kscans

Chapter 5 - 5

I sliced through the monsters that appeared one after another with my four swords.

The last time I challenged this dungeon, I ran out of healing items around here and had to give up and retreat.

This time, however, I still had plenty of items left.

I had also been able to conserve my attack-boosting buff items.

This was because Elena was taking out the particularly troublesome monsters heading towards us from a distance with her powerful long-range attacks.

All I had to do was scatter the small fry that got close.

It had been a while since I had been in a party, but it was incredibly easy with a strong player of her caliber.

Having a partner is a good thing...

"Hayate. You really are amazing. To be surrounded by that many monsters and not take any damage at all."

"That’s because you took down all the enemies that were likely to damage me before they could get close, Elena. Thanks."

She was using a character with a small body. So, intending to praise her for her hard work, I ended up patting Elena on the head.

"H-Hey!"

"Ah, sorry."

She was blushing all the way to her ears. Did she dislike it that much?

"So suddenly, I... I wasn’t mentally prepared..."

Was she just embarrassed? So she wasn’t angry?

"I-If I contribute to clearing this dungeon, you have to do that again."

This girl is definitely a natural tsundere.

She’s so prim and proper in real life, why is her character in the game the complete opposite? Well, FWO is a game about hunting monsters, so I can see why her current character would be more popular. A boisterous, beautiful girl effortlessly dominating is refreshing to watch.

Though, I don’t see much of her tsundere side on her streams.

"H-Hey! Well!? Don’t ignore me! Or do you still think it’s impossible to clear it with me?"

"Um. If we clear it, I just have to pat your head again, right? At this rate, I think we can do it. Though it depends on the boss, since no information has been released about it yet."

A few parties had already cleared this dungeon.

Since I’m a student and go to high school during the day, I can’t compete with pro gamers who can play FWO all the time. However, among Japanese players, our current location was the highest floor reached.

"I have information on the boss."

"What?"

"Don’t underestimate the information network of the Shinonome Group. I had them look into the boss so I could use it as a bargaining chip when you refused to let me in your party."

So she prepared all this just to party up with me.

"So, what will you do? Want to see the boss information?"

"You haven’t looked at it yet, Elena?"

"No. Because if we can beat the boss without seeing any information, it’s practically the same as being the world’s fastest to defeat it. That’s what makes it fun, so I don’t look at strategy guides on my first try. Right?"

Those were the words I had said on my stream.

"Could it be you watch my streams?"

"I-It was a coincidence! It was in the list of FWO-related videos, so it just happened to catch my eye."

Of course. There’s no way the daughter of that massive conglomerate would be watching all of my streams.

But I was a little happy that she agreed with my way of thinking.

"I feel bad since you went to the trouble of getting the information, but for the first time, let’s go in as we are. Worst case, we fail and get a death penalty."

"I’ll be fine."

That’s right. She uses items to avoid the death penalty on all of her equipment.

"We predict the boss’s characteristics from the tendencies of the monsters that appear in the dungeon and prepare our equipment and items accordingly. We’re not specifically geared for the boss, so we often fail, but that just doubles the joy of clearing it on the first try. I think so too."

"Nice. I think I could really grow to like you, Elena."

"L-L-Like! W-What kind of stupid thing are you saying!!"

Her voice was trembling. Was that too creepy of me?

I have to smooth this over somehow.

"I think I’ll quit FWO once I can’t use the four-sword style anymore. But even so, I’ll definitely watch your streams, Elena. Keep being Japan’s top ranker for me."

I said, holding out my hand.

"First, let’s clear this dungeon today!"

"...Okay."

Elena took my hand. I hoped that this would make her erase what I said about growing to like her from her memory.

──＊＊＊──

"This is it."

"Yes. I’m ready."

Elena and I had reached the area where the boss was.

We both did a final check of our equipment and set up items to use in an emergency.

I was actually supposed to log off for the day, but since we had come this far together, I was determined to clear this dungeon today.

"No streaming is fine, right?"

"Yeah. I don’t stream anything other than mid-bosses on my first playthrough. I want players who will challenge it later to enjoy their first try for a little while too."

The world’s top rankers who have already defeated the boss seem to think the same way as me, as they also didn’t stream their first attempt. There are many players who look forward to the boss appearance sequence.

"Well then, shall we go?"

We stepped into the boss area.