Chapter 172
Chapter 172
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 172
Chapter Title: Succubus Rampage and Rift Counterattack
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Succubus.
They were a race that fed on the desire for life as their staple.
Seducting someone and mingling bodies?
“Easier than eating breakfast!”
Naturally, something like an affinity potion wouldn't work on a succubus.
Except for the dryer.
The dryer grabbed me and breathed hot breaths.
The one and only variant succubus with no interest in sex but all in love.
To her, the affinity potion had become the worst kind of aphrodisiac.
“Does this even make sense?”
Not only had she ripped open the buttons on her chest, her eyes had lost focus.
“I, I can't hold back anymore!”
After groaning for a while like that, a pair of butterfly wings sprouted from her back.
The dryer had gone berserk.
“Penny! Help!”
There was no way I could handle this alone.
I could borrow the power of modern weapons, but I had no intention of doing that.
Instead, when I called for Penny, she ran into her halfway out of her room still half-asleep and bumped into the dryer.
“What's going on... huh?”
She was rubbing her eyes, still not fully awake, but the dryer was faster.
Penny's entire body was bound by the tentacles sprouting from the dryer's hands.
“Oh no, no tentacle play with a minor!”
“Stay out of it for a bit, intruder...!”
Penny was helplessly subdued.
“Hmph, these tentacles are nothing.”
But Penny wasn't the old Penny anymore.
She was a great demon possessing the powers of two of the Seven Deadly Sins.
As Penny tensed her whole body, the tentacles went slack powerlessly...
No, they didn't.
“Huh... why won't they come loose?”
“What.”
Penny's face filled with bewilderment.
Of course, as Penny put in more strength, the tentacles weakened, but she instinctively felt it.
If she used her full power, the bunker would explode.
“St, stop!”
It was my house, painstakingly prepared.
If this home base went up in smoke, I'd have to find a new place, move, organize the warehouse...
Anyway, no way.
Then Penny shouted as if she'd realized a solution.
“Fulfill her desire!”
“Gasp.”
“She's like that because her urges aren't satisfied right now. Just give in a little, and she'll go back to normal.”
[Whisper some affection, and she'll snap right back!]
“Oh.”
Come to think of it, Estella had said something like that.
The dryer was interested in love, not sex.
In that case?
“Thanks, Movie and Novel Gallery.”
A line or two from a romance novel should be more than enough.
No need to overthink it.
An old classic romance novel, still consumed in various media even today.
“Pride and Prejudice.”
I recalled a famous scene from the Movie Gallery.
“Dryer... no, Lilian!”
For the first time, I called the dryer by her real name.
A name unknown to others.
Her true name, Lilian, which she'd told only me before we started living together.
“!”
The dryer flinched, shoulders shrinking, and turned to look at me.
“W-What did you just say?”
Her expression was one of disbelief, as if she couldn't believe she'd heard it right.
I'd ditched the weird dryer nickname I'd been using every day and called her real name.
“Have I been too harsh on you all this time?”
With all eyes on me, I recited the famous scene straight from a Movie Gallery post.
“You just called me by name...”
“Actually, there's something I've been hiding from you, something I haven't said.”
The famous scene where the perfect male lead, Darcy, launches an unexpected confession attack.
I clutched my chest dramatically and whispered.
“But it was all in vain. I can no longer suppress my feelings.”
“W-What feelings?”
“Lilian, that I ardently admire and love you.”
- Crash!
The tentacles that had sprouted inside the bunker twitched and shattered a glass.
Penny's face, who had been struggling to escape, turned into that of a startled rabbit.
Both wore expressions of facing an unbelievable reality.
But the best lines were yet to come.
“Every moment I meet you, my heart races.”
“Ah, ahhh...”
I could feel the strength draining from the tentacles.
I went even further.
‘Sad expression, sad expression...’
I recalled the time I first stepped into the coin market and lost a million won.
My face crumpled naturally into the look of someone deeply hurt.
“You've captured my entire soul...”
“W-Wait a second!”
“Lilian, I love you.”
The tentacles vanished completely.
With all restraints gone, only the trembling dryer remained.
‘Normally, it'd end with wanting to be together forever.’
I remembered the scene where the dryer had particularly swooned over a romance novel.
I adapted the line slightly and said it.
Grabbing the hand of the dryer, who had half-collapsed under the sofa, I whispered in her ear.
“I want to share a scarf with you on a cold winter day.”
“Heeeek...”
The moment the final line ended.
The dryer fainted on the spot.
“Did I get her?”
Even with revival spells, she wouldn't wake.
As I stared down at the dryer like that, Penny asked in a trembling voice.
“Y-You can say stuff like that?”
Then Penny shook her head side to side and asked another question.
“No, where did you even learn lines like that?”
“Movie Gallery.”
“What?”
Ignoring Penny's question, I dashed straight into my room.
Then I dove onto the bed and opened the gallery.
- Ugh, where's Judak when we need him for the ceremony
- Everything's ready, check point?
- Third time asking if we charge into the rift now
The day humanity counterattacks into the rift for the first time.
I couldn't hold back from gallerying at such a historic moment.
“Time to gallery now.”
All my focus was on the gallery.
-Bzzz.
One of the severed horns the dryer had given me before.
It pulsed with a deep purple glow, unnoticed.
*
The Great War.
Hundreds, thousands died every day.
How many magic beasts had crossed that stepping stone connecting to the outside?
It started with a rift so massive its size couldn't be gauged.
“An existence we could never defeat.”
But now it was the stuff of the past.
- Ugh why are my hands and feet shaking like this over something like this
ㄴ Fact) It's no big deal
ㄴ This is the official expedition team's first time though
ㄴ Go well and leave a review
Who said the world demands death? The gallery owner had appeared.
Countless rifts spawned, and the outside attempted endless invasions.
But far from devastation, the world had recovered and advanced at a rapid pace.
[Title: Goosebumps if it's new - upvote lol]
(Rural village, expedition team gathered in front of rift image)
Sorry, pulled aggro just to show this...
Charging into the rift for real?
It's the world's strongest expedition team...
Is that the same nerdy human?
[Upvotes 392] [Downvotes 31]
- Ugh new aggro is total bullshit
- Goosebumps goosebumps goosebumps goosebumps
- But really, never imagined we'd counter-invade
- Big trouble comes from humans after all...
ㄴ What are elves and dwarves doing?
ㄴ Too far, Judak cleared them all apparently
ㄴ (Elf cone crushed! Screeech!)
ㄴ I want 22 quintillion hourly wage too!!!
“We're going in!”
At the lead knight's shout, the expedition team filed into the rift beyond.
What greeted the expedition team was...
“It's creepily familiar.”
A damp, disgusting massive cave.
The floor littered with unknown debris and objects...
[Service unavailable in this area.]
And the gallery's disconnection notice.
But the expedition team didn't panic.
They already knew up to this point.
“Not scary at all.”
The reality of starving idly outside was a hundred times scarier.
Realizing that, advancing was a piece of cake.
“Above all, the gallery is watching over us...”
[Rift Core located. Retrieve the Rift Core and return it to Judak.]
They had a clear objective.
Find the rift core and return it to Judak.
Plus, this was a rift where the wave had already burst, so no major threats.
“No magic beasts.”
As expected.
Since a massive horde had already poured out, few remained.
“...Kiek?”
The only ones they encountered were a few goblins.
Even those froze in shock upon seeing humans and died on the spot.
Feels great.
At this rate, they'd find the rift core in no time.
But of course, subjugating it wouldn't be that easy.
-Clank
“...That!”
Something blocked the expedition team's path.
A variant magic beast guarding the rift core.
No, it was a knight.
“Grrr.”
A knight in steel armor.
Posture, movements, even the wariness.
“...Doppelganger slime, huh.”
Among slimes, the trickiest doppelganger type.
-Grrr
-Grrrrr
The problem was there were multiple.
The expedition team stirred for a moment at the sight.
“Why are there so many...?”
“Wasn't this a rift where the wave already burst!”
Doppelganger slimes mimic every move of their opponent.
Even mana.
They wait until the opponent's strength is exhausted, then slowly melt them down.
“Did Judak give us wrong info...!”
“No.”
The lead knight quickly scanned the surroundings.
This rift originally spawned low-level beasts like goblins.
“The doppelganger slimes must have made this their habitat.”
The outside was a vast world too.
Just like slimes taking over a goblin den.
“So what do we do now?”
A mage from the rear asked in a trembling voice.
Magic didn't work here.
It would reflect it right back the moment cast.
Nor could knights handle it.
“We can't beat them.”
The grave of experts.
Even during the Great War, they were the trickiest magic beasts.
“Grrr.”
“Grk.”
As if knowing this, the doppelganger slimes began grinning disgustingly with human faces.
After a brief standoff, the knight beckoned the mage.
“Bring that staff.”
“That staff...!”
The magic staff Judak had given the expedition mages.
The mage realized and briefly vanished, returning with it.
Made of iron.
A massive staff that had to be shouldered like artillery.
“Grr?”
Did the mage use a staff like that?
The doppelganger tilted its head at the unfamiliar staff but soon smirked.
Unless it melted the vast mana inside its body, it could reflect anything.
So the slime didn't properly read the letters on the staff.
[RPG-7]
It was a magic staff.
Allah's magic wand, that is.
-Kabooooom!!!!
The blast shook the dungeon violently.