Chapter 426
Chapter 426
The next three days were spent travelling.
If Fer was right and the 40th Floor was even bigger than the 39th, it will take us days of continuous travel to reach whatever was equivalent to a Boss Room on this floor.
Naturally, in those three days, we managed to collect all kinds of Drop items such as skins, horns and fangs. Sadly, there were no meat Drops and I ended up having to hear my familiar complain about it.
[6] Is the dungeon testing our food reserve or something?
Anyway, we finally reached the end of this messy place and got to the Boss of the 40th Floor…
“Wh-what the heck…?”
From the cover of a large tree, I stared at a large golden deer-like creature. When I say large, I mean, this deer was twice the size of the Four Arms Bear. You know, the nearly 10 meters tall bear?
The golden deer creature was chomping on some purple fruit that was growing by its feet.
“Hoohh~~ that’s a rare one.”
“You know it?”
This golden deer creature was really an incredible sight to behold.
“I saw it once in the past. I wanted to fight it but it ran away.”
Fer, who had been alive for over a thousand years, have only seen one of those…
“”Well, that’s kind of their thing,”” Dora-chan nodded sagely.
“You know it too, Dora-chan?”
“”Yeah, there’s one in the forest where I used to live. It’s like the lord of the forest there and really smart. It never attacks first and probably ran away from Fer because it knew he’s stronger.””
[8]
“Well, it looks plenty strong to me,” I said.
“”Yeah, that thing isn’t weak. I was young back then and, well, there’s this tree with some kind of orange fruit on it. Well, I wanted some and tried to sneak one. It saw me and was incredibly mad! That guy shoot Lightning Magic at me with its horns and followed me all day.”” He shuddered.
“Ah…”
“”I even dropped the fruit and had to move out from that forest!””
Is it bad if I say, ‘serves you right’?
I used [Appraisal] on the creature.
[Zlatorog]
S Rank monster, very smart and rarely attacks. However, when someone touches something it cherishes, it will become enraged and attacks relentlessly.
[8]
Ah, the explanation confirms what Dora-chan said.
[5a] Then, something occurred to me and I zeroed in on the purple fruit growing by its feet…
[9]Then, I stared at the cave entrance just beyond the shrubs bearing purple fruits.
[9] “Hey, Dora-chan, will it attack us if we just walk past the thing it cherishes? I mean, without touching anything?”
“We can just take it down.” [5b]
Fer, your first suggestion is always to destroy.
““Eh, I’m all for that. Let’s do it! I want to take my anger out on one of these things for a while now.””
Ahaha, it looks like Dora-chan still has some pent-up frustrations over being chased by the previous golden deer creature.
[10]
“… …” hmm? Something seems to be missing…
I patted my bag. “Sui?”
“Umu, she’s over there.” Fer jerked his snout in… the direction of the Zlatorog creature thing.
I squinted my eyes and found that a light blue blob of jelly had appeared beside the purple fruits at the Zlatorog’s feet. While I watched, Sui bounced on top of the shrub and waved her tentacles at the deer creature. [5c]
“Ah, Fer, that-”
Kyaaaaaaaa!!!!!
A high-pitched scream rang out, I squeezed my eyes shut and slapped my hands over my ears.
“What- what-”
ZZZZzzzzztttt–
Oh, that does not sound good.
I squeezed one eye open and saw electricity jumping between the golden antlers.
“Uhh…”
“Not good.”
“”He’s done it.””
Dogooonn—-
Lightning suddenly exploded in front of us.
“Uwaaaa, Sui!!”
I tried to keep my eyes open, but it was impossible. The lightning attack was too bright.
When the world finally stopped crackling and buzzing, I shake my head. My hair was sticking oddly to my hands, what the- Is this some kind of static or something- [5d]
“”Muu, Sui is mad now!!””
“Sui! Language!” I yelled.
Then, I realised just how stupid I sounded. My other two familiars were looking at me with equally judgy eyes…
Luckily, the moment was interrupted by another loud-
Kyaaaaaaaaaaa!!
What followed was a series of onomatopoeia.
Bzzztttt!!
“”Muu,””
Pew! Pew! Pew!
Kyaaaaaaaaaaa!!
Dogoonn— dogoonnn—
Pew! Pew! Pew!
[5d] [5d]
Suffice it to say, the majestic, dignified looking golden deer was completely destroyed. A terrible hole appeared in its chest where Sui had concentrated her attacks and, well…
Anyway, Sui came back victorious.
Of course.
With her prize held over her head.
““Aruji~~ this fruit is really yummy~~””
The fruit in question looked like a giant berry, it looked like a Kyoho grape to be precise.
[10]
[11]
I wordlessly accepted the giant grape thing.
Then, I looked at the area where the deer monster had been, the scorched marks on the floor, and then at the cheerfully bouncing Sui.
“Thank you,” let’s not think too deeply about this.
Deciding to distract myself I cast [Appraisal] on the fruit.
[Violet Berry]
Rare fruit, limited habitat.
I pinched a small bit off the fruit and tasted it.
“Oh? It tasted kind of like a blueberry. Hmm, but it’s less sour than a blueberry, like a really rare ripe blueberry. It will probably be great when made into jam or eaten on its own.”
Yeah, I’m running away from reality, so what?
[11]
“”Is jam a yummy thing?””
“It’s a sweet yummy thing~”
“”Yay~! Sui will collect lots so Aruji could make lots of sweet yummy thing~~””
“Ahem, sure. Alright, everyone, let’s harvest all the berries!”
“”Aahh, what a pain~””
“Umu, I shall stand guard here,” said Fer as he settled down.
“Fer…”
“A second Zlatorog might appear.”
“Please keep watch, Fer.”
In the end, we managed to collect five small sacks of berries. A second Zlatorog actually appeared and Fer got to kill it, causing Dora-chan to complain, ““Unfair! Now I’m the only one who hasn’t killed one of these!””
“Well, I guess we could wait for another one to respawn-”
“”No way, let’s get out of here!””
Aside from the Violet Berries, we also collected some Golden Horns, Golden Hooves, Golden Fur, two large magic stones and-
“What are these stones?”
“Umu, according to my [Appraisal] they are teleportation stones. The white one is already used up, the blue one still has five more uses.”
“Oh? I guess that’s useful. So, do you guys want to return to the surface? Since we have these stones.”
“No,”
“”Nope!””
“”Sui wants to continue~””
“Ahem, the reason I mention this is because it has been two weeks since we’ve been in the dungeon and I still have to make my offerings to the Gods…”
I mean, I could probably do the offerings in the dungeon, but I really want to return to the surface. Hopefully, none of them pick this up…
“Mu? Offerings? Then, we have no choice. We must return to the surface.”
[5e]
I privately pumped my fist in victory.
We made our way to the teleportation room without issue. I place the blue teleportation stone close to the pillar and chanted ‘First Floor’.
There was a whoosh and that light feeling before we materialise on the appropriate floor. We exited the room to see many Adventurers entering and exiting the cobblestone walkway and more importantly, real sunlight shining in through the entrance.
“Phew, we’re back.”
“”When you’re done making the offering. We shall dive back immediately.””
I stiffened at Fer’s telepathic message. Then, rolled my eyes and thought back, “”No way, I want to take it easy for the next 5 days~””
“”What?! Gunununu…””
“”Fufufu, hm? Hey, I just thought of something, since we didn’t take the stairs down to the 41st Floor, when we use the teleportation stone, will it take us to the 40th Floor teleportation room?””
“”Umu, that’s right.””
“”Wait, we have to travel three days through the forest again?!””
“”… …””
“”… …””
“Nooo!!! I don’t want to go through the damn forest again!!!”
I am getting odd looks from passersby, but I didn’t care. Why didn’t we leave the dungeon after going down the stairs to the 41st Floor!!??
“”Hey! That means I get to fight that deer next!!””
Ugh, Dora-chan…
You don’t have to sound so pleased…
Gumihou: What the heck? Only 1400 words left?! From over 2000?
[1] Structural Change: Combine 2 paragraphs
[2] Structural Change: Combine 3 paragraphs
[3] Structural Change: Combine paragraph & dialogue
[4] Structural Change: Change passive sentence to dialogue
[5] Delete Repetitive or Pointless Information… starting to delete pointless scenes now
[a] Completely the slow and tedious roundabout thought and discussion re purple fruit = precious thing. Like, dull. Also, it’s not like Mukouda is stupid, just overly cautious.
[b] Delete Fer’s wordy ‘we can’t just sit here faffing about’ to ‘let’s take it down’
[c] Delete Sui’s ‘dialogue’ with the Zlatorog, which is mostly ‘hey, hey,’ followed by ‘grrr, angy now!’
[d] Delete Mukouda panic ‘Save the Sui’ mode. Why not? I’d been doing it all this while now.
[e] Deleted reiterations of ‘oh, we must return to the surface’
[6] Additional Information for Aesthetic Purpose
[7] Add Dialogue Tag
[8] Creative Licence Taken – Takes liberty on explaining this deer creature thing without too much repetitions and info vomit.
[9] Working out how to get around the Zlatorog as well as the inevitable failure to do so. Because, eh.
[10] Reworked the ‘Where is Sui’ scene. Since that one is pretty important.
[11] Reworked the aftermath due to [5d]