Chapter 29: Parting Ways

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The number of reinforcements was slightly smaller than Olang had anticipated. Three Genprey, summoned by their leader, lowered their bodies and raced toward him at full speed.

Olang glanced at the bone barricade a short distance away.

By this point in the battle, it was difficult for the barricade to serve any further purpose.

The Gendrome had clearly realized that the barricade severely restricted its movements, and so it was unwilling to approach.

The other Genprey might not have been as intelligent, but under the Gendrome’s direction, they would not foolishly run over there either. Instead, they would remain around their leader and fight.

Whether he could quickly eliminate the approaching reinforcements had become the key to ensuring the battle did not turn against him. Since he could no longer rely on tricks, he would have to face them head-on.

“Sea Buckthorn! Keep it occupied for another thirty seconds if you can!” Olang shouted.

Dizzy from being tossed around on the Gendrome’s back, Felyne Sea Buckthorn cried out with difficulty, “We’ll... ngh-meow! We’ll do our best!”

Olang took out a bottle of Dash Juice and drained it in one gulp. His blood surged as he entered Demon Mode.

His entire body became a blur as he shot toward the three approaching Genprey.

This time, he did not use his usual technique of bracing with his shield to deflect the force before slashing through a Genprey’s neck. Raising his shield would slow him down.

If he wanted to eliminate the threat swiftly while surrounded by three Genprey, speed was essential.

He twisted aside to evade the first Genprey’s snapping jaws, then swung his blade and opened a wound along the side of its neck.

Because he was moving so quickly, the slash lacked precision and failed to kill it in one blow.

Still, the pain made the Genprey stumble. Before the blood spraying from the wound could reach him, the hunter—without breaking stride—was already charging toward his next target.

The other two Genprey closed in from the front, one on either side. Perfect, Olang thought.

He drove his foot into the ground, accelerating his charge even further as his steps crossed and his waist and legs twisted.

His whole body swept between the two Genprey like a whirlwind, blood spraying through the air.

Demon Rush—Rending Blades!

“Skreee!”

“Graaah!”

Their miserable cries echoed behind him. One of the two Genprey had been struck in a vital spot by the flurry of slashes and collapsed limp onto the ground. The other looked as though it had been pulled through a meat grinder, one side of its body covered in wounds with flesh hanging open.

Olang came to an abrupt halt, but he did not waste the momentum that still urged him forward. Instead, he used that force to compress and tense the muscles in his legs.

Then, relying on the springlike power released by those muscles, he spun around and swung his blade and shield once more.

Whirling Slash!

The Genprey had just turned around and was preparing to counterattack when the diagonally sweeping hunting blade and round shield struck it squarely. It cried out and fell to the ground.

The second.

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In scarcely more than the blink of an eye, only the first Genprey remained. It had been wounded by his initial slash but was not yet dead.

To conserve his strength, Olang canceled Demon Mode. He raised his shield to knock aside the creature’s feeble lunge, then thrust his hunting blade into the weak point beneath its chest and pulled it free.

Thus, all three Genprey that had hurried to their leader’s aid fell in the final moments before reaching its side.

“Meoooow!”

Sea Buckthorn had fought with all its might and held on for a long time, but its stamina had finally reached its limit. Its claws loosened, and the Gendrome flung it from its back. It crashed to the ground and rolled through the sand, looking thoroughly disheveled.

But it had completed its task beautifully.

While Sea Buckthorn had kept the Gendrome occupied, Olang had eliminated the reinforcements first, and the battle had returned to a one-on-one fight.

Realizing this, the Gendrome let out an enraged roar. It drove forward with its hind legs and leaped at Sea Buckthorn, intending to deal with the furry little creature first.

At that critical moment, Olang charged in at full speed from the side and raised his shield in front of Sea Buckthorn.

“Bang!”

The Gendrome’s claws struck the shield. The two scraped against each other, producing a piercing shriek.

The Gendrome possessed the powerful weapon of paralyzing fangs and did not often use its claws to attack prey. As a result, its claws were not as long and sharp as those of its close relative among the same species, the Velocidrome.

Even so, the Gendrome’s blow left several savage gouges across the alloy shield.

The impact of its leap drove Olang several meters backward. If he had not found the proper angle to deflect the force instead of taking the full impact head-on, his defensive stance might well have been broken.

“Meow!” Sea Buckthorn cried out in alarm.

“I’m fine!” Olang shouted, reassuring it. In truth, however, he was not nearly as unharmed as he appeared.

The Gendrome weighed more than a ton. Its leaping kick was no simple thing to endure.

His raised right arm throbbed with unbearable pain. It was not broken, but the bruising was severe, and there might even be a hairline fracture. His chest and abdomen also felt stifled in waves, a sign that his internal organs had suffered from the impact.

But at a time like this, he absolutely could not reveal the slightest weakness. Olang threw back his head and roared before charging toward the Gendrome.

His fierce momentum startled the monster.

Throughout the battle, it had consistently suffered setbacks. The kin it had summoned had been dispatched in an instant, while its own attack had struck its opponent yet seemed to accomplish little.

All of this made the Gendrome, which had never taken the hunter seriously, feel uneasy.

When its opponent once again rushed toward it, the Gendrome did not choose to meet the attack. Instead, it thrust off with both legs and sprang backward, opening a safe distance of several body lengths.

Then it opened its jaws, displaying its poisonous fangs, and unleashed a threatening roar at the hunter before turning and fleeing.

Olang pursued it for a while, shouting as he ran. He even found time to take out a paintball and hurl it forcefully at the fleeing Gendrome.

The paintball struck the Gendrome squarely in the back, splattering dye with a powerful odor. This made the fleeing monster even more panicked. It seemed to think that its pursuer possessed some kind of long-range attack, and it quickened its pace several notches.

Only after the Gendrome disappeared behind the sand dune did Olang gradually slow down.

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Once it had recovered, Sea Buckthorn hurried after him. It had seen through Olang’s bluff and was also deeply worried about his injuries.

Olang steadied his breathing, took a Potion from his pack, and swallowed it. With Sea Buckthorn’s help, he then removed the vambrace from his right arm and examined the injury.

“The bones should be fine, meow. But there are bruises and sprains around your shoulder and elbow joints, meow. It would be best to rest for a while, meow,” Sea Buckthorn said after examining him with the basic first-aid skills it possessed.

“As long as the bones are fine, it’s nothing serious. A Potion will have this little injury feeling better soon.”

Olang clearly had no intention of returning to camp to rest.

After drinking a second Potion, he took out a Whetstone and began sharpening his weapon.

“The Gendrome isn’t weak enough yet. We can’t give it too much time. If it gets another chance to call in several more Genprey, we’ll have trouble on our hands. We need to catch up with it as quickly as possible.”

Seeing how resolute Olang was, Sea Buckthorn no longer voiced any objections.

It nodded its little head. “We brought this along, meow. If we find a chance to use it properly, it should improve our odds of success, meow.”

Sea Buckthorn opened the item pouch behind its back, revealing a flat, round, cylindrical device roughly thirty centimeters in diameter.

“A Pitfall Trap? You brought one of these?” Olang asked, pleasantly surprised.

For a novice hunter like him, traps that could be deployed quickly were complicated to make, while buying one outright was expensive. They were not items hunters carried as a matter of course.

If he had prepared properly before the hunt, he might have gritted his teeth and bought one to bring along.

But during the time between accepting the quest and setting out for the hunting grounds, his state of mind had been troubled. As a result, he had prepared only basic Potions, rations, and paintballs.

“You really thought of everything! When we get back this time, I’ll treat you to a huge feast!” Olang vigorously ruffled Sea Buckthorn’s little head. “Order everything you like from the menu and eat until you’re stuffed!”

Sea Buckthorn scratched its ear, looking somewhat embarrassed. “Actually, I just tried making it for fun by following the steps in the combination manual, meow. It took several failures before I finally made this one, so I brought it along, meow.”

“Do you have Tranq Ammo?” Olang asked tentatively.

“I didn’t prepare any, meow.” Sea Buckthorn shook its little head. “But I found several Sleep Herbs near the camp, meow. If we have some Parashrooms, we should be able to combine them into Tranq Drugs, meow.”

“I know where there are Parashrooms nearby.”

Olang put away the Whetstone and took out the map.

“They’re here. Go take a look, and if you find any, combine them into Tranq Drugs. I’ll pursue the Gendrome. Leave the preparations for capturing it to you.”

“Understood, meow!”

After dividing up their responsibilities, the man and cat went their separate ways.