Chapter 557: For the Goddess's Advent
Chapter 557: For the Goddess's Advent
“Phew. With that, I’ve finally got my hands on the penguin’s penis.”
I muttered to myself as I watched the male penguin turn to ash and disappear.
What’s that? You think I skipped a few steps?
What were you expecting? It was just a penguin, you know?
I’d like to say that, but you’re right. Something important did happen in between.
So, as much of a pain as it is, I suppose I’ll explain.
“If we take too long, there’s a risk the hole will close up while we’re fighting the male penguin. If that happens, we’ll be forced to go down to the 4.5th floor. The passage might even get blocked on the way, splitting the party up again. So let’s take care of this quickly, then come back and rest. I know we just fought the Emperor Penguin, so I’m sorry, but can you do it?”
When the others were trying to get me to rest, Diana had already found the next task. It seemed her actions were the result of calculating all those possibilities.
Honestly, our Diana is just so smart.
“Of course. As you can see, I’m full of energy.”
I gave the admirable Diana a pat on the head and squeezed myself into the hole in the wall she had pointed to.
Ugh, it’s tight… I can’t even get in without squeezing my shoulders as much as possible.
And I have to pass all the way through here. It reminds me of crawling drills in basic training.
My arms were pinned to my sides from having to shrink my shoulders, the widest part of my body, so I had to push through the narrow hole using only the strength of my legs.
The only saving grace was that the ice was slippery, I guess?
Plus, the surface was perfectly smooth, as if it had been drilled by a machine.
Using the crampons attached to the soles of my boots, I somehow managed to make it through the hole.
Of course, it was still a time-consuming task, so I decided to check the skills of my new job, the Moon Shadow Warrior.
As expected of a job that combined Martial Artist and Assassin, the skills were mostly fighting-style techniques that used quick movements to launch surprise attacks.
At this rate, it seems better to act as an evasion tank, drawing aggro with my Saint skills and dodging attacks, rather than relying on my defense to be a traditional tank.
I mean, up until now, I’d only been forcing myself to tank by relying on my high Durability; it’s not like I had any actual defensive skills.
It worked because my Durability was absurdly high for my level, but once we get down to the 6th floor, it’ll be tough without defensive skills. So maybe this was a good opportunity for a change.
As I was thinking that and skimming through my skills, I realized something.
I finally have skills that let me imbue my attacks with mana.
Until now, my Martial Artist skills were mostly just passives that increased my attack power when I punched or kicked in a certain stance. I didn’t have any skills that directly infused my attacks with mana.
Like how Sara could make her hands or arrows glow blue by filling them with mana.
But now, I finally had skills like that, too.
Come to think of it, I feel like Sara was imbuing her attacks with mana not long after we first met.
For her to use something I could only learn after a class change at such a low level…
Isn’t the Hero class just too broken?
Then again, it’s not like I, a Saint, have any room to talk.
With those thoughts, I exited the passage and emerged into a space even larger than the boss room from before.
I never would have imagined the path the Emperor Penguin drilled would lead to a place like this.
Who would have thought? I’ll have to be extra nice to Silvia when we get back.
And there, in the middle of the space, stood a penguin even larger than the Emperor Penguin, just as I’d expected.
I didn’t even need to check to know it was the male.
The moment it saw me, it dropped its belly to the ground and slid toward me like a missile.
This one uses that attack too!
“Guys! Don’t come in yet! And be careful out there! This thing might try to break through to your side!”
I shouted back toward the hole I’d just come out of, then threw myself to the side to dodge its attack.
Just like the Emperor Penguin, it smashed through the wall and vanished from sight.
For anyone else, the pressure of not knowing where a surprise attack might come from would be immense. But for me, with my ridiculously high defense and the high Agility I’d gained from leveling up as an Assassin, it didn’t feel like much of a threat.
If anything, I was grateful it gave me time to regain my footing after exiting the hole.
Alright, you penguin bastard. I played around with the Emperor Penguin for a while so it would drill holes, but I don’t need to do that with you.
The moment you show yourself again, I’ll finish you with one Saint skill… no. Wait a minute.
My original plan was to just finish it off easily with a Saint skill, but a certain possibility suddenly occurred to me.
This… this might just work!
Before the penguin could reappear, I decided to immediately put my new idea into practice.
In one hand, the Saint’s Touch. In the other, the Fighting Aura I learned after changing my job to Moon Shadow Warrior.
Holding these two opposing forces in each hand, I brought them together and interlocked my fingers, trying to merge the two disparate powers.
The two opposing forces should have repelled each other… but they didn’t. Still, I deliberately made my arms tremble as if I were struggling.
This kind of thing is all about the presentation.
It would be perfect if I chanted some incomprehensible alien spell, but I can’t remember any… no. I’m a man who respects copyright, so I’ll refrain.
With my hands clasped together and held out in front of me, I waited for the penguin to charge at me again.
“Kieeeek!”
The moment the penguin smashed through the wall and flew toward me, I swung my clasped hands and shouted with all my might.
“Uooooooh! HELL! AND! HEAVEEEEEEEN!”
Ah, for the record, it means I’ll show you pain and pleasure—hell and heaven—at the same time. I’m not copying anything.
“Kueeeek!”
In any case, the penguin, struck squarely by my clasped hands, let out a grotesque shriek and died on the spot. I have no idea if it died from the pleasure of the Saint’s Touch or the pain of the Fighting Aura.
It would have been perfect if I could have ripped out its magic stone with both hands.
I had a rough idea of where the penguin’s magic stone was, so I gave it a shot, but it was hard to pinpoint the exact location on a target flying at me like a missile.
No, before that, even a fist infused with Fighting Aura couldn’t pierce its hide.
No matter how weak its defense was, it was still a boss-level monster.
Well, not that it matters, since it died in one hit anyway.
And that’s how we were able to safely obtain the male penguin’s penis.
What? You’re asking what the important thing that happened in between was?
What have you been watching! The most important thing of all happened—I developed a new ultimate move!
Anyway, I picked up the penis that dropped from the male penguin and looked around.
Since I got the penis here, the path to the 4.5th floor had to be somewhere in this room.
I should at least check before I go, right?
Thankfully, because I finished off the male penguin so quickly, holes weren’t drilled all over the place. I found the keyhole quickly, opened the passage just to confirm the existence of the 4.5th floor, and then immediately went back into the hole to return to where the Emperor Penguin had been.
“…Silvia. What are you doing here?”
“W-Whaaa…! Aaaah!”
As I was sliding through the hole using only my leg strength, just like before, I ran into Silvia, who was stuck halfway.
As I said, I was moving in a way that was more like sliding than crawling.
Moving like this is fast, but the downside is that it’s hard to brake in the middle.
But as long as there are no obstacles, there’s no need to stop, right?
I had never imagined Silvia would be stuck in the middle of the passage, so I had just kept sliding straight ahead.
Thanks to that, now that I was face-to-face with Silvia, our faces were incredibly close.
To be specific, there wasn’t even five centimeters of distance between us.
It felt like I could kiss her just by stretching my neck a little.
That must be why Silvia looked like she was about to die of embarrassment, even though we were in a dungeon.
“Silvia?”
“Y-Yesh! I-It’s just! Y-You were taking a while, Sir Guwon! So Miss Sara was about to go in! But I’m sturdier than Miss Sara! So I went in first to check! But my armor got stuck in the middle! And your face is so clooooose! Close! I-It’s too clooooose…!”
Silvia, in a complete panic, was rambling incoherently, but I got the gist of the situation.
Well, even though Silvia was much smaller than me, she was wearing thick full plate armor.
Of course she’d get stuck trying to pass through a hole like this.
Since this is a fantasy world, it would be nice if there was armor where exposure equals defense power.
But I guess that was too unrealistic, because all the armor in this world was painfully realistic.
I mean, there are cases like Alicia who wears somewhat revealing armor, but she’s just an exception.
Anyway, Silvia was stuck, unable to move forward or backward.
Hmm. So what should I do now?
No, I want to help. I really do.
But as it happens, I can’t use my arms right now either.
If I could push her from my side, the situation would be a little better.
But I couldn’t imagine Silvia being able to reverse in her current state.
If this continues, the only outcome I see is the two of us getting buried here together.
Of course, there is one way.
But that’s a bit… no. This is an emergency. I have no choice.
Silvia’s life might be in a little danger, but it’s better than the two of us getting buried alive.
I put more strength into my legs and pushed my body further forward.
“S-S-S-S-S-Sir Guwooooon?!”
As my already close face got even closer, Silvia started flailing her entire body in panic.
Not that she could move much, being stuck and all.
I brought my forehead to hers and spoke to her.
“Silvia. Brace your neck. I’m going to push.”
“Eek! Hah! Haah! Y-Yesh! Hnng! Hnngh!”
The distance was so close that my lips brushed against Silvia’s as I spoke.
But Silvia seemed to understand the urgency of the situation. Despite her panic, she admirably managed to answer and seemed to be tensing her neck.
In that state, I put all my strength into my legs and tried to push Silvia.
It was a rough method, but it seemed like the only way.
And considering Silvia’s level and job, her Strength stat must be incredibly high, so something like this probably wouldn't hurt her.
“Mmmph! Nngh! Hyaah! Hieeeungh!”
But it seemed there was a limit to what a person could endure with just their neck strength.
I had been trying to push with our foreheads pressed together, but as I exerted more force, my head naturally tilted back a little, causing our lips to meet.
In other words, we were kissing.
To be honest, it was more accurate to say our faces were mashing together than to call it a kiss, but to Silvia, it must have felt like nothing but.
Her body started trembling even more violently than before. She tried to scream, but then seemed to feel her tongue touch my lips, which threw her into an even deeper state of panic.
Frankly, it was a miracle she hadn’t fainted.
Well, her eyes were spinning in circles.
Anyway, after a few seconds of struggling to push Silvia with our faces pressed together, our bodies suddenly slid forward with a swoosh, as if something that had been caught was finally freed.
Well, from Silvia’s perspective, she slid backward.
In any case, we managed to escape before the passage closed.
“Silvia. Are you okay?”
After we got out of the passage, I looked at Silvia’s lips and saw that they were bleeding.
Well, I did push her pretty hard.
In fact, I could taste the faint, metallic scent of iron, so my lips were probably bleeding too.
But I didn’t care about that. What was important was that my cute Silvia was bleeding.
“Leia. Heal her, please.”
I said, sticking out my tongue to lick the blood from Silvia’s lips.
“Hyaaaah! Aaaaaah….”
But that seemed to be the final blow. Silvia, who had been holding on so well, finally fell backward and lost consciousness, right there in the middle of the dungeon.
“…Guwon.”
“W-Wait. I can explain. I can explain everything.”
And so, I found myself in the position of having to desperately explain the situation to my party.