As the Living Armour appeared in front of them, Rei’s group immediately took action.

「Set, used Wind Arrow to test it out!」

「Gururururu~!」

Set used his newly levelled up Wind Arrow.

Seven wind arrows appeared behind Set with a cry and, the next moment, they shot towards the Living Armour.

(I see. At level 1, the maximum number of arrows was 5, but that has increased. The speed of the arrows has also increased and their power has……)

The wind arrows disappeared after making only a small scratch on the armour.

(As for its power, I’m not sure if it has increased or not. But considering the larger number of arrows and faster speed, it has already improved overall. ……Well.)

As Rei analysed the power of the wind arrows, Set let out a cry and the Living Armour shook slightly as if hit by something.

Evil Eye Impact. It was a skill Set had only learned recently and it had an excellent feature, low power but instantaneous activation.

(Wind Arrow is better in setting up a barrage of hits, but Evil Eye Impact is still better for dealing with a single enemy. ……Both are too weak to be used as a deterrent though.)

The Living Armour was knocked somewhat off balance due to the power of Evil Eye Impact, but it quickly regained its footing by striking the shaft of its poleaxe into the floor before walking forward again.

As its only method of attack was with its poleaxe, it had no choice but to move towards Rei’s group.

「Guru~?」

What do you want to do? Set tilted his head and asked with a cry as he stopped attacking.

If they continued attacking from a distance, they could easily defeat the Living Armour without issue, but that would end up damaging the armour and poleaxe that the Living Armour had.

「Yeah, that’s right. Like Skeletons, there’s a magic stone inside the armour, so if we pull out that magic stone, the Living Armour won’t be able to move anymore. ……Alright, I’ll do it. I was able to confirm the performance of Set’s Wind Arrow. Set, wait until I call for you, Elena will keep watch for any monsters coming from the left passageway.」

Elena nodded at Rei’s words as she held her sword whip.

She could have attacked the Living Armour, but she knew what Rei wanted to do and decided that if she attacked, it would only get in the way.

Sending a grateful glance over to Elena, who immediately understood his intentions, Rei closed the distance to the Living Armour with Death Scythe in hand.

Unlike Skeletons where you could see their magic stone at a glance due to the gaps between their bones, in the case of Living Armours, it was a lot harder to find as it was hidden within the armour.

If it were an ordinary monster, it wouldn’t be so hard to find its position because magic stones were usually found in a monster’s heart. However, Living Armours didn’t have a heart which made it a lot more difficult.

「HAAAAaaaah-!」

First of all, to get it out of the way, Rei sliced the neck of the Living Armour with the magic empowered Death Scythe.

His aim was that if the helm was removed, it would be possible to stick his hand in from the neck to take out the magic stone.

「……」

The Living Armour might not might not have understood what Rei was trying to do, but it still swung the poleaxe down in an attempt to block the Death Scythe.

However……

「You’re too naive!」

Even though the power of the dead spirit within the Living Armour half transformed it into a magic item, it was only so strong.

Although Rei felt it would be a bit of a waste to destroy it, he immediately gave up on the poleaxe.

The Death Scythe was not only created with Rei’s enormous amount of magic power, but was also currently empowered with magic power as well.

In order to withstand an attack from the combination of the two, the quality of the weapon blocking and the skill of the person wield the weapon needed to be exceptional.

Kiin-, a sharp metallic sound echoed out into the surroundings.

Normally, two sounds would have been heard, the sound of the poleaxe’s shaft being severed and the sound of the Living Armour’s neck being sliced. However, due to the speed of the Death Scythe’s blade, both were heard as a single sound.

That didn’t stop the movements of the Living Armour though.

It swung the severed shaft of the poleaxe like a club as it tried to strike Rei.

As the Living Armour was possessed by a dead spirit, slicing the helmet off wasn’t a fatal attack.

「I already knew that though!」

Rei’s movements didn’t stop after slicing its helmet off. He gave a sharp shout as he did a half turn on the spot, catching the Living Armour’s attack with the shaft of the Death Scythe before knocking it out of its hands. He continued by flicking his wrist and sweeping the Living Armour’s legs from under it.

Rei shouted out as the Living Armour fell to the stone floor with the high pitched creaking of armour.

「Set!」

「Gurururu~!」

Set immediately knew what Rei’s shout meant and dashed across the stone floor to the Living Armour before placing his foot on its chest.

He was careful not to damage the armour with his claws as he understood from Rei’s earlier words that the armour was quite valuable.

Anyhow, the Living Armour was unable to get up due to Set’s strength as it silently flailed about in an attempt to break out of its predicament.

If it still had its poleaxe in hand, it might have found a way to attack, but as it had been knocked aside by the Death Scythe, it had no way to resist.

It tried to move Set’s claw as if flailed about with metallic creaks, but Set’s physical strength as a Griffon along with the Bracelet of Herculean Strength meant that it could do very little.

「Okay, Set. Keep holding it down.」

As he said that, Rei reached into the Living Armour from where the helmet had been removed, revealing a hollow space.

He eventually succeeded in grabbing the magic stone shifting about inside as he felt around before he pulled it out through the neck.

The moment the magic stone was taken out, the Living Armour stopped moving, like a puppet which had its strings cut. Its limbs that had been struggling to escape Set fell to the stone floor with a high pitched metallic screech.

「Set, you were a great help. ……Here.」

After confirming that the Living Armour was no longer moving, Rei tossed the magic stone over to Set.

「Guru~!」

Catching it in his beak, Set swallowed it……

【Set has acquired the skill 『Power Crush Lv.1』】

An announcement echoed in his mind.

「Heh, we were able to learn a skill twice in a row. Is it just luck, the location, or timing? Whatever the reason, I’m quite happy about it.」

「Huh? It seems you got a new skill. What kind of skill is it?」

「Power Crush. Well, it’s not that strange considering it’s a skill learned from a Living Armour.」

「Gururu~!」

At Rei’s words, Set also gave a happy cry.

Set understood the usefulness of a skill that allowed him to make the most of his physical strength and, unlike flashy skills, it allowed him to use skills in front of strangers that didn’t know about Set’s secret. The thing that Set found strange though was……

「Guru!?」

He had just raised the level of Wind Arrow by absorbing the Desert Lizardman’s magic stone and now he had absorbed the Living Armour’s magic stone.

Rei stroked Set as he noticed his round eyes.

「Don’t worry about it. As I said earlier, I’ve already secured at least one more Desert Lizardman magic stone. As for Living Armours, since this is an undead floor, we’re bound to run into one again.」

「Gurururu~……」

Set didn’t seem too convinced, but since Rei had said that, he reluctantly accepted it.

Giving a small smile as he stroked Set, Rei stored away the remains of the Living Armour into the Misty Ring.

「Now then, let’s get going. If we stay on this floor for too long, it feels like the smell is going to soak into our bodies.」

「Kyu!」

Yellow, who was floating at a distance where he wouldn’t interfere with the fighting, let out a cry as if to say “let’s go!”.

「Fufu, as Rei and Yellow said, I wouldn’t be happy staying here forever. Let’s move on.」

Elena gave a smile as she headed for the right passageway, where the stairs were indicated on the map.

Yellow sat on Set’s back as Set took the vanguard with Rei and Elena bringing up the rear. After walking for 30 minutes, they reached point where the passageways split.

「Another one. ……Elena.」

「It’s the middle passage……but, before that.」

「Gurururu~」

Elena turned her eyes to the right passage as she seemed to notice something.

Sounds of battle could be heard from that passage.

If that was the only thing they heard, they wouldn’t have worried about it that much, but it was a different matter if the noise was getting closer.

「What do we do? Considering the sounds of battle are getting closer, I think some adventurers probably ran into a monster they can’t handle and are running from it.」

「……You’re probably right……」

Rei was lost in thought for a few seconds at Elena’s words before reaching a decision.

「We’ll wait for them here. There’s a possibility they won’t head down the the middle passage we’re planning to take if they’re running away.」

Normally, they should try to run for the small room with the magic circle and stairs. But in unexpected situations, you would never know what might happen.

Nodding at Rei’s decision, the two of them prepared themselves to attack from either side of the passage, a short distance away.

As usual, Yellow flew to the back to avoid getting in their way.

Confirming that Yellow had moved out of the way, Rei started to thing about what means he could use to intercept the enemy.

(Wide area magic? ……No, there’s a possibility that would end up hitting the adventurers running away as well. In that case, I have to use magic that is a bit more focused.)

『Flames, burn your enemies according to my will.』

As a result, Rei chose the easiest and fastest magic to cast.

As he said the incantation, balls of fire about 30cm in diameter appeared at the blade of the Death Scythe.

Next to Rei, Elena used wind magic to create a small tornado in her hand.

As their magic was finished and could be activated at any time, four adventurers ran out from the right passage accompanied by several angry shouts and metallic clangs.

They were running in a way that could only be called running away in defeat.

One of the four adventurers had lost his right arm from the shoulder down, blood bleeding onto the stone floor as another adventurer pulled him by his left arm.

With one arm missing, it threw his balance off and he had asked the other adventurer to help him along.

The other two adventurers frantically swung their swords at their pursuing enemies to push them back before quickly running to gain distance.

At the far back, a Skeleton with white bones chased after them.

(How could adventurers that made it to this floor have to run from a Skeleton?

Rei muttered to himself as he kept his magic ready to activate. However, as he heard the relentless sound of clashing, he realised that they had been beaten by sheer numbers.

In fact, the number of Skeletons that appeared from the passage after the adventurers gradually increased and when there were over 30, both Rei and Elena started to become suspicious.

At any rate, Rei decided it was too dangerous to let things continue as they were and glanced over at Set.

「GURURURURU~!」

The four adventurers looked at Set with despair before their expressions turned to confusion as they saw Rei and Elena about to activate their magic. But, they seemed to understand what Rei and Elena wanted to do as they immediately split to the left and right.

『Fireball.』

Seeing that, Rei activated his magic and a fireball struck the Skeleton that had been chasing the four adventurers, scorching it. At the same time, Elena threw out a wind blade that sliced the Skeletons out of the fireball’s range.

A few seconds later, all that remained were charred and broken bones.

************************************************

【Set】

『Water Ball Lv.3』 『Fire Breath Lv.3』 『Wind Arrow Lv.2』 『King’s Awe Lv.1』 『Poison Claw Lv.4』 『Size Transformation Lv.1』 『Tornado Lv.1』 『Ice Arrow Lv.1』 『Optical Camouflage Lv.2』 『Evil Eye Impact Lv.1』 『Power Crush Lv.1』

Power Crush: Increases the power of a single strike. Normally, there would be a kickback against the user, similar to Power Slash. But in Set’s case, there is close to no effect due to his physical ability.

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