Chapter 22: Time to Head Out!
Chapter 22:
Time to Head Out!
THE THREE OF US aimed our spells and firearms at various parts of the creature and fired at the same time. We prayed it wouldn’t have time to use its skills. Later, I wanted to punch myself for even thinking that.
“Uh.”
“Ewwww…”
Just before our attacks hit, mouths appeared all over its body and gobbled up our spells.
“Ehhh heh…heh…heh…” It let out an unsettling laugh. Its frothing mouths were, in a word, terrifying.
<Mmph.>
“Tigerson, is something bothering you?”
<It is faint, but I feel as though its evil has increased. It is just my intuition…>
“You mean it got stronger? Hang on…wh-whoa?! It went up a level?!”
It had been Level 80 earlier, but now it was Level 81.
Luna frowned. “I suppose it gets stronger whenever it absorbs magic.”
“That seems plausible…”
“What do we do, Noir? Keep fighting?” The anxious look on Emma’s face was completely understandable; we hadn’t yet found a single attack that worked. She was probably also worried about overexerting ourselves or getting injured before we made our move on the thieves’ hideout.
“Let’s fall back for now—or maybe we should just give it the slip.”
<In either case, you must get on my back.>
We did as Tigerson said and fled the village. The magic eater pursued us, but we were too fast for it to keep up. A few miles outside the town, we encountered a few small monsters, which we hunted down. We left their carcasses on the road for the eater, and when it caught up to us, watched the gluttonous creature gobble up their corpses, crunching on their bones. We prepared a few more meals for it as we went, then slipped around it back into town while it was busy gorging itself.
“What is that thing? It’s so unsettling.”
“Seriously. I’m sure there’s some way to defeat it, but this is some seriously bad timing. It could come back at any time, too. I don’t know what else to do.”
It wasn’t like we could wait, either. The thieves might notice that their comrades hadn’t returned and send reinforcements. If they put their guard up, we wouldn’t get the jump on them. I really, really wanted to avoid that. While I floundered, Tigerson offered a suggestion.
<What if I stand guard in the village? Then if the eater returns, I can repeat our earlier course of action with the bait. Or perhaps I might overexert myself and thereby defeat it.>
“Hey, by ‘overexerting’ yourself, do you mean that you might come to harm?”
<Perhaps.>
“Well, listen, I don’t want you to shave years off your life over this.”
<I see. Then I shall stick to our previous course of action.>
“Good. Then in the meantime, we’ll go take out the thieves.”
I prayed that the magic eater wouldn’t come back before we did. Once we gave an update to the villagers, the three of us set out for the hideout.
***
It was already dark when we arrived at the foot of the mountain. We only had the moon to light our way. Normally I’d want a lantern, but we all had Night Vision, so we made it up the slope to the hideout without much trouble. There weren’t many monsters, just a lot of stones, so the footing was rather poor. We took care on the steeper inclines as we pressed on.
“There it is. That must be the hideout.”
On a flat spot near the summit stood an old castle surrounded by trees and shrubs. Its age was palpable, but it was still a fairly large and impressive two-story building.
Some paranoid noble family must’ve lived there once. The torches were lit at the entrance, which was guarded by two men wielding spears. They looked like they were drinking. They probably weren’t giving the job their full attention, since the chances of attack were slim. A good sign for us.
We hid behind some trees and discussed our strategy.
“Hey, Noir, should we take out the guards first?”
“It’s probably about midnight. Let’s wait a little longer just to be sure.”
“Okay. Those guards look pretty drunk, though. I think they’d go down easy.”
That’s what I was banking on, too. Even under less-than-ideal circumstances, they would be easy for a party like us to take out. The real question was what to do once we got inside. We needed to get our plan straight. Fortunately, Luna had some ideas.
“They have captives, don’t they? The chief’s granddaughter and some others. In that case, we should split up,” she said.
“I was thinking something similar,” I agreed. “It’ll make things more complicated if they use the hostages as human shields. One team can take out the thieves while the other team frees the prisoners.”
“Okay,” said Emma. “I’m with Noir.”
“Works for me,” Luna agreed. “I’ll look for the hostages.”
“I’m sure you can handle it, Luna, but be careful.”
“My gun and surprise attacks are a match made in heaven. I’m not going to have any trouble.”
“No, I mean, what if you pass out…?”
“Oh…right. Yes, I’ll be careful.”
Luna’s seizures weren’t a big deal when she had other party members to watch her back, but they could cause a real problem when she was working solo.
We had our plan sorted, so we ate some rations while we waited for the night to grow even deeper. Luckily, the guards were so drunk they started to get sleepy.
“I think it’s about time we got going.”
“I’ll take the one on the right.”
“Then I’ll take the one on the left.”
Emma and I moved out from the trees and approached the lookouts. Luna’s gun had had a long range, so she stayed put. I was a bit envious, honestly.
Pew! Ka-pow!
I fired off a Stone Bullet at almost the same moment as Luna fired an Energy Shot. The enemies were knocked out nigh simultaneously. Guards subdued, the three of us opened the heavy door and tiptoed down the hallway. The carpet was falling apart with age. The first floor had a ton of rooms, but there was no one in the halls. The thieves were likely sleeping. When we got to the stairs, we heard vulgar laughs echoing from upstairs. It sounded like a group of people were up late drinking.
“Sir Noir,” Luna said. “I think I should continue to search the first floor.”
“Got it. We’ll head upstairs.”
“Be careful, Luna.”
We gave each other a little wave and split up. Emma and I climbed the stairs and were immediately startled. Footsteps were coming toward us.
“Wh-what do we do?”
“From those footsteps…it’s probably just one person. Let’s take them out in one shot. I’ll keep them quiet, so you give ’em a nice gut punch, Emma.”
“Can do.”
The hall at the top of the stairs split into a perfect T-intersection. We hid against the wall and stifled our breath.
A man’s voice sang unevenly down the stairs. “Hmm hmm hmm. I’m the best. I’m the best. I am the best…”
I leapt out at the man and covered his mouth with my hand.
“Mmph?!”
“Emma!”
“Hyah!” Emma let out a short, quiet shout as her fist connected with the thief’s stomach. And with that he…was still conscious. “Huh? I guess I didn’t hit hard enough. There!”
She threw another punch and this time, thankfully, it worked. She really had me panicking there for a second.
“Eh he he, sorry about that.”
She was so cute, I couldn’t hold it against her.
We tied up the thief so he wouldn’t be able to move even if he woke up.
“This strategy really makes your heart pound, huh?” Emma asked.
“You’re excited about this, aren’t you?”
“You could tell? We used to explore together all the time when we were little. Do you remember when we pretended we were sneaking into a thieves’ hideout?”
My memory was actually pretty fuzzy, but I remembered another game that was centered around stealing a treasure back from a wolf den. We had to sneak into a neighbor’s house and past their dog to snitch some sweets. Looking back on it, the whole game was kind of stupid. We didn’t succeed even once.
“See?” said Emma. “All those games we played are paying off.”
“I think that argument feels a little forced, but sure.”
“Eh he he, anyway, let’s just keep going like we have.”
“Yeah. I bet that guy was headed to the bathroom. Let’s take out the guys making all that noise next.”
“Okay! Let’s do it!”
Emma strode down the hall and I followed behind her. I couldn’t help wondering if the boss was in the group we were headed toward. I wasn’t worried about the underlings, but he was supposed to be strong. I braced myself for the confrontation.