Tutorial Rewrite 64 (Patreon)

<Top—Status—Community>

<01:30:21

Day 118>

<The fifth attempt will begin in

2:23:29:39>

I open my eyes. I’m lying with my back against the ground. The ground below me is soft, even though it should be rocky.

Slowly, I sit up. I rub my head. It kinda aches, but it doesn’t hurt. I feel funny.

<Tutorial stage,

Hell Difficulty Fifth Floor

Boss Stage>

<[Clear Condition]

Escape the Minotaur by

climbing the mountain.>

I read the message in front of my eyes. And then, like an office worker pressing snooze even though he’s already late, I lie back down. Above me stretches that immense mountain. Compared to most mountains I’ve seen, this one is really more of a needle. It’s slim and sharp and it has little to no slope to it. It’s almost a complete ninety-degree drop. Interesting. A swirling, squirming swarm of bats covers almost the entire mountain. Outside this swarm, it’s still nighttime and black, but the stars are so numerous you can still see pretty well.

For example, I can see that minotaur pretty well.

…Hm.

Hm?

<Minotaur (Lv.37) [BOSS]>

Huh. Yeah, that’s a minotaur alright. It’s standing a pace or so away, just kind of looking at me. It’s larger than the poet king, and broader, too. And then, just to really ram it home, it’s carrying an axe. Oh, and did I mention that it’s got a snake for a tail? Yeah.

But it isn’t really moving, so I don’t know what…

Hang on, wait, I just made eye contact with it. Uh. Hum. Erm… Hi?

As if on cue, the minotaur roars and raises its axe, the little snake it has for a tail also roaring, which makes it shoot fire from its mouth because obviously, that’s something minotaurs do. And then, much like minotaurs also do, it charges at me. I’m still lying on the ground. Now that I think about it, this might not be the most favourable position.

Leaping to my feet, I start to frantically claw at the barren rocks of the cliff just above, almost slipping once, twice before finally pulling myself up. Scrambling up the side of the rock using every relevant skill I can muster, I try my best to ignore the sound of the minotaur, seemingly mere inches below.

I glance down. Oh, wait, scratch that, it really is mere inches below! Who would’ve thunk it?

Right as I begin to question the sense of it all, the snake it has for a tail shoots toward me, spraying fire towards my feet.

<You have learned:

Heat Resistance Lv.2>

Ow, ow, ow, hey, that’s unfair, cut it out!

Breath in my throat, trying not to hear the sound of the minotaur huffing and panting, I clamber further up.

Okay, remember when I said that some bosses were only temporarily invincible? Yeah, uh, that only counts if you aren’t completely underleveled compared to them. I mean, I’m ten levels below it! How is that fair?!

It sure as heck isn’t, that’s what!

Ah, I’m already starting to lose fingers. This sucks. And no matter how high or how fast I climb, the minotaur always seems to be mere feet behind. You know, if I was a little less optimistic, I might have assumed that the whole you-shouldn’t-defeat-the-minotaur thing was part of the level’s design! Hahaha, but there’s no way that that could be true, right?

…Right?

—Okay, let’s think here. I can afford to think, since the bats have started descending on me but they’re going at the minotaur too, so it doesn’t matter. See, if I don’t remember wrongly, when I fell down the cliff, I literally bashed my brains out. I’m honestly surprised I’m not dead, but it isn’t the first time I’ve been partially lobotomized, so… But that isn’t the issue here!

When I woke up, the minotaur was just… there. It didn’t even attack me until I’d looked at it first. That is, until I’d read the boss stage's clear requirement.

It was waiting for me.

An axe flies towards me and I only barely dodge it by making a quick jump a step higher.

That isn’t to say that it isn’t currently trying to kill me, but I have a feeling that it isn’t exactly trying its best either. It’s keeping me on my toes, while still pushing me higher. It is, by all means, fully sentient. This is both a good and a bad thing. I mean, frankly, if it was trying its damndest to get me, I’d be dead. To reiterate for the slow ones in the audience, me being dead is a bad thing. But just because I’m not dead doesn’t mean that this doesn’t have any downsides.

<Top—Status—Community>

<07:07:59

Day 118>

<The fifth attempt will begin in

2:16:53:01>

Two days is a lot of time. But that’s only if you don’t think about the fact that it took me five days to descend the mountain. Going up it? I can already tell you that my body and brain aren’t quite up to the task, and especially not while being chased by an axe-wielding, fire-breathing minotaur. If I hurry, I might be able to survive until the next attempt starts and I can do this all over again without falling.

But where’s the fun in that?

Didn’t I tell Moleman I’d beat the minotaur? Didn’t I decide that I was going to prove the whole tutorial wrong? To show them that this here minotaur was just a chump, and anybody who decided to escape it rather than kill it was, in turn, even less than a chump?

Yeah. That’s right. Because I’m a real gamer.

And someone’s got to prove that this strat is viable.

I pull one of the many bats off my face and toss it at the minotaur, a tactic I have since long since learned was useless. Fun fact, no matter how many bats you toss into the minotaur’s wide-open maw, it won’t die. I’ve tried for a while now, and it just swallows them down. By this point, I think it might have eaten more bats than I have, which is impressive.

Holding one hand over my eye to shield it from the bats while using the other to heave myself further up, I look down, but not at the minotaur.

We’re pretty high up now. If I fell from up here, I’d be falling for… five, six seconds? Something like that. Either way, this should be high enough.

I survived this high of a fall once, didn’t I?

After less than a single moment of hesitation, I let go of the rocks.

Within only half a second of falling, I crash into the minotaur’s face, and the image of his cow eyes widening at the strange sight is enough of a delight for me to with full certainty say that even if this fall kills me, it will be worth it. And, as expected, the combination of me smashing into his face and the surprise of the whole thing is enough for him to lose his weak grip on the rocks. If he’d had agile toes like I do he wouldn’t have any problem staying on, but all he has for feet is a pair of worthless hooves.

We both fall.

I’m on top of his face, madly grinning, ripping at his flesh and trying to open his mouth so I can tear out his tongue in some strange desire for a fitting last meal. Who doesn’t like ox tongue?

“GROUUGGHHHHHH” the minotaur cries, the sound of which makes all the bats around and above us scatter like mad, and we fall and fall and fall and fall, and even though I am engorged in a bloody, ruthless mania, deep in that one sane corner of my mind, I hear a voice counting, carefully, making sure that each number is as long as it should: one, two, three, four, five, six…

Seven, eight, nine…

…Hm. Did I perhaps miscalculate the height we were at just the slighte—

The ground greets us firmly and I smash on top of the minotaur, and even though I had expected its body to sound like popcorn since I’m sure every bone in its body just shattered into a million pieces, instead, all I get is a single resounding CRACK and a SPLAT and my body, despite being cushioned on top of its massive one, also makes a similar sound.

<You have learned:

Pressure Tolerance Lv.5>

<You have learned:

Falling Resistance Lv.2>

<You have learned:

Organ Rupture Tolerance Lv.9>

<You have learned:

Organ Rupture Tolerance Lv.10>

<You have learned:

Organ Rupture Resistance Lv.1>

<You have learned:

Concussion Tolerance Lv.5>

<You have learned:

Concussion Tolerance Lv.6>