Ch.342Changed Raid NPC. (7)

“Assistant, switch with me. I’ll attack, you defend.”

“Huh?”

The Dean walked forward with his lips curled up like a child who had discovered an amusing toy, while I shouted in bewilderment.

“Wait!! What do you mean I defend?! What am I supposed to defend with…!!”

“Just occasionally fire some magic bullets at him to keep him in check and take down the surrounding undead.”

However, the Dean merely waved his hand dismissively at my protest, pointed his staff, and addressed the creature with a smile.

“How interesting. Much better than that so-called Deadly Sin of Greed. I was expecting something that could eat anything and move freely regardless of its physical form, but it was terribly disappointing. You, however, seem quite entertaining.”

“Ah. So it was you? The one who defeated Greed hiding in the Empire. That was quite irritating. It took considerable effort to summon it, but I never expected it would die without destroying even a single pony.”

Looking truly troublesome, the priest pulled up the corners of his mouth just like the Dean had done, created weapons with holy magic around him, and then—

“Since I’m irritated, please die.”

-BOOM!!!

Without any warning motion, he launched the weapons and blew up the Dean. Wait, I thought he was holding back until now, but can he really launch attacks without any motion?!

“Dea—!!”

“Come forth, high-level elementals Pleia and Wintra.”

[——♬]

[——~!]

However, as if to demonstrate that such attacks couldn’t even scratch him, the Dean emerged from the explosion and summoned massive high-level elementals of fire and wind. The surrounding air grew hot.

Oh right, before being a mage, the Dean was an elementalist!

“Now. Time for a fun analysis.”

“High-level elementals…”

[——♬]

-BOOOOOM!!!

The high-level fire elemental, appearing like a burning woman, raised her voice as if singing lightly, and instantly the priest disappeared into a pillar of fire. However, as if to signal that he was unharmed, the surrounding undead rushed toward the Dean rather than me.

“You are in the way.”

[!——~!]

Those undead simply evaporated like they were weathering away at the roar unleashed by the high-level wind elemental, who looked like a blue-hued girl. Wait, what’s going on? He told me to defend, but am I not needed at all?

“Stop thinking foolishly and properly clear away the undead. I want to focus on him.”

“Please don’t read my thoughts as you please.”

Is this how people feel when I do it to them? Thinking this after hearing the Dean’s words, I shot down the remaining undead that were still around due to the distance between us. Then the pillar of fire exploded, and once again the golden-glowing priest rushed toward the Dean.

“Elementals are truly disgusting. They’re failures created by the Supreme God.”

-KAAAAANG!!!

“Surely you don’t have some defective magic where elemental time isn’t slowed down, do you?”

“What I use is not… magic!!!”

-BOOOOOM!!!

A massive stone spear blocked the creature’s path as it rushed toward the Dean. After smashing through it with all his might, the wind elemental appeared before the creature’s face with a grin and let out a roar, sending him crashing into the ceiling. Then as the Dean swung his staff, a massive lightning sphere formed around them like a flash bomb had gone off.

-CRACKLE-BOOM!!!

It created a storm of lightning indoors. W-wait!! At this distance, I might get caught in—! Kyaaa!!!

“Tsk, Assistant. Be more careful. When you were attacking, I protected you well. What are you doing?”

“Eek! Forget it!! I’m backing off!!!”

While I fought with fists or guns in a limited range, the Dean’s flashy attacks were all wide-area magic. Even now, I was nearly five meters away but almost got scorched by the lightning. If I stay nearby, I’ll just interfere with the battle. With that thought, I shot at the reviving undead while backing away when—

“Hup!!”

-BOOOOOM!!!

The creature, who should have been directly hit by the lightning magic, emerged unharmed from the collapsed ceiling and launched holy weapons. This is—I should snipe—

“Gravity Manipulation. Needle Stones.”

“Ugh…!!”

The trajectory of the flying weapons and the freely falling creature were strangely pulled and altered. Then, raising several stone spears from below the falling position as if to skewer his entire body, the Dean’s bombardment finally made the creature spurt blood.

Wow, what is this? If it was going to be like this, the Dean could have done it alone from the beginning…

“Enough playing around. Aren’t you going to show me what you showed my assistant earlier?”

“…Haha. I was hoping you’d lower your guard so I could blow your head off in one shot.”

He casually pulled out the weapons that had pierced his solar plexus—both his own and the Dean’s stone magic—and landed back on the ground, making me think of a woman I’d rather not remember.

Wait, are all high-ranking priests of the Holy Theocracy like this? Why won’t any of them die easily?!

“Well then, as you wish, I’ll show you. This is the ‘authority’ bestowed upon me by the Pope and the Supreme God.”

The priest, showing no trace of the wounds inflicted by either me or the Dean, smiled eerily and created dozens of weapons with holy magic, pointing their blades at us. Considering the Dean’s defensive magic and the power of the high-level elementals around her, attacks that merely increased in number shouldn’t be a threat. I guess I don’t need to provide covering fire…

[…You need to shoot, Two.]

-CLICK!!

Startled by the sudden sultry female voice in my ear, I flinched before gripping my guns and began shooting down the holy weapons flying straight toward the Dean.

Ugh…!! You could have said that earlier!!

-TAK-KANG! TAK-KANG! TAK-KING! TANG! TANG-KANG! TAK-KAANG! TAK-KIING!

[Four. Five. Six…]

As I worked hard to shoot down the weapons, something strange was happening. Neither the Dean nor the high-level elementals around her were moving at all, just staring at the creature. Hey, aren’t you going to attack or counter or something?!!

[…Nine.]

“Reverse Gravity!”

[——♬!!]

The Dean’s gravity manipulation magic created a belated barrier, and the fire elemental created a massive wall of fire, causing the creature’s few remaining weapons to explode before reaching the wall. Wait, could this be…?

“Slave. How many seconds?”

“Yes!! It was 9 seconds, sir!! Even the elementals were completely stopped!!”

Speaking with a slightly more relaxed voice, the Dean called for the slave, and immediately the high-level demon of lust with pink hair appeared beside me and raised her voice. Seriously, what if I hadn’t recognized this demon’s voice? Normally I would have shot her first out of surprise!

“9 seconds. To lose 9 seconds in battle is quite significant.”

“You mean…”

“I don’t know the activation method yet, but it seems to steal about 9 seconds of our perception speed, thinking speed, and physical time. But it’s strange, earlier the assistant seemed to stop for less than 2 seconds…”

“Are you crazy?! You deliberately let yourself be stopped by the enemy after saying you’d attack?! Are you trying to get yourself killed?!!”

He even had that demon time the stoppage from the beginning! If you were going to do that, you should have told me from the start…!!

“Don’t be foolish. If I had told you and that creature managed to stop both of us with some extra effort, we’d only end up with incorrect information even if we barely survived. Besides.”

You’re protecting me. So there’s no reason for me to die. Speaking as if it were nothing, the Dean said that much before staring at the burning wall, lost in his own thoughts again.

Wait, I won’t die because I’m protecting you? Where does that confidence come from? But why did my heart skip a beat?! What is this! Dean, are you trying to seduce me?!!

“Stop saying stupid things and focus. The creature has climbed to the ceiling from behind the wall, and since I still don’t know the activation method, I’m keeping more distance. If I experience it once more, I think I’ll get a better sense of it.”

“You’re going to let it happen again? That thing from just now?!”

“I’ve told you about it this time, so you might be able to avoid stopping too. Hey, slave.”

“Yes!! If both of you stop, I’ll take responsibility!!”

That’s not the issue! After saying that much, the Dean gave instructions to her high-level elementals to collapse the ceiling and attack the creature, while she herself froze again in the middle of casting a spell.

[One!]

“Aah!! Really!!!”

-BANG BANG BANG BANG!!!

Protecting the frozen Dean, I hunted down the incoming attacks and undead with all my might.

*

“Master. If it’s just a time-wasting pattern like this, it’s not that difficult, is it?”

“Hm? Oh. The Sloth pattern?”

As Gorg carried me in a princess hold, silently going through the same alley for about the 200th time, he questioned what I had said earlier, seeming a bit confused. Well, this is a passage gimmick, not a battle. It’s just annoying. Actually, there were supposed to be mobs appearing here to reduce the number of loops, but it seems that was replaced with Greed.

“Then what is it that makes the Dean and Ragni unable to defeat it even after understanding the pattern?”

“Simply put, even if you and I encountered Sloth, we couldn’t break through.”

Similarly, it would be impossible with just Rey and Ira. Hearing this, Gorg tilted his head and asked, “Is it a matter of numbers?” I nodded, confirming that was the answer.

“It inflicts an extreme slow debuff on opponents. In game terms, it’s like the affected person’s screen freezes and they can’t move.”

“Since it’s called Sloth, it makes people unable to move—makes them slothful. I understand.”

“Something like that. But the problem is that it’s not cast on just one person. It’s randomly cast on ‘half the party.'”

“…Half. So if there are two people, one will definitely be slowed down.”

“And you can’t defeat it while protecting allies who are frozen. Is that what you mean?” Gorg nodded, seeming to understand what I was getting at, but I added a correction.

“That’s roughly right, but there’s more to the strategy.”

“What else? Actually, since we have plenty of time, I’d like you to tell me everything.”

As he said this while passing through the alley for the 200-something time, Gorg looked at me. I told him to keep his eyes forward while running, then explained the strategy.

“Half the party. I’ve mentioned before that in Eight’s raid system, a 4-person party means 8 people including available NPCs, right?”

“Yes. So I understand that 4 people would be affected.”

“Right. But here’s the problem: ‘slowed [users]’ need to deal damage to the boss during the slow timing for the damage to register.”

“…Wait. How can you deal damage when your screen is frozen?”

Hearing my explanation, Gorg frowned his beautiful gray face in genuine confusion, looking back at me. Seeing that he wasn’t going to crash even if he didn’t watch where he was going, I stopped nagging and simply shrugged before giving the answer.

“Prediction shots. At the timing when the slow effect ends, you predict where the boss will appear and activate attack skills. Then, even though my slow status has ended, the boss still recognizes me as slowed for about a second, so the damage goes through.”

In other words, allies need to protect the ones using prediction shots so their attack skills don’t get canceled by getting hit and staggered, and if you can’t hit the boss with predictions, you can’t deal damage. After explaining this disgusting boss, Gorg said:

“…No wonder all the players left. Isn’t that pattern too disgusting? Why did you even play such a game, Master?”

Well, since it’s the motif for this world, let’s not criticize it too much? I could only smile awkwardly as Gorg continued his scathing critique of the original game.