Chapter 38.1

Let’s Survive without Abandoning Hope!

“Karen. Stop attacking! Fall back!!”

“…Uh, yes!”

Karen obeyed Haruki’s direction without question.

Apparently, she had panicked a little when the enemy’s hatred had been directed towards her.

Her voice was a little high-pitched.

She wouldn’t last a second if the Owner got close to her.

And so Haruki went in on the attack in order to distract it.

He would not allow it to get past him!

Here, his daggers wouldn’t be enough, and so Haruki used his legs to deal extra damage.

“…Hmm?”

The more he attacked, the more shallow wounds appeared on the Owner’s arms.

However, he found that there was one wound that was especially big.

This…

He rewound the footage that he had recorded of the attack in his brain and compared it with the wound.

–There it was!

It was five attacks ago. It had done slightly more damage than the others.

However, it was at the end of three successive attacks.

It was a descending attack that matched the enemy’s counterattack.

It wasn’t a particularly good attack compared to his usual ones.

And yet, it had still cut the deepest.

What made that attack different?

But Haruki was now thinking of too many things at once.

And that wasn’t good.

“Graagh!”

“Tsk! Ka…ha…!”

“Karaboshi!”

He heard Karen scream.

And in the next moment, the world seemed to spin around him.

The breath left him.

He tried to inhale but found it difficult.

His vision shook.

Haruki ground his teeth as he slowly stood up.

“Haahh…haah…”

As his attention had momentarily shifted from the fight, he had been hit head-on by one of the Owner’s attacks.

If he was fighting against a Silver Wolf, there would have likely been a follow-up attack.

But the Owner did not pursue him.

This was because, though he was in severe pain, Haruki had met him with a counter.

The Owner must have been surprised.

Up until now, all of Haruki’s attacks had been at a level that didn’t threaten its survival.

Still, the counter just now had torn off a third of its arm.

As the Owner was smart, it was also cautious.

It was cautious. And so it hesitated.

Haruki smiled mischievously.

Haruki was able to deal so much damage to the Owner because he had done the same thing that he did during his fight against the Werewolf.

He matched the force of his opponent’s attack, and one other thing.

A circular movement had been added to Haruki’s attack.

The end of the blades of Japanese swords and knives consisted of small, concentrated jagged edges.

That meant that you couldn’t cut by just pressing.

You had to move it like a saw in order to start cutting.

Push and pull.

A circular movement allowed you to do both at the same time.

Western swords cut meat with weight.

But a dagger had no weight.

And so by using the circular motion, it finally became a weapon that was as sharp as it could be.

He tested his theory without hesitation and swung his weapon in a circle. And like that, Haruki had cut deeply into the Owner’s body.

That being said, Owner’s had incredible defensive ability.

The bones of Silver Wolves would have been severed after just pushing against them, but even after adding the circular motion and increasing its sharpness, his attack was stopped.

Still, he was now more than capable of winning.

“Alright, I want to see more.”

Haruki licked his lips and approached the Owner once again.

He had now seen all of its patterns of dealing with attacks.

Now, he just needed to see how the Owner would react to attacks that would be dangerous if they landed.

He cut, thrust, dodged, kicked, and circled.

He matched Karen’s movements and pushed in all at once.

It was easy for Haruki to handle the Owner, now that it was confused about how potent his counterattack had been.

At the same time, Karen supported Haruki with her powerful magic.

After that, the fight became very one-sided.

It still took some time, but Haruki succeeded in defeating the Owner.

Just as the Owner breathed its last breath, he felt his body grow hot.

It had been a while, but he was feeling very sick after leveling up.

Haruki held his head in his hands as he leaned against the wall.

He had been fighting for five minutes.

While his stamina had been raised to 2, he was completely out of breath after just a five-minute fight.

It was likely due to extreme nervousness and concentration.

A similar phenomenon had happened during his fight against the Werewolf.

His breath was hot.

His body was heavy.

But it was good.

He felt amazing.

As he had been fighting nothing but Silver Wolves for a while, it was refreshing to be able to fight a different monster.

On top of that, the Owners were just the right difficulty for Haruki–difficult but still manageable.

Yes.

It was so good.

He was on an adventure.

You weren’t on an adventure if there wasn’t some danger.

Yes, this was the way that it should be…

That being said, they were currently searching for Oiso. This was no time to be taken up by this adventure stuff.

“This would be great for leveling, but we don’t have much time right now. We should try and avoid combat as we continue to search.”

“I agree.”

Karen had beads of sweat on her forehead.

If someone else attacked now, she would probably just run away.