Okami Wa Nemuranai

Episode 43.9

Episode 43.9

"Pardon us. We're also in the middle of a giant variant hunt ourselves. Do you mind if we wait here?"

"No, feel free to."

"Thank you so much. We will take care of it if it spawns near us."

"Do as you like."

By defeating the Giant Variant twice and creating the <Mark>, one can then get down to the floor below. Everyone near the spot when a Giant Variant is defeated also get the <Mark>. As there is a limited amount of Giant Variant, taking advantage of another party defeating the Giant Variant is permitted here. Different from Dungeon Tsubolt which is a room-type dungeon, other parties cannot get in the Giant Variant room when a party is already inside. But since this dungeon is an open space-type, there's no need for that here.

"It seems the Giant Variants in this dungeon don't have fixed spots where they spawn, do they."

"Yea. Seems so."

"It was such a hassle looking everywhere for them."

"Really."

The youth party consists of two swordsmen, one spearsman and two mages. Lecan feels like one of the mages is a <Recovery> user. He can't explain why he knows, he just does.

"Hey so, how old are you?"

The spearsman who looked comparatively older than the rest of the group asked Julius.

"I'm fourteen."

"Ah, same age as Chiris then."

The girl Lecan suspected being a <Recovery> user turned around, looking surprised. She must be Chiris.

"He's my age? I'm, Chiris."

"My name is Julius."

With that as the impetus, the five youths, Eda and Julius engaged in a conversation for a while.

The swordsmen are 16 and 17. The spearsman is 19. The mages are 21 and 14.

The five of them were instructed by their mentor to dive in a 20 floor dungeon near the capital. They worked their way to decent equipment there before coming here to challenge this dungeon.

They had a hard time finding the giant variant even though they dived in early in the morning. 'You guys are so lucky', thus they spoke.

"Julius."

Lecan who was standing in silence called out to Julius in a low yet firm volume.

Julius who was chatting with the spearsman suddenly turned around and drew his sword before breaking into run past Lecan, he arrived behind a tree and decapitated the magic beast that just spawned there.

The blissfully chatting youth group fell into silence.

"H-how did you know?"

"Hm? What do you mean."

"You were looking in our direction. Then a magic beast spawned behind you. It was even hidden behind a big tree. And yet you managed to notice it. Even before the magic beast had fully spawned. How did you know?"

"It's not that I knew before it spawned. Just sensed the magic beast's presence as it was spawning."

"Presence?"

"You won't survive long in dungeons if you don't grasp that. Julius, Eda, we're moving out."

"Yes. Master."

"Un."

The three got near a big tree, recited <Floor> and <Warp> to get down to the floor below. This dungeon has no stairways, instead you can warp to another floor by being near a big tree.

They searched and destroyed solely the giant variants on floor 2.

The giant variant Lecan detected on floor 3 was already fighting another group, they were allowed to watch nearby. There were other parties already watching besides Lecan's. Once the combat was over, they greeted the fighting party and got the permission to watch their second battle.

They took it easy and reached floor 14 that day.

Each floor in Dungeon Kozuin is awfully vast with a great number of adventurers exploring those floors. There's a tacit understanding on how the exploration is done here, when a party is fighting a giant variant, another party is expected to watch from a safe distance to get the <Mark>, while for battles that do not involve giant variants, that party is to go past the other party. This manner of doing things has been established here.

As someone who has gone through many brutal dungeon explorations, Lecan would love nothing more than to drive away other adventurer parties watching them from behind in the middle of a combat, but he can't exactly do that here.

The majority of adventurers would leave the dungeon at night to rest at the surface like in other dungeons, by the time Lecan's party were preparing for their overnight camp, floor 14 was pretty much deserted.

The three sat down and had meals together around a campfire. Of course they had put the Magic Beast Wards in the four corners already.

The Fanged Rabbits on floor 15 are bigger than Eda. And they tend to flock together in a group of four-five rabbits.

As a matter of fact, five of these rabbits are no match to Eda armed with <Bow of Yelvitz>. But Eda is acting as a support player this time around. It's Julius's turn to fight these Fanged Rabbits.

Julius could not handle one-on-many fight well. Apparently he's never been trained in that.

But compared to his pitiful state in Dungeon Palcimo, he's gotten much more better at fighting non-humanoid beasts now. He should be able to deal with a relatively tough beast if it's a one-on-one fight.

Looking back, Arios was strong even in a scuffle. His field of vision covered extensive areas, and he was capable of exceptional foresight even when up against multiple opponents. However, that was something he must have gotten hold of after a long and arduous training. You cannot expect that from the current Julius.

"Julius."

"Yes."

"Even when you're up against many foes, not all of their attacks can reach you at once."

"Yes."

"Decide which is which, and fight only one of them at a time."

"Eh? But those beasts are taking turns attacking me."

"Regardless of that. Listen here. Five enemies are coming at you. Say your power is ten. If you focus your power equally among five, you only exert two power on each one. Add another five enemies behind those five alternating with the ones in the front to attack you and your power gets split to one for each of those foes. Fighting like that is a no go."

"Yes."

"Even when you're facing ten foes, you must pour all ten of your power into dealing with each one of them. Doing so should let you beat them one after another."

"That does make sense."

"With that in mind, concentrate on one foe at a time. However, you must still keep track of other enemies in your vision. Right. Put eight of your ten power into one enemy, while leaving one on each foe in either sides. Swap around those eight and one power depending on the state of affairs."

"Yes. I will give it a try."