(Warning: this chapter contains a mild depiction of cruelty, please proceed with your own discretion)

Before I knew it, I had been in Yuna-san’s embrace with my head wrapped in between her soft chest.

I have no idea why this situation is happening, causing me to start panicking.

"Yu-yuna-san?!"

"Oh, you finally noticed me, Eve-chan~"

Looking at Yuna-san’s calm expression, I feel slightly relieved.

Seeing that gentle smile, I regain my composure and remember a little bit about what caused this situation.

------

I left Lucia-san's store and headed to West Forest together with Yuna-san.

The hunt today was smoother compared to yesterday, even though only Yuna-san and I went to hunt this time.

It was totally worth it to invest my points on my STR stat.

I remembered that it took me 7 strikes to kill a Cuckobird before, yet now I just needed to do 4, and when Yuna-san supported me, it would die in only 3 strikes, without even having a chance to charge at me.

"You are getting a lot better than yesterday, I’m impressed." Yuna-san said with an "Eeh~" expression on her enchanting face.

I waved my hand shyly and quickly denied, "No, no, no. It just that I levelled up so much yesterday, and I’m getting used to fighting with other people, I think."

"Speaking of which, Eve-chan, this is your first time playing a game like this, right? I won’t believe it if it’s not coming directly from your mouth. After all, you moved so well that I can’t think of you as a newbie."

"I can say the same to you, Yuna-san. It’s rare to see someone who can handle a bow as well as you."

"Well, my Moonlight Bow has an additional effect to increase the hit rate, you know. That’s why it’s pretty easy~"

We continued to chat as we moved forward.

Since I have found hidden monsters with [Presence Detection], my progress is slow, but I don't feel uneasy.

"We almost at the forest, so let’s have lunch before then."

Yuna-san took bread and rabby meat from her storage, used her [Cooking] skill on them, and then voila! They instantly turned into Rabby Sandwiches!

I was so happy to see that she was making use of her skills right away.

Now that we had had our fill, we resumed our way to the forest.

We mainly focused on collecting rather than hunting.

Since hemp grass was supposed to be very tall, we ignored the area near the entrance where only short grass grew and went deeper into the forest.

On the way, a wild Spice Rowder appeared!

If I wasn’t wrong, this gross creature also dropped a thread, right? It was just at the right time that I was in need of a lot of threads, so let’s beat the hell out of this guy!

Just as I was about to attack, it spat its thread at me first, which I easily dodged and then followed with a neat slash on one of its legs.

My dagger sliced the limbs into pieces as effortlessly as slicing butter, which I couldn’t do before because of my lack of physical strength.

Once I saw through its pattern, the rest became so simple, and I was able to kill it without even breaking a sweat.

As for the Eye Hunter, my newly acquired skill, [Presence Detection], played an active role here.

Yesterday, our party depended solely on Yuna-san's excellent eyesight to deal with these hawk-like monsters, but today I spotted them earlier than Yuna-san most of the time.

I’ve never felt so glad that I did my best to learn this awesome skill.

After entering the forest and proceeding to the southeast, I finally found a cluster of hemp grass.

From the perspective of ordinary eyes, these grasses might not look any different from other plants in the surrounding area, but my [Craftmant’s Eye] showed me these were indeed the ones I was looking for.

I heard that even if you swept them clean, they would grow back after a while, so I decided to dig them to the roots.

If you cut it into pieces by inserting a dagger into the root, the cut hemp will go into your inventory on its own.

How convenient~

I immediately handed over all the fruits of my hunting until now to Yuna-san and concentrated on harvesting the hemp grass.

Since Yuna-san didn’t have the [Craftsman’s Eyes] and couldn’t help my work, I asked her to keep her eyes on the surroundings.

After much time had passed, I finally filled my inventory to the brim. Even so, they were still 10 x 10 in size, so there was only that much hemp grass we could obtain for today.

I was so absorbed in my work that I didn’t notice that Yuna-san had disappeared from my sight, and instead, a group of men with a bad vibe appeared in front of me.

"Hyahaha, look guys, there's still a woman left here."

"Oi oi, let us do it this time."

"That's right. You should have had your fun with that woman earlier!"

"Damn. I can't stand it. I'll laugh at you if you get killed, so go ahead and get killed in cold blood. The men are ignoring me."

What the hell is this?!

These men talked among themselves, ignoring my presence.

And more importantly, Yuna-san wasn’t here either. Where did she go?

I couldn’t shake the bad premonition that slowly engulfed my heart.

"Ah, have you seen a woman around here? She's the one with a bow..."

I suppressed the uneasiness in my heart and braved myself to ask these guys.

At that time, I was so frustrated that I couldn't find Yuna-san, so I thought that I could only get information from them.

"Oi oi, are you serious?"

"Damn, seriously. I think we hit the jackpot."

I didn’t understand the slightest of what they were talking about, but I knew that these people came over me bearing ill-intention in their mind.

They slowly approached me with weapons in their hands while laughing creepily.

My body shuddered involuntarily as my heart tightened up. Cold sweat broke in my palms as I trembledly drew my weapons.

Thud!

Suddenly, something flew, knocking the daggers out of my hands.

"It’s too late~ kukuku…"

I… I was scared.

I froze on the spot.

"Then, let’s start the fun~"

One of the men walked closer, I felt his presence towering over me.

He raised his weapon and swung it down at me, who couldn’t move.

It was not once or twice, but over and over again. He aimed at my hands and feet to avoid fatal wounds.

"AAARRGGGHHHHHHH!"

I screamed in pain.

If I suffered this much pain in the real world, I’m sure that I would’ve passed out instantly.

Unfortunately for me, this was a game where my sense of pain was dulled to some degree.

I wished nothing but to lose consciousness right now so that I didn’t feel this suffering anymore, but these cruel guys wouldn’t let me off easily.

Tears gushed out of my eyes uncontrollably as the pain assaulted me.

I must’ve looked so pitiful right now.

"Stop, please stop!! It’s hurt, stoooppp!"

Despite my desperate plea, they didn't stop attacking, and with disgusting smiles on their faces, they hit me again and again.

At some point, my HP dropped to 0 and I was sent back to the city where I started.

Back in the city, my confusion and my fears still lingered. I remained distraught.

Yuna-san saw this and brought me to a nearby inn to take care of me.

And she kept holding me and hugging me to calm me down.

*

I could’ve used my [Stealth] there; I could have resisted desperately, biting and chomping their flesh like a wounded beast, but I was overwhelmed by my fear instead. I was so frightened that I couldn’t even move.

I’m so pathetic.

But, it’s already too late to regret it.

Even if this is just a game, I can’t forgive those bastards who made me experience that cruelty.

And so, I swear to exact revenge on them! All of them!