Moto Sekai Ichi - 006 part 2 (Patreon)

Along the way, I took a small detour to the forest. Adding a Soldier Archery strike, I shot an arrow from atop of the horse towards the slime that came out.

It missed. As expected, it wasn’t possible to hit it the first time. I repeated until the shot connected.

"Pikki! " With that cute dying scream, the slime splattered and died. Leaving the forest, I returned to the highway and checked my stats.

"Good, good."

Since I met the conditions for acquiring the skill, "Knight Archery" was added to my archery skills. The condition is quite simple, 「Kill a monster from atop a horse」.

After that, by the time I arrived at the mine I've already met the conditions for acquiring 《Silver Archery》 and 《Gold Archery》. The conditions are simple too, the first being "kill 20 monsters in a row in a single hit" and the latter "kill 10 monsters in a row within 3 meters".

The next one to learn is 《Bishop Archery》. This one is a little bothersome. For example, you need to meet two conditions, one is 「Kill five monsters at the same time using 《Lance Archery》」 and the second 「Kill two monsters at the same time from a distance of 25 meters or more, using a combination of 《Lance Archery》 and 《Knight Archery》」.

After entering the mine, I wandered around searching for a group of Kaen Ants.

The lower-class monsters called Kaen Ants have weak individual strength, but more often than not, they act in groups of dozens and attack relying on each other. In particular, their nest house hundreds of them, and it get pretty troublesome when you get surrounded. However, they are not hard to deal with if you put some distance between you and them. The two conditions can be cleared at the same time if you use 《Lance Archery》 from a very long distance.

"Whoa, found them..."

I sighed in relief after finally finding a group of Kaen Ants. When I estimated our distance was approximately 30 meters, I used 《Knight Archery》 to aim.

Schhwaff―― With that sound, the arrow flew from the bow, coated in red and white effects. The red one is the effect of Lance and the white of Knight.

"……Alright."

Taking a victory pose, I said in a quiet voice. That arrow pierced more than ten Kaen Ants. The operation was a success from just a single shot, and 《Bishop Archery》appeared in the skills column.

Since I was not able to find the nest of the Kaen Ants, I quickly left the place.

Well then.

The only one left is 《Rook Archery》.

This is the most powerful, yet most annoying skill to get.

Why is it powerful, you might wonder, it's because this is a 「Scaling attack skill」. Even at the 16th class, a single attack has a power of 250% raw firepower, and if you raise it to the 9th grade, it scales up to 600%. 【Archery】is the skill that, against a single target, has the potential to produce the most power.

However, due to the skill acquisition conditions, including all other bothersome skills, this one is definitely inside the top ten worst.

First, 「Kill 1,000 monsters using 《Silver Archery》」. This one isn’t so bad since you end up meeting the requirements anyways. Next is 「Get 500 critical hits using 《Silver Archery》」, this too can be completed without issue.

A critical hit is a phenomenon that occurs depending on the amount of LUK and the 《Critical》 skill rank, and also the additional effects your gear might have. A critical hit will deal damage equal to 300% of the original damage. The Critical skill is easy to learn, and can be obtained once you deal a critical hit.

My current rank is 16. My current LUK stat is at 31, and there's no additional effect from my gear. Therefore, the critical rate is approximately 13%, you get it by dividing LUK by 30 and adding the rank 16 correction of +10%. By the way, if you rank it up all the way to grade 9, it adds a +40% correction. I wonder if I should give priority in raising it when I acquire the needed experience...

Anyway, the talk has gone in a tangent. Let's get back to the conditions to learn 《Rook Archery》.

In any case, the two previous conditions can be cleared in time as I go along. The problem is the last condition.

And that is 「Using a combination of 《Knight Archery》 and 《Silver Archery》kill three monsters in a row that have attacked another player and dropped that player's HP by 50% or more, from a distance of 15 meters or more」.

It annoys me just thinking about it.

First of all, I need to come across a situation where someone is being attacked by monsters. Then, I need to way until their HP has been reduced by more than half. And adding to that, I would be troubled if the enemy is a strong monster, since it has to be killed in a single hit. And in case you fail even once, you need to start it all over again. This is the worst.

If this was still an online game, I could ask someone to stay there until their HP is below 50%... and it would be relatively easy to do, but this isn’t a game anymore, it’s the real world. A situation where your HP has been reduced below 50% could already be considered a "life or death situation". It is impossible to ask that of someone. And then, I have to make such situation happen three times? There no way I can do it.

However, I really want to get my hands on 《Rook Archery》. It is one of the essential skills of 【Archery】.

"......Well, I guess it can’t be helped, I'll have to find other things to fill that gap."

Since it couldn’t be helped, I decided to shelf it and complete the 1000 silver kills and 500 silver criticals while waiting for the opportunity.

And that opportunity suddenly came in an unexpected way.

　　＊　＊　＊

Royal Great Library.

The director, Paloma was resting after finishing the day's affairs.

"Paloma-sama, could I have a little of your time?"

"Umu, what happened?"

A librarian has come to meet Paloma. She opened her mouth, and asked along a simple bow.

"Today, there was one suspicious man."

"Fumu."

The young librarian women said that, and handed over a single document to Paloma.

Paloma looked over the report while stroking his white-haired beard.

"......Ohh, nothing but skill books."

"Most likely, he didn’t read them. He took each book for about 10 seconds before returning them. I believe his purpose was something else."

"I see."

According to the report, the man "departed after 25 minutes".

"He wasn’t reading them, huh... I'll keep it in mind. If that man visits this building again, be sure to report it to me."

"By your will."

The librarian lady bowed and then she left Paloma's office.

With a quiet murmur, Paloma took a sip from his cup of tea. 一Just what did he came here for――?

His monologue quietly disappeared into the teacup.

=====

Thank you for reading.

【Archery】Skill list

《Dragon King Archery》　 Powerful on-impact range attack.

《Dragon Horse Archery》　 Powerful piercing range attack.

《Rook Archery》　 Very strong single-target range attack.

《Bishop Archery》 Strong piercing range attack.

《Gold Archery》 Range attack with added knockback.

《Silver Archery》　 Strong single-target range attack.

《Knight Archery》　 Precise sniping range attack.

《Lance Archery》　 Piercing range attack.

《Soldier Archery》　 Normal range attack.