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Chapter 158: Pinewood Forest (5)

"Zzz..." With his mind going elsewhere and his body resting on the cold hard floors of the cavern, Ethaniel completely ignored the shouts and constant bickering from the jumping slime that was leaping up and down on his body.

"Ugh... You, answer!" Minister Yer frowned angrily as he continued repeating the action he had been doing for the past few minutes moments after Ethaniel had fallen down to the ground in the mood to sleep.

"Later... My stamina's drained and well, my body aches..." Ethaniel murmured out in a tone of laziness as he soon kept quiet.

"OI! Human! The hell?!" Minister Yer cried out.

"Hah..." At the sight of the slime's attitude, Shinto sighed as he slowly got up from the ground which he had hoped he'd stayed glued to, and walked up towards Ethaniel. "Hey, if you're going to sleep, give me that necklace so I can speak to them."

"What?" Ethaniel's drowsy eyes glanced to the figure of a man in front of him. "...aren't you tired too? Just let this guy jump up and down and waste energy complaining. It's a good massage actually."

"Well... I prefer to have peace and quiet," Shinto stated. "So, can you give me the necklace so you can sleep without interruption?"

"Ugh..." he grunted as he moved his hand over to his neck, soon taking out the necklace he had been wearing for quite some time. "Since you'll be having a discussion, I'll just move deeper into the caverns for a nap. Wake me up when Frey and Raina get back."

With the harsh cold environment within the air and the overexertion of the stamina of the two players, their bodies were bound to grow tired. Thus, in order for them to be at full strength, they needed to sleep in-game which they hadn't done in a while.

"Right... Have a good nap then," Shinto stated whilst letting out a yawn. Though, despite his clear worn out and exhausted expression, he took a deep breath as he equipped the [ Necklace of the Gloop ] on him. "Ahem... Now, Minister Yer, was it? Ask away. Though... I warn you that I won't explain thing's to the fullest due to my drowsiness."

"Hmph... At least a decent human knows to show his respect!" Minister Yer stated. "Now explain. What happened to those other slimes that went out with you? Did you leave them to die?!"

"H-Hey... Minister," Erith sighed. "Can you act decently too and stop shouting? Your voice is starting to ring in my head and well... I frankly don't like it."

"Ugh... I'm here trying to help by seeing whether or not they've conspired in the death of our precious people!" Yer stated. "If they die, what about us? We'll definitely die! Us Slera's aren't born to handle the winter coldness!"

"Sigh... At least hear out the human before we decided what to do?" Erith reasoned as he turned towards the helpless Shinto. "A-Anyway... Human... Shinto was it? What actually happened?"

"In simple words, they left us to die," Shinto stated.

"Huh? What?" Minister Yer blinked helplessly. "Say that again? Who was the one that left the other to die?"

"...the slimes left us to die," Shinto repeated his words to the two slimes. "We ran back all the way here with our lives intact just barely surviving the horde of monsters we encountered."

"Reru and Rustly left you two... What the?" Erith muttered out. "They're typically not like this... and... they wouldn't dare pull off such a thing..."

"So you're saying... The humans are the one's lying?" Minister Yer stated as his body soon shook. "If that's so... Then... Aren't we in like... Danger?! I don't want to die!"

"H-hey... Calm down, will you?" Shinto helplessly uttered out. However, before he could say a word, Shinto suddenly felt a chilly breeze within the area. "...huh?"

"We're so dead... We're so dead!" Minister Yer continued to utter out as his body shook as if ignoring the sudden cold air around him.

"Hey... Shinto, this is not your doing, right?" Erith questioned as he entered into high alert. "Cold air all of a sudden... Did something follow you back?"

"No... That can't be..." Shinto's brow raised in confusion as he tried to recall the previous events that had happened. He vividly remembered that they lured the monsters away from them, thus escaping out of their range of aggro. HoweverIt seems as if he was misremembering due to his tired demeanour and, with that, the latter sounds proved him so.

Ting...

With the sound of ice clanking onto a stone that reverberated through the caverns, the group was quickly alerted as they turned their heads over to the direction of the sound, noting the sight of multiple hail elementals at the entrance of the cave.

"E-Eek! What is that?!" Minister Yer's body began to shake much greater than before. "Monsters? Ahh! You humans, aren't to be trusted at all! We're all gonna die!"

"Ugh..." Shinto clicked his tongue at the sight as his eyes turned towards his back, noticing that despite the sudden situation they were in, Ethaniel was still asleep. It hadn't yet been ten minutes since they were back to the caverns and his group was pulled into another scenario once again.

"Besides Ethan... It's just me and Kon..." he muttered out whilst turning to Erith. "Do you think you're able to fight them?"

It wasn't a question for him to ask given the circumstance, yet he still needed to confirm whether they needed to run away once again or they had a fighting chance.

"I guess? Just what are their levels?" Erith asked.

"From the way we fought against them earlier... They're around forty levels above mine with Reru seemingly being quite higher than them. Though I don't know," he explained.

"And what's your current level?"

"36," Shinto spoke out.

"36... And if their forty levels higher..." Erith suddenly coughed at the thought. "The seventies?! I'm only just in the sixties!" 

"Ten levels below..." Assessing the situation and scanning the numbers of the enemies upfront, he nodded his head whilst taking out his staff. "...it might be a struggle, but four on three is doable if we act smart. I'll support you."

"This..." Without anything he could do, Erith took out his sword and shield from his body. Unlike how Reru's was made of pure slime, Erith's equipment on the other hand was purely made of metal, though unbeknownst to Shinto on how the structure of a Slera work, it seems that they can carry around items within them without much issue. "...I hope you're right about this."

Ting...

If only time would have paused whilst the group were discussing, however, the sad reality was not how time worked. While they were conversing, the elementals had gotten much closer towards the party and were about to channel out multiple bursts of energy.

"Ahem... In any case... Get into position and we'll begin," Shinto stated as he cast out [ Shadow Fields ] which had successfully gone off cooldown just in time, and soon followed it up with [ Rainy Slime ], [ Poisonous Goo ] and [ Hallowed Crest ].

The moment he did so, with the combo of skills he shot out to the elementals, the attacks all jumbled up together as if the skills were all simultaneously cast with little to no interval at all and quickly befell upon the enemies.

Tang...

With the stream of attacks hitting the monsters at their front, Kon and Erith immediately rushed forward as they channelled out their attacks. [ Orbal Shadow ] and [ Quick Flame ] were cast by Kon onto one of the enemies and was soon carried through with Erith whose blade swung in an arc as a combo attack, swiftly pushing the enemy away.

In the next moment, Erith whose blade was still on the elemental quickly mustered up all his strength as he slashed through the monster in front of himcracking the core and damaging the internals of the icy monster that was constantly clanking at a moments notice.

Ting...

Though only tying up the hands of a single monster, the rest were quickly alerted at the group's deed and hurriedly rushed over towards Erith in a pincer attack. From his right, spikes of ice protruded out from the ground, from his left, fields of ice froze the stone grounds and from the edge of his vision, spikes shot out towards him.

"...ack...?!" Erith's eyes widened in shock. "My shield can't last this!"

If all the attacks landed, it seemed as if he'd be a goner. But, with one whiff of a young man's staff, the Shadow Diviner, Shinto leapt forward as he activated a skill, [ Mark of Umbra ] on Erith.

"Not enough..." Shinto uttered out as he closed the distance between Erith even more and soon activated a spell which in turn brought out a small shining light around him[ Sanctum Brilliance ]. "...let's hope this is enough!"

With one breath, Shinto averted his hand over to a nearby elemental a shot out [ Divinity Brilliance ] which then provided his allies and himself with a 250 and 500 HP barrier respectively.

...

With his shield held up into the air, Erith's health pummeled down into the red zone from all the attacks that he took. But, with the help of Shinto's healing and barrier usages, he survived with barely enough footing to defeat the first elemental.

Tang...

"Hah... Hah..." Erith hushed out a breath of exhaustion as he saw one of the elementals turning into grey ash. "Three more... You got anything more up your sleeve, Shinto?"

"Huff..." Shinto's eyes slightly shook as if he was about to faint. "I used up all my cards on this one enemy..."

"Damn... Is this the end?"