CH 28

We’ve been hunting Black Wolves ever since, and we’re currently in the Forest.

To be honest, we got bored. What’s the fun in just hunting Black Wolves for a couple of hours, when you can kill them in less than 5 seconds instead of 10? There was nothing wrong with me physically, but I was mentally exhausted, so we took a break in the room after we left the boss room for about an hour, and then we started running towards the Forest seemingly randomly. It would have taken us a while to explore, but we already knew the shortest route. In addition, the status we gained in the dungeon gave us extraordinary physical abilities. We took a quick detour, killed the Minotaur instantly, and came straight to the forest. And then,

“[Impact] [Decaple].” (Haru)

Ten balls of light spun around and scattered in all directions. Haru’s current weapon does not have a magic circle engraved on it, so she uses a card with a magic circle engraved on it that she made earlier.

Each explosion knocks down trees and causes more damage. The trees in this forest burn, but for some reason, they don’t spread, so there is no need to worry about forest fires.

Yes, what we are doing now is a man-made stampede of some sort.

There are no more trees around us, and the monsters that reacted to the sound are gathering together and closing in on us. I look up, but Rimdobmur is apathetic to what’s happening.

“I guess I’ll be on my way then.” (Kei)

“Yeah. I will be defeating them from here.” (Haru)

I kick the ground and head towards the monster’s reaction. There are no strong enemies like the Earth Dragon from last time. They’re all small fry, and you can slay one of them in less than a second. It’s probably because I’ve slain so many Black Wolves that my sword path doesn’t bend even when I’m slashing at high speed.

But even so, the number of monsters increased more than they decreased.

“I can’t catch up, I guess? [Speed] [Power] [Chain] [Slow].” (Kei)

The combination of [Speed] & [Power] physically enhanced me, and [Chain] makes the effect of [Slow] affect over a wide area. It’s not an attack, it’s just magic that lowers the speed of the opponents, but it can spread several times farther than normal.

As it is, I plunge into the enemy group, take on, and eradicated a much larger number of monsters than before.

Gradually, the number of monsters dwindled.

“Hey, something’s coming!” (Haru)

I heard Haru’s voice, so I returned to Haru, I felt a strong presence on the way.

It is an enemy that seems to be weaker than the Earth Dragon but stronger than the Minotaur.

Another reason we came here was that we were tired of Black Wolves and wanted to fight a large number of enemies. We also want to fight stronger enemies.

Occasionally, monsters with strengths that do not normally appear show up. We call these monsters rare monsters, and the only ones that seemed for us are the strongest were the Golden Skeleton and the Earth-Dragon. But in reality, we have fought a lot more rare monsters. However, they weren’t strong enough to mention.

Rare monsters vary greatly in Fighting Power from individual to individual, and the Earth Dragon, which had twice the Fighting Power of the Minotaur, that was the boss of the previous layer, can be considered an overwhelming force in that layer, while there were rare monsters that had only the Fighting Power of small fry.

Weak rare monsters are not a very good source of quality drop items, but if they become strong to some extent, they may drop skill cards. But this time,

“Wise Wolf, Fighting Power 187, slightly stronger?” (Haru)

“I guess. I think we’ll just kill this one and be done with it for today.” (Kei)

When I put the sword back in the scabbard, I tilt it a little vertically so that it doesn’t get in the way of the battle. Then Haru puts her right hand forward and lets the magical power flow through the ring.

“I’m going to go with my magic. [Impact]” (Haru)

Haru also slams her treasure, Morningstar, on the ground.

“[Speed]” (Kei)

I buffed myself and used [Stealth] and approached the Wise Wolf who is charging towards us.

The Wise Wolf moved differently probably because of it being “wise”. It shifts a little to the side and avoids the trajectory where the [Impact] heads towards. However,

“Half-hearted wisdom makes you no different from a sitting duck.” (Kei)

I wield my scythe while using [Stealth] to erase my presence near the area where the Wise Wolf dodged. I cut off one of its legs and used [Bind] to nail it on the spot. I keep my distance from the Wise Wolf while using the scythe as a shield. Not to avoid the Wise Wolf’s attack, but to avoid Haru’s follow-up.

The magic that Haru unleashed drew a gentle curve in the middle and blew the Wise Wolf away. It’s not enough to kill it, but if it loses one of its legs and is covered in injuries, it’s as good as dead.

“In addition, the accuracy of the redirected ball has been improved.” (Kei)

“Well, it’s easier to add rotation using [Magic Manipulation] than change the speed at which the magic flies.” (Haru)

As I observe, Haru bends her magic by adding a spin as she manipulates her own magic power. Although magic is just a small mass of magical power, it still possesses air resistance.

And in case you’re wondering, the speed of magic is well over 200 kilometers. It’s just that the increase in status makes it seem slower than it is.

I walked up to the Wise Wolf, who stood unsteadily, and used the scythe as a feint to send his head flying. It was unlikely that he would be able to resist without feinting, but skills and magic can be used to reverse a predicament. There was no need to neglect the possibility that the enemy might use skills or magic.

“The drop is a dagger. Oh, it has skills. It’s a Counterattack. I’ll check it out when I get back.” (Haru)

“Oh, that’s good. For some reason, Haru stopped using daggers.” (Kei)

“Muu, because the blades aren’t very responsive. I feel like I should knock them down with a blunt weapon.” (Haru)

“Oh, oh. I see.” (Kei)

I felt like I had seen a glimpse of a horrifying side of my sister.

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And now I’m cooking. After defeating the Wise Wolf and returning home, we decided to have dinner before checking the results.

“Oh, this is great.”

Incidentally, Haru was in the back of the room analyzing something unusual that she had picked up today. It all started when Haru started to analyze some random items in the jar as a way to pass the time, and she happened to discover that some nondescript items had skills attached to them.

Of course, the skills were not valuable, but rather trivial things like [Anti-slip]. It was at this point that Haru became motivated to find some useful skills, and while killing time, she started analyzing the unusual ones in succession.

The most unusual skill she found so far was a skill called [Medicinal effect], which increases the potency of medicines.

The effect is to strengthen the effect of the medicine. However, for some reason, the above-ground medicines don’t seem to work in the dungeon. And potions were not included as medicine. In other words, it was useless.

Other than that, it would be a skill called [Luminescence] with a duration of one hour.

Once you use it, it will continue to glow for an hour, but since there is no way to turn off the light, the only way to turn it off is to wait for the hour to pass. And perhaps because it is a magical light, the glow will penetrate even if it is covered with some object. First of all, it can only be used in dungeons, but there are no dark places in dungeons.

Well, after all, it’s a garbage skill.

By the way, the skill I found was transferred to a metal plate I made by [Alchemy].

Since metal processing is difficult, I used the easy-to-process and soft Boar Horns from the sixth layer to make small plates and then used [Alchemy] to turn them into strong metal. Haru has engraved the name of the skill on the plate so that we can see which skill is attached to it without analyzing it.

“Haru food is ready.” (Kei)

“Brother, please also transfer this skill that deodorizes.” (Haru)

“Oh, I understand.” (Kei)

As usual, Haru was still collecting seemingly meaningless skills. [T/N: Kei clearly doesn’t read enough web novels.]

“So what kind of skill was [Counterattack]?” (Kei)

We talked about dungeons over dinner as usual. Today, of course, it was the skill attached to the dagger.

“Yes. It had a duration of 0.5 seconds, unlike the [Strong Slash] from last time.” (Haru)

“Duration is the time when the skill is active, which is usual for a garbage skill.” (Kei)

“Yeah, and the cool time is 1 second. It’s short, but it’s double the duration.” (Haru)

“You can use it multiple times in a fight, but you can’t keep using it.” (Kei)

“The effect is that when a physical attack lands, it will send back a counterattack in proportion to the strength of the attack but negating the damage. Thank you for the meal.” (Haru)

“What do you mean? Thank you for the meal.” (Kei)

The explanation of the skill was, as usual, incomprehensible, and I couldn’t understand it.

“Brother insisted that I should never enter a dungeon alone, so I did my best to analyze it.” (Haru)

“Thank you. So?” (Kei)

“And? Well, okay. The definition of an attack here is something that impairs you when it hits you, and if it doesn’t damage you, it’s called fatigue.” (Haru)

“What is that?” (Kei)

“If the opponent’s physical attack is received by this dagger when the skill s active, the opponent will get tired in proportion to the strength of the attack.” (Haru)

“Oh, it’s definitely strong, so why didn’t it use it?” (Kei)

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“Because I killed the Wise Wolf without it preventing the attack even once. By the way, the name of the weapon is [Wise Wolf’s Dagger].” (Haru)

“Hmm. So it’s not truly a ‘wise’ wolf. Well then, shall we continue with yesterday’s alchemy?” (Kei)

“Yeah. I’m ready.”

If I look beyond Haru’s line of sight, I will find the armor we bought yesterday and the same number of Black Wolf Furs. The Black Wolf we hunted was a lot, but it seems that the number of materials was just enough.

We decided to start with the hoodie, so we cut off the hood. Then I used [Alchemy] for the lining and other parts of the hoodie, and then Haru stitched the hoodie and hood together, which had become so strong that no needle could penetrate it unless she used her [Craft] skill. Of course, the thread she uses is from a small fry’s drop item, which I used [Alchemy] along with the Black Wolf’s fur to make it stronger.

The reason for doing such a troublesome task is quite simple: when it comes to stab-proofing, modern stab-proof fibers are stronger than Black Wolf’s fur. That’s all. No matter how strong the Black Wolf’s fur is, it can still be pierced by iron if you hit it with all your might. However, if you’re in a dungeon and your status has increased, you can easily pierce it anyway, or something like that.

Next, I strengthen the pants and clothes we’ve been using for exploration by using [Alchemy]. I didn’t strengthen the underwear because it becomes a little stiff and difficult to wash. However, I also used [Alchemy] on some of the socks for good measure.

The breastplate had metal some in it, so I used Black Wolf Fur for the outside. The iron inside was strengthened with Black Wolf Iron made from the Black Wolf Fang.

Finally, the shoes, if I only used the fur, only the cloth part was replaced by [Alchemy], so I also used the Black Wolf Iron, so the few metallic parts were also strengthened.

“Okay, it’s done. Would you like to go to Tokyo tomorrow?” (Kei)

“Yeah. I’m ready.” (Haru)

We ended the day with more than enough preparation to enter a dungeon that would be much weaker.

“Oh no, brother. We forgot to buy gloves.” (Haru)

“Yes, that’s right. Well, we didn’t have enough money to buy them even if we had remembered.” (Kei)

After all, we have no money.