Slave Harem in the Labyrinth of the Other World (LN)

But after what seemed like ages of just dancing around trying to deal damage, it looks like a chance to truly go in for the kill has finally presented itself to me. The Beep Sheep charged at me, and then immediately went for a sweeping attack with its horns, first to the left, then to the right, then to the left again. Now all I have to do is to position myself in the right place, and

The Beep Sheeps head moved to the right, carried by the momentum of its previous attack. It shook its horns wildly at me, but right now I could easily read the trajectory of the entire attack. Dodging out of the way of the incoming horn, I raised Durandal and dropped it at the Beep Sheeps neck in one powerful motion. Its blade tore through the skin, muscles and the tissues underneath, severing the bosss head from the rest of its body.

Finally, the Beep Sheep has fallen. It left its item behind and then disappeared in a cloud of green smoke.

Okay its its finally dead. How are you holding up, Roxanne? Is your body okay? Are you hurt anywhere? When I snapped back to reality after being hit with that Skill I saw that you got hurt as well, so

Yes, I did suffer some damage, but Ive used recovery items several times now, so I should be fine for now. Nevertheless, thank you for being concerned about me, master.

You dont have to thank me for it, Roxanne. Youre my precious companion, so of course I would be worried about your well-being. If something ever happened to you, I would not be able to forgive myself for it.

If you think you have any kind of lingering damage left, be sure to tell me. Recovering our health and keeping ourselves in the best possible condition is our number one priority after all. And also, I I dont want to lose you

Understood. If I notice any abnormalities, I will be sure to tell you immediately.

With that said, we have proceeded to the fifth floor as I kept Durandal equipped on me just in case any dangerous enemy would pop up and tried to attack us.

All right, we have made it to the fifth floor. So, how is it, Roxanne? You smell any people nearby?

*Sniff Sniff* Hmm there should be a lot less people here in comparison to the fourth floor, and I also sense a monster nearby. How would you like to proceed, master?

Lets go have a look at the monsters inhabiting this floor then. Just, you know, lets be cautious about it, okay?

Yes!

Now that we caught up with our progress of the exploration of the Labyrinth of Quratar in comparison to the Labyrinth of Veil, it was high time to see what kind of enemies are we going to encounter here. Normally I would have opted for going back home, especially since the Floor Boss fight was especially tough, but since the both of us managed to heal ourselves back to full health and we both still had the energy to spare, then I decided that why not, lets at least go and see what will be there in store for us.

Walking forward under Roxannes careful leadership, we have soon reached the place where the monster she mentioned was located. It was called Collagen Coral Lv.5. So this guy is the monster native to the fifth floor of the Quratars labyrinth, huh? It looks like a round rock on a thin, twig-like body supported by only a single leg? And it is approaching us by hopping on that one leg very slowly I mean okay, but what does collagen has to do with anything here? Maybe it means that the rock-like thing acting as this guys head is actually soft and easy to cut through? Lets check it out!

I slashed it once with Durandal to see what would happen, and let me tell you, I was only partially surprised. Because the monster is called Collagen Coral, a part of me was hopingthat it would mean that its head will ne all light and squishy and easy to cut in half, but it was anything but that. Quite contrary to my assumption, the material this monsters head is made of was surprisingly hard, and making a dent in it required a pretty decent amount of strength to be put behind the slash of my sword. Is it because its head is made from solid rock? No, not rock. Since its called Collagen Coral, then I guess coral has to be its main component. Yeah, that makes sense.

Naturally, one blow was not enough to kill it, so I had to whack it in the head a second time. I guess that means that the fifth floor is the natural borderline of sorts, a place where one strike from Durandal is no longer enough to kill monsters. I have to remember that: floors one through four: pretty much everything except Floor Bosses can be one-shotted easily, but from the fifth floor onwards, every single battle, even against the mob enemies will require more effort from us.

The monster collapsed in a puff of green smoke and disappeared, leaving behind an item. Now, lets see what we have here

Coral Gellatin, huh?

The body of the monster was all sturdy and hard to cut through, but when I touched this Drop Item, it turned out to be solid, but decently soft, to the point where I could easily make a dent in it by pressing it down with my finger hard enough. Maybe that was what the Collagen in the name Collagen Coral referred to?

I wonder if maybe we could make some decent jelly out of it?

Excuse me, but what exactly is this jelly, master?

Nothing, its nothing, forget I said anything. Just a little thing we had back in my homeland, is all. More importantly, do you know if this thing is edible or not?

I asked Roxanne after I picked up the item and handed it over to her so that she could put it back in her backpack.

I dont know if it can be eaten on its own, but I heard that butchers use it when they are making sausages and they want them to maintain their shape. Also, I heard that once it is dissolved in hot water, it can become a pretty strong adhesive that can then be processed into glue. With enough of it, we could make enough glue that we could then use to attach the carpets to the walls like we talked about a few days ago.

Is that so?

An adhesive used in the production of glue, huh? Then maybe it will really be quite convenient to have as much of it on us as possible? Also, Roxannes talk about carpets reminded me that we have indeed talked about buying a few of them so that we could use them as decorations in our house to make it look less empty.

Okay, we will worry about that later once we get back home. Can you scout ahead with your nose?

Of course *sniff sniff* *sniff sniff* there is someone a little bit further ahead. If we want to avoid being seen, we can go through the path to the left, but be advised that I do not sense any monsters there as well, master. The path to the right contains some monsters, but if we go there then we will be at risk of being seen.

So it is a choice between three possible routes then. The left one is automatically out of the question, because according to Roxanne there is literally nothing for us to find there. The way forward is also off limits to us, because you know, people. I could always switch from The Durandal Build to Magic Build and we could try going through the path to the right, but that might not be the best option under the current circumstances. We are currently on the fifth floor of the Labyrinth, the floor where one strike from Durandal, my best Bonus Weapon, is no longer enough to defeat monsters as quickly and efficiently as I was doing it on the lower floors. Two hits from Durandal are not all that bad, but when it comes to magic, I needed four shots of it to defeat a single enemy on the fourth floor, and that was already becoming a kind of an issue whenever we had to fight larger groups of enemies back to back without an option for me to switch back to Durandal Build so that I could recover my lost MP whenever it was dropping to the critical zone.