Dragged Into Another World Because of My Otaku Friend-Chapter 160: Phobia

In the base camp, Prince Reid was sitting inside his tent, accompanied by a firelamp on his table. From time to time, soldiers would enter and give reports regarding the current situation.

So far, he knew Prince Reymond was now within the plaza. His group had found one of the kaoslith and was attempting to secure the area.

Another one was found near the port, which had a lesser number of monsters compared to the others. He already knew this from the intel given by the local captain, and he had ordered some soldiers to guard the kaoslith there.

Now, the remaining problem was the last kaoslith, which still could not be located.

’Are the Dawnbloom guild members having trouble along the way? Are the enemies there too strong for them? Should I send some of my soldiers as reinforcement?’ Reid’s mind was working vigorously. As the interim chief of this campaign, standing in for his brother, he needed to make the right decision. One wrong move, and he might jeopardize the whole operation.

As he was staring at the map of the town, a soldier entered his tent. He bowed to Reid.

Reid frowned, his eyebrows tightening. He had already ordered the soldiers to update him on an hourly basis. The last report had just arrived fifteen minutes ago, so why was there another one so soon?

Unless something urgent had happened.

"I apologize, my prince, for disturbing you. Sir Lloyd and Lady Githa have just arrived at the base camp. Unfortunately, some of their soldiers were heavily injured and are now being treated by the medical personnel," the soldier reported.

Reid immediately stood up, eyes widening. Both of them were the guards responsible for protecting his only sister.

He instantly walked toward the medical tent, just a few meters away. Sir Saul followed close behind.

Upon entering the tent, he saw dozens of soldiers lying on mats, most of them wrapped in bandages while some were already covered with blankets.

His eyes scanned the tent anxiously, searching for Reika.

"Prince Reid." A voice called out to him. Reid turned and saw Githa and Lloyd. Both of them bowed to him, and Reid could clearly see the despair on their faces.

"Where is the princess?" Reid asked.

Lloyd and Githa stayed silent. It wasn’t that they refused to answer but they were simply terrified to speak.

"I don’t want to repeat myself. Answer me. Where is the princess?" Reid’s voice rose slightly. He was usually far calmer than Reymond, but the situation was dire enough to shake even him.

"She... she was kidnapped. We were ambushed on the way here," Githa replied, her voice trembling.

"I am truly sorry, my prince. This happened because of my weakness. Please punish me, I will accept it," Lloyd said, suddenly kneeling before Reid.

Reid tried to process the information. He never expected the enemy would dare to kidnap royalty. Bringing Reika here now seemed like a huge mistake.

Reid exhaled slowly, then helped Lloyd back to his feet. "There’s no need for that now. What matters is finding the princess. Do you know who the perpetrators are?"

Githa and Lloyd explained everything inside Reid’s personal tent. Reid rested his hand on his chin as he absorbed every detail.

"One thing is certain from what all of you have told me. It seems these men are connected to the Kaosliths as well. Sir Saul, send someone to report this to Prince Reymond’s army and also to the Dawnbloom Guild. And summon Guildmaster Mirinda. I need to speak with her."

Saul nodded, bowed, and left the tent.

---

"Aaarghh!"

Alia and Evelyn screamed at the top of their lungs as they clung to each other.

"Urgh! My ears! Can both of you stop screaming?" Lee snapped, covering his ears in annoyance.

We were now on the 5th floor, still making our way toward the top of the building. So far, we hadn’t faced much trouble dealing with the monsters.

The only real issue was that most of the monsters were giant versions of insects, something that triggered phobia in a lot of people.

Spiders, centipedes, millipedes, even butterflies, just monstrous versions of them.

For people with phobias like Alia and Evelyn, they were completely useless in this raid. We were constantly bombarded by their high-pitched screams every few minutes.

"No, no, please... I can’t do this anymore. This is too much for me..." Evelyn dropped to her knees, eyes full of tears. Alia sat helplessly against the wall beside her.

"Hang on, Eve. What’s wrong with you? I’ve never seen you look this hopeless before." Maya tried to comfort her.

"You look so miserable, Evelyn." Bob was holding back his laugh.

"I can’t even handle insects when they’re small. How do you expect me to deal with giant ones? I’m sorry, but I think I need to withdraw for now. I’ll standby at the base of the building. All the best to all of you." Evelyn weakly tried to stand up.

Beltimore shook his head and adjusted his glasses. "Fine. Both of you can go down now. Just be careful of any monsters."

Evelyn and Alia nodded, then proceeded to leave the building.

"I pity them. Both of them are important members of our party. Is it really okay to let them go?" I asked. I disagreed with Beltimore’s decision.

"Well, they can barely fight right now. At the moment, their presence will only drag us down. I’m with the vice captain on this one," Linus replied calmly.

We continued our way upward. On the 10th floor out of 20, we encountered one of the most disgusting monsters so far.

A group of giant cockroaches.

We slowly walked as the cockroaches were not moving. From what I saw, there were about ten of them. Their antennae were wiggling as they were facing each other.

"Please do not fly. Please do not fly. Please do not fly," Bob kept whispering while tiptoeing toward the next staircase.

"What are you chanting, Bob?" Maya was confused.

"These bastards, if all of them stay on the ground, it’s just cockroaches. But once it starts flying, it becomes a whole different species. A catastrophe," Bob said.

I nodded. He was absolutely right. These insects are in top ten of sworn enemies of humankind.

Thud!

While Bob was talking, he accidentally kicked a tin-like object on the ground. The sound echoed throughout the floor.

All of us froze.

Keeek!

Keek!

I looked to my side...

and saw a group of catastrophes flying straight toward us.