Those noises, which I will admit were horrifying at the time and caused my hands to shake around the PickAxe, only grew louder as the trees nearest to us started shaking. Between the trembling ground, the shaking trees, and those monstrous noises that sounded as if they were coming from bloodthirsty demons, I was seriously getting worried.
I thought we agreed neither of us cared about fighting or horror?! I’ve got a seriously bad feeling about this! Not only do I have next to no idea how to fight, but it sounds like we’re going to be fighting things way beyond our level! Are they going to be demons? Zombies? Minotaurs? My thoughts raced with all the possibilities of whatever could make those sounds. The more I thought about the options, the more scared I became.
This is why I don’t like horror! I can’t handle these sorts of situations! It’d be better if the monsters just came out and revealed themselves at least instead of building up the tension!
“You ready?” Vala asked, looking at me with that same confident smile from before.
“Ready to probably have my face bitten off by zombie-demon-minotaurs? Sure, why not,” I answered. “No, I’m not ready!”
“It’ll be fine, fam.”
“What the heck is a fam? Some kind of yam? No, if it was, I would know.”
“Y-you really like plants, huh?”
“I wish I had some cherry tomatoes right now. They would relax me.”
“Cherry tomatoes relax you?”
“Yes. They taste nice and I enjoy popping them in my mouth.”
“You like when things pop in your mouth?” Vala asked, giggling behind the hand raised over her mouth.
“Don’t corrupt the popping of cherry tomatoes or else you’re on your own.”
“Okay, I won’t say anything lewd about popping cherries.”
I looked at her and saw her snickering behind her hand again.
“I’ll pop your cherry if you keep this up, you degenerate dragon,” I threatened. I didn’t mean it, of course. I just wanted to throw her off guard as revenge for mocking the glory of cherry tomatoes. Only, the reaction I got from her…
“Wh-wha? I-it’s way too soon for that! That event shouldn’t be coming up until after I get more love points! I–I need to load a save and go back…”
For the first time, the girl who had been teasing me, sleeping on me, trying to fluster me, and so on, finally showed me blushing cheeks and panicking eyes. Her pale skin made her blush even more obvious as she turned light shades of red from her neck to the tips of her ears. Even her horns turned red! Not only that, but… her blush didn’t quite look natural. There were what looked like diagonal lines over her cheeks and nose.
“Did a cat scratch you while I wasn’t looking or something?” I asked.
Vala wrapped her tail around the spear to hold it so that both hands could rise to cover those strange lines. “Ju-just ignore that,” she said.
“What’s up with them?”
“I—”
| We made it possible to blush like anime girls here because she thought it would be cute to see you blush like that. |
Looking at Vala, she was blushing even more after having Window expose the truth.
“So, those weird lines are… blushing?” I asked.
Vala made a couple of V shapes with her fingers to peek through with her eyes as her hands covered the rest of her face.
“I didn’t think you were going for a speedrun… I wasn’t expecting that, so it’s not fair,” she explained.
“Is now really the time to be blushing when we’re about to be under attack? Shouldn’t they already be attacking instead of just letting us stand here talking?”
| I told them to wait so you two could have a cute moment together. You’re welcome. |
I wonder if I could take advantage of this to get the towers done before we’re attacked. If talking to Vala and making her blush means the enemies are going to wait for us to finish before attacking, then maybe…
I looked up at the towers and noticed that the timers had paused. So, the enemies might have paused for us, but the construction of our towers paused, too.
Window didn’t have any noticeable expression, but I was sure she was looking at me with a smug smile.
“Speedrunning isn’t allowed anymore,” Vala said, finally taking her hands away from her face.
At least I discovered a weakness of the lazy dragon. She was able to tease me with ease, but if I tried teasing her about something sexual, she started blushing and didn’t know how to respond.
That was useful information to have.
I would have to figure out later on how to fully take advantage of that information, though, because the sounds from the forest resumed. That meant she went back to looking cool, confident, and ready while I returned to shivering.
A dragon who can act so confident when it sounds like Hell itself is behind the trees, but gets flustered at the first mention of having her cherry popped, and a guy who can joke to a dragon about popping her cherry but gets scared because of some spooky noises behind some trees. I can’t tell if we’re a perfect match or a horrible one.
Finally, it began.
“Here they come,” Vala said.
The enemy that I was increasingly scared of finally came beyond the trees to begin their march toward my greenhouse.
And they were every bit as horrifying as I thought they would be, only in a different way than what I was expecting.
Four small, spotted cats wearing leather armor with daggers held in their mouths came running down the road straight at us.
|
New Enemy Discovered!
Cat Scout
Threat: ★
HP: Like barely any. Go easy on them.
Damage: 3
Defense: 2
Brave felines who scout ahead for the main legions of the Pawsitively Feline Empire!
|
I hate cats. Why couldn’t they have been dogs?
As much as I hated cats, how was I supposed to fight them? Not only that, but how was I supposed to fight them without killing them? All I had was my PickAxe, feet, and fists! Any of those would seriously hurt a little cat!
“I can handle this,” Vala said.
“Hey, take it easy on them. They barely have any health,” I told her.
“Trust me.” The mischievous grin she showed me did the opposite of make me trust her. “I can take them out with only a fraction of my power.”
The cats, with evil looks in their eyes, were getting closer.
That was when Vala held her free hand out to the cats and… fired a massive fucking rainbow-colored beam of energy that destroyed everything in its path including the forest behind the cats.
“What the fuck was that?!” I shouted in disbelief at what I just saw. “There’s no way those cats are alive! There’s no way anything in the way is alive still! Also, aren’t we only level one? How was that only a fraction of your power?!”
“O-oh. I guess Window only leaving me a percent of my power was too much still,” Vala said before nervously giggling while rubbing the back of her head.
“You’re telling me that was only a fraction of one percent of your power?!”
“That was like… three percent of my one percent. I’m not good at math.”
I dropped my PickAxe alongside my jaw.
Then, as the smoke cleared, I looked at the road to see the destruction.
To my surprise, the path looked fine, the forest behind it was already regrowing the trees that she blasted away, and the cats…
They had ghosts, floating out from their mouths, hovering above them while waving white flags.
A couple of gold coins appeared above each one of them with the obligatory video game sound effect that you would normally hear after collecting a gold coin. They disappeared just as quickly as they popped up, and then the ghosts went back into the bodies of the cats who got up, limped off of the path, and returned to the forest.
Somehow, somehow, they survived.
“See? I told you there wasn’t anything to worry about,” Vala said.
“So… nothing will actually die here? Everybody here is seriously immortal and we’re all just doing this for fun without any actual risk?” I asked.
“Hehe, told you! You’ve got to have faith in me! I would never let anybody sharing this world with us suffer,” said the girl who just shot a giant rainbow beam at a few, small cats.
“Such a benevolent goddess.”
“Pfffsssshhh, I’m not a goddess, I’m just a dragon!” declared the dragon who could not only make entire universes on her own as well as fill them with life and different laws of reality, but who could also shoot giant rainbow beams with only three percent of one percent of her power.
The text in the sky changed to say, “Wave: 2/5,” and the sounds from the forest resumed.
Three cat scouts came running down each side of the path for six total.
“I’ll get these three, you get those three!” Vala commanded.
“Can’t you just blast them all away again?”
“Nah. Window nerfed me again. This is all I can do now.”
Vala stuck her hand out just like before and shot another beam… that behaved more like a limp pool noodle which couldn’t even make it halfway to the charging cats before dissipating.
At least she wasn’t so insanely overpowered anymore. I almost felt bad for the cats, and that would never happen normally.
Vala ran forward to meet those coming down her fork in the path, so I did the same.
Hitting small targets with my heavy PickAxe would be difficult, but it was my best bet aside from trying to kick them.
Will they be okay if I hit them with the pointed end or the bladed end? I know they won’t die, but what if I somehow cut them in half or impale them? Maybe I should just try smacking them with the sides instead. Yeah, that would probably be easier. I’ll swat at them like I have a golf club and they’re just golf balls.
I reached the cats with my plan ready and… was immediately put on the defensive.
The cat in front of the others jumped up and actually swung its dagger against the bladed end of the PickAxe with enough force to push my arms back a bit. The little bastards were seriously strong!
Not only that, but the other two ran past me and were headed for the greenhouse!
In the moment, I forgot that special hero units in tower defense games could usually only distract a single enemy at a time no matter the power discrepancy. So, no matter how much bigger and potentially stronger I was than the cats, it didn’t matter. I could only distract this single one.
That meant I had to hurry up and deal with it.
Then the annoying thing dropped its dagger and bit my ankle.
It all came back to me.
The memories of going to my childhood friend’s house rushed back.
I was only a little kid when it happened, maybe six or seven years old. We were playing video games, but he had to go to the bathroom, so we paused and he left me alone in the room with his cat.
I still remember how irresistible the cat’s fluffy, exposed underside looked to my childish hand. How was I supposed to resist petting such a fluffy, soft belly? My other friends who had dogs loved getting their bellies rubbed, so a cat would probably enjoy it as well, right?
Wrong.
My mom had to pick me up from what was originally supposed to be a sleepover because I wouldn’t stop crying from how bitten and scratched-up my hand was. No matter how many bandages and kisses my mom gave my hand, the pain persevered throughout the night.
I hated cats ever since, and now this bastard reminded me why.
The cat must have been able to sense my killing intent seeing as how, rather than try to attack me again, it sat there with large, innocent eyes and curled lips as if trying to win me over with cuteness.
I swung my PickAxe-turned-golf-club with enough force to send the cat flying off the path, causing its ghost to slip out from its mouth and those gold coins to appear above it.
One down, two to go.
The remaining cats must have sensed it, too, because they turned their heads back to look at me running at them. Dirt from the path was kicked up from them trying to run even faster to escape me, but they were too slow.
Unfortunately for them, I caught up.
“Ooh, good job. I knew you could do it,” Vala said from behind once I was done swatting the other two cats off of the path.
“I found my resolve,” I replied.
“I knew cats would help bring that out.”
“How’d you manage to know something like that?”
“Be-because I’m awesome and know everything.”
“I thought you didn’t know anything about what would happen?
“Don’t question me.”
The text changed to show that the third wave was beginning, so rather than pursue that topic, we returned to our positions.
I wanted more cats to take out my revenge on for the sake of six-year-old me. I never knew that I was somebody who could be so easily fueled by the desire for revenge, but there I was, wanting nothing more than to inflict ultimate despair upon cats for having such pristine, fluffy bellies that they wouldn’t let others pet.
What’s even the point of having such perfectly fluffy bellies if you’re not going to let me rub them?!
Five scout cats came running down each path for the third wave, and only one of each of ours got close to the greenhouse before we were able to catch up and take them out.
However, the fourth wave was when things became challenging.
Only two scout cats came down each path at first, but the wave didn’t end there. Those two were followed by three, and those three were followed by four.
Then, after barely managing to catch up to the last scout cat before it reached the greenhouse, Window popped up with new information.
|
New Enemy Discovered!
Cat Soldier
Threat: ★
HP: Weak enough to die from a three percent of a one percent of energy magical beam, but strong enough to survive getting smacked a couple of times by your weak arms swinging around a PickAxe.
Damage: 4
Defense: 5
Foot soldiers of the Pawsitively Feline Empire who can easily go claw-to-PickAxe with sadistic virgins who shake around informational status windows!
|
One cat soldier came walking down each path. They were twice the size of the scout cats and protected by what looked like iron armor instead of leather armor, and they had short swords held between their fangs as well.
It was time to figure out if they could really go claw-to-PickAxe with me.
We met each other on the path and immediately clashed weapons. The cat soldier’s sword clanged against the blade of my PickAxe, and neither one of us were interested in giving the other any ground.
It only took a few more blows before I was the one getting pushed back. The armored bastard even managed to cut my arms a few times, and that was when a red bar appeared at the bottom of my vision letting me see that I only had eighty percent of my health left.
Vala looked like she was struggling, too, with her own cat soldier when I looked over at her.
While we could both probably win as long as we kept it up since we probably had more health than the soldier cats, would we be able to win before the next wave began? We wouldn’t be able to take out the next wave in time if we were still fighting the soldiers.
That was when our reinforcements arrived.
The tents were pulled off of the towers, which were really more like two-story houses with a few windows on the top floors and doors on the bottom floor, and our reinforcements came pouring out from the doors.
Except those “doors” on the bottom floor were actually dog doors, and our reinforcements were… short, fluffy dogs wearing light metal armor with swords between their mouths just like how the cat soldiers were holding them.
Three dogs charged out of each tower and immediately rushed over to help us like the good boys and girls that all dogs naturally were.
As the cat kept its focus on me, one dog slashed its sword against its side, another jumped up to tackle the cat from the other side to knock it down to the ground, and the third dog dropped its sword to—playfully—bite the cat’s neck.
The cat’s ghost slipped out from its mouth and gold coins appeared above it.
The three dogs, satisfied with their work, all looked up at me with their tongues hanging out of their mouths and their tails excitedly wagging behind them.
Dogs were the best. No, dogs are the best.
Since there was no way I could resist, I crouched down to rub each of their heads as the cat soldier limped away into the forest.
Then, as soon as the last wave began, the dogs got into position and waited for the enemies to come.
Two cat soldiers and ten cat scouts came down each path, but not all at once which allowed us to easily hold the line and deal damage while keeping the enemies within range of the now-completed bowman tower. I couldn’t see who or what was firing the arrows since they were firing from darkened windows, but arrows came down every other second to help us out with our enemies.
Between six dogs, me, Vala, and the bowman tower, the last wave was the easiest one yet and our first battle was over.
The sky returned to normal, the paths stopped glowing, and no more sounds came from within the forest.
“We did it. Good job,” I told the dogs, petting their heads some more. Even the other dogs from Vala’s side had come over to receive my pettings.
At that point, I lied down and let them climb all over me.
This is the best. Dogs are the best.
“Nice,” Vala said, standing behind my head and almost giving me a dangerous view up the baggy shirt. Thankfully for her, it was dark enough that I couldn’t see anything. “Did you have fun?”
“I did,” I answered. “It was actually kind of exciting, especially once the dogs joined us. What about you?”
Vala smiled a huge grin and nodded. “Tons of fun! Now I’m ready to sleep. Carry me to bed.”
“So, you have no problem sleeping with me and using me as a pillow, but you get embarrassed as soon as I bring up popping your cherry?”
She turned red and covered her face before whining, “Y-you’re such a speedrunner…”