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Chapter 182.1: The Knife’s Ownership
Three shadows of humans were trailing a huge shadow that was racing through the dense thicket.
「WAIT RIGHT THERE!」
「TRYING TO RUN HUUUH!」
The one who ran through the forest while clearing away the branches along the way was the 『Swordsman』, Ueda. Right behind him, wielding ax was the 『Warrior』, Nakai.
The two were yelling as they went after their escaped prey.
「BUGIIIIIIIII!」
The one who ran through the forest while raising a pig-like scream was a boar-like monster. It was different from the great boar that they had hunted down before. It was one size smaller yet a precious source of food.
Thus, they went after the boar-like monster while sporting demon-like looks on their faces, just like primitive men.
「UWOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, GRAB IT! 『AQUA BIND』!」
Shimokawa, the 『Aquamancer』 who followed after Ueda and Nakai had somehow managed to unleash his most powerful 『Aqua Bind』 while running.
Several small feelers emerged from the magic circle that appeared in front of his palm, heading toward the fleeing boar――coiling around its rear leg.
「BUHIIII!」
The boar tripped and fell down due to the sudden breaking. The chasing trio rushed at once without wasting even a breath.
「YEAAH, YOU’RE FINISHED NOW, PIGGY BA*STARD!」
「DIE AND BECOME OUR SOURCE OF PROTEIN!」
Nakai and Ueda raised their weapons, shouted those remarks as they rushed toward the boar.
「OI, WAIT A MINUTE! THAT GUY CAN USE SOME SORT OF SPELL!」
Maybe because of his spellcaster-type vocation, Shimokawa detected a flow of magical power that couldn’t be detected by the other two and warned them the next moment,
「BUGIGIGI!」
A cloud of dust suddenly blew up along with the boar’s warcry.
「UOOOO!?」
「BUHOOO!」
Ueda and Nakai stumbled on their steps when the cloud of dust suddenly exploded from under their feet. Fortunately, it had zero offensive ability, thus the two of them were literally unscathed.
「BUGIGI!」
But that was enough for the boar to regain its footing and resume escape.
「YOU’RE NOT ALLOWED TO ESCAPEEEEEEE, 『AQUA Heavy Bind』!」
He stretched both his hands, and a magic circle that was much bigger than before appeared in front of his palms, the binding magic turned into a huge whip that bound the boar’s body.
「NOW!」
「UOOOOOOOOOOOO!」
「MEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT!」
Thanks to the Totempole Trio’s perseverance, they managed to secure precious boar meat for the first time in a long time.
===
Thus, they lay on the ground in front of a flickering bonfire after they had enjoyed the feast.
「Haa~h, as expected, meat is the best.」
「I feel alive again.」
The boar that kept resisting until the very end with their earth magic was called 『Geoboar』, the taste of its meat was simply out of the world. Thus, the trio felt sympathy toward primitive humans whose daily lives depended on hunting. It was now that they realized the meaning of life by hunting.
「But ain’t delicious enough since we’ve no salt.」
Shimokawa muttered after burping.
「C’mon, that’s a bit too much for our current situation.」
「Momokawa ain’t with us, that’s literally impossible.」
One week had passed quickly after the trio had parted ways with Momokawa Kotaro.
Thus, they finally realized that they had lost the key player of their team. Even now, they were already missing that cheeky youth with a girlish face.
They had happened to witness the break-up between Souma Yuuto and Co with Futaba Meiko who had suddenly appeared on the scene when Reina was being murdered by Kotaro, resulting in Kotaro and Meiko’s retreat while taking Reina’s corpse as a hostage. Thanks to a certain understanding in their minds that Kotaro’s actions were so like 「Momokawa’s」, the Totem pole Trio plus Yamada also managed to escape safely.
Shimokawa, who used 『Aqua Mist』 due to Kotaro’s sudden request, left the fairy plaza along with his friends after greeting Souma Yuuto’s group.
Since there were several branching passages beyond the fairy plaza in which Reina was cooped up with sacred beast 『Souma Yuuto』, Souma Yuuto and his party who were chasing couldn’t overtake them after a point. Naturally, they couldn’t reunite with Kotaro and Meiko who were already far ahead of them too.
From the fact that the trio had already suspected Souma Yuuto for being involved in Reina’s murder due to their previous record in trying to kidnap Takanashi Kotori, Shimokawa made a spur of moment decision to part ways with Souma Yuuto’s group since it was literally impossible for the latter to believe them in that kind of situation. No one was going to blame him for making such a decision… or so it was supposed to be since, unlike the trio, Yamada had no criminal record to his name. But then, he didn’t say anything to the trio and just went along with the flow and joined the trio’s group.
It was clearly unusual for Yamada to not join Souma Yuuto’s group which was composed of top beauties of Class 2-7 with his little sister, Sakura, on the top list.
Anyhow, now the trio who wanted to get away as far as possible from Souma Yuuto’s group got the fourth member, Yamada, into their group and resumed their dungeon crawling.
After that, they left the stone area and currently, we’re in the outdoor, jungle-like area like the one where they had discovered Goma’s fortress.
Though the vegetation resembled a jungle, a white sandy beach and azure blue sea spread on the other side. As if the place they were arriving at was the coastline of a southern island.
Though they’d only been advancing by following the directions of the compass so far… after their sweet time with Momokawa’s skills, their bodies, that had tasted the flavour of the meat again, couldn’t be satisfied with just the nuts they found in fairy plaza. Not to mention that they’re youths at the peak of their growth. Meat, their body wanted meat.
Though the main reason was simply that they wanted to eat meat instead of nuts, Shimokawa suddenly recalled the fact that in Kotaro’s case, he turned the leftover meat into preserved food such as bacon or air-dried meat. And he simply couldn’t forget the taste of bacon stew they ate in the night before commencing Reina’s rescue(assassination) operation.
If they were to continue their dungeon crawling as it was, Shimokawa knew that they needed preserved meat. Naturally, Ueda, Nakai, and Yamada agreed immediately.
Thus, the first thing that the four of them did after arriving at the seashore area was secure the supply of preserved foods.
Thus the four started living a life of survival.
Things such as ‘Can we eat this snake?’ ‘Is that delicious-looking fruit really that delicious?’ was something that always became their main problem due to the existence of poison, they had to drink the antidote they got from Kotaro but if the poison turned out to be more than the antidote could handle…
The thing that was seemingly edible was everywhere. But they had no idea which ones had dangerous poisons or dangerous parasites or viruses in them.
At that moment, they came to realize again just how terrifying the shaman’s passive skill is called 『Pharmacy Intuition』.
Nevertheless, to a certain extent, they tried to eat things that seemed to be edible with the mentality of a gambler. For example, fish.
It could be seen very easily that there were various fishes swimming in the sea. Thus, it was only natural for them to come up with the idea of catching the fish immediately.
Fortunately for them, Yamada had the experience of fishing. Unfortunately, he couldn’t stop crying when he started telling the story about how he went to various places to fish with Yamajun.
And as if that wasn’t unlucky enough, they had no fishing pole and line either.
If Momokawa was with them, he would have used his spider thread-like curse and prepared everything they needed immediately, but none of the four had such wonderful production skills.
After two days of gruesome work, they managed to create a fishing pole with a tree’s branch, a line by knitting small ivy and a hook from a shaved monster’s bone. The fishing pole was finally ready.
The hooked fish was only so-so. It only served to fill the four youths’ stomachs but definitely not long-term by any means.
Nevertheless, they’re very lucky since they at least knew which fish was edible from the hooked fish.
The matter of supplying fish by fishing was left to Yamada, as for the Totempole Trio, they went into the forest, looking for monsters that were seemingly edible at first glance such as great boar.
They decided that the insect-like monster and raptor that could appear out of nowhere from the thicket was no good. A great fight broke out between the trio and the plant-type monster who could spit digestive acid and use its ivies to attack them.
Thus, as they kept failing in their quest to find the monster that was seemingly edible at glance. Today, they finally found what they were looking for, albeit not as big as a great boar, they found a geoboar whose appearance resembled that of a great boar, which brings us back to the present.
「Haa… Momokawa is truly amazing.」
「Especially now when I want a bathtub and hammock the most.」
「Oi, be grateful to me who provides you with a shower.」
Thanks to Shimokawa, their group never had a hard time with baths. Unfortunately for Shimokawa, there was nothing exciting about pouring water on the bodies of naked dudes.
Despite her ugly appearance, showering Airi with his water would make him feel much better than showering some dudes.