By the end of day one, Sword God Guild wasn't just surviving, we were thriving.
Keiji's strategy worked disgustingly well. Instead of charging in like wild idiots, we targeted small guilds that wandered too far from their flags.
Pick them off, grab their banner, teleport it home, easy win. By sunset, we had three extra flags flapping proudly behind our base.
Three.
That was three guilds who now had to sit in the dirt, flagless, crying into their helmets while plotting revenge.
I stood at the base, arms crossed, trying to look stoic while inside I was screaming: Oh god, they're all going to come back for us. And they're going to come for me first, because apparently I'm the bodyguard of the magical cloth on a stick.
When night fell, the system updated the maps. Sure enough, every captured flag synced the original guild's base location to ours. Which meant our map was lit up like a Christmas tree. We knew exactly where those guilds were holed up.
But worst case? They also knew exactly where their flag was now. Here. At my feet.
So, yeah. No pressure. Just casually guarding a glowing target while being one bad roll away from turning into bloody confetti.
°°°°°°°°°°
Day two arrived.
The weirdest part? I wasn't tired. At all. My stamina bar hadn't budged, my HP and MP were full, and hunger was apparently just… switched off for the duration of the event.
Which meant while the rest of my guildmates returned to base at dawn, sweaty and exhausted from night patrols and fights, I looked fresh as a daisy. I didn't even need a nap.
I stretched in front of the flag like some spoiled noble. "Well, at least guarding comes with perks. Zero stamina loss. Zero hunger. I could do this forever."
Keiji passed me a look. "Good. You're not moving from that spot."
"Glad we're on the same page," I muttered, plopping down by the flag like it was my throne.
And that's when I made the greatest discovery of my tragic new life.
I pulled up my skill tree. Usually, I ignored the lower branches, they were like baby teeth.
You had to keep them for a while, then ditch them the second something cooler grew in.
My build was stacked with endgame OP skills: Judgment Strike, Blade Cataclysm, Heaven's Wrath. Stuff that blew up landscapes and made my rivals cry in PvP.
But as I scrolled down… there it was.
The abandoned baby skills. The ones no one cared about after level 5.
Slash.
Thrust.
Dash.
Strike.
I clapped my hands to my cheeks and squealed. "My babies! You're still here!"
I nearly cried. After nuking slimes into radioactive dust with my top-tier skills, these little weaklings looked like salvation itself.
"Leonhart," Luna asked gently, "why are you making noises like you just found kittens in a box?"
"Because," I said, clutching my chest dramatically, "this is it. This is what I've been waiting for. The most basic of basics. The normal, boring attacks everyone threw away. They're my only hope of not vaporizing people into oblivion with one sneeze."
I hovered over "Slash" like it was the Holy Grail.
Just a normal sword swing. Just a swipe. That's all I wanted in life.
And then I noticed something else, on the far side of the window, practically gathering dust in the UI, was a feature I hadn't touched since my tutorial days.
Auto-cast sequence.
I gasped so loud the entire guild turned their heads. "Oh my god, I forgot this even existed!"
Keiji narrowed his eyes. "Forgot what?"
"The auto-cast bar! You can line up skills in order so they activate automatically in a chain. Nobody uses it because it's trash, but it means I can cheat the system!"
They blinked at me like I'd grown another head.
"I'll just line up my baby skills, slash, thrust, dash, strike. Then I can pretend I'm a normal swordsman instead of a walking tactical nuke. Boom. Genius."
Luna tilted her head. "...That actually makes sense."
"Of course it does!" I said proudly, dragging the icons over into the bar. "Look at this masterpiece. Slash into thrust into dash into strike. It's like training wheels for my overpowered butt."
For the first time since being trapped here, I felt hope. Actual hope.
And then the system decided to ruin it.
A flashing notification appeared in my vision: Warning: Enemy Approaching.
My stomach dropped. "No. Nope. Absolutely not. Tell them to go away. Send them a nice letter. I am not ready."
Keiji barked, "Everyone! To the walls!"
The guild scrambled into position. Luna tightened her grip on her staff. And me? I stood frozen in front of the flag, my sword shaking in my hands.
"Okay, Leonhart," I whispered. "This is it. Your first test. Just use the basics. No world-ending nukes. Be normal."
Figures emerged from the treeline. Not a whole guild, just a scouting party. Maybe five players, sneaking closer. Their eyes locked onto the flag. Onto me.
I tightened my jaw, raised my sword, and shouted the bravest thing I could think of.
"Y-you better not touch this flag, you..." my voice cracked..."you low-level discount minions!"
They laughed. Actually laughed. One of them sneered, "The great Leonhart, reduced to babysitting."
That was it. That was the spark.
"Auto-cast, don't fail me now!" I roared, charging forward like a man possessed.
Slash - Thrust - Dash - Strike.
My sword blurred, cutting through the air with all the grace of an overexcited toddler.
And for once, it didn't explode anything. No shockwaves, no craters, no nuclear fallout. Just clean, solid strikes.
The scout in front of me staggered back, clutching his side. "What the hell....he's just doing basic attacks?!"
I beamed. "That's right! Leonhart, the average swordsman, reporting for duty!"
I swung again. And again. The auto-sequence flowed like water, chaining the simplest moves together. It wasn't flashy. It wasn't legendary. But it was… perfect.
Behind me, my guild roared, charging into the scouts. Luna's spells lit up the field, Keiji shouted orders, and I kept my focus on one thing: not vaporizing anyone.
For the first time since being trapped here, I felt in control.
And when the last scout collapsed, vanishing back to their guild hall, I threw my arms in the air and shouted, "YES! BASIC ATTACKS FOR THE WIN!"
The guild stared at me like I was insane.
But I didn't care. Because deep down, I knew.
This was the beginning of a new era.
The era of Leonhart, master of mediocrity.