Chapter 42: 300-Limit Rhapsody, The One Chasing the Odds of Victory

Losers' Woods (Moshu no Juma). To put it mildly, it's bad news. How bad? Bad enough that right now, I honestly think I’d have a better chance of winning against Lycaon of the Night Attack.

I dodged tree roots that turned into spears attacking from the ground with almost no start-up animation (and of course, they have homing properties). Beyond that, I slipped past jet-black chains fired from the Losers' Woods' main body—which would clearly inflict debuffs if they touched me. Amidst screams that sounded like jarring creaks, unpleasant enough that having a cicada buzzing right in my ear would be better for my mental health, I simply ran. Sometimes rolling, I clung desperately to the survival mark five minutes away.

Dammit. If I don't force my fading consciousness back to the surface and think while I move, I'm dead. First, the major premise: None of my attacks work on that thing. It’s not like Lycaon where the specs are just too different to scratch him; it’s a compatibility issue. That pseudo-mummy is the ultimate anti-physical class killer.

"Complete Physical Attack Immunity...!?"

In the first few seconds, there was still a chance to attack, so I didn't hesitate to hammer some hits in. But the feedback felt like punching a lump of iron wrapped in rubber—a fruitless sensation. Usually, the standard practice for this type of enemy—or rather, the rule for enemy mobs—is to defeat them with non-physical attacks. But for me, who hasn't learned a single magic spell, I can't deal even 1 millimeter of damage to this guy. That meant the clear condition Vash set... "Survive for five minutes." It sounded simple at first glance, but that naive thought was blown away twenty seconds after starting.

"Close... one...!"

A few seconds after the ground turned unnaturally black, sludge spewed out. Dammit, another new attack. Losers'... it's too long, let's call it the Mummy Palm. Anyway, it has too many moves. Can you understand the annoyance if I say every single action is a "first-sight killer"? Since we started, it hasn't repeated the same action once; it always throws out something different. The only saving grace is that the main body of the Mummy Palm never moves from the center of the arena, and between the barrage of attacks, there is definitely a cooldown period connecting one motion to the next.

At least, as long as I don't get caught by that technique that looks like magic, I should be okay for about five minutes, but...

(If I just keep running, I'm definitely going to get checkmated, though.)

At least in the first twenty seconds, it only shot fireballs or a single earth spear from the ground. But now, at the two-minute mark, five of them spawn simultaneously, they have homing, and the cooldown is clearly getting shorter.

Shit, my head hurts... I want to eat something sweet... Gather the remaining active brain cells and think. Information I can use for the next step... no.

"A game that you can clear assuming you give up...!"

That's inferior even to a Kusoge (Trash Game)! Unless it's a scripted event battle that happens without foreshadowing! Come to think of it, maybe I was being a little spoiled. The result of that was my pathetic leech play during the "Mud Digging." While I preached efficiency, I feel like somewhere inside I was cutting corners, thinking, "Well, it's okay if I die." That's right. Playing a Kusoge I've already cleared lazily is one thing, but slacking off in a game I haven't cleared yet is nonsense. That’s no different from an enemy character who blatantly underestimates the Protagonist (Player), says things like "Im-Impossible! The great me...! Gwaaaah!" and then explodes. My god, has playing too many Kusoge turned my mental state into a "Trash Character"? As expected, overdosing on Kusogenium comes with dangers, so I need to neutralize it with Kamigenium (God-Game-nium)........... Yeah.

"Let's clear this quickly... and go to sleep!"

I'm tired, dammit. So, the problem is how to buy time. Complete Physical Nullification is a hard counter to me. The density of attacks is steadily increasing, and eventually, magic will probably rain down over a wide area like hail. "AoE Magic" is a very convenient factor for making an easily understandable strong character. Of course, I know how to deal with those attacks... but dealing with it as a Light Warrior build without magic is rough. Whoops, watch out.

"Lightning. Approx. 0.5 seconds after generation..."

Even if it's an attack I haven't seen, it doesn't hurt to memorize it. Besides, non-homing delayed area attacks like this are a chance to recover stamina. Next is Mud... Here it comes!

"Run out of material!?"

Remember! Recall its attack patterns! First Fireball, then Earth Spear, Geyser Mud, Lightning Strike, Magic Chain, Miasma Smoke... and then close-range Physical Attack! I see. If I think calmly, the scale is different, but the general attribute and shape of the attacks are the same... Shit, I assumed they were different types of attacks on my own! Usually, I would have realized this sooner. I want to ingest caffeine.

"A monster where attack density and power increase over time, Complete Physical Nullification... No."

The Mummy Palm is certainly designed to kill physical-specialized classes, but would a physical-specialized class become completely garbage? Is that possible? In this game, would they create a monster balanced for players of the appropriate level, assuming that everyone is a physical class that also learned magic? Most likely, even if a pure physical class can't win, there should be some way to counter it.

"In... that... case..."

I see the thread of a walkthrough.

Author's Notes & Lore:

Setting Disclosure Corner (Since I couldn't think of anything specific to explain in this chapter, here is some info that has a low probability of appearing in the main story.)

There are a massive amount of "Excaliburs" in Shangri-la Frontier.

Strictly speaking, only one "Excalibur" exists. However, because player blacksmiths name their self-made weapons "Excalibur," a massive amount of Excaliburs are being sold dirt cheap in the market. Of course, you cannot give a weapon the exact same name as the official "Excalibur" prepared by the system. So they become things like:

"True Excalibur" (Shin Excalibur)

"RE:XCALIBUR"

"Ritual Excalibur" (Giten Excalibur)

"ExcaIibur" (Written as "工クス力リバー" where the 'E' and 'Ka' are different characters [Kanji], but you can tell by the font)

"Super Excalibur"

And other variations with slightly added text. For convenience, we call the real one "The Real Thing," but this is also a countermeasure against scams where people try to sell weapons shaped like the real Excalibur to beginners. Among them, there are "Excaliburs" created by players with the passion to seriously surpass the real one, so you can't just dismiss them all as "Fake Excaliburs." It's a kind of lottery.

Translator's Remarks:

300-Limit Rhapsody: "300 Limit" refers to the 300 seconds (5 minutes) Sunraku must survive. A "Rhapsody" (Kyousoukyoku) implies an enthusiastic, ecstatic, or irregular musical composition, fitting the chaotic barrage of attacks.

"Construction-Power-libur": In the author's notes regarding the fake Excaliburs, one example is 「工クス力リバー」.

The first character is not the Katakana 'E' (エ) but the Kanji for construction/craft 'Kou' (工).

The fourth character is not the Katakana 'Ka' (カ) but the Kanji for power 'Chikara' (力).

Visually they look nearly identical to "Excalibur" (エクスカリバー) in certain fonts, making it a "typo scam" weapon.