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

Defense Specialization and the Tower’s 8th Floor 2

"Mm...uh, huh?"

Maple slowly got up after 20 seconds and looked around in a panic.

"Morning. It didn’t attack us again after you fell asleep."

"I see. And Dedicated Affection is still activated...that’s good."

"But... It’s going to take a long time to catch a monster that uses ’Sleep’ attacks and can turn invisible."

"What about using the item that Izu gave us?"

Among the items they had received from her, there was one that made you temporarily immune to Sleep, but it didn’t last long. Also, they had only a few of them.

So not only did they have to be careful when using them, but they didn’t know when the monster would attack.

"We won’t even know how much HP it has unless we can get closer to it."

"That’s true! Alright, let’s go and find it...!?"

Once again, Maple was caught off guard as something slammed into her back. However, this time Maple was not launched forward into the air. Instead, she was pulled back.

"Whaat!?"

"This-this is bad! ’Super Acceleration’!"

Maple had been pulled so far away that Sally couldn’t reach her with Web User anymore. And so she accelerated in order to catch up.

Tree roots attacked her from behind, and exploding fruits were thrown at her.

"Ah! Woah! That was...close..."

She rolled back into the protection range of ’Dedicated Affection,’ which was constantly moving away from her. Then she sighed in relief that she was still alive.

"Uhhh. What a shock..."

Maple wasn’t so much released from the thing that was pulling her, but thrown. She crashed and rolled noisily on the ground.

Sally had reached Maple by now, and she used Web User to connect their bodies.

"Connect the lifeline...hah... I nearly had a heart attack...."

"Yeah. You can’t tell when it’ll attack..."

"Hmm. But it does seem to attack from the back each time. So at least we’ll know which direction it’ll come from."

But they had only been attacked 3 times. And obviously, it was always advantageous to attack from the back, so they couldn’t jump to any conclusions yet.

"I’ll try shooting in its direction if it attacks again. Maybe I’ll be able to hit it!"

"Yes. That would really help."

As neither of them was able to detect it, they had to wait for the monster to attack first. Then they could act.

And so the two of them waited for a while for the monster to reappear.

"...It’s sure taking its time."

"There’s no point in being careful. We won’t know either way."

"Yes. Oh, by the way...!? Ah, Commence Attack!"

It seemed that she had noticed something while talking, and so Maple fired off a round of bullets straight ahead.

While her attacks were shredding up the trees and bushes, there were no damage effects coming out at all.

Instead, colorful fruits fell down from the trees.

"Ugghhh... It sticks to your face."

Maple said as she wiped her face with both hands. Sally took out a towel from her inventory and handed it to Maple.

"It should come off after a while. But it’s still gross."

"Yeah. Thank you."

"So, while you didn’t hit it, something did fall down. We should go see what it is."

"It might be materials or an item! Oh, I should change my equipment... Maybe I should use Helping Hand to increase the number of shields."

"That would be good! We don’t know where the attacks will come from."

Maple wiped her face clean and changed her equipment. Then the two of them cautiously made their way towards the foot of the fallen tree.

"Materials?"

"No, it looks like items that are exclusive to this floor. There are three types."

One item allowed you to see invisible monsters in exchange for making previously visible monsters invisible. The second item made you temporarily immune to status effects. And the last allowed you to see the chameleon’s current position for 10 seconds.

"Ohh! We can beat it with these!"

"True. We should explore the forest a little and try to get more."

"Yes, let’s do that!"

They were fine with getting attacked every now and then, since they were gathering the items in order to kill the boss properly afterward. They focused on getting the ones that told them the boss’s location, so they would be able to attack it.

"Okay. Now we can fight back."

"Alright, let’s go then!"

Maple bit into the fruit, then she grabbed Sally tightly and set off the explosion, which sent her shooting through the trees.

Maple shot towards their target and Sally used her webs to adjust the direction.

They decided that they wouldn’t try and track it slowly. Instead, they would attack it straight on.

"Sally! To the right!"

"Okay!"

She forced them to turn while in the air. And then Maple accelerated once again by blasting her weapons.

"We’re close!"

"Got it!"

It was here that Sally bit into the fruit that would allow her to see the boss. She disconnected the web from Maple and jumped to a tree.

In response, the chameleon stretched out its tongue towards her, but she was able to dodge it.

"It’s easy if you can see it."

While she knew it was risky, she used ’Leap’ to bridge the gap between them and then used her momentum to slash deeply at its face and tail before landing on the ground where Maple was.

The chameleon became visible for a second as it thrashed about. Then it quickly disappeared into the trees.

"Sally! The chameleon’s HP was at 50%!"

"I see. So it’s pretty weak when fighting it like this."

Sally bit into another fruit and returned her vision back to normal. Then she stretched her limbs.

"Hmm. Maybe it’ll be dead after just one more attack."

"Then we’ll have to find it again."

Of course, things rarely happened the same way twice. And before they knew it, multiple chameleons had appeared around them as they moved about.

Then they all disappeared, as if they had only meant to show that something had changed.

"Do we...have to kill all of them?"

"Maybe only one of them is the real one?"

"Uhh. I hope there is a way to tell them apart..."

"Maybe looking at the HP bar. But I doubt it..."

They braced themselves for what promised to be a tough fight.