I Became a 6★ Gacha Character-Chapter 549: Hero of Flame 3

Just to be safe, let's create firebreaks using the holy sword before setting the fire to secure our retreat. At my suggestion, my companions nodded in agreement, while the viewers spewed all sorts of nonsense just to tease Han Se-ah.

What if the door to the 63rd floor burns down, there might be more fae, let's seduce the forest master too, sorry trees sob sob—the chat was flooded with such comments.

But Han Se-ah, having already stuffed dozens of barrels of sticky oil into her inventory, had a frighteningly resolute gleam in her eyes. Those eyes reflected the madness of someone who genuinely believed that burning this forest would defeat the Demon Lord, bring peace, and win ownership of BB Games.

Her usually dull eyes—which should be called dead fish eyes when she was suffering from arson-deprivation—now sparkled with such pure delight that it was almost scary.

"We should at least secure our retreat path, even if we don't know where the gate to the 63rd floor is. How ridiculous would it be if we set the fire and then got caught in it ourselves?"

"Roland, the gate won't be damaged by the fire, right?"

"If sticky oil could burn down a gate, we could kill the Demon Lord with this stuff."

Han Se-ah was clearly determined to set the fire, ignoring both the viewers' malicious comments and any anxiety stemming from our haphazard, improvised plan.

Having made up our minds, we moved forward with what was embarrassingly called a strategy.

We'd head to where we found the fae seed—the same place the secret terror had visited us. Then we'd use the holy sword and Earth Control to clear the area toward the gate leading back to the 61st floor, preventing fire from spreading along branches and fallen leaves to block our retreat.

After that, well, we'd spray sticky oil in all directions using the fuel sprayer purchased from the stone dwarves, then toss a flame from the staff, and let nature take its course.

"One monster in the underbrush. Not traveling in a pack."

"I wonder what kind of animal it is this time."

Unusually, instead of heading in a new direction to illuminate the minimap, we were following the already illuminated path back to where we'd encountered the wraiths. Knowing wraiths appeared there made the dark forest seem even more ominous compared to the forest fairy villages.

At least we weren't facing ghosts but beasts, so our journey wasn't significantly hindered. The only notable occurrence was suspiciously fur-knowledgeable viewers commenting things like "judging by the pattern, that's a lycaon," "looking at its back, it's a jackal," "considering its size, it's not a wolf but a jackal."

Thanks to this suspiciously suspicious fur enthusiast group asserting themselves among the female gamers, moms, and kids, we managed to cover about half the distance before we knew it. Since we'd encountered ghosts on our second day, this area must be near where we'd pitched our tent and camped on the first night.

This conclusion came from Grace's keen tracking abilities, combined with Han Se-ah's primitive method of measuring distances by spanning her fingers across the minimap.

"Hmm, this looks like where we pitched our tent on the first day. Since we hid it in dense foliage rather than a clearing, I can't be certain."

-We're watching the world's #1 streamer measuring an electronic map with her fingers in an era of virtual reality gaming and AI learning from humanity. I'm seriously losing my mind LOL

-I solved math problems like that in elementary school LOLOLOLOL

-But the travel speed is similar and we've fought about the same number of battles, so this area seems about right, no?

-What else could it be but her trying to naturally set up a tent and have some intimate time? LOL So transparent

-Regardless of intimate time or whatever, it's dawn so they need sleep anyway LOLOL The girls' skin will suffer

Han Se-ah zoomed out the minimap to its maximum, showing the barren map illuminated in a straight line from the gate, and spread her fingers to measure one span, two spans. She wasn't even trying to be funny, just measuring the distance with a serious face, causing viewers to burst into laughter.

While she could direct her voice to be heard only by viewers, there was no way to hide her finger movements in midair, drawing everyone's attention... honestly, it was pretty funny.

"Hanna, is something bothering you?"

"Huh? Oh, no. I was just thinking about creating that fire... firebreak Roland mentioned, using the spot where we pitched our tent on the first day as a reference point."

"Ah, this is definitely the general area. Since we maintained a consistent pace, we should set up the tent around here."

Thanks to Han Se-ah measuring spans in midair, the party naturally took a break. Normally, we would have camouflaged the tent to prevent beasts from accidentally approaching, but today was different.

I turned toward the gate, while my companions watched me intently from behind thick tree trunks at a safe distance to avoid the backlash. Seeing them, I concentrated and summoned the massive holy sword instead of my warhammer and shield.

Since today wasn't about sword training, I concentrated holy power to make it as large as possible. With the sword expanded to the point where it was hard to tell if it was a sword or a pillar, I raised it above my head. Then, following the basic swordsmanship I'd learned from memory fragments—

SWOOOOOSH—!!!

KYAAAAAAAA—!!!

A single strike delivered with perfect posture and perfect breathing.

As the enormous pillar of light struck down through the forest, a storm of crushed leaves and shattered twigs mixed with dust erupted, and beyond it appeared a clean trench wide enough to be called an eight-lane highway.

...But did I also hear a strange scream when I swung the holy sword? Or was that my imagination?

※

The holy sword had the drawback of being usable only once per day, but it wasn't a one-time skill.

While I wildly swung the holy sword with horizontal and vertical slashes like someone practicing swordsmanship on a dummy, bundle of straw, or log, my party members huddled together inside Han Se-ah's shield.

Though the holy sword possessed both physical and holy power, it wasn't a magical sword that cleanly purified the surroundings. The soil dust and wood sawdust kicked up by my forest-clearing rampage swirled around like a snowstorm in the mountains.

'...Aren't they coming? They're smarter than I thought?'

The reason for making such a loud commotion was to clear out the surrounding monsters.

Tower monsters had several peculiarities beyond their bodies being composed of mana (or something similar) as evidenced by their bodies disappearing and turning into mana stones when killed.

Whether wild beasts or other races like orcs and goblins, they tended to charge at humans regardless of strength measurement. Outside the Tower, they might engage in primitive politics, exiling members to become wanderers, but inside the Tower, they generally attacked on sight.

But even that was just a story from the lower floors, as this forest remained eerily quiet. Despite making obvious noise—human presence so disruptive that forests split and plains turned into canyons—no beasts showed interest in our commotion.

'Are neutral objects different?'

The monsters I knew would at least approach out of curiosity or target the women hiding behind me during the commotion.

Before Han Se-ah connected to this world, when dozens of aura users gathered with high-rank adventurer titles and barely managed to break through forests and swamps—even then, monsters would charge at parties of high-rank adventurers while wielding just a single weapon, regardless of strength disparity.

Those same creatures were now running away from the holy sword?

If that were the case, they wouldn't have rushed in when high-rank mages carpet-bombed the forest with magic to build research labs.

"Grace! Anything around us?"

"Nothing! I sense something moving away, though!"

Thanks to Grace's confirmation, it was clear something strange was happening. Whether it was due to a patch at the start of Season 2, or the influence of the Four Heavenly Kings, or perhaps these forest monsters being closer to neutral objects than the Demon Lord's army—one thing was certain.

If beasts or wraiths could be intimidated by overwhelming power, if unlike ordinary monsters they could recognize fear and regulate their aggression through compromise... couldn't we negotiate by beating the shit out of them? If we could skip unnecessary battles through fear and violence, the path to the 70th floor to kill the Four Heavenly Kings might become slightly easier.

That's why we needed to set fire to the forest.

"The dust seems to be settling. Should we pitch the tent?"

"I'll drop the shield and use Earth Control to prepare the tent site."

"We have time to cook now, but we're short on ingredients."

"Hehe~ I actually packed some food separately in my pocket. Since we're not staying long after burning the forest, I brought enough for today and tomorrow."

Maybe I'd been infected by Han Se-ah too. I thought this as I put away the holy sword and readied my warhammer and shield, gazing at the landscape that had been so thoroughly destroyed it looked like a plain rather than a forest.

Back when I was striving to break through around the 30th floor as an adventurer, I had to use my brain, form temporary parties, manage connections, take requests, and ask mages for cooperation. But since becoming part of the hero party with Han Se-ah, it seemed like I'd stopped thinking and started charging in headfirst.

The tent set up in what was now a clearing rather than a forest, the savory aroma of Irene's special soup bubbling away, the beast-type monsters too intimidated to approach, and the wraiths mysteriously absent. Slurping the soup that remained delicious despite having less meat than usual, I pondered these things.

...Well, whether it was gaming carried or life carried, there was nothing wrong with me taking the easy way.

If I got carried, at least Han Se-ah would be the one getting criticized.

Enjoy the chappy!