WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Alyo

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◈ Surviving as a Warrior in a TRPG World ◈

Chapter 48: Border Forest (5)

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After Gerik sneakily ambushed and killed one of their own from behind, the enraged Boarmen seemed to forget Ilvern entirely. Ignoring him, they raised their weapons and charged Gerik.

Bang!!

The moment they turned their attention away, Ilvern drove his tower shield into the ground again. Another powerful Shockwave spread in every direction, stopping the Boarmen in their tracks.

Having been hit by it once already, however, the Boarmen flinched and resisted the Shockwave this time.

While they hesitated, Gerik, who had planted his sword in the ground and lowered his stance beforehand to let the Shockwave pass over him, quickly pulled out his sword and rose.

Bang!!

Just as the Boarmen recovered and prepared to charge Gerik again, he used Charge, which had come off cooldown.

Unlike before, though, he did not shoot toward the Boarmen. He burst toward the edge of the torchlight instead. As if mocking them, Gerik left the battlefield and disappeared into the darkness.

"Squeal...?"

Confusion spread across the faces of the Boarmen chasing Gerik when he suddenly fled.

A few of the more cunning Boarmen quickly shook off their confusion and tried to track Gerik using their race's keen sense of smell.

Poof...!!

A cloud of strongly scented powder scattered in every direction from where Gerik had fled.

Some of the Boarmen, focused on their sense of smell, were directly exposed to the harsh irritation of the Fire-Eye Herb Powder. They howled in agony. And as an added bonus, they lost Gerik's scent too.

"Squeal!! Squeal!!"

Freed from their pressure for the moment thanks to Gerik, Ilvern struck his mace against his shield and taunted the Boarmen.

Clang. Clang. Clang.

The mocking metallic sound echoed through the forest.

"You pig bastards! Did you lose the mother who was supposed to save you? Why are you turning your heads and staring mournfully into the forest in the middle of a fight?"

As the sharp taunt rang out alongside the metallic clangs, the Boarmen searching for Gerik immediately turned toward Ilvern.

"Squeal!! Hooman...!!"

The taunt must have worked. The Boarmen charged the Warrior before them, their faces twisted with rage.

Even in their fury, though, they had not lost all sense. Rather than blindly rushing in, two attacked from the front while the rest tried to surround Ilvern from the sides.

"Come on, you pig bastards!"

Even as they charged fiercely, Ilvern did not so much as blink. He raised his heavy mace and tower shield, ready for their attack.

Boom!! Clang!!

When the two Boarmen in front swung their clubs, Ilvern leaned into his tower shield to cover the opening in his stance, blocking the attack from the left.

At the same time, he swung his raised mace hard, smashing aside the club of the Boarman attacking from the right.

"Snort... Squeal?!"

Though it was larger, the Boarman felt strength far beyond its own travel through its club as it collided with Ilvern's mace. Its eyes widened in shock.

"Save your displays of strength for Goblins, pig bastard."

Ilvern shouted at the Boarman on his right, which staggered with its arm numbed by Heavy Strike. Raising his mace again, he swiftly activated Heavy Strike once more.

The mace flew out at a terrifying speed, so fast it was hard to believe only enough time for two breaths had passed. The Boarman panicked and desperately tried to block it with its crude shield.

Crack!!

Its defense proved useless. Struck by the terrifying Heavy Strike, the Boarman was sent flying backward along with its shield.

The blow was not fatal, but the impact was severe enough that it could not rise for some time.

Bang!! Bang!!

Seeing its fallen companion, the Boarman on the left wildly hammered its club against Ilvern's shield, trying somehow to injure him.

Yet, true to a veteran of countless battles, Ilvern kept his head slightly away from the shield while pressing his body close against it, minimizing the impact and completely neutralizing its attacks.

"Hooman!! Die!! Squeal!"

By then, several Boarmen had reached Ilvern's most vulnerable flank. Aiming for his weak point, they charged while swinging their clubs.

Bang!!

Just as a Boarman swung its club at Ilvern, an earth-splitting roar burst from behind it, and a Warrior carrying a longsword shot out.

Shhk!!

Gerik burst from the darkness in an instant.

Using Charge, he drove his sword into the back of the rearmost Boarman among those trying to attack from the side.

"Squeeeal!!"

Ambushed again, the Boarman howled in pain and fell to its knees. Seeing that, the three Boarmen broke off their encirclement of Ilvern and rushed Gerik in fury.

Gerik only mocked them. He stepped backward to open the distance, then used Charge again as it came off cooldown and fled toward the dark bushes.

Whoosh!

As if laughing at the Boarmen thrown into confusion by Gerik's repeated ambushes, an arrow flew from another patch of darkness. It pierced the head of the Boarman brought down by the ambush and was howling, finishing it off for good.

"Squeal! Squeal!... Group up!!"

The Boarman leader finally realized that if they scattered, they would only be picked off one by one in ambushes. They began gathering in the center.

An ominous crimson sphere blazed in the darkness where the Boarmen had clustered.

"Screeeech!!"

A horrible scream erupted from the red sphere, filling the Boarmen's minds with intense fear. Unable to endure it, two Boarmen panicked and began sprinting madly toward the bushes.

The remaining three gritted their teeth and somehow resisted the fear.

"Squeal!! Focus only on the Hooman in front of you!"

Thinking there was no other answer, the Boarman leader ordered them to focus their attacks on Ilvern, the only one exposed in their field of vision.

"Is that all you can manage after using that little brain of yours?"

Ilvern sneered at the charging Boarmen. Then he forcefully thrust his shield toward the foremost one.

Bang!!

The instant the shield cut through the air, a fierce Shockwave erupted and blasted straight at the Boarman in front of him.

Its power was on another level from when it had spread across a wide area. Hit head-on by the powerful Shockwave, the Boarman's body stiffened, and it froze in place.

"Come on!!"

Having instantly subdued one of them with Shockwave, Ilvern roared. Bracing himself against the shield on his left, he unleashed a fierce Heavy Strike at the Boarman rushing him from the right.

The Boarman was not an idiot. Taking its earlier companion's fate into account, it did not recklessly try to defend. Instead, it tried to evade as much as possible and buy time for its ally on the left to attack.

Bang!!

As the two Boarmen grappled with Ilvern, another roar burst from the darkness, and Gerik shot out from behind them again.

Cunningly, he used Charge on the Boarman stiffened by the Shockwave and drove his sword into its back. Naturally, the paralyzed Boarman could not resist and suffered a fatal wound.

"Squeal!!"

Seeing that, the Boarman flew into a rage. It stopped keeping Ilvern in check, raised its club, and charged Gerik.

It was a foolish response that showed no capacity to learn, but Gerik's Charge was still on cooldown. By coincidence, the Boarman's stupidity worked in its favor this time.

"Come on!"

Unable to flee because of the cooldown, Gerik did not retreat. Instead, he calmly raised his sword, lowered his stance, and prepared for the Boarman's attack.

Clang!!

The club and longsword collided head-on, sending a sharp metallic ring through the forest.

"Urgh...!!"

A powerful pressure traveled through his sword. Knowing the Boarman had superior physical abilities, Gerik focused on holding his ground with all his strength rather than counterattacking.

Still, the force carried by the muscular Boarman, over 190 centimeters tall, was no joke. Gerik's feet slowly began to slide backward.

To make matters worse, the Boarmen fleeing in fear began to recover their senses one by one.

Gerik felt their eyes turn toward him as they came to their senses, and tension filled him as he realized the situation was turning bad.

'At this rate...'

Gerik gritted his teeth and held on, wondering how to overcome this crisis.

"Magic Missile!"

A shout rang out from the darkness. Several violet spheres of energy shot out and struck the back of the Boarman locked in a contest of strength with Gerik one after another.

"Squeal!"

The Boarman wore armor, primitive though it was, so a first-circle spell could not inflict a fatal wound.

Still, Magic Missile carried force comparable to being struck by a heavy thrown stone. That was more than enough to inflict pain through the armor.

The pain momentarily drained the Boarman's strength. Gerik expertly seized the opening, pushed it away, and created some distance.

Once he had opened the distance, Gerik used Charge, which had come off cooldown, and slammed into the Boarman. Caught off guard by the sudden, violent impact, it lost its balance and fell backward.

"Squeal?!"

As it twisted its body to rise in panic, Gerik raised his sword like a skilled executioner and brought down Slash.

A silver flash cut through the air, and at the same time, a grotesque boar head soared upward.

Crack!!

Meanwhile, Ilvern, now freed from being outnumbered for the first time, overwhelmed the Boarman facing him in both strength and skill, just as one would expect from a retired knight.

The Boarman, desperately trying to defend against his attacks, finally could not hold on any longer. Ilvern's mace split its skull open.

"Squeal?!"

The two Boarmen who had fully recovered from the fear spell saw all their allies slaughtered. Deciding they could not stay, they turned and tried to flee.

"Who said you could leave?"

Gerik spat the words and used Charge to quickly close in behind a Boarman. As he swung his longsword at its back, he did not feel Charge's usual penalty for some reason.

'What was that? Was I imagining it...?'

Gerik hesitated for a moment, then instinctively used Charge once more to see if the sensation was real.

'It works?!'

To his surprise, the skill activated again. Startled, he lost his aim and failed to inflict a fatal wound.

"I'll finish it!"

Katrin's spear drove deep into the back of the Boarman, which had lost its mobility and was stumbling around.

'Could it be...?'

An idea came to Gerik, and he opened his status window to check.

[Name: Gerik]

[Class: Unemployed]

[Attributes] Strength (3), Agility (3), Health (3), Intelligence (3), Perception (3),

[Skills]

* Lv.4 Slash (80/100)

* Lv.2 Charge (3/100)

[Achievement]

* One Who Crossed the Line of Death (Passive / Rare)

'Charge leveled up!'

It seemed the number of times he could use it had increased along with the level. Both its range and its number of uses. Gerik felt the corners of his mouth rise at the unexpected gain.

* * *

Once the battle ended, Ilvern briefly evaluated Gerik.

"Your judgment was sharp across the board. Keep disrupting the battlefield like that from now on."

After praising Gerik, Ilvern looked at the rest of the group and added, "At this point, I think our party coordination is up to par. We should be able to head for the depths we were aiming for now."

It had already been ten days since Gerik and Minos's party began working together. Over three expeditions, they had carried out all kinds of missions together in the Boundary Forest and had now achieved their promotion to Copper Plate.

The countless battles they had fought along the way had been excellent practice for coordinating with one another. The party's tactical ability had become far more refined than it had been at the start.

Even in Ilvern's eyes, however, their coordination had remained terribly clumsy until then. He had firmly refused Minos's request to explore the far reaches of the Boundary Forest, saying that setting foot there at their current level would be suicide.

But based on today's Boarman hunting mission and its results, Ilvern finally gave them a passing grade and allowed them to enter the far reaches of the Boundary Forest. In other words, today's battle had been a test.

Footnotes:

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