The enemies we’re facing are strong enough now that exploiting game knowledge won’t get me past them, I guess.
The Goblin Slaughterers I’d gotten from the casino were pretty powerful weapons in the early game. Sure, they had the debilitating drawback of doing heavily reduced damage to anything that wasn’t a goblin, but you could circumvent that by using them as throwing weapons instead of equipping them. However, the bats here were high enough level that even the powerful Goblin Slaughterers didn’t do much damage to them.
But it’s not like I was out of options. I pulled out another Goblin Slaughterer and clutched it in my left hand, then grabbed onto my Metallic King Sword with my right.
Man, this sucks, I thought. I wasn’t even planning on fighting in this dungeon. Cold sweat poured down my back. I rhythmically bobbed my left hand up and down, maintaining a beat in my head. I just...need to make sure I get the timing right.
The most annoying thing about these bats was how small they were, and how erratic their movements were. Ideally you’d have some kind of big AoE spell or long-range sniping skill to take care of them, but neither Nyuuk nor Prana were high enough level to take them out in one go. Plus, now that we were stuck in this tiny room, we couldn’t afford to use big spells or we’d get caught up in the blast.
One of the bats got tired of waiting for me to advance and dived down.
Oh! Here one comes! I thought, jolting into motion. I swung my sword to intercept it, but as expected it deftly dodged out of the way.
This was what made the bats such troublesome opponents. They were nimble enough that unless you knew Arts that could be freely redirected at any time, you’d never hit the buggers. I winced as someone behind me let out a scream, but didn’t look back. I wasn’t in any danger yet at least.
I stopped my sword mid-swing and stepped forward.
“Not so fast!” I shouted, stopping my sword mid-swing and stepping forward. I changed my swing into a thrust, stabbing through the chest of the bat that was attacking me. It flapped weakly for a few seconds, trying to escape, but then disintegrated into particles of light.
“That’s one down.”
I then swung my blade in a wide arc, catching the second bat which had tried to circle around to my flank. “Come on, is that the best you’ve got?”
I doubted the bats could understand human speech, but they chose that moment to rush me all at once. But that changed nothing. I was no longer a simple gamer who knew nothing of swordplay and had to rely on Arts. When I’d entered Rex’s body, I’d inherited his swordsmanship skills.
“Four, five, six...”
Once I’d taken down half of the bat swarm, I ramped up the pace of my swings. At times I predicted where a bat would dodge, at times I had to chase after it, but either way I was always able to take advantage of my sword’s speed and reach to bring my quarry down.
“Holy shit...” I muttered.
It looked like there were only two bats left, flying weakly around the center of the room.
An extended engagement will only put me at a disadvantage. I’ll end this now!
I was still waving the dagger in my left hand up and down to keep the rhythm, and the moment the two bats’ flight paths overlapped enough that they were both in a straight line from me, I leaped forward.
There was a good two meters between me and the bats, but I closed the distance in an instant.
“It’s over!” I cried, slashing through the two remaining bats in one fell swoop.
Phew, I managed to make it through that alive. I let out a small sigh of relief.
“Rex!” Mana shouted, and I turned around to see a new monster burst out from under the stack of lumber that had been leaning against the wall, its claws heading straight for me.
Shit, I forgot there was an ambush in this room!
That had been the source of the unease I’d felt upon entering this room, but there was no point in lamenting my carelessness now. This particular monster was a Moon Werewolf, and there was no time to dodge the claws going straight for my throat. Instead, I pulled my sword arm back, then waited for the perfect timing to act.
“Flash Step!” I shouted, and in that instant I teleported behind the werewolf.
This was one of the skills a Blademaster could learn, Flash Step. It was a completely bullshit skill that let you teleport behind an enemy the moment their attack hit you. But thanks to that, I’d come out unharmed, and in a perfect position to counterattack.
“Too bad, you almost got me.”
I drew my sword back, preparing to strike at the werewolf’s unguarded back.
“Infinity Blade.” I sliced straight through the monster, cleaving it cleanly in half.
I breathed another sigh of relief, but this time I was sure there were no surprises left waiting for me. I resheathed my Metallic King Sword, stuck the Goblin Slaughterer back in my Inventory, and waved limply to the others.
“Are you okay, Rex?!” Mana shouted, pushing past Radd and running over to me.
“Don’t worry, I’m fine.” I forced myself to smile, making it look like this had been a piece of cake.
Seeing that, Mana gave me a relieved look and said, “Th-Thank goodness. When I saw that monster burst out from the wood, I thought I was going to have a heart attack.”
“Don’t worry, I was ready for a surprise attack,” I replied confidently.
That was, of course, a blatant lie. I’d been completely blindsided by the werewolf, and if Mana hadn’t warned me I might have been killed.
That scared the shit out of me...
I’d reflexively stepped forward to cover Radd, but I decided next time I wouldn’t do anything so reckless. I wasn’t a fan of battles that carried too much risk. My style was to maintain a safe margin of error and only fight when victory was assured. Maybe I was a weak gamer, but I liked it when things were easy like that.
“Wh-What was that thing you did just now, old man?!” Radd exclaimed, coming back to his senses now that the fight was over. He’d been watching me eviscerate the bats with slack-jawed amazement this whole time. “Like, I knew you were strong, but I didn’t know you were that strong! I mean, aren’t your stats...” Radd trailed off awkwardly.