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Chapter 429

The sunlight beat down assertively as the sand took a toll on their feet. The air was so dry that their throats became parched simply by breathing normally.

「Oh, sh*t! They’re here again? It’s a Sandworm! Spread out! Don’t get stuck in one place or you’ll be killed by their charge!」

At those words, the three members of the party of four quickly scattered and took up positions around the Sandworm that emerged from the dunes.

The last member, who had a large backpack on his back, kept his distance and notched an arrow in his bow while looking for an opening.

This was one of the parties that had taken the request from the Silva family to hunt the abnormal species of Spear Frog. Of course, they had a decent level of skill.

Normally, there were a party that was active around the 20th floor, so while they weren’t a first class party in Exil, they were at least half way there.

Because they were such a party, the porter could also attack from range with a bow in addition to carrying their baggage.

Of course, he wasn’t as strong or as accurate as a professional archer. He was only able to pin a monster down. Still, there was a large difference between having a long range person who could pin a monster down and not having one. Especially in this party, where the other three all fought as vanguards, including the thief.

「AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!」

A man swung a poleaxe down from behind the Sandworm as he gave a shout to draw its attention.

The Sandworm tried to turn around to face the voice, but an arrow shot by the porter pierced its body as if waiting for that moment.

Being over 5m in length, the arrow pierced a non vital location. However, it seemed to still be painful as it changed its focus from the man with the poleaxe to the porter……

「HAAAAAA-!」

The next moment, their thief, who had concealed his movements, closed the gap to the Sandworm and struck out horizontally with his long sword, cutting into the Sandworm.

Normally, thieves would use daggers as weapons, but in this party, their thief was a strong part of their combat strength.

「UOOOHHHH-!」

The next weapon to strike was the spear of the warrior that led the party. Quickly and sharply, he made nearly ten spear thrusts into the wound on the Sandworm’s body that the thief had opened up.

The spear tip buried itself into the Sandworm’s body causing significant pain.

Because of the severe pain, the Sandworm tried to turn towards the leader, however……

「HAAAAAAAAAAAA-!」

The man with the poleaxe came up from behind and struck down with all his might. The next moment, the Sandworm’s body was cut……or rather, smashed, into two halves.

The Sandworm eventually died with a cry. However, the party remained alert……as they kept an eye out for other monsters.

After a few minutes, when they were completely sure the Sandworm was dead, the party’s tense atmosphere subsided, if only slightly.

The reason why they didn’t completely let down their guard was because they had already been attacked by monsters many times since coming down to the 11th floor.

The leader spoke out to the porter, who came over with his bow.

「Is this something you can still carry?」

「Yeah, no problem. But if we continue to get attacked at this rate, we’ll soon reach capacity. It would be better to only strip the more expensive parts from the Sandworm.」

「I know. If we still have time on the way back, we can strip more materials. You guys, let’s start with stripping out the proof of subjugation and the magic stone.」

「All right.」

Following his party leader’s orders, the man with the poleaxe slammed his weapon into the Sandworm’s body, opening up its belly.

Working with him, the porter and leader started to strip materials from the Sandworm.

However, after 5 minutes, the thief, who had been keeping an eye on the surroundings, called out to those stripping materials.

「This sound is……hey, stop stripping materials! There are two……no, three Skull Eagles coming down!」

「Ahhhh-, damn it, that’s so much trouble! Everyone prepare for battle!」

At the leader’s orders, they all stopped stripping materials from the Sandworm and took up battle stances against the avian monsters that were made up of bones, with the exception of their heads.

「Damn it, Skull Eagles aren’t actually undead even though most of their body is just bones.」

「That’s because it’s a monster!」

While replying to the man with the poleaxe, the porter readied his bow again as he shot an arrow, which was better than doing nothing at all. Soon they were back into battle.

「Heh, it really is a desert with things like oases.」

「Gururu~!」

While most other parties were fighting, Rei, Elena, and Set arrived at an oasis in the desert.

They hadn’t fought a single battle up to this point and they had ran into surprisingly few monsters compared to other parties.

……Yes, until now that is.

An oasis in the desert. It was the perfect watering hole for monsters on this floor, so there was no way there wouldn’t be any monsters here.

「……They’re here.」

「Yeah.」

Elena reached out for the sword whip at her waist as Rei responded with Death Scythe in hand.

As for Set, he crouched down, ready to jump out at any moment.

And……

「Gyagya-! Gyagyogyogyo-!」

「Gyagagaga,、Gyogyagyogyo-!」

「Gyogyo-!」

「Gyagyayga-!」

A few monsters appeared with familiar shouts.

Of course, Rei, Elena, and Set, knew the monsters that only went up to Rei’s chest in height. In terms of how well known the monster was, it was one of the most recognisable in the world. In other words……

「Goblins, huh?」

Rei muttered in surprise at the Goblins that appeared.

「No, even if they are Goblins, they’re not ordinary Goblins.」

Rei looked at the 10 or so Goblins that appeared as Elena immediately noted the differences from ordinary Goblins.

Ordinary Goblins had green skin, but the Goblins in front of them had brown……or more accurately, sand coloured skin. What’s more, ordinary Goblins usually wielded clubs and rusty daggers or long swords at best. However, these Goblins has sharp long swords and daggers. Even if they didn’t wear metal armour, they still had some sort of leather armour made from animal or monster leather while ordinary Goblins would usually wear nothing but basic cloth.

As Rei pointed it out, Elena looked at the Goblin leading them with some interest as she spoke.

「It’s probably a higher ranking Goblin species.」

「Yeah.」

Goblins had weak individual strength and ordinary people with some combat knowledge would be able to kill one. However, their fertility rate was high and generations came and went quickly. In other words, they had the ability to rapidly adapt to harsh environments within reason.

Of course, not all Goblins could adapt to new environments . No, rather, there were very few who could adapt to new environments.

「Gyagyigyigyigyi, Gyagyagya-!」

Those were probably Goblin specific words. Rei and Elena didn’t understand what they were saying, but they still understood their general intention by their action of pointing their sword. In other words……

「Do they want to strip our equipment? Stripping equipment from humans like we strip materials from monsters……can we say they’re quite clever?」

「Hmph, they’re just Goblin bandits……what do you want to do?」

「You don’t need to ask. It’s a new monster, so of course I’ll kill it.」

Monsters that didn’t appear in Zepairu’s knowledge or in monster encyclopedias would bring a smile to Rei’s face.

Looking at Rei, Elena felt it couldn’t be helped. That said, she had no intention of letting the Goblin bandits go either as she pulled her sword from her sheath.

「Guru~!」

As for Set, he jumped forward several steps and flew up, wrapping around the Goblin bandits to stop them from escaping.

「Gyi, Gyagyagyayga!?」

「Gigigigyi!」

「Gyagaga, Gyigyi-!」

Though somewhat confused, the Goblins didn’t seem to be intimidated by their appearance and even wanted to immediately attack them. However, the confusion subsided when one of the Goblin bandits, who seemed to be the leader, gave a shout to calm them down.

Although Set, a Griffon, was present, they didn’t seem to show any signs of escaping, probably because it was a higher ranking species, even if it was still a Goblin.

(……Could these guys also be abnormal species……no, they can’t be.

As far as Rei knew, there would only be a singular abnormal species. Whether it was the Sword Bee queen, the Stone Golem, or the Spear Frog, the target of their subjugation request.

Considering that, the Goblins in front of them shouldn’t be a group of abnormal species. That was was Rei thought, but he still had some doubts.

(I heard from Pleiades that there shouldn’t be any Goblins on this floor. I wonder about that……well, if we just kill them now and bring back their corpses, everything will become clear. We’ll get a lot more rewards and, more than anything else, I can also keep two magic stones. It won’t be difficult to match the number of Goblins I hand over to the number of magic stones.)

Deciding that the first thing to do would be to kill the 10 Goblin bandits, Rei swung the Death Scythe at them.

「Flying Slash!」

A slash flew out from the Death Scythe. The number of slashes hadn’t increased, but its size, power, and speed had all improved after reaching level 3 from absorbing the Sandsnake’s magic stone.

The crescent shaped slash shot out through the air as it headed for the Goblin bandits in front of Rei.

「Gyogyagyogyo!」

The first Goblin tried to use the sword in its hands as a shield with surprise at the slash coming towards it, but it was a step too late.

It’s arm was cut off mid movement to bring its sword in front of its body. At the same time, its body was also cut in half.

The slash continued on towards the other Goblins behind it without weakening after splitting the leading Goblin bandit into upper and lower halves along with its leather armour……

「Gyagyagyagya!」

「Gyogyagyagyo!」

Two Goblins screamed as their left and right arms were severed.

As the lead Goblin had its blood, internal organs, and flesh scattered onto the sand, the arms of the two Goblins behind it also fell to the ground.

As it was a desert, blood, which was mostly water, was absorbed by the sand in a blink of an eye. However, the flesh and internal organs remained on the surface of the sand.

「Haah-!」

Elena’s sword whip flew out right after Rei’s attack.

As Elena poured magic power into her sword whip, it changed to whip form as it slashed the Goblin bandits with the various blade sections while the tip of the sword pierced the forehead of a Goblin, killing it in a single blow.

「Gururururu~!」

The next attack came from Set’s Water Ball, even though half the Goblins had already been taken down.

Two balls of water, about 30cm in diameter each, were shot at the Goblins, shattering everything they hit.

The Goblins that were hit in the head were killed instantly while those hit in the torso touched their bellies with expressions of confusion over why their body was no longer there. By the time they saw their flesh and internal organs scattered on the ground……the light faded from their eyes.

For the Goblin bandits, they had never thought that the enemies they saw as prey would crush them so one-sidedly. They screamed like a mess, but decided to rush towards Rei and Elena in revenge rather than escaping.

By this time, only two able bodied Goblins were left, with the others all incapacitated and unable to fight properly.

Still, there was some wisdom in going for Rei and Elena rather than Set. They would stand a better chance against humans than against a Griffon.

However……the end result, after a few more seconds, was the death of all the Goblin bandits, their corpses exposed in the desert.