Chapter 64 - Plan towards victory

Excluding Tobi, the four of us were in the guild home’s lounge watching the replays of yesterday’s fights.

You can watch the replays from your menu screen and it’s also possible to make a projection in mid-air.

You can also adjust the size of the screen, first off, we watched several replays where we won and things went according to plan.

There was red tea on the table…unfortunately, there’s no black tea, we watched yesterday’s matches while drinking the herbal tea.

This tea is hibiscus tea that we bought in the market, we tried it out and it was quite sour. Yup, it’s sour.

It’s tea that you’d rather blend with something else than drinking straight away.

「Yup…the place you set this Area Healing at was really good. It would have felt like you had infinite HP from your opponent’s point of view.

「Yumir-san also perfectly shut down the vanguard.」 (Selene)

「Coming back from taking that much damage without being afraid is scary after all. His face is full of fear and despair…fufu.

「…Ah, he surrendered. Tsk…」 (Riizu)

「The face you are making right now is far more terrifying. Are you not aware of it?」 (Yumir)

「W-Well, these are the fights that turned out well. If possible I’d like every match to go like this but…」 (Hind)

Everyone took a sip from the cup and made bitter faces.

I took out some honey from my inventory and left it on top of the table, then the girls fought over it and poured some on their tea.

Even though it’s apparently good as a beautifying product…wait, I guess that has nothing to do here since it’s a game.

Since it’s sour, it might also help you recover from fatigue. I wonder if it also recovers HP?

Regarding the replays, while Yumir intercepts the opponents that aim for me, she boldly attacks them while I make the best use of my healing skills.

Each time 『Shining』 is up, I use it on the rearguard or the other vanguard to obstruct them while I support and heal her.

If we manage to make it go that way, it would usually lead to a victory.

Shining has low power, but it also has a suitable low CD because of it.

If there are two vanguards, the times where I have to run around the place trying to avoid them will increase, but I’m able to do something about it as long as I focus on dodging.

It is possible to cast spells while moving around, even if they kill off each other at the same time, as long as Yumir defeats one of them it’d end up in our victory.

However, double vanguards are the 2nd type of teams we are weak against.

Whenever we win, we are forced to endure and be patient, usually, if I’m caught we’d lose.

Next, is the replay of our important loss.

While we watched the match, we talked about why we lost this time.

「…This match too, the pattern of the way you lose is mostly the same. Yumir doesn’t give up until the end and tries to persevere through.」 (Selene)

「Yes. I die before Yumir does, it’s only that.」 (Hind)

「Especially this one, when you face a rapid-fire type archer I get the feeling that it doesn’t go well.」 (Riizu)

「I hate those! They just attack and are so sticky! If they are going to aim for someone, they should just aim for me!」 (Yumir)

「Hind-kun puts himself between the opponent’s vanguard or Yumir-san and him to cut his line of fire but…」 (Selene)

「The main problem are these high-angle type skills. The skills that are represented by skills like Arrow Rain.」 (Riizu)

I believe it’s just as they said.

You can’t really avoid them…after all, several hundreds of arrows rain down on you at the same time.

Even if you only get hit by one, you’ll enter hit stop and be unable to move, then you’ll get hit by the next one and quickly take more damage.

Like that heavy warrior from the BBS, instead of magic, I’m wrapped up in sorrow whenever I face a heavy warrior paired up with an archer.

These are the opponents we hate the most.

The long ranged physical damage job archer is the one that Shinto priest has the worst affinity against.

Shinto priest is in the middle when it comes to magic resistance, but with the exception of the vanguard type Shinto priest, the other 2 types are tied with mages for the worst physical resistance.

「So, what’s your current rating, Hind-kun?」 (Selene)

「It’s 1628. I can’t really say it feels like we are in a good situation.」 (Hind)

「If you can keep up with your 70% win rate, I believe you might be able to reach 2000 rating by the end though.」 (Riizu)

「However, if we only looked at the 10 matches of the 2nd half, it would be a 40% win rate…if we keep going like this, entering the rankings will be just a dream.

If we kept going like this, our current rating would slowly stagnate. Maybe we’ll be at around 1600 rating?」 (Hind)

「Nuuh…」 (Yumir)

We keep losing to players that pass 1700 rating, that’s our current wall.

Based on yesterday’s matches, I reached the conclusion that it’s better to use this first half to strengthen ourselves.

From there, we started talking about concrete ideas of how to improve.

「I can think of a few plans. Then again, it’s about the same as with the last event. First off-」 (Hind)

「Strengthening your weapons and defensive gear right? Leave it to me.」 (Selene)

「Thank you very much!」 (Hind)

「Thanks Secchan!」 (Yumir)

「It’s just that I want your help with gathering materials before doing that. It would help me a lot if I had more people…could I ask you that favor?」 (Selene)

「Of course. We are the ones asking you for the gear after all, we’ll go anywhere you want.」 (Hind)

「Yup, let’s go!」 (Yumir)

In order to contend for the duels from now on, there was an urgent need to strengthen our current weapons and defensive gear.

Just as the post in the BBS had said, from 1650 rating onwards, the players have already moved on from turtle type gear.

If Yumir fought with vanguards that are equal or stronger to her she could easily lose, you could say we are in an impossible situation with our current gear.

Since Selene-san seems to have a proper plan to strengthen our gear, let’s leave it to her.

Right after, Riizu humbly raised her hand.

「What I can help with is…probably leveling up? I’ll search for monsters that are efficient to farm around here.」 (Riizu)

「Thanks, Riizu. If we level up, we’ll also get more skills.」 (Hind)

「There are still a lot of skills I want to pick up after all. Isn’t it quite the good idea from someone like you!?」 (Yumir)

「…Don’t you think that “from someone like you” part was uncalled for? Right, Yumir-san…?」 (Riizu)

「It hurts!! It was my bad! I’ll apologize, so please stop stepping on my foot!」 (Yumir)

It was quite common to see players at the current level 40 cap yesterday after all.

I’m quite thankful for Riizu’s proposal.

After that, let’s see…all that’s left is preparing proper measures.

「The remaining measure is to organize our skills well. That’s related to the way we fight.」 (Hind)

「That’s where we shine right!?」 (Yumir)

「Yup. Even if we level up or prepare our gear, everything will be for naught if we don’t work on that. We have to practise together.」 (Hind)

「Got it! Let’s do it!」 (Yumir)

「…Yumir-san always looks like she’s having fun…that’s so nice.」 (Selene)

Just as Selene-san had said, Yumir was always merry.

She had been in high spirits since it was close to TB’s launch date.

Though it’s an enigma what Selene-san is envious about.

「By the way, what is Tobi-kun doing? We haven’t seen him tonight…」 (Selene)

「Seems like he hasn’t got anyone to pair up with yet. Like he said, it hurt him to have a late start.」 (Hind)

「「Isn’t that just him being disliked?」」 (Yumir and Riizu)

For some reason, Selene-san shivered when she heard Yumir and Riizu’s abusive remark.

Her eyes behind the glasses are dead…

「Stop it! There are people whose heart will get hurt because of your words you know!?」 (Selene)

「S-Selene-san…?」 (Hind)

「-Ah! I-It’s nothing! Everything’s fine!」 (Selene)

She didn’t look fine at all though…but well, it’s better to not ask further.

You need to be in a party to participate in the preliminaries, of course, you can’t form a party if both of you are far away from each other.

That being the case, instead of searching for players that came to the desert, Tobi went to their places to look for them.

That point is making it harder for him to pair up with someone and he grumbled about that at school.

They were interested in the middle of the talks, but once they heard that he was in the desert they would reply with a 「Then it’s impossible」.

Travelling takes quite a lot of time in TB.

Among the friends that Tobi has, practically no one has come to the desert…as a result, so far he hasn’t been able to get a favorable reply.

At that moment, the door to the lounge opened vigorously.

Everyone looked that way and-

「Everybody, good evening! De-gozaru!」 (Tobi)

「Speaking of the devil. Have you found someone to pair up with, Tobi?」 (Hind)

Tobi came normally through the door today.

Since he looked quite cheerful, I thought he had found a partner but…

Tobi’s following words were quite unexpected.

「This might be sudden. However, I’ll be going on a journey for the duration of the event!」 (Tobi)

「Nuh?」 (Yumir)

「What are you saying?」 (Riizu)

「Eh…? What do you mean?」 (Selene)

Ah, I see.

The other members weren’t aware of Tobi having a hard time finding someone to party up with.

Let’s fill them in in a simple manner.

「Basically, you are saying that your duo candidate will pair up with you if you get closer to where he is…you found someone like that right? That’s why, you want to leave the desert temporarily. Am I right?」 (Hind)

「Yes! It’s just as you said. The truth is, moving away from the desert is a pain but…if I take much longer finding someone, I won’t be able to raise up my rating in time!」 (Tobi)

With that conversation, finally everyone started to understand.

Tobi on the other hand, gulped down the entire cup of Hibiscus tea in one go and made an incredible face as if he had eaten some umeboshi.

I didn’t even have time to stop him.

「I see, so that was the case.」 (Riizu)

「Guess there’s no helping it then.」 (Selene)

「Once the event ends, you have to return immediately, you hear me?」 (Yumir)

「Understood, guild master!」 (Tobi)

With that being said, Tobi will leave the party temporarily.

He got on his camel and left town from the exit starting his journey. Seems like his destination is a secret.

After sending him off, we started by improving our equipment first.

*End of the chapter*