Early DAR Vol. 5 Chapter 16 Part 6

Full title: Starting a New Life for the Discarded All-Rounder

Note: If you found any typos/mistakes, pls write them in the comment. Thanks.

Translator: Airis

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<Brat, don’t just follow it with your eyes, read the motion of its wings.>

“But it’s too fast—!”

<Every attacking magic beast has a target. Anticipate that, and trace the route it’ll take. Watch the state of its wingbeats. Compared to the rabbit’s unpredictable moves, this is far easier. The basics are the same as with beasts or humans.>

Under Uncle Gry’s guidance, Roa was fending off a bird-type magic beast.

Beyond the iron plate—on the sixteenth floor—there had only been Thunderbats, so they had already ascended to the seventeenth floor.

Since the staircase had been sealed off by a metal lid, Uncle Gry’s prior magical onslaught hadn’t reached here. The corridors and adjacent chambers remained untouched.

Naturally, the beasts that inhabited this area were still alive and unscathed.

Roa’s current opponent was a single Confusion Crow—Nevan.

A large crow-like magic beast, it induced confusion and fear through magic, causing enemies to turn on each other. Dangerous enough to wipe out entire military units.

Its magic was the main threat; its actual physical strength was no greater than that of an average bird-type beast.

However, ever since Roa formed a familiar contract with Uncle Gry, his resistance to mind-control magic had increased. Nevan’s magic didn’t affect him at all.

Because of that, it was deemed an ideal first opponent among bird-type beasts. Roa was handling it alone.

The members of Nostalgia stood at a distance to avoid accidental friendly fire. While they were unlikely to fall into confusion, they took precautions nonetheless.

By all accounts, Nevan was indeed a formidable threat.

<It’s coming. Think—where is it aiming? Counter accordingly.>

“My head—!?”

Roa swung his knife at the Nevan gliding toward his face.

<Exactly. The eyes. Many birds go for the eyes. Whether against humans or beasts, blinding the enemy drastically reduces their combat effectiveness. And since eyes must remain exposed to monitor their surroundings, they’re an easy target.>

The knife struck cleanly, grazing one of the Nevan’s wings and disrupting its flight.

Taking advantage of its hesitation, Roa slashed again, clipped the other wing, and finished it off once it crashed to the ground.

“Got it!”

<Don’t drop your guard. The moment you defeat an enemy is when you're most vulnerable. Many are struck from the flank then.>

Uncle Gry’s words were stern, but he looked satisfied.

Roa tossed the dead Nevan into his magic bag.

Its meat was foul-smelling and inedible, so there was no need for bloodletting. Only its feathers were worth salvaging.

“Looks like you’re done.”

“Your movements were sharper. Did something happen on the way here?”

Dietrich and Cornelia called out. Cornelia, in particular, had spent time coaching Roa, so she’d paid close attention to his performance.

“...I don’t think anything in particular happened...”

Despite saying that, Roa’s mind conjured the image of Puffy, the Winged Rabbit.

Though he hadn’t received any formal instruction, the short battle had left a strong impression.

It had given him a mental benchmark.

Even during battle, thinking things like “This is slower than Puffy” or “Less erratic than Puffy” helped him stay calm.

Of course, he knew that voicing this would immediately irritate Uncle Gry, so he kept it to himself.

“Baw!”

“Baw!”

<More incoming. Bats again. Hm... they seem to have different affinities this time. The servant’s lightning magic should work fine.>

The twin demon wolves and Uncle Gry pointed in the same direction.

Since passing the iron plate, their detection capabilities had returned to normal.

“All right! Time for us to shine.”

Dietrich drew his sword, not the pure mithril blade, but the one reforged by Bruno using mithril-laced steel.

He wore one blade on each hip and switched between them depending on the situation.

Recently, he’d prioritized using Bruno’s sword to become more accustomed to it.

It wasn’t just Dietrich; Kristoff carried only the new sword at his waist and had a hidden assassin knife strapped to his back. Cornelia now wielded a massive war hammer as her primary weapon.

“I can sense them too. Three targets. Not very fast. Different species from the previous bats.”

Kristoff drew his blade and began positioning himself for combat.

<Don’t embarrass yourselves in front of the brat.>

“Who’re you talking to, you petty gryphon?”

<To the coward who cowered from a crow.>

“You’re the one who said we couldn’t resist its confusion magic‼”

They were bickering, but Dietrich kept his eyes forward, his stance firm.

It wasn’t carelessness, it was a way to ease the tension.

Soon, the bat-like beasts came into view.

“That’s a frog!”

<No, that is a bat.>

Despite Uncle Gry’s correction, the creature looked unmistakably like a giant frog.

Its head was roughly the size of a human’s, with bat wings sprouting from its back.

Its green body and clumsy, wobbling flight gave it a strangely endearing appearance.

“It’s clearly a frog.”

<It has wings—thus, a bat. Watch out for its venom spit. Sleepyhead, open your mouth wide and catch it.>

“You want me to get poisoned!? Take this!”

Dietrich slashed.

Against flying beasts, tanking was ineffective. That’s why Dietrich, the most agile, took the lead.

He swiftly cleaved through one of the bat-frog’s wings. In retaliation, it spat sticky venom, but Dietrich dodged it easily.

“...I wonder if its poison is more like frog venom.”

Noticing the ease of battle, Roa voiced his curiosity aloud.

None of them had seen a bat that resembled a frog before, nor had they any idea of its capabilities.

Still, Roa’s interest was natural, after all, poison could also be used to craft medicine.

“I’ll take this one.”

“Then I’ll handle the last one.”

Judging that coordinated effort wasn’t needed, Kristoff and Cornelia moved to defeat the remaining beasts individually.

Even Cornelia, clad in full plate armor and typically the least mobile, avoided the venom with ease and finished off her target.

Poison was dangerous, but irrelevant if it didn’t land.

The Nostalgia members took down all three with minimal effort.

“Roa, you want to extract the poison, right?”

“Yes!”

Roa answered energetically and moved toward the dead bat-frog—

<Did I not say the moment after defeating an enemy is when you're most careless? Stay alert.>

Though it sounded like a gentle warning, it wasn’t.

Uncle Gry was already moving.

Before anyone realized it, he’d leapt in front of Roa, shielding him.

His speed rivaled a gust of wind, and the resulting wind pressure nearly knocked Roa over.

Roa stumbled, and was promptly caught by Uncle Gry’s wing.

<An ambush is easy to block if you know it’s coming. But when you strike, that’s when you’re most exposed. I’ve found you!>

A light sprinkling of dust landed on Roa’s head.

When he looked up, he saw dozens of large, cone-shaped stalactites hanging from the ceiling.

“…What is this?”

The sudden appearance of the stalactites overhead caught him off guard.

A few seconds later, Roa realized: it was an attack from someone lying in ambush.

“Uncle Gry!”

He hastily lifted himself from Uncle Gry’s protective hold and took a defensive stance.

The stalactites overhead shattered and turned to dust before reaching him, raining harmlessly down.

It was Uncle Gry’s magic that had neutralized the attack, he had just saved Roa.

But there was no time to be dazed, let alone express gratitude. Another strike might be coming at any moment.

<Sleepyhead! I’m leaving the cleanup to you! The twins will keep it still—just take care of it. I’ll deal with the wretch who set this up!>

“Wha—? Uh, okay?”

Neither Roa, Dietrich, nor any member of Nostalgia fully understood what was happening.

All they knew was that someone had launched a surprise attack.

And yet, Uncle Gry and the twin magic wolves moved as if they’d anticipated it. They must have seen it coming.

“Waf!”

“Wafuu!”

The twins darted between the members of Nostalgia and leapt at seemingly empty air.

They appeared to land in midair, kicking off an invisible surface before bouncing back to their original positions.

The air shimmered.

From the distortion, a faint figure began to take shape—it became a statue of a woman entwined with serpents.

Roughly two meters tall, the statue hovered in midair.

“A gargoyle?”

<That’s one of this fortress’s defense mechanisms. I thought I’d smashed them all because they were such a nuisance, but it seems some fool revived them. Destroy it!>

Though commonly treated like magic beasts, gargoyles—or rather, Magic Statues—were in fact magical devices.

Remnants of ancient ruins’ defense systems, they operated as long as there was ambient mana to sustain them.

Programmed to eliminate any intruders who entered their assigned range, they came in many shapes and abilities, but all animated statues were referred to collectively as Magic Statues.

The one kicked by the twins was half-frosted and half-smoking.

Frozen and then superheated, it had become dysfunctional and now wobbled erratically.

However, it wasn’t fully destroyed, it looked ready to reactivate at any moment.

“Baw!”

“Baw!”

“Cornelia!”

“Got it!”

Dietrich shouted at the twins’ prompting, and Cornelia responded immediately.

Though no orders had been exchanged, their coordination was flawless.

Without hesitation, Cornelia swung down her war hammer.

And with a single, crushing blow, the Magic Statue shattered into fragments.

“Eh!?”

Oddly enough, it was Cornelia herself who sounded most surprised by the result.

Unlike normal stone, Magic Statues were magically reinforced, far harder than ordinary rock.

She’d swung with all her strength expecting no more than a scratch.

Whether the freeze-heat combo had made the statue brittle, or the war hammer’s power was simply that immense, she had no idea.

But the ease with which it shattered stunned her.

<Hmm. I suspected something during the battle with that Gigant Skeleton, the war hammer seems to have been magically enhanced. A fine piece of equipment. The stronger the mana in the target, the more potent the effect.>

“Wait, what?”

Still staring blankly at the shattered remains, Cornelia turned in surprise at Uncle Gry’s observation.

“What the—? My detection just cut out!?”

Kristoff’s shout followed immediately.

His detection magic had stopped working the moment the Magic Statue was destroyed.

Having used it continuously until then, the sudden blindness was jarring, like being plunged into darkness.

In tense silence, the members of Nostalgia gathered together and raised their weapons, ready for anything.

<Don’t panic, Mr. Flashy. Your real senses just came back.>

“What does that mean?”

<These Magic Statues use illusion magic to conceal themselves and eliminate intruders. What you were detecting wasn’t real. Your magical and physical senses were being deceived. This whole area is designed to interfere with detection magic, and the statues are the core of the trap!>

They remembered how the twins had attacked an empty space earlier, where the statue had materialized out of thin air.

No one had noticed it before then.

Had it attacked freely, they might not have survived.

That invisibility was due to the statue’s illusion magic.

<And likely meant to hide this, too.>

Everyone turned toward Uncle Gry.

Above his head was a massive, vertical shaft—a giant hole punched through multiple floors.

It extended upward through several levels, wide enough for even Uncle Gry to pass through.

The jagged edges and exposed flooring made it clear it had been carved out with brute magical force.

Uncle Gry was glaring at a single point above.

There, floating in the air, was a gryphon.

It hovered in place, likely using wind magic, and bore no visible injuries, meaning it wasn’t the same one that had attacked them the night before.

It looked exactly like Uncle Gry but was restrained, struggling in midair as if caught by invisible hands.

That enormous stalactite that had nearly crushed Roa—

This gryphon was the one who launched it.

<That chick attacked right after the Magic Statue’s ambush, trying to split our defenses. The statue would hit the sleepy ones, while this one went for the brat. They thought they could wound us by dividing our focus. But don’t think a childish trick like that would ever work on me!>

Uncle Gry roared.

His words shifted halfway through, now clearly addressed to the gryphon above.

The gryphon writhed in place, baring its teeth and glaring at Uncle Gry with eyes full of malice.

Though it couldn’t speak like Uncle Gry, it was clearly cursing him with every fiber of its being.

The members of Nostalgia stood stunned by the sudden appearance of both the hole and the gryphon.

Roa, surprisingly calm due to how shocked he was, couldn’t help but think: Wait, weren’t you totally freaking out when the ice boulder ambushed us at night? That definitely got to you.

Of course, he kept that to himself.

If Uncle Gry was to be believed, the hole had been there from the start, and the gryphon had been lying in wait for the right moment.

The illusion magic from the Magic Statue had concealed both it and the opening.

<Heh heh heh. Judging by the lack of lethality in the attack, they probably wanted to wound us and create a liability. Then they’d pounce while we scrambled to protect our own. They must’ve realized they couldn’t kill me directly, so they aimed to catch me off guard. A wise choice. But to think you could fool me with illusion magic of this caliber—don’t make me laugh‼>

“Baw!”

“Baw!”

The twin wolves barked in frustration.

<…Okay, okay. Fine. You were the ones who noticed it first… but I did too! I totally did‼>

Uncle Gry tried to cover himself, but the twins shot him a skeptical look.

In truth, it had been the twins who realized something was wrong.

They had sensed no discrepancies between their respective perceptions, a rare event.

Despite being twins, they were distinct beings. Their senses naturally diverged.

During combat, they always cross-checked their readings to reconcile any differences.

But this time, there had been no variance. That was unnatural.

It made them suspect their perception itself was being manipulated.

They reported it to Uncle Gry, which finally jogged his memory:

He had completely forgotten about the Magic Statues and their illusion magic above the sixteenth floor, as well as the interference with detection magic.

That was how he managed to predict the ambush just in time.

Technically, it was Uncle Gry who realized the attack was coming.

But the real credit belonged to the twins.

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