Chapter 170: Anxiety before the fight

Regular chapter. I’ll be releasing the next chapter concurrently too ????

As the boat drifted away from the coast, I jumped into the boat and stretched my hand towards Carol who was following behind.

Carol grabbed my hand and climbed onto the boat.

“Our feet are soaked now.”

“Yeah ― it’s a good thing we brought 2 pairs of shoes.”

I bought hiking shoes at Gomaki village so I had changed into those when I was running on the coast.

Since it would have been a problem if I got a wound from running along the coast. There were considerably sized rocks around after all. I would be able to treat any injuries using healing magic but it would have been troublesome if I got some strange infection from the wound.

Naturally, there weren’t any doctors or hospitals on the deserted island so getting a bacterial infection might be life-threatening.

When I went barefoot by taking off my shoes, Carol also followed me and took off her shoes and we poured the water in our shoes off the boat.

Carol’s small feet were revealed.

“Now then, I guess I’ll start rowing.”

“Ichino-sama, should I row too?”

“No, it’s the guy’s role to row on a rowing boat after all.”

I held the oar securely and rowed.

“I guess the last time I rowed a boat was about 5 years ago ― immediately after I graduated from middle school.”

Miri was still an elementary school student at that time. During summer break on a day our parents were away for work, we went to a park together and rowed a boat.

Until today, I still clearly recall Miri saying “Hey Onii, Miri is no longer a child so I won’t be happy with something like this.” even though she was still an elementary school student.

At that time, that small pond felt extremely wide. We reached the opposite shore of the pond a minute before we would have had to pay additional by missing the appointed time. It would have been seriously dangerous if a strange gust didn’t blow us towards the boat landing area.  And I remember Miri looking quite exhausted perhaps because she was seasick from the sudden gust. She was as exhausted as I am when I reach magical power exhaustion.

Never in my wildest dreams would I imagine that I would now be sailing out into the ocean with a rowing boat.

Thankfully the waves were calm so the ship didn’t sway much. To the extent that I felt that I was shaken more when I rode on a horse carriage.

I thought to myself that once this was all over, it might be fun to have a relaxed journey by sailing on the sailboat and passing time by doing something like fishing.

Thanks to my status increase, rowing the boat didn’t tire me at all and my speed was much faster compared to when I last rowed a boat in Japan.

I wonder how far should I row the boat until? By now, the island was but a faint shadow.

“Well then, shall we wait here? ― ”

The biggest problem was where the monster would appear from.

She mentioned that it would appear around the island but I didn’t ask her for the exact location. It would be troublesome if it appeared at the opposite side from us but I took a gamble.

However, Carol discovered that inside the uninhabited labyrinth, the monsters spawned more frequently at the southeast so I sailed the boat to the northeast.

If you’re wondering why not to the southeast, it’s because I would not have the leeway to intercept the monster if the monster appears directly below the boat, I would be too busy avoiding it.

“Carol, in your opinion, what kind of nasty monsters live in the ocean?”

“Let me see, a famous legendary monster would be the Sea Serpent.”

“A huge snake huh ― ”

“Sightings of other monsters include the Spirit monsters Lorelei that sink ships with their songs, single-horned whales the size of islands, or the Big Black Shark that’s feared for consuming ships is also famous … but the Demon Lord should be able to defeat those.”

“I don’t feel like I would be able to defeat a single-horned whale the size of an island though.”

“Don’t worry, their weakness is Thunder so Ichino-sama will be able to defeat it easily with Boost Thunder.”

… Carol’s belief in me is way too high. I seriously don’t believe I can defeat a monster the size of an island.

“In addition, there are many other mythological monsters of the sea.”

“Really?”

“Yes. A huge octopus called a Kraken, also ― ”

It happened when Carol was about to say something.

The waves surged ― and the ship was swept about as if we were being sucked into the sea.

“This presence ― tch, this is out of my expectations.”

My monster Presence Detection skill captured it instead of my Enemy Detection skill and I looked towards it.

A shark flew up from below the ocean surface like a flying fish.

“Ichino-sama, is this the monster?”

“No! Slash!”

It was a slight expenditure of MP but it was better than using magic.

The shark aiming for the boat was shot down by the Slash attack released from my knife hand pose.

That’s right, the shark died from just that ― there’s no way that kind of small fry would be something the Demon Lord fail to defeat.

In addition ―

“More of them incoming.”

Not only the shark, numerous monsters were surfacing on the ocean surface. They were the monsters that were not detected by my Enemy Detection skill even though the bottom of the ocean isn’t that far away.

This was most likely due to the revival of the monster Sheena No.3 talked about.

The monsters inside the ocean were escaping to the ocean surface ― and the agitated monsters attacked the enemies they were unaccustomed to ― in other words, us.

“Give me a break, just escape and leave us be! Slash!”

I cut down the monster that came to assault our boat this time, a large octopus (not a Kraken). The octopus ink polluted the ocean but when that washed away, a shark appeared next.

My MP would be depleted even before the actual monster appears if this continued on.

That being said, if I allowed the monsters to approach until I can reach them with a sword, a small boat like this would sink in the blink of the eye.

We were in a bigger pinch than I had imagined.