Translator: Shizukuku

Editor: Lilia

Read at Watashi Wa Sugoi Desu!

Chapter 142 – Unique Boss Battle

If a quest was popping up here, it had to mean there was something big ahead.

While walking, I quietly open my quest column.

『【NEW】 Defeat the Unique Boss

A Unique Boss has appeared in the depths of the Tre Forest!

Join forces with Tre’s elite to defeat the Unique Boss and protect the town from the threat of monsters!

Clear Reward: ???

Quest Failure: Failure to defeat the Unique Boss, incapacitation of Tre’s elites, destruction of Tre’s southern gate, 1/3 of Tre’s functionality reduced. 』

Tre’s elites were the gatekeepers, right? So if one of the gatekeepers became incapacitated, would that mean I’d failed the quest, and the boss couldn’t be defeated? Once again, the reward was marked as unknown. Does it depend on the rank? Or is it decided on the spot like with Emily-san?

We probably couldn’t defeat it unless everyone worked together. After all, it was a Unique Boss.

Vidello-san should be stronger than Yuuta, so I didn’t have to worry about him, but what about the others?

Checking my inventory, I was glad that I had prepared for the hunt and patted myself on the back.

The magic saving doily was securely tied to my arm. If there was an emergency, I could use a magic circle to create some distance for us to regroup.

…I tried not to think about the fact that incapacitation could mean death.

I took a deep breath and closed my inventory.

The red dots were increasing around us, and the gatekeeper at the front had already taken down a boar with a single blow with his sword the moment it appeared.

He was strong. That’s good.

Watching the boar turn into light in an instant, I breathed a sigh of relief.

“Mac, are you nervous? Don’t worry, the other guys are stronger than me.”

“Stronger than you, Vidello-san? That’s very encouraging. I hope I’m not dragging everyone down.”

So I was the weakest one there.

As soon as I muttered that thought, the gatekeeper who was walking in front of us laughed.

“Mac, you’re our rearguard. It’s obvious you can’t be in the vanguard, but it’ll help us a lot if you can support us from behind. Against such a big opponent, we won’t remain unscathed. If we get hit in the wrong spot, one blow could be the end of us. Just one of your high potions would be enough to keep us alive. There’s a huge difference between having you and not having you.”

“When you say it like that…”

The gatekeeper’s verbal thumbs-up made me happy and eased some of the tension in my shoulders.

I’ll do my best.

I won’t let anyone die.

While steadily slaying the boar-shaped monsters that appeared one after another, we headed deeper into the forest.

We occasionally checked our direction and adjusted our course in the direction of the unique boss. The dense trees made it difficult for the gatekeepers to swing their swords freely—whenever they made a sweeping motion, the trees seemed to get in the way. A unique boss in a quest with limited movement was quite the hurdle.

For now, I was just glad they didn’t need my high potions.

“The big one will come out soon…”

I informed everyone in a hushed voice.

Then the gatekeeper at the front rubbed his arms as if he suddenly shivered from the cold.

“Yeah, I feel it. The presence of something strong is prickling my senses…”

“Can we handle this on our own…?”

The gatekeepers peered through the grass and seemed to have the unique boss in their sights. They had their eyes focused on a single point and didn’t look away.

“Hey, Roy.¹ Don’t be scared.”

“I know, Blossom.² But are you okay with taking the lead? You’re shaking, hehe.”

“Hey, quiet! The enemy’s coming.”

“I know, Marcus.³ Vidello, you ready? Mac, stay at the back and don’t move.”

That intimidating presence was getting closer and closer. It wasn’t moving very quickly, but it was strange that I still couldn’t see it. I thought for sure it would be a giant boar, but maybe it’s a smaller, stronger monster.

Anyway, it was probably best that I go out first and throw a blinding potion. I hoped it would work. It had worked in the previous boss battles, so it should be fine.

“No, I’ll take the initiative. If the monster’s movements become erratic, everyone attack all at once.”

“Mac.”

“I’ve got this.”

I smiled at Vidello-san, who was anxiously extending his hand to me, and then I quickly walked up beside the gatekeeper in front.

“Mac. You…”

“Now that we’ve come this far, let me be a proper member of the team, Gatekeeper-san. I’ll be a hindrance with a sword, so I’ll contribute in other ways.”

“Gatekeeper-san? Hey, my name is Blossom.”

“Blossom-san.”

A notification popped up on my hidden list. Feeling a bit pleased, I tightened my grip on the blinding potion I had taken out from my inventory.

“Vidello, did you not tell Mac our names or something?⁴ Are you trying to keep Mac all to yourself? Is that really how far your jealousy extends?”

“What are you talking about? If you want Mac to call you by name, then introduce yourself.”

Vidello-san stepped forward and gave a dismissive snort from beside me. Oh, that smug look was cute. Thanks for the motivation!

“Fine, then. Mac, I’m Roy. Call me that from now on.”

“Roy-san. Nice to meet you.”

“I’m Marcus. Did I not introduce myself until now? Sorry about that.”

I got the names of the gentle gatekeeper with the droopy eyes and the one who always teases me and Vidello-san. The exclamation mark on the hidden list made me happy.

I definitely couldn’t fail this quest.

Well, quests received from outside of the Adventurers’ Guild were often ones where failure wasn’t an option.

But…

After glancing briefly at Vidello-san, I took a step forward with a blinding potion in one hand and a sword in the other.

“Urah!”

With a shout, I hurled my weapon at the monster that had leapt out from between the trees. Okay, I hit it!

The monster, struck by my blinding potion, let out a hair-raising roar.

Whoa, that gave me goosebumps. What was that sound? It was a roar different from any intimidation tactic I’d heard before. 

The gatekeepers, their faces tense, raised their swords and leapt at the monster all at once.

The unique boss that appeared wasn’t all that big, but its appearance was incredibly striking.

It was more like a small mammoth than a wild boar, with a stocky body covered in shaggy fur and tusks that extended from its mouth to the top of its head. Its head came up to about the height of an adult’s head, which wasn’t that big for a boss, but the black mist rising from its entire body made it look eerie and gave me goosebumps just from looking at it. And then there was its face. It was split in half vertically and horizontally, revealing rows of sharp teeth that flashed every time it growled. Ugh, gross. I’d never seen a monster that could split its face into four parts before. 

Above the head of the thrashing unique boss, there was a blue HP bar.

Monsters with relatively low HP had a red HP bar, yellow meant double HP, the next level up was green, and really strong monsters with boss-level high HP usually had a blue HP bar.

What was strange, though, was that despite everyone’s attacks being strong enough to take down a boar in one hit, they barely affected this monster. Its HP decreased very slowly.

“Why aren’t our attacks working…?!”

Roy-san, who seemed to have heard my muttering as I stepped back, took a moment to put some distance between himself and the monster, his expression grim.

“It’s no good. This thing is corrupted. Our regular swords won’t do much damage…”

“Corrupted?”

I vaguely remembered reading about this on a forum. It was kind of like a zombie. Physical attacks were ineffective, so you needed to use magic attacks or cleanse the corruption before attacking.

“How do we cleanse the corruption?!”

“You’d have to splash it with holy water! But usually, no one carries holy water with them!”

The monster was still struggling with the blinding attack and wasn’t attacking us, but we weren’t getting anywhere, so everyone fell back for a moment.

“Holy water! I have some! I bought it at the Quattro church!”

“Why would you have something like that…?”

The gatekeepers looked at me with slightly exasperated expressions when I eagerly took out the holy water from my inventory, but I was sure it was just my imagination.

I was really glad I bought it.

Seeing the demon’s movements starting to become more coordinated, I quickly took off the lid of the bottle of holy water while I still had the chance. Then, I threw it.

The monster, hit in the face with the holy water, spewed more black mist and let out an even more terrible roar. 

Suddenly, my body stiffened. I was covered in goosebumps. Something nauseating crawled up my spine, and my legs suddenly felt heavy.

Ugh, that roar just now might have paralyzed me.

The enraged monster’s red eyes stared down at me.

Its front half was free of the black mist, but its face was still there, looking down at me: an unsettling presence that ranked high among the most disturbing creatures I’ve ever encountered. Paralyzed, I fought against the fear, waiting for my body to move.

[ Guaaaaah!! ]

Suddenly, its head swung down toward me, with its gaping mouth coming closer.

“Ah!”

I was so terrified that I forgot to close my eyes and just stared at the descending mouth, and the next moment, I felt a shock through my whole body and was sent rolling.

“Mac, are you okay…?!”

I thought I was done for, but Vidello-san had rescued me in the nick of time.

The arms embracing me and the sound of his lovely voice brought me back to reality.⁵

I looked down at Vidello-san, who was lying on the ground beside me, breathing shallowly. Vidello-san gave me a faint smile of relief. His face, flushed with adrenaline and smeared with dirt, was handsome. I love him so much.

When I lifted my head to check the situation and looked at the monster, it was thrashing about with its uncorrupted face partially slashed by Marcus-san.

“Sorry, we were paralyzed for a bit too. Are you hurt?”

“I’m fine, not hurt anywhere. Thank you, Vidello-san.”

I slipped out of Vidello-san’s arms, and we both stood up. Physical attacks seemed to be effective on the areas where the mist had disappeared, and the gatekeepers were attacking in unison.

But most of the monster’s body was still covered in mist, so I pulled another bottle of holy water out from my bag so I could sprinkle holy water on those parts.

Vidello-san quickly took it from me.

“I’ll go. Mac, you heal Roy. His arm got grazed by a tusk.”

Before I could respond, Vidello-san, with sword and holy water in hand, ran toward the monster.

I wondered if the monster would roar again when he splashed it. Feeling a little worried, I ran over to Roy-san.

He had a nasty gash on his arm, and one of his hands was hanging limply.

Ouch, that looks painful. I quickly poured a high potion on the wound, and it immediately began to heal.

“Sorry, Mac. Thanks.”

The wound had healed, but Roy-san’s face remained pale.

The area around the wound was still bruised and inflamed.

“It’s not fully healed! What should I do?!”

The monster’s roar, the sound of swords clashing, and the crashing of trees echoed around us.

I had to raise my voice to be heard over the clamor. Blossom-san glanced over during a break in the fight.

“When you get hit by a corrupted creature, the wound gets tainted like that! If you still have holy water, pour it on!”

“Got it!”

Taking Blossom’s advice, I took out another bottle of holy water and poured some on Roy-san’s arm.⁶ Immediately, there was a hissing sound, and Roy-san groaned in pain as black mist rose from the wound.

“Ughhh…”

“Roy-san…!”

“I’m okay, I can still fight…! We can’t let this filthy creature get anywhere near the town…!”

When the black mist disappeared, Roy-san once again readied his sword and ran back to the front line.

The next moment, that hair-raising roar pierced my ears again.

Instinctively covering my ears, I willed myself to move. Slowly, my feet began to respond.

Okay, I’m moving!

The paralysis was short-lived, and I hurriedly turned my attention to Vidello-san.

The monster’s neck was bent backward, and its small red eyes were glaring at Vidello-san.

No, not good!

“Stop!”

My screams were drowned out by the roar of the monster.