「You have completed the quest, "Evaline's Exorcism", visit the mercenary guild to receive your rewards.」
As soon as the talisman was stored away, Merlin received a notification that he had completed the quest, and at that moment he knew he was finally free. The stress of being hunted was no longer weighing him down, and only now did he realise that his cursed purple arm was clearing up quickly, returning to the pale skin he had chosen during his character creation.
His sword began flickering, and moments later the light faded away, leaving Merlin in the middle of the forest without any form of vision. The only thing he could see was the faint orange light of what he could only assume were lanterns in the distance, but those too were slowly moving away from him in the direction of the town.
Not wanting to remain in the dark for much longer, he began chanting out the light skill once more.
「Skill ⟪Light⟫ Activated.」
Instead of touching his blade like before, Merlin allowed the light to form in his hand. The traces of light slowly coalesced into a small ball, roughly the size of a billiards ball, before it left Merlin's hand and began floating around him.
Merlin started walking towards the town, although he still had his weapon drawn and his guard up. A murderous undead wasn't the only threat in the forest after all, wolves were also present. And there was always a threat of bandits, even if the last group was exterminated, it was highly likely that another bandit group would fill in where they left off after claiming their territory.
Eventually Merlin had made it back to town, his return trip ultimately being uneventful. There were a few more guards on the eastern gate than usual, and Merlin saw a pair of familiar faces. The two guards he had interacted with on multiple occasions at this point were both there, uninjured. Merlin was relieved that neither of them had a shift on the day the wight attacked, because he was aware of what happened to the guards who were.
Not even the chattier of the two spoke up as Merlin passed, all of the guards held a sombre expression, and as Merlin entered the town, he felt that the usual lively nightlife the town had was replaced with a dreary atmosphere. Merlin began walking towards the mercenary guild, passing by all of the people who were huddled around while mourning their losses.
Merlin eventually made it to the mercenaries guild, but from outside the door, he couldn't hear any noise. The usual rowdy atmosphere, or even the aggressive yelling he heard before leaving, wasn't there, it was just silent. As Merlin entered the building, like always, all the eyes in the room fell on him, but this time they weren't eyes tainted with fear, disgust, hatred or envy, but were instead just curious gazes.
Merlin ignored the gazes as usual, and walked towards the counter, greeting the bartender as he sat down.
"I see that arm of yours has cleared up, looks like it really was a curse." The bartender spoke while pouring himself a drink. "I also heard that you took the monster down by yourself... Where everyone else struggled to make a dent, you sliced through it with ease."
The bartender downed the glass in a single gulp before continuing. "You helped her pass on. Thank you."
Upon hearing those words, he received a notification, and when he checked his character profile, he noticed that a large chunk of his experience bar had filled up.
「You have earned +20 reputation within the Orchomenus Mercenary Guild.」
"Thank you... And sorry." The bartender lowered his head. "Even though you were sent on a task by us to subjugate bandits, you were suddenly treated like a monster through nothing but rumour, and we now know that isn't the case."
"I know this wont make up for the slander you've experienced, but we apologise." The bartender raised his glass, "This is a little late, and not the best atmosphere to be doing this, but your welcome is long overdue."
"Welcome our brother in arms..." The bartender paused mid speech for a second, only realising now that he didn't know Merlin's name, but before he could awkwardly ask, his speech was overshadowed by the collective chant of everyone else in the room.
"Ghost!" In a similar turn of events to the thieves guild, the nickname that was forced upon him was used instead, something about it appealed to large groups of drunkards. And it seemed his reputation, even if it was slander, had been spread using the moniker instead of his name, alongside a description of his appearance.
"What did I say about giving me strange nickna--" Merlin's complaints were cut short when he received another notification.
「You've been granted the title, "The Ghost".」
The notification left him speechless for a moment. His greatest fear had come to pass, the moniker that was forced upon him had been recognised by the system.
Merlin inspected his title's information window, hoping that he at least acquire decent stats for his humiliation.
┌───────────────────
[The Ghost.]
Rumours about you have spread amongst the mercenary and thieves guilds, and certain figures within the criminal underworld have started to hear your name.
• May buff your diplomacy, deception, intimidation or coercion attributes when speaking with those who know of your reputation.
• This title's effects will grow alongside your reputation.
└───────────────────
It was similar to a typical reputation-based title, although Merlin's title had a darker theme added to it due to the rumours being spread about him and his ties to the underworld.
Reputation titles were a type of growth title, but they were a little different to the usual growth type titles most players were used to.
There were a handful of titles that players considered growth types, and some users found it a little confusing at first, but it wasn't that difficult to wrap your head around after it was explained by someone.
The most common growth type titles were nicknamed evolution types by players, seeing as it shared a similar gimmick with most job souls, as such every rank up was given a title that showed the player they had achieved another level of proficiency.
Skill ranks were essentially just a tier system that used words instead of numbers to show that a player had progressed in some aspect, it usually consisted of ten ranks, the names of which progressed as follows; Beginner, Novice, Amateur, Adept, Professional, Expert, Superior, Master, Legendary and Transcendent.
For job souls however, they utilised skill ranks to showcase what stage of the soul's evolution you were at, instead of just the level of the soul. Job souls that utilised the system started you off as a beginner version of the soul, and allowed you to evolve a total of nine times up to the transcendent rank.
Once a player reached the max level of a job soul, they could level it once more to evolve it and increase its rank, which was essentially a prestige system that buffed their job soul. The effects of the evolution differed from soul to soul, but the most common changes was that they had access to more powerful materials and recipes, or in some cases earned new abilities or tools.
A beginner miner for example wouldn't be capable of mining rare ores in a high level area, and an adept blacksmith may have issues with forging higher tier materials, but a transcendent alchemist would not have any form of restriction within their craft.
Merlin smiled as the mercenary guild began getting rowdy once more. It felt wrong to him that the place was dead quiet earlier. Unfortunately there were a few mercenaries lost in the rose wight attack, but everyone currently seemed to be mourning in their own way, which for the most part involved the consumption of too much alcohol.
After a little while, Merlin made his way out of the building to clear his head, the scent of tobacco smoke and alcohol was starting to give him a headache. When he left the building and began walking around, he noticed that a group of people had begun crowding, and when he moved in closer he saw that they were crowding around a familiar looking man who was standing on a makeshift podium.
As he approached, he received the usual notification.
「Eliminate Arwell Lychester.」
"...And for our community, for our families... We must all stand strong together during these tough times." Merlin walked closer, joining in late to what was Arwell Lychester giving the crowd a lecture on grief from atop his wooden crate podium. "I have experienced so much loss in my life, my own son was taken from this world at such a young age, so I know it wont be easy."
Merlin's fists tightened as he began talking about his own losses in the family in the most hypocritical way, obviously not including the fact he had signed an assassination contract for his own son.
