If a weak civilian who’d never fought a monster before had no choice but to kill at least one, which would be the best monster to fight? A slime, the traditionally weakest monster in most RPGs? Unfortunately, that was a terrible choice in Braves and Blades. Slimes in BB weren’t especially strong or anything, but they were far from the weakest monster. They were bigger than the slimes you saw in most RPGs, and more intimidating than the cute little guys that just jumped on your face. Most of them had surprisingly hard to deal with fighting styles, so they weren’t a great enemy choice for beginners.
The actual weakest monster in BB was a goblin, but they weren’t a suitable enemy for beginners either. Sure, they were weak, but they did look vaguely humanoid, so they were psychologically stressful to kill for people not used to violence. I was speaking from experience here. Plus, goblins tended to move in packs and use different weapons and all that. They were a fine choice for someone who was aiming to become an adventurer and had the mental fortitude for it, but they weren’t great for power leveling a regular person.
Ideally, you wanted an enemy that was decently weak, didn’t fight in packs, and had extremely static attack patterns. Which was why...
“Over there. That’s going to be your first target.”
“It...is?”
Rose gave me a quizzical look. I was pointing to a spot that looked like it held nothing but trees, so her reaction was understandable.
“It’ll be faster if you see for yourself. Fire!”
While I wasn’t a particularly strong level 52 character, I was still level 52. My basic Fire spell was a lot stronger than a starting adventurer’s Fire. A fireball around ten meters in diameter shot out of my hand and slammed against one of the trees.
“R-Rex?! What are you doing?”
I calmly pointed to the tree I’d hit with my fireball. “Look closely.”
“Huh? Oh! Th-The tree is moving...” The burning tree was squirming in pain.
“That’s a treant, a monster that camouflages itself to look like a regular tree.”
“S-So that’s a treant...” Rose gulped.
She must have at least heard about them before, I thought.
I’d never seen anyone look so afraid of a treant before. It was honestly kind of funny to watch.
You see, treants were level 5 monsters who had a nasty habit of ambushing newbie adventurers and feeding on them. They had much better Attack and Defense than most monsters at their level. Most new players—myself included—had experienced running out into the field after the tutorial dungeon and immediately getting one-shot by something they’d thought was just a tree. However, treants were only dangerous if you carelessly approached one. They had high Attack and a powerful camouflage ability, but their mobility was trash. Furthermore, their Defense was high, but their Magic Defense was exceptionally low, and they were of course weak to fire. So, if you just picked them off from a distance with fire-aspected spells, they weren’t a threat at all.
“Aaand it’s dead.”
The treant desperately tried to waddle its way over to us, but it burned to a crisp before it had even gone five meters and disintegrated into shining particles.
All right, this will definitely work.
Because of how slow treants were, and the fact that the lower-tier versions of them had absolutely no ranged attacks to speak of, as long as Rose struck first and kept her distance she wouldn’t be in any danger of taking damage. Rose’s highest stat was her Intelligence too, so these would be the perfect foes for her.
“Wow...” Rose let out a sigh of admiration. This was likely her first time ever seeing combat.
It’s too soon to be amazed, Rose.
“Sorry to interrupt your wide-eyed staring, but you’re going to be doing this next.”
“Huh?”
I nodded toward the remaining treants.
Rose’s jaw dropped open, and she shook her head. “I-I can’t... I mean, I don’t even have a class or anything. I’d never be able to use magic like you...”
“Why do you think I gave you all that equipment? Don’t worry, you can do this.”
While it sounded like I was just trying to psych her up, I knew for a fact she could do it.
Rose still looked shaken, but she’d put on the equipment I’d given her. She’d been wearing a simple dress before, but now she was in a white robe with a matching white witch’s hat. She was also wearing a burnished red ring that looked as if it was made of living flame. Not only did she look like a Mage, she had the stats of one too. All of the equipment I’d given her boosted Intelligence by quite a bit, and right now it was a whopping 150. In terms of magical power, she was much stronger than the average novice adventurer.
Furthermore, the staff she was holding in her right hand was a Fire Rod. Just by using the item itself she could cast Fire, so she didn’t actually need to know any magic at all. She could easily take a treant out in one or two hits, but just in case I’d made sure to get her equipment with high defensive stats as well. I hadn’t been able to give her actual armor with high Defense since those pieces tended to have minimum stat requirements to equip, but all of her accessories gave defensive buffs. For starters, she was wearing a Barrier Ring to keep her safe from any unexpected attacks.
On top of the Barrier Ring, I’d also given Rose an Anti-Burn Ring to make sure she didn’t accidentally hurt herself with her own Fire spells. For her final accessory I’d been debating between the Golden Iron Ring, which heavily increased physical Defense but lowered Magic Defense, and the Bastion Ring, which gave a decent boost to both types of defense. In the end, I’d opted for the Bastion Ring, just in case something unexpected happened and Rose needed to take magical hits.
She was as safe as could be against low level monsters. Plus, I’d be by her side the whole time, so even if something out of the ordinary happened I’d be able to protect her. In all honesty, all these precautions might have been overkill, but I’d figured better safe than sorry.
While I was confident no harm could possibly come to Rose, she still looked a little scared. Since she’d never fought a monster before I couldn’t blame her.
“H-How am I supposed to tell a treant apart from a regular tree?” she asked hesitantly.
I gave her a reassuring smile. “No need to worry. Just start blasting away at every tree you see.”
“Huh?”
“If it starts squirming once it’s on fire it’s a treant, and if it just sits there as it burns to ash it’s a regular tree. Simple enough, right?”
“B-But...I’d feel bad burning down regular trees for no reason.”
Seeing Rose’s apologetic expression, I burst out laughing. “Sorry, that was just a joke. I can use Analyze to check whether it’s a treant or a regular tree. If it’s a treant, I’ll get a stat window. I’ll let you know which trees are treants, and you can just shoot at those ones.”
“D-Don’t tease me, Rex!” Rose said, pouting.
Still, I could tell my little joke had helped ease her nerves.
“See that tree, second from the right?” I asked, pointing at one of the trees. “That one’s a treant. Ready to fight?”
Rose slowly nodded, then took some deep breaths to steady herself and closed her eyes.