Chapter 67 - Coordination
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
A series of explosions resounded in the savanna as it kicked up the dust on the ground, creating a thin smokescreen.
Clone Theo went straight to its target and smashed the monster with its shield.
The monster seemed to be a five feet grasshopper. It swung its scythe to cut Theo in two, only to be blocked by his shield.
Meanwhile, Alea faced a monster that had a similar appearance to that of a zebra. But on its skins, she found many thorns that would be able to injure her if she was careless.
Alea took a deep breath and stomped the ground, swinging her sword from above. Her strength completely changed compared to when she wielded the sword with her right hand. The sword cut the zebra like butter even with that hard thorn before she kicked the body from the left, clearing up the path between her and the grasshopper.
Since Theo took its attention, Alea went around it and cut the body in one clean strike before jumping to the air. She said, "Let's go."
Theo nodded and continued running like before.
"Seriously, I think we have more hope than earlier… Thanks to the abilities you have hidden this whole time." Alea couldn't help but praise him. If they truly wanted to kill all five of them, Theo only needed to aim the Magic Bullet toward them.
In fact, the reason why Theo could adapt to her movement so easily must be because of his clone. He had gotten accustomed to fighting with a clone, so he simply treated her as a replacement for his clone.
"Just shut up. I can see the forest, but we will have a problem before entering that forest." Theo narrowed his eyes.
"Hmm… fifty or sixty." Alea also understood and checked the monsters. They were a bit spread out, so there must be a way to slip past them.
Suddenly, Alea and Theo said their answer at the same time.
"Left."
"Middle."
"Eh?" Theo and Alea widened their eyes, never expecting to have a different opinion.
"Your reason?" Theo asked without hesitation.
"There are multiple monsters behind what you're pointing at. If we go there, we will be stopped by them and swarmed by the monsters we've passed." Alea let out a long sigh. "Huft. To think that more and more monsters will come out of the forest later."
Theo nodded. "I thought the same thing, but if you see it a little bit, the monsters are relatively leaning to the middle, so we can use them to halt the advance from the middle to right side. That's my plan. Do you have anything that can stop them for a few seconds?"
"I have. It uses up a bit more of my Magic Power, but your plan seems to be better than mine, so we will use yours." Alea agreed without hesitation after understanding Theo's thoughts.
"Good. This is going to be a bit dangerous, but I will signal you when to use it."
"Roger."
Theo then raised his spear as Magic Power fluctuated around his spear.
"Focused Charge."
Seeing Theo had gotten ready, Alea released her fire and raised her sword. She slashed it before even reaching the monsters, shooting out a crescent-shaped red sword wave.
"Flamming Ge-Sword."
Boom.
The fire hit the monster between the left side and middle area, creating another smokescreen to mask their movement for a while.
Still, they needed to handle ten monsters on the left side, considering they couldn't really go around them for two reasons. One, they needed a longer time to go unnoticed since it would be the same if they got noticed. Second, there were many monsters around there too, so they might be chased by two groups instead of one. In other words, circling around them was not an option.
A rhino charged from the front as Clone Theo grabbed both the sword handle and shield handle with his left hand at the same time. Then his right hand slammed the sword handle, so the sword would be planted on the ground.
This way, he could create a situation as if the shield was planted on the ground, allowing him to take on this Rhino's charge.
"Good job." Alea's voice resounded from above as she leaped over them before slicing the Rhino.
The real Theo didn't do something that fancy and slipped next to his clone and saw Alea focusing on the monster on her left.
Believing Alea would kill it, Theo turned to the right and saw another Rhino. He thrust his spear that had been enhanced by Focused Charge.
Surprisingly, Theo managed to stop the Rhino without even getting pushed back. Although it was due to his Focused Charge, it was still an impressive feat.
His clone then came from the side and cut the Rhino's body.
"Theo, two on our front and one on our back."
Theo heard her voice and turned around, seeing Alea already charged toward the two monsters in their front.
He summoned his Magic Bullet and split it into ten, aiming for all three monsters. "Duck."
The moment she heard his command, Alea had no hesitation and bent her knees before seeing five Magic Bullets flew over her and hit the right one.
Although it wasn't enough to kill it, the bullets stopped its movement and left it almost dead.
'Nice shot.' Alea smirked, used all the power on her tight and transferred it to her legs to make a fast jump toward that monster and killed it. She then extended her sword with her flame and cut the second monster. "Nice job, Theo. Keep it up."
"Your turn hasn't ended yet." Theo snorted and continued running forward, slipping past her.
"Right." Alea hurriedly followed him from behind while glancing to the right, finding that the monsters had begun to charge at them. If they stopped here, they would probably get surrounded.
There was no other way other than to go to the left, but ultimately, they would find another group of monsters, so the timing needed to be perfect.
As soon as they passed the left side and faced the monsters behind them, Theo took one big diagonal step to the left and shouted, "There."
"Okay." Alea understood his intention and went straight to the mark Theo left by that stomp and raised her blade, which had been covered by fire. It flared up to become a bigger one, and Alea slammed the sword to the ground, channeling all the fire on her sword to the ground.
"Grand Burst."
