Who told you I am an NPC

Chapter : 187

"Lord Traveling Merchant! We have already fulfilled your request. Although the Blacksmith couldn't clarify what exactly you wanted in your order, we have collected a warehouse full of various ores that the Blacksmith would use. We guarantee that you can order your desired weapon as soon as you go there!"

[Mount Emei Monkey] finished the entire sentence without taking a breath. The surrounding players looked at her, silent—

Oh, right, I forgot I had silenced them.

I blinked. "Is that so? Thank you very much. Then please let me go meet that Mr. Blacksmith first. I hope, as you said, he will readily accept my order."

Players: !

Yay! It looks like this quest can be completed within the time limit.

"Then you will lead the way for me." I pointed at [Mount Emei Monkey].

The other players' gazes immediately fell on [Mount Emei Monkey]. The players under the Silencing Spell couldn't speak, but they still had the players' special cheating artifact: the chat panel.

Instantly, message after message popped up on the private chat panels of the players present.

[What's the situation? Does this count as her snatching the quest completion first? I remember she wasn't the first one to come over just now, right?]

[How can an NPC randomly pick someone to complete the quest? Shouldn't this kind of public quest count as completed for whoever finds the NPC first? What kind of underlying code is this?]

[Could there be a hidden affection setting?]

[Which novice village is this player from? She can't be an outsider, right?]

...

I didn't know what the players were chatting about privately, but seeing their simultaneous movements of reaching out to summon the system, I could tell their chat panels must be very lively right now.

Still a bit too inexperienced. I can now open the system panel and use system functions with just my consciousness, guaranteeing that players won't notice anything unusual.

[Mount Emei Monkey] didn't expect that this public quest might end up with her completing the final submission. She was extremely excited; this was her first time encountering a special quest. Previously, no matter how hard she tried, she only encountered some basic quests in the novice village.

"Of course!" [Mount Emei Monkey] agreed readily, happily trotting forward to lead the way for me. The other players had no choice. After all, they were all currently afflicted with the [Silence] debuff and couldn't snatch the initiative at all.

They could only hope this mysterious NPC Traveling Merchant wouldn't just settle the quest immediately.

When I appeared at the entrance of the blacksmith shop again after more than a week, Merlin had already sensed it. This time he wasn't drunk out of his mind but was pretending to study ores inside the shop.

As soon as I entered, Merlin looked up at me, casting a resentful glance which I, completely unaffected by the hood, saw clearly.

Me: Cough.

The quest I issued had indeed brought Merlin some trouble.

The players were still oblivious, happily leading me to Merlin. [Mount Emei Monkey] said, "Mason, we brought Mr. Traveling Merchant. Quickly accept his order!"

The players looked expectantly at this historic meeting—

Merlin glanced at me: Your doing.

I smiled reservedly under the cover of my hood, unseen by Merlin and the players. I took out a roll of parchment from the wide sleeve of my magic robe and handed it to Merlin. "This is what I need, Mr. Mason."

Merlin raised an eyebrow, not expecting me to actually produce something. He took it and unfolded it, his eye twitching uncontrollably.

Nothing was written on the parchment; instead, there were two large paw prints—considering whose territory I had been in these past few days, there was no doubt whose paw prints these were.

Merlin: ...

Merlin glanced again at me, covered tightly by the hood, still as fond of pranks as ever.

I feigned confusion. "What's wrong, Mr. Mason? Are you unable to fulfill this order?"

Players: !

The players looked at Merlin with bright eyes, terrified that this unreliable drunkard blacksmith would say he couldn't do it. Then what was their frantic mining these past few days for?

For their diligence?

Truly a terrible King.

Merlin sighed inwardly. He rolled up the parchment and stuffed it into his bosom to prevent the Descenders from seeing these two inexplicable paw prints. "Of course I can, sir. Please follow me; let's discuss this order in detail."

Merlin stood up, signaling me to follow.

"Great, I like doing business with straightforward people." Saying this, I also stood up and followed Merlin into the inner room again without pause.

The left-behind players: ???

So what about their quest? Was it completed or not?

Wait, why did the NPC leave them behind again?

By the way, what exactly is the relationship between you two? Last time you also shut yourselves in a dark room without a word, and this time you want a private chat after just a few sentences?

Hmm???

With a click, the door closed, cutting off the players' view. Merlin, as usual, set up a soundproofing spell so people outside couldn't hear their conversation.

I took off my hood, revealing Nolan's face. Merlin paused involuntarily at the sight, his furrowed brows relaxing, and his expression softened subconsciously.

I gave myself a thumbs up in my heart.

Sure enough, this face belonging to Nolan would subconsciously generate goodwill from former kin and friends. It was probably because I had grinded affection points too high in "Demon King" before.

Merlin only softened his expression for a moment before quickly recovering. He looked at me speechlessly. "So next time you come, can you sneak in secretly? You cause trouble for me as soon as you arrive. Heaven knows how confused I was when those Descenders found me talking about a Traveling Merchant's order."

"Don't say you can't do it. I know as long as you want to, you have a hundred ways to sneak in."

I curved my eyes into a smile. "Aiya, don't you think this is fun?"

Merlin didn't think it was fun and rolled his eyes at me.

"Alright, alright, I just wanted to find a chance to try out some special skills." I spread my hands. "I promise I absolutely won't trouble you next time."

Merlin looked at me suspiciously.

Me: Innocent.JPG

Merlin could only accept his bad luck. "Is everything okay on Palos's side? That prince... who was it again, died?"

I nodded. "Died. Couldn't withstand the interrogation, injuries were too severe, so he died."

Merlin had lived for so many years and had long seen through life and death. He had no good feelings for a guy like Fitch who wanted to climb up over the lives of an entire city's people. If he died, he died.

"Augreer... tsk. As far as I know, although that Queen has always relied most heavily on the Second Prince Felton, the brothers Feu and Fitch were also very favored by her. After all, they were the twins born when her power was at its peak."

Since the Slanlipa City incident, Merlin had investigated the Augreer family's public affairs thoroughly over the past few days and had heard about that Queen's deeds.

"You killed Feu. That Queen was already very angry and poured all her remaining love onto Fitch. Now that Fitch is dead, I reckon the Augreer family will make big moves next," Merlin said.

I rubbed my nose. "How did you know... it was me?"

I didn't seem to have admitted to Merlin that I killed Feu, right?

Merlin stared at me for a couple of seconds: "...Do you really take me for a fool?"

"That day when you fought with Palos, the image you used, the image you appeared with in Mandiper, such obvious features, how could I not recognize it?" Merlin said with interest. "What's more, you're on Bartovita's wanted list. Speaking of which, you really..."

"I didn't!" I kept a poker face. "It wasn't me!"

"I haven't even asked yet?" Merlin found it funny.

I rolled my eyes. "Then don't ask. Anyway, I didn't do that."

Seeing Merlin was skeptical, I sighed and simply picked some shareable parts of what happened in Bartovita to tell him.

For example, coincidentally meeting Cornelia who was looking for her sister, then some events in Sunset Village. Finally, I decided to avenge Kalenna and the others, cooperated with Cornelia to infiltrate the Bartovita Royal Palace, killed Feu, and incidentally promised to buy Cornelia enough time.

Merlin was stunned listening to it. "Your adventure experience is quite rich and colorful."

I gave him dead fish eyes.

"But... Cornelia?" Merlin rubbed his chin, pondering, "This name sounds a bit familiar. A mermaid, huh..."

I was puzzled: "You know her?"

Mermaids are the royal family ruling the Sea Tribe. Since the Eternal Empire fell apart, mermaids chose to return to the deep sea, and it was hard to see Sea Tribe members inland.

Of course, smuggling, trafficking, and illegal trading didn't count.

And Merlin followed Isabel all year round, either in the Dragon Valley far from the ocean or running around everywhere. Would he know Cornelia who had just run out from the deep sea to find her sister?

Merlin recalled for a long time, finally saying uncertainly, "I don't know if it's the same person, but I might indeed know the Cornelia you mentioned?"

"But the Cornelia I know is completely different from the Cornelia you described. The Cornelia I know is a ruthless mermaid," Merlin said. "She's a terrifying fellow who killed an entire royal bloodline. I heard that among them was a mermaid she grew up with."

Thinking of the delicate-looking girl who smiled softly in the evening breeze, I couldn't help but type a question mark. "Huh?"

"Oh?" Seeing my disbelief, Merlin smiled. "It seems the Cornelia I mentioned is very different from the one you know."

"Tell me in detail?" I couldn't help being curious. "The story I heard seems quite different from what you said."

"Actually, I only looked into it out of curiosity because I heard that a branch of the mermaid royal family was wiped out by a mixed-blood mermaid."

Merlin shrugged. "After all, that Mermaid Prince with his trident was invincible. It's indeed unbelievable to hear that the lineage he chose was killed so easily by a mixed-blood mermaid."

Mermaid Prince... Siren.

A scene from "Demon King" flashed before my eyes, of that man who possessed a beautiful transparent fish tail.

He was one of the few kin who never expressed any admiration for the Demon King.