Boss Concept

「Gekho! Geho geho……」

Well, after Tsumugi was washed down the river and drifted ashore, I say it again.

「Maybe I’ll let you experience it three more times.」

「I’m sorry, Onii-chan! So please spare me!」

「What good does apologizing to me do?」

At least apologize to Shouko, who wasted a lot of energy.

Even if it’s a game, a game that everyone can’t enjoy can’t be entertaining.

I’ll put aside the matter of leaving Yamikage alone.

At that time, I’ll accept the punishment.

「I’m sorry, NPC!」

「You’re just risking your life for a joke, aren’t you!」

「I’m sorry! I won’t play with the Brave Peckle by hanging dolls anymore!」

You were doing things like that, huh?

Come to think of it, I remember doing things like trapping residents in pitfalls and pushing them off bridges in a game called『Animal Forest』.

I felt like I was looking at the darkness of the actions that can happen within a game.

「Well, well… once you get through this event, there might be some good results in the end, so let’s leave it at that.」

Shouko stops me, so I have no choice but to give up on further punishment.

Since the person suffering the most is forgiving, then it’s fine.

「Hah… be grateful to Shouko.」

「Yes!」

「Well then. According to Alto, the hole left by Brave Peckle is quite big and troublesome. He thinks it will probably return after defeating Wrath Pengu, but how do we defeat it?」

「Apparently the rules are one challenge per day and a 30-minute time limit.」

We can only fight once a day.

Which means we have to wait until at least tomorrow.

「Shouko, how long do you think it will take to recover the damage?」

「If we go into the dungeon right now and fight as hard as we can… it would take about two days, we’ve been hit pretty hard.」

Well, that’s quite the beating… It’s pretty severe for Shouko to receive this much damage.

「We should put off a rematch. Besides, will everyone on the island be forcibly summoned again?」

If that’s the case… like the waves, it would mean a large number of people defeating the boss.

With just our current numbers, it would be impossible.

But… we were steadily dealing damage.

We took off about 30% of its HP, so it’s not as strong as we thought.

If we had enough time, we should be able to defeat it.

Well, there’s still the time limit.

「Those kinds of conditions are still a mystery since we’ve only fought once. But judging from how I wasn’t particularly targeted, the AI probably doesn’t attack people who can’t fight.」

「There’s also a possibility that you won’t be attacked unless you get within a certain range.」

At least the chances of me, Sheryl, or Romina being targeted were low.

We don’t really know much about the AI in that regard.

「Also… the attack of the monster Dark Filolial was fierce, but Wrath Pengu itself didn’t directly attack us, did it?」

「Didn’t it cast the Self Curse Burning skill several times?」

「Onii-chan, didn’t you notice the condition for that attack?」

「Well… given the name of the skill, I figured it was most likely focused on counter-attacks.」

It leaves the attacks to Dark Filolial and focuses solely on defense.

And when an opponent’s powerful attack lands, it takes the hit and counters with Self Curse Burning to scorch the area.

Against the enemy’s high-powered skills, it reacts by solidifying defense together with Dark Philoreal.

And if there’s an opening, it traps you with a cage skill and finishes you off with its ultimate move, Iron Maiden.

That’s about it.

It took a while before it could use Iron Maiden, so it likely has some kind of cooldown.

You really like to fight in the nastiest way possible, huh.

「But with that skill… it didn’t activate when I used Round Dance Breaking Stance – Shell Splitter. It blocked Kizuna-san and the others support fire with its shield or caught the arrows, but it never used Self Curse Burning.」

So it doesn’t activate against ranged attacks… I can figure out that much.

And according to Shouko, defense-ignoring skills are effective.

Looking at it, it’s clearly a defensive-type enemy, so that must be its weaknesses.

「If we take out Dark Filolial in one go, we don’t know what kind of behavior change it might cause, its solid defense might be broken!」

Indeed, for overly tough enemies, defeating their minions often removes that toughness.

The tricky part is that Wrath Pengu itself seems to be able to use some kind of healing magic.

That’s why Dark Filolial is so hard to defeat.

「Even if we defeat it, there’s a chance it might re-summon Dark Filolial after a certain amount of time. It’s not a bad idea to challenge it for research purposes, but fighting it repeatedly would be tedious and hard on our Spirits.」

As it is, it will take Shouko quite a while to regain her original strength.

「At this rate, we may have no choice but to either steadily level up without provoking it, or wait until we have enough fighting power for a rematch…」

Then Romina raises her hand.

「Is there any attack method we haven’t tried yet? Well, it also depends on the type of skill Shouko was using.」

「What do you mean?」

「Somewhat unconventional attacks may be effective… for example, being weak to status ailments like poison, paralysis, or petrification.」

「Those attacks are often nullified against bosses in typical games, aren’t they.」

It would be nice if it works.

In overseas games, status ailments often work even against the final boss, but in Japanese games, even regular bosses are sometimes completely immune.

I don’t know which standard applies here, so we need to experiment.

「Since defense-ignoring worked, it’s not impossible.」

「There are also other means of attack we definitely haven’t tried yet.」

「What is it?」

「Magic.」

Ah… well, that’s true.

Me, Shouko, Sheryl, and Tsumugi all wielded weapons and attacked however we liked.

Romina and Alto are out of the question, of course.

They’re merchants and craftsmen, so it can’t be helped.

I’m more on their side too, in a sense – half a craftsman, you could say.

In a fishing sense.

「We could try using tools that trigger magic effects.」

Alto mutters with a slightly troubled expression, perhaps because he has some knowledge in that area.

Putting costs aside, we don’t know if such effects would work, or if we can even create tools powerful enough.

「Do you have any good ideas?」

「I’m not completely unfamiliar with crafting tools, but I’m not confident I can make anything effective. Sheryl’s Machinery might be more effective.」

At that, Sheryl shakes her head.

「Bomb.」

「Bombs?」

She nods.

I guess she doesn’t really recommend it?

「No magic.」

「Does that mean it’s meaningless because it’s not magic but physical?」

Hmm…

「What about fire bombs and such…?」

「They would probably count as magic, but would they work against an opponent that counters with fire attacks?」

It’s difficult.

Maybe our best bet is to make some kind of tool from materials gathered on the island and give it a try.

Or we could lose once and retreat, and then there might be an event to create countermeasure items – a pretty typical development, you could say.

「The fact that none of our companions are mages is really affecting us here.」

「You’re completely ignoring Yamikage-kun, you know.」

「If Santa Peckle responds, then I’ll summon her.」

Since Alto arrived, he’s been doing nothing but explaining things.

At most, he says the usual line『Peckle is not a monster-pen.』in response.

It’s about time for him to show up, so this time our late hero can finally make her debut.

「Doesn’t Kizuna-kun plan to learn magic?」

「Considering my proficiency levels, it might be a long way off… Shouko, how do you learn magic again?」

「You can learn it by raising the proficiency of weapons that are imagined to be magical like staff.

Either way, it would be difficult for us to suddenly use powerful magic in our current state.

From our past experiences, we know that Spirits have a decent compatibility with the magic attribute.

As long as we store up enough energy, we can fire spells endlessly.

However, we would need enough power to penetrate that solid defense.

「None of you here have learned magic.」

「I can use minor healing magic for first aid purposes, but that’s about it.」

Alto says.

Heh… as expected of a merchant, you’ve already learned the healing magic that could make money.

Well, I’ve never seen him use it, so his proficiency is probably low.