Going back to the other group, the air around them has been all around pretty nice. An overall lack of interpersonal turmoil and issues has led to them letting their guard down by a sizable degree. Of course, they still understand that they're on one of the tallest mountains of the world, said to be the meeting place of the Gods, and even being warned by Aru that their path is all but littered with traps, but even with all that, they can't help but crack jokes and laugh at them. Then again, can you blame them? They've been walking all this time without even stumbling upon a single trap or enemy.

"D'you think we somehow lucked out and went around all the traps?" Cecily pondered.

"Hm?" Eleanor turned around with a puzzled expression.

"Y'know, like, what if we found some other path that's essentially completely safe?" Cecily figured, "I mean, I'd expect something to pop up by now, even if we're not nearly a quarter of the way there yet."

"Cecily what the fuck are you talking about?" Issei groaned.

"Whoa, where did that attitude come from?"

"Sorry, I heard it from a show a long time ago and felt like referencing it." Issei chuckled, "But seriously, you really shouldn't be saying all that. It's exactly when someone says they're fine that everything goes astray."

"Oh, is that so?" Eleanor pointed in front of them, "You mean something like that?"

As the two followed Eleanor's finger, they couldn't even think of any other reaction other than an annoyed sigh. Indeed, it was as Issei said - something was blocking their path forward, and that something was a snair.

"See? That's why I told you not to say anything!" Issei went to reprimand Cecily.

"Oh come on! It would've been there regardless of whether or not I said anything!" Cecily refuted, "Seriously though, what the hell is a snair doing all the way out here? This isn't their habitat."

"Don't be too certain." Eleanor warned, "Whilst it is true that our standard Green snairs aren't indigenous to the icy parts of the world, this arctic White snair is a different story."

"Arctic White snair? Gimme a break..." Issei chuckled as the snair hissed at them from afar, "Lemme guess, it's got frost resistance and its weakness is fire or something."

As soon as he said that, a powerful fireball flew above their heads, just barely giving them enough time to duck. It appears Issei's knowledge from his home world's video games and anime don't exactly apply in this scenario, as the snair's Red Iro all but immediately debunked his theory.

"Okay, it can spit fire!" Issei warned everyone after the fact as Cecily pulled him away from the danger.

Now promptly huddled up behind a large stone on the side of the pathway they were just walking on, the group of three had gotten their wish fulfilled, it seems. The snair was rampaging all around the path, and from the sounds it was making over there, they could tell that it was steadily approaching them more and more. If they were to survive this encounter, they needed to devise a good plan quickly.

"Alright, how are you guys at fighting?" Cecily immediately readied her two knives.

"Fighting!? I'm a cartographer, not a fighter!" Eleanor hastily declined going toe to toe with the beast.

"I fought all kinds of beasts on my journey for a living during our travels." Issei explained, "Though it mostly worked because I used their bulky stature against them to trip them up."

"That's more than enough!" Cecily went to get up, "We'll just do that then! Eleanor, stay back-!"

"Hold it, that won't work with this one." Issei yanked her back down, "The beasts I fought couldn't Wield Iros like this one can. My plans usually involved me getting close to them and swerving around them until they tripped up, but if I do that now..."

"You'll be toast, literally." Eleanor began thinking up another way for them to win, "Well, how about I serve as a distraction, in that case?"

"Huh?" They both looked at her.

"I'll let it target me while you guys sneak up from behind." She explained, "My brother once told me about a time him and Lune did that against a snair as kids, so I'm thinking if those idiots could do it as kids, then I don't see why three capable adults wouldn't be able to as well."

"Just whose husband are you calling an idiot again?" Cecily cracked her fingers.

"Eep! F-Forget that, more importantly, the snair is getting dangerously close!" Eleanor yelped, "Everyone in agreement with the plan!?"

"Aye!" The two fighters of the group nodded with wry smiles as they all jumped to another rock, just in time before the snair gobbled them up.

So, the positions were as such - Eleanor was the only one not hiding behind a rock, instead completely exposing herself to the snair so that she could get targeted. Issei and Cecily on the other hand, they were hidden behind two respective rocks of their own, waiting for the snair to let them pass behind it.

"H-Hey you, b-big dumb s-serpent!" Eleanor's legs quivered as she hollered, "B-B-B-Bet you can't catch m-me!"

"Hisssss!" The snair snapped at her without a hint of hesitation.

"Iyaaaahhh! N-Never mind, actually! Don't go for me!" She cried out as she ran with all her might.

"Should we go in soon?" Issei was still waiting for Cecily to give the signal.

"Nah, let her fear for her life a bit more." Cecily giggled ominously, "This'll teach her to make fun of my Lune."

"Dammit Cecily, now's not the time!" Issei got scared and ran behind the snair, "Now, Instarope! Hyaaa...! Ack! H-Hot hot hot!"

"Yeah, safe to assume shouting at the top of your lungs will definitely alert it." Cecily mocked him from the safety of her rock, "You wanna try not getting burnt to a crisp this time?"

"Crap, that should've worked..." Issei once again hid behind his rock, this time with a bit of his clothes charred, "Maybe we overwhelm it at the same time?"

"Yeah, that's the plan, but we gotta wait for it to forget about us." Cecily explained, "This time, just let Eleanor do her part properly."

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

"What the hell do you mean my part?!" Eleanor shouted as she continued running in circles, "Get your butts over here before I become snair food!"

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"Okay, while we have some time still," Issei got serious, "What's our gameplan?"

"Well, we can't do anything about it unless we get it to stop spewing fire everywhere." Cecily figured, "So maybe if we plug up its mouth with something?"

"Nah, from what I understood, Iro Abilities don't come from the mouth, they come from..." He suddenly realized, "A-ha! The Eyes!"

Rummaging through his backpack until almost all of his handy-dandy gadgets were taken out, he finally found it at the very bottom - A single grenade and an Instarope. As he was putting everything else back in the backpack and combining the two main ingredients for this highly-destructive dish, he began to explain his master plan.

"Say, how would you rate your knife throwing skills?" Issei smirked confidently at the rather confused Cecily.

"Nothing short of impeccable." She proudly threw one knife high into the sky before taking aim and throwing the other one at it.

The first knife was thrown with a ton of spin to it, only to be used as a makeshift target. The other knife was thrown with a very straight trajectory, incredibly high velocity and absolutely zero spin to it. The result was just as impeccable as she had described it to be, namely the second knife perfectly passed through the hole of the target knife's handle, with the target knife safely falling back down for her to catch it, and the second knife taking a while longer before doing the same. Looking at such a magnificent display of skill, Issei actually had to snap back to reality before smiling as he explained her role in the plan.

"I'm so glad Lune came back for you!" He laughed, "Well, this is gonna make things way more interesting, then! Gimme that knife for a sec!"

"What are you doing?" She hesitantly obliged.

Tying up the knife with the end of the Instarope capsule, he had merged the knife handle with the capsule to create a peculiar shape. Tossing the knife back to her, he told her to cut the middle of the rope lengthwise.

"Eh!? You're still not done yet!?" She jumped a bit once she saw him attaching the grenade to both ends of the rope, one rope attached to the grenade whilst the other was attached to the grenade pin.

"This was something I had cooking up in my head for a while now, but I couldn't quite get it to work without someone skilled enough to properly throw the knife." He explained, "Your job is to cast the Instarope in front of its face, and then immediately turning around to toss the knife at the opposite direction to serve as a counterweight."

"What...?" She still didn't quite understand.

"Don't you get it?" He looked super stoked to finally test his idea out, "By pulling on the two sides of the rope, you'll rip the grenade pin off and it'll detonate in front of its Eyes, blowing its brains out from a distance! It's this world's first ever remote detonation!"

"...Come again?" She glanced around all confused, her mind empty as Issei just sighed and kicked her out of her cover.

"Just do what I told you, you don't gotta understand the theory behind it!" He yelled as she got a running start.

Running with all her might, just as an experienced athlete would, she stopped and pointed the Instarope at its face. Pressing the button to launch the rope towards it and over the edge, she immediately turned around and tossed the knife it was attached to backwards, towards where Issei was. He ducked despite her not even aiming at him, probably out of fear for his life or something, and in the next moment...!

"Ka-BOOM!" He jumped out of the rock to witness the explosion firsthand, not sparing a single second as he went to mock the beast whose head just got blown to smithereens, "Ohoho, they're going to have to glue you back together - IN HELL! Haha, always wanted to say that..."

"W-What the hell was that!?" The tired Eleanor's legs finally gave out as the giant snair's headless remains fell from the side of the mountain, "Y-Yuck..."

"That, my dear comrades, was Newton's third law!" He explained, "Every actions has an equal and opposite reaction. In other words - science, bitch!"

"What'd you just call me?" Cecily took her deeply-lodged knife out of the stone she was aiming at previously, "Wanna test your luck and repeat that for me?"

"I-I didn't mean you, what the hell!" He clicked his tongue zestily as he folded his arms dramatically, "Geez, not everything's about you, girl..."

"Ehh... Well, I guess you're right." Cecily shrugged as she put her knives away, "Alright then, let's move on. Come on, Eleanor, let's go."

"S-Sorry guys, c-can you go on without me for a bit...?" She refused to get up, or even turn around to face them for that matter, "I-I'll catch up to you in a bit, s-so just please..."

"Sniff, sniff... Oh, something smells salty all of a sudden." Issei immediately noticed, "It could just be the snair's blood, but blood should smell like iron, not at all salty... Eh?"

Looking more closely at the shaking maiden that was cooped up in front of them, Issei had noticed a small yellow puddle start to form from underneath her. It appears all that running, in addition to the fear of getting chased by a deadly beast had made Eleanor's bladder weaken. The shock of the sudden explosion happening just above her probably didn't at all help with that. Now Issei was a gentleman, first and foremost, so before Cecily could notice, he briskly led her away by the wrist, thus allowing Eleanor to change her britches without having to deal with any more shame. Of all the people in this Vast world, Issei was probably the only one who wondered if it would be alright to ask for those panties once she changed out of them.