『 ...and now we just tuck this in here -- there. 』 I test the tightly wrapped leaf with one last tug. It holds, keeping Sing's mouth bound shut. Perfect. Now if she wants to kill someone, she can do so without letting everyone in the forest know. I don't plan for such a situation to be necessary but... ...you know how it is. I then notice the faint scent of blood seeping into the air. My gaze falls to the source, a bite-sized piece of raw red meat wrapped in shadowed tendrils and raised up to my face. 『 ... 』 I softly pluck it from their grasp and stuff the gob into my cheek, covering my mouth to chew as quietly as I can manage. My attention swivels to Setsuna, darkened under the shade of old twisting tree roots. She returns a blank stare -- blinks, then slowly shakes her head from side to side. ...We must be out of meat; I'm still irritatingly hungry, but we'll have to manage. Just all the more reason we need to deal with these adventurers. Gazing out from our mossy wooden cover, my attention magnetizes to the forest's luminescent foliage and fungi. These, along with the various monsters of the canyon, and of course, Setsuna, are our sort of puzzle pieces to combine and work with here. ...Hm? "But why bother with all that," you ask? "Why not just use Sing's instant-kill?" Ahaha... Did I make it look that easy? If so, please dispel that idea from your head. It takes about thirty long accumulated seconds of broken visual contact with me for Sing's enrage to trigger, and then even when she does enrage... she walks. No, that's not something she does for dramatic effect. During her enrage attack, she can only walk. It's a powerful soul-separating and instant-killing walk, yes. For that reason, it's practical against big predictable monsters. But you know what it's not practical against? Raiders -- raiders that just challenged a level one hundred raid boss. Imagine a reality where such players stand still for thirty seconds and then somehow fail to dodge the world's slowest monster attack. You may as well imagine the reality where they want to be friends too, the astronomical unlikelihood is comparable. But wait, there's more. "Veil yourselves from mortal eyes," Agehatate said. Was this a warning she gave exclusively for when we were assisting her, or is it a forever and ever thing? Is diplomacy outright impossible? Will so much as showing our faces send them into fever? Who's to say? May as well start placing your bets now, you know? This unsureness, in tandem with Sing's instant kill being as unwieldy as it is, is the reason why planning for it feels like a waste of time and energy. Better saved as a last resort than the main act, I would think. Why is why I've- ...I hear footsteps. Clang! I cover my mouth with both hands as my Eldritch Serendipity spikes into the high twenties. Its haunting phantom grip begins to twist and helix. A few dozen meters away, warm light illuminates the grooves of the trees. Silhouettes and shadows are flung into the canopy, while the light source itself is obstructed from our line of sight. Clang! Clang! The rhythmic crashing of steel continues. My Eldritch Serendipity steadily depletes to level nine. ...Are they leaving? After a pause, as if to answer, a fourth and fifth blow resound. The fifth, distinctly a mixture of metal and sharp whistling wind. A faint high pitched whirring sound follows, winding down, concluding in a deep-toned... "poof." A large object disappearing in a puff of smoke is brought to mind. I keep still, waiting for the return of nature's ambient noise whilst my eyes remain locked on that stomach-churning light. It sways gently and flickers as if from a lantern. Its user appears to be standing still. Until the light suddenly jerks. My blood runs cold. My Eldritch Serendipity... drops one more level? Another moment of silence passes... before I finally hear footsteps fading out, the lantern light fading along with them. My Eldritch Serendipity... for some reason... rises to the twenties... I squeeze my lips together, both in pain and confusion. It rose when the clanging started, fell mid-way through, only to then rise again once the source of the noise left...? That's... a first... What unusually meaningless information... For what reason would it... hm... how annoying... Is FATE jamming my death sense or something? Or... perhaps, could The Hero be among the adventurers? Ah... geez. Annoying. Annoying. Of course it would start acting up at a time like this... 『 ...Setsuna, let's go. 』 I whisper, beckoning her with the flick of my wrist. ...Whatever, a little malfunction isn't going to stop me. As if the idea of losing Agehatate's treasures wasn't enough, my hairclip as well needs rescue after that Witch Tongue tossed it who knows where. I really hope it got lodged high in a tree or something, somewhere those adventurers won't get their grubby hands on it... Thinking about how they could be holding it right now... Huff. I'm already mad imagining it. ...I quickly survey the immediate area around our tree before pulling Sing out from the roots by her wrist, Setsuna following just behind her. 『 «Identify» 』 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

LV.6 ▬ Shilleirn Däfkaeg

Iridescent Beetle

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ What the- I flick the bug away. 『 «Identify» 』 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

LV.22 ▬ Zaugus vos Boun

Wild Berry

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Effects ▐ Toxic[LV.22]

▐ Embigg[LV.2]

▐ Mana Restoration[LV.13]

▐ Bioluminescence[LV.6]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ There. Hm... No, this isn't the right plant, its toxic level is too high. I'm looking for a plant with high damage-to-mana efficiency with at least under fourteen levels in toxic. I know I've identified at least one before, it's just a matter of finding it or better among the visually similar. 『 «Identify» 』 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

LV.16 ▬ Guun Wahflüss

Wild Drupe

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Effects ▐ ◈ Bioluminescence[LV.8]

▐ Blind[LV.16]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 『 «Identify» 』 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

LV.17 ▬ Die Rahnd Bluut

Wild Berry

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Effects ▐ ◈ Thermaphobia[LV.17]

▐ ◈ Regeneration[LV.4]

▐ Toxic[LV.16]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Identify, identify, identify... We slowly creep along the forest floor searching for that one elusive plant. Occasionally, in the background, we catch the faint sounds of combat and magic, but they often clear up as quickly as they begin leaving us with the hum of bugs and beasts flying overhead. And as the minutes pass, our Eldritch Serendipity rises, albeit at a sluggish pace. After at least fifty unique plants, not including duplicates, it reaches the high twenties. 『 ...Ah, finally. 』 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

LV.17 ▬ Zig̃riiors Boun

Wild Berry

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Effects ▐ ◈ Mana Regeneration[LV.17]

▐ ◈ Heavier[LV.16]

▐ Toxic[LV.9] ▐ Bioluminescence[LV.2] ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ A softly glowing, angular, and tough-skinned berry. Its shape is probably better known as a something-something-hedron, but I couldn't tell you really. What I'm more interested in are its effects. Should be enough to get one good spell out of this, I think... Borrowing Sing's hair pin, I run my nails across a berry stem as close to its base as possible, severing it off, and hopefully not leaving too conspicuous a mark. These berries are big enough that we should only need one but, just to keep our options open, I cut off one more in the same manner. ...There, so far so good. I turn back to Setsuna, constantly twisting her head every which way in what I can only assume to be a state of high-alertness. 『 ...S- 』 My Eldritch Serendipity suddenly dives to below ten. I gasp as my muscles tense, I have to focus to not drop the berries. Setsuna's eyes snap to me, her pupils dilating. I flutter my eyes and shake my head a bit. 『 I...I'm okay, just... 』 ...just startled me a bit, is all. It's not everyday Eldritch Serendipity drops for seemingly no reason. If it dropped any earlier I'd easily assume it was because we acquired the berries but, to respond so late after the fact, well... it reminds me of really bad network latency. Hah... if it's going to be like this, I should probably brace for it to go off more often, and at any time -- if this instance is any indication. Geez... 『 Come, Setsuna. 』 All we'll need is a new hiding spot and we'll be able to get things started. ...Hello? Anyone in here? No? Perfect. Crawling carefully through a bush and squeezing between exposed roots, I take refuge underneath another tree carrying the bright blue berries with me. Sing is coaxed in with a bit of work, followed by a more accepting Setsuna. Oh, wait, hm, can Setsuna not fit in here after all? 「 ... 」 ...After a bit of wriggling, she decides to pull her upper body out, before sending in her lower body, tentacles first. They wrap around and through all manner of crevices and cracks, covering the ground and filling in the gaps between each root. By the end, I'm fairly certain a bit of her is still sticking out, but not much I'd wager. The bush should cover the rest of her I think. Alright, down to business. I start carving a hole into one of the berries. The consistency of its skin somewhat reminds me of a banana only without the intuitive shape, making this, I imagine, much harder to peel... but we won't have to put up with any of that thanks to Sing's hairclip. Finished, I pull off a section of its thick glowing skin, revealing faintly glistening insides, kind of like mango but more glowy and grey. The smell is... uh... kind of like melted plastic, it's not very good. I glance up at Setsuna. She looks up at me. 『 ... 』 「 ... 」 I gently push it towards her. She leans back just a little, but does hold the berry as I let go of it. I, of course, can't eat it. Ignoring the fact that the fruits and veggies from this world, for whatever reason, are torturous for me to eat... this one will actually kill me. Toxic[LV.9] will, I'm fairly certain, never kill Setsuna with her seven hundred HP. Even if things do look like they might get dicey she can always drink Sing's blood. Me? Even if the toxin doesn't kill me in two seconds, there's still a high chance that even with the aid of Sing's blood, that it just kills me in three, four, or five seconds instead. Also, you know, my mana pool is ruptured. So please understand, really, only Setsuna can eat it. ...Setsuna grunts in a low tone. Her eyes squint, and she recoils after bringing her face close to the berry. Despite her mostly expressionless face, she's very clearly put off by it. 『 Setsuna... 』 I press my hands together and dip my head a bit. She pushes the berry towards me. I look up at her. She shakes her head awkwardly. 『 ... 』 I touch my hand against her tendril, and push back softly to say, "Please, eat it." But she shakes her head again. I... hesitantly... take the berry back. High above us, a distant roar takes up the silence. Looking down into the berry, I let my mind wander for a bit. ... I look back at her. She stares at me with a blank expression. A faint chill taps against my spine. ...I gently close my eyes. Then, bite my tongue. Leaning my head back to swallow the blood pooling in my mouth, I briefly consider what it would take for Setsuna to eat the berry. What I could feasibly do given the urgency of the situation. ...I bite my tongue again, harder. Then, leaning forward, I cup my hands under my mouth and spit. I glance up at her. She stares at me with constricted pupils. 『 ... 』 Avoiding eye contact, I shyly extend my arms towards her, offering her the berry once again, along with a piece of my tongue. ...I wipe the back of my hand against my mouth. Preparations are done. The second berry came in handy after all, although not for its contents, but its glow, giving me some light to work with. I turn to Setsuna. Eyes shut, she rests against the walls of our hideaway. Her chest rises and falls as she takes heavy breaths, enduring the toxin. She just drank from Sing's wrist so her health is nearly topped off. Luckily, the toxin had very low damage per second, but... as the tradeoff, this could persist for over a dozen hours. We'll need to keep a close eye on her health. 『 Setsuna. 』 She opens her eyes -- blinks a few times, then glances at us. 『 «Phantom Fire» 』 I press my hands against the ceiling and repeat it, a sizable lock of my hair flattened underneath my palm. 『 ...«Phantom Fire» 』 Her orange ringed pupils lock onto my hands. I repeat the spell name again, but slower, sounding out each syllable. 「 ... 」 Carefully, a dark tendril slides up my arm, coiling around it like a snake. Upon reaching the surface of the damp wood, it wanders around, seeming to feel the grooves carved into its surface. I press my lips together. 「 ...«𝄞◕◕◕◕◑◑◑...◕◕◔◔» 」 It begins. A visible static arcs off the magic circle as its carved lines begin to illuminate in a bright orange glow. The gentle tinkling of glass resonates from the runes, gradually rising in power, volume, and disarray. As the seconds go by, I start to feel trembling. Setsuna's tentacle, wrapped around my arm, shivers as it pushes against the circle. Her muscles tense as what I assume to be mana burns through her to charge the spell. Simultaneously, the cut hair underneath my hand evaporates, consumed as a catalyst. ...I'll need to find an opportunity later to repay Setsuna what I owe her. 『 That's enough. It's time to go, Setsuna. 』 I retract my hands from the glimmering light, and tap on Setsuna's tentacles which bar the exit. She takes a moment to register my message, then promptly slithers her body, piece by piece, limb by limb, out from underneath the cage of tree roots. Once it looks like she can fit, I push Sing through the primary gap, making an effort to ensure she doesn't step on Setsuna. Although, I've reason to believe she may barely feel it given how light we are, I do so out of courtesy. I take my exit last. Stepping out into the open air, Setsuna's posture immediately catches my eye. As opposed to standing upright, she's bent over, her arm tentacles attached to her shoulders pressed against the ground for support. The image of a person on all fours comes to mind. ...The result of the berry's Heavier effect. It's exactly as it sounds. While this effect can be advantageous, allowing you to burn more SP for more impact force, naturally, it restricts your movement and exhausts you quicker. Not to mention, discomfort. I'm not too familiar with the exact numbers on this effect, but I'm fairly certain level sixteen is more than a 200% weight increase. Her signature bursts of speed I'm sure have been crippled, making dodging unreliable. So, combat should be avoided for her unless she's in a position to KO in one hit, I think. ...I rub my eyes, breathing in the forest air. It's time to focus. Defeat the adventurers. 『 Setsuna. 』 I whisper, passing her by. Pulling Sing along by her wrist, I walk us in a direction away from our tree. Behind us, the chaotic clattering of the magic circle steadily transitions to a pulsating form. Its light, changed from orange to a flickering purple, and the air around it distorting in waves synchronized with the pulsing. Dark purple embers fading into existence indicate the spell's area-of-effect, as well as its timer nearing the detonation point. We're already well out of the way, but I keep us moving lest we meet any adventurers attracted by the noise. We can afford to stay hidden with this. Even if they don't find us, the spell will find them. It's fire, after all. ...The magic circle's final pulse is one to draw in air. It's then immediately superseded by a ghastly roar accentuated by splintering wood as the source explodes in a hellish purple whirling wall of fire, expanding outwards. The wall touches the forest floor and rises to above the canopy in tornado-like fashion. Shrubs, ferns, trees, fungi, every stone and spec of dirt in the area is swallowed whole. Once the wall reaches its outer limit, blowing up dust and dead plant matter, it withers away, leaving behind a blinding purple inferno, a living wildfire. But its amaranthine hue isn't just for show. «Phantom Fire» is the bane of mages. It burns hot, but it doesn't singe your clothes. It won't light chemical oil but detonates magic flasks. This purple flame isn't a sparked physical fire, but a magical one. A fire that spreads to, and consumes any and all things mana-related as fuel. It will quickly jump from leaf to leaf, plant to plant, burning what little mana it finds before extinguishing. Anything with mana to burn will feel it as they take damage for each point of mana they have while ablaze with it, spreading it to sources nearby. ...The sheer heat generated from the now burning forest before us creates a heat current underneath the canopy, sending embers and leaves outwards. Having taken a brief moment to survey the spectacle, I turn around and resume pulling Sing by the wrist, tapping an astonished Setsuna on the shoulder as a reminder that we need to keep moving. I tried making Setsuna burn as much mana as she could into that spell to reduce the risk of her being set alight, but because her Mana Regeneration effect is still slowly incrementing, she'll want to stay out of the spreading heat. Ah, what about me? I pluck one of the hundreds of purple-burned leaves out of the air and nibble off a glowing bit. ...I'm immune of course -- no mana to burn. I return the leaf to the air, letting it soar off to start more fires. The fire isn't inextinguishable of course, there are a multitude of skills and spells that can mitigate and douse the fires, but none cheaply nor easily. Even if they do have the resources to fight it, what about the monsters? The sleeping, the massive, the nocturnal and predators will all be seeking to escape the spreading flames. Is it really worth it to stay and fight the fires to find us when it means you'll have to fight even more raging monsters too? Better to just retreat and admit defeat for now, you know? That is -- unless you all want to face my plan's... phase two. ...I hear a rustle behind us. My Eldritch Serendipity rises just one level. To our left, two balls of purple flame suddenly roll past us and into the thicket. Watching closely, I notice the balls have spike layered tails before they disappear. ...Just a few a critters escaping the heat, I think. I breathe out and get back to walking. Now's our opportunity to get to the river to wake up Sing, preferably further down. The idea is to give her a system shock. Expose her monster-mode to something which it has no familiar pre-designated action to select, causing it to just fail entirely. This is also the theorized reason why Agehatate can regain autonomy if she ever fights more than twenty-four people at once. Her raid in Myriad Worlds was designed specifically around twenty-four raiders, so adding one more is like glitching her out. Her attacks just aren't designed to accommodate that many players. Completely submerging her in water would probably also work given her raid normally takes place entirely on land, but I didn't have the courage to confirm that with her when she was teaching us. My Eldritch Serendipity suddenly spikes eight more levels. I whip around and scan the immediate area. ...Looking into the bright purple blaze, I notice faces. Which... is normal, phantom fire is supposed to look creepy and ghoulish, with eyes and mouths noticeable when you stare into it long enough. The Demon King's castle was lit with torches of this stuff. ...So why? Why chill and twist my spine, death sense? What am I doing wrong? Do you want me to walk into the fire instead? 「 ... 」 I glance back to Setsuna, squinting to see me through the fire's light. Newly illuminated, I notice her skin... notably drier. We... really need to get her to the river. I shake my head and get back to- My Eldritch Serendipity rises two more levels. Then it drops one level. Then it rises three levels and drops two. I drive my hand into my chest and breath out. 『 Focus. 』 The overpowering crackle and roar of the flames behind us fills the air. My Eldritch Serendipity now rapidly adjusts its levels multiple times per second. 『 Let's hurry and finish this, Setsuna. 』 I shake my head, faintly hearing a wisp flying somewhere off to our side. With Sing's wrist in hand, once again, I start walking, with Setsuna at our side. I do still try to take more visually obstructed routes but with the fire growing as out of control as it is, the need to do so lessens. The critters we had such a difficult time finding before all crawl from the woodwork. It's an often sight, a flaming purple blob running or flying in the distance or right by us. Unlike regular fire, they will most likely live as the violet fires will eventually extinguish themselves, but I have no doubt it probably feels unpleasant. I would like Setsuna to not have to experience that. Leaning down, I pick up a loose piece of bark off the ground as we walk, and start carving a magic circle just to give Setsuna a place to dump her mana. I'll pick something useful of course, but... probably a little less optimal than if I were to instead let her save her mana for a bigger spell. ...I suddenly find myself yawning. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. The phantom hand suddenly crushes my spine in a death grip. My eyes widen, and my attention snaps to my right. A faceless flaming treant towers over us, emerging from the inferno. 『 ... 』 Before I can react, Setsuna tackles me, knocking the wind out of me. I fall against a tree, losing at least a third of my HP in scrapes. A mere moment later, I feel the ground ripple and shake. I struggle to open my eyes. ...A blurry crater of dirt and wood forms where we once stood. 『 ...Set-? 』 She appears from my peripherals, orange, and crouching low to the ground. She's not facing me, she's instead poised towards the treant. Clang! Thunk! ...Eh? Metal? I blink hard to clear my vision. The creaking and splintering of wood is drowned out in the cacophony of the crackling fire. 「 ...There you are. 」 My heart stops... as my sight returns. A toxic voice bleeds into my ears. Frozen still, and burning alive, a figure stands atop of the flaming treant split in two. Her hair is long, black, and flutters in the immolated wind. Her skin is as pale, her attire regal. She wields a tower shield and heavy blade. Her jaw is decorated with half of a monster's, and her eyes burn cerulean blue.

SING CRIER CH.33 - Ariadyne ...It's Marie. Eldritch Serendipity[LV.84] 62 [END]