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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Wjin
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“Now’s our chance to attack!”
The Pleasure Lord raid was progressing slowly but smoothly.
Rumble. Rumble.
A mass of blackish-purple flesh, torn and scattered across the ground.
The Pleasure Lord’s true form was a worm-like creature, writhing and pulsating beneath the earth.
Boss and monstrous being strategies were different.
Monstrous beings were essentially normal named monsters mutated by black magic.
They possessed an insatiable hunger for mana and would nest in sanctuaries or areas with strong mana flows.
Therefore, subjugation strategies revolved around this characteristic.
First, monstrous beings couldn’t survive on their own. They used their tentacles or illusions to absorb life force.
If left unchecked, they would take root within the sanctuary, making future removal incredibly difficult,
but before they stabilized, their tentacles and illusions weren’t particularly strong.
In short, the [Pleasure Lord] currently had numerous, evenly distributed weak points that could be exploited to weaken it significantly.
This meant that while subjugating a monstrous being required more preparation than a boss, they were much easier to defeat if discovered early.
Ronald, the raid leader, also seemed aware of this.
For hours, he had been chipping away at the Pleasure Lord’s outer tentacles,
trying to trigger a groggy state.
“Biketz, the last one is to the east and west!”
“Yes, sir!”
Biketz, the lead archer, was on the verge of collapsing, having been pushed to his limits in my stead, all for a few extra coins.
As he mustered all his strength and drew his bowstring, the last remaining tentacle turned towards them.
“Vanguards! Hold it! Buy us some time! Mid-liners! Attack on my signal!”
Magic was a tool for the nobility. Street mercenaries rarely possessed magical abilities.
Therefore, the rear guard consisted solely of archers, and the mid-liners were mostly dual-wielding melee fighters capable of dealing burst damage, like spearmen.
Crash!
Aaaagh!
Hold the line!
But with the vanguards holding the line with their shields, the mid and rear guards could attack safely.
Die!!! Die!
Let go!!
Crunch! Crunch!
Groooooan!
And after what felt like an eternity,
with all the tentacles finally severed,
-Ding!
Pleasure Lord Groggy State triggered!
Successfully resisted Pleasure Lord’s ‘Pleasure’!
Whoooooosh!!!
An ominous black magic dissipated.
Thump!!!
The Pleasure Lord entered a groggy state.
Is… is it done?
Wh-what’s happening?
As everyone stared at the massive, motionless worm in confusion,
Ronald belatedly yelled,
“Damn it, now’s our chance! Attack!”
Raaaaah!!
With a hoarse battle cry, everyone charged, their weapons plunging into the creature’s flesh.
Stab! Stab!
While each individual attack was weak, their combined assault inflicted significant damage on the tentacle-less creature.
Groooooan!
‘Going smoothly.’
I joined the attack, pacing myself, my senses heightened, anticipating the next phase.
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After a long and arduous battle…
Groan…!
Rumble!!
The [Pleasure Lord] collapsed with a thunderous roar, like any other monstrous being.
-Damn it…
-Raid Leader, that was tough…
-Don’t act weak, you bastard.
Exhausted, everyone collapsed to the ground.
But not Ronald.
‘Hell yeah~, this is where the fun begins.’
The Pleasure Lord was no joke.
He had sacrificed countless scouting parties to get to this point.
He had sent his subordinates, one by one, to their deaths, just to gather information.
If he had been the one fighting, he would have graduated at the top of his class.
‘Everything… for this moment…!’
He had rejected offers from other major guilds who had caught wind of the monster,
hoarding the information he had meticulously gathered, securing his position and Crow’s Fey’s authority over the raid.
“Everyone stay here and rest! I’ll go check if it’s really dead.”
Dash!
Ronald, his belly jiggling, sprinted towards the Pleasure Lord.
.
.
.
“Just as I thought!”
Treasures were scattered around the sanctuary where the Pleasure Lord had nested.
Had it devoured several parties to become this plump?
The amount of mana stones was far beyond what one would expect from a low to mid-level monstrous being.
And, of course, there were the belongings of the countless mercenaries who had perished in previous expeditions.
‘I could probably swipe a few things without anyone noticing…?’
Ronald licked his lips, gazing at the loot with satisfaction.
.
.
.
“Just die already, you pig…”
A young girl, around Lev’s age, had also joined the raid.
Her name was Emma.
She was one of many who resented Ronald’s tyranny and greed.
But the gods were cruel.
Emma’s fantasy of the Pleasure Lord, not yet dead, killing Ronald as he ran towards the loot…
remained just that: a fantasy.
“But… I will…!”
Today would be different.
Deep within Emma’s pockets was a considerable sum of money.
Refusing to be exploited by Crow’s Fey any longer, everyone had pooled their money and given it to her.
A total of 71 gold coins and 47 silver coins.
She had hoped to purchase a few items, but…
“Now, we’ll combine all the loot and start the auction right here! That’s the order from above, so no complaints!”
“!!”
Ronald, the pig, announced that they would be auctioning off all the items together.
-What…? Here?
-What will happen then?
His greed was on full display.
It was disgusting, but… acceptable.
If she raised the bid to 71 gold coins, Ronald and his cronies would be forced to increase their bids as well, resulting in a slightly larger payout for everyone else.
It was better than nothing.
As Emma clenched her fist, the object of her hatred approached, a smug grin on his face.
“Little girl, I know what you’re thinking~.”
“Really? Because I’m not thinking anything at all.”
“Playing coy, are we? Cute.”
Ronald leaned in and whispered, loud enough only for Emma to hear,
“You managed to scrape together… 70 gold coins, was it? Someone was kind enough to inform me.”
Bwahaha!
Betrayal upon betrayal!
“I’ll buy you some cute lingerie. Wear it and come to my room. Who knows? I might go easy on you.”
The men behind him burst into laughter.
“…”
Humiliated, Emma trembled.
“But there’s a slight problem. You’re going to have to give me that money… before we can do that.”
“…?!”
Ronald raised his voice, drawing a line in the sand.
“Listen up, everyone!”
He addressed the 13 support members of the raid.
“Unfortunately, you’re all going to die in five minutes.”
-?
His words were met with confusion and murmurs of disbelief.
He was the raid leader, but surely, he couldn’t just decide who lived and died.
Ronald’s cronies roared with laughter, finding the situation amusing.
-Bwahahaha! Look at their faces!
-Those bastards… mercenaries are supposed to embrace death. Are they afraid to die? Huh?!
Then Ronald offered a “kind” explanation.
“Kehehe… Bwahahaha!! You’re all cursed! The Pleasure Curse! That potion I gave you earlier? It was just water. Well, if you’re lucky, it might have contained someone’s bodily fluids, hehe.”
Ugh!
Sounds of disgust and retching filled the air, turning the atmosphere chaotic.
-Th-the Pleasure Curse?
-I-I don’t know what that is!
-A-are you crazy? I’m reporting this to the Cooperative!
-Raid Leader, what do you think you’re doing…?!
“Shut up! Shut up! You all have about five minutes left! If you don’t want to die, strip naked and kneel in a line. Then I’ll give you the real curse-removing potion.”
Clink.
Ronald held up a small, triangular potion bottle.
A curse antidote.
A low-grade one, sold for about 20 silver coins in town and 15 silver coins in Ebenbahu.
“And just so you know, I don’t have enough for everyone, so first come, first served…”
And that’s when it happened.
“1000 gold coins. I bid.”
A young man’s voice made a preposterous offer.
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“Who’s that?”
Ronald looked around, then approached me.
I was the only young man here.
“What? A th-thousand gold? Hey, kid, you have no idea what’s going on… You’re going to die, you know?”
He poked me in the chest.
And this was just one of Crow’s Fey’s bribed lackeys, not even a guild member.
I couldn’t imagine how many villains lurked beneath Regillus.
“Oh, you’re talking about the antidote? You want to buy it for a thousand gold and be the only survivor? Wow, you must be loaded… my ass. If you don’t want to die, cough up what you have, you little…”
Slap!
“Look ahead.”
I slapped him across the face, his head snapping to the side.
And then, like a good little soldier, he snapped back to attention.
“Y-you… crazy… bastard!!”
Ronald lunged, his fist raised.
But I was ready.
SMACK!!
Another slap, even harder than the first.
“I said, look ahead, you idiot.”
He stumbled, but still refused to listen.
-R-raid Leader…?
His lackeys whimpered, their voices filled with fear.
Not because of me, though.
“What the hell are you…?”
Ronald finally turned to face his cronies.
Stab!
Too late.
One of the Pleasure Lord’s tentacles had pierced his head.
‘I tried to save him…’
I averted my gaze, not wanting to dwell on the gruesome sight.
I didn’t want to remember it.
-Ding!
Pleasure Lord entering Berserk Mode!
The author had designed this to be super-hell difficulty.
There was no way it would end easily.
-Flap. Flap.
-Flutterflutterflutterflutter!!!!!
It was a butterfly.
A giant moth, its wings covered in grotesque, circular patterns that could trigger trypophobia, unfurled another tentacle and flapped its wings menacingly.
“Wh-what the hell is that?!”
“I-isn’t it supposed to be dead?!”
Indeed.
The super-hell difficulty Pleasure Lord only revealed its true form after being “defeated.”
-Ding!
“They really made acquiring legendary items a pain in the ass.”
And monsters, not monstrous beings…
were my specialty.
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I guess the monsters can be the heroes as well when compared to the likes of fat bastard pigs like that one
Nice