CH 294

Summit

“Man it really has been battle after battle without breaks. It’s nice to finally have a solid breather in between.”

“Seriously! There’s way too many monsters on this damn mountain! The numbers have been way beyond anything I could have ever imagined!”

“So Chris-san, what should we do from now? We made it this far, and confirmed the location of the safe zone here. It is perfectly viable to return back for now. I also think that the number of monsters we’ve faced was beyond our expectations.”

Soon after sat down to take a break, Esta popped this question to me.

She’s right, I do have to carefully consider our next move.

We haven’t come that deep into the mountains yet, and like Esta said, it might be better to fall back for now and regroup.

But, in my heart, I didn’t want to stop and wanted to go all the way to the Cave of Bahamut, and I have been quite careful with using my stamina so it’s perfectly viable to continue our exploration of the mountains.

………….the question is whether these two and Snow also have such stamina remaining in them.

“It depends on how you two are feeling. What’s both of your stamina reserves looking like? Also tell me if the miasma has had any adverse effect on your bodies.”

“Oh I mean, I can still keep going you know? Well, I barely took part in the fighting, and was mostly focused on holding the enemies down after all! As for the miasma, I haven’t felt any difference I think? My body feels normal at least!”

“Well, I also have a lot left in me as well. I mean I was fighting even less than Ralf so. Also, the miasma hasn’t had any effect on me either.”

Looks like these two are also okay with continuing.

The miasma seems to have no effect either, so now I just need to check if Snow’s okay as well since Snow was the only that was continuously fighting alongside me.

“Hey Snow, how are you holding up? Tired yet?”

“Awoo!!”

I still don’t if it can actually understand what I say but when I squatted down and asked it that, Snow wagged its tail and gave an energetic howl.

………I’m going to assume it’s still raring to go then.

I quickly checked its body to make sure it wasn’t hurt or anything, and since I can’t even see a scratch on its body, I have to assume it’s fine as well.

“I have been saving my stamina as I fight as well so, if everyone’s alright, I’d like to continue the exploration. Unlike the great forest of Roza though, we can always come back here and continue so if it gets too dangerous, we’ll fall back——–any objections?”

“None here! If anything, my body’s getting all antsy since I haven’t really put in some work yet!”

“If Chris-san is okay then I I have no problems either. If I feel that things are getting dangerous, I will tell you instantly. Since I have no info of any such safe zones existing from here onwards.”

“Sure, don’t hold back if you any of start struggling. For now, let’s continue to rest for a little longer and then restart the exploration.”

While chatting we took about a 30min long break, and the we left the safe zone to continue further around the mountains.

We made sure to keep a good grasp on the time so that we can return back to this place before the next time the miasma gets thicker again.

I don’t know what we’ll do if we end up discovering the Cave of Bahamut but, safety was always my first priority.

If something irregular happens, I readied myself to use [Black Mist] at any time, and we continued our exploration of the Barbadd Mountains.

.

We continued moving towards the summit, while killing any monster that got in our way.

I don’t know whether it was because of the miasma, or the rough mountain path, or perhaps the thin air due to being so high into the mountains; I was finally starting to feel a bit of fatigue and right around that time——-the summit finally came into our view.

Near the summit, the miasma was pretty thin, and I had sort of realized half way through but……..

“………There’s nothing here.”

“No seriously, the place is completely barren! How are there no monsters here like, at all!?”

“Even the strength of the monsters had begun to get as weak as the ones near the base of the mountain as well.”

Even though we had worked our way to the summit, there was nothing to gain here except a great a view.

Like Esta said, after a point, even the monsters had started to become weaker again.

Around that time I sort of realized but, it seems the cave of bahamut is not located near the summit it seems.

Well it is called a ‘Cave’ so I suppose that should have been obvious but, then again, I didn’t quite see anything that could classify as a cave on our way here either.

I really thought that we’d fine it if we kept climbing the mountain but I guess it was never going to be that easy huh.

……….looks like it’s gonna take a lot of effort just finding this damn cave in the first place.

“Well I suppose knowing that there’s nothing at the summit is in and of itself kind of good info to have eh.”

“Well that’s one hell of a positive way to look at it, eh Chris! Sorry, but I can only call this a waste of time really!”

“Regardless, we have spent quite some time climbing here, so let’s hurry back to that safe relay spot. Once the thick miasma has passed by again……..we’ll descend the mountain for today.”

“As expected, finding the cave on just our first day was a bit too much of an ask it seems.”

“At least now we know that we can still explore the areas with thick miasma, so we’ll just have to scour the entirety of the area one by one. While paying attention to the strength of the monsters, we’ll narrow it down to places where the strongest monsters appear and explore there.”

Since we didn’t have a lot of info on it, we really will have to look for it on foot on our own.

Deciding to explore specifically in areas where the stronger monsters appear——-we decided to focus on safely getting back down the mountain for today.