Fairy Tale Chronicles

Chapter 4.3

「So, yeah. Watch out for it. I don’t think you’d have a problem takin’ it down, though.」

「Roger that.」

If possible, even Haruna didn’t want to take on such a creature.

「Won’t you know, just because we talked about it, I’m going to run right into it, aren’t I?」

Hiroshi responded with a chuckle to Haruna’s muttering. This won’t be much of a story if it never showed up after these two spent so long talking about it. That would almost be as bad as a gun that had appeared in the first act of a play never going off. Clichés are clichés for a reason.

「…I knew I shouldn’t have mentioned it…」

The cliché struck again. She had gathered some leaves and grass for potion making when she came across a giant next with a whole load of massive silk balls. In the center of it, scuttled an enormous spider, almost as tall as Haruna even as it kept low to the ground. Bam. Their eyes met.

Azuma-kun. Azuma-kun.

Did ya find it?

Yep. We made eye contact.

I’ll be right there.

After their conversation through the feature of their Adventurer Cards, Haruna drew the Piaranork towards Hiroshi’s direction. She had to choose her route carefully, as to not provoke the other spiders. She carefully began walking back.

The Piaranork was formidable.

「Goin’ your way, Toudou-san!」

「Aye-aye!」

The massive spider flew through the air. Without being distracted by the bizarre sight of it, Haruna cast a spell to set a trap where it would land. As soon as it landed, a pillar of flame erupted, torching the spider boss.

With what sounded like grinding, the spider, an epitome of rage, charged towards her. Haruna dodged it by a thread, and blew it away with a Smash attack, as if to steal Hiroshi’s thunder. Even as it lost balance, Piaranork spun its web in order to catch itself. Jumping into range, Hiroshi charged with another Smash attack, rendering it completely immobile.

「Pile on it, now!」

「Aye-aye!」

Returning the role of the distraction to Hiroshi, Haruna shot out a flying Magical Sword (Light), Aurora Bird. It was a Novice Magical Sword, that prioritized a quick draw over damage output, but combined with Haruna’s own skills and the caliber of the rapier, along with its “Elemental Attack (All)” bonus, it easily penetrated Piaranork’s exoskeleton.

「You’re goin’ down!」

Clenching his shaking arms, Hiroshi slammed his axe with his all his might into Piaranork’s face. While he didn’t have combat skills, his physical strength had been buffed by all the modifiers from skills like Harvesting, Excavating, Forging, and Building, bulking up Hiroshi’s base Attack stat to nearly double of Haruna’s. While his damage output per second was much less impressive, mainly because his attack speed were slow and he hadn’t learned any attack moves. Still, it was powerful enough to wound a boss monster. Overall, his damage was still above the average of adventurers in this world.

However, despite the high base Attack stat, he lacked the explosiveness of attacking skills; he wouldn’t match up to an adventurer who’s skill sets were developed for combat. In the end, he wasn’t up to par in comparison to an adventurer. Even this attack, while it penetrated the spider’s exoskeleton, it just wasn’t as effective at Haruna’s attack. The fact that he disabled the spider’s fangs were more meaningful than the damage he put out.

「Another one!」

As Piaranork reared up, enraged, Hiroshi flipped it over with a Smash attack.

「Toudou-san!」

「Flash of Blood!」

In response to Hiroshi’s call, Haruna shouted, and developed an Intermediate combo attack with her rapier to tear open the spider’s gut. In succession, she precisely retraced the cut again with her Intermediate magical sword, Dance of Flames, to torch its insides. Piaranork writhed in agony and slammed its front leg into Haruna, which was elegantly brushed aside by her precise swordsmanship, preventing it from dealing any damage to her.

「I can get in one more!」

Lunging towards the Piaranork, which had lost its balance from the parry, Haruna held high her Magical Sword (Light), Saint’s Blade. However, Haruna had forgotten something.

Her enemy was a spider, which could move without using its feet.

「Toudou-san, don’t!」

Hiroshi had called out a moment too late. Haruna ended up cutting off the leg she had just blocked, and taking a massive hit by the giant spider while she was vulnerable in the follow through of her swing.

「Aaah!」

With a girlish scream, Haruna was blown away. She had instinctively guarded with her rapier to avoid a direct hit, but she was completely thrown to the ground.

Immediately, Piaranork tried to pin Haruna down with what were now its seven legs. Once she was caught, she would be wrapped into a silk ball in no time. Struggle, and the spider may shatter every bone in her body. Then, she was done for.

「Not so fast!」

Striking in between the spider’s gut and chest, where Haruna had sliced and burned, as it was about to jump onto Haruna, Hiroshi accurately blew away the spider.

With the self-awareness that he didn’t have much cards in hand, Hiroshi was determined to stick to defense and buying time. Until Haruna could gather herself up so she could protect herself, Hiroshi had to guard the line. If the spider were to make it past him, that would be the end.

「C’mon!」

Desperately trying to keep his knees from buckling, Hiroshi shouted as loud as he could to draw the spider’s attention. Truth be told, Hiroshi was terrified of facing off this one, unlike the Giant Spiders from earlier. It’s size was intimidating, too, but it just had so many moves in its arsenal, and each of them were painful. It didn’t matter that he wouldn’t even bruise from the attacks, they still hurt.

「Azuma-kun!」

「Toudou-san, ya all right?」

「Yes!」

After blocking a few attacks and countering a blow from one of its legs, Haruna called back as she seemed to have gotten back on her feet.

「Azuma-kun. Any rare materials in this spider?」

She asked, as Hiroshi was flipping the spider over with Smash attacks to set up an attack from her.

「In its gut, but don’t worry ‘bout it.」

「So if I cut off all its legs and head, you can go in for it?」

「Well, yeah.」

Nodding, Haruna chugged a Mana potion and a Stamina potion, and started pouring magic into her rapier, holding it up.

「I’m going to go big. Buy me a little more time, would you?」

「…Sure thin’.」

Feeling the pressure in Haruna’s tone, Hiroshi nodded and did an uppercut to the Piaranork, charging towards him. With a swing of the axe, he swing down with all his might to chop off the leg he damaged earlier. Now, all this giant spider could do to attack was to spin a web or charge, nothing else.

Still, the Piaranork recklessly charged to crush Hiroshi and Haruna. While internally taken aback by its determination, Hiroshi had to fight for his life. Judging that it was about to spin a web and jump up, he slashed through the string with his knife. The spider’s body, already halfway up, stumbled to the ground on its back.

「Azuma-kun, ready!」

「Alright. Don’t push it!」

「Don’t worry!」

With a chipper response, Haruna activated the spells she had been simultaneously processing. Multiple Harunas appeared, and the ground erupted under Piaranork’s feet.

「Let’s go! Elemental Dance!」

All the Harunas called in harmony, then lunged at Piaranork in succession. The first cut off a leg with a magical sword of fire, then a second one froze the wound with a magical sword of ice. The third swung the Blade of Wind, and the fourth broke off a leg with Earth’s Fang. And so, they continued to tear up the spider, and when all legs were cut off, all the Haruna’s merged back into one.

「Finale!」

A blade that accomplished the ridiculous task of layering every element cleanly sliced the spider’s gut in half. Even the king of the Giant Spiders couldn’t survive this. It twitched for about a minute, and the base of where legs used to be were still moving, but the spider soon became immobile.

「Agh, I’m exhausted…」

「Ya all right?」

「…Yeah sure no problem…」

Even as she said so, Haruna crumpled down where she was, and leaned back against a nearby tree, as if to say that she couldn’t lift a finger. Elemental Dance was an Advanced Magical Sword. It always hit any enemy that had an element with the element they were weak against.

Combined with the fact that the damage went through regardless of any resistance to a particular element, this was rumored to be the skill to have the best damage output (save for Extra Skill attacks). But, it came with various downsides that prevented many players from using it.

The first of which was that the conditions to learn the skill were difficult and convoluted. A minimum Speed of 150, along with mastering two Novice Magical Swords and one Intermediate Magical Sword, and to have a skill level of 50 or more for each element, on top of knowing two Intermediate element-less combo attack skills and one Double spell or skill, each at skill level 75 or above. The skill itself doesn’t require a rapier, but many weapons can’t fulfil these conditions without learning skills dedicated to rapier. Realistically, anyone who could use this skill mainly used a rapier.

The second drawback was that the player had to create their doubles before activating the skills, which wasn’t included in the motion of the skill itself. There was always a beat or two before the attack, which it made it difficult to slam in this attack immediately when the enemy presents an opportunity while fighting it with a party.

The last (and worst) drawback was that it consumed a ridiculous amount of MP and Stamina. Perhaps because the player had to pay the cost for all the Magical Swords the doubles used, their MP and Stamina (already depleted from preparing for the spell) were drained almost to its last drop.

Not unlike a harvesting task in the beginning of the game, a player with average Stamina would have to rest for at least five minutes after firing this move off. It was terribly high-risk. Even an addict towards the top of the pyramid wouldn’t be able to use it a third time during a single combat. This was truly a trump card.

「That just eats up my Stamina…」

「Yeah, it sure looked like it…」

「But, maybe it’s because I’ve been helping you out lately. My MP and Stamina weren’t full, but it feels better than the last time I used it.」

「You may have a point there.」

To wait for her to recover, Hiroshi stood as close as he could to Haruna maintaining some distance to avoid his phobia acting up, as she slumped with an exhausted look. While no insects were as bad as a Piaranork, there still could be some aggressive bugs around.