Volume 3 Chapter 7.3 (1/2)

Volume 3 Chapter 7.3

Translator: Adam Seacord

Editor: Weasalopes

“This oughta be close to our last one, but boy, is this one troublesome.”

“That bridge looks really rickety.”

Seeing the narrow and long suspension bridge without any handrails, Hiroshi and Haruna commented with a very annoyed expression. The fact that there were no handrails alone was enough to make them want to leave. There was a safety net below the bridge, not too far down, and even a ladder to return to the starting side, which made things even more irritating.

On the other side, they could see a building that resembled a Japanese castle, which appeared to be their goal. The bridge was about as wide as a Forest Giant’s foot. Not too narrow to call it a tightrope, but not wide enough to just walk across normally. All of the obstacles so far had proved to be considerably difficult. It seemed like a very careful balance that even the Norton sisters could have beaten them. The maze where they were being chased by a pair of wrestling-heel looking golems, for example, they had passed in one go by some miracle.

Unlike the source material, though, the element of luck had been completely eliminated, like the level where the contestants had to pick the right wall with no clue or indication after the first pond, or the level where that would come after this one, where they had to choose the right tunnel to crawl through.

“So, what do we gotta do here? If we just gotta make it across, the first pond was more difficult than this.”

“Hey, there’s a note this time.”

Apparently, the level was complicated enough that it wasn’t evident on the first glance. Everything that they had to do was laid out on a placard, with a diagram, right next to the bridge. There were other levels along the way that provide similar things, so the party wasn’t surprised now.

“Let’s see… Catch the gold ball around the middle of the bridge, dodge all of the black balls, and make it to the other side.”

“Seems pretty tough.”

“Since we’re carrying someone, we have to catch two balls?”

“That’s what’ll be, I think. Let’s give it a shot.”

Haruna took the first try, since she knew that she was the best suited for levels like these, from experience. Light on her feet, she moved halfway across the bridge with ease, and caught the golden ball that was shot out with decent velocity without a problem. By only moving her weight forward or backward as to not rock the bridge, she dodged all of the black balls and made it all the way across. Just as she did with all of the previous level, she beat it perfectly on the first try. It was a demonstration, at this point.

“How’s the bridge?”

“Not as wobbly as it looks, but it might get scary if a ball hits you and your weight shifts.”

“I see. Ya got it.”

Hearing Haruna, Hiroshi understood the gist of the level. From what he observed and from what Haruna had just said, he assumed that the bridge more twisted than shook. If they didn’t sway left and right, they should to fall off. It also seed fortuitous that the balls to longer to fire than expected. Of course, if that time was spent locking onto the target, they could very well end up with a rapid fire after them, if they move to slow.

“Got the strategy, for the most part. Different story if we can pull it off or not, though.”

“Oh yeah? Elaborate for us.”

“The key’s to walk down the center of the bridge as possible without swayin’ left or right. Judgin’ by the structure of this thing, it won’t twist left and right, and if we lose balance that way, it’ll twist around the middle.”

“Ah huh. And the balls?”

“The gold one, from what we’ve read in that sign, won’t penalize us for missin’ it. We should focus on one we can grab without losing our balance or reachin’ too far. The black ones didn’t come too fast; maybe they take too long to aim when Haruna-san was movin’ that fast. Goin’ too slow could be a problem, in the sense that you’d get rapid-fired.”

The party accepted this explanation. Mio, of course, knew this level, but had never considered a specific way to beat it. She was simply impressed by Haruna and Hiroshi’s teamwork.

“Then we better work out a strategy, so let’s start with the Norton sisters.”

“I’m so sorry. We keeping dragging you down…”

“It ain’t your forte, nothin’ ya can do ‘bout it. If this were a normal ruin or dungeon, we wouldn’t be havin’ such a tough time, either, but here we are.”

Hiroshi offered in consolation to Primula. He really had not expected this ancient ruin to be a carbon copy of a game show. In a normal ruin, Primula and her knowledge as a clergywoman would have been extremely useful for analyzing and understanding things. In the first place, an ordinary dungeon could be traversed with a few tricks, like using a rope, to make up for the lack in athleticism. In that sense, this ruin that didn’t allow tricks was much more difficult to beat while having people like the Norton sisters in tow, who didn’t seem to have much speed. In exchange, there was almost no threat to their lives. You win some, you lose some.

“I mean, there’s gotta be more things after this. Maybe ya can make it through this one?”

“…Okay. I’ll try my best to make it across.”

With some resole, Primula began crossing the bridge. As advised, she stood by, waiting for a ball she could definitely catch. She managed to catch one coming from directly in front of her, albeit with a little loss of balance, before moving on with a forward lean, trying to make it across as quickly as possible. She might have moved too fast for the mechanism, as the first few shots completely missed her. After the aim became accurate, she dodge the first three black balls with miraculous timing, somehow carried on through the fourth one that hit her foot. When she was two steps away, the fifth ball hit her straight on the face. While she almost lost her balance, she countered the weight with her force of will, and powered through the last two steps like she was falling down. Just before her face fell into the ground, Haruna caught her. Primula managed to make it across in one try.

“That was amazing, sis!”

“She has some guts.”

“You gotta have some too, Judith.”

“I know!”

After watching her sister’s courageous attempt, Judith took her turn, invigorated. She made it halfway across on a surprisingly light foot, and fearlessly caught the golden ball with ease. She walked through the rest of the bridge as if it was a normal path, completely fearless. She had made it across so smoothly that only three black balls had been shot. Her attempt displayed that these obstacles were worse off if you became timid.

“Now that the Norton sisters are through, we better get started.”

“I mean, the worse is probably for one of us to re-do it once.”

As Makoto had mentioned, the only failure was Tatsuya, who had took a hit from a ball that ricocheted off the bridge. The most noteworthy things about this level, though…

“Yikes…”

“What is he doing…?”

“He’s ignoring everything the game’s about.”

Was Hiroshi, of course, who activated Fortress, and walked across with complete balance, taking hits from all of the black balls along the way without losing any of his balance.

“You all survived, my elite challengers!”

They in front of the castle, where a humanoid mole wearing an army uniform called out as soon it saw Hiroshi’s party.

“Survived? No duh, we re-did everythin’ until we all made it.”

“Formalities, my man. No sense is bring semantics into this.”

The mole politely responded to Hiroshi’s reaction. It seemed that they could hold a conversation.

“You must have many questions, but the show is not over. You must beat all of the levels, first.”

If they really were filming a game show, that sounded exactly like the thing he should only off-camera. If they were recording all of the levels until now, everyone filming and watching would have a lot of patience.