The Fox's Revenge and the Fallen Elite
Revenge successful! *Grind!* Moira gnashed her teeth, recalling the humiliating spectacle she had just made of herself. 'Who was it? What kind of bastard did this...?' The wave of pleasure that had struck her brain like a lightning bolt was not something she could have possibly resisted. The only reason she hadn't collapsed right there on the spot was because she was an SS-Class hunter.
Sensing that someone had played a dirty trick on her, Moira sharpened her focus more than ever before heading into battle. As usual, she tried to belittle Miho and force her out of the fray to reduce her share of the spoils. But...
Boom, ka-boom!! The flames Miho poured out were boasting a firepower unlike anything she had shown before. Her movements—binding monsters with spells and slicing through space—were so fluid they rivaled the SSS-Class hunter she had seen once before. Miho, displaying skills so impressive that no one could possibly tell her to step back, continued the raid under everyone's gaze. When the tanker was injured during the raid, she reached the pinnacle of her performance.
"W-wait, what?!" One of the reptilian race members, whose body was covered in scales, had suffered a massive injury to his arm, but Miho’s white flames had healed it instantly. Everyone looked on in shock, and even Miho seemed stunned by her own power.
"Miho, did you re-awaken?"
"Oh... I think so."
Jerry, the leader of Team 3, asked Miho, and she answered with a sheepish expression. Even though they were both SS-Class, Jerry had always looked down on her, but now, he couldn't stop himself from acting this way. Even Moira was dying to know the answer. While the awakening rate for intelligent beings on Earth was 100%, re-awakening was so rare it was less than 1%. Unlike stats that could be raised through effort, re-awakening was only granted to those with true talent, to the point where it was called the "true awakening." Moira could only swallow her jealousy as she watched Miho, who would soon surpass her—or perhaps, had already done so.
Day 2 of the gate raid.
"Kya-hahaha!" Moira laughed like a madwoman during battle.
"*Hic*, *sob*..." She would shed tears while eating her meals.
"Damn it! Who is it!!" She would suddenly burst into rage and scream at the empty air.
Ah, for the record, the last one wasn't me using the Word Collection.
"Target reached! We will now begin the return march!" shouted Bigstone, a member of the Vargon race, the leader of this raid party and an SS-Class hunter, with a booming voice. The raid had progressed faster than expected, and we were set to return on the second day, a full day earlier than the projected third day. The reason, of course, was Miho, who had obtained the SSS-Class Heavenly Fox power. She had joined as an S-Class dealer but performed well beyond an SS-Class.
"Miho... I'm sorry for everything until now. Congratulations on the SS-Class in advance!"
"M-me too! Please take care of me from now on!"
The Baekryeong-ga guild members, who had ignored Miho all this time, completely changed their tune, ignoring Moira and starting to suck up to Miho. Was it true that they were a race that worshipped strength? Their speed in switching sides was certainly remarkable. Other races in the raid party were even making passes to recruit her into their guilds. It was an even more dramatic situation since Miho had been suppressed by Moira and unable to perform properly until now.
Even to my untrained eye, the 500% boosted flames and the spells Miho used in between looked truly incredible. On top of that, she had even taken on the role of a healer in addition to her long-range dealer position, so it was understandable why they were fawning over her.
"Three hours until return!"
Three hours until the gate raid ended and we headed outside. I hadn't used the Word Collection even though its cooldown was up. The reason was that I wanted to use my skills on Moira while we dealt with the monsters that popped up along the way. If the Word of Madness I wanted didn't appear, I planned to use every last coin I had, so I just prayed for many monsters to appear.
"Ten... twenty monsters appearing ahead!"
At the two-hour mark before our return, the monster horde I wanted finally appeared, and I used my skill on Moira in the middle of the battle.
'Please, Madness! Madness!'
Disposable Skill: Word of Madness has been activated.
'Nice!' I clenched my fist and decided to watch the show.
Moira's body collapsed for a moment as if a fuse had blown, and her gaze turned toward Miho. Then, a blade of wind unfolded from her hand and flew toward Miho. However, since I had warned her in advance to be careful because I was going to make Moira go crazy, she defended against it cleanly.
"Eek! Moira! What are you doing!!" Miho shouted in an exaggerated voice, drawing everyone's attention. Bigstone, the raid team leader who had just smashed the head of the last monster, witnessed the scene.
"Die! Die!! You damn..."
Bang!
"What are you doing?"
Bigstone, who had smashed the floor between Miho and Moira, turned to stare at Moira. As a reliable, rock-solid tanker race, his presence was immense.
"Ugh, ugh..."
In the tense, hair-trigger situation, I saw Moira's eyes, clouded by madness, slightly unfocusing as if she were coming to her senses, so I delivered the final blow.
Disposable Skill: Word of Rage
Forces the target race into a state of rage. Cost: 500 Coin.
It was an additional attack costing a whopping 500 Coins. "I don't know what's going on, but petty emotional outbursts inside a gate are dangerous..."
Whoosh! A wind blade fired from Moira's hand headed toward Bigstone. To be precise, it was aimed at Miho, who was behind Bigstone, but that fact didn't matter to the people watching. The team leader of Baekryeong-ga's Raid Team 2 was spamming skills at the raid party leader who had stepped in to mediate the fight.
"Kyaak! Damn it! Move!! I will definitely kill that bitch... *Gack!*"
As an SS-Class hunter, Bigstone, who hadn't even a single scratch on him, subdued Moira in an instant. Bigstone was still holding back. He hadn't broken the neck of the person who used a skill on him; he was merely pinning her down with brute force. I had heard that even if one didn't attack the raid leader, if one openly created a disturbance inside a gate like this, summary execution was possible. He was so stoic that I thought I should hire him if I ever went into a gate myself. I hadn't memorized anything other than the races that were "possible," but I decided to remember the Vargon race separately.
"Ugh, let go of me!!"
The sight of her flailing her body while lost in madness and spamming her wind blade skill all around was quite threatening.
"Haa..."
Rumble.
As Bigstone raised his hand, a small sphere made of rock formed around her. ...Thump... Thud. Violent sounds echoed from inside the sphere. A moment later, Moira, covered in blue bruises, crawled out from the cracked rock sphere.
"Grrr..."
Moira spotted Miho with eyes that could barely stay open and reached out a hand, but—Bang!!—she lost consciousness and collapsed from Bigstone's head-smashing blow.
"Phew... Healers. Please... treat this person only moderately."
"Since our destination is close, we will resume movement quickly. Move out!"
In the aftermath, the gazes of everyone looking at Moira, who lay twitching on the ground, were cold. It was, after all, an SS-Class hunter throwing a fit of madness in the middle of a perfectly fine raid. It was lucky that she was easily subdued by Bigstone due to the compatibility and the distance, but if Moira had truly gone on a rampage, it wouldn't have been strange if several people had been hurt.
"Uh, well... there are no signs of mental-abnormality magic."
On top of that, when the testimony of a human mage from the association with good credibility was added, the hands of the healer treating Moira stopped. She was twitching with her arms and legs broken. 'Is this enough?' I thought to myself as I looked at Miho. I could see a look of regret on her face, but when she made eye contact with me, the fox smiled brightly. ...As long as she's kind to me, that's all that matters.
Thanks to Moira's "carry," I found an opportunity to use the Trait Explorer, which I hadn't been able to use for fear of being caught, and I used it on every race I could. And the fact I learned in the process was that Miho's traits were better than I thought.
[Good-for-nothing Fox Lv.8 / Lv.10]
[Horny Fox Lv.7 / Lv.10]
[Genius Fox Lv.7 / Lv.10]
[Lazy Fox Lv.6 / Lv.10]
[Timid Fox Lv.3 / Lv.10]
There weren't many races that had openly good traits like "Genius Fox." Traits like "Diligent," "Kind," or "Conscientious" might be good if you called them that, but in my view, they weren't much. And I roughly understood why "Genius" and "Horny" had gone up, while "Timid" had gone down. She had become stronger to take revenge on Moira, and she was doing lewd things with me every day.
'Why aren't "Good-for-nothing" and "Lazy" going down...?' Was she a fox that was born good-for-nothing? Just as I was lost in thought, I snapped back to reality when a human A-Class mage from the association reported to the S-Class elf superior who had been dispatched in an emergency, and Bigstone began answering questions.
"So... you're saying that the leader of Baekryeong-ga's Raid Team 2, SS-Class hunter Moira, suddenly fell into madness and attacked, and there were no signs of special mental interference. Is that correct?"
"That is correct."
Moira, whose entire body was bound, hadn't even received proper treatment yet. In addition to this, the testimony of guild members who said she had consistently bullied them within the guild was added, leaving no one to defend Moira.
"N-no!! *Gack*... That bitch... Miho, that bitch definitely played some trick on me, *ugh*..."
Thwack! Miho's kick struck Moira's face cleanly.
"You had a good time all this while, didn't you? I won't leave you alone for the rest of your life... until you die."
Seeing her smiling so refreshingly, the hunters nearby thought to themselves: That woman must never be crossed.