[Arc 5] Chapter 2-8: The Grievous Gorge

7 days before the release of the Invidia Overlord.

Noire's PoV:

"...Alright, you guys can pass. Be careful down there." - Flugel

T-too close for comfort...

"Bwa-hahaha! No need for worries! The five of us will triumph over any monsters that may hide in the shadows!" - Grangron

That stupid Ground Ogre that Mira got along with during the festival in Luxuria is making a ruckus again. My poor ears...

"Gran, stop bothering our leader with your loud mouth." - Smart-looking Ogre

One of the Ground Ogre's companions is living up to his image and told off the Ground Ogre for his loud voice. 

"...Gran...always too...noisy. Nothing new...there." - Calm-looking Ogress

The sole female in the Ogre-trio nodded along to the smart-looking Ogre's words. But the Ground Ogre just laughed with a smile. Ugh, this will be a horrible exploration...

"Kkkkkk! (Special translation: Kiriste-gomen! Give me bad-guys to cut!)" - Lunatic

And then there's the fifth wheel to our party. That strange, samurai-dressed spider. I think its name is "Lunatic". It is easy to remember, seeing as it is acting like it's crazy all the time. Or maybe it simply is crazy. 

As for the ogres, the Ground Ogre is supposedly called "Grangrog", but both the name and the person are too annoying to bother remembering. I will take note of the other two ogres and just call him "Gran". 

Speaking of the other two, the smart-looking one's name is "Shen" while the quiet girl is "Sei". Simple and easy names to remember, as opposed to their boisterous companion. Referring to people by their names is important when it comes to teamwork after all. Otherwise, I'd never bother to work with these unpolished ogres. 

...But the worst part of this mess is that I even have to go exploring some nasty mountain gorge. It is horrible! Why could I not be assigned to a mission in a city? 

The Flugel guards let us pass through the Gorge Gate despite the commotion Gran's loud mouth caused. Luckily, it seems that my disguise magic item that I nabbed when I fled from home is working even now. 

And Lady Luck is giving me even more of her fortune. Despite there being people from my home country here in this city...the people working at the Gate were Jaune and Orange. My stupid, stupid older brothers. They wouldn't realize the truth even if it came and hit them in the face with a sledgehammer. 

Anyway, we left the two idiots behind as we passed through the Gate and entered the Grievous Gorge. It is...not as impressive as I would believe from the narratives Flint gave me while he tried to stop his knees from shaking. 

The "Gorge" is simply a mountain track. An extremely dark one, but they are selling magic lanterns at the entrance of the Gate, so I doubt we are going to face any troubles. 

"Now, let us be on!" - Grangron

"Hold on, Gron. Do you even remember the reason why we are here?" - Shen

"......Not at all!" - Grangron

"Oh, come on..." - Noire

Why do I have to be stuck with this idiot? Because that idiot Filyn never bothered hiring more people, that's why!

Ugh, meeting people from my homeland is making me lose my calm. But you have to keep it, "Noire". You are not part of that ridiculous comedy of family obsessed with some lame "warrior group" that some lame Migrant told my ancestors about. You are the stylish and fabulous Flugel Noire who is working for the next Demon King. Don't lose sight of your future celebrity life...

"*Sigh*, let us go over this one final time. Our goal here is to discover the Treasure Tower of the Inventor Lord, a mysterious person that we know almost nothing about, except for the facts that he is connected to the Demon King of Solomar, could be a user of the Metal attribute, and that he has some history with this Gorge. Enough for the Tower representing him to appear in this area." - Shen

"And we have no idea just where the Tower is, except for it being in this Gorge." - Noire

"Thank you for reminding me, Ms. Noire. This makes it our quest to locate this Tower, and if we can, obtain the Treasure inside it." - Shen

"That's easy! Let's take care of the villain of the Tower while we're at it!" - Grangron

"Just where did you plan on looking? We have nothing on this person. We don't even know if he is in the Gorge at the moment." - Shen

"Wa-hahaha! Too bad for you, because I have proof backing me here!" - Grangron

"And what would that be?" I asked in an attempt to humor the giant ogre. Let's hope he turns quiet when he has to admit-

"...The puppets...attacking the city." - Sei

"Bingo, Sei!" - Grangron

There was backup to his rambling!?

"I am sorry to say this, but anyone could have sent out the rumored automatas to attack the city. There is no proof that this Inventor Lord was behind them." - Shen

There are also those strange undead creatures assisting the automatas, but I am going to keep my mouth shut from now on. Gran is too heated up to hear our words anymore, and even Lunatic is getting too excited. Sheat those katanas right this instant! And if you are going to drag around that strange coffin of yours, don't forget it at the entrance!

We ventured deeper into the dark depths where the sunlight couldn't reach. Who would have thought it could be this dark in the middle of the day? I can even see the sunshine right above us, but it does not reach down here.

"Everyone, make sure not to lose your lanterns. Having to navigate through these dark chasms would be a trial even for people with skills like [Nightvision]." - Shen

"Hmm? I think these lights are weaker compared to being able to see in the dark." - Grangron

"If it only was the darkness we need to worry about... But you will see soon." - Shen

Shen gave only those vague clues as we headed deeper into the Gorge. An hour or so after we'd left the gate, we finally encountered them.

"ZOMBIES!!" - Sei

"I was afraid of that." - Shen

"Hah! You can be alone on that." - Noire

There is no sweeter EXP than that of massacring a group of unholy corpses walking around!

Grangron had taken out a battleaxe from his bag and stood defensively in front of the other two ogres. So he's not a mindless berserker after all.

Shen is supposedly an intellect-type, and that Sei girl is supposedly only a packer who keeps a track of all the items we need. The girl looks sort of pale. Is she bad with zombies?

Neither of them has any decent combat abilities on their own. Having the big brute protect them is an unexpectedly wise move on his part. Or it's a habit he has developed after the trio's long time together.

In comparison, Lunatic charged in with katanas drawn, cutting apart all the moving corpses who're not been crushed by the coffin that the spider is using as a flail. Just how little disrespect can you show to the dead? Even I am feeling a little repulsed by her behavior. 

Not that I am going to ease my bow. Undead must die! 

I took to the air and started to give Lunatic air support. The undead easily fell prey to the holy arrows I released. I do not even need to use the Thaumaturgy Bow for these "chumps". They are falling like flies only to my "ordinary" arrows that I created before we took off! 

Some of the undead tried to release some nasty long-range attacks, but this new skill, [Trouble Revelation] is giving me an early warning, so I can easily evade the thrown lobes of...stuff that I do not wish to describe. Yuck.

I think the skill can be considered a Celestial-limited version of the [Paranormal Intuition] skill Garami bragged about, the one that shows her where attacks will come flying. In my case, [Trouble Revelation] is not based on intuition, but a sort of divine faith. For as long as my aptitude for the Holy attribute is high, I can foresee any kind of "trouble" aimed my way!

What luck that the latest System Update gave new rules regarding the skills evolved from [Identification], and that I was granted [Trouble Relevation] alongside the new "evolved [Identification]" skill. I am invincible with it!

...Or so I thought, but as I have recently discovered, more "divine" creatures seem to escape this skill's effect. Why else wouldn't the skill react to my blasted brothers until right before I met them? That gave me a heart attack. 

Therefore, this cute and fashionable Noire is going even stronger to become the most divine fallen angel of the millenia~. Even the replacement for Fallen Mage (which got canceled due to the new rules of Celestials being incapable of using Curse anymore for some reason) is relying on Holy now~.

I am of course speaking of "Celestial Archer". A race-limited class based on archery. If I had known about this one before, I would not have bothered with the plain old Archer class! Now I understand why Garami and Ciara are always saying "information is power!!". Is it some common sense for Migrants? But I digress, so let's return to shooting down corpses. 

Needless to say, the zombies are flocking toward the group on the ground like ants on a sugar cube. Big ants at that.

The lanterns' lights seem to affect the zombies somewhat, weakening them so that the ground team can easily beat them up, but it defeats the purpose if the lanterns are attracting more undead than we can defeat! For every 3rd undead I impale with an arrow, 10 new ones have already taken their places!

"...Okay, that's enough. Gran, get ready." - Shen

"Roger, doger!" - Grangron

"Spider, mind coming over here? And Ms. Noire, please remain off the ground for a little longer." - Shen

They are up to something... But I do not want to go down there to the zombie party any more than a fish wants to be out of the water. I am staying.

"Alright! Time for the grand, sparking finale!!" - Grangron

With a loud battle roar, Gran lifted his giant axe in the air while producing that dinosaur-shaped aura of his again. His [Anima Drive: Tyrranosaurus], I think it was. That is not surprising, as I have seen him use it many times before during the Nightmare Festival... But did his axe release lightning sparks as it does now?

"Hahahaha! Take this! Certain kill: THUNDER AXE SLAM!!" - Grangron

*ZZZZAAAAAAP!!!*

After the axe hit the ground, a field of pure lightning spread across the dark chasm. No joke. The whole field is flashing like the lights in Lily's room during the nights after she's listened to Mira's collected ghost stories. All the zombies got electrified to the point where they went past "scorched" and turned into piles of ashes!

Is that axe the key here to this ridiculous display of electrical energy? ...No, that's not it. The axe itself feels less impressive compared to my Thaumaturgy Bow, and it cannot reach this level of power even if I had to use its self-sacrificing effect as Garami supposedly did with her revolver back when she fought the Darkness Dragon. 

Does the axe have some secret ability that I didn't detect at first? No, that can't be it. Even if I cannot see it, there is no way Flint wouldn't have made a ruckus about it that day when Gran asked that lizard to polish his battle axe. Then maybe there is some sort of skill behind that ridiculous power, outside the Anima Drive?

*Craaaaack...*

Hmm? What is that sound?

*Rumble, rumble rumble!*

Oh, no! The floor!

"Gran, you idiot!" - Shen

"Whoops. Did it again." - Grangron

"......*fainted*." - Sei

"Kkkkk!?!? (Special translation: But I didn't get to hunt down enough heads!?!?)" - Lunatic

Everyone down below fell into a crack in the ground before I could react. Even Lunatic, who could spin webs to stop her fall, couldn't react in time. Those idiotic ogres! Now I have to fly down and save-

*CRASH!*

...Hmm? Where did this black pillar come from? It is attached to...to...to..., what is that...!?

"BIRdy. YUm, yuM!" - Atlach-Nacha

...I am so dead...

Greydra

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