Translation: DarkHeartedAlchemist
Editor: Weasalopes
All right now.
Before I go back to the village I have to make sure I"ve done everything I wanted to do.
I headed towards Gozu and Mezu"s sp.a.w.n point.
I picked up all the items and placed them in my bag, after which I went to the sp.a.w.n point in the main cave.
There they are!
Gozu Lv.1
Youkai Target Subjugation Active
Battle Position: Ground Fire Attribute
Mezu Lv.1
Youkai Target Subjugation Active
Battle Position: Ground Fire Attribute
Those are their normal version, weaker than General Gozu and General Mezu.
Well, it was to be expected.
Anyway, let"s get this fight started.
My MP bar recovered to about 50%.
I"m going to go back to the village using Return Home anyway, so I can go a little wild here.
In my current party configuration, Rig has been replaced by Bunraku.
It"ll be attacking with bow and arrows from the back.
Also, this will be a good exercise to see how long can Tigris go without relying on Rig too much.
The battle proceeds as expected.
I ended up using both spells and my Power Water.
Gozu is being attacked by a combined effort from Volff, Jean, Senki and Tigris.
Bunraku also supports them from the back with arrows, but in hindsight, it wasn"t really that necessary.
I also help with defeating him by throwing my own attacks here and there.
I wonder what"s going to drop from them this time?
I know I shouldn"t get my hopes up, but maybe this time will be different?.
Oops, we"re still in the middle of a fight and here I am, thinking about what"ll come after it.
I have to stop being so careless and get my bearings straight.
So now that I"m fighting against Mezu again, let"s dispatch him quickly by twisting his neck with my leglock.
Probably because I upped my STR with Power Water, Mezu"s head turned around 1.5 times, creating quite a gruesome sight to behold.
I mean sure, I did what I wanted to do, but I can"t shake off the feeling that I overdid it way too much.
Maybe I should intentionally hold back some of my strength? I like my battles to be moderately tense after all.
That way I can keep improving without feeling too OP.
As for the drop from defeated enemies, it was a big fat pile of nothing, as per usual.
I wonder how long is my bad luck with drops from those two going to continue?
I returned to the Wind Spirit Village via Return Home.
I can"t forget to activate 【Disa.s.semble】 again.
When I dropped by Fionsan"s place, I notice almost all members of her party were gathered there. Looks like they were in the middle of eating a meal.
「My oh my, isn"t it a bit early for you to come back?」
「Just wanted to catch a little breather, that"s all.」
That said, I walked to Margrid-san who has finished eating already.
「Can you buy this off of me?」
「Hooo, 2 Tsavorites, huh?」
Her eyes were immediately drawn to my Bracelets of Torture and their Iolite engravings.
「Next are those Anklets?」
「If you would.」
「I can"t promise I"ll do it right away.」
「Thank you.」
Good.
Now that that"s done and I"ve made my request I can leave after I gave her my thanks.
In the afternoon the traffic gets much more severe, so I have to do as much as I can before it gets dark. And I also have to eat somewhere.
When I looked back at the village, Fionsan and her party seemed to be heading out for an afternoon hunt as well.
All right, let"s give it our best today as well!
Today I would like to go to the mountains.
No, wait. It can wait until tomorrow, but I want to legitimately go mountain-climbing.
But that might be a bit difficult to do here in the vicinity of the Wind Spirit Village.
Okay, first of all, let"s go to the Area Portal for N1W1 and head to the Shrine of the Earth Spirit.
There is one thing I want to confirm.
Whether or not Abominable Snowman is stronger than Deva King.
Looking at their body types alone, Abominable Snowman"s physique should be superior.
But I guess I won"t have a definite answer to that unless I"ll fight one personally.
The setup of my party has changed significantly.
Now it consists of Zangetsu, Creep, Helix, Obsidian and Heather.
In order to make our movement faster, I chose to strengthen Zangetsu with my spells.
My MP will recover nicely while I"ll be riding on top of him after all.
For now let"s just focus on reaching our destination as fast as possible.
We reached the Skeleton Cave next to the Forest Maze in no time with our current speed.
The Maze itself was quite large.
Good thing I decided to take Creep with me as well.
Fighting Skeletons and Spirits is normally a lot of trouble, but with Creep by my side I should have nothing to worry about.
Our victory is going to be a smooth one.
I signaled Zangetsu to slow down.
While still riding on horseback, I proceeded to enter the Forest Maze.
It"s been a long time since I"ve been here.
I feel that the number of players here has increased.
We had a few monster encounters while we made our way forward.
Mushrooms and Branch Golems were being trampled or thrown to the sides by Zangetsu.
Weren"t some giant ants also here? They are indeed, but we"re running so fast that they have long since been left behind us.
In other words, this little trip is boring.
I can feel how powerful I"ve gotten, but that is exactly why it is so boring here.
I know I shouldn"t be saying his, but after the Deva King battle, nothing felt like a good challenge for me anymore. I guess I just got too used to fighting.
Branch Golems were nothing more to me now than pebbles on the side of the road.
To kill some boredom I played around with Pyrokinesis to create some charcoal for the purpose of refueling.
I don"t know anymore.
Was there some kind of mistake somewhere?
And that"s how we left the forest behind and entered the ivy-covered upwards path.
As expected, that is as far as Zangetsu will be able to carry me.
You can go back now, buddy.
I summon Rig in his steed.
Now that it"s here it can also play an active role in our party for today.
Both Rig and Creep are able to travel through s.p.a.ces unavailable for the rest of us, like cracks or narrow pa.s.sages.
Helix and Obsidian fly through the skies to provide reconnaissance and combat aerial enemies.
Even I can climb up walls if need be.
The enemies here consists of Tree Vipers, Wood Slugs and Frogs. I can collect their fat, venom and oil as drops.
I hunted here for a while, and I can say it with absolute certainty now: the ones we need to look out for the most are the Wood Slugs.
Those are the enemies we can leave for Rig to take care of.
The last batch did not leave any items behind though, probably because Rig absorbed and dissolved them inside its body without leaving anything behind.
I tried taking the next two on myself.
It was tough, but I managed to do it by using Ice Magic spells.
During my climb, I haven"t encountered any other players at all.
The higher I went the more frequent encounters with the enemies became.
There is a surprisingly large number of monsters in here.
I gradually get more and more items because of my 【Dismantle】 skill.
Is that okay?
I say its fine, especially if I get more of those strange stones that drop from Tree Vipers, I bet I could make some pretty potent poisons out of it.
We climb even further up and it gets even more chilly than before.
The time is now way past 6:00 PM.
Even if I rode on Zangetsu"s back for so long that much time has pa.s.sed.
This is not good.
Should I prioritize moving forward as much as possible or maybe make my camp somewhere in here and camp throughout the night?
Anyhow, I should grab a bite to eat here while I still have the chance.
I use Instant Portal spell. Next I call Rig back and summon Bunraku.
If I am to fight some more than I cannot do so on an empty stomach.
The place I am currently at is perfect for observing the monsters while I eat.
There are lots of Blitzes and Snow Leopards, and we have finally found an Abominable Snowman.
That many enemies means there will be many potential drops from them.
And it"s all because we entered the Instant Portal area.
I observe the seemingly translucent Abominable Snowman.
Height-wise it appears to be somewhat shorter than Deva King.
Nah, that information won"t change much in the grand scheme of things.
It"s shoulders, however, are quite the different story.
They are wide as all h.e.l.l.
He has a barrel chest.
Arms are long, muscular and more reminiscent of human torsos stacked on top of each other, maybe even thicker than that.
His legs, on the other hand, are quite short, almost comically so.