Raising a scraping sound, contrary to its appearance, the cluster of rocks came at me with quite the speed.

Tracking the timing, I bounced it back with the blunt weapon skill art《Home Run》.

And after repeating that pattern three times, the rocks broke into pieces and turned into polygons.

「Hmmm, they feel sturdy. Though certainly, the efficiency is good.」

「It is. It might feel like labor, but the experience is really good.」

While checking the battle results with Touka-chan, I exhaled in relief.

Several kilometers to the northwest of Fias.

As it was implied by its name, the perma-scorchlands had been burned until nothing was left, and the lands…rather, instead of a plain, there were mountains.

They weren’t like huge mountains, and they weren’t volcanoes. The series of mountains that reached around five hundred meters looked as if they were forever being burnt up from the inside.

There were pulsations of heat, giving the impression that the ground was circulating blood, and a sweltering heat was released with each pulse.

If I were to describe it, entering its cracks, it was a place that looked like the red-hot smoking charcoals of a brazier.

The temperature of the surroundings might be greater than even sixty degrees. Making eye contact with Touka-chan we both put a Refrigerated Tomatton in our mouths and then mysteriously, we couldn’t feel even a hint of heat.

Thanks to the Refrigerated Tomatton, we could move around freely for four hours now.

The Scorching Caverns we were aiming for were in a cave-like are where a part of the scorchlands opened. After walking around the outer area of the perma-scorchlands a bit, we could see them.

The Scorching Caverns’ temperature itself was hot, same as the perma-scorchlands, but compared to the outside, it was hot, just as I thought.

With the effects of eating the Refrigerated Tomatton, the outer area felt like a room that had an AC cooling it down, and the Scorching Caverns we had just entered was like the heat of standing under the blazing sun.

It wasn’t as if a heat of around sixty degrees bothered me, and it seemed Touka-chan could bear it, although compared to outside, right now, she seemed a bit more frazzled.

In any case, there really wasn’t any presence of anything living.

If I were to activate my detection skill then I could know there were monsters disguised as the rocks or ground here or there, though. For example, the rock-type monster 《Dodorock》 that I had just blown away. It somewhat felt like an inanimate object that had some sort of presence dwelling within it.

That was why, if you asked me just what this place was, I would say it was kinda a bit of a lonely one.

By the way, the Dodorock basically just rolled and charged at you. Anyhow, it’s tough, but since blunt weapons had no concept of ‘sharpness,’ if you just did a 《Homerun》with all your might three to four times, you could defeat them.

「Ooh, it dropped a heavy metal!」

「Heavy metal, if I’m right, a heavy metal was used on Nee-sama’s gauntlets right?」

「Yeah, yeah. Since I wanted to have a weapon made for the event, it’s just the right timing.」

The blacksmith Haruru at Dualis that sold me weapons had told me that you could get heavy metal ores around Fias, but I hadn’t thought that it actually came from the Scorching Caverns.

Ah, speaking of Haruru…..in this setting, 《Meteor Impact -Zero Type-》might have been quite effective.

The 《Strike Metal Club》that I had now was certainly strong. It was light and easy to handle, and had an overly sufficient durability.

It was just that, maybe because it used light steel, but the power was a bit lacking. I had felt that during the Mount Gorilla battle.

Being a two-handed mace, Meteor Impact was a bit bigger than the metal club, so it might be quite a chore to swing inside the caverns, but I could deal with that somehow.

Operating the menu card and changing my equipment, a heavy weight appeared on my back.

「Nee-sama, is that the weapon that you used at the Forest of Magic?」

「That’s right. Rather, Touka-chan, you sure do watch the stream quite a lot.」

「Ehehe.」

Was she really only watching when she had free time?

I was worried a bit about Touka-chan’s studies there.

「Fuunn!」

“DOGON!” Creating such a sound, the Dodorock was blown away.

『The shouting is deep』

『I like her swinging hammers』

『F’ u’ u’ n’ n’ !』

『↑ I lol’d』

「It was not that deep, okay!」

Seeing it defeated it on just the second hit, as I thought, their firepower was incomparable.

Defeating them was easy and the EXP efficiency was around half that of the gorillas, which was quite good, and the material drops were great as well.

By the way, from what I had experienced, the drop rate of heavy metal was around one in ten.

There were a lot of Dodorocks around, so gathering them was not that hard, but there was a problem.

「Heavy metal, the ingot itself is also absurdly heavy.」

The capacity of the inventory was not based on numbers but on weight. And one’s carrying capacity was simply decided by strength.

Because it was defined like that, in this world, Kohaku might have the largest inventory.

Anyhow, my inventory was more than twice that of Touka’s, but after defeating tens of them, my inventory was gradually getting heavier.

For now, rather than having me, who was moving around a lot during battles, it was better for Touka-chan who was focused on support to carry them.

I had entrusted the heavy metal drops to Touka-chan, but it seemed her inventory was already very full.

「Sha-!」

「Derya!」

From the cracks here and there throughout the caverns, 《Rock Snakes》would appear. As these snakes with rock scales came at us, I’d strike them as if smashing the walls.

They might have thought of ambushing us, but since all the monsters that appeared here were made of rocks, when they got near, I could hear the sound of rocks scraping.

It felt like their stealth bonus always had a minus penalty.

「It’s a surprisingly good grinding place, but it’s oddly not that popular.」

「After all, even though it might be good for blunt weapon users, other than them it’s totally not a good place. It might be a rather unique field. And it seems like other than water and ice magic, nothing else affects them….」

「And there is only heavy metal that is quite a questionable drop, too. Is Heavy metal not that popular?」

Since I wanted to gather up heavy metal for the future, it was fun, but to people who didn’t need them, it was simply an item that put a lot of weight in their inventory.

Even so, it shouldn’t be that unusual for this place to be quite popular among the blunt weapon users….

「It is definitely not popular. Nee-sama, you have Named equipment that is light and moreover has high defense power, so you might not notice it, but normally the vanguard’s armors are quite heavy, you know? And weapons have weight too. The kijin, even more so than the other races, are specialized in physical abilities, so heavy metal has good compatibility with them in various ways.」

「I see. Now that you said it, I totally forgot about the lightness of this armor.」

The Red Wolf’s attire’s biggest selling point was its agility increase, but anyhow, its lightness was also something you could say was a part of why it was good.

It was light even among cloth-type equipment. Even as equipment, it really didn’t need that much strength either, so all I really had to think about was my weapon’s weight.

And adding on to that, combined with the Kijin’s status, I could finally carry the Meteor Impact.

These pure heavy metal-made weapons needed that much strength to use.

Thinking that way, if you needed to be either a kijin player or a high-levelled player with a focus on strength, heavy metal-made weapons might not be much of an option.

「Thinking up to this point, aren’t I the only one that has a Named armor?」

「Currently, that’s true. But after Nee-sama subjugated one, three more types of Named were confirmed to be defeated, it seems. Although, those players also had a weapon a made…」

「A weapon, huh…..certainly, it was strong.」

「Nee-sama are you acquainted with someone who owns a Named weapon? I heard that they hide the effects though.」

「Ah….well, kind of.」

Now that I thought about it, I didn’t really stream when I fought with…Rou, was it?

The《Murder Princess》Rou. As of now, she was the only PK player I had fought. And we only fought for a brief time, but did so both against and alongside each other.

The weapon she had,《Rapier of Enticement -Mellow Rapier-》, had a really special effect that reduced the target’s abnormal status effect resistance.

To be blunt, it was an effect more powerful against monsters than players, but due to her ability and the huge level gap between us, I was forced into such a troublesome battle recently, and the memory was still new.

Although it was spoiled by Apocalypse, she was an opponent I’d like to challenge again to see who would have won.

Although, she probably wouldn’t be able to participate in the event.

This event had dungeon entrances in each town, so regardless of if she wanted to or not, she needed to be able to get into the towns to participate.

Maybe there were some entrances outside the gates, but still, if a PK player appeared, they wouldn’t be able to avoid a bout.

Although, to Rou, that itself might not be bad.

Named Boss monsters. It might be a good time for me to challenge one again.

Recalling the fights with Aria and Rou, naturally, I thought that.

—————————————————-