Together with Kuina, Ruhe, and Tindalos, I went to the Transfer arrays hidden in my estate.
The one we were about to use was the one that would bring us to the [Crimson Cavern], the dungeon left behind by the late [Flame] Demon Lord. It was a place I used to level up my monsters. Due to the innumerable [Maelstroms] present in the dungeon, it would never completely run out of monsters for us to defeat.
Speaking of which, because I had gathered just enough DP recently, I bought another one for the Darkness Dragons, increasing the total to two.
If a monster could be bought with DP, a [Maelstrom] could be bought for it for a price equal to 100 times the cost of the said monster. In exchange for that, the [Maelstrom] would forever produce one of that particular monster each day for no additional cost.
That was great and all, but I had discovered that [Maelstroms] had some shortcomings.
First off, the monsters it made could only have static levels.
Secondly, not all monsters could have [Maelstroms]. In my trials, I had found out that I couldn’t buy a [Maelstrom] for the Mythological Foxes, Dwarf Smiths, High Elves, or the Ocean Singers. On the other hand, both the Darkness Dragons and Hippogriffs were eligible.
Based on those results, I had conjectured that [Maelstroms] couldn’t be bought for humanoid races. By the way, this was another of the reasons I chose not to use [Person] when I made Tindalos.
“Oto-san, let’s go call the crow!”
Kuina merrily announced so.
The crow she was referring to was the monster I received from the [Time] Demon Lord. It could use [Transfer], so we had been relying on it whenever we wanted to go to the [Crimson Cavern] or some other place.
“Actually, we don’t need to anymore. After all, we can just ask Tiro to help us.”
As I had remarked before, Tiro was wonderful.
On top of being able to go to and from the other dimension and controlling time, she could even use [Transfer].
Thanks to her, we no longer needed to rely on the crow monster whom we knew was a spy for the [Time] Demon Lord.
He might be an ally for the moment, but he’s the kind of fellow I can’t let my guard down to.
“Tiro, would you please use [Transfer]?”
“Garuu!”
Tiro enthusiastically answered like that.
She was currently in her black hound form. I much preferred it if she stayed in this form, but given her capricious personality, that was unlikely. Worse yet, there was no telling when she would transform.
At any rate, she approached the Transfer array, sat on top of it, concentrated, and then poured some magic power. The rest of us followed suit and entered the array. A moment later, the array shone and the floating sensation peculiar to [Transfer] enveloped my body.
◇
Like that, we arrived at the Transfer array placed in the [Crimson Cavern].
It was pretty much a volcano dungeon, so it was quite hot.
“Everyone, come near Kuina.”
“Gau!”
“Phew. Thanks. It was so hot, I thought I was gonna die.”
“Yeah, thanks, Kuina.”
It got cooler when I went near Kuina. This was made possible through her power over fire which, to put it crudely, allowed her to control the amount of heat of things.
On sultry nights, Rorono and Aura would even sneak into Kuina’s room and sleep there. In fact, due to that well-maintained temperature, I too enjoyed sleeping beside her and hugging her like a pillow.
Even now in this volcano dungeon, her ability was proving mighty useful.
“Tiro, you’re an S rank monster, but you’re still at level 1. I prohibit you from attacking a C rank monster or above, you hear?”
“Gau!”
What a wise kid. Obedient too. It seems like she got what I was trying to say.
“Kuina, if ever a C rank monster or stronger appears, I want you to take care of it.”
“Leave it to Kuina!”
Kuina, taking on her role as the eldest, energetically replied so.
For the most part, the strongest monsters in this dungeon were C rank monsters.
That was due to the fact that most monsters here were born from [Maelstroms], and as stated before, [Maelstroms] could only produce monsters that were eligible for purchase with DP. For a monster to be eligible for purchase, another monster that was at least two ranks above it and of the same lineage must first be made through [Synthesis].
Most Demon Lords could make only up to A rank monsters, so the most a [Maelstrom] could offer them were C rank monsters. Meanwhile, I could reliably make S rank monsters, so I had easy access to B rank monsters.
As to be expected, the difference between B rank monsters and C rank monsters were huge, thus giving me an overwhelming advantage.
That reminds me, I bet Stolas has already bought a [Maelstrom] for the monster unlocked by her Storm Dragon Knight Bahamut.
In my estimation, my Black Dragon of Death Siegwurm and her Storm Dragon Knight Bahamut were on par with each other. If I was correct, it stood to reason that the monster two ranks below her Storm Dragon Knight Bahamut was also on par with the Darkness Dragon Graphross.
If she had bought a [Maelstrom] right away, then in half a year’s time, she could possibly have nearly 200 B rank monsters at her disposal.
If I have Stolas as an ally, we’ll be quite powerful, wouldn’t we?
I would say about 90% of all Demon Lords had B rank medals, which meant the most powerful monster they could make through [Synthesis] on their own was just a B rank monster.
Given the regular rules of [Synthesis], they weren’t even guaranteed that. If two medals of the same rank were used, there was only 2/3 chance the created monster would be of those medals’ rank. The other 1/3 chance, however, could make the new monster have one rank lower. And if they somehow obtained an A rank medal, a [Synthesis] using that and their B rank medal would only have 1/3 chance of yielding an A rank monster.
For those reasons, Demon Lords who had B rank medals considered B rank monsters as their elites while D rank monsters made by [Maelstroms] composed the bulk of their forces.
To be blunt, from Stolas and my own perspective, most individual Demon Lords could be considered small fries already. The quality of our forces was just so great, it was more than enough to compensate for the fact that they had years ahead of us in terms of preparations.
In retrospect, giving Stolas that [Creation] medal was truly the correct decision.
Maybe it’s wise to also give the next member of our faction a [Creation] medal. That way, we’ll all have [Maelstroms] that can mass produce B rank monsters. Alright, I’m going to reserve the next medal I make for that purpose.
For whatever reason, [Viscosity] Demon Lord Ronove’s face popped into my head, and it just might not be the worst idea ever.
As a Demon Lord, he could make aquatic monsters and also slimes.
And slimes were the embodiment of potential. Its lower-class species were pretty much synonymous with the term small fry, but the same couldn’t be said about high-class slime species. I had even heard of rumors saying there was an [Infinitely Evolving Slime] somewhere out there.
If I gave him a [Creation] medal, he could make an S rank slime and an army of B rank slimes. In my opinion, that was a reliable ally.
Of course, I knew that in terms of war potential, intellect, or whatever else, it was probably better to look for another Demon Lord to add to our faction, but the thing about [Viscosity] Demon Lord Ronove was that he was good people and incapable of treachery.
The worst that could happen was that he would sit on his hand, wasting away the [Creation] medal and all its benefits. If I could prevent that from happening, recruiting him to our faction was a valid option.
“Oto-san, you look serious. What’s wrong?”
“Oh, nothing. Sorry, I just got lost in thought. Now then, let’s focus on Tiro’s hunt.”
It was a bad habit of mine, to go from thought to thought.
Nevertheless, the idea of recruiting him was definitely something worth considering.
“Okay, let’s move forward! We’ll be counting on you, Kuina.”
“Gaugau!”
Kuina had often come here leading others, so she had somehow grown accustomed to being a leader. In fact, it was fair enough to say that she was the one that trained both Aura and Ruhe.
The person herself felt she was next to useless outside of combat, but these kinds of things proved exactly how useful she was.
◇
Through Kuina’s guidance, we reached a dungeon room where we could efficiently take down many monsters.
The dungeon room in question was the inside of a cave filled with many rock formations. These rock formations were as tall as I was and was littered all over the place, creating blind spots.
However, thanks to the lack of lava, thus the better footing among other things, it was quite easy to fight here.
The moment we entered the dungeon room, I felt many eyes staring at us.
“There’s lots of D rank monsters here. They’ll be great for leveling up Tiro-chan!”
Like that, Tiro took a step forward to sniff and look at the surroundings.
It seemed like the many monsters here were hiding behind the rock formations, waiting for their chance to strike.
One foolish monster had its tail jutting out, so I used my Demon Lord powers to look at its status.
Race: Fire Salamander
D rank
Name: Unnamed
Level: 35
Physical Strength: C
Endurance: D
Agility: C+
Magic: E
Luck: D
Special: E
Skills:
Fire resistance
Camouflage
Fire Breath
It was a small fry monster without anything worth mentioning.
However, the danger with them was their numbers. Once we got close to the rock formations, it was likely that the Fire Salamanders hiding there would attack us all at once.
At any rate, seemingly done with reconnaissance, Tiro looked down at the rock at her feet. Not even a moment later, she jumped head-first into that rock and vanished.
Actually, she didn’t vanish. To be more accurate, she dove into the other dimension using the acute angle present in the said rock.
The next thing I knew, a Fire Salamander hiding behind a rock a few meters ahead fell into the ground and died. Its head was missing.
Aside from using the ever-present acute angles as entrances to the other dimension, her skill used it as exit points as well. When exiting, the skill allowed her to pretty much teleport to any acute angles within a certain range.
In other words, it was the strongest ambushing skill.
Right after surprising and decapitating her prey, Tiro dove back to the other dimension using a nearby acute angle, repeating the process over and over.
The Fire Salamanders, who were waiting to ambush us, had no clue on what was happening, and yet their heads were flying one after another. They weren’t even able to perceive Tiro’s presence.
Looking at the nightmarish scene unfolding before me, I gulped down my own saliva.
Her skill was much, much more terrific than I anticipated.
Coupling the teleportation blind spot attack with her insane stats—Physical Strength S and Agility S+—it was a genuine one-hit fatal attack.
I couldn’t picture a way to prevent such an unreasonable attack. Those that didn’t know about it would be killed without much resistance. Those that knew about it would forever be on guard which was impossible as sooner or later there would be a miniscule gap in their defense and that would be all that was needed to kill them. Meanwhile, Tiro had the option to simply stay in the other dimension and wait until that opportunity presented itself.
After leveling up enough, she was going to become invincible. This hunt has reaffirmed that belief.
By the way, Tiro’s sense of smell was fantastic. Even though she wasn’t able to use [Supreme Hunter] as it required visual confirmation of the target first, she was able to locate all of the hiding Fire Salamanders with just her excellent sense of smell.
Anyway, after finishing the last of the Fire Salamanders, Tiro returned to us via the acute angle in the pebble on the ground.
She was carrying the head of a Fire Salamander in her mouth. When she was near enough, she dropped it in front of me.
“Gau!”
With her tail wagging and a triumphant look on her face, Tiro barked so.
She seemed like she wanted to be praised, so I petted her head. When I did so, she hummed sweetly.
“You’re so amazing, Tiro-chan!”
Kuina excitedly praised Tiro like that. An absurd battle like that was definitely worth a praise.
“Kuina, if ever you and Tiro fought, how would you go about it?”
Kuina was one of my strongest monsters, if not the strongest. So, it got me thinking of what kind of methods she would employ against Tiro.
“Hmm… First of all, Kuina will melt everything a few meters around me. That way, there’ll be no nearby angles. I’m sure I can make it smooth and all curvy, even the ground. If I have a few meters of that, I have nothing to worry about ‘cause then I’ll have enough time to react with my [Ultra-rapid Reaction].”
I see. Removing all acute angles in the vicinity is definitely possible for a first-rate monster like her.
“Plus, Rorono-chan and Aura-chan can just fly up to the sky and make that the battlefield. There won’t be any acute angles there.”
“It seems it’s not as undefeatable as I thought, but she should still be extremely hard to counter if the enemy didn’t know anything.”
I decided that we should keep details of Tiro’s skills a secret as much as possible. Particularly the fact that she used acute angles to enter and exit the other dimension.
“Yup! Although, I think I can still win against her even if I knew nothing.”
“How?”
“Let’s see. The moment she bites my head, I can focus my magic power into my head to harden it. And then, before she tears it off, I would have shot her in the gut with my shotgun! So, yeah, I’ll probably be fine!”
Kuina was impressive as always.
Contrary to her appearance of being a cute little girl, she was actually already a veteran soldier who has survived countless of battles before. Being one of Avalon’s strongest wasn’t just for show.
“Anyway, good job, Tiro. Do you still have enough magic power to go on?”
“Gau!”
The person herself said she could still go on, so we hunted a little bit more.
Due to the large number of enemies defeated and also to the fact that she was still just at level 1, she leveled up a lot all at once.
At that point, I remembered Rorono’s request and made a digital camera using [Creation].
It was for recording the next battle.
According to Rorono, if she was able to see how Tiro fought, an idea for Tiro’s equipment might come to her.
After seeing Tiro fight myself, I thought she would like to have a close-range weapon with high offense capabilities.
Now, to properly record her next fight. Incidentally, why don’t I record Kuina too? So that someday, far into the future, we’ll have something to look back on and smile at.
“Kuina, Tiro, let’s go to the next spot, okay? Let’s go level up a whole lot more today!”
“Yay~ ♪”
“Gaugau!”
Like that, we hunted in the [Crimson Cavern] until it got late.
Afterwards, we returned to Avalon. Because of all that moving and fighting, we decided to eat.
To double as the celebration for Tiro joining our ranks, we should eat luxuriously tonight!
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