[UNKNOWN] [Lesser Human Lvl. 1]
[Magic Points: 5/5] [Hit Points: 10/10]
[Total Combat Power: 10]
[Unique Skill: Studious Advance]
[Unique Skill: Identification Lvl 1]

I had been studying my status window, mulling over the rumors I heard, mostly from the otaku group, about what exactly each of these numbers signifies. I had been thinking about the comforts left behind in Japan. As I thought and listened to the quiet chatter of my friends, a frantic cry, coming from the other side of the camp, breaks through the tranquility of the evening and makes us all alert.

. . .

. . .

The voices of my classmates -- even those who always play it cool -- are heightened with panic and with that tone of conviction brought along by fear.

They run past me and into the forest, crushing handfuls of green and pink fruits (what had been our supper) into the moss. People far from the commotion, though they did not understand what was going on, end up following the others in their confusion.

A tall bespectacled boy stands on a boulder and tries to command order, gesturing vigorously with his arms, but no one understands what he's trying to do.

Shouts in the distance give what appear to be battle directions.

 

For a moment, I feel tempted to follow the others running away. But, partly out of curiosity, and partly because I don't want to let the moment pass, and receive only a second-hand account of the events, I find myself instead approaching the eye of the tumult.

It was a beast. No,-- all the animals we've seen so far have resembled, at least in their harmless atmosphere, the forest critters back on earth. But this one, though still recognizably a mammal, gives an immense aura of its alienness to everything we've known. It is what they call a "monster".

In front of it, figures I recognize as those from the scouting party are standing, holding the wooden spears that Takashi had carved with his summoned sword.

But not all of them -- many of them are armed with sticks or nothing at all. Takashi only learned to use his ability earlier today... We are still unprepared for a real encounter... And those who are unarmed stand uselessly in the back...

To be honest, I did not expect my classmates to be even this brave, to even stand their ground. Perhaps Ikko is a better leader than I thought.

 

I take a better look at the monster.

Together with awe and revulsion, a feeling similar to the feeling I felt with the slime arises in me...

There is something different about how something looks when you know that nothing separates you from its will, that no law or greater authority mediates between you and it. Granted, it is only around as large as a human bodybuilder, and certainly shorter than the tallest people back on earth. Nevertheless-- it gives the impression, even at a distance, of greater presence, of an authentic threat to existence...

To any human sensibility, it is almost fascinating in its ugliness. It resembles a mammal but gives the atmosphere, rather, of a grotesque insect or deep sea creature. Sickly pale, with wrinkled skin, and hairless, with only patches of matted fur here and there, it could be said to resemble the idea of a troll, deformed ape, or orc. Though it has four limbs, a head, and crouches like an ape, it resembles a beast much more than a humanoid.

Crouched, it is as tall as us. Fully standing, it might be close to 7 feet. It is almost twice as wide as the average person in Tokyo.

Increasing my wariness (though perhaps not my classmates') is the fact that one can't appraise the strength of a monster by the standard of a human being. An animal, comparatively sized, can be several times faster and stronger, though seem, on the surface, a lesser match. This owes itself (so I've read) simply to what's inside, to the quality of their muscles to the quality of our own, to the variation of nature.

 

Though I don't consider myself a coward, I can't imagine myself standing up against it.

"Come on! You want some of this?"

For now, the monster is sizing them up cautiously, drifting sometimes off to its left and then to its right. It seems that the scouting party has interpreted this as its being afraid of them. Perhaps this is part of the reason for their confidence.

"Do it Takashi!"

"Go Takashi!"

"Don't move! Wait for my signal!" (Kumi)

The ones in the back seem certain about the abilities of their scouting party. Now and then cheers would go up for Takashi, Ikko, or some other member of the frontline. It would appear that they've seen proof of each other's strength on their scouting trips.

Indeed, they've almost convinced me with their confidence. I'm not sure who to favor, the monster or the scouting party.

Let's be optimistic. I'll favor my classmates.

. . .

. . .

Ikko is the first to make a move.

Or, to put it more accurately, he had already moved.

Seizing the moment the monster looked away, he'd made a wild lunge.

As one would expect from someone with 60 combat power, Ikko's attack was faster than I could even see.

But, fast as Ikko was, his very power was more than the wooden spear could handle as well. I see, in the aftermath, the spear splintering off inches away from the monster's neck, and Ikko thrown backwards a step by his own force.

"Wait! I said, wait!!" (Kumi)

"おおお! So close!" (Tomo)

Not listening, or perhaps not hearing Kumi in all their excitement, the others begin lunging further as well.

Well, I knew that they had higher combat stats than the rest, but I am still impressed. At least, from the spectator's perspective, their thrusts look quite strong, even if they lack technique. Thank you Goddess-sama.

On the other hand, this same lack of technique makes for a bad combination with the loose uneven ground. Many of them are constantly on the verge of losing their footing. When the monster catches their spear in its ape-like hand, snapping the shaft with a turn of the wrist, they actually tumble onto the ground like cartoon characters, completely losing their balance. If another member of their party did not step up, putting the monster again on the defensive, they might have met their deaths then and there...

 

All the while Takashi, the sole unarmed fighter in the frontlines, has not made a move, stepping forward and backward with his hands up. Perhaps it is just because he's somewhat overweight and unathletic, but his movements appear, on the outside, extremely awkward. He himself seems unreliable. Still, he has the most combat-ready ability among us, besides perhaps Chiho (the girl who spoke up the first day). And I know, from playing sports, that many who've looked just as awkward and unmuscular prove themselves head and shoulders above the rest as athletes. I wonder how effective he'll be?

Perhaps seeing in Takashi the same awkwardness that I do, spectators urge him forward, their tones growing more and more annoyed and disrespectful. Strangely enough, they seemed convinced in the superiority of the scouting group. They are totally nonplussed by the size of the monster. People who had run away before are even coming back, watching the battle from afar.

Indeed, at first glance it might appear that we're slowly gaining on the monster, that despite its size we have been able to triumph over it, as our forbears had done over the beasts of their homelands, by dint of our intelligence, teamwork, and Japanese quickness. While the monster bleeds from its lower neck, the blood tracing a crimson stripe over its sickly-white torso, none of us have suffered a direct attack yet.

Seemingly, victory was in sight...

In reality, however, we are only doing so well because our enemy, surprised by the initial strike, had been thrown into caution. If it were not for Ikko's first blow (powerful enough to break the shaft of the spear on impact) setting a precedent for the others in the team, the monster would probably have been much more aggressive.

But even with this, the battle is not looking good for our side. We are gradually losing spears as our opponent catches and breaks them. And we are only so aggressive in order to prevent it from attacking the exposed members of the group, those that have broken formation in their excitement, or have lost their footing and slipped into range of its attack. The monster, on the other hand, has deceptively efficient footwork for its size, getting better grip on the moss and loose soil than us. And as we lose weapons, it is gradually outmatching us.

From the original 8, only 3 spears remain. It is clear to me that if this continues, we will soon have no spears at all and be at the mercy of the monster's brute strength and longer reach.

It won't be long before a counterattack comes...

And,--right as I think this! a spear is dashed to the ground, and its wielder, a boy on the baseball team, screams in shock and leaps backward, and almost immediately falls to the ground in agony. The monster had tagged him on the arm and broken something.

The 2 armed fighters that remain become all the more energetic, feeling the responsibility for everyone's lives now descend upon them... But even despite this renewed burst of fighting spirit, their movements are becoming visibly more sluggish. It's been a few minutes since the start of the battle. They've not paced themselves. And they have not taken a break yet.

 

"Go forward! Switch up!" (Kengo)

"Yeah! Move up! Tomo, switch with Yoshi! Ikko!" (Kumi)

Finally, we start listening to the people in the back row.

To be fair, the fact that everyone didn't start running to save themselves is more than I expected. If we did, several of us would probably have fallen in the resulting chase. After all, for the greater part of civilization battles had been won and lost by nothing more than the discipline of soldiers, by the strength, given by pride, training, experience, will, or firmness of mind, to keep together and not run for one's own life at the first disappointment, at the first discouraging sign. To not require a strong emotion in order to do something difficult.

Nonetheless, we still suffer from the poor coordination of a team that has spent only 3 days together.

Right at our most susceptible moment, the monster leaps for Ikko, whom it seems to recognize as the one that injured it.

"Takashi!!! Now Takashi! Now!!!" (Kumi)

Takashi is still bobbing forward and backward. Perhaps he is out of magic energy, or perhaps he is looking for the best opening, but, due to how awkward he looks, people are assuming the worse and growing frustrated at him.

Ikko, realizing too late that he is the target, has only enough time to shield himself with his arms.

"Ikko!!"

He's flung as though he were a beach ball up into the air and several meters away, and rolls a few times before coming to a stop, his limbs akimbo and his body as limp as a rag doll's.

The monster turns toward Yoshi, the last of us armed with a spear.

Then, suddenly, it stops...it stops and drops its guard...

"Go Takashi!! Now!!" (Kumi)

His position can't get better than this. Behind a monster that seems to have been somehow, inexplicably, stunned or confused, Takashi summons his ethereal sword and, holding it for a moment above his head, swings it down like a hammer.

It disappears almost at the same time as it hits the monster.

Eh?

Ehhhh???

That's it? That's it??? Did he run out of energy??

We couldn't have asked for a better opportunity than that! Ah, if only someone other than Takashi wished for a weapon ability! If only it were me!

Why did he raise it above his head for so long, when he can only keep it up for a few seconds??

But then, just when we are about to despair, the monster lets out a scream. A large gash opens in the top of its back. Blood streams.

"I did it!" (Takashi)

Don't talk when you're fighting.

 

Focused anxiously on the battle, no one had noticed the reason why the monster stopped for a second. If I had not been observing the battlefield from two different vantages, it might have escaped my notice as well.

When Takashi was thrown away, he happened to roll right next to the pit we dug earlier,-- the pit where we kept the slime. And, landing in such an awkward position, his arm had happened, after a short delay, to untwist itself and land near the pit. It was at that accidental movement that the monster stopped.

Could it--Could the reason the monster is here have something to do with the slime?

It's possible...

I cry out for Ikko to reach into the pit and toss it to me. Toss me the slime!

The monster, ignoring its injury, turns around at the person who attacked him, whipping its arm at Takashi and managing to land a glancing blow, but enough to cause Takashi to drop to the ground, screaming in pain.

Ikko is still lying limply on the ground.

With both Ayame and Hideki, I shout desperately for him to wake up.

"Ikko! Ikko!"

 

It's no use. Likely he's lost consciousness completely. If only I could lend him one of mine.

 

Putting both my focuses into Hideki, I begin sprinting there myself, when I notice Tomo, a member of the baseball team, already halfway towards where Ikko is lying.

The monster drops its guard again when it notices Tomo running toward the slime. -- Yoshi, the last one with a wooden spear, takes this chance to land a blow, but like Ikko's attack before, he only manages to make a superficial wound. -- The monster lumbers rapidly toward Tomo, the wound in his upper back radiating stripes of blood. --

Unaware he's become the new target, Tomo manages to reach the slime...he lifts it out of the pit...

As the monster closes the gap to Tomo, Yoshi throws his spear in a last ditch effort to stop it. The spear wobbles pitifully off the mark and hits the monster with the side of its shaft...

I shout for Tomo to toss it to someone else. He of all people should know that you can pass faster than you run.

"Tomo! Pass it to Ayame!" (Me)

At the same time, I gesture (with Ayame), holding my arms in a receiver position. I would have liked it to be Hideki, since I'm faster in that version of myself, but Ayame, standing behind the remaining bystanders, is in the best position.

Trusting in my words, without looking behind, Tomo throws it.

 

As expected of a member of the baseball team.

 

I didn't think a slime would be so aerodynamic. It lands plush in my arms.

Ah.

Now what?

 

I notice Kengo running from the scouting party towards me. Thanks for noticing a girl's dilemma.

I run to meet him, enduring the pain of the slime attacking my arms.

Of course, I am many times slower than the monster. I can see this through Hideki.

When it is a few meters away, I realize that I won't make it. I throw the slime as far in Kengo's direction as I can, perpendicular to where we're running.

The monster instantly forgets my presence and changes direction.

 

The slime falls many meters short of Kengo's position. -- But instead of turning back, running from the approaching giant, Kengo speeds up even more! He doesn't realize that my intention was to buy us time! Now he's trying to make up for my bad throw.

I wince, expecting him to be tackled even worse than Ikko the moment he reaches the slime.

But he doesn't even manage to reach the slime.

Suddenly there is a bright light.

Suddenly--there is a roar in the air... A torrent of fire shoots across the battlefield...

Kengo rolls about the ground in agony, beating his own flaming body with a flaming arm...

Did it just shoot that? A magic spell? I had heard the otaku talking about fireballs and fire magic but I hadn't expected it to be like this...

In the corner of my eyes, I see the members of the class that had returned to watch already fleeing.

I see the monster reach the slime and, grabbing it, lift it to its head. I'm not sure if a slime can struggle, but it does something resembling the struggling an irritated cat might make in a person's arms.

In the next moment a dark shape, like the shadow of a bird sweeping across the forms of objects below, passes through the slime and into the monster.

A white wisp emerges from the space the body of the slime used to inhabit, and--like an earthlier heavier smoke--descends rather to the ground and disappears.

Is that it then? Has the slime been eaten?

Are you satisfied?

Will you leave now?

But instead, to my shock, the monster drops to its knees, as though it were overcome by the pleasure of eating the slime...

Then it falls onto the ground and moves no more.

 

* * * * *

 

A day has passed since the monster attack.

The remains of the monster lie in a pile in the middle of the camp. Parts of the body have disappeared, turning into a kind of white mist upon the death of the whole... Random bits of flesh, limbs, organs remain. Quite a gruesome sight.

Kumi, one of the members of the leading group, has decided on burying the monster in fear that, as the slime had done, the scent of its flesh will attract other monsters to our area.

Besides pretty much only Takashi, no one is happy at all. The mood in our camp is one of anxiety and discontent. Even Takashi is somewhat annoyed, feeling he had proved everyone wrong, especially the people who were rebuking him and shouting at him last evening, and that he was now not receiving the recognition he deserved.

"Shut up. Anyone could have wished for your [Manifest Weapon]. The Goddess didn't tell us enough about what we were getting into. You just happened to luck into the right thing." (Tomo)

"What matters is that I have it now and you don't! What's even the point of thinking 'what if', 'what if'? Pie on your 'if's! Pie!! Anything could have happened-- you could never have been born at all, your mom could have found a better looking guy, the entire course of human history could have changed! That monster could have never been there at all. But it was...it was!" (Takashi)

And so on.

 

Last evening, it was Takashi with his [Manifest Weapon] skill that had slain the monster.

Partly we had won by luck. If the monster were not constantly distracted by the presence of the slime, it would not have dropped its guard so much and the battle would have gone in its favor. Thinking about it, we had probably unintentionally used the slime to our advantage.

The other reason for our victory is, indeed, simply Takashi. Everyone knows it, and many of us--particularly those who ran away--have gained a newfound respect for him. In fact, it's mainly the scouting party who are annoyed at him, saying that he didn't do his job correctly, that he was the reason Ikko is critically injured, that everyone else made up for him messing up, that, even though he showed his weakness back then, now he's trying to pretend that he planned everything out all along...

I don't know what to think. Tomo is my friend...but I don't think Takashi is lying either...

 

What had happened was this. Just as the monster raised the slime into the air Takashi had fired an arrow. Yes, an arrow. Apparently, his Cheat Skill encompassed more than just a sword. It seems that he can use both a sword and a bow. That time, his arrow had happened to hit the monster in its head, instantly killing it.

Though no one says it directly, in private some of my friends are speculating that Takashi had been keeping this ability a secret from the public. They find it doubtful that Takashi, who had proven his unreliability earlier, had managed to improvise a new form of his Cheat Skill in the heat of the moment. My friends like to gossip, and it's unfortunate because they're otherwise good people. In the end, one should take what they say with a grain of salt and be slow to come to a judgement.

Unfortunately for the scouting group, however, they'll have to reconcile with Takashi if they want any more weapons produced. No one has a knife, and, as was demonstrated by the battle, something more advanced than wooden spears would be needed for security.

Hopefully, the giant we had faced is among the strongest of the forest. In reality, we have no idea.

For now, Takashi is our main, if not sole, defense against a monster of similar caliber.

Ikko is still unconscious. At least he's breathing.

I'm also among the injured. People saw me faint with Ayame at some point because I was focusing all my energies on running with Hideki. -- Technically, I am "injured" -- my hands are scarred (hopefully not permanently) from handling the slime. In reality, I am maybe exaggerating the extent of my wound a bit so that any blame that comes will fall a little softer on me.

After all, the monster had been attracted to us by the slime. Once they remember that it was Yui and I who brought the slime back, we might become targets.

Let them think I sacrificed myself!

Besides Ikko and Ayame, most of the scout team are injured in some form or the other. Some of them have come out of it with only minor scratches, sprained ankles, bruises from bad landings, caused by their own overexcitement and lack of fitness, rather than an enemy attack. Takashi got away lucky with only a bruise when he was struck. Ironically, he might be more appreciated at present if he had suffered something as bad as Kengo.

Kengo came off with one of the worse injuries. Another ikemen of our class, he had been training for a prospective idol group in Tokyo before we got reincarnated. Conventionally attractive with a square face and athletic build,-- now he is not only injured but it looks like his burn scars will be permanent.

However, things are not as hopeless as they might have been if this had taken place back on earth. A few good developments have come.

One happened this morning. Water Filter had brought a gourd to the leaf beds where the injured were lying.

When I related to her that no one was thirsty, she remained among our beds, timidly holding her gourd to us. It was only after half an hour had passed, and she had been scolded for getting in people's ways, did we manage to gather that the gourd of water apparently had healing properties.

Water Filter's Cheat Skill is not filtering water after all. It seems to have something more to do with making healing medicine. When, later, I asked one of the round-faced otaku about it he went "ahhhh!" and nodded knowledgeably. It seems that she has something of a famous ability.

This didn't stop people from reprimanding her for not communicating this earlier.

"Why are you always so timid?? Speak up!! Take responsibility!!! Everyone is depending on you!!" (Kumi)

"Ugugugugu" (Water Filter Girl)

"Look at Ikko! Look at him! This is a matter of life and death! Do you understand?? Huh?? Huh??" (Kumi)

"Ugugugugu" (Water Filter Girl)

 

Some of the people that engaged the monster have leveled up. Takashi has leveled up the most. Apparently his Combat Power now rivals Ikko's, who used to be the highest in our group with 60.

I watched him testing out his new powers earlier this morning. Though he seemed more innately powerful, he was just as uncoordinated as ever. His swings with the sword were wild and imbalanced. His shots with the arrow all seemed, at least on the outside, to miss their marks.  I say "on the outside", because after every one of his shots, he nodded to himself with an air of satisfaction ("Yosh"), as though they did what he intended them to do. Who knows what he was testing?

His group of onlookers would cry "Sugoi!" untiringly. He would grow more and more enthusiastic, shadow-boxing imaginary enemies, chaining normal attacks together with summoned sword strikes and arrows ("ora ora ora ora!"). At the end, sweating and panting heavily, he retired to his sleeping mat amid the effusive praise of his audience, and slept through the afternoon.

 

As for myself, I did not receive a level up. But perhaps I've received something better in lieu of that...?

Checking my status window now, I see (with Ayame) the following:

 

[UNKNOWN] [Lesser Human Lvl. 1]
[Magic Points: 5/5] [Hit Points: 10/10]
[Total Combat Power: 10]
[Skills: Dissolve Lvl --]
[Unique Skill: Studious Advance]
[Unique Skill: Identification Lvl 1]