I came back but the world is still a fantasy!? – Garesto Academy – Exam Arc: Chapter II – Those Who Take Advantage of the Test – 04-27: How the Weak Fights II (1/4)

The group whose numbers didn’t even reached a hundred pushed courageously through the gaps between the hordes of raybeasts.

They tried to avoid fighting as much as they could, but avoiding everything was never an option.

“Three raybeasts approaching from 11’clock!”

The raybeasts showed no signs of stopping as they continued to give rise to more clouds of dust.

The approaching raybeasts were as big as cars and ran just as fast. Three thick, sharp horns could also be seen on their heads.

There were too many of them to avoid these raybeasts, and they couldn’t ignore them either since they’ve already been noticed.

“Enemies sighted! Vanguards, withdraw! We’ll take them on!” A student said.

“Don’t lose to these fake Triceramons!” Another student said.

“Understood! UOOO!!”

The Resistance-specialized students stepped forward with their respective weapons held out like shields as they switched places with the vanguards.

15 students took formation as they set out to receive the assault of the dinosaurs(triceratops).

When the students and the triceratops met, a powerful clash erupted and the three horns of the triceratops mercilessly stabbed at them.

“GUuu!!”

“Damn it!!”

“Like we’d lose!!”

The students that received that blow directly were pushed back by the impact, drawing skid marks on the ground.

These students had relatively high ranks in Resistance, but they did not have much in the way of Strength.

The only reason they were able to stop the assault of the raybeasts was because of all the buffs they’d received.

And yet despite that, their photon barriers were damaged and even their Simple Exoskeletons(Protectors) creaked.

But regardless how much they’d been pushed back in that one clash, they had still successfully stopped the raybeasts momentarily.

And stopping these raybeasts momentarily was all they were tasked to do.

“ORA!”

“Eat this!”

“Blow them up!”

The raybeasts had a fatal weak point in the way of their glowing crystal organs.

The moment they stopped, the vanguards immediately jumped out and hit, cut, and thrust at those weak points.

As their cores shattered, the raybeasts all dispersed without a trace.

“Great team work! Don’t forget that feeling just now!”

Their commander didn’t forget to praise them even as he took out the Bird-Type raybeasts in the sky.

A faint smile appeared on the students when they were complimented, but their faces quickly became solemn once again.

Part of it was because they were not in a situation where they could afford to idle around, but the bigger reason was because they’d remembered that their commander was taking care of their airspace all on his own.

Their commander’s red gun would shoot out compressed air bullets to intercept the raybeasts attacking from the sky.

Because of that they didn’t have to worry about enemies coming from above.

But that also meant that they had to take care of the land on their own.

“Medics! Those three are injured! Treat their arms quickly!” Shinichi said.

“Understood! Over here. We’ll heal you right now. ‘Heal’” A student from the medic team said.

Three students tried to ignore their wounds and go back to their position, but Shinichi stopped them and had the medic team cast a healing spell on them. After all, they’d directly taken on the attack of a triceratops’ horns.

Fortunately, the horns failed to penetrate their arms, and though they’d still received quite the beating, a low-level spell was enough to get them back to shape.

“Next time please call us if you’ve been injured. We’re not as sharp as the commander, so if you hide your wounds, we’ll never notice,” a female student from the medic team said.

“G-Got it… Ah, but we can still fight!” The student said.

It was curious if it was because they had come into contact with some female students, but the three male students blushed.

Their eyes swam and they obediently took the advice, but perhaps because they didn’t like how they’d been pushed back by that last attack just now, they tried to put on a tough act.

Shinichi wasn’t having any of it, however.

“Of course you can still fight!” He said. “We’re not even half way through just yet! But withdraw for now. You can come back in the next rotation. Prepare to be used until you’re injured again next time too!”

“Y-Yes! Wait, what?” One of the three said.

“We’ll be taking in these three students then,” a student from the medic team said.

As Shinichi left the students to the medic team, he turned to the rear.

They should’ve already pulled away from the raybeasts, but Shinichi could see that some raybeasts were still on their tail.

“They’re coming at us from behind! Block them!”

“Understood! We’ll combine our skills! ‘Stone Wall’!”

10 students from the skill group simultaneously chanted the same skill.

In the next moment, a wall of stone protruded from the ground they’d passed.

Roughly 15 meters tall and 30 meters long, the erected wall drew a line between them and the raybeasts coming from behind.

Had they cast the spell individually, the most they could have erected would have been a tenth of that wall.

But by combining their skills, even beginner skills like this could be used to change the terrain to great effect.

But of course, if the raybeasts were to keep attacking, the wall would eventually collapse.

“I’ll strengthen you guys now! ‘Accel’ ‘Physical Boost’ !!” Tomoe said.

“Good timing! So you can do it when you try! Good, keep it up!” Shinichi said.

“Heh, understood!” Tomoe said.

Until then, though, they’ll be able to keep progressing.

As they buffed their physical abilities and legs, the mixed class ignored the raybeasts and ran. After all, there would be no fight if they just left.

“We’ve been fighting so much yesterday and the day before that I kind of have a much better feeling for the distance now,” A student said.

“You said it! I don’t worry so much about the range of the raybeasts now even when their size changes. I just kind of know,” another student said.

Thanks to the wealth of battle experience that they’ve accumulated, they were able to maintain an appropriate distance between them and the raybeasts, while minimizing their encounters.

The high morale and the exam(grueling training) this past two days had allowed the 90 students to coordinate smoothly and supplement any of their weaknesses to maintain this abnormal pace. Not much time had passed since the special exam started, but the distance between them and their goal had already gotten even shorter.

“200 meters until the river!”

“Great! Once we get there, we can just go down along the river and— !?”

While one student was getting excited thinking that the goal was right in front of them, a roaring sound suddenly resounded.

It sounded just like an explosion and the source was right in front of them.

A long body had drilled out of the ground.

“Eek!!”

“Nooo!”

“Another icky one appeared!!”

Some of students screamed at the revolting sight.

Just the part protruding out of the ground was already about 10 meters long, so one could just imagine how long the whole thing was.

That was a Giant Earthworm(Sand Worm) and it was big enough that it could easily swallow a human whole.

The evenly-spaced bellows and transparent color spoke of the elasticity and softness of the creature. But because of that the fake organs could even be seen moving inside, making the creature even more revolting.

There was also a round mouth at the end of the worm that came out. Sharp teeth could be seen lined up along that round mouth and a bear-type raybeast appeared to be inside.

“Does that count as cannibalism?”

Saliva splattered all over from the mouth of the sand worm as Shinichi nonchalantly asked that question.

Although the bear and the worm didn’t really look like the same species, they were both raybeasts, so while in one sense, Shinichi wasn’t wrong, he was still quite off.

Tomoe happened to be in the same formation as him, so she answered him with an exasperated voice.

“Of course not. The sensory organs of raybeasts born underground are all weak save for their sense of touch. So it probably just attacked whatever passed by the ground above it.”

Raybeasts didn’t acknowledge the existence of other raybeasts, so they normally didn’t fight.

But raybeasts that spawned underground had this particular trait, making scenes like this possible.

Shinichi nodded, then immediately kicked off against the ground.

The giant earthworm had suddenly spat out the raybeast it was playing with in its mouth at them.

The icky display had caused the students to let their guard down, so they weren’t able to respond in time.

“Push!”

Shinichi stepped up and wielded his Pile Bunker vertically to receive the raybeast that had been spat out. The raybeast no longer looked like a raybeast, though. Already, it was nothing more than a giant bullet of meat, but the resulting impact from clashing with it was surprisingly heavy.

“GU!”

In the face of that fake bullet that shot faster than even the pitch of a strong-armed pitcher, even Pile Bunker that was known for its ludicrous weight was pushed back a little.

Fortunately, the vanguards regained clarity and caught Shinichi’s back.

“Sorry, we were careless!” One of the vanguards said.

“No, you did well! Keep supporting me like this! Change mode, Short-Ranged Wide-Area Attack, Photon Burst!”

A brilliance of photon shot out from the Pile Bunker, and the lump of meat was crushed into pieces before dispersing without a trace.

That was the explosion that was normally used to release the stake of the Pile Bunker.

Although it had less power when attacking a single point, it could affect a wider area and also be fired more frequently.

This was one of the uses that Shinichi had come up with when he used Pile Bunker for the first time.

“Shoot that thing and don’t let it come close!” Tomoe said.

A barrage of bullets descended on the giant earthworm from the skills and shooters of the students.

Tomoe had given the order because she noticed that the worm was about to attack them after spitting the meat bullet at Shinichi.

Their attacks failed to damage the worm, but they did manage to suppress it.

Thanks to that Shinichi and the vanguards were able to avoid getting attacked.

Concerned, Tomoe called out to Shinichi.

“Any injuries!?” She asked.

“None. Don’t worry, I won’t let any of you get hurt!” Shinichi said.

“…Huh? I was talking about you!”

“…Huh?”

“W-What are you tilting your head for!? Ahh, sheesh! I’m asking you if your arm is alright!?”

Shinichi finally understood after she said it straight. “I’m fine,” he finally said, but Tomoe couldn’t understand why it took so long for him to understand that she was talking about him.

“Safina-senpai! The worm!”

“Ah, damn it! It went underground!”

Perhaps it found their attacks annoying or perhaps it thought that there were no prey near it, but regardless of the reason, the giant earthworm opened its giant mouth and went underground as though it was trying to eat the land.

That body that was much longer and faster than any of them could have thought vanished from right in front of their eyes.

The only thing that was left was the giant hole that showed how thick its body was.

“Someone use a sensor! Find where that thing went!”

“On it! Huh!? It’s right beneath us!? It’s coming up!!”

Before any of them could have time to be shocked, the earth shook.