Scrape! Scrape!
Scrape! Scrape! Scrape!
After all the Strong Acid Ant corpses had been collected, Ethan actually found an open spot and began sharpening a long, slender arrow on a large rock.
At first, Harriet thought Ethan was making the arrow sharper so he could use it against the second wave of monsters.
But soon...
Harriet noticed that Ethan was actually grinding away the arrowhead?
'What kind of weird move is this?'
'Does someone really think their arrows are too sharp?'
"What are you doing?", Harriet asked because she didn't understand.
Ethan couldn't even be bothered to look up. He simply replied, "Can't you see? I'm working on arrows."
"Of course I can see that," Harriet frowned, "What I don't understand is why you're grinding off the arrowheads. Is there really someone who's worried their arrows might hurt the monsters too much?"
"You got it right. I am worried about hurting the monsters."
"What?"
Harriet thought she had misheard and quickly rubbed her ears.
But Ethan ignored her and continued dulling the arrowheads. One wasn't enough. He went through more than ten arrows that looked quite valuable and blunted them all before finally stopping.
But that process took nearly an hour.
And the second wave of attacks arrived.
Flap! Flap!
Flap! Flap! Flap!
Chirp!
The sound of birds flapping their wings came from the sky.
Bird cries could also be heard from time to time.
But the fog above the desert was too thick.
No one could see what was hidden inside it.
Until, a huge dark cloud began to appear above the Desert Tree.
"Birds!"
"Those birds look like eagles. How can they be that big?"
Harriet and Charlie immediately cried out.
Seeing this, the birdfolk group transformed into birds one after another, preparing to fight the massive dark mass in the sky.
"Stop!"
However, Ethan raised a hand and stopped the birdfolk group.
"Leave these birds to me. None of you move! Otherwise I might accidentally shoot you."
"Ethan... Lord, you're not planning to use those blunt arrows to shoot birds, are you?", Harriet said speechlessly, "And... even if you're alone, at most you can fire ten or twenty arrows in a minute. There are so many birds. Can you even shoot them all?"
"Whether I can or not, won't you find out by watching?"
Ethan glanced at Harriet.
Harriet was beautiful and had an outstanding temperament. She had always done well among men.
Yet she kept running into walls with Ethan.
That made her even more unhappy. The frustration in her chest had been building up and never got a chance to come out.
So she no longer cared whether she was tearing things apart and directly argued back.
"Hah! Stop acting so full of yourself. Protecting this Desert Tree is everyone's mission, not yours alone!"
"I know you're powerful. I know you're unmatched!"
"But with this many birds, if you miss even a few and refuse to let anyone help, do you know how much danger that could cause us?"
"Especially Charlie. He barely has any ability to protect himself. If something happens to him, are you going to take responsibility?"
"And this Desert Tree too. It already lost so much health because of the Strong Acid Ants. If you let a few birds get through and they eat more leaves, once the Desert Tree dies, all the effort we spent getting here will have been for nothing."
"I'm asking you, can you think about other people before showing off?"
"Are you done?", Ethan said helplessly, "Can't you just quietly watch me perform? If I can't shoot down every single bird in the sky, then I'll give you the treasure chest from this stage for free. Is that enough?"
"Fine! If you can really shoot down every bird in that flock without leaving a single one behind, then I'll give you everything inside the treasure chest too," Harriet said through gritted teeth, "But you also have to agree to one condition. If you fail, then from now on, both you and your people have to follow my command and fight together."
"No problem."
Ethan only wanted this woman to stop talking anyway. Since the agreement had been made, he didn't waste any more words.
He immediately drew his bow and nocked one of the blunted Rich Guy Arrows.
Whoosh!
The arrow shot into the sky.
Harriet folded her arms and watched coldly. She simply didn't believe Ethan could deal with all the birds by himself.
As for Charlie, he had already moved beside Harriet and sought her protection.
However... when the Rich Guy Arrow reached the air, something unexpected happened.
Whoosh! Whoosh!
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
One arrow, in an instant...
Became two.
Two became four.
Four became eight.
Eight became countless...
Then the contempt in Harriet's eyes disappeared.
Because she saw the sky fill with arrows flying toward the flock of birds.
The strangest thing was...
Those arrows seemed to lock onto targets automatically. They shot toward birds flying in every direction on their own.
Smack!
As the first bird was hit and began falling...
Countless others were struck as well.
They dropped from the sky one after another like rain.
Smack! Smack!
Smack! Smack! Smack!
Patter! Patter! Patter!
At this point, not only was Harriet stunned, but even Charlie, who specialized in prediction, was stunned as well.
Because no matter how much they calculated, they had never imagined Ethan could be this terrifying.
As more birds fell, everyone finally got a clear look at what kind of birds made up the dark cloud in the sky.
The birds were round in shape, covered with grayish-brown feathers, and looked like sparrows.
Yet their bodies were huge.
With their wings spread, they were over a meter wide, making them no smaller than eagles.
And beyond that... the strangest thing about these birds was that hidden among both wings and their short, rounded tails were metallic feathers that gleamed with a metal sheen.
Harriet used her large saber to pry one of the metallic feathers loose.
Only then did she discover that it really was some kind of metal... because when the saber struck the feather, it made a metallic clang clang sound.
"This bird..."
Whoosh!
At that moment, a bird that was not quite dead suddenly fired one of the metal feathers from its tail straight at Harriet.
Fortunately, Harriet reacted quickly and blocked it.
"This bird can actually shoot arrows?"
"Yeah, that's why I suggest you hurry up and take your burden back up the tree."
Ethan let out a cold laugh.
And in that short amount of time, the dark cloud covering the sky had already been completely cleared away by him.
"Everyone, get up the tree!"
However, because the Blade Sparrows had only been injured and not killed, they occasionally still launched sneak attacks.
So Ethan simply shouted to everyone.
The birdfolk group immediately transformed into birds and flew into the tree without a word.
Ethan also used his refreshed Lord's Domain skill and teleported up.
This time...
Harriet and Charlie were stunned again.
If they had known, they never should have come down from the tree.