Chapter 182: Familiar Taste 2
TL/Editor: Raei
Schedule: 5/Week Wed-Sun
Illustrations: Posted in discord.
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The hesitation was brief and the action immediate.
Relying on my innate warrior instincts, I swung my warhammer with the ease of a golfer swinging a club.
Although I never had weapons training, resorting to the awkward stances I learned during physical education classes in middle and high school, my formidable physique lent power even to these unpolished moves.
With a sound like air bursting, a wave of purple toxic liquid surged forth, engulfing the robbers like a wave in a water park.
What the-?
My eyes!
Senior adventurers, capable of emitting mana outside their bodies, could roll boulders and hurl rocks with more force than crossbow-fired arrows.
Yet, they were flustered by a mere splash of water, clearly not senior adventurers after all.
Some closed their eyes tightly or crouched behind small shields to protect their faces from the poisonous liquid, an immediate but inappropriate reaction in the face of an enemy.
Vanguards, who should have held their ground, either covered their faces or crouched in defense, while archers meant to provide cover were scattering in disarray, afraid of the toxic splash.Ñøv€l-B1n was the first platform to present this chapter.
Really, losing the advantage, just like that.
It was absurd that, even in surprise, they would close their eyes or cover their vision, especially when an armed enemy was less than 10 meters away.
Even without mana enhancement, this distance was close enough for immediate engagement.
Like right now.
Haaah!
In the brief moment when the view was obscured by the purple toxic wave, Katie, having quickly assessed the situation, drew her sword and charged forward.
She gracefully darted over the other side of the toxic pool, moving as elegantly as a dancer.
I was initially surprised at her agility, thinking she had reached a higher level, but a closer look revealed small mounds of earth under her feet.
These discreet platforms had been covertly created by Han Se-ah, who had engaged the robbers in meaningless conversation as a diversion.
Katie's sword, targeting the leader of the robbers, who had his face drenched in toxic liquid and was blindly trying to wipe it off, slid effortlessly through the armor and into his neck.
Despite being a noble lady known as the brat from the north, she was essentially a cold, calculating swordswoman.
Trained with knight orders and tested in a mercenary group, she executed her move without a hint of hesitation.
The only one startled in the midst of this ruthless action was Han Se-ah, who momentarily forgot it was just a game, due to the realism.
Then Grace's arrow precisely pierced the eye of a robber archer, who was clumsily trying to regain his stance.
"What's with these guys? They're way weaker than skeletons?"
"They're probably a band of robbers from the middle layers, targeting those who climb up relying on the temple."
"Ah, really? With the increase in easy and high-paying quests, there's been a surge of intermediate adventurers coming up..."
Maybe the tension of facing other archers for the first time had drained her energy.
However, on the 36th floor, transformed into a poisonous marsh, it was a clear act of suicide.
"Seriously, to think of using a poison pond for cover and then dying from that same poison..."
"A fitting end for criminals who rejected the Goddess's grace. We should just take them to the brothers on the lower floors."
"I'm not sure if these guys were just weak, or if I've improved. I faced four alone and it felt too easy."
With no intention to drag the bodies, we quickly bandaged them and used ropes from our inventory to tie up the robbers, continuing our conversation.
Despite the anticlimactic end of the battle, Irene couldn't hide her irritation, which was rather cute to see.
The only one who seemed oblivious to the mood, or perhaps chose to ignore it, was Katie.
She seemed eager to test her sword skills.
Fortunately, we weren't too far from the passageway to the 35th floor.
We tied the robbers' arms behind their backs and picked up their dropped weapons and shields, which Han Se-ah stashed in her inventory.
With three big bundles, it was obvious we needed to head back to the 35th floor.
"Should we cut off their heads to claim a bounty?"
"We're not handing them over to the city guard but to the temple. Let's just leave the bodies and go."
"Yeah, even if we brought the heads, the brothers on the 35th floor probably wouldn't recognize them."
"Then let's just head back quickly. We haven't strayed far from the passageway, right?"
Han Se-ah was initially shocked by Katie's suggestion to take the robbers' heads, but Grace and Irene intervened.
It's one thing to be in an adult-rated game, but as a streamer, depicting the act of severing and carrying heads is a bit too much.
Han Se-ah, who almost filled her inventory with the dripping heads of the robbers, hurried the group along.
-The stream is on the edge of being shut down, watch out
-It's kinda surreal seeing these beautiful girls debating whether to rip off the heads of robbers
-I remember being freaked out carrying heads around during mercenary play, turns out it's a fantasy culture thing lol
-But even with an adult rating, wouldn't the stream get cut off if it goes too gore?
-Yeah, there was this guy streaming mercenary activities. He got banned for opening up a person's abdomen on the battlefield, labeled as sadistic content.
"Logically, if you start disassembling limbs and showing intestines, obviously you'll get banned... Even horror movie reviewers struggle to edit out gore scenes, let alone doing a live show flaunting organs. The admins will definitely take action against that."
An arrow stuck in the armor or a sword slash between the seams of the armor might be fine.
But, as Han Se-ah said, slicing off heads from dead bodies in front of the stream is definitely not allowed.
"Is Hanna scared of corpses?"
"She might be, she's a mage after all. Even among the brothers, many are reluctant to kill."
"True, killing a monster feels different from killing a person."
This attitude might have been perceived differently by the rest of us.
Grace, who had experienced wandering monsters and robbers in her village in the outskirts; Irene, who had embarked on a pilgrimage and gained various experiences; and Katie, who had risen from the bottom ranks of a mercenary group, might see Han Se-ah as a delicate flower in a greenhouse.
In a desperate effort to save the stream, we ended up adding another misunderstanding about Han Se-ah as we returned to the 35th floor.
