CH.149 Search and Destroy
<span style="font-weight:400">“Here. I have a carriage waiting for us.” Paulina said as she led us outside.
<span style="font-weight:400">We had finished breakfast and were on our way to the adventurer’s guild.
<span style="font-weight:400">“You thought that far ahead? Nice.” Imented. I was just going to summon Overdrive and use it, but this is nice. Overdrive would get some looks. It got looks in Alewatch and most people there seemed to know about me and my mechanical carriage.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“Good morning.” Lua said, as she spotted us. We had gotten to the guild easy enough. We did get a few looks from the adventurers leaving the guild when we got out of the carriage, but we should be fine.
<span style="font-weight:400">“You brought an extra person with you.” Alexmented.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah. That kind of happened.” I quickly passed over that problem. “So, what are we doing today?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“We took on a search and destroy quest on a potential orc settlement.” Tye answered. “There have been multiple orc sightings and we need to search an area for their settlement and destroy it if we find it.”
<span style="font-weight:400">“An orc settlement. That should be a B-rank quest, correct?” Paulina asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yes it is.” Tye answered. “I know your party isn’t B-rank, but you can still be a support party, so there is no problem.”
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<span style="font-weight:400">After quick introductions that totally didn’t turn sideways after a minor freakout when Saber Fang realized that both Alice and Paulina are daughters of nobles, we epted the quest and were on our way out.
<span style="font-weight:400">I also learned that Paulina is an adventurer. And C-rank at that. Alice was a bit jealous that Paulina was higher rank than she is. Paulina said that she registered so she could go to a dungeon that is in a town close by.
<span style="font-weight:400">By the way, the names of the other Saber Fang members are, Arvin the great sword guy, Rhys the sword and shield, and the archerdy is Vivien, but she goes by Vivi.
<span style="font-weight:400">We got onto two fast carriages that Saber Fang had secured for us. With them, we could get to the area that we were going to search in just a couple hours.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“Should I go ahead and do a scouting run?” I asked before we even got out of the city. With Gradius, I could fly over to the area and scout it out from the air. That way, once the others get there, we could go straight at the orcs, instead of wasting time on the search.
<span style="font-weight:400">“And how are you nning on doing that? Summoning a dragon in the city is not a great idea.” Tyemented.
<span style="font-weight:400">“I have other things than just dragons.” I said. “But I would need someone toe with me as I don’t actually know our target area.” I added, hoping that Tye would instantly want toe with me as we would be riding on a summon.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Brian, what will you summon?” Alice asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“That spaceship that I summoned in the manor’s backyard back in Alewatch.” I answered. I think Alice saw Gradius that time.
<span style="font-weight:400">“What is a spaceship?” Tye asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Basically a flying golem.” I answered. I know that is not true, but Overdrive is a golem carriage so Gradius can be a flying golem.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Then why don’t we all use that?” Tye asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Sorry, but it can only fit me and one other passenger. But it should be perfect for scouting.” I said.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Oh. Well, that’s too bad.” Tye said. “Could have made the trip faster.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Well sorry that I don’t have B.E.S. Big Core yet.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“Gradius.” I said to summon my monster.
<span style="font-weight:400">We had gotten outside of the main wall of the city and were in a clearing that wasrge enough to fit Gradius. Paulina had opened the noble’s gate for us with her medal. It was simr to the one I was given, but hers was gold.
<span style="font-weight:400">“... WHAT IS THAT!?” Tye yelled out.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Gradius. My spaceship.” I answered.
<span style="font-weight:400">“No. No. NO! There is no way you can summon something like that. That’s not real!” Tye was in disbelief.
<span style="font-weight:400">“... But it is real. So are we using it or not?” I asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Of course we will use it. If it makes us do the job faster, why would we not?” Vivien asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Then let’s get in.” I said back to her.
<span style="font-weight:400">Vivien, the archer and scout of Saber Fang, was going toe with me on Gradius. She had the best idea about our target area, so she was the obvious choice. I didn’t pick her because she is a girl.
<span style="font-weight:400">I jumped into Gradius’ cockpit and turned around to give Vivien a hand, but she didn’t need it and instead just jumped up like I did. Jumping up like three meters feels a bit strange, but if I can do it, why not.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Strap yourself in and make sure not to press any red buttons. Those are bad.” I warned Vivien. They aren’t bad for us, but for everything on the ground below us.
<span style="font-weight:400">Vivien seemed to take a look at the five-point harness and asked. “How do I do that?”
<span style="font-weight:400">I turned around in my seat and helped her strap in before strapping myself in.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Well be off.” I said to the others before closing the canopy. (Lua. Contact me if something happens.) I added to Lua through our system link.
<span style="font-weight:400">(Brian. Yes. Please do the same.) Lua responded.
<span style="font-weight:400">One of the ‘issues’ with this n was actually finding our team again after we located the orc settlement, but with Lua there would be no problem. Well, more like between the two system supports, they couldpare their map data and we could find each other that way.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“I think this should be the area.” Vivien said after just a few minutes of flying.
<span style="font-weight:400">We had flown south, towards a ce called wyvern mountain. The settlement we were searching for should be at its northern end.
<span style="font-weight:400">“I see. Then let’s fire up every scanner this thing has and find our target.” I said, basically giving amand to Gradius. While I knew some of the buttons, I hadn’t studied them all yet, so I would still need tomand Gradius either verbally or have Laura transmit my order with the mana control method.
<span style="font-weight:400">I hadn’t flown at high speed, as I didn’t want to overshoot our target. I learnedst time just how fast Gradius can be, so I’m not making that mistake again. Well, I probably will, but it will be on purpose, so it won’t be a mistake.
<span style="font-weight:400">I now switched the ship to hover mode, so we could use the scanners Gradius has to search out our target.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“Is that it?” Vivien asked. “It’s tiny.”
<span style="font-weight:400">We had spotted something that could be called a settlement. And only because Gradius has heat sensors.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Well, there are at least six orcs there, so probably.” I said.
<span style="font-weight:400">The ‘settlement’ was just a few logs that were propped up against a sheer cliff of a mountain, covered by some vegetation.
<span style="font-weight:400">Well, I guess more advanced building methods would be too much for monsters. At that point they would be at the same level of intelligence as primal humans. Actually, even this is not bad.
<span style="font-weight:400">“We could do another search. We could find arger one.” I offered.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yes. Let’s do it, just in case. I don’t usually have a chance to scout like this.” Vivien agreed.
<span style="font-weight:400">As we got back to the search, I contacted Lua and had Laura send over the information about the location of the settlement. We also added a potential footpath from the road to the settlement.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“We will have to call it quits now.” I said to Vivien. “I can’t keep Gradius summoned for much longer.”
<span style="font-weight:400">We had been searching for about ny minutes, so I wanted to use the rest of my summoning time to set us down into a safe spot.
<span style="font-weight:400">We hadn’t found any other orc settlements, but did spot a potential kobold cave. At least based on the number of kobolds around the area.
<span style="font-weight:400">We also went a little too close to the peak of the mountain and got a wyvern’s attention, but I just used Gradius to speed away from it. I kind of would have liked to see the face the wyvern made when we sped off at mach 2 speed.
<span style="font-weight:400">“That’s too bad. But we did find our objective, so this is fine.” Vivien said.
<span style="font-weight:400">I also had Laura mark a lot of potential spots where we could head after the orc settlement, in case we didn’t get enough blood from them. The main one being a group of 20+ D-rank herbivore monsters that looked like evolved forms of the boars that live around Alewatch.
<span style="font-weight:400">Of course we could also go after the wyverns at the top of the mountain, but we already killed over ten of them just a bit ago, so probably not the best idea. Better not to overhunt and all that.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“Took you a while. We were waiting.” Tyemented after we got out of Gradius.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah, sorry about that. I really didn’t want to stop until we were sure the one we found was the one we are after, so we went a bit overboard.” Vivien admitted.
<span style="font-weight:400">“So, how many orcs are we dealing with? And how was the settlement?” Tye asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“We spotted six, but there might be more. The settlement is just some trees leaning against a five-ish meter shear wall.” Vivien informed everyone.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Sounds normal enough. On the smaller side though.” Tyemented. “But it’s good that you found it. We can get this done today.”
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<span style="font-weight:400">“Hold. We are close.” Vivien said as we approached the settlement.
<span style="font-weight:400">We had our battlen all ready to go, even if some members of Saber Fang weren’t sure I could do my part. They expected that I would stay back and use my summons to fight, but I offered to go into the frontline with Alex and Rhys. For Alex and the others that saw me holding off an orc during our escort quest, it wasn’t anything strange, but to Saber Fang that only knew me as a summoner, it might seem a bit weird.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Tye, you as well Brian, now is a good moment to summon something if you are going to do it.” Vivien reminded us.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Sorry, but Ceart is still out ofmission and Sally won’t be able to deal with orcs.” Tye said quietly.
<span style="font-weight:400">Sally? Interesting name. I think Vivien told me that Tye has the tiger and a smander. So he named the smander Sally. Or do summoned beasts already have a name?
<span style="font-weight:400">(They do, unless that happens to be their first contract. The first contractor is the one who names the beast.) Laura said.
<span style="font-weight:400">“And you, Brian?” Vivien asked.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Sure, but how strong of a summon do you want? I might steal every orc if I summon something too strong.” I said.
<span style="font-weight:400">I know I want to summon Dark Pdin, Laura even put a toploader onto it for me, but it is overkill.
<span style="font-weight:400">“... Well, something that won’tpletely annihte the orcs would be nice. We need their meat so we can sell it.” Vivien said.
<span style="font-weight:400">“I also need the blood.” Lua added.
<span style="font-weight:400">“That’s what I thought. Then this will do.” I said as I pulled out a fusion monster from the collection. No. Not Dark Pdin. This one is one I have summoned before. I also got Millennium Shield while at it, but I’ll summon itter. “Flower Wolf.”
Spoiler
<span style="font-weight:400">[Flower Wolf was summoned for the first time in CH.128]
[copse]
<span style="font-weight:400">“Oh. Just a wolf. That’s surprisingly normal.” Tye said as he looked at my summon.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Well, they said no annihtion, so I didn’t summon anything too strong.” I said.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Well, if you are ready to go, let’s start.” Vivien said.
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<span style="font-weight:400">Whish.
<span style="font-weight:400">An arrow shot by Vivien flew through the air, hitting one of the orcs in the head. Nice shot. Headshots aren’t that easy.
<span style="font-weight:400">The orc that got hit let out a massive screech as it fell down. You know, you didn’t have to do that.
<span style="font-weight:400">But at the same time, that achieved what we were after. It drew out all of the orcs into a nice little clump. Or in other words, a target.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Earth Hole.” Paulina casted a spell that created a hole below the orcs. The hole formed around the fallen orc, and some of the orcs that had gathered fell in.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Ice Lance.” Lua casted a spell, targeting one of the orcs that didn’t fall in. The spell contacted and pieced the stomach of the orc, but the orc didn’t go down.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Dark Wave.” Alice followed up with her spell. As it connected, the orcs became visibly confused and began to sway on their feet, as if they were drunk.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Now, Attack!” Tye gave the order.
<span style="font-weight:400">This was our n. Trap some of the orcs in a hole and confuse the rest with Alice’s spell before going in.
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<span style="font-weight:400">“Millennium Shield.” I said to call my shield out to the battle.
<span style="font-weight:400">As soon as Tye had given the order, I had rushed in with Alex and Rhys. It was our job to get the attention of these orcs, so that our damage dealers would be safe.
<span style="font-weight:400">Lucky for us, out of the total eight orcs that hade out after the scream, (well, actually there is seven of them, plus the one that took the arrow in the face) three and the dead one had fallen into Paulina’s spell, so we only had four to worry about. And one of the four was already injured by Lua’s Ice Lance.
<span style="font-weight:400">My Flower Wolf was the first to reach the orcs and it jumped onto the orc that was injured by the Ice Lance. The wolf was currently on the orcs back, biting its neck from behind.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Hey, you fat pigs! Come at me and be my dinner!” Rhys yelled at the orcs.
<span style="font-weight:400">… what was that for?
<span style="font-weight:400">(That was a taunt. It is necessary for the taunt skill.) Laura said.
<span style="font-weight:400">(Oh yeah. That inferior version of shining taunt. I remember now.) I said back.
<span style="font-weight:400">Out of the four orcs, three turned towards Rhys. The only one that focused on something else was the orc that was being bitten by Flower Wolf. The orc desperately tried to shake off the wolf or get a hold of it with one of its arms, but the wolf was able to stay on and avoid the arms.
<span style="font-weight:400">I took another look at the three orcs that were headed towards Rhys and Alex and decided to go help my wolf instead.
<span style="font-weight:400">I activated Shining Taunt to draw the attention of the orc. That made its rage focus on me and my wolf had free reign to bite the neck of the orc even harder, before finding a big blood vessel and causing blood to spray everywhere.
<span style="font-weight:400">Hey. We need that.
<span style="font-weight:400">I pulled open my collection and searched for a card. A toploader monster that I’ve only summoned once.
<span style="font-weight:400">As I was pulling it out however, (Master, behind you!) Laura warned me.
<span style="font-weight:400">I turned around and saw an orc that had climbed up from the hole raising a tree trunk, preparing to hit me. But as soon as the orcs arm reached its peak and going to strike down on me, I felt a power surge from my left shoulder.
<span style="font-weight:400">“ROAR!!!” A massive roar shook the forest, as an illusion of a manticore roared between the orc and I. A roar caused by the Threatening Roar that I set on myself before we left Alewatch.
<span style="font-weight:400">That actually brings up something. Why didn’t Threatening Roar activate when we fought the orc during our travel?
<span style="font-weight:400">(Master, now is not the time for that! Focus!) Laura yelled in my head.
<span style="font-weight:400">Her words brought me back to the situation at hand and I called my Millennium Shield to stand between me and the orc.
<span style="font-weight:400">I took a quick look around to get a hold of the situation. All of the orcs seemed to be … frozen? Perhaps stunned is the better word, because of the roar. But so were my teammates. But they seemed to be more out of surprise, not because the card directly affected them.
<span style="font-weight:400">Interestingly, Alice was the first to recover. She began spamming Dark Bullets towards the orc that had tried to punch me. As soon as the first Dark Bullet hit the orc, the orc ‘woke up’ from its trance and began attacking me again. But this time, there was a Millennium Shield between the two of us. As I focused my efforts on the orc, the other orc that was bleeding from its neck, bled out and died.
<span style="font-weight:400">All of that delicious blood was wasted into the ground.