Itai no wa Iya nanode Bōgyo-Ryoku ni Kyokufuri Shitai to Omoimasu Chapter 62

Defense Specialization and Quest 2

「We can see the forest now. There is a way in, please enter through there.」

「Say, can we not just fly through it?」

Maple got off Syrup in front of the forest and put it back in her ring.

「Come on, let’s hurry!」

「Alright! This… is the place, right?」

A trail extended in front of her.

The woman was also pointing to this trail, so she must have been right.

Maple walked further and further down the trail.

The woman was always within range of 【Cover】, so protecting her was easy.

Normally, she would have had to fight battle after battle before coming to the forest, but Maple was able to get through by her own special means.

The means was, of course, Syrup.

「【Paralyze Shout】!」

Since Maple’s attacks had no effect on the woman, even if she was surrounded, she didn’t have to panic, she just had to activate this skill.

「I don’t have to defeat them now, do I?」

However, Maple, unlike normal players, was really slow.

That meant an increase in the number of times she was attacked.

By the time the woman led her to the center of the forest, she had used up all of her Eating Inedibles skill.

「I’ll change to the crystal shield.」

She changed her equipment to the purple great shield and followed the woman.

「Look, that is the 【Tree of Life】!」

The tree that the woman ran up to was only about half the size of the surrounding trees.

「It’s not what I thought it would be…」

Maple had imagined a giant tree with a mysterious glow.

「These leaves can help with illnesses, you know?」

The woman took a few leaves from a branch and showed them to Maple.

「Oh… is that so? I wonder if it’s okay if I take some too.」

Maple tried to take some, but an invisible wall prevented her from coming closer.

Apparently, it was an event-only item, not obtainable by players.

「I’m done now.」

「Let’s go back, then.」

Maple summoned Syrup, made it float up and then used Gigantification on it…

Because there was no space.

「Syru-up! Ple-ease!」

Syrup was a little too high to grab her with its mouth as usual.

Maple spent some time thinking about what to do, and finally came up with a good idea.

She wasn’t going to climb the tree.

Of course, she wasn’t going to jump either.

「【Crystal Wall】!」

The purple crystals growing from beneath her feet sprang Maple up.

Obviously, that wasn’t how it was supposed to be used.

「Syru-up!」

Maple soared up and plunged into Syrup’s mouth head-first torso-deep, its teeth holding her.

From the outside, it would have surely been a shocking sight to see.

No matter how you looked at it, it looked like she was being preyed upon by a flying turtle.

And just like that, Maple was thrown onto its back and positioned herself there.

「Ah… what should I do with her…?」

When Maple tried to look at the NPC below her, she had just leapt from the tree and jumped onto Syrup’s leg.

「Eeeeehhh!?」

「Let’s go. My daughter is waiting.」

「S-sure.」

Maple started flying through the air.

Then, she muttered to herself.

「This woman could definitely go alone…」

She couldn’t help but think that the woman’s ability would allow her to go deep into the forest.

And so they flew, and when they came out of the forest…

「Pant… Pant… I am very grateful for your protection. I would have died if not for you…」

「Huh!? W-what’s happened all of a sudden?」

Maple didn’t do anything special.

She was just flying in the sky.

No, flying in the sky itself was abnormal.

What was supposed to happen was that a player equipped with a great shield and lacking in offensive power would be battered by the monsters that would become much stronger on the way back.

The woman’s words came only after they were overcome.

Because of the way they broke through, this line became unnatural.

「Knight-sama… you are so kind.」

「Eeh… um… I’m sorry for… something.」

Maple felt somewhat guilty and apologized, but the woman didn’t respond in any way.

Maple couldn’t stand the atmosphere, so she hurried back to town.

「Okay! Here we are!」

Maple got off Syrup in front of the town and put it back in her ring.

The place she was heading for was this woman’s house.

「Thank you very much! I better hurry up and get going!」

The woman hurried off.

She was too fast for Maple to catch up.

「…let’s go slowly.」

If Maple didn’t get there, the event wouldn’t occur after all, so it wouldn’t end before that.

This was just a performance.

After some walking, Maple arrived at the woman’s house.

When she opened the door, she saw the woman was just about to give the girl some kind of drink.

A dark green liquid was in the vessel.

As for Maple, she could tell from a simple glance that it looked bitter and she did not want to drink it.

The girl who drank it also grimaced.

「…How is it?」

「Cough, cough… yes… a little better… hack! hack!!」

「What a horrible cough… Arghh! What do I do-oo!?」

The woman lamented.

At that moment, a blue screen appeared in front of Maple.

Quest 【Benevolent Knight 2】

A new quest appeared.

Naturally, Maple accepted it.

「Knight-sama! Will you help me again?」

「Uh, yes… I can’t just leave her like that.」

The girl, still coughing heavily, seemed to be getting worse.

「Then… please take me to the 【Evil Expelling Spring】! It’s to the northwest, outside the town!」

「Yup, got it.」

After saying that, the woman went out of town ahead of her again.

「Hmm? …I got a skill.」

【Benevolent knight】

The name of the skill had indeed been added to her skills column, but it had no effect.

The only thing that was there was the skill name.

「Hmm? No effect? …is it because the event hasn’t ended yet?」

With that, Maple knew she couldn’t just throw this away, so she headed out of town.

「To the northwest!」

「O-okay. Northwest, I guess.」

Using her now-natural means of transportation, flying Syrup, Maple headed northwest.

The players around her were not surprised, perhaps because more and more people had seen her before or heard rumors about her.

What, Maple business as usual?

That became the general sentiment.

As you continued to encounter the unusual, it became a part of the normal.

It may not be long before players started to think, “Oh look, there’s Maple flying around in the sky again today”.

「It wouldn’t end with 2… there will be a 3, won’t it…」

Maple muttered.

She felt that ending it with 2 would be too half-baked.

The content of the quest hadn’t changed much from the previous one.

It didn’t look like it was going to end with this one.

「Ah!? 【Eating Inedibles】 hasn’t recovered!」

Maple realized on Syrup’s back.

It might be dangerous for her to enter a fight.

「Umm… if things look dicey, I guess I’ll just have to go back…」

It would be meaningless if the woman were to die.

In the meantime, Maple decided to explore the area around the spring from above and see what was going on before thinking about anything else, and proceeded in the direction instructed.