Published: September 9, 2025
This is Satou. I often lose track of time when I'm completely absorbed. During MMO version updates, I used to stock up on two days' worth of food for the weekend and dive into the game without even sleeping.
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“Nana! Hold on for a bit. Pochi, Tama, use your demon blades! Let's finish this quickly.”
“This vine! Is it a plant or an animal? Decide already!”
“Demon blades~” “Goo~!”
At Nana’s provocation, the thorn vine feet (Thorn Foot) that crawled like octopus legs toward her wrapped their vines around her body. However, the demon blades enhanced by Liza’s “Sharp Edge” logic art skill quickly sliced through the vines, leaving no chance for the vines to coil around her torso. Honestly, I wish they’d be a bit more seductive about it.
Ignoring my inner thoughts, Pochi and Tama’s demon blades tore through the main thorny vine.
Arisa’s “Spatial Severing «Dimension Cutter»” pierced and cut halfway through the lump on the head part of the Thorn Foot.
Then, a large-caliber magic projectile fired from Lulu’s magic cannon completely blasted off the half-torn lump of the Thorn Foot.
Mia’s “Water Cleave (Water Shred)” took effect, using the bodily fluids flowing beneath the Thorn Foot’s skin to shred its hide to pieces.
Finally, Liza, who had been slicing the Thorn Foot’s leg-like vines with her demon blade, delivered a finishing blow with a spiral spear strike.
“Total victory~!” “Goo~!”
After the battle, I cleaned everyone’s wounds with life magic and quickly healed them with “Healing (Aqua Heal).” Mia handles injuries during fights, but I take care of post-battle treatment.
The Thorn Foot we fought this time was level 30, but we’ve become stable in defeating it.
This is the plant-filled 1-4-9-17 section of the labyrinth. Because entry points vary depending on the route, it got this kind of name. Since it’s long, I’ll just call it the 17th section from now on. Every room here has glowing plant roots hanging from the ceiling, brightening the area. I was curious before and cut one of the roots; its cross-section looked like fiber optics. Probably the roots and stems act as natural fiber optics, capturing external light.
Perhaps because of that, this section has many plant-type monsters: walking vines like the one we just fought; giant trees that shoot acorn-sized nuts like cannonballs; walking corn monsters that fire thumb-sized pellets like machine guns; and carnivorous plant-type monsters that use slime-like tentacles to try capturing prey. All these enemies are roughly level 20 to 30.
An intriguing monster here is the “Walking Bamboo (Ugi),” a deer-like creature made of bamboo. Processing fibers obtained from its bamboo body yields Ugi sugar, a pale green substance resembling matcha. Its horn-like leaves are used as stabilizers for potions. Both the Walking Bamboo and the thorny vines of the Thorn Foot we hunted earlier are ingredients for mid-level potions. The vines rot and become toxic after a few days, so Elf alchemy guides advise local preparation.
Occasionally, demi-goblins and herbivorous monsters appear, but low-level trash mobs are a nuisance, so I dispatch them with guided arrows (remote arrows).
The 9th section before here was a trap heaven full of small insect and slime enemies that specialize in poison, disease, and paralysis attacks. Because of that, no one else but us is in this section. Few past explorers visited, as evidenced by only about 20% the number of signposts compared to other sections.
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“Alright! We did it! That got me to level 27!”
“Nya ha ha~?”
“We did it!”
“Don’t get complacent. It’s all thanks to our master here.”
“Affirmative. Master, much gratitude.”
“Of course, I’m grateful. While we’re hunting, no other enemies come, and right after a short break, suitable enemies show up. The efficiency is top-notch.”
I ignored Arisa’s slightly rude praise.
At the 1-4 section, the enemies were too weak to offer good training, so we pushed a little further. Thanks to the appropriately strong enemies here in the 17th section, leveling up and training became efficient. I was worried about Arisa’s stamina at first, but she says it was because she heavily invested her stats in magic-user attributes. Adjusting those at level-up fixed it to a manageable level. Being able to freely allocate stat increases is something I envy.