Chapter 19: If You Have Not First Become Ashes

If I wanted to find a Rychaff, I could just search the dozens of lakes and rivers outside the protected roads, but I wouldn't get as many rewards as a quest.

A hunt would only give me materials, but a quest could give me Szerath and some bonus rewards.

I checked the Guild Hub if anybody had posted a hunting quest for a Rychaff, only to see that there weren't any.

That's tough.

Oh, well.

And so, Sakimi and I headed off down the main street, following it into the woods. We ended up passing by a warning sign for goblins, which brought back unwanted flashbacks. I didn't want to deal with other random monsters, so I decided to take a branching path west, directly opposite the katana demon's dungeon.

While I walked, the sound of moving water reached my ears. Sakimi pointed to the left, and we headed in that direction. It was strange, but I felt a little anxious when straying from the Totems of Warding. It was probably just the fear of the unknown.

Soon enough, we came across a rushing river. The waters were too violent for a Rychaff, but I still checked. I walked up to the water's edge and placed my hand on the surface.

Nothing leaped out to eat me, so it was safe to assume that there wasn't anything here. Usually, Rychaffs would wait by calmer lakes since it attracted people and animals who wanted to drink water. When it came to rivers, Rychaffs would only reside in deep ones that had extremely slow currents.

Sakimi and I continued our search.

It took a while, but upon pushing through a set of branches, we arrived at a lagoon. Unfortunately, I had inadvertently stepped knee-deep into the water without realizing it.

"Sakimi!" I yelled, pushing her out of the way.

Upon saying that, the dirt shifted around my feet, and I was launched into the air.

Below me, a gaping mouth full of razor-sharp teeth was opened wide, waiting to catch my descent.

I should've watched where I was going, but being the idiot that I was, I didn't check if there was any water ahead.

"I got you!" Sakimi said, using telekinesis to pull me back to dry land.

The Rychaff was about twice my height, and it stood on its hind legs with a hunched body covered in bluish-green scales for camouflage. Its head made up most of its salamander-like body mass, being a gigantic arrow shape, with its mouth stretched from end to end. Although the Rychaff couldn't swim, it could flatten its entire body and hide underwater unnoticed. On top of that, the creature could move at surprisingly fast speeds without warning, striking like a snake.

"Frozen beam!" Sakimi said.

The magic blast struck the Rychaff's head, but it only dealt six percent of the monster's total health.

"It's resistant to water and ice magic," I said.

"In that case, I'll—"

Sakimi's sentence was cut short when the Rychaff rushed forward. She dodged the initial lunge, but the monster performed a tail sweep, sending Sakimi flying.

"Dammit! Sakimi! Are you alright!"

"I'm good," she replied with a wince.

I lunged at the Rychaff and swung my weapon, taking its health down to eighty-two percent. The creature recoiled from the pain and opened its gaping mouth, threatening to swallow me whole. If that happened, I would take immense acid damage.

Luckily, Sakimi yelled out, "Arcane Missile!"

Four blasts of concentrated mana struck the Rychaff, taking its health down to seventy-one percent and causing it to flinch. Good thing Sakimi was proficient in both ice and arcane magic.

Then, Sakimi used telekinesis. Since the Rychaff was much too heavy to pull, she went flying instead; it was Newton's law of action-reaction.

"What are you doing?" I exclaimed.

But Sakimi had a plan.

"Arcane Blade!"

Mana engulfed Sakimi's staff, solidifying until it turned into a magical spear. She gouged that weapon into the Rychaff's eye, dealing a critical hit that knocked its health down to forty-nine percent.

I activated Lightbringer and followed up on Sakimi's aerial attack, dealing two hits before the monster temporarily retreated.

As Sakimi hopped off the enemy, I said, "That was reckless. What would you have done if you went flying into its mouth instead?"

"It worked out, didn't it?"

"Hmph. I guess you're right."

The Rychaff expanded its throat, indicating that it was about to spew acidic saliva.

"Sakimi!" I said.

"I know!"

The girl pointed her staff forward and said, "Absorb!"

The liquid went flying, but Sakimi's staff acted like a vacuum, pulling in every last drop.

Then, Sakimi said, "Release!"

The spell converted the acid into mana, sending it flying at the Rychaff. The monster tried to dodge, but it didn't react in time, and the attack sent it staggering, dropping its health down to twenty-five percent.

The Rychaff retaliated, swinging its head and sending both Sakimi and me in opposite directions. I quickly recovered to protect Sakimi, using Angelic Blaze before the monster could attack my companion again.

Angelic Blaze not only did holy damage but also fire damage, which was super-effective against the Rychaff. My attack managed to bring the creature to two percent health, and Sakimi finished it off with an Arcane Missile.

The Rychaff collapsed on the ground, and Sakimi cheered. Her face was covered in mud, and there must have been numerous bruises under her clothes. Even still, she was acting like there was no pain at all.

When I checked her health bar, she was at around sixty percent.

Even though people in this world couldn't get sliced in half because of video game physics, they would still show signs of injury as their health lowered.

"Don't you care about your own safety?" I asked.

"Everybody does!"

"You fought so recklessly!"

"That was tame by my standards."

I wanted to object, but I still had to acknowledge her magical prowess. I had greatly underestimated her.

Even though Sakimi's personality was almost the same as Ayame's, their fighting styles were completely different. Ayame preferred to stay back and support with projectiles, while Sakimi would try to get up close and land powerful hits.

"In any case," I said. "You did a good job fighting."

Sakimi placed her hands on her hips. "I know! I'm the greatest mage, aren't I!"

"Sure, sure."

"Why does it sound like you don't believe me?"

"Maybe I do, and maybe I don't."

"What's with that vague wording?" Sakimi asked. "And besides, it feels like we had this same conversation before!"

"Maybe we did," I said, leaning over the Rychaff's corpse.

Sakimi continued babbling, so I ignored her. Instead, I focused my attention on looking for item drops.

In the base game, you got materials from monsters by going up to their corpse and pressing a certain button. In this world, all I had to do was touch the Rychaff, and the items automatically went into my inventory.

I gained two Rychaff scales, one Rychaff fang, one Rychaff claw, and the rare item "Wing Boots."

Rychaffs were known to prey on adventurers, so you would sometimes get a random piece of gear. In this case, I got the Wing Boots, a piece of armor that allowed the wearer to jump extremely high. Unfortunately, its defense was quite low, and the jumping boost was perpetually active, so it was easy to inadvertently ram one's head into a building's ceiling. Still, it could be useful, so I put it in my inventory for later.

Now that I had all the materials I needed, it was time to head to the blacksmith and craft the weapon Laevateinn.