We can search for a Hybrid Class." Thankfully, Shiroe, having gone full planning mode, wasn't paying any attention and handled the situation quite well here. "What kind of weapons do you use?" He asked.

"A Spear."

"Hmm, the range of the spear is always welcome. We can check the Guild and Black Markets for other classes and see what route would be good for you. Anyways, we have a basic team now. All we need is to get everyone to the T4 Class next as our short term goal. We can add more members as time goes by."

"How many people are we looking at as our final goal?" I asked.

"That's hard to say. We don't know how strong the final bosses will be. I mean just Tier 5 had that Rhino so who knows what we can face later on? Would the game even end at T10 or do we even have to face something beyond it?"

I winced a bit at the mention of that fucking Rhino…

"Let's get back to the guild and get it levelled up fast so that we can add everyone to the guild first. Also, we will have to leave at least twenty places vacant for urgent invites from the next time."

"Agreed."

With that we got talking.

Bina was quiet most of the time and only spoke when questioned. Rose was also the same but in her case it wasn't professionalism but rather shyness which prevented her from speaking out loud.

_________________________________________x_________________________________________

After finishing our talks, we decided to go on and do our own work.

I took this chance to see if I could get any more references and found the Captain.

"You brat went and shook the entire Sabaody in just a few days." He laughed as he got drunk on some booze we had bought. "Oh this is good stuff. It has been a while since I have had something like this. Is this from the Grandline?"

"It's from the Grandline. Something Derek had for sale and I picked it up."

"Ah, no wonder. It just has a different flavour about it. Makes me wanna sing and dance after drinking it."

"Hahahaha, then what are you waiting for? Let's sing. I even learned a song back in Sabaody. How did it go again?"

"Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho, Yo-hohoho. Binkusu no sake wo, todoke ni yuku yo…" I honestly didn't remember more than that and was hoping that this would be enough. Seriously remembering the whole song was hard…

"What forgot already? Sing after me…" The captain continued the song further and I sang after him.

Unfortunately I didn't get any rewards for this but it was fun.

Eh, I got enough on this trip already. I would need a lot of time to level all of this up.

We sang the entire day.