Tsurei

“How do you know that anyway?” Kenji mused, frowning over at Yuta, he didn’t remember a time when they had gone to a information broker to get this sort of information,

“Well, this guy over here had taken the time to keep his ear to the ground, you know,” Rei turned around and faced the group, stopping Yuta and leaning on his shoulder casually whilst pointing at him, “In short, Yuta here’s a budding information broker himself,”

“What? When did this happen?” Kenji looked over shocked, he was surprised anyone had the energy to do anything other than go on these quests and then go to sleep which was exactly what he did, and ended up being exhausted every day since they started these adventurers, even if they’ve been fun and new experiences,

“About a week ago,” Yuta scratched his cheek, “I wake up early in the morning and I get restless, a jog wasn’t really going to help me train my body anyway, so I tried out gathering information,”

“Granted, the guidebook really doesn’t have a specific number, the quest was discovered by players farming for xp and col because the Wind Wasps were good opponents with decent drops for their difficulty,” Rei explained the situation more clearly and with obvious honesty this time, “And after all this time, it’s not like anyone’s bothered to actually count, well, maybe some information brokers,”

“Shouldn’t we actually make sure of the amount before we do this…?” Kenji worried, timidly suggesting a different plan of action even though he knew he was going to be brushed off and ignored,

“Don’t worry, we just need to kill 50 of them between us,” Yuta replied, giving a surprisingly exact number,

“That sounds about right,” Rei nodded, it was a nice round number after all,

“So that’s 12.5 per person,” Takuma instantly calculated and mumbled the new number, rubbing at his chin and frowning, imagining himself fighting 12 to 13 of those flying Wasp Monsters wasn’t exactly dangerous, but it was going to be tiring,

“That’s a bit unfair…” he emphasised further when Rei and Yuta simply turned around with a grin at each other and continued to walk forward nonchalantly, pretending to not notice the implied meaning in his earlier words, forcing him to state it clearly,

“It’ll be fine… they can’t hurt you anyway, just swing away!” Rei waved dismissively, chuckling to himself,

“Oi, we can’t feasibly take on tens, let alone hundreds ourselves, there’s no way we’re doing  that,” Takuma ran up to chase them, giving his clear stance of unwillingness to participate without their help, he no longer had any thoughts about of loading most of the work to Rei and Yuta, but since they were essentially the combat orientated of their group, it was going to be the case, he would be satisfied if they at least helped.

“We’ll help...” Rei sighed, giving in and letting go of the topic, deciding to stop teasing them though he was sure they knew he wasn’t serious,

At that mention, Takuma and Kenji exchanged pale expressions,

“Wait, wait, how many do we need to kill?” Takuma quickly suppressed his shock and unease, striving instead to get clear answers and parameters for his problem,

“Who knows?” Rei shrugged dramatically in response, his smile growing wider as he enjoyed seeing the pair grow worried, “Could be ten, hundreds, thousands….”

“You can’t be serious…” Takuma always doubted Rei’s words, after all, he was known to trick them for amusement’s sake, the shark like grin on his face was one of the many tells but he already knew that Rei was well aware of his tells, and had a way of making even his own tells simple traps for another lie, so he faced this reply with equal amounts of dubious mistrust and trusting  reliance,

“… So we’ll have to fight a bunch of them ourselves,” Kenji sighed deeply, his legs shivering, he really didn’t like fighting or the prospect of getting hurt or even hurting others, programs or not, it’s what leads him to instinctively treating npcs like any other person.

“Why don’t you guys take charge this time round, we’ll hang back and relax for a bit,” Rei suggested, sending the pair a small playful grin, “We did all the fighting last time, so we’ll leave it to you this time, it’ll be a doozy anyway,”

“Easy for you to say,” Takuma groaned and shook his head, “We have to `farm` a bunch of these Wind Wasps to even get the Queen to show up, right? … For reference, what does it mean, `farm`, I doubt this game will have us planting seeds and harvesting wasps out of the ground, it’s not that type of farming, right?”

There he shows his inexperience with games like this, considering that Takuma and Kenji were rather normal in that they liked football and sport games, they naturally never had much experience with rpgs and the like. So whilst it was a rather amusing comment, Rei didn’t give much more than a understanding smile,

“It basically means you have to kill the mobs over and over until the Queen shows up,”

“Did you guys even do any fighting?” Yuta glanced over at Takuma and Kenji near the back of the group with a dubious expression, more than willing to join Rei in this exchange of levelled accusations, considering that he and Rei were the ones flailing around in the darkness fighting giant bats that were all to happy to do their utmost to bite their necks and drain them of blood,

“Of course we bloody did! We went to get that child and one of the giant bats attacked us,” Takuma cried out in indignation, distraught at their seemingly petty grudge,

“Well, it did run away after it hit Takuma once,” Kenji shrugged, not quite willing to go along with the small lie, his reveal caused Takuma to glare at him with a narrowed look,

“Why did you have to say that…” he sighed in annoyance,

“I mean, you guys  were making a lot of noise, so I think it went after you guys instead,” Kenji looked over to Rei and Yuta,

“More like, aren’t the stats exactly the same?” Yuta frowned in disbelief and uncertainty, glancing over to his side at Rei whilst pointing a finger at his digital guidebook within his UI, something that no one but the user themselves can see, so naturally he was pointing at thin air when Rei looked back,

“Yeah, seems like it,” he nodded and gave an affirmative answer, there wasn’t much to really say but yeah, the stats were completely the same, 50 health and 20 attack,

“At least we’re not fighting in a dark cave this time round,” Takuma smiled without a trace of worry, it seemed that being able to venture away from dark caves filled with unknown crawlies was a source of great relief for him, despite the fact that…

“Hey, you guys were the ones with the light crystal,” Rei shot back over his shoulder, rolling his eyes as he stared off towards the front,

Barely moments after their last quest in rescuing the child, the 4 man group were more than ready to set off to hunt down the next target, being no stronger than the one before they were fairly confident in taking it down, especially more so since they were now relieved to see the light of day, they wouldn’t be fighting blind anymore at least.

“The last one for today is the Wind Wasp Queen, it’s not any stronger than the Giant Bat from last time,” Rei explained as  he lead the group along the worn down dirt road, nothing but the expanse of grasslands and loomed over by huge mountain ranges on all sides, making the plateau seem like a valley. The sun was hard to see, hidden a veil of grey clouds, up here in the mountains it was chilly as ever with the wind relentlessly pushing at them and biting into them as they travelled.

Summary

“And there they go…” Rei sighed sadly, putting his hands on his minds satisfied at what they managed to do,

“So? What next?” Yuta glanced over to Rei for answers, in the end, the quest didn’t take all that long and it was still barely afternoon, they probably had enough time for another quest was what Yuta tried to implicate,

“Let’s see…” Rei shrugged and flipped open the guidebook, “There’s a hunt against a boss called the Wind Wasp Queen,” he ended up on the quest and suggested it, it stated that in a field nearby were a bunch of Wind Wasps, if they were farmed and hunted for long enough, the Queen would show up, judging by the stats, it was no different from the giant bats they had just fought, but since they would be in the open, this was foretelling a relatively simple fight,

“Urgh… can’t we just call it a day now?” Takuma grumbled, slumping over in disappointment,

“Come on, let’s go,” Rei smiled fondly and slapped them on the back before leading them back out of the city, headed out once more.

ID# 136076
LD: 2 = 50 Col Quest Reward End

“Oh thank you, thank you so much for bringing her home safely…” the woman bowed in deep gratitude, pulling out a old styled coin pouch and dropping it into their hands with the sound of clinking coins, curious, they opened it up but before the could take a look it had dissolved into data, having entered their system,

And here they hoped to see what Col looked like in this world, they couldn’t help but feel they had been teased, baited and bamboozled by the turn of events, seeing their distraught expressions, the woman quickly worried,

“I-I’m sorry it’s not much, it’s all I have,”

“No, no, it’s fine, we weren’t worried about the amount,” Rei smiled and waved it off, “Please be careful on your way home then you two,”

“Yes, thank you kind sir,” the woman’s smile returned as she took her daughter’s hand and walked off, giving them a slight bow as she walked away,

“Thank you mister!” the child waved at them cheerfully as the pair faded into the distant crowds, leaving the four of them pausing in their wave,

The little girl seemed energetic again and no longer appear weak and frail, now she was just like any other girl her age, seemingly having taken a liking to Takuma, she began to pester him with numerous questions about where he was from, what he liked to eat, what his previous adventurers were like, why he became an adventurer and so on, Kenji nearby tried to fill in the void to prevent Takuma’s callousness from hurting the girl by answering in his stead.

The monsters of the forest were not quest monsters, so they at least obeyed the usual rules of observing the player’s levels before avoiding a direct confrontation with them, which made escorting her back to the city much easier.

Waiting right at the gate was her mother, the pair sprinted to each other and happily threw themselves in each other’s hands, tearing up and happy about seeing each other again.

Seeing her so relieved, everyone couldn’t help but share a glance at each other and heave a sigh of their own, yeah, all that matters right now was that everyone was alright and the girl was safe and sound, they shouldn’t be spending all this time throwing complaints at each other,

“Well then, shall we get going then?” Rei announced after a moment of respite, glancing over to the city that could still be seen in their vantage point halfway up a mountain’s cliff not far from the main road,

“Yeah!” the girl happily nodded and cried out eagerly,

The journey back to the city was uneventful, leaving Yuta and Rei to share complaints about how their individual fights went down, it seems that he too didn’t have a good time trying to throw punches and kicks at flying giant bats in the darkness either. Meanwhile, Takuma tried to ignore the child even though he was the one to grab her hand and pull her away from the cave,

“Come on now, how did you get her to follow you then?” Rei couldn’t help but stare at them dumbfounded and shocked,

“We just sort of… dragged her along,” Takuma glanced away and back, struggling to hold to his explanation since even he knew that it was a bad way to go and something to be guilty of, “I mean, she’d rather not be in the dark cave with all the giant bats, right?”

“You still could’ve tried to explain things,” Rei sighed deeply and shook his head in mild disapproval,

“We’re going to take you back to your mom, she was worried about you and sent us out to find you,” Yuta gently patted the girl on the head and tried to calm her down, ignoring the pair of them arguing.

Her relief was clearly visible as her tense shoulders relaxed, “Oh… thank god…” she sighed, seemingly having lost all energy and nearly looking like she fell unconscious after the rush of adrenaline wore off, but luckily it seemed that she was just momentarily overcome by relief,

“S-sorry, I meant…” his head bowed in apology, shocked that he came to a wrong conclusion so quickly,

“It’s fine,” Rei waved it off, such misunderstandings were completely normal and hell, he would be annoyed if someone grabbed him from behind and literally threw themselves full bodied backwards into the stone ground,

The sound of the child coughing nearby brought them to their senses, looking over they found the girl dirty all over, just from dirt or black soot but nothing major, she had fair freckled skin and even had the same hair colour and braids as her mother, she looked up at them with soft harmless brown eyes, full of confusion and fear,

“W-what are you going to do to me?” she asked fearfully,

“Huh?” Rei’s brow shot up as he looked over to Takuma and Kenji, “You guys didn’t tell her?”

“We didn’t exactly have a lot of time whilst being assaulted by giant bats,” Takuma shrugged, giving an indignant excuse,

“Oi! Oi! Slow down!” Rei could only get that much out as a warning before they were blinded by the sun’s light outside,

“Woah!!!” even with his eyes squeezed shut, he could hear the screams of his friends and even the little girls as they teetered on the edge of the several tens of meters drop to the ground which would mean certain death, Rei quickly grappled everyone in a bear hug and threw them all backwards with him jumping to pull them with him, this led to a rather rough crash to the stone ground by the cave, leading everyone to groan and wince in the pain,

“Ow ow ow…” Kenji grumbled, rubbing his elbows before staring at Rei with a frown,

“That was close,” Yuta commented, letting out a breath of tension as he glanced at the drop down the cliff face, at it’s mention, Kenji’s face went red with embarrassment,

As Yuta and Rei took off, they could hear swarms of more giant bats screaming behind them, chasing them down and still thirsting for their blood, such were quest mobs, even if the level gap was large, they didn’t even care if they did zero damage, they would come at you with full intention to kill, their vicious throat tearing attacks against their mitigation however meant that let alone feeling any pain, it felt more like a nibble, and receiving a strange wet nibble in the dark was certainly not a pleasant image.

So the pair picked up the pace, they caught up with the glow crystal’s guiding light around the time they were at the cave’s exit, Rei vaguely remembered that right outside the cave was a narrow ledge, he quickly began to slow down, but he realised with shock that the others had forgotten and were still running full speed,

ID# 136073
LD: 7 = Treasure Found

100 Col, 2 T1 Mats, 2 uncommon consumables

“Ah screw it, never mind!” Rei rolled his eyes as hard as possible, knowing full well that Yuta couldn’t see his incredibly annoyed expression, he heard the sound of wind rushing nearby and instinctively struck out at it, having luckily struck the injured bat and killed it in that one casual hit,

`seriously?` Rei couldn’t help but sigh, he would be more than happy to curl up on the ground right now, why couldn’t he hit it after trying so hard but hit it when he didn’t really care about it any more?

He supposed that was just how it went,

“We have the kid, we can go!” Takuma called out, glancing over the pair found the glow crystal in the darkness waving back and forth, indeed, the crying from the child that filled the air even throughout the battle was now gone,

“Great! Let’s run for it!” Rei turned around, all too happy to leave the dark cave where they couldn’t even see their hands if they held it out in front of them,

ID# 136072
LD: 19 = Treasure Found

Before he could land the last attack however, another giant bat crashed into his back right after a loud booming strike from behind him, the impact knocked Rei over and that moment was enough for the stun effect to have worn off and the bat to have flown off, avoiding Rei’s hurried slash,

“Crap, I was so close and all!” Rei cursed to himself, the bat had hardly any health left, it was in the red after that attack,

“Rei?” Yuta’s voice came over close by, turning around he found him lowering his guard, having been prone to strike at him before he identified him as an ally,

“Oh, hey there,” Rei nodded and greeted casually, his earlier annoyance gone,

“I kicked a bat over here, did you see it?” Yuta glanced around, weapons raised once more, on the lookout for the enemies,

“So that was you?” Rei sighed, slumping his shoulders in disbelief,

“What?” Yuta looked back over at him, somewhat confused,

ID# 136071
BD: 5 +3 -1= Hit Giant Bat 2
MD: 9 = Crit +1

Damage Dealt = 8
Damage Received = 20 - 17 [Mit] - 10 [Regen] = 0

Rei - HP: 400/400| EN: 21 (+1-1) /40| 8 DMG | 17 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD| 2 REGEN
Giant Bat 1 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG
Giant Bat 2 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG

“Over here!” Rei and Yuta called out, quickly confusing the other two as they were unsure which direction to go,

“Ah, whatever, go get the kid out of here, we’ll handle it somehow!” Rei called out his new instructions, one that the pair of them found more agreeable since Kenji wanted to help the child and Takuma didn’t want to go through the effort of fighting, not to mention he only had his shield and his spear hand was currently holding the light.

Lashing out constantly at the bats that flew by them, Rei eventually caught one of them, his eyes lighting up in vengeance, he unleashed Rasetsu, immediately following the cut with a kick, slamming the bat to the ground before driving his blade in one last strike to it’s body, carving a deep wound into it.

As Rei grinned, looming over the bat that was currently quivering and stunned from the effect of the attack, he was overjoyed that he could finally kill one of them,

ID# 136068
BD: 2 +3 -1= Miss Giant Bat 2
MD: 5 = Miss

Damage Dealt = 8 x 6 = 48
Damage Received = 20 - 17 [Mit] - 10 [Regen] = 0

Rei -  [Regen 1/3] HP: 400/400| EN: 21 (+1-2) /40| 8 DMG | 17 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD| 2 REGEN
Giant Bat 1 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG
Giant Bat 2 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG

Leaping into the air, he preformed a spinning multi strike in the form of Wa Shu, the attack forcing him to become a whirlwind of uncontrollable steel, his blade lashing outwards and his body moving on its own, like a drunk person, all throughout the art it felt like his balance was tipping from one side to the other causing him to trip and fall all over but never actually land on his ass, but even after the strikes ended, he frowned in frustration as he wasted all that energy for nothing, he must have launched the attack at a bad moment since he didn’t catch a single bat with the strike, they were likely all still in cooldown and haven’t launched an attack, otherwise, he was sure he’d have gotten some of them.

“Oi! Where are you guys!?” Takuma shouted lazily, panting heavily as he lifted up the glowing crystal shining dim light into the cavern but not touching on Yuta or Rei,

ID# 136064
BD: 8 +3 -1= Hit Giant Bat 2 [Rasetsu] [Stunned]
MD: 8 = Hit

Damage Dealt = 8 x 6 = 48
Damage Received = 20 - 17 [Mit] - 10 [Regen] = 0

Rei -  [Regen 2/3] HP: 400/400| EN: 22 (+1-6) /40| 8 DMG | 17 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD| 2 REGEN
Giant Bat 1 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG
Giant Bat 2 - [Stunned] HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG

They were fighting blind and as expected, it was getting difficult, Rei was finding himself beset by more and more bats, his swings unable to hit any of them as they were happily toying with their prey who had wandered into their domain of darkness, Rei slipped his grip and took hold of his scabbard, preforming a off-handed Ukifune to try and catch his target, but unfortunately he missed, the bat twisted in the air so that it brushed on by him, their fangs dug into his jacket and armour but weren’t able to pierce through it, leaving only tiny red marks which quickly closed up.

These fights were more frustrating than against stronger foes like the dragon, who were at least, fun to fight on equal footing, meanwhile, even though he was stronger by far, he simply couldn’t hit these bats whilst they had their fun simply nibbling on him.

ID# 136063
BD: 1 +3 -1 = Miss Giant Bat 2 [Wa Shu]
MD: 3 = Miss

Damage Dealt = 8 x 2 = 16
Damage Received = 20 - 17 [Mit] - 10 [Regen] = 0

Rei - [Regen 0/3] HP: 400/400| EN: 27 (+1-5) /40| 8 DMG | 17 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD| 2 REGEN
Giant Bat 1 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG
Giant Bat 2 - HP: 50/50 | 20 DMG

Tilting the katana to his side with his right arm, he charged it up for a sword art before shoving the giant bat in front of him away, giving him room to run forward and preform a rotational slash in a 360 spin, the blade traced a beautiful circle, but it only managed to hit the injured one, shattering it to pieces.

Fine by him, that was good enough, whipping around to face the bat he left behind, he found that he could see a single trace of it in the darkness, to his far side he could hear the sounds of Yuta fighting, his blunt force impacts pounding into the bat’s bodies with the occasional screech and sound effect of his dagger cutting into the creatures, even further away he could hear the clanking of armour and footsteps, the trailing of his other friends running after them,

“They’re still not here?” Rei frowned, heaving a small inward sigh,

ID# 136062
BD: 3 +3 -1 = Miss Giant Bat 2 [Ukifune]
MD: 7= Hit

Damage Dealt = 8 x 2 = 16
Damage Received = 20 - 17 [Mit] - 10 [Regen] = 0

Rei - [Regen 1/3] HP: 400/400| EN: 31 (+1-4) /40| 8 DMG | 17 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD| 2 REGEN
Giant Bat 1 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG
Giant Bat 2 - HP: 50/50 | 20 DMG

He lashed out at it, but his blade missed by inches as the bat flew back towards the air where it had full dominance against a land creature like Rei, clicking his tongue in annoyance, Rei jumped to the side to avoid it’s huge full bodied lunge attack only to end up crunching into a wall, he had practically thrown himself at it so it stood to reason that it knocked the air out of his lungs, as he was left vulnerable, a giant bat, a different one, swooped in to bite on his neck to kill him.

This was a game, but even so, Rei felt a moment of fear in fighting within darkness, managing to raise his arm to take the hit instead, out of the corner of his strained vision past the huge fuzzy bat that flapped right in front of him, he could see the injured giant bat coming in for seconds.

ID# 136060
BD: 5 +3 -1 = Hit Giant Bat 1 [Tsumuji Guruma]
MD: 1= Miss

ID# 136061
BD: 2 +3 -1 = Miss Giant Bat 2 [Tsumuji Guruma]
MD: 7 = Hit

Damage Dealt = 8
Damage Received = 20 - 17 [Mit] - 10 [Regen] = 0

Rei - [Regen 2/3] HP: 400/400| EN: 34 (+1-4) /40| 8 DMG | 17 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD| 2 REGEN
Giant Bat 1 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG
Giant Bat 2 - HP: 50/50 | 20 DMG

They eventually got into yet another huge cavern, it was hard to see anything what with their sole light source left behind, they really didn’t think this one through, but up ahead they could hear the fear choked sobbing of a child struggling to survive, the sounds of the giant bat’s flapping wings and screeches as they tried to go in for the kill could be heard, Yuta leapt into the darkness and Rei could no longer see him, he left forward as well into the darkness,

Mid air he traced his blade through the air, the movements trailing arcs of water and a glowing neon blue light as he activated his sword art, Gen Getsu, it was less stationary if he leapt through the air during execution, preventing him from being stuck still as he was forced to preform the preliminary activate motions, as he fell downward, he slashed out at the dark moving shapes in front of him, luckily he cut straight down one of the bats, dealing significant damage to it, it was nearly dead, but not quite.

ID# 136058
BD: 4 +3 -1 = Hit [Gen Getsu]
MD: 6= Hit

ID# 136059
MD: 3 = Miss

Damage Dealt = 8 x 6 = 48
Damage Received = 20 - 17 [Mit] - 10 [Regen] = 0

Rei - [Regen 2/3] HP: 400/400| EN: 37 (-3) /40| 8 DMG | 17 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD| 2 REGEN
Giant Bat 1 - HP: 2/50 | 20 DMG
Giant Bat 2 - HP: 50/50 | 20 DMG