Chapter 1484 December 15th: I Am the Tenth Truth. Thou Shalt Be Afraid of the Sharpness of My Blade

It was right there.

According to Sigma’s words, “Okeagranos Plateau”,it was right there at the sloping top that is a little difficult to climb…… It sits like a king in the center of a vast grassland with almost no undulations or obstructions all over it.

Each and every one of us observed it through their own TelePhoto lens, and after that we all had only one comment about it……

「It’s just a lump of blades, casually sleeping.」

「Is this some sort of abstract, contemporary art?」

「Are those bayonets that I can see here and there?」

「This is going to take all night to finish, isn’t it?」

「For the time being, want to just rush there and give it a try? But it looks like its physical defense is going to be really high.」

「Even from all the way here I can feel its tremendous aura of strength.」

Whoa now, wait just a moment, Deepslauhter! It’s still too early to just blindly rush in! We should observe it first and see what that nets us!

In the first place, this situation is very convenient for us. The term “whole body weapon,” which was all curled up in the center of the plateau, suits that thing perfectly..

I’m not like a self-proclaimed visual acuity of 12.0 Survival that is trying hard to see with the naked eye, but I see it by synchronizing the visual data observed by Sigma with the help of the head equipment infused with the Era of the Gods technology. I understood that there is a clear arrangement to this thing and a distinct role.

「Those big blades, are they supposed to be wings? It’s not at the stage where it doesn’t fly…… If it can’t be removed, it would be a complete dead weight.」

「Oh, Karoshis-san, maybe it’s bipedal.」

「Does it have two legs? Hmm, I see…… Then it’s going to get up from that state for sure. It seems to be a hassle to aim at its head, and even more than we might think.」

「…… I can’t see anything because it’s night.」

「I don’t really feel like it’s a living thing……」

「Maybe it’s something like the Earth Golem? But then again, I wouldn’t be surprised if its body was composed entirely of blades at this point.」

Especially since I have already encountered far weirder things in this world than this. So a development like that would not be surprising at all.

Apparently, the “Blade Dragon” that we were informed about previously turned out to be just that – a dragon made entirely out of blades. It can also be assumed that slashing attacks are going to be its forte. And the reality is that it is almost certainly non-material! Because there was a possibility of its whole body being composed of swords. I am actually grateful that it has a completely physical body just like that.

「It looks like it hasn’t noticed us just yet. So let’s have a short strategy meeting.」

「How about we just charge straight at it for now?」

「Let’s just stop with thinking that we are going to be all night here, okay? No rushing in, Karoshis-san.」

For the time being, I would like to summarize the information that we managed to find out just by visual observation:

・ Its whole body is covered with a hard and sharp shells

・ It seems to be bipedal

・ (Probably) It’s an orthodox long-necked dragon, although I’m not sure because its back is facing this side.

* ·It looks strong

「So how do we attack it?」

「We do not know the effective hit strategy in the first place, but it seems that the physical attacks will not be so effective, but we won’t know that unless we go on the offensive here……」

Everyone’s gaze is directed at me and Urdim-san for some reason. Well, I am sure that Aradval is going to be at least SOMEWHAT effective in here. Furthermore, Urdim-san’s ridiculous strength is also reliable as a brute force.

「For the time being, how are we going to attack? But in the first place, we need to recognize that this party has three avant-garde members and three rear guard members, right?」

「Oh, in that case I can be the avant-garde-oriented middle guard.」

「Well, that takes care of Karoshis-san’s position. Do you plan to use your Ritual Sword here?」”

「If I don’t use it here, when will I ever get to use it?」

Ritus, the Ritual Sword … Was it a special weapon that was different from the Mystic Sword Retzel, which certainly takes a lot of time and effort to create? Well, this is probably the point of having other weapons in your inventory.

According to the story I heard, the “Mystic Sword” of full power seems to be even more powerful than a Sword Saint, but … I know that Sword Saints like Saiga-100 can be a little bit terrifying, so I don’t think it’s very helpful here.

「Okay, then let’s confirm this one last time: the complete avant-garde is Survival and Urdim-san. Karoshis is the avant-garde and the the rear guard in one, and Sanraku is the avant-garde as well.」

「Yup, that’s about it.」

「No, you’re bouncing around way too much. So in any case, you’re a middle guard.」

Well, I can’t really deny that.

「So this time around I’m a rear guard, huh…… Oh no, I’m a rearguard. I don’t have to force myself to go forward with four avant-gardes. And Deepslaughter is a rearguard, is this going to be all right?」

There are no words of objection for the time being.

That way the formation has been decided, so the next move is to move on to make the first move…… In short, how to launch a surprise attack?

「A guy who bets that damage will not pass unless the battle is in the beginning state.」

Myself, Karoshis, and Deepslaughter. Are Survival and Yashiro Bird going to do a surprise attack?

「Basis.」

「I Implemented a sniper rifle right before the battle, so now I will be ready to deploy it at any moment.」

「It’s a little bit hard to handle, but once the damage is able to pass, it will be huge. But unless we know that those blade-like scales can be pierced, I wouldn’t really want to employ it.」

I see, so there is a reason for that. Raid Monsters have a really shitty performance that cannot be bypassed unless you do that mid-battle, but conversely, victory conditions are definitely set when you manage to bypass their shitiness.

So there was a prejudice that it would be impossible to damage it in that pre-battle, curled-up state, huh? That’s a true Raid Monster for you…… But if it’s sleeping…… It only makes sense that its defenses would be solid.

It’s the worst pattern when it gets up and gets into a fighting state, but that kind of guy won’t sleep for eternity, right? …… At least that’s all just a guess based prior information.

Now then, what kind of first approach should be taken by us based on that? After all, before the opponent reacts, we need to hit it with a large firepower and be done with ten percent…… No, it would be ideal to cut away twenty percent of its HP, but it might be a really tall order. but the problem here is just how much HP the dragon has. If it’s a Raid Monster class, we might be here until the morning … No, until noon? Or maybe even longer?

「…… So in other words, you are going to approach that dragon and awaken it from its slumber?」

Urdim-san, who had been silent up until just now, opened his mouth. It was around the time that all of us were accustomed to his presence, but Oak-san, who has this terrifying steel appearance and terrifying steel voice, gave a simple and clear answer.

「I’ll keep a close eye on this thing, and when I see the opening, that’s when I’m going to strike.」

Nice idea.

…

………

……………

That’s why I’m standing in front of this cute, peacefully slumbering dragon right now.

「Alright, then」

Urdim-san is certainly nice to have here, but there is one misconception here that needs to be cleared.

It means that he can earn more DPS than I do at the moment…… And the decoy should be someone who is okay to die in the worst case scenario. In other words, that’s me.

I’m not going to die here in the first place, but it’s nonsense to put Urdim-san as a decoy, since he can do more damage with the momentary attack, pinpoint attacks and a surprise attack.

「……… Fumu.」

When I approached it, I realized it again, but this is definitely a dragon. The resolution was quite good even when transferring video from Sigma, but it seems that it is incomparable to seeing it from a close distance with the naked eye.

When viewed from a distance, its whole body looked like it was made of blades, but when viewed from a close distance, I could see skin reminiscent of rubber under the blade-like protrusions.

It’s also way more muscular than I expected, and that’s why it could look “curled up”. Oh well …… it seems that the other guys have arrived at their designated positions. That’s why I have to get the dragon to wake up.

「Today, you can enjoy dragon hunting to your very core……. Until you are fully satisfied.」

It’s time, Aradval. It’s time to make your dream come true.

I just hope that this is not a mistake, and then I took out the dragon-slaying sword from my inventory and approached the sleeping dragon…… And I could feel Aradval being hot and slightly quivering in my hands.

Then, as if in response to Aradval’s fetal movement…… the curled “it” moved.

The wings of made of blades moved, the bladed head moved, which had been hidden by its terrifyingly sharp-edged arms, and it rose up and its half-opened eyed sharp eyes stared directly at me.

The sharp shell of its whole body rubs and squeaks at the awakening of the dragon. The wings are spread out and the crouched legs are stretched out, revealing the true size of the dragon … no, I knew it was going to be huge, but not THIS huge!

It’s a little bit smaller than the imaginary Kutanid or Siegwrum, but it looks like the size of the Kirin that Wezaemon called forth, probably because it has spread its wings like that. In other words, from now on, we have to deal with the dump truck that has started up and would only keep on gaining speed.

But yes, I’m not the only one who is going to fight here.

「RISE AND SHINEEEEEE~~~~~~~~~———!!!!!!!!!」

At the moment when the roar of the dragon and my greeting collide with each other and echo across the space, everyone except me launches an attack all at once ───!!!

「THE TRUE DRAGON: No. X」

「TOMAHAWK.」

「NUMBER OF ACTIVE PARTICIPANTS: SIX PEOPLE.」

「BEGIN THE DRAGON HUNTING!!!」