Chapter 442 |
Day 101 – Evening, White Weirdo Inn
The contrast couldn’t be starker, Kakizaki-kun and the others, satisfied and glowing after enjoying a properly challenging Frontier Dungeon for the first time in a while and the monks, with eyes like those of a dead fish… It would seem they got abducted by Haruka-kun and forced to join Kakizaki and others for a dungeon run?
Their eyes may be dead, but their expressions are oddly… unburdened. Not the grim, vacant look of someone prepared to die, but rather the face of someone who realized that overthinking everything was just plain stupid and finally let it all go.
「We have seen the light! Instead of risking our lives or steeling ourselves for martyrdom, the answer is simply to punch first, right?」
「We were ready to embrace death with the resolve of true martyrs, but it turns out we can just hit stuff first and think later!」
「Rather than endure hardship and seek salvation, we should punch, and if we punch hard enough, basically everything gonna be okay?」
「Yes! The Lord did say, 『Extend your hand』 so it turns out He meant a fist!」
「If it’s a trial our Lord has bestowed, we’ll punch it to death! And if that doesn’t work, we’ll punch it anyway and then figure it out!」
「「「If punching once doesn’t work, punch harder, at the end of that path lies the truth!」」」
「「「Harukaaaa, We’re hungryyyy! Is dinner ready yet? That’s literally the only reason we came back to the frontier.」」」
The broken monks and the ones who broke them, Kakizaki-kun and others, speak to the one who made all of that happen, Haruka-kun. They probably went feral during one of those infamous brutal melees that Kakizaki’s squad is known for, and having been forced into that chaos, the monks lost their sanity and awakened something primal within them. I mean, they’re still saying vaguely religious-sounding things, but everything that isn’t about punching is total nonsense!
「「「Why are the monks the ones who got brainwashed?! This is a way worse doctrine corruption than the Church was doing!」」」
What kind of god in any world would say, 『Extend your hand for one-punch KO』? If it did, that’s a dark god and you shouldn’t be listening! How did this come to mean that basically everything’s gonna be okay?! And somehow, those gentle, devout monks now wear crooked, cynical smiles, and their eyes gleam with a dangerous light. Yeah, they look like total villains!
「These middle-aged guys had already given up on winning. They were strapping bombs to themselves, planning to die behind enemy lines. Yeah, they thought they’d go out with a bang to let everyone else escape. They’d already accepted a heroic death instead of actually fighting. So I threw them in with our natural-born combat maniacs(Bloody Morons) to flip the switch and trigger Combat Maniac Mode. Since they get stuck once they start thinking, I tried infecting them with the Idiots’ idiocy? Such idiots?」
That grim sense of resolve they had was just the calm before death. That quiet smile merely meant they’d given up and accepted their fate. That’s why they studied how to handle explosives. They were preparing to blow themselves up to protect the others… Aaah, yeah. Giving up will get you in trouble with this person. Just betting your life won’t do. You have to survive even if it kills you. You have to at least have the resolve to come back from the dead, otherwise, it will get you scolded.
Because in front of that person, giving up is not allowed.
Because no one suffered a tragedy more hopeless than him.
And because that person, even in a situation so bad one can only laugh, does exactly that and keeps fighting anyway, no one else is allowed to give up, you know? Until he gives up, no one else is allowed to even think of something as soft and naive as giving up, okay? And he wouldn’t, even if he dies or gets killed, he wouldn’t just drop dead and die. That’s why he keeps surviving,and even now is feeding the chicken…Looks like he and Cockatrice-san developed some sort of a friendship now?
「Uwaaah, I think they might be too far gone? Look at that one, he is licking the knife?」
「That’s a dagger, okay? And he definitely stabbed monsters with those… That’s so gross…」
「They used to be pious, kind-hearted monks with humble ideals of asceticism… Who are those people?!」
「Who? The one licking the knife? Or the one trying to attach spiked shoulder pads to his monk robes? Or maybe the one with the nail bat and…」
「「「Don’t say that aloud! Lady Arianna’s mental HP is at zero already, she’s about to cry!」」」
They say she used to be kindhearted, but lacked a strong will. Yeah, if you don’t hold your ground, you’ll get swept away. Here we have an overabundance of bad influence and countless, infinite varieties of wickedness on display. And now she’s been influenced by Kakizaki-kun and his gang, who even Haruka-kun calls the kind of madmen who genuinely belong to this world.
Cold, indifferent, ruthless, and nihilistic, that is the impression of Kakizaki’s five-man squad.
Famous, athletic, good-looking, but always with a detached vibe, five guys who gave off a constant air of pent-up gloom… Turns out they were total meatheads. Yeah, at first I thought, 『You can’t say that about them』but they really are meatheads. And now they go around smiling, carefree, easygoing, grinning in ways I’ve never seen before. They’re like totally different people.
Haruka-kun said that they are the ones who belong in this world, natural-born fighters, barbarians, muscle-brained savages, and idiots. But over there they would be just lunatics, crazy people..
And now, they’re being called meatheads, and laughing about it. But at their core, they are berserks(murderers) who relish battle, rejoice in risking their lives, embrace the kill-or-be-killed, savoring life and death like connoisseurs. They aren’t crazy or broken, it just was their natural calling. Out of place in the modern world, they were warriors who didn’t fit in, madmen of war. That’s why, in a peaceful age, they had nothing that could make their hearts rumble, nothing to burn their lives for.
So they were cold, indifferent, and nihilistic. Always somewhat bored and gloomy. And when they are finally released from those restraints…
「Harukaaaa, I’m dyinggg, so hungry! Seriously can’t go on, I’m gonna starve! I’m starving to death!」
「Meaaaat! Gimme meat! …Wait, it’s raw?! Are we supposed to eat this?! I’m not a dog!!」
「Dude, mushrooms for breakfast and lunch? That’s too healthy, it’s killing me! I seriously feel like I’m low on blood and meat!」
「「「We’re hungryyyyy, Harukaaa! Feed usss!」」」
Yup. Once freed from their peaceful, oppressive boredom, they became very energetic musclebrains. That’s what those cold, cool, relentless, and nihilistic guys turned into… And they even had fan clubs?
「If you want food, I’ll feed you. But, did you actually make sure the Middle-Aged Men can handle the lower floors? If all they picked up was how to lick knives, dinner’s gonna be Knife Bowl. Down it in one gulp without licking? Wait, that actually sounds fun?!」
「Don’t enjoy that! And no one taught them to lick knives, okay!」
「Knife Bowl, huh… We tossed them all the way into the seventies, so they’re good.」
「Yeah, also dragged them into the eighties too and made them fight there.」
「Confiscated away their bombs, took away their shields, and left them to do melee with just daggers.」
「「「They really aren’t cut for this, but at least they aren’t going to kick the bucket?」」」
Oda-kun and company, who at some point fought side by side with them, said they became savage beasts that leap on monsters, feral berserkers, totally different from how they are with us. They even said that they can’t keep up and coordinate with Kakizaki’s team when they get serious. Getting dragged along or thrown right into the hordes of monsters they ended up swallowed by the sheer madness that compels these insane savages to rush headfirst into the very midst of enemies. And thus that madness had taken root in their own heads, and bloomed. And they started licking the knives! WHY?!