I like traveling the most

This is what Xiaolin heard later.

The ingenious plan of Kainz and Yezi was implemented smoothly. Because of his guilty conscience, Schmidt ran to the 19th floor to worship the Golden Apple President overnight, hoping to be forgiven.

And the people lying in ambush there were Kainz and Yezi who had already set a trap for him.

But after the intimidation, it was discovered that the murderer was not Schmidt. He just followed someone's instructions and logged the location of the corridor crystal in the Golden Apple President's hotel, and then placed the corridor crystal in the public warehouse of the guild.

This is a very clever and meticulous method.

Although the system will lock the hotel's guest rooms, it is usually set to a state that friends or guild members can open except when sleeping. The other party took advantage of this and asked him to sneak into the room and set the transfer location of the corridor crystal in the room, and then invade when the room owner was asleep.

Then just make a transaction application, press the consent button with the other party's finger, and then select the ring to exchange.

Although there was a risk of being discovered, he agreed to the deal under the assumption that the other party would give him half of the proceeds from selling the ring as a reward, and that even if the president woke up and found the thief, it would not be him, so he would not be implicated.

And the result...

"I, I really didn't expect the other party to kill the president, and I really didn't think of killing anyone! I, I was also scared! If I tell my companions about the note, someone will want to murder me next time, so, I really don't know who wrote it! Please, please forgive me!"

Schmidt begged for mercy in a shrill voice, and then kowtowed repeatedly, begging for the other party's forgiveness.

"I have recorded what you said."

Although Schmidt was almost out of breath due to excessive shock, he still looked at the two people whose faces appeared from under the death robe. He originally thought it was the president and Grimrock who were asking for his life, but he didn't expect that their real identities were Yezi and Kainz.

But these two people should also be dead.

Especially Yezi, who had seen with his own eyes a few hours ago that the black knife that flew from the window pierced her body, and her character had already scattered when she fell from the window.

So are they really ghosts?

When Schmidt thought of this, he almost fainted again, but the words that Yezi said when she revealed her true face saved Schmidt's consciousness at the last moment.

"Record...record?"

As if answering his question, Yezi took out an octagonal crystal column emitting a light green light from his arms, and this was the crystal used for recording.

Ghosts can't use props to record the conversation just now.

In other words, the deaths of these two people were fake.

"So that's it..."

Finally understanding the truth of the matter, Schmidt finally relaxed and collapsed in front of the cemetery.

Schmidt was not angry about the fact that he was completely fooled and the other party had evidence in hand. He was just surprised that Keynes and Yezi had such a deep obsession with the Golden Apple President.

"You two admire the president so much..."

"Aren't you the same as us?"

"Huh..."

"You don't hate the president either. Although you have a strong obsession with the ring, you definitely don't want to kill her. This should be true, right?"

"Of course! It's true, please believe me!"

Schmidt's face twisted, and then he kept nodding.

This sentence should be true.

After all, Schmidt is a member of the strategy group, and this is still in the wild. If he wants to kill these two people to silence them, it will be very easy.

It doesn't work to explain that he will become a red-name player or can't stay in the guild and strategy group. He just feels that if he kills the two people, he will not be able to continue to be a normal person.

So even if Schmidt knows that Crystal is still recording, he still keeps talking about the crimes he has committed in the past.

"I just sneaked into the president's room and set up the exit for transfer. Of course... I admit that I got a lot of money to buy equipment and weapons by doing this, so that I could enter the Holy Dragon Union."

"You really don't know who wrote the note?"

"I, I still don't know!"

Schmidt shouted a little aggrieved: "It should be one of the three people left among the eight people, except you, me, the president and Grimrock... But I haven't contacted them at all since then, don't you have any clues?"

Ye Zi shook his head: "After the guild was disbanded, the three of them all joined a core guild similar to Golden Apple and lived a fairly ordinary life."

"No one bought rare equipment or player huts, and you were the only one who suddenly upgraded and joined the strategy group, Schmidt." Cainz added.

No wonder...

He was considered the murderer of the president because of his behavior of buying equipment after obtaining a lot of money, but how could he resist spending so much money?

"Wait, wait!"

Schmidt asked curiously, "If it's not for the money, why do you want to take the ring even if you kill the president?"

Kainz and Yezi also seemed to be asked, and their upper bodies shrank back a little.

In Aincrad, there is almost no benefit in putting the money you earn in the prop column, because under the careful operation of the drop rate, the value of the gold coins will not change at all, and naturally there will be no inflation.

So even if you buy expensive weapons or armor, as long as you maintain them carefully, you can sell them at the same price on the day you don't need them. There is almost no point in keeping the money.

In other words -

"The person who wrote that note originally wanted to kill -"

Before he could finish, the knife that stretched out from behind had already made a "pop" sound and pierced into the gap between the chest and throat armor. This was a sneak attack that combined the special skill of small piercing weapons, armor penetration, and the special skill of non-metal armor, tiptoe.

Relying on the reaction ability trained on the front line, Schmidt quickly reacted from the surprise and prepared to retreat.

SAO is a game, and life and death are determined by health points, so even if the throat is pierced, it will not die immediately. Although the health points lost due to the injury to the important parts are relatively large, it is nothing compared to Schmidt's extremely high health points.

However, he could not move.

When he was about to turn around, his feet had almost lost feeling, so he rolled to the ground, and his health bar was surrounded by a green frame.

This is the paralysis state.

As a tank, he has obviously improved his anti-poison skills, but the poison he has been hit by is a high-level poison that ignores resistance. Who is the opponent?

"Oh, one fell."

The innocent voice like a boy came from the sky, and Schmidt could only move his eyes upward desperately.

He saw a man wearing black leather shoes, black tight pants, black leather armor, and a black mask covering his face - his whole body was black, except for a green slender knife in his hand and an orange float on his head.

"Wow..."

There was a faint scream from behind.

Schmidt turned his head with difficulty and found that Yezi and Kainz were threatened by a short player at the same time. He was also dressed in black, but the material of his clothes was rags instead of leather. He wore a skull-shaped mask on his head, and the dark eye sockets glowed red. He also held a rapier in his right hand, and the buoy on his head was orange.

Both of them were murderous players, and they were also cadres in the largest and most vicious guild.

The one who paralyzed Schmidt was Johnny Black, the poison knife user, and the one who threatened Kainz and Yezi was Chiba Shasa, the rapier user.

Could it be that even that guy...

You must be kidding!

Don't do that, don't joke!

Then a new footstep sounded, as if to laugh at Schmidt's inner roar. He looked over timidly, and the figure that made people feel the greatest level of terror in Aincrad immediately appeared in his wide eyes.

The man was wearing a knee-length raincoat and a hood on his head that completely covered his eyes.

In his right hand, which was hanging down easily, he held a large square-shaped heavy short knife that looked like a kitchen knife, and the short knife had a dark red blade like blood.

"PoH..."

The words that Schmidt squeezed out of his lips were already trembling strongly because of fear and despair.

Since it is a death game, killing is a matter of course - PoH used this distorted concept to brainwash many players to form a killing guild and embark on the road of PK, becoming PK players who are more despised than BOSS in SAO, but more feared.

This tall and thin man has a funny name, but his eyes are as cold as cold. After he approached Schmidt, he issued a brief command.

"Turn him over."

Schmidt was like a turtle that couldn't move, and was kicked in the abdomen and turned over.

After seeing his face, the tall and thin man looked at him and spoke again: "Wow, it's really a big fish, isn't this the captain of the Holy Dragon Union?"

It was obviously a moving voice full of elasticity and vitality, but for some reason, there was a certain special temperament hidden in the tone.

Although Schmidt knew that he was in a desperate situation, he couldn't help but think about why they appeared here. The three giants of the Smiling Coffin could be said to be a symbol of terror, and they were also extremely vicious wanted criminals. It was impossible for them to wander around in this lower-level maze area for no reason.

This means that the three knew that Schmidt was here, so they came to attack him.

But this is not reasonable at all.

He went out without telling others where he was going, and it was even more impossible for Kainz and Ye Zi to tell them about this. Even if the members of the Smiling Coffin happened to meet them here, they came here too quickly.

Is he really so unlucky?

A sense of despair emerged on Schmidt's face.

PoH looked at Schmidt, who was desperate, and tilted his head and said, "I want to say it's Showtime, but how should we play it?"

"Let's play that, boss!"

Johnny Black immediately shouted excitedly in a sharp voice: "A game where we kill each other and the one who survives will be spared! But the three of them have different strengths, so we still have to set fair conditions!"

"You said that, but didn't you kill the last guy last time?"

"You can't play it if you say it, boss!"

After hearing this tense but creepy conversation, Shasa, holding a rapier in his hand, laughed.

At this time, terror and despair finally invaded Schmidt's body, and he couldn't help but close his eyes.

Just then——

A rhythmic sound of "dong dong dong" came to his ears. PoH frowned and warned his two subordinates with a sharp breath.

A few seconds later, there was a light jumping up and down in the distance. It was a cold flame wrapped on the black hoof of a horse that almost blended into the night. There was a black knight on the horse's back, driving this black horse that seemed to come from the underworld. The horse reached the hill in an instant, climbed to the top of the hill after several jumps, and stood up on its hind legs, and its nose was violently emitting white hot gas.

The three were forced back several steps by the horse's momentum.

Then, the knight on the horse's back rolled off the horse's back, and screamed after landing on his buttocks.

"It hurts so much!"

Schmidt was very familiar with this voice.

It was Kirito!

"Ah, PoH, long time no see. Why are you still dressed in that lousy way?"

"... You have no right to say that to me."

PoH's answer was full of murderous intent.

Johnny Black then took a step forward and shouted in a very obvious and excited voice: "You bastard... stop pretending to be calm! Do you know what's going on now!"

PoH stopped his crazy subordinate with his hand.

"Just as this guy said, Kirito, it's cool to appear like this, but even you don't think you can deal with the three of us alone at the same time, right?"

Three to one, the advantage is mine!

Schmidt clenched his fist.

The situation is just as PoH said, even if he is the top of the strategy group in terms of combat power and the champion of the world's first martial arts tournament, he can't defeat the three members of the Laughing Coffin at once.

Why didn't he bring Krillin and Asuna with him?

Schmidt wanted to ask.

Kirito said easily: "I think so. But I have already drunk the poison resistance potion first, and I have a lot of recovery crystals on me, so it's no problem to hold on for ten minutes. In addition, I invited someone to come here to enjoy the moon before coming here. PoH, guess who he is?"

While speaking, Kirito shared his window.

PoH and the other two saw a familiar name right above the chat window.

——Xiaolin!

He couldn't help but utter a sigh.

Johnny and Shasa looked around anxiously, fearing that Xiaolin would come out of the darkness.

"...Suck!"

PoH cursed briefly, and as his companions were also scared, he snapped his fingers, and his two men immediately relaxed and quickly put away their weapons, as if they really came here to enjoy the moon.

They disdained Kirito, the champion of the world's number one martial arts tournament, but they were absolutely in awe of Xiaolin.

In their opinion, they were a group of people who could act arrogantly in the game, but compared to Xiaolin, the game protected them. If it was in reality...

The murderous intent that made people feel like falling into an ice cellar, even PoH couldn't help but tremble.

PoH raised the kitchen knife in his right hand and pointed it at Kirito.

"Don't think you can always be a bully, black swordsman... One day I will make you beg for mercy on the ground. I will make your important partner bleed into a river, and you can only roll around in it in embarrassment. Just wait!"

"I'll wait. Oh, by the way, Xiaolin asked me to tell you: your performance in the martial arts meeting was very bad, and he hopes you can find some more tricks."

"You don't have to tell me! If I find it, I will use it on you first!"

After saying that, he deftly rotated the kitchen knife on his fingers and put it back into the scabbard. The other two hurriedly followed the leader who walked down the hill leisurely.

But before that, Shasa was very unwilling to leave a harsh word.

"Don't think that your appearance is handsome. Next time, I will ride a horse to chase you."

"Then you keep working hard. Maybe you will not chase me, but be chased by others on horseback."

Hearing Kirito's answer, Shasa just made a heavy breathing sound, and then chased his companions away.

Kirito sighed in relief when he saw them leave.

He had only seen PoH before, and the other two men were new to him. As expected, their strength should not be underestimated. If he had known earlier, he would have asked Kobayashi to come along. Fortunately, Kobayashi's reputation was useful, otherwise it would have been a fierce battle.