[Oathsworn]

You have decided to take up the call of an Oathsworn, sworn to the protection and service of a liege. Your liege was never informed of this fact beforehand, but you're pretty sure you can make it work.

Objective:

Your liege must survive until the end.

Active:

If your liege is about to die, you may exchange places with them and take the fatal blow instead.

Passives:

You always know exactly where your liege is.

When trusted implicitly by your liege, you can detect anyone with hostile intent towards them.

You are permitted to remain at your liege's side at night.

Rules:

Rules are ordered by priority.

You may not harm your liege.

You must obey any direct order your liege gives you unless it would lead to your death.

You may not harm another unless it is in defense of your liege.

You may not lie to your liege.

If only you and your liege are alive at the end, it counts as a win for both of you.

If you slay your liege, your Role changes to [Oathbreaker].

I think my Role actually told me more about the game than the rules did. Sure, the rules outlined the format of the game, but otherwise didn't tell me much about what was actually going to happen. The Role I was given actually provided more insight into how the format was run during an active game.

First of all, Role passives seemed to override the actual game's rules. The fact that I could stay with my liege at night broke the rule that the only action allowed at night was to return to one's room. This meant I couldn't trust other players to follow the game's ruleset. They might have their own Rules that superseded the game's.

Next, I could apparently somehow break my own rules. It should technically be impossible for me to switch my Role to Oathbreaker. Because I couldn't harm my liege, but the requirement to become one was to kill them.

Either that or the game was poorly designed, which was entirely possible.

The fact that I could only harm other people to protect my liege meant we were allowed to attack each other at will.

Or, well, it meant other people could. I couldn't even defend myself, apparently. Unless, and this was only if these rules acted in a similar way an Oath did, I could convince myself that attacking me was also attacking my liege.

We'll call that work in progress.

I wasn't sure how to proceed. Revealing myself to my liege gave someone near absolute control over me. But it would also make completing my objective way easier. I would just have to feel out whether I should reveal. I could just not tell them my rules and pretend I was listening to them because I genuinely wanted to.

How would I get them to trust me implicitly to trigger my second passive? What counted as implicit? Was it even possible to trust someone implicitly in this game? Maybe my liege had an ability that allowed them to see my role?

No, wait, that wouldn't confirm that they're my liege. That would only confirm I had a liege. Even the weird speech requirements could be faked.

Novi poked me, snapping me out of my thought spiral. "Are we going?"

"Hmm, actually, it might be better for you to stay in the room. I can call you if I need backup ever, the surprise that I have more than one body might be worth it," I said, patting her head. She nuzzled into my hand like a cat.

I immediately stopped when she started acting fucking weird.

"Sicko."

"Don't you know it!" she replied with a stupid grin on her face.

"Use my eyes and ears so you know what's going on," I said, exiting the room.

I was immediately met with a cacophony of people yelling at each other. I let out a sigh. The game hadn't even started yet, and it was already falling apart.

"Everyone shut the fuck up!" I commanded. There was slight resistance from a couple of the people, but most were too surprised to react to my Divine Skill.

The room went dead silent, and everyone's attention snapped to me. A quick scan revealed that there were fourteen people here; twelve were humans, and one was a bird person that I had thought I saw as one of the potential choices. Unfortunately, I couldn't remember what the theme of that species was. The final was a slime person, whom I definitely did not see as an option when choosing, which was interesting. That meant there were more options that I didn't get to see for some reason.

I was mildly surprised there were no people with insane hairstyles. That felt like a requirement in a death game.

Counting doors, one person was still in their room.

There was also a very large red frog with horns in the corner but I was fairly certain that wasn't a person because it couldn't fit through the doors to the rooms unless someone put it through a trash compactor.

"Can one person tell me what the hell everyone was arguing about?" I asked, then realized I had just nominated myself as the voice of reason for the rest of the game. Fuck my life, why do I do these things to myself?

I felt Novi snickering in my mind, and swatted her mentally in response.

Three people started talking, then stopped almost immediately when they realized I had asked for only one person.

With a sigh, I pointed to the bird, "You, what's going on?"

"An angel told us we have to vote on whether we're doing a blind ballot or an open ballot for the executions at the start of the game," they replied.

"Then just vote, no need to fucking argue about it," I said, then sat down on the spot.

I didn't like the fact that an angel was hosting the game. But what was I to do about that? Not like I had any say in it.

I was just glad I missed it when it first appeared, apparently.

I couldn't sense who my liege was yet, so I assumed that I had to wait until the game started.

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Moments later, the final door opened, and the sketchiest-looking human I had ever seen emerged.

Their hair was a mess, they were limping, and their outfit looked like it had spent a couple of seconds in a blender before they put it on.

I was also immediately notified that they were my liege as the game began.

I let out a sigh. What else was I expecting?

I decided I wasn't going to get involved with that mess for now. If someone attacked them, I would fight to defend them, but otherwise, they were on their own.

With a flash of light in the centre of the room, an angel appeared. This one looked a little different from my last experience.

Instead of a winged adult with a halo, this one was more like the size of a doll. I think it would be called a cherub on Earth? Thankfully, not the biblically accurate version.

I noted some people weren't paying attention to the angel. Five people were either distracted or appeared indifferent at this moment. I took note of that fact. They were probably receiving information from the game's start.

"The vote begins now, please tap your card against the pedestal with your intent in mind," the angel said in an adorable voice that made me want to squeeze it until it popped.

A flash of Winter, and I no longer had that urge pressing in on me.

Someone else, one of the humans, seemed to have the same thing in mind and actually lunged for her. With a flick of her arm, a glowing golden arrow appeared in their skull. They collapsed on the spot.

"Please restrain yourself. I know I'm cute, but there's no need to act uncouth," she said, except I detected absolutely no displeasure in her voice. A smile crept up on her face as she watched the person bleed out on the ground.

She knew this would happen and was excited by the prospect of killing us all. Her voice almost certainly carried a mental effect.

Gods, I fucking hate angels.

The angel flashed me a look, and I felt my body lock up. She couldn't read my thoughts, right? That would be ridiculous. These are private thoughts, and I do not consent to an examination. Please leave me alone.

She didn't acknowledge my disclaimer.

"As I said, please come forward and tap your card on the top of the obelisk. You don't have to worry about anyone else reading your card. Only you can see what's written on it," she squeaked.

People began moving towards the obelisk, but I waited a moment. She said nobody could read our cards, but she didn't mention anything about whether there was a Role that could bypass that restriction.

As the last couple of people came forward, I slid my card into my palm, then went forward and tapped my hand against the obelisk.

"Thank you, all the votes are in. The results were six for the open ballot, eight for the blind. Blind ballot wins. That has already begun. We will not be displaying the results of the vote."

I obviously voted for a closed ballot. It's much easier to scheme if you can do it in private.

My liege looked incredibly relieved about that fact, too, so I assumed his Role wasn't investigatory in nature.

"The first day begins now. Feel free to discuss amongst yourselves until the next vote," she said, before vanishing in a second flash of light.

I didn't have anything to add, and I had no interest in disclosing my position to my liege, so I just listened in. I pushed extra power to my ears.

Three of the people I noticed who were distracted earlier had come together and were whispering something to each other. Some kind of faction was forming already, huh. I couldn't tell if it was a Role thing or they just knew each other beforehand.

Their voices were distorted, so I couldn't actually hear what they were saying. There was also Mana in the air around them, doing something. Again, no idea if that was a Role thing or if they were doing that intentionally.

Most other people were either just standing around wearily watching others like I was or talking about unimportant things with people who were clearly their friends.

It was just the first day, and I didn't expect anything actually important to happen.

"So, how far from Fateswatch are you right now?" a voice next to me spoke. I felt like I should have jumped in surprise, but instead, I found that I had automatically activated [Argent Flow]. The difference in my expected and actual reaction was odd, but I was glad I didn't show that I didn't notice someone had snuck up on me.

Turning towards them, it was the bird guy. He looked like the result of if Falco from Star Fox had had relations with a crow.

"Two hundred and fifty thousand kilometres. You?" I replied. I realized I hadn't actually had a chance to talk to another non-human before.

"What?! How are you alive? I got the achievement for being the first to travel one thousand kilometres out from Fateswatch, and it feels like a nightmare already!" he said, which was interesting. I also received the same Title. Maybe we all appeared at the same time?.

"I've barely stayed alive by hiding mostly. My class ended up helping a lot in that regard."

"I think I got lucky with my first Zone. The only monster there was the Zone boss. Everything else was dead. I just booked it and managed to survive." I replied, "What's your Class?"

"I'm a Cunning Slink, what about yours? Something to do with commands, maybe? Your voice felt like it carried something in it," he said.

I just smiled at him. I would accept free information if he was handing it out, but I wasn't going to be doing the same.

Luckily, that just got a chuckle out of him, "Name's Zahir by the way."

"Ellie."

He leaned back a bit, and his eyes widened. Then he scooted back a few feet.

"The uh, Ellie who cleared a Zone on her own?"

"That's me," I replied.

He chirped once and looked away, "You're not going to kill all of us and escape this game on your own, are you?"

"That depends."

"On?"

"If people vote to execute me." I hated my Role. Was I intentionally given one to prevent me from doing that? It would make this whole thing so much easier.

Assuming I could even take everyone here in a fight. Which I wasn't entirely sure about. I was keeping my Authority politely restrained, of course, so I couldn't really tell how strong anyone was. I was sure it would be rude to probe at everyone.

"I will see to it that doesn't happen," he said, then vanished. It was like he had just stopped existing. I couldn't even see him with my Mana sight.

That was a damn good invisibility Skill. No wonder he was able to survive wherever he ended up.

Nothing of interest happened for the rest of the day.

A chime signalled when the vote began. People gathered towards the obelisk.

"We're not voting for anyone, correct?" A guy with glasses said. Where did he get the glasses? I thought the world was fantasy-themed. "We have no information that would tell us who's part of which faction. Or at least not conclusively."

I saw his eyes flicker to the three people who had met up to talk for just a moment.

That's interesting. Are there two groups?

"Yup, vote for nobody!" a girl said, tapping her card against the obelisk.

Could we actually do that?

After a few people had gone, I thought about nobody and tapped my hand with the card in it against the obelisk. It seemed to accept that as a choice.

At the end of the three minutes, a tally was displayed in the air along with a camera shot of everyone that seemed to have been taken at that exact moment.

There were thirteen votes for nobody and one vote for the guy with glasses. That's what you get for taking charge, I guess.

He didn't seem fazed by that fact but didn't say anything.

Then I walked back to my room. An owl's hoot indicated when night actually began.

"Hey, how do you think I did?" I asked Novi once inside.

"You could have talked to more people. I'm sure there was useful information you could have garnered if you tried," she replied.

"Ugh, but that would be so much effort. Talking to people? Are you kidding me? I feel drained just from the one interaction with the bird," I said, flopping onto the floor.

"Yet you can talk to Hazel for hours with no problem," she said, then joined me on the floor.

"You know that's different!" I shot back.

After a few minutes, the night finished, and a rooster's crow indicated a new day.

I was also greeted with two notifications.

Notice: Your door was marked with a curse. You have been killed.

Notice: A passing healer brought you back to life. You now owe them a favour.

Fucking, why?!

I let out a groan. Why did I have to get a Role that prevented me from killing everyone and getting out of here?

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