Chapter 20
"Not exactly what I had in mind, but it'll do." Issei muttered as he placed the helmet on his head and drew the hood over it. Picking his swords up again, he moved around the chest and started up the stairs carefully. He would have to find a way to raise his MP by quite a bit to use the spells he knew effectively; at the moment, using his defensive spells alone would drain him dry of MP in just over a minute if you included the initial MP used to activate said skills.
At the top of the stairs, there was a square entry room with nothing in it that had one door leading out of it. Nailed onto the top of it was a sign written in very crude English.
"'Hooman-thinks. Entr + die-die! Yoo hve bin wrned!'" Issei read with a grimace. Even he had better English writing skills than that and he was at the dead middle of the class.
"[Lesser Barrier Shield]" he muttered as he opened the door and stepped through cautiously. No sooner had the red and green circular barrier flickered into place than a loud [BANG!] echoed and a green missile slammed into the energy shield, cracking it.
"Crap!" Issei cursed, cancelling the shield and dodging behind a stone pillar just in time to avoid another bullet. Peering around the corner, he spotted a pair of ratmen furiously reloading a pair of crudely-built long-muzzled guns while another pair stood in front of them holding a pair of triangular shields.
'What the heck kind of weird guns are they?' Issei thought before he ducked behind the pillar again as the muzzles of the weapons were pointed at him again.
Ratman Jezailier LV 10
[Not-so-Sharpshooter]
Ratman Shielder LV10
[Fair Weather Protector]
A Jezail? What the heck was one of those things when they were at home? Obviously some kind of one-shot gun, but when had the ratmen gotten their hands on guns?!
The Shielder was acting as both protection and as a platform for the Jezail wielder, as the rifle was too long and unwieldy for the ratman to aim properly without something to lean the body of the weapon on, so the thing to do was to eliminate them first.
The problem was, his list of long range attacks were very limited. He could use [Knife Throwing], but the damage would be minimal and he only had about five knives left in his inventory. Other than that, the only skill he had that was usable here was the [Earth Shot] spell.
Issei winced as two more bullets slammed into the pillar he was hiding behind and started counting in his head. He stopped when another pair of bullets slammed into his hiding place.
'About forty seconds. That should be long enough for me to go out, blast one of the Shielders and then get under cover again.' The Sekiryūtei thought, 'I'll move when they both fire again.'
When the two Jezails barked their payloads again, Issei moved fast. He, pulled his hood down, leapt out and pointed a sword at the shield-user on the right.
"[Earth Shot]!"
In front of him, a large lump of earth appeared and formed into a bullet-shape before hurtling at the target, smashing through the shield and removing the head of the ratman that held it. The nerveless corpse thudded to the floor along with the broken shield it had supported.
You have slain a [Ratman Shielder]! You gain 130 EXP!
You have inflicted the [Cumbersome] status on a [Ratman Jezailier]!
Dodging to the pillar on the other side just in time to dodge the panicked shot from the other Jezail, Issei grinned. That took care of one of them. He reached out to the window and tapped the [Cumbersome] status to see what it did.
[Cumbersome] (Passive)
Someone inflicted with this status has been overweighed with equipment or an oversized weapon, resulting in movement being reduced by 40% and accuracy reduced by 30% due to the weight of the weapon/armour.
Considering that the accuracy of the Ratmen mustn't be all that high to begin with, that meant that one of the Jezails might as well be shooting blanks. He could handle the remaining one alone.
"[Lesser Barrier Shield]!" Issei snarled as he came out from cover. The shield materialised again, intercepting the bullet from the one remaining Jezail user that had a Shielder. The other one shot wide.
Rushing forwards, he sent another [Earth Shot] at the Shielder, killing it. As the two gun-wielding Ratmen panicked, Issei got in amongst them, disembowelling the one on the right and beheading the one on the left.
You have slain a [Ratman Shielder]! You earn 130 EXP!
You have slain X2 [Ratman Jezailiers]! You earn 300 EXP!
Do you wish to loot the bodies, including the one slain prior to the above?
Yes/No
Hitting 'Yes,' Issei watched as the list formed up.
X2 Warplock Jezails
X2 Magiscopes
X2 Shattered Triangular Pavise
X4 Ragged Leather Tunics
X2 Lesser MP Potions
X1 Skill Book (Unknown Skill)
¥758
Considering he'd seen the familiar shine of Warpstone on the Jezails, Issei didn't want anything to do with them. He marked the Jezails, the useless shields and the tunics for sale, earning him another ¥2367. Then he pulled one of the MP potions out of his inventory and [Observed] it.
[Lesser MP Potion]
A common potion used by apprentice-level magicians and other magic users. While weak, it is commonly used due to the fact it can be created by even a beginner potioneer.
- Rarity: Very Common
- Restores 150 MP when drunk.
When he drunk it, Issei almost spat it out. It tasted like concentrated wasabi and miso! It did work though, filling his MP back up to a full tank again in an instant. Then he turned his attention to the Skill Book, aware that he could only acquire one more Skill from a Skill Book today.
[You have acquired the [Tier 1 Earth Magic: Small Pit of Spikes] Skill Book]
Do you wish to learn this?
Yes/No
At this point in time, no.
Hitting 'No,' he stowed the book into his inventory before having a look around the passage he was in. It was fairly narrow, with four pillars set into the walls at intervals. It being narrow would prevent enemies from jinking around to throw off the aim of the Jezails, but that advantage was negated by the pillars acting as ready-made cover.
You receive +1 INT for a well thought out deduction!
Shut up!
Issei then had a look at the Magiscopes. They were why he had been attacked even with his Cloak fully deployed, as they granted the skills [Mage Sight] and [Awareness Amplification] to anyone who looked through them. If all the Jezails had those things, this would be a pain in the ass dungeon to clear.
Flipping his hood on again nevertheless, Issei moved forwards cautiously. The doorway into the next room was open and this made him suspicious. Peeking into the next room, he spotted his next opponents, four of them. Organised into teams of two, they each carried a weapon between them.
One was clearly a flamethrower of some kind, demonstrated by the fact the one carrying the business-end unleashed it at a Giant Rat, green flames engulfing the hapless rodent, leaving only a charred skeleton behind. The other ratman carried a large wooden tank on its back, which presumably held the fuel for the weapon, and was connected by a heavily patched leather hose to the rear of the flamethrower.
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