340 Part 1

Itai no wa Iya nanode Bōgyo-Ryoku ni Kyokufuri Shitai to Omoimasu 340

Defense Specialization and the Snowy Mountain 2

After a while, the frozen interior of the cave began to be filled with the unending reflections of the pale ice, and it was so blinding that they had to close their eyes.

“Hah!”

“‘Flame Bullet’!”

Maple was currently wearing her green clothes beneath the overcoat. The reason for wearing this was, of course, so she could swing the laser beam from ‘Poltergeist’ like a sword.

When she swung the thick laser beam wildly, left and right, up and down through the narrow passage, she instantly incinerated the monsters that occasionally appeared in front of them. Maple just needed to hit them, and as they tried to regenerate, Sally would shoot her flame bullets.

“Hah! Hyaah!”

“Hmm. It’s been a while since I saw this, but it really is ridiculous.”

Sally recalled the time she had fought the fake Maple. Even the fake Maple had only just reused ‘Hydra,’ and had not been able to control it as freely as this. But she could control things other than Hydra and even change its trajectory now, which would ruin the boss.

“Oomph! Huh?”

After killing the bears, ice blocks, and the spirits and snowmen that came out later, the beam that shone through the mirror-like passage suddenly hit against a door.

Maple put away her weapon and changed her equipment.

“Is it the boss?”

“Yes. It was a lot easier than I expected, thanks to ‘Poltergeist.’ Our goal is to defeat this thing and reach the top. But, I’m sorry if there’s nothing there, okay?”

“If that happens, we can take the boss materials as a souvenir.”

“Yes, we’ll do that.”

Maple and Sally pushed open the doors together and entered the room. The floor and walls were coated in even thicker layers of ice, and in the back stood a woman with pale skin and blue clothes. There was no expression on her face, and she seemed just like the ice statues they had seen on the way.

A cold gust of wind blew from the ground as they stepped in, and in a flash, ten of the exploding ice chunks were born.

“We’ll win!”

“Yes!”

And like that, the battle with the ice queen began.

“‘Provoke’!”

As soon as the battle began, Maple used ‘Provoke in order to lure the ice monsters towards her as she and Sally advanced.

“Oboro, ‘Crossing Flame’!”

Oboro’s skill caused fire to spread to all of the ice monsters that were close together, and pale light poured from them all at once.

“‘Pierce Guard’!”

The explosion was incredibly powerful. But even with Sally and Oboro there, it was nothing as long as the defense piercing attacks were eliminated.

As the ice shattered around them, Sally used the opportunity to rush forward after being defended from the explosion.

While ‘Pierce Guard’ was activated, the only way to hurt these two was to have attack ability that exceeded Maple’s defense ability. And these two were not going to let this perfect timing pass them by.

“‘Quintuple Slash’!”

“‘Cover Move’! ‘Predator’!”

Once they saw that the enemy couldn’t break through ‘Dedicated Affection, they rushed forward to attack. There was no need to reserve your strength during a boss fight, and so they just needed to push with powerful moves.

Sally’s chain attacks all spread fire that burned the ice-like body. Maple used teleportation to catch up and then slap the boss with her great shield. Her summoned monsters followed with their own attacks.

It was then that the boss’s clear, blue body began to crack and fall to the ground.

“Huh?”

“No, I think that it’s…”

Sally felt a wind at her back and she swirled around. She saw that a blizzard had erupted behind her, and the boss was taking shape once again inside of it. And then the blizzard moved towards them, along with a rain of hail.

“‘Cover’!”

Maple stepped in front of Sally, though she didn’t use her shield, as she wanted to save ‘Bizarre Eater.’ While she was using ‘Dedicated Affection,’ if ‘Cover’ was enough, that would be the better option. It would be impossible for Sally and Oboro to be hit by multiple piercing attacks if she was standing there.

“Phew, what a relief. It was just a normal blizzard.”

“But your body is frozen.”

Maple’s body was covered in pale ice.

“…Well, I don’t really feel anything?”

“Maybe it’s a status thing then.”

“Oh, you’re right, Sally!”

“Even something like this will be dangerous if it stacks, so use your shield if you have to!”

After saying this, Sally moved forward once again. As for the previous combo, the boss had just turned into normal ice halfway, and so it didn’t inflict a lethal wound. But it still did quite a lot of damage.

As Sally moved in, the boss placed her hands on the ground and caused glowing, cold air to shoot out.

“‘Icicle’!”

Sally created a pillar of ice and then used her webs to escape into the air.

“Hinata was more dangerous… ‘Flame Bullet,’ ‘Fireball’!”

They were not the most powerful, but she chipped away at the boss’s HP with attacks that targeted its weakness, while staying out of its reach. The boss then summoned more of the monsters they had seen on the way there, but they were all sucked towards Maple, thanks to ‘Provoke.’ Normally, luring this many monsters towards you was a bad idea, as there would be too many to deal with. Thankfully, Maple didn’t have to do anything.

“Sally, leave them to me!”

“Thanks!”

Maple could crush this advantage of numbers, and Sally would do what she did best, which was going one on one.

“Oboro, ‘Binding Barrier’!”

She had several patterns. And she tried them in order from best to worst.

Once Oboro succeeded in binding it, Sally moved from one move to the next, as smooth as water.