Isekaied Into An Eroge, Time To Have Fun!-Chapter 127: Back On The Grind (1)
"I truly dislike these sorts of places..."
The soft grumblings from the blonde made me smile wryly as I stepped off of the dais and into the Dungeon again, returning not so long after the first time I had come here and definitely feeling ready to get back at it.
The idea of desecrating the bodies of the Spirits that I killed still made me feel a little queasy, but the opportunity to learn more and to apply the things I now knew was definitely outweighing that queasiness by a lot.
Especially now that I had Sera with me to help me learn how to cast other kinds of magic and how to better deal with the elemental matchups in real, actual combat; the fighting system in the game likely didn’t cover a tenth of what was actually possible now that everything was real and unrestricted, so I needed to ’relearn’ some of these basic things.
Like being able to still use Fire Magic against an enemy that was shrouded in Earth Magic or even in Water Magic; in the game there was no circumventing the elemental matchup even if you used some Goddess blessed Fire Magic against some low level water attuned mob, but here..?
Well, heat water up enough and it starts to evaporate, so in real combat you just need a hotter flame to overwhelm those making use of most liquids, but I had yet to achieve that level of power... and it would take me a long time to get to that point.
"You don’t like dingy, damp caves filled with monsters? And here I was hoping that this might become a regular spot for me to take you~!"
Trying to lighten the mood with a joke did seem to work since Sera just snorted and followed me off of the dais, walking by my side as we began to make our way towards the same path that I had taken with Kha’Miero.
As we walked the blonde checked her armor one more time before saying "You do need to learn another element soon though. Specialization in a singular thing only works if you are insanely talented with it, have some racial gift for it, or if you are being taught by someone who has completely mastered it.
Natalie, you are... none of those things, just to keep it honest. Us Humans don’t have any proficiencies in practically anything besides fertility, and as for talent... you are talented, but not to the point that I would tell you to only pursue Fire Magic. We also don’t have easy access to those sorts of Professors, so you need to start rounding out your arcane arsenal."
I just nodded and began checking the area around us when we emerged into that first, somewhat confined chamber that had a few Spirits floating around, each one being a different element.
Because of that Sera stopped me before I could even attempt to start as she instead murmured "You can copy the actions of the spells you know for all elements. All you need to do is imagine your mana becoming one of those other elements, just like you did with fire. The fluidity of water, the rigid stiffness of rock, the weightlessness of the air around us... Just start with the basic elements for now."
Immediately I was feeling a little uncomfortable since this was not the place I wanted to be doing my first ever Earth, Water or Wind Magic attempts at, yet at the same time it was that sort of pressure that would help me grow immensely.
It was also the reason I had invited Sera along with me and it was the reason she had accepted, so I took a breath, nodded and picked the lone Fire Spirit that was floating lazily in the corner, deciding that I would attempt Water Magic first.
Just like I had with my first attempts with Fire Magic what I needed to do was get my mindset right first, and visualizing what I was going to need to do in order to make this an offensive spell was somewhat tricky... yet also would become easy the moment I actually did it.
To me the only way to make water ’dangerous’ is to use it when it is pressurized because otherwise it just sort of seems... useless, mainly because I cannot think of just lobbing a ball of water at something as capable of dealing damage.
That meant I needed to figure out a way to get my mind in tune with my magic to achieve what I wanted, and for me that would mean pressurization of the water to use it as a blade of sorts, which would definitely limit me in how I used this element going forwards... but oh well.
Jack of all trades is cool but I wasn’t really interested in becoming adept with each element simply because a few of them were far more my style than the others... and sadly Water Magic was never something I looked to for offense.
For defensive and supportive purposes though Water Magic was easily one of the cooler elements to make use of because of how versatile it was, but that was for another day; right now I needed to kill a Fire Spirit, so I decided to go with a pressurized arrow of water.
Simple enough, and turning the raw mana inside of my Hubs into something liquid rather than a bundle of energy was somewhat challenging... for a brief moment, because after a second it worked and I now had ’liquid’ mana.
Going through the same motions that I did with the Fire Arrow, I summoned a long spiral of water that lazily spun between my fingers, and after a moment of thinking I quickened the spinning, tapered the point and aimed it at the Fire Spirit.
When the arrow was let loose it zipped through the air and pierced the aura of Fire Mana around the red skinned doll with ease, allowing the water to tear into the flesh and come out the other side relatively easily.
Seeing the Fire Spirit dropping to the ground was the sign of accomplishment that I had cast a successful spell, yet at the same time it provided that hollow sort of feeling that made me smile wryly as I approached it, quickly taking what I needed from the dead monster and swallowing down some bile.
"Rudimentary but workable."
Sera was right there the moment it was over, and the way she was still looking around at our surroundings made me flush slightly in embarrassment as I remembered what Kha’Miero had told me time and time again just two days ago; always be on your toes and never let your guard down.
But at least I was here with someone who was competent and knew how to handle themselves, so it wasn’t like it was all bad; it was just a reminder that I needed to be more vigilant as well, though the immediate discussion about the magic I had used took my mind away from that quickly.
"I uh... don’t think I am going to pursue Water Magic for offensive purposes, so... It just doesn’t seem to be something I want to or even can use effectively, y’know? It feels off when I just think about it..."
Sera shrugged at that, helping me up and gesturing at the various elemental monsters around us as she said "That’s good to realize early on. Forcing yourself to practice something you do not have any interest in only results in bad habits being formed. With magic, bad habits can lead to injury if not death..."
I nodded and realized it really was only Water Magic that I thought of like this; Wind Magic had its own luster that I found appealing, Earth Magic was simple yet so obviously effective because of that, and Fire Magic was flashy and awesome.
It was just Water Magic that I didn’t really ’vibe’ with at all, and even when I moved my thinking to the ’combined’ elements like Lightning, Metal, Nature and Ice I could see myself using them all effectively and pursuing each to a certain degree of mastery.
That made me curious about everything but I really wasn’t in the place to be that curious right now, especially not with a busty blonde telling me to show her what I had with the other two ’basic’ elements.
Solidifying my mana into rock wasn’t that hard either, and there was a sort of amusement to be found in needing magic to create a solid, ’realistic’ projectile that functioned practically the same way a normal arrow would, just with this one being a bit heavier.
Meanwhile making use of the air to attack things was also kind of amusing, even more so when I wondered how viable a vacuum spell would become against monsters and even potentially other mortals.
If I could suck the oxygen out of an area would they be able to fight against that or would they just need to concede defeat before they suffocated in an ’empty’ bubble?
I wasn’t sure, but what I was certain of was how deadly pressurized air was at severing through flesh and how much of an impact it could have against practically anything, so long as you gave it enough juice.
It even blasted chunks out of the wall behind the Water Spirit that I had used this Wind Arrow against, and that alone was both awesome and terrifying since it was definitely stronger than anything else I had cast so far.
