Otome Game no Heroine de Saikyou Survival [WN] - Chapter 51
Journey to Royal Capital
Rank 4 adventurer party, Mercenary of Dawn.
The members of the party were Rank 4 warriors, Daggart. Male, 31 years old. Red hair.
Randy, a Rank 3 heavy warrior. Male, 29 years old. Blonde hair.
Rank 3 scout, former hunter Duncan. Male, age 30. Black hair.
Rank 3 sorceress, Glenda. Fire and water attributes. Female, 26 years old. Daggart’s mistress.
They were my target. They embezzled the commissioned goods they were supposed to recover, and their nobleman, who absconded with a magic tool pendant that belonged to his family, asked the Assassins’ Guild to assassinate them and recover the commissioned goods.
If I intended to antagonize the Assassins Guild, there would be no need to assassinate them, but this time a liaison would be dispatched to the Royal Capital from the Assassins Guild, so I should refrain from any suspicious behavior now to catch the Guild off guard.
On that note, I was glad they were the bad guys. I would have also been offended if someone took away my family’s belongings. I gently clutched the amulet bag that was my mother’s memento while thinking so.
Mercenary of Dawn was a well-balanced party, though small for a typical party. With their strength, they would be able to dive deep into the dungeon.
If they did so, it would be difficult for me to catch up with them alone. If I wanted to get rid of them safely, I should do so at the Royal Capital or at a town south of the Royal Capital where there was a dungeon, but if I could not catch up with them by then, I would have to wait until they came back to replenish their supplies.
Even so, the most reliable place to take them down was the dungeon.
Royal Capital was too safe, but also very dangerous in its own way.
But in a dungeon, I would be in danger, and so would they. The more danger there was, the easier it was to create an opening.
It was my bad habit to think ahead of time. However, if I had prepared countermeasures for various situations beforehand, I would be able to take immediate action when it actually happened.
Even so, I should act first, rather than thinking about various things at a distance right now.
Assumptions could easily change depending on the local environment and circumstances. I needed detailed information to improve the accuracy of the possibilities I had considered.
I stayed in the city where this Northern Division was located for three days, making preparations at the guild and in the city before departing for the Royal Capital.
Even during those three days, I could not find out who the contact person was. I would be contacted there, but all I wanted to know was how many liaisons there were.
As long as they were there, I must not act strangely. If I failed to take out more than one liaison, my treachery would be exposed.
I could only hope that they are at least manageable…
There were two ways to get to the Royal Capital from this Count Hedel’s territory.
One was the relatively safe route Elena must have used, which was the main road along the coast from Count Centralia, where we worked last time.
The other was a dangerous but quicker route that went straight south from Dandol through a mountainous canyon.
I would, of course, take the dangerous canyon road.
If I used a special fast carriage like Elena did, I think the main road by the sea would get me there faster. However, it would take about a month and a half to get there on foot or by horse-drawn carriage that stops at various places.
It was actually not impossible for ordinary horse-drawn wagons to pass through the canyon, but the appearance of many bird-like monsters made it so.
Thus, only peddlers escorted by Dandol’s guards would go through the canyon once a month.
Ordinary commoners could buy a bill issued by Dandol to get a seat in a peddler’s wagon, but the bill was costly, so only a few people used it because there were other routes which were safer and cheaper as long as they didn’t mind the time.
Besides, since it was once a month, if the timing was not right, I would have to wait quite a while for the next departure, and there was no way I could use it. Moreover, I also wanted to avoid Dandol, as people there knew my face.
I spent another ten days or so traveling south through several noble domains that were parcels of the Dandol frontier counts and arrived at a barony near the mountainous region.
As a commoner, I didn’t spend much money unless I stopped at a big town. Even so, I paid one silver coin as a toll to enter the last town and bought food and other necessities. Then I asked for information about monsters at the adventurers’ guild in that town. The staff member, who had lamented that the guild here was the kind of place where hunters only bring in materials when they hunt monsters that get in their way, and that there were few full-time adventurers, gave me quite a bit of detail.
There were several types of monsters that appeared in the canyon, but as expected, high-rank monsters such as griffons had not been confirmed to appear for the past decade or so, since a strike force was immediately sent out to take them down. In the first place, they targeted horses, so if they could target travelers on foot, they might also target cows at a ranch.
If you were going through that canyon on foot, the problem was the small and medium-sized bird monsters.
The Wind Bird was a falcon that preyed on its prey by slicing it into pieces with incredible speed, and the Giant Crow was a crow that caught travelers and brought them back to its nest as a food supply.
The small Wind Bird was a Rank 1 monster, and the medium-sized Giant Crow was a Rank 2 monster, but when it came to the difficulty level assumed by the Adventurers’ Guild, the Wind Bird was a Rank 2 monster and the Giant Crow was a Rank 3 monster.
This was because the location was a canyon with no obstacles or ceiling, and the opponent was a bird.
It was difficult for an adventurer Rank 1 or 2 to even hit it with an arrow, and even a Rank 2 or 3 Warrior would have to come down to attack it.
If you wanted to hunt them properly, you needed a magician who could use offensive wind magic, and it was difficult to hunt the monsters in the canyon unless your party could prepare a shield to protect the magician.
…normally.
The canyon was about 10 meters wide at the widest point, and the cliffs were about 50 meters high, so it was dimly lit except at midday.
But if I could find a way to overcome the darkness, I would be safer in the dark hours. Since they were monsters, they could sense my presence and attack me, but still, because of their bird’s-eye vision, their detection range became narrower when it was dark.
On the way to get here, I had been traveling while training a certain dark magic, but it was still difficult to activate it, and as I was practicing while walking in this canyon, the sun had risen directly above me, illuminating the canyon, and soon the monster finally found me.
“…It’s here.”
My ears caught a slight whistling sound of wind, and a moment later, my detection skills also caught a small presence approaching from behind.
Reflexively twisting and shifting my body to look up, I avoided and brandished my black knife as I passed by it, but the owner of the presence also avoided the blade as it spun around and turned in the sky as if to sneer at me.
Wind Birds, which were falcon-like creatures, never acted alone but in groups to attack humans.
It was hard to hit a flying opponent with a knife, after all. If they could maneuver like that, they would have to rely on luck to see if they could hit you even if you threw a knife at them.
Meanwhile, a second Wind Bird attacked from right next to me.
It was probably as fast as an arrow shot from the bow. It would be difficult to spot a Wind Bird with the naked eye in a proper fight, but the Wind Bird only slowed down for a split second before it moved to attack.
I concentrated on using my detection so as not to miss that moment and threw my blade at one of the Wind Birds that attacked me again.
The Wind Bird spun in midair to avoid the blade, after which I manipulated the string of the pendulum I threw at it.
[Gigyaaah!]
Wind Bird, its wings were cut by the pendulum’s blade, which later hit the ground with great force. I didn’t even need to give it a finishing blow. There was no way it would be safe if it were to fall to the ground at that speed.
I threw the pendulum from my left hand as well, and with a curved trajectory instead of a straight line, I slashed the wings of the other Wind Bird that had attacked me again.
Not wanting to stand in the same place, I used complicated footwork to avoid the Wind Bird’s attack, and used a curved attack with the pendulum’s blade to drop the Wind Bird.
I didn’t care if I missed. A 30% hit rate with the blade was good enough. However, even if the blade was avoided, it was meaningless unless the threads that controlled it were also avoided, and the threads of the Giant Spider, strengthened with my magical power, could not be cut through even with the Wind Bird’s claws.
When a dozen or so Wind Bird fell in a few minutes after having their wings cut off and hitting the threads, one of the Wind Bird, which had stopped approaching me and was circling above me, sent a [wind color] magical element flying at me.
The name Wind Bird was not a joke, and these guys could use [Wind Cutter], which was a Level 1 wind magic.
Wind magic had speed and was invisible, so it was difficult to avoid. However, with my eyes, which could see the color of the magic element, it was not difficult to avoid if there was enough distance between us.
With Wind Bird’s magical power, I could shoot only once or twice. After two shots, the Wind Bird would run out of magic power and its speed would also drop dramatically, so the [Wind Cutter] would be the Wind Bird’s most powerful move.
One of the Wind Birds, annoyed by my continued dodging, attacked me and fired a [Wind Cutter] at me at close range.
“–[Magic Shield]–“
A Shield of Light of about 30 centimeters had materialized in my left hand.
I pressed the Magic Shield with the least amount of magic power against the darkest part of the approaching wind elemental, and while deflecting it at an angle, I slashed the wings of the Wind Bird that came straight at me with a black knife.
Most of the Wind Bird that had attacked were dropped, and the few that had lost their magical power flew away into the sky as if fleeing–
[Kaaaaaaah!!!]
Did they realize they were no match for me, or were they afraid of this?
A high-pitched cry echoed through the canyon, and a huge black bird spread its wings and swooped down, as if darkness was cutting through the canyon sky.
[Giant Crow] [Race: Raven] [Difficulty: Rank 3]
[Magic Power: 69/73] [Strength: 212/215]
[Total Combat Power: 145]
A Giant Crow, with its wings flapping over four meters, came straight at me.
I threw my pendulum blades from both hands, wanting to intercept it, but the blades only slightly scratched the black feathers and were repelled.
At that moment, I manipulated the thread with my fingertips and [manipulative thread] and wrapped the thread of the pendulum around the black wing as it was.
[Kuaaaaaaaah!!!]
The Giant Crow noticed this and let out a cry of rage, flapping its wings to take me away into the sky with the pendulum thread.
But I would not let that happen. I pulled the thread hard enough to interrupt his flapping wings, quickly clapped the heels of my boots together, and kicked the blade that flew out of my boot into a nearby rock.
The boots, which had been given to me by my master and which she had used in the past, were crafted so that when I impacted the heel from a certain direction, a small blade would fly out from the toe and heel.
The heel blades would anchor me to the ground, and I would be able to pull the strings with my full-body strength, putting all my weight on them.
I was still only a 2 in terms of overall Rank, but several of my auxiliary skills had risen to Level 3.
With Level 3 [Control Magic], I channeled magic power throughout my body, and with Level 3 [Intimidate], I stopped Giant Crow’s movement for a moment…
[Kaaaaaaah!!!]
“Taaaaah!!!”
While being dragged by the inertia of the ground rock by rock, I had put all my strength into it and slammed the Giant Crow, which was screaming in terror, head first into the ground.
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Also check out my other novels: Reincarnated into a Game as the Hero’s Friend, Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear, and A Girl Who Was Told “You Have No Talent” Turned Out To Be A Talented Monster