NOVEL NEXT Volume 1 Chapter 18
We continued through the dungeon at the same easy, but quick pace that we first started at today. After our last surprising encounter with a pair of casual dungeon explorers, I had Yua keep an ear out for more on top of her monster spotting duties so we could avoid getting in each other’s way. After every other fight or so, she would assure me to the best of her ability that we were indeed the only people still exploring the third floor. Probably because anyone that teleported down here from the outside realized we wiped out most if not all of the monsters and left as soon as they could to explore elsewhere. But it was due to the fact that we were alone that gave us a plethora of monsters to loot and level off of.
While I wished I could let Yua enjoy herself and fight to her heart’s content, getting through here as fast as possible was still our top priority. She understood this and accepted it without hesitation. She even came back at me with an “I know I’m strong enough to beat them, anyways,” and patted her biceps when I tried to apologize for sucking up all her fun for what I found to be near-mindless monster farming. In the end, even if it seemed we had most if not all of what we needed to pay off her contract, it was still safest to push forward as fast as possible.
Rounding off the floor, we exterminated a total of 30 goblins, but only 5 gremlins. Apparently, gremlins were so easy to kill once you found one, that most people that visited the third floor just killed a few and called it quits for the day. So, most of what was available, if any more than this was likely already exterminated by other Adventurers in the time it took us to complete the first two floors. Still, with the supposed point of this floor being to bolster the monsters’ numbers, I had to wonder how many we missed out on. I wanted to spend a short while this morning doing some easy-leveling, but maybe we should have skipped repeating the first floor all together.
Adding up the value of the loot we were holding, including the Elderwood Staff, we had gathered about 53 gold, 79 silver and 15 coppers worth of goods. So, we barely made a dent. Seems like we really will have to farm the bosses to get what we needed. That or maybe we should check on the fourth floor and see what we can get there, since it was new to even the more experienced Yua.
Huh… In terms of floors, if not time spent down her, I’m actually about as experienced as she is now. Weird.
“Yua, do you know what the boss on this floor is?” I asked as we walked up to yet another waiting room right outside the large stone doors indicating the presence of a boss.
“No, sorry, but I never made it this far before. And I didn’t ask anyone else, either.”
“I see. That’s unfortunate.
I really don’t like the idea of going in completely blind, but if she didn’t even ask, maybe she preferred it that way? Maybe she just wanted to make it more of a challenge, for the sake of the fight, rather than the goal of actually beating it, or something. Regardless, having her knowledge of what was ahead all this time must have spoiled me a bit, because I would really rather have known and was honestly disappointed that she couldn’t give me any details. Our lives are on the line down here.
I considered just having her open the door just far enough to get a peek at the boss, learn what we could about it and then retreat before it noticed us. At least that way we could back off and wait until we came up with a plan to fight it. Hopefully, we could do this without it breaking free of the boss room and forcing us to square off against it in the narrow halls now at our backs. Every boss so far had been huge. Absurdly huge when compared to the other monsters. If we ended up forced into a situation where our only option to damage the boss was to run in a straight line towards it… Well, I couldn’t exactly see that going well. Especially not if the boss had some sort of front-facing area of effect attack that we couldn’t dodge.
Thinking it best that I start working up ways I could work around such a fight using my magic and abilities, but before I could even properly weigh the pros and cons of this approach, Yua strode right straight over to the door. When I saw that there wasn’t even a hint of nervousness in her gait, I gave up on my caution. She was ready for a fight after essentially getting blue-balled this entire floor. Be it the fierce look plastered to her face or how her fist remained balled up the entire time, right up until she relaxed her fingers to reach for the door’s handle, something was telling me that I didn’t want to get in her way right now.
I may be one of two parts wanting to progress the dungeon as fast as possible, but this was her fight, not mine. She proved herself more than capable against both the goblins and the gremlins, so all that was left was the boss.
Seeing as how I didn’t make the best use of her knowledge regarding the bosses up until now anyways, we might as well just go at this as we have been.
“We weren’t going to be able to know everything ahead of time anyway,” I said to myself. “Just keep your guard up, Yua.”
“Yes, Master. I’ll make sure we win. No matter what.”
She pushed the big stone doors open for us and her fierce look turned into an equally fierce grin that left no room for second guessing ourselves.
Following her swishing tail and clenched fists, we entered into a boss room much like the last two, being that it was significantly larger than every other part of the floor and that it was mostly empty. This time, the only difference of note was that there was no giant wolf or tree waiting for us, but a much larger goblin. The boss, whose info box named it as a “Hobgoblin,” was about six-times larger than the one’s we’d been fighting all morning. Or so it appeared, anyways, as it separated itself further from the last two bosses by sitting on a pile of stone shaped into what almost looked like a throne where it waited for us, its cheek resting on its knuckle as the doors to the room slowly closed all on their own.
We were sealed in with it, the only reliable light source saving us from total blindness being the two large burning braziers on either side of the throne. The Hobgoblin didn’t jump into attack mode the moment it saw us like the others did, either. The red, flickering hue of the flames calmly lit up both sides of its face as it stared. It just stared straight at us, its beady eyes almost calculating as they moved between us. It felt like it was trying to sum up our fighting potential to see if it needed to bother to stand.
Aside from the dense muscles that covered its entire body, it looked a lot like its smaller counterparts. If I didn’t already know that these monsters were born from the dungeon’s magic, I’d say that they might have actually been this one’s children. And, if this were true, given how many of them we slaughtered on our way here, we’d have given it a good reason to try and kill us now. Hopefully it didn’t make this connection by us standing before it, as it seemed to be the most intelligent of the bosses so far.
Finally sensing that we were worthy, or perhaps only just taking note of Yua’s battle-ready stance and my raised staff, it stood. The ground at its feet almost seemed to quake beneath it, like its muscle was denser than it appeared and the stone struggled not to crack under its pressure.
The Hobgoblin, roughly the same level as Yua, glowered down at us again before reaching behind its throne for a weapon. What it pulled out wasn’t a short sword or spear similar to the goblins, but a greatsword about half as tall as it and was as thick as four of the regular goblins’ swords stacked together. When it gripped the hilt of what was clearly meant to be a two-handed weapon, it only took one of its thick hands to cover it entirely. It almost looked like it had stolen the weapon from a particularly sturdy Adventurer that fell against it in battle, rather than the blade having been forged specifically for it.
The simple fact that it was able to hold such an unwieldy sword in one hand spoke volumes about its true strength.
“Master, it looks like the bosses are all just bigger versions of ones waiting outside.”
Spoken with a confident smirk, her observation was much the same as mine. When we were three-for-three on that idea, it was hard to argue. But this one definitely wasn’t like the others.
“I don’t think it’s going to be that simple...”
The Hobgoblin prepared itself for battle. Not by howling like a wolf or screeching like a Trent. It was deathly quiet. Instead, it raised its sword. It didn’t take the unsteady, untrained stance the goblin’s put up to defend themselves from our assault. They didn’t know how to use their weapons, only that they could kill with them. This one, though, pointed its sword at us, as if specifically asking for a duel between blades that I wanted no part in.
When it didn’t receive the response it wanted of me drawing my own sword to meet its challenge, it drew its blade back and held it behind itself, ready to slash at us in a moment’s notice. It held the professional stance of a trained swordsman as it faced us.
Or at least, the way it held itself felt skilled. For all I knew, it was copying the person it presumably stole that sword from. I was no expert, either. My Swordsman class and my own eyes just warned me that this monster wasn’t as unskilled as the others. This one looked oddly dignified, intelligent and, probably worst of all, patient.
Not all the bosses were just beefed-up versions of their smaller counterparts. Some had real skill to back up their title as floor boss.
Yua must have noticed this too, as the easy-going grin she had upon seeing the boss disappeared and she adopted her own tried and true fighting stance herself by bringing her fists up to her face. Not wanting to fall behind them, I readied the Elderwood Staff. It wanted a sword fight, but I wasn’t about to weaken myself to fight on its level.
Even though it showed no signs of knowing human speech, I got the strangest sensation that told me I shouldn’t just shout out my plan of attack or it might understand me and counter it. So, we were just going to have to wing it using our experience fighting together to back us up.
Waiting, the three of us staring each other down. It faced us, its gaze unflinching. Yua, from the corner of my eye, looked to be as calm as ever. I, however, was surprised to see that I wasn’t shaking from the anticipation.
Nobody made a move. With me seemingly being the only one unwilling to participate in a movie-esque eyeball showdown until the crack of thunder coming from a non-existent cloud kicked things off, it looked like it was going to be up to me to make the first move.
I cast a Fire Ball, aiming for its chest, and watched as it jumped to the side to avoid it, only to land a few feet to the side as nimbly as Yua would have. The ball of flames flew right past it and hit its throne, doing little more damage than scorching its rocky surface.
“Shit...”
As it’s demeanor so far suggested, it proved me right in assuming it had a fair bit more intelligence than the previous bosses, who basically just allowed the fire to hit them. Unfortunately for us, it clearly understood the danger possessed within a fire ball hurtling towards it.
Seeing that I was the one to attack first, the Hobgoblin stepped forward with one of its massive feet to strike at me with its sword in retaliation. I ducked down, narrowly avoiding the horizontal slash aimed for my neck. Feeling as though I almost went prematurely bald from how close the blade flew over my head, I vowed to start putting more points into my Speed stat. Its brawny muscles held clearly a great deal of power, but not enough to completely mitigate the weight of the greatsword as its attack was slowed enough for even me to react. The Elderwood Trent’s attacks were much sharper.
While I was trying to think up a was we could use that fact to our advantage, it swung at me again, as if my initial attack offended it for not flying at it in the shape of a sword. This time, a diagonal slash bared down on me, so I ducked and leapt to the side under where the slash had started to avoid it. Sensing the Hobgoblin’s distraction as its greatsword bit into the stone flooring, sending up chunks of debris instead of dust, Yua used the brief delay it had to suffer to pull its sword out as her chance to run at the Hobgoblin.
Easily finding the cat- girl running straight towards it in a mostly empty room and choosing to avoid rather than meet her head on, the Hobgoblin retreated to widen the distance. The immense pressure exerted by its legs to jump backwards was all the power it needed to rip the blade out of the stone. There, the moment its foot touched stone again, it swung its sword horizontally at Yua, forcing her to stop her charge.
Apparently, it intended on maintaining the advantage its longer blade gave it by refusing to let her close the distance, as she obviously intended for a fist fight. As was probably understandable given how large its blade was, it didn’t want someone like her getting too close or it wouldn’t have room to swing it.
“That’s it… Yua, just keep attacking it after I do.”
“Got it!”
I launched another Fire Ball at it, this time aiming for its left arm. It easily dodged the projectile by sliding to the right. Yua charged at it again. It swung its sword to ward her off and she dodged it even easier than I did. Following up with her charge, I cast another Fire Ball, once more aiming for its left arm, forcing it to dodge again. Yua charged at it right after, as if she’d truly taken my simple order and extracted all my meaning from it. The boss swiped at her, but missed. I charged another spell.
This accomplished two things. Yua’s charges caused it to leap backwards to avoid her, while my Fire Balls forced it to move in the direction I wanted by aiming at its body in the opposite direction. Want it to move right, aim for its left shoulder. An easy trick. While I wouldn’t have complained if one managed to land, I wasn’t actually trying to hit the boss.
The Hobgoblin was intelligent enough to be cautious, so we had to use that against it.
It was the only plan I could think up on the spot, but it proved effective as, aside from the swipes it made against Yua’s relentless chargers, the boss wasn’t given the chance to properly fight because of our constant repetition of this pattern. We were letting it dodge our attacks to make it back itself into a corner. A literal corner. One where it hopefully couldn’t swing its greatsword with impunity. At least, not without accidentally striking the wall the way the earlier goblin on the second floor did.
Each successive combination we launched at it forced the Hobgoblin closer and closer to the right-most corner of the room, just what the Proud Great Wolf tried to do to Yua yesterday. Only, unfortunately for the Hobgoblin, it didn’t have a partner to come bail it out.
Without needing to be told this, possibly because she noticed my attacks landing in the same place each time, Yua kept charging at the boss without fail the second my spells created an opening for her. No doubt, getting it locked in a corner with her was exactly what she wanted.
The Hobgoblin’s heel slammed into the corner just as expected and it momentarily lost its balance. I used the chance it gave me when it shifted its gaze off of us to confirm that it just hit the wall to launch another Fire Ball. This time I aimed right for its face. So far, blinding the bosses was a good approach to making the boss fights easier.
As if sensing my intention, the Hobgoblin snapped its neck so hard to the side to avoid the spell that it slammed its head into the wall. The strength of its own attack on itself did around ten percent of its total health, which showed plainly on its face when it pulled back after the flames dispersed behind it. There was now a large, bleeding gash on its temple.
The Hobgoblin glared at me with a murderous intent so thick that it nearly stole my breath. It was like it intended on an honorable duel between the three of us, but my trick, which was essentially no better than throwing a fist-full of sand right into its eyes, ruined any plans for honor it may have sought from us.
However, even if my attack missed, Yua was still charging straight for it. With each set of our combination attack, Yua was able to inch closer and closer and now that the Hobgoblin’s anger was directed at me, she was able to get within striking distance.
“Iron Fist!”
She shouted and, with all her strength and perfect form backing her up, threw a glowing punch straight into the Hobgoblin’s right knee. The sound it made when her fist connected with it was reminiscent of a swinging wrecking ball colliding with and splintering a thick tree trunk.
Its knee bent backwards into such an awkward angle that it genuinely made me feel a bit sick. But Yua wasn’t finished.
Bending her knees for a jump, Yua was about to aim for its torso or head with her next strike, but the Hobgoblin somehow managed to put its pain aside in favor of its anger and, without so much as a grunt to show the obvious agony it was in, tried to bring its blade straight down onto her head.
She dodged it by abandoning her jump mid-squat, but the sword buried itself into the ground so close to her body, that she probably could have counted the number of chestnut-colored hairs it shaved off in the reflection of the blade’s steel.
The Hobgoblin tried to pull the blade out of the ground, but it was stuck. It tried again, this time putting more power into it with both hands, but Yua used this chance to jump above the blade.
“Iron Fist!”
Instead of aiming for the boss, she instead punched the center of the greatsword, burying it further into the ground. She then landed on the edge of the blade, wide enough to support her, and stayed there only for a second before running straight up the steel to launch herself directly at the boss.
“Iron Fist!”
For some reason, the Hobgoblin refused to let go of the sword and swat her away, even though it had plenty of time to do so. It met Yua’s full-forced punch head on and it connected. And, oh, did it connect.
With the force of her punch ringing out like a gong as it tore through its flesh, its head was suddenly and forcefully whipped to the side. The hit shattered the Hobgoblin’s jaw. Almost completely torn away and now dangling limply against its neck by a single strand of flesh, its jawbone sparkled in the light of the braziers, showing its crooked teeth now caked in thick red blood. Bleeding profusely, its long black tongue became a rather unfashionable sort of tie where it fell out of the new hole in its neck.
The concussion that a punch like that should have caused should have been enough to wipe out its health bar, but it managed to on by about twenty-five percent of its max value. And still, it made no noise. In the face of what likely should have been a mind-breaking amount of pain, it didn’t so much as grunt in discomfort. It just glared, its beady eyes burning more now than ever.
In a state of freefall after her attack, Yua was utterly defenseless. Full of blind, wordless rage, the Hobgoblin finally surrendered its sword to the ground and launched a punch at her. She blocked it by striking back with another Iron Fist, but all it did was protect her from the initial damage. The force of the Hobgoblin’s punch still overpowered her and sent her flying backwards.
Quickly correcting herself midflight, she managed to land on her feet, though not without taking a bit of damage in the process. Without removing her eyes from the boss’s movements, she gripped the wrist the took the blow for her, squeezed and shook it to match with the boss’s tenacity.
With the distance between them restored, the Hobgoblin grabbed the hilt of its sword once more and ripped it out of the ground. However, instead of taking it up again, it used it as a crutch to support its broken leg. Its first mad howl came out as a gurgled cry of anger through its jawless mouth as it pushed off the ground towards Yua, the true threat. After what she did to it, I was no longer of any concern. She got to her feet once more and readied herself.
Impressed and shocked by this true display of her strength, rather than just seeing the number next to her stat, I thought that I better not leave this all to her and decided to help out.
Now that the Hobgoblin seemed to have completely forgotten about my existence, it its furious glare was only for Yua as it dragged itself towards her. So, I launched another Fire Ball at its still working leg the second it touched the ground. The flames exploded against its shin, but with no fur or bark to cling to, the fire did not spread. I hit it with another, this time aiming my spell for its sword hand, forcing it to let go.
Not that it had to. Yua used the distraction the Fire Ball caused and the moment the Hobgoblin closed its eyes in continued agony, she closed the gap. Making full use of the points I had been putting into her Speed stat now that it couldn’t use its sword to stop her, she was on it in a fraction of a second.
“Iron Fist!”
This time, she jumped directly into its body and placed a well-timed punch directly into the Hobgoblin’s stomach. The boss lurched forward, fell to its knee and had to put a hand out in front of itself to keep from hitting the floor completely. An act of surrender that this thing somehow refused despite no longer having a jaw and at least one broken leg.
Not that it mattered. The second Yua’s feet touched the ground again, she unleashed several powerful punches into every inch of the Hobgoblin’s body her fists could reach.
Her last Iron Fist was already enough to nearly kill it, so as she continued with punch after punch, it quickly became clear that the boss had gone completely limp and was probably knocked unconscious after that gut punch, as the only reaction it showed to her attacks was the jolt of force her attacks moved it with.
Her pummeling and forceful battle cries continued relentlessly right up until the boss finally burst into light as it died, leaving her to only stop her flurried fists once she failed to connect with the flesh that suddenly disappeared. She punched straight through the empty air, her punch carrying her forward until she caught herself by stomping her foot on the ground before she could fall like the boss did.
With a look of astonishment overpowering the labored breathing her heaving chest made all too apparent, she stood amongst the particles of light signaling the boss’s defeat. Almost like she was in a battle-induced daze, she looked all around the room, as if she thought the boss had used its broken leg to jump out of sight to try and hit her when she let her guard down, but nothing was there. The boss was dead.
Sweat dripping from her brow, Yua looked down to her hands with an expression of sheer disbelief that completely countered the confident smirk she started this fight with. Gazing at her own open palms, she fell to her knees the moment they started shaking. Tears started streaming down her cheeks.
“Yua, are you alright?”
I ran over to her, health potion in hand. I hadn’t thought to check on her actual health bar after she met the Hobgoblin’s punch with her own, but apparently, she did take a bit of damage from it. Not much. Not enough to make her cry, but I held out the potion to her all the same. She smiled through her tears and shook her head.
“Master, I did it. I really did it! After all this time, I beat the third floor!”
“Yea, you did…”
The second I confirmed what she said, content on giving her the vast majority of the credit for that fight, both her tears and smile doubled. Like an idiot, I only just then realized that her idea of revenge wasn’t just killing the monster that ruined her life, but that she desired to beat the boss of the floor she had failed on. To prove to herself that she wasn’t weak.
“It was a good fight, Yua. You were the one who was amazing this time. You’ve gotten so much stronger since we started.”
“…Thank you, Master!”
Wiping her tears, she cried out happily and jumped to embrace me all on her own. Flustered by the full-body hug she granted me, as if I was the one deserving of a prize for winning the fight, all I could do was hug her back.
“I’m so glad I met you, Master!”
“M-Me too.”
Hey… While I’m happy that you’re so happy, shouldn’t you still be mad at me? It’s only been two days.
For a reason that, to me, was entirely understandable, she should have every right in the world to hate me for buying her. Regardless of whether or not the world says she had that right. Yet, here she was, crying so happily into my arms. Like we were nothing more than friends or maybe… lovers. That there wasn’t a slavery spell binding her to me at the cost of every freedom she’d ever had or ever will have. We were nothing more than two people that just overcame a serious life-or-death situation together. And she was happy.
Why? She’s supposed to hate me. Why doesn’t she hate me? I felt like the answer should have been obvious. It was obvious, but I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t let myself see it.
“Master?”
She unburied her face from my chest long enough to shoot me a concerned look. Apparently, the worries racing around my mind in endless loops were written on my face. Weary of ruining her success with my pessimism, I forced a smile and, unsure of what else to do, plopped my hand on her head to pet her between the ears. She gave me the cutest smile yet and buried her nose right back into my chest again.
How can I deserve this? How can I deserve such happiness knowing I’ve done something evil?
This girl. This person is literally my possession
and she is this happy. How? Shouldn’t I complain that her obsession with her strength has clouded her judgement of me? Would she hate me if I called her out on it? I don’t want her to hate me, but she should. I don’t want her to, but she must. This happiness is not for me, but because she herself righted a past mistake of hers.What is the point of the Confidence Boost ability if it is useless here? I out leveled her ages ago. And we were doing just fine together not even an hour ago. Why did these thoughts come back when she finally, truly, showed me some affection?
“Master, let’s see what the boss dropped!”
“Yea…”
As if we weren’t in a life-or-death battle just seconds ago, Yua happily ran over to where the boss’s body disappeared and bent down to collect the item. I could tell from where I stood that it was a smaller version of the greatsword the boss used, as if it had been scaled down for an actual, normal human to use. Well, normal relatively speaking, as it was still large enough for me to feel a bit concerned that I wouldn’t be able to hold it and that I’d only embarrass myself for trying. Yua, though, lifted its weight so easily that it might as well have been as heavy as that twig I burned when I first arrived in this world.
Still full of smiles, she ran it straight over to me. I won’t comment on the actions of her tail, but I will say that I was skimming through a mental catalog of dog breeds that had pointed ears like hers to see if any lined up.
“Hurry, Master. How much is it worth?”
Said pointed ears stood on end, twitching endlessly in wait for my answer. Her tears were already gone. Long gone. It was as if they only existed in my imagination. Bathing in the happiness she shared with me, I felt I already knew the answer. And as luck would have it…
“Appraisal.”
[Hobgoblin Greatsword. Value: 50 gold coins.]
“Really?!”
Yua exclaimed so loudly that it shook me out of my stupor when I told her. She wrapped her arms around my neck to embrace me in another hug. Two dangerous mounds of softness pressed against my chest so hard that I wouldn’t have been surprised to find an imprint of them there the next time I took my shirt off. But at my back, was something just as dangerous. The sword she might ought to have stabbed me with dangled from her hands as if it were nothing but a byproduct of our embrace.
Finally, she let go and held out the sword in front of her.
“That means we have enough, right, Master?”
“Yea… We do.”
That means that tomorrow, she will become completely mine in the eyes of the laws that govern this world. We could spend the rest of our lives together. Waking up to her at my side every morning. Giving her every happiness her years of captivity deprived her of. Getting to see that smile even one more time already sounded like a blessing directly from the Goddess herself, but the thought of seeing it every day from here on out warmed me enough to almost forget everything else. The happiness I longed for myself was right around the corner.
And it could all be ours if she continues to forget her hatred.
“Th-That is, if the ring sells.”
No. I couldn’t let myself daydream such happy thoughts. Not knowing that I didn’t deserve them. I just needed to keep a level head and correct my past mistakes so that I can better myself.
“We shouldn’t get our hopes up so soon.”
“But with Master’s luck, we are sure to…”
“We can’t bet everything on that! We need to keep…”
We needed to keep plowing our way through the dungeon. If the ring didn’t sell, I could try to trade it to Alphonse instead of the gold I owed him. But if he didn’t accept it, then we’d be screwed. And she’d be killed.
But if I had all the luck in the world and the stars aligned themselves just right, if he accepted that trade… then what?
Yua’s ears drooped as my outburst stole her happiness away. I felt even more horrible for ruining her moment, but we couldn’t get cocky and stop here. She grasped the sword against her chest like a child clinging tight to a puppy as she begged her parents to let her keep it.
“But, Master, we have the minimum of what we need now. If we keep exploring the dungeon now, we will never be able to make up what gold we need with how much time we have left. I think it’d be best to just wait and see about the ring at this point.”
“… That’s not necessarily true. We’ve gone through three floors in the last two days and two of them had something valuable hidden in them. If we keep looking, I’m sure we can find something else that we can sell.”
“Master, wouldn’t we just be relying on your luck at that point as well?”
“I…”
She had a point. My initial Luck boost and all of the points I had been dumping into it so far were most likely the reason why we got the things we got. You could argue that we only found the steel sword because Yua was being observant, but the other finds had to have been based on luck.
“That may be true, but…”
“Then shouldn’t we take a break from fighting for the day, Master? That way, we can save the rest of your luck for the auction.”
I doubted it worked like that. If it did, then I would have blown all of my luck already just finding the ring in the first place.
Why couldn’t the auction have been today? At least, that way I’d be able to plan ahead in the event we failed there too.
Yua continued, once more holding the sword out to me.
“If Master wants to keep exploring the dungeons, then I will too. We have stamina potions, but those will only take us so far. The mind can’t last forever when constantly fighting for your life.”
“… A-Are you sure? Do you really think we should take that chance and just stop?”
“I’m worried Master is pushing himself too hard.”
“I’m pushing myself too hard? You just threw yourself at a boss three or four times your size!”
“That’s because I’m a Monk. It’s just how we fight. Besides, Master was helping me with your magic by backing him into a corner.”
So, she did notice my plan.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. Half of me was telling me that I didn’t deserve her now that I was so close, but the other half refused to quit because of the ever-present chance that I might lose her if I don’t press on.
But I knew she was right. With the tiny sums the monsters have been giving us, there was no way in hell just farming them would get us far enough. Even if the monsters on the lower floors dropped loot that was more valuable. I already did the math on that and came to the same conclusion a while ago. And if what the Merchant Albert said was true, it was unlikely we’d be able to instantly sell off anything of high value we might find anyways. And I doubted the auction house would accept any new items the day of the auction.
With a sigh, I put the greatsword into my item box so Yua wouldn’t have to carry it.
“I guess… All we can do is hope now.”
She smiled, albeit sympathetically.
“Then let’s go.”
“Yea… Let’s sell off what we got today and take a break.”
“Yes, Master!”
With her cheering on my decision, I cast Dimensional Step to take us back to our room at the Lazy Cat Inn.