Battle of the Hell Hole: Stealth Battle

With the Centaurs back, we had reached a point where we could defeat the Hell Beasts charging us head-on relatively safely, so I finally ordered the overworked Eiji to fall back. After knocking the Hell Beasts away with his shield, he retreated with heavy steps that made the ground boom.

"Ah, what a pain! I really felt the power of sheer numbers!"

"You did well. I can't exactly tell you to take it easy in this situation, but make sure you recover properly."

"Yes!"

Eiji pulled several potions from his inventory and gulped them down one after another. He looked somewhat unhealthy, as though he were chugging several energy drinks all at once. Of course, he was only recovering.

Jokes aside, the Centaurs' return to full strength had clearly made our battle on the ground, where we were facing the enemy's main force head-on, much easier. The fourth wave of Hell Beasts looked as though it would soon be dealt with as well.

"Meeeeh. I wonder how many more are coming? Is it an infinite respawn?"

"Who knows? Still, by my rough count, the number of Hell Beasts appearing at once has been decreasing. That means there is a limit to the enemy's numbers."

"There is an end, then. Let's keep at it."

Wool's tone was as flat as ever, but I could tell they had pulled themselves together. I was grateful that our morale had not fallen. That was because I feared that, rather than things becoming easier as their numbers decreased, this was where our strength would truly be put to the test.

The Hell Beasts' numbers were certainly decreasing. However, there was no doubt that powerful individuals were making up a larger proportion of them. It was still within the margin of error, but it would not be strange for Hell Beasts equal to or stronger than us to appear from here on.

"Black Hole... In any case, if we do not win this battle, the continent will overflow with Hell Beasts. That would be troublesome, and utterly unpleasant. No matter how difficult the battle, we must win."

As I muttered to myself while chanting a spell, dozens of Hell Beasts were sent flying through the air near the foot of the hill with a tremendous crash. The ones rampaging there were my brother-in-arms Jigorou and Genzuro, who possessed equal strength.

With those two around, perhaps we could win somehow or another. They possessed enough power to make me think that way, and their spectacular exploits gave courage to everyone who witnessed them. Having received that courage myself, I devoted my attention to commanding the ground forces.

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"Whoa... Jigorou and Grandpa are really going wild..."

Ruby saw the same sight Izam had witnessed: Hell Beasts flying through the air like scraps of wood. She muttered in exasperation. Even her own grandfather was as inhumanly strong as ever.

At the same time, she could not help marveling anew at Jigorou, who stood shoulder to shoulder with that level of strength. From the time Ruby was old enough to remember, her grandfather had been a peerless swordsman, and she had believed that no one could stand as his equal in battle. She had never imagined that this fixed belief would be shattered by a game.

"I've heard that he's been much livelier during training since he met Jigorou, too. I'm sure he'll live a long time."

Ruby expressed her delight by trembling the surface of her body, but an enemy was actually right in front of her. Operating alongside the Scars, she was responsible for choosing suitable locations where the Centaurs could lure Hell Beasts while she concealed her presence.

The individual combat strength of a Scar could not be said to be high compared with that of the other Races gathered for this battle. However, the traps they had set across the battlefield—pitfalls, bottomless bogs, and even mines made from shiitake mushrooms—were essential for defeating the Hell Beasts one by one.

"Let's see... The traps for the weak ones are over there, so that's where they should be lured, right? Then the next traps should go over there. And the strong-looking ones... Whoa, there are five of them! Let's catch them in the traps meant to hold them in place, then leave them to Grandpa and the others."

After determining where the Hell Beasts should be lured and where the next traps should be placed, Ruby immediately sent Sei a chat message specifying the destination. They could also communicate with signal flares, but since those were limited, they had agreed beforehand to use chat unless the situation was urgent.

"Grr...? Grrrrrrrr!"

"Wooooooo!"

"Gah, they noticed me!"

Ruby's stealth techniques were highly developed. She took advantage of her Slime-type Race by reshaping her body into a difficult-to-see form, had raised her 【Assassination】 Skill to a high level, and had taken an assassin-type Job specializing in stealth and surprise attacks.

However, as demonstrated by the attack on the Scars' settlement, whose stealth techniques were no worse than hers, some Hell Beasts possessed remarkably keen senses capable of seeing through stealth. Such individuals were mixed in among the Hell Beasts emerging from the vertical shaft, and every so often they noticed Ruby's presence like this.

"I'm higher level than you, though... Oh, well."

Although she was disappointed at being discovered, Ruby drew two daggers and regained her composure. She was currently operating alone, but there was a reason she was doing something so dangerous: if she were discovered, she could almost certainly escape as long as she was alone.

Ruby reshaped her taut surface to ready her daggers, then slipped smoothly through the gaps between the charging Hell Beasts as she slashed at their vital points and legs. Her attack power was not particularly high, so she could not kill them instantly, but it was more than enough to injure them, and she had ample agility to escape with ease. It was a graceful getaway that no one else could have managed.

"Gagya! Gagya!"

"Gooooooooh!"

"Whoa, there's a tough one too! It looks like 【Slashing Resistance】. Then... take this!"

During her escape, Ruby encountered a Hell Beast with such tough defenses that it deflected her blades. Her daggers were a reward for clearing 【Azure Moon's Trial】, but her own attack power was by no means high. Thus, they were ineffective against enemies with high defense or 【Slashing Resistance】.

However, this was not the first time Ruby had encountered an opponent her attacks could not hurt. She already knew how to fight enemies with 【Slashing Resistance】 in particular.

"Juuump! And now—Hardening!"

"Ggeeeeh!?"

If slashing did not work, she only had to use blunt or piercing attacks. Ruby charged at the Hell Beast at her maximum speed, hardened her entire body, and rammed into it. Combined with her speed, the impact pierced straight through the torso of the catlike, scale-covered Hell Beast. Ruby continued her escape without slowing.

"Gwooooooh!"

However, blocking her path was a Hell Beast with a bear-like silhouette that could only be described as grotesque. Its abdomen had a huge mouth large enough to swallow a person whole, while a massive right arm grew from the place where its head should have been. A bulging eye and a nose were set into the back of its hand.

The large right arm sprouting from the Hell Beast was heavily muscled like a human's, and the features on its palm and the back of its hand resembled human features in shape alone. Ruby trembled her surface in disgust at how grotesquely lifelike it was.

"That one looks strong. I don't think I can get away from it... And another one's coming from behind, too, right? Controlling this is difficult, but I think I'll field-test a new technique!"

Ruby readied her daggers while reshaping her body into a whip. She then changed the tip into a ball and hardened only the very end.

"Ugh, partial hardening... It's still so difficult!"

Although Ruby called it partial hardening, there was actually no Skill with that name. It was a technique that took advantage of the properties of the 【Hardening】 Skill.

【Hardening】 made a designated point on her body hard, then spread until her entire body was hardened. By canceling the Skill before the hardening had spread completely, then activating 【Hardening】 again and repeating the process, she could harden only a portion of her body.

Since it had to be maintained by repeatedly activating and canceling the Skill, she had to pay constant attention to it. Ruby excelled at fighting through intuition and superior reaction speed, so having to devote part of her thoughts to partial hardening was difficult for her.

When Genzuro heard about it, he encouraged her by saying it was like maintaining one's speed in an automatic car: she would get used to it with practice. Ruby did not have a driver's license and had never driven a car, so she could not really understand what he meant.

"But once I master it, it'll definitely be powerful, so I need to learn it soon! Take this!"

Ruby charged at the bear-like Hell Beast blocking her path while simultaneously striking the well-defended Hell Beasts closing in from behind with the part of her body that had become a whip tipped with a bludgeon. Her daggers instantly inflicted countless wounds on the bear, while the whip's tip battered the other beasts.

The Hell Beasts could not catch Ruby as she darted around them in all directions. They fell one after another to her two types of physical attacks—daggers and bludgeons—and in about two minutes, every beast pursuing her had been wiped out.

"All right! They're not following me anymore!"

"Ruby-dono, are you safe!?"

A voice called out from the empty space behind Ruby, who had stopped her partial hardening and shapeshifting and returned to her usual oval form. Without showing any surprise, Ruby answered that she was all right.

"I'm fine. Have you finished setting the traps?"

"Yes! Of course!"

"Okay! The Scars work fast. Then I'll show you where to set up the next ones."

The voice belonged to one of the Scars who had been working with Ruby. Anticipating the possibility of a battle, Ruby had told him to wait a short distance away and rejoin her once there were no enemies in the area.

After rejoining him and the other Scars farther away, Ruby led them to the location she had marked earlier. To put it mildly, their work was not glamorous, but it was thanks to their traps that the Centaurs could dispatch the Hell Beasts with minimal effort. As the battlefield's support staff, they were performing such indispensable work behind the scenes that the army could not have managed without them.