CH 255

Potential

30 mins since we began walking on the footholds made with the help of Esta’s ice magic.

The water level begun to rise, and it became deep enough that a single person alone couldn’t do much about it.

“From here onwards, I don’t think any of us could manage it alone Chris-san. What do we do?”

“Then you all want to work together from here? Or should we raise it to two magicians, while 1 rests?”

Esta asked me, but I wasn’t sure what the best course of action was either.

The three magicians themselves should have a better idea anyway, so rather than me deciding it by myself, it was better for them to choose how to proceed from now.

“Esta can use a lot more magic than I originally thought, and Fecilia-san is obviously very strong herself. I think 2 of us can freeze the water to make a foothold while the other can rest, right?”

“I agree with that as well. But honestly, I could do it alone too so we can switch between myself and then Mielle-san and Esta-san as one team.”

Mielle’s suggestion seemed the quiet reasonable but Fecilia instead offered an even bolder plan.

Certainly, Fecilia’s magic was more skilled and powerful than both Esta and Mielle. Even I could tell that from simply watching so I’m sure she could manage making a foothold all by herself but……

I wasn’t so sure if it was the right decision to put so much burden on just one person alone.

No matter how good of a magician she may be, the amount of mana she has is finite.

Esta and Mielle seemed a bit troubled by this suggestion as well, so I was going to butt in and suggest something but at that very moment—

Snow, who had been watching these three silently from the side for a while, suddenly howled.

“Snow, what’s wrong?”

“Aurf! Aurf!!”

Snow pulled on Esta’s hem and dragged her to the front, and while standing beside her, it took a an intimidating looking forward bent posture and then, just like the three magicians, began to freeze the muddy water around us and made a new platform.

“Snow, amazing! Not just ice elemental attacks, you’ve even become capable of using wide area based ice element skills!?”

“……..Now this is a surprise. On top of being cute and being good at enemy detection, it can even use Ice magic? Isn’t this child way too amazing!?”

“I am surprised as well. The quality of this ice platform is in no way lacking to either of ours as well. I didn’t think Snow-san still had such a trick up its sleeve.”

Surrounded by the three ladies, Snow got a lot of headpats and compliments.

I mean, I had always counted Snow as part of helping with the ice platforms from the start but………

That was only in a form of support——-and that’s it. Even I didn’t think it could match the actual magicians in terms of skill.

“Snow! You really are amazing in all sorts of ways huh!”

“Its potential continues to amaze me………..but with that we now have 3+1 to help with the ice platforms. Esta and Mielle and then Fecilia and Snow, we can rotate between these two teams right?”

“We can! Even when the water level rises further, we won’t need to lessen our speed!”

Due to the unexpected capability shown by Snow, the three ladies were even more fired up now, and continued to swiftly make platforms as we continued on our journey.

The further we moved ahead, the more the water rose, and even the waist high water where I stopped last time, was also no problem and we walked through with ease.

“Everything’s going all fine but………aren’t we surrounded?”

“These things haven’t stopped aiming for us for quite some time huh! There’s even monsters that are ramming the ice non-stop to try and break it!”

“Should we eradicate them all in one fell swoop with a big lightning magic? If it’s my magic——-even that long legged bird that’s approaching us will get electrocuted as well, you know?”

Just like last time, on top of the carnivorous underwater monsters, the long legged bird was also aiming for us and walking towards us.

The three were saying that with worry but, the underwater monsters that did make it to the surface were hardly an issue while we’re on this platform.

So I felt that wasting mana on using an offensive magic just to exterminate them all was a waste of resources but, I guess for the people making the platform, it’s a bit more irritating.

“if possible, I’d prefer if you saved your mana for later. Even if we do get attacked, me and Ralf will take care of it, and besides, I don’t what other weird monster might show up later. It’s better to save it as our trump card instead.”

“If that’s the case, we’ll leave it to you two to care of it when we get attacked then.”

I feel like Fecilia’s words still had thorns in them but………at least she was convinced by my decision.

Last time, I definitely saw the corpse of a big underwater monster.

If monsters like that can be found in this area regularly, it’s better that we continue to save their mana for later.

From there onwards, me and Ralf continued to kill any monsters that approached us instantly, and as for the long legged bird, we intimidated it by throwing icy pebbles at it while it was still afar to make it maintain its distance from us.

The pebbles were not going to kill it obviously but, they were still effective as the bird didn’t attack us once, and once we reached the area where the water level rose even further, it stopped following us.

“Looks like that bird has finally given up on us. That aside……….the water level has really risen a lot here, no? At this point this feels more like a river than a forest.”

“You’re right. But I’ll take being in the middle of river above being in a big infested forest at any time.”

“Are you sure about that!? Look in the water! There’s a giant monster in there!!”

Looking to where Ralf was pointing, we saw a fish like monster, about 2m in length, swimming and circling around us in the water.

It’s fine if it really was a fish monster, but if it was the Forest Lizard that Henjak had told me about, this was a lot more dangerous.

Forest Lizard was an amphibious monster that was both strong and aggressive, and also possessed a strong poison as well.

It could definitely climb the ice platform, so we need to really be careful.

“From here onwards, it’s unknown territory even for me. Be wary of any little thing or change that you might notice.”

“I know! If I see something——-Wait, Chris! Look at that!!”

Right after I warned him, Ralf’s mouth flapped open and close as he pointed back into the water again.

I wondered if he had seen another big fish or something but………….looks like a strong foe had decided to already make an appearance.

Rising to the surface of the water and approaching us, was a monster that shared quite a lot of characteristics to what I had heard of Forest lizards.

Judging by how 1/5th of its body was just its mouth, it was definitely a ferocious beast. Furthermore, it also had sharp claws and fangs, and a long tail.

And its giant body was covered in the characteristic black and gold leather-like skin.

A monster that was said to rival the forest lizard, one of the danger monsters of the East area—–Thunder Alligator.