Chapter 41

Or human fat.

Shaking his head at the morbid, but all-too-likely, thought, the Sekiryūtei continued down the stairs, tense and ready for a sneak attack. He wouldn't put it past the ninja-eske ratmen of Clan Eshin to stage a sneak attack on him amidst the dim light of the torches.

"[Force Absorption Field], [Bronze Skin]." He muttered as he brought his two main defensive spells online. It never hurt to be careful.

At the bottom of the stairs was, as usual, a round room with a chest in the centre of it. Opening it, Issei found three things in it; a skill book, a sword and a necklace. He decided to see what the sword was first.

It was a short sword, keeping with his current specialisation. He had watched a few movies set in Ancient Rome and recognised a gladius when he saw one. It was a rather beautiful sword with a polished blade and red-dyed wood inlaid with what looked like ivory on the hilt. When Issei tilted the blade, he saw a red tint to the metal.

[Bloodmetal Gladius]

A gladius forged from Bloodmetal. It naturally synchronises with draconic energy and is a suitable channel for it and human magic. The true worth of this blade is the increased learning speed that its wielder will be under whilst wielding it.

Durability: 80/80

Short Sword

Slash Damage: S+26

Pierce Damage: S+17

Effect: 1) While wielding the Bloodmetal Gladius, the wielder gains an additional 5% EXP to all Short Sword related skills, with a 10% chance with every skill level to randomly generate a Short Sword Skill. If one is generated, another will not be generated for at least 24 hours afterwards.

2) Any magic ability used by the wielder that affects the blade has is effects raised by 5.

"Whoa…!" he breathed. This was an excellent sword, even better than his [Rapscallion Wave Blade]. Quickly stowing it in his inventory for later, Issei moved on to the skill book.

[You have acquired the 'Lesser Golem Creation' skill book]

Do you wish to learn this?

Y|N

Not at the moment. He put it away in his inventory. Last was the necklace. It was in the form of an eye, which was a bit creepy.

[Necklace of the Secret Hunter's Eye]

A must-have item for anyone seeking to delve into a dungeon, this necklace allows the wearer to spot basic traps instantly, as well as raising the chance to detect intermediate level and above traps by 15%. Additionally, any hidden compartments and/or secret rooms have their entrances highlighted. There will be no hints on how to open the doors, however.

Now this was what he was talking about! This was a really good item!

Issei paused. 'Given that my [Gamer's Gear] seems to be giving me things that I will need, rather than anything else, I can foresee a lot of traps, secret passages and hidden compartments in my future. Just brilliant I don't think!'

Slipping the necklace on, he absently noticed that his [Poison Resistance] Skill had levelled up again. At least this poisonous environment was going to do wonders for that skill.

Casually looking around the room briefly to double check that no secret passages existed here, Issei then moved out of the room and into the corridor. The passage was narrow and carved from rock, or so it seemed. This was impossible, as he wasn't down far enough in the earth to be in rock, but he just rolled with it. One more supposedly impossible thing like this wasn't going to unnerve him after all of the crap he had been through since that nutjob almost killed him.

'Haa…it's amazing what a human can get used to if given enough time.' Issei mused wryly. He stepped into the first room on the other side of the corridor…and was confronted by fifty ratmen. Not just any ratmen, these were Ratman Slaves, easily the most disposable troops that they had. Still, even ants could overwhelm an elephant with sufficient numbers.

Ratman Slave LV6

[Scumbiter]

"Like hell! Let's go!" Issei shouted and charged forwards bearing his blades. The poorly equipped Slaves, armed with clubs made from rotting wood and rusted copper swords and with only threadbare tunics covering their bent and deformed bodies, were not close to being a match for Issei one-on-one. Hell, even five-on-one.

Each swipe of his swords caused spurts of blood to jet from falling Ratman Slaves, shattering their pathetic excuses for weapons without so much as a pause. It barely took two lazy strikes to kill each one and he danced around the panicking and desperate Slaves with speed they couldn't hope to match. Even with the extra levels they had gained, these disposable minions were far and truly outclassed.

Unfortunately, the amount of EXP he received from each Slave reflected their cannon fodder status…a measly 10 EXP per Ratman Slave. While that would add up to 500 EXP once he'd finished killing them, it wasn't a lot given that Clanrats were usually gave at least 100 EXP when he killed them.

Of course, Issei wasn't having entirely his own way. He was being it by staves, whacked by clubs and clumsily stabbed by pitted swords. All of them bounced off of his armour, naturally, but the odd point of HP was lost with every strike. This was in addition to the continuing damage from the poisoned atmosphere. This raised a question for Issei; why was it that the ratmen were perfectly fine in this kind of environment while he was getting poisoned?

[Poison Resistance] has levelled up! LV3-LV4!

One of Issei's eyes twitched underneath his Menpō. This had to be the fastest any of his skills had ever levelled up. Just how poisonous was this air?!

Once the last Ratman Slave fell…

You have slain Ratman Slave X50! You earn 500EXP!

Do you wish to loot the bodies? Y|N

Issei severely doubted that there would be anything remotely approaching decent on the bodies of these things, but he hit 'Y' anyway. If nothing else, he could sell the stuff for Yen.

As expected, the stuff was rubbish, all 'rotted', 'rusted', 'splintered', or 'rotted, rusted, and splintered' if applicable. Altogether, he barely got ¥1000 for over 100 pieces of equipment. Barely enough to buy a couple of burger meal sets at a fast food place.

Looking around at the room full of ratman corpses, Issei had to sigh. He was getting far too used to this sort of thing.

Without a word, he examined the Durability status of his two swords and snorted. They were almost fully used up, with two or three DP left each. He stabbed them into the ground and pulled out two more from his inventory before heading out of the room through the other side of the room, leaving a scene of carnage and two swords behind to serve as a makeshift grave marker for the fallen fodder.

Pausing just inside the doorway, Issei's eyes narrowed as he spotted several glowing squares on the floor. He guessed that these were traps revealed by his new necklace, but were they the triggers or were they the actual traps?

Grabbing a stone from the floor, Issei lobbed it at the square furthest away from him. As soon as the stone touched the glowing square, the ceiling dropped down on it. Not the entire ceiling, but a four square foot, three meter long chunk of it.

"Okaaaayyyy….going to have to watch my step here." Issei sweatdropped. That would likely kill him, HP or not.

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