Chapter 148: What can be more rural than the frontier of human habitat?
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Translator: “Pink Tea” Editor: ”Ryunakama”
Day 50 – Morning, Dungeon.
And with this and that we continued to the lower floors of the dungeon.
Rather, that’s all I do? Go down some stairs, pick up books, proceed to the next staircase? And the raid group formed to challenge a floor master in a currently alive dungeon is engaged in a lively conversation on fashion. The Armored Pres-san, who by now finished her cheeky bloodbath, also joined the girls’ talk about clothes. Well, she even took off her helmet and is chatting happily, so it’s fine, I guess? But is it, really?
On the 30th floor was another room with a book from yet unseen series by the name of『Living a Country Life』, I am! It’s enough of the countryside already! Is there anything more rural than a frontier? The Evil Forest? That’s where my home is? I don’t think it’s possible to go more rural than that? But I don’t get to enjoy the slow life at all? I’m working every night like some kind of work-horse? Do I have to go to the end of the world for my shut-in life? Hmm? Maybe that’s what I should do? Retire and live a slow life? Come to think of it, there is nothing better to do? Can I just retire already?
But reading the contents, it seems to be a manual on agriculture and animal husbandry. A book scholarly enough to be called a textbook. A perfect manual for the agricultural renovation of the frontier. This surely must be the result of raising the flag earlier! It wasn’t without a reason that it spent all this time here! When we get back I should have the geeks, who are knowledgeable on administration cheats as well, read it as well, and then consult with them. With this, we will be able to incorporate animal husbandry into agricultural reforms. However, I can’t help but feel that there is a bit of a problem with the way they name books in this world. They should’ve published 『How to Name Books』first. I especially want the author of 『Know How』to read that. Seriously.
And without anything exciting or interesting happening, we reached the 35th floor. Armored Pres-san, you are way too much into this? Dungeon exploration kind of turned into a cave excursion? And another hidden room. At this point, it is pretty much confirmed that there will be a hidden room every 5 floors. As expected, the room on the 35th floor had a book,『Weapon Skills Encyclopedia』, yeah, useless.
I mean, Weapons Skills are meant for a serious head-on face-to-face exchange of blows, right? There is no way I can do that brawl-like『whoever collapses first – loses』thing? I’ll die? On the other hand, since blasting each other with weapon skills is the norm here, Level Wall becomes a huge factor. Since the motion for Weapon skills is too large, it prevents dodging and evading attacks. They hit hard and fast, but also leave one wide open, that’s why I can’t use any of that, so I don’t need this thing. Well, if we share it, everyone will read it, and the geeks have already begun researching club techniques, so this is perfect. Looks like there are some pretty dirty attacks as well, so it might be fine to learn them, but at level 10+ it might be pointless.
And the clothes talk still goes on. Just how many more clothes do they intend to have me make? Am I going to continue my small production until I get the town to the modern era level of industrialization? Let’s send a new plan to Meripapa-san. I have to make him prioritize daily necessities and clothes! The food situation should gradually improve as more and more surplus appears with agricultural innovations, for housing, we already went over the basic stuff from modern architecture and submitted plans for it, but clothes are falling behind. First of all, we need to begin an industrial revolution from weaving and create a supply of a rich variety of fabrics. The designs they can learn and imitate on their own. But we need a large-scale magic-powered weaving machine. In which world would a person have a pressing need to create a blueprint for a huge weaving machine to start an industrial revolution for their nighttime side job?
I mean… We have 21 girls and only 10 boys, among which 4 geeks, who can’t read the mood and thus have no right to speak during the meetings, and also 5 idiots. The boys have no voice at all! In the first place, there is no way highschool boys can go against cute girls, and there are 21 of them. Even now, there are 11 girls and 1 boy, which might look like a harem party to an outsider, but in reality, it’s suffocating? I mean, I’m getting overwhelmed? By numbers? On top of that, since they are better with words, they have an edge over the boys even with even numbers. The power balance is devastating. That’s how we got this atmosphere where the girls cannot be opposed. This is harassment of the lonely home industry? Well, there is no way I’d feel bad about being surrounded by a bunch of charming girls, pleasing to the eyes. It is nice, but it takes a lot of work. Seriously.
And I’m probably easily swayed. Even so, since it’s nice to see laughing and smiling girls, I end up making sweets, food, clothes, and accessories.
Even so, I still remember their faces when I encountered them in the Evil Forest, frightened, tired, warped by sorrow and despair, blank and completely disheartened expressions, faces saying that they gave up on everything. I still can’t forget them. That’s why I don’t want them to make such faces again. I don’t want to ever see that.
That’s why I want them to keep smiling, laughing, jolly and happy.
And that’s why I’m in this endless compulsory overtime home crafting…
I should vent my anger on useless geeks and idiots when we get back. Definitely!
「As I thought, there is another hidden room on the 40th floor as well? So this is a bookstore dungeon after all? Is there going to be a bookcase on the last floor? Okay, let’s clear it today! We are going all the way down! I prohibit flooding or burning the place. Or rather, you might ruin the books if you go wild, so maybe we enter the lowest floor with just Armored Pres-san and me? Vice President B-san absolutely can’t go there.」
Yes, she is a Great Sage. A large-scale magic used at such a place can ruin the books, but that’s not what I’m worried about. The real problem is that in combat she is basically lord of destruction. She smashes, she crashes, she bashes, she throws, utterly destroying everything around her? And she is also swinging them around, destroying my concentration too. For some reason, occasionally, despite staring directly at the enemy during the combat, I keep seeing Vice President B-san chests with my Rajingan!
「Hmmm, if there are books we are fine with leaving it to you two, but we are worried about you, so we will come along anyway. Also, did you just have some kind of a weird flashback during the last part of your sentence? Guilty?」
「AAAAAAAh, oh my, a h.i.d.d.e.n. rooom at suuch a place? Another boook? Look『Herbology』? I woonder what is it about? Kind of?」
Yes, that’s a good book, was every book we found so far banned? This one is all about medical plants and medicine creation. Particularly, about pharmaceutics for dealing with all sorts of diseases. Speaking of medieval medicine, it’s herbal solutions. Magic and shrooms can help recover, but they don’t actually heal. Mushrooms and potions that do heal are rare and thus cost a lot. That, of course, is not enough. This book should be immediately copied and distributed. There is no point in me being the only one learning this. There is a limit to what one person can do, but a book can bestow its knowledge upon many people. If many were to gather herbs and make large quantities of medicine from it that would save that many more people. So I now have even more work on my hands.
「Armored Pres-san, the monsters are getting stronger, so don’t run off solo, okay? Well, I know that you are going to be alright, but don’t do anything dangerous? Sort of?」
She is nodding, so I guess she agrees. We are on the 45th floor already. Armored Pres-san is about to hit level 30 soon, but her stats are still low enough for getting immobilized and hit to be a real danger. On top of that, the monsters show up in packs, each coming with tricky attacks, so we cannot let our guard down.
There are 5 monsters on the way to the hidden room, no, there are 2 more after those five, so it’s 7 monsters.
「There are 7 monsters ahead. Since it’s 45th floor, they should be 『Chimera Beast Lv 45』, a pack of animal-type chimeras, so it’s a bit annoying. They are quite hard to kill. So everyone, be really careful.」
And they are also the most dangerous of all monsters here up to the 49th floor. Animal-type chimeras,『Chimera Beast』.
Being a fusion of several different animal-type monsters, they also have several heads, hearts, and even magic stones. So often it’s impossible to kill them in one attack. For such opponents, tough brawler types are more suited than evasive one-hit killers. The risk is much lower.
And the most troublesome point of chimeras is their power to absorb the abilities of the enemies they ate. Just because it’s a Chimera Beast, there is no guarantee that it can’t use magic, and there is no telling what else it can hide. The danger of an unlikely worst-case scenario is very high here.
Luckily, these are just mobs that recently respawned, so there are only a few of them, and I’m pretty sure they don’t have any control or special attacks, but there is no telling what might happen during a prolonged melee, so it is still dangerous.
So we are going with a safe approach of the glass cannons Armored Pres-san and I staying in the rear and supporting with magic and hit and run attacks. A safe approach it was.
「「「Haruka-kun! We even went as far as to advance in a defensive formation, so why are you insta killing all 7 of them!? Who was that person that talked about no dangerous stuff?!」」」
「Well? I just wanted to test『Dimension Blade』before the actual combat? I took it pretty easy, like 『Hey, would be nice if that did any damage』? It wasn’t on purpose?」
All I was planning is to jump in for a bit, do one attack, and retreat? I was planning to go back to the defensive formation even if I managed to knock them down? Although I ended up charging into them.
Dimension Slash. I might’ve poured too much mana into it since it was my first time using this thing. It slashed chimeras along with the walls… There is a half-circle of about 30 meters in radius, gouged out in the walls. Along with the dungeon itself, huh…
As expected,『Teleportation』, is a subtype of spatial magic, so it seems to have cut the space itself? This one is dangerous, it can’t be easily used around allies. It’s a potential hazard without proper control.
An instantaneous teleportation slash through Kyojitsu, utilizing『Teleportation』that I can’t fully control yet. An unavoidable strike. It’s safe as long as I don’t fail. But since I used teleportation along with the Dimension Slash I ended up jumping too far, unable to fully control it. For some reason, all of my skills are all about plunging ahead? For real?
However, it seems to be a one-hit attack that cannot be used in succession. If I were to try to chain it, I’d probably have to keep mana output much lower. This is a type of technique that cannot be used without prior practice.
Even now, I was barely able to control it.『Mana Control』and『Holding』contained it, allowing me to keep it in check with『Apex Thinking』, but it was inches away from going wild. And even after all restraining, that destructive power. With a divine sword involved as well, it creates an extremely dangerous combination. Ah, there also was 『Spatial Staff』! So it must’ve contributed to cutting through space too. Such an uncontrollable technique.
And since it cut apart the chimeras, it must’ve ignored their『Slashing Immunity』and『Magic Immunity』.
I can’t sell this weapon to anyone. This can be used to cut even us. And there is a high probability of instant death as well.
It’s so dangerous that I can’t even use it for practice with Armored Pres-san? After all, even cheat items won’t be able to protect her if space itself was cut.
This is a dangerous weapon, maybe I should seal it?
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