Chapter 947: To My Beloved Dawn, Part 20
"Sure, ShanFro is ultimately just a game, you know? But as a tool for experiencing the 'thrill' of discovering an as-yet-unseen new creature, I think it surpasses reality."
"Fumu, indeed."
"You think so too, Tsuchinoko-san, right!? See, when I heard this Unique Monster was humanoid, I almost went off to sulk in bed, but then I heard she controls snake-type monsters, and that golden snake we'd never seen before......... did you see the materials it dropped? The Scorch-Devouring Great Emperor Serpent is unquestionably a new species."
"Hee, I certainly hadn't seen one before."
"ShanFro's snake-type monsters basically follow the '◯◯ Giant Serpent' template, but Nemestron is a 'Great Emperor Serpent'......... no, wait, I'm sure there was a 'Great “Sovereign” Serpent' somewhere.................. could they be closely related? Isn't this a major discovery!? Don't you think so too, Tsuchinoko-san!?"
"Hou, you have a point."
"What's with that energy?"
"Hahaha........."
This is Takeda-shi's secret 'H-Row Response Lexicon.'[*1]
According to him, when you're not in a public setting and are dealing with someone you aren't particularly close to, but whose impression of you you don't want to worsen, the H-row is more than sufficient to tide you over for the moment, de gozaru.
When I asked, 'Then what is hi supposed to be?' he replied, 'That is for you to discover yourself, de gozaru.'
He probably just couldn't think of one, or rather, wasn't this whole thing a rip-off of the S-row in the first place.........? Slightly suspicious, I went with 'Hi, hyeee〜!' for the time being. Didn't use it this time, though.
Apparently, even SF-Zoo had never observed the gold king cobra from earlier and considered it a new species, so Vet's mouth was picking up more and more speed.
Why was he telling me all of this, why wasn't he talking to Animalia or the rest of his clanmates........................... for one instant, the terrifying hypothesis that he had come to talk to me specifically because I was the one called the phantom snake raced through my mind at high speed, but I pretended not to see it.
That said, it is also true that this player called Vet possesses truly remarkable knowledge of snake monsters.
......... I feel like this exact flow already happened with Eta-Zero, and with PT Overwerke too. ShanFro's top players are nothing but people like this.
SF-Zoo's excessively deep knowledge of creature-type monsters, acknowledged by themselves and everyone else throughout ShanFro, is far too valuable in our current circumstances.
That remained true even if their joining us and accompanying us had slowed our pace from the speed of a horse, and the speed required to keep alongside one, all the way down to a human walking pace.
I could feel anxious impatience slowly welling up inside me.
But the people who went ahead aren't beginners or anything. Trust my companions, huh..................... no, there are several people among them who may have already gotten themselves killed just like that. When it comes to that, the fact that I can't trust them is the one thing I can trust, or something.
Though dying itself isn't a problem.
"Hmmm.................."
I'm not particularly good at the kind of thinking required to lead a group like this, especially because my baseline assumption is that the unit called me can operate solo, so naturally my thought process leans in that direction.
Which is why it helps tremendously when someone does that at times like this.
"Human-type enemy up ahead!"
"Search aaand Destroooy!"
At the shout raised by an SF-Zoo member, I instantly led the charge.
Yeah, nothing beats punching the enemy in front of me without thinking! Anything that appears head-on must be prepared to get kicked away head-on, were you prepared for that, Poison Maiden!!
I already knew that touching the skin of an 'Eyeless' was safe. Strong, sure, but it was basically PvP against someone with only certain parameters bugged out.
I didn't know what they found so amusing, but every last Poison Maiden showed up grinning away. Kicking those faces as hard as I could and sending them flying felt slightly criminal, but it was undeniably satisfying too.
"......... Wait, wasn't Tsuchinoko-san beside Vet?"
"So you really can experience losing sight of someone because they are too fast........."
"Thinking about it calmly, a clan with two Maximum Title-holders is completely ridiculous........."
I think that myself sometimes.
And then, beyond the Poison Maiden that had gone flying with her face scraping across the ground and was now getting back up, I spotted a large, long silhouette, so I raised my voice just as the SF-Zoo member had earlier.
"Snake-type monster coming this wa───"
"Formation Eel Trap!"[*2]
"""Aye!!"""
".................."
Isn't it harder for an entire group to instantly form a formation that hard-locks the target than it is for one person to launch the fastest possible preemptive strike?
While I watched the anti-snake encirclement, screenshots and debuffs flying everywhere, with feelings I couldn't quite describe, Rei-shi caught up, turning our two-man cell into an ironclad beatdown formation, and we resumed pounding the Poison Maiden into pulp.
……
…………
"One new species after another is a real lifesaver, and our members' excitement is climbing like an eel too."[*2]
The people saying that were the same ones who had marinated the exciting new species in debuffs until it was in a 'dies easily' state, then beaten it to death......... with that many people taking it down, they probably hadn't gotten any decent drops, yet the members of SF-Zoo continued their post-match analysis with beaming faces.
And why were both the sub-leader and the leader talking to me......... though, the way SF-Zoo fought just now really was interesting.
It applies to every monster, but there are matchup differences like certain attacks working especially well or the target resisting certain attributes.
Fundamentally, I'm a self-enhancement type who piles buffs onto myself before fighting, so I hadn't really understood what a playstyle built around debuffing the opponent actually looked like.
In that sense, SF-Zoo's debuff-specialized combat was extremely interesting.
Sure, taken to the extreme, combat centered on debuffs boils down to 'creating weaknesses that aren't there'......... but once you can coordinate at the tactical level, you can pull off something like a debuff relay?
During the Lycaon battle......... well, how do I put this, my impression of them being turned into bowling pins is much stronger than my impression of them actually fighting, so that's the only part I remember.
"......... We may want to hurry a little."
"Hm?"
I'd been thinking back over SF-Zoo's tactics, but when Animalia beside me suddenly murmured those words, I turned toward her.
The rabbit ears she'd also been wearing when we first encountered her swayed in the wind as Animalia stared straight ahead, into the distance beyond the dim gloom.........
"The signals are far away......... but there are a lot."
"Far away but numerous......... two possibilities."
I didn't know how capable that rabbit-ear accessory was, but was it picking up the 'main force,' a mixed army of humans and 'Goldunine'?
Or was a mixed horde of Poison Maidens and Giant Serpents approaching in numbers large enough to be described as 'a lot'?
......... Could be both, too?
"Can you pick up the pace?"
"Yes. Everyone! Pick up the pace a little!"
The worst-case third possibility.
The 'main force' was already locked in a melee with the enemy!
Author's Afterword
Hahaha
Hi, hyeee〜!
Fumu
Hee
Hou
Translator's Notes
- [1] H-Row Response Lexicon: The Japanese H-row is ha, hi, fu, he, ho, matching the five stock replies listed in the afterword. Takeda's system parodies the familiar conversational 'S-row' mnemonic, sa, shi, su, se, so, a set of convenient flattering responses.
- [2] Eel Trap: An unagi-uke is a traditional one-way eel trap. Animalia later says the members' excitement is rising unagi-nobori, an idiom meaning to rise rapidly but literally 'climbing like an eel,' echoing the formation name.
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