English Novel
CH.149 Search and Destroy
CH.149 Search and Destroy
“Here. I have a carriage waiting for us.” Paulina said as she led us outside.
We had finished breakfast and were on our way to the adventurer’s guild.
“You thought that far ahead? Nice.” I commented. 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.
“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.
“You brought an extra person with you.” Alex commented.
“Yeah. That kind of happened.” I quickly passed over that problem. “So, what are we doing today?”
“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.”
“An orc settlement. That should be a B-rank quest, correct?” Paulina asked.
“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.”
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 accepted the quest and were on our way out.
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.
By the way, the names of the other Saber Fang members are, Arvin the great sword guy, Rhys the sword and shield, and the archer lady is Vivien, but she goes by Vivi.
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.
“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.
“And how are you planning on doing that? Summoning a dragon in the city is not a great idea.” Tye commented.
“I have other things than just dragons.” I said. “But I would need someone to come with me as I don’t actually know our target area.” I added, hoping that Tye would instantly want to come with me as we would be riding on a summon.
“Brian, what will you summon?” Alice asked.
“That spaceship that I summoned in the manor’s backyard back in Alewatch.” I answered. I think Alice saw Gradius that time.
“What is a spaceship?” Tye asked.
“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.
“Then why don’t we all use that?” Tye asked.
“Sorry, but it can only fit me and one other passenger. But it should be perfect for scouting.” I said.
“Oh. Well, that’s too bad.” Tye said. “Could have made the trip faster.”
Well sorry that I don’t have B.E.S. Big Core yet.
“Gradius.” I said to summon my monster.
We had gotten outside of the main wall of the city and were in a clearing that was large enough to fit Gradius. Paulina had opened the noble’s gate for us with her medal. It was similar to the one I was given, but hers was gold.
“... WHAT IS THAT!?” Tye yelled out.
“Gradius. My spaceship.” I answered.
“No. No. NO! There is no way you can summon something like that. That’s not real!” Tye was in disbelief.
“... But it is real. So are we using it or not?” I asked.
“Of course we will use it. If it makes us do the job faster, why would we not?” Vivien asked.
“Then let’s get in.” I said back to her.
Vivien, the archer and scout of Saber Fang, was going to come 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.
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.
“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.
Vivien seemed to take a look at the five-point harness and asked. “How do I do that?”
I turned around in my seat and helped her strap in before strapping myself in.
“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.
(Brian. Yes. Please do the same.) Lua responded.
One of the ‘issues’ with this plan 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 could compare their map data and we could find each other that way.
“I think this should be the area.” Vivien said after just a few minutes of flying.
We had flown south, towards a place called wyvern mountain. The settlement we were searching for should be at its northern end.
“I see. Then let’s fire up every scanner this thing has and find our target.” I said, basically giving a command to Gradius. While I knew some of the buttons, I hadn’t studied them all yet, so I would still need to command Gradius either verbally or have Laura transmit my order with the mana control method.
I hadn’t flown at high speed, as I didn’t want to overshoot our target. I learned last 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.
I now switched the ship to hover mode, so we could use the scanners Gradius has to search out our target.
“Is that it?” Vivien asked. “It’s tiny.”
We had spotted something that could be called a settlement. And only because Gradius has heat sensors.
“Well, there are at least six orcs there, so probably.” I said.
The ‘settlement’ was just a few logs that were propped up against a sheer cliff of a mountain, covered by some vegetation.
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.
“We could do another search. We could find a larger one.” I offered.
“Yes. Let’s do it, just in case. I don’t usually have a chance to scout like this.” Vivien agreed.
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.
“We will have to call it quits now.” I said to Vivien. “I can’t keep Gradius summoned for much longer.”
We had been searching for about ninety minutes, so I wanted to use the rest of my summoning time to set us down into a safe spot.
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.
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.
“That’s too bad. But we did find our objective, so this is fine.” Vivien said.
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.
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.
“Took you a while. We were waiting.” Tye commented after we got out of Gradius.
“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.
“So, how many orcs are we dealing with? And how was the settlement?” Tye asked.
“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.
“Sounds normal enough. On the smaller side though.” Tye commented. “But it’s good that you found it. We can get this done today.”
“Hold. We are close.” Vivien said as we approached the settlement.
We had our battleplan 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.
“Tye, you as well Brian, now is a good moment to summon something if you are going to do it.” Vivien reminded us.
“Sorry, but Ceart is still out of commission and Sally won’t be able to deal with orcs.” Tye said quietly.
Sally? Interesting name. I think Vivien told me that Tye has the tiger and a salamander. So he named the salamander Sally. Or do summoned beasts already have a name?
(They do, unless that happens to be their first contract. The first contractor is the one who names the beast.) Laura said.
“And you, Brian?” Vivien asked.
“Sure, but how strong of a summon do you want? I might steal every orc if I summon something too strong.” I said.
I know I want to summon Dark Paladin, Laura even put a toploader onto it for me, but it is overkill.
“... Well, something that won’t completely annihilate the orcs would be nice. We need their meat so we can sell it.” Vivien said.
“I also need the blood.” Lua added.
“That’s what I thought. Then this will do.” I said as I pulled out a fusion monster from the collection. No. Not Dark Paladin. This one is one I have summoned before. I also got Millennium Shield while at it, but I’ll summon it later. “Flower Wolf.”
“Oh. Just a wolf. That’s surprisingly normal.” Tye said as he looked at my summon.
“Well, they said no annihilation, so I didn’t summon anything too strong.” I said.
“Well, if you are ready to go, let’s start.” Vivien said.
Whish.
An arrow shot by Vivien flew through the air, hitting one of the orcs in the head. Nice shot. Headshots aren’t that easy.
The orc that got hit let out a massive screech as it fell down. You know, you didn’t have to do that.
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.
“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.
“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.
“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.
“Now, Attack!” Tye gave the order.
This was our plan. Trap some of the orcs in a hole and confuse the rest with Alice’s spell before going in.
“Millennium Shield.” I said to call my shield out to the battle.
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.
Lucky for us, out of the total eight orcs that had come 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.
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.
“Hey, you fat pigs! Come at me and become my dinner!” Rhys yelled at the orcs.
… what was that for?
(That was a taunt. It is necessary for the taunt skill.) Laura said.
(Oh yeah. That inferior version of shining taunt. I remember now.) I said back.
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.
I took another look at the three orcs that were headed towards Rhys and Alex and decided to go help my wolf instead.
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.
Hey. We need that.
I pulled open my collection and searched for a card. A toploader monster that I’ve only summoned once.
As I was pulling it out however, (Master, behind you!) Laura warned me.
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.
“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.
That actually brings up something. Why didn’t Threatening Roar activate when we fought the orc during our travel?
(Master, now is not the time for that! Focus!) Laura yelled in my head.
Her words brought me back to the situation at hand and I called my Millennium Shield to stand between me and the orc.
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.
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.
All of that delicious blood was wasted into the ground.
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