Don’t Screw With Me

As he walked through the grassland, there were several “holes” that seemed to have been made by kobolds.

Basically, he ignored them and kept walking, but that was simply a matter of mana.

Even if his mana capacity had increased somewhat, repeatedly using Mjolnir would quickly leave him out of mana.

For now, Kikori’s strongest trump card was Mjolnir.

Even Kikori understood well enough that it would be foolish to use it all up too early.

So when it came to the kobolds that would occasionally, as if remembering, fire at him—

“!”

A whistling sound cut through the air. In that instant, Kikori leaped sideways from where he stood.

He was checking ahead of himself. To the left and right, he could notice things to some extent.

Then if it was a snipe he would not notice until he heard the sound… it was highly likely from behind.

After dodging like that, Kikori immediately turned and ran toward the bow kobold sticking its face out of a hole.

“Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!”

War Cry. That roar filled with killing intent made the kobold freeze for an instant, and Kikori reached it and brought down his Magic Axe.

Thunk. With that dull sound, the kobold tumbled down into the burrow, and from inside the hole he could hear the voices of the other kobolds.

He did not know whether they were screams, panicked cries, or angry shouts, but if they had social behavior over there, then Kikori thought that “this method” was extremely effective.

They should just quietly let him pass through here.

If he made them think that way, it should ultimately reduce the number of battles.

At the very least, it had to be far better than running away and making them think he was easy prey, but—

“Damn it, again…!”

Fighting, fighting, and fighting, he still could not easily reach the spatial distortion on the “other side.”

While that continued, the sky turned red, and before long night came.

But he did not think for even an instant that he should make camp in this place.

He did not think so, but… even Kikori understood how dangerous it would be to walk around holding up a lantern in this situation.

That was exactly why, placing priority on the danger of an ambush, Kikori remained standing where he was.

He did not even think of sitting down. If he sat, he would not be able to block arrows.

He simply kept straining his eyes to the darkness of night, and looked around without letting his guard down so that he would know whatever came.

And then, even after some time passed, no attack came.

“…Phew.”

Just a little. At the moment he let out a small sigh of relief, a somewhat strong wind blew with a whoosh.

Countless arrows pierced into Kikori. Some were deflected by his armor. Some stuck into the gaps in his armor.

“Guh, uh…!?”

The second volley, the third volley. The sounds that had been swallowed by the wind could now finally be heard clearly.

“Black arrows…!? Don’t screw with me!”

Black-painted arrows for night raids.

He could see a great swarm of kobolds emerging from holes all over the place and rushing to attack Kikori.