NABC Chapter 48: A Shaman’s Gear part.1
Chapter 48: A Shaman’s Gear part.1
Chapter 48: A Shaman’s Gear part.1
Before heading into the dungeon, we started off by refreshing our equipment.
“The area ahead from here is largely divided into two types”
“One side is shown by the magic circle, and it continues deeper into the dungeon. The other route goes through the forest outside. The forest route has Skeleton soldiers, and also Goma who we think may possess equipment stolen from the Skeletons. If we go there first to gather materials, we should be able to take care of our equipment to a certain degree”
Souma-san and her group had apparently done some investigation after landing on this area. If they had finished preparing after their first scan of the area, they’d have left already, and wouldn’t have been involved in our crisis.
“So the Armor Bear got here because it’s connected to the forest huh”
“Souma’s the only one of us who fought that bear, but I’ll bet we can take it down with our current power”
With a proper vanguard, and attack magic shooting from the rear, even an Armor Bear would down on its luck. Kenzaki-san isn’t just being over-confident here. Fact is, that Armor Bear backed off right away.
“Then should we head off after a bit more rest? Futaba-san, you just woke up after all”
“No, I’m perfectly fine. I can move anytime”
Replying like a veteran mercenary, Mei-chan was munching on a bunch of fairy walnuts, accumulating that nutrition in a wild fashion. How utterly manly. That demeanor fits the Berserker to the T.
“Futaba-san, you know, you don’t have to force yourself”
“No really, I am fine. Look, my arms are healed up too”
Wow, they really are. Mei-chan put out her arms to show us, and though her sleeves were still a mess, the actual arms underneath not only had no wounds, but was back to their original spotless, beautiful skin.
“Souma-san, you used your magic to heal me right? It worked wonders see, thank you”
“Uh, huh... But my Healing Light isn’t all powerful alright. Please don’t overestimate it. What I’m wondering is, Futaba-san, you’re trememdously quick to heal aren’t you?”
“Yeah, maybe it’s that. I think I have a skill for that too”
Her talking so fluently with that Souma Sakura is kinda like, like they’ve been on equal footing since forever. When standing amongst these all-star pretty girls from class, Mei-chan who has attained beauty not losing to their own, she somehow seems stunning.
Feels like she’s gone to a different planet. Honestly, right now you could say I’ve gotten myself in a harem-like situation with 6 total hotties surrounding me. But I can’t be happy about this at all. My shoulders are simply too thin. The only guys who ought to stand amongst girls like them are Souma Yuuto, or Tendou Ryuichi. Any other boy would be like me, just gawking awkwardly, or get into a crazed high like a horndog.
“Ah, that’s right, Natsukawa-san, do you still have my knives?”
“HHhe!?”
Natsukawa-san jolts so hard, I kinda feel bad for her. Faced with the kindly smiling Mei-chan, she’s already in tears. Yup, this girl is absolutely terrified.
“I’d like to get it back, if I may? I lost most of my weapons in the fight before”
“HYeass! I has it right here!”
Hii, replies Natsukawa-san in tears, while she clutters around her waist to retrieve a short-sword, and hands it over to Mei-chan. The shorter than average Natsukawa-san standing face to face with the tallest girl in class, Mei-chan, really paints an fierce picture. Their height difference is like that of an adult and child. Line them up, and their busts would show a similarly grand dissimilarity.
“Thank you”
Mei-chan who recieved the knife cheerfully, had surpassed any delinquent extorting someone out of their pocket change, and looked like a yakuza(mafia) member collecting all their belongings and property.
Well then, about this, now returned to its rightful owner, knife...
Kill CarverA kitchen knife not for cuisine, but thirsting blood, it was reborn to kill.
Now then. We got ourselves this Kill Carver with a very ominous name and description, but with that I now have an idea of just how powerful weapons can become from Takanashi-san’s remodeling.
“Hey lookie Kotarou-kun, this spear isn’t rusty at all!”
Strengthening one’s vocation is up to the individual. But then, if you’re granted high-spec powers, you can overcome things like experience just like that.
“Yeah, I’m kinda relieved hearing that”
“Relieved? How so?”
“Err look, Kenzaki-san and Natsukawa-san have been using so many different skills while fighting. Mei-chan doesn’t have such a rich array of skills after all”
“... Momokawa-kun, you can see them using those?”
“Yeah well, it’s pretty obvious”
Like, both of them have been doing double jumps and all. No way they had those back in Japan.
“Kenzaki-san has one-shot attacks like Slash. A single bladed one, and one let out from both swords. Also, there’s one that lets out a shock wave after piercing through. Well, these are just my guesses from what she’s been using, for the past while?”
“And Minami? What about her?”
“I know from Mei-chan that she has Slash. But it looks like she can do two of those back to back. But what’s more amazing is that Natsukawa-san can dodge with Foresight even while moving super fast with High Walk. I think she also has Repel, but maybe she’s not too confident in its power. I didn’t see her use it often”
“I wonder, did you happen to watch martial arts matches often Momokawa-kun?”
“Nope, not at all”
I have literally no interest in that area. I’m more if a big fan of anime, manga and games. Always looking forward to epic finishing moves or super-tier magics being used in fantasy battle stories and such. But say I did watch martial arts, I’d have no idea what move was used or what technique was being carried out.
But no way am I spilling out all that jargon. I at least have the judgement to avoid my otaku fanboy-ing in public.
“I, see... You’ve been watching well”
“It’s life and death after all”
Depending on how the vanguard fairs, us in the rear could get into deep shit before we know it. So obviously we need to understand each others’ strengths and weaknesses. Though it’s not like a total noob like me can tell much from just looking.
“I’d like to talk a bit more about everyone’s skills once we get back, that alright?”
“Yes, of course. We need to do that or else we won’t coordinate well after all”
And like that, we smoothly finished gathering materials. The groups of Skeletons or Goma weren’t a match for our amazing trio in the frontlines, so us in the back didn’t have much to do. Nevertheless, the shamefully weak nature of my curses have indeed come to light.
I can’t just use Rotten Bog with party members who aren’t used to it, and I haven’t reconstructed Rem either. In the end, all I could manage was some harassing from Blackhair Bind. I can’t help but be jealous of Souma-san and Class Rep shooting off light and ice attacks left and right.
But the most annoying part about being in the rearguard was that Takanashi-san. As if using me as a shield, was always standing right behind me. Well, that was the formation so I can’t complain too much... but having someone right on your tail is pretty annoying.
Don’t bring along non-combatants dammit, I want to complain, but even though the fairy square will hinder entry to monsters, it won’t do the same for beasts. In other words, horny bastards like that totem-pole trio could come in so we always have to be together, is what it is.
Takanashi-san has this super convenient self-defense skill, namely Sacred Tongue: “Word of Rejection”, so frankly speaking, her safety is guaranteed even more than mine. In live combat, I may as well count as the bigger piece of excess baggage.
She also has this Mana Analysis skill. It’s like her remodeling ability with the fountain, but with this it doesn’t even have to be a physical magic-imbued object, but also stuff like magic shot out by monsters. Depending on the type she can understand it, so she’s not entirely useless in combats either. And it even feels like Mana Analysis can act as a higher form of my Intuition Pharmacy. If it has mana, she can handle magic and objects the same, so the skill’s multi-use capability isn’t limited in the least.
But the least you can do is carry a spear or knife like, for self-defense, are my honest thoughts. Takanashi-san being so frail, she only carries cores in her bag. Though I’m not in any position to tell her that. I’m pretty much the same level of useless as her at this point.
Anyway, there were some annoying points, but our harvest was excellent. Plus I got to see first-hand how these girls fight. You could say it was a very fruitful practice session.
Incidentally, we were doing so well, that we made it to the exit into the forest outside. Since it was a good opportunity, we tried heading in a bit and... hell yes! We found ourselves those some of those delicious snakes, three even. This is great Mei-chan, tonight shall be a feast.
Well, when those 5 pretty girls saw how Mei-chan was joyously hunting down snakes and brute forcing apart their skin, we got a real jump out of them but... Fufun, once they know this taste, they too shall become avid Snake Hunters no doubt.