Departure
In the floor where Kenshin lost his life or was supposed to have, Mark and the commander Rays managed to clear debris of the tunnel.
They expected to find the body but what met their view was what looked like a graveyard.
"Sir...." (Mark)
"This is...." (Commander)
"What do you think caused all of this sir?" (Mark)
"It's unlikely that it was a monster that caused it. I mean what kind of monster stacks them up neatly like logs!?" (Captain)
It was as he says, giant bees stacked up like logs with fatal stab wounds here and there.
What's more was, all of them were neatly piled up.
All 2000 of them.
“What's that?...." (Commander)
What the Captain pointed at was a staff stuck on the ground that the adventurers earlier offloaded to lighten their load.
On it was a pouch made of cheap twine.
It was one of the pouches Kenshin used.
The weapons the stay behind group dropped was also there, piled up neatly.
"That kid is definitely something………"(Mark)
"Oi, are you telling me that he defeated all of them!?" (Captain)
"Sir, didn't I tell you that he defeated the giant black wolves that attacked us right?" (Mark)
The commander looked at him with big, wide eyes that said 'are you serious!?'.
"Wait, that kid really defeated them!? I thought you were lying!" (Commander)
"What?! No way! Is that why you wanted me to see a shrink?! Geez. You know sir, while the stay behind group was busy fighting at the front, he was able to off two blaze berserkers that the rest of them struggled with. Whats more was he finished them quicker than the rest of them. By making one of attack him and quickly dodging it so that the sword would get stuck unto the tree behind him, and also making the other trip up onto the other blaze berserker, by using his cloak on the floor, to make them collide, knocking both of them out, giving Kenshin the oppurtinity to finish them. They were on the palm of his hand when they picked him to fight." (Mark)
When the Commander heard it, he remained silent.
He never thought that the summoned kid who was not even a hero with such low specs was able to do that.
He seriously underestimated him, big time.
After a while, they chose to try to find Kenshin but had to stop because they were not able to locate him in the floors beyond 50.
---------------------------
During that time, Kenshin and Lana was in the 60th floor.
It was their third day together.
Kenshin and Lana were laying in a cotton bedding, the same from when she was in the the flower.
Of course there was a decent space in between.
Kenshin would normally be able to sleep if it were left at that.but....
Lana who was beside him, was staring at him.
Although it was dark and he was facing up, he knew that Lana had been staring at him while she was laying on the other side. It also happened in the other two nights. He chose to ignore it because he thought it was just her being cautious.
But today he felt the need to confirm it.
'stare..........'
"Lana....." (Kenshin)
Due to the unexpected voice, Lana was,
"Ha-ha-haaii!?" (Lana)
"What?" (Kenshin)
"I- if you don't mind me asking......what are you going to do with that teacher?" (Lana)
Kenshin told her about his teacher before because she claimed they needed to talk more about each others background.
"Nothing" (Kenshin)
'stare.......
“Lana, sleep now, questions tomorrow. Good night." (Kenshin)
"Ah, ah......" (Lana)
'I’ll ask him if I can accompany him even after getting out of this dungeon .........'
Lana has always been trying to figure out what she wanted to do in life.
There wasnt much options for her due to the war. She didnt want to participate in the war and just thought she might have to continue working at the general store shes been working at in her home city to afford to pay rent for her family, as she was from a poor background and her family couldn't afford to pay the war taxes.
But due to the current events she thought that it might have been a chance to have a better future.
Kenshin figured that Lana might have wanted to go travel with him but he still wasn't sure if he could trust Lana.
He knew that she didn't lie about her past, also that she was a good girl at heart, but true trust takes time to form.
By the way, he didn't trust Haruna sensei even in the other world as he felt that she was hiding under a facade.
So even when she used him as bait, he thought that not trusting her was the right call.
---------------------------------
70th floor
'scurry'
Lana startled, looked in the direction of the sound, but found nothing.
Only rocks and sand.
Kenshin who was ahead of her kept walking forward.
Did he not hear it?
He did but chose to keep moving forward.
Lana seeing this hurried forward to his side.
When she spotted his face, as always he was expressionless.
With half closed eyes, line of sight straight ahead, no change in pace and no signs of any other action.
One would think that he was deaf but Lana, who has been with him for 20 days, whose seen how he is, knows otherwise.
"Four legs, walks on four, sharp feet, tail, four meters long. Its big, but its light. Lana, watch out for poison or traps.Wait, cut that. It’s a pack. They probably coordinate with each other to do hit and run attacks. There are eleven of them. They've surrounded us." (Kenshin)
Lana knew they were invisible because Kenshin mentioned it earlier.
Lana who was able to use her powers to sense life forms using plant life as sensors was unable to due to the environment.
Vegetation wasn't able to survive in these conditions where all there was is rock and sand.
But if she were to get injured, her auto heal abilities would kick in so most of her powers did not rely only on the environment.
How Kenshin knew of their appearances even when they were invisible was due to sensing the changes in the surroundings.
Even if they were invisible, they had physical bodies.
He was able to deduce from their footprints how their weight was distributed due to the depression they made in the sand.
That wasn’t all, Kenshin also took notice of the change in the air current by using all of his senses.
If it was a big monster moving around it would cause changes in the air current including the particles of sand that was moved due to the wind they produced.
Still this wasn’t sufficient enough for Kenshin when his life is in danger.
When in situations like these, one couldn't lax in information on the enemy.
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That was one of the principles that he made.
So he used a power that was not available on Earth but was in here.
Magic.
It was something he created using acoustic location as a reference.
It worked by emitting really low potency pulses of mana that allows only Kenshin to perceive, emit from two points.
The two pulses of mana would hit the surroundings that would receive interference.
The receiver, Kenshin, would use this ‘information’ received to make out the physical features of the object.
It was basically mimicking triangulation.
Requirements:
Mastery in mana control- Allows for pulses to emit the same type of intensity. Also for the timing of the pulses emitted.
Mastery in ‘information’ decryption- Allows for info received to be organised to allow for perception of outer appearance of object.
Failing to produce these would result to perception interference.
Its name ‘mana triangulation’ a Kenshin original.
From what Kenshin sensed, they weren’t using magic to turn invisible; it was a biological skill like what chameleons had to allow them to blend in to their environment but their camouflaging technique were leaps above chameleons.
It was a troublesome trait they had but maybe due to Kenshin and Lana being the first people they encountered rather than regular prey, their caution was to its maximum.
If it was the usual targets, they would have attacked by now using poison needles that paralyzed them then attacked it while it was unmoving.
Being wary of a new foe was something that would govern their life, so it could not be helped doing so.
Eventually, they overcame this wariness because they were monsters that judged only by appearance.
They judged Kenshin and Lana to be weak due to their size that was a lot smaller compared to their usual game that were herd creatures that had deer like appearance, only 5 meters tall.
Also, these new beings seemed to be unable to sense them if they were invisible.
That was true for Lana who did not have Kenshins new magic.
It was true for her….
The two stopped and took out palm sized mirrors.
“Ooh, you were right Kenshin!” (Lana)
Lana shouted with a ecstatic expression at her companion.
The creatures that were camouflaging themselves to match the background became discoloured and was revealed.
They appeared to be scorpion like creatures that had four feet that were like spikes and two claws raised with a harpoon like tail.
Their invisibility worked by using their preys eye sight to adjust their skin colour to appear invisible.
That was their weakness, tracking their targets eyes to change their skins to appear invisible to them.
That's why the two used mirrors to trick the scorpions.
With their appearance exposed, it was time to fight.
Their roles were Kenshin for attack, Lana for support.
“Get ready” (Kenshin)
He muttered.
He threw something with his arm out, something that spun like a top, towards the scorpion, but it dodged.
It took this chance to attack Kenshin with its tail that had the paralyzing venom by doing a lunge.
Kenshin who stood there with the right arm out, made one think he gave up life but then pulled back his arm.
After that,
‘Buchi!’
It died.
On top of its head, an object in the shape of a disk with a radius of 11 cm with four ten centimetre blades that protruded from its sides, pierced it.
Seeing this, another scorpion went in front of the dead creature preparing to attack Kenshin.
A grave mistake.
Kenshin bent his right arm towards himself again,
Another ‘buchi!’ resounded.
Now two scorpions lay lifeless.
“How are the other four Lana?” (Kenshin)
He asked Lana without facing her who was behind him.
“They’re immobilised.” (Lana)
She said to Kenshin while having an expression of being proud of herself.
As she said, they were immobilised.
There were four other scorpions that had tried to encircle them.
But they were still in one place, curled up like dead spiders.
When seen close up, you could see that they were trying to move, it seemed they were bound.
Bound by strings.
That is what did it. Strings. More specifically, spider strings.
They were string from the giant spiders.
Their strings were silk like and strong to the point that it was able to support the weight of 3 grown adults.
Even more, its thickness was the same as that of a piano wire.
Its only weakness was that it was susceptible to fire.
Other than that it was a miracle material.
With it Kenshin was able to make a new weapon.
It was based off a toy on earth but Kenshin was able to make it into a weapon.
In its inactive state, it was a disk object made of black wood with a radius of 11 cm.
In its offensive mode or active mode, it had four edged protrusions.
In other words.
A weaponised yo-yo.
That was what killed the scorpions.
“Youre getting better at handling the strings” (Kenshin)
“Ehehe, in that case, will you cook karaage for me?” (Lana)
Currently, Kenshin and Lana began using strings to immobilise their opponent’s. Kenshin who was originally using strings and ropes was able to adapt it to his armament while giving Lana pointers.
After that they killed the bound creatures and ate Karaage.
-----------------
“He’s alive!? There’s no way he could survive that!” (Haruna)
Haruna sensei shouted frantically with a grim and dark expression towards Mark.
A day after they found out that Kenshin was probably still alive, Mark and the Captain told the stay behind group.
Haruna sensei was the first to respond.
“I don’t know how he did it but evidence we found points to obvious human activity in the floor” (Mark)
He told them about the corpses and items left there.
But even though evidence points to him surviving the encounter, it didn't show if he survived further than that.
Haruna sensei whose expression was filled with panic and distress thought that if he was alive, he might try to take revenge.
Because of this, she tried considering that even though he survived by some miracle, he might have died after.
That’s probably why they couldn’t find the body.
‘That must be it!’ (Haruna)
She thought to herself while looking down to avoid being seen making an expression of displeasure.