Fear Comes from Insufficient Firepower

He had been in this Dungeon World for some time now and had gone through several battles, big and small.

Aside from the expected reward of leveling up, Gu Mo had also acquired some game-like items and tools, such as Sacred Water and Arrow Protection Talismans. Of course, there were also the most classic monster materials... In short, some were quite useful, while others were utterly useless.

Among them, yokai soul cores fell somewhere in between, constantly bouncing back and forth and difficult to categorize.

Calling them useless would not be entirely accurate. Every soul core was essentially a Skill Badge, though they were restricted to yokai skills, or rather, yokai arts, and had to be equipped in a Guardian Spirit's skill slot before he could use them indirectly. But calling them useful... well, Gu Mo basically could not use those skills at the moment.

He had collected four kinds of soul cores so far: Hungry Ghost, ordinary yokai, Ape Fiend, and Horse-Headed Demon. Naturally, he had several duplicates among them, so including the Heretic Soldier soul core he had just obtained, he now had five types of soul cores in hand.

Studying the Heretic Soldier soul core in his palm, Gu Mo made up his mind. If it proved useful, that would be ideal. He was desperately short on useful skills right now.

There was no need to mention the Horse-Headed Demon's. It was one of the strongest yokai he had encountered so far, and the skill carried by the soul core he had obtained by riding someone else's coattails was the Great Slaughter Slash that made him incredibly envious. Just imagine that forty-meter serrated greatsword in the Horse-Headed Demon's hands, swung at full force by a monster of that size in a devastating wide arc...

Huge range, AOE, and absolutely explosive damage.

Unfortunately, after attaching the Horse-Headed Demon soul core to his fox, Gu Mo had not successfully recreated that powerful yokai attack even once. Otherwise, even if he could only use it once in a short period of time, his damage output would undergo a qualitative leap.

There was no other reason for it. His mana bar was insufficient, nowhere near the requirement for unleashing that attack.

He could use the ordinary yokai and Ape Fiend soul cores, but their attributes and effects were mediocre to begin with. Since he lacked the special energy known as Yokai Power, every use violently drained his physical strength and mental energy as the price. With no particular advantages and severe exhaustion as a consequence, they were clearly not good options either.

Only the Hungry Ghost soul core was temporarily usable. It summoned a starving Lesser Hungry Ghost to frantically attack and bite the enemy, dealing a certain amount of damage while siphoning the life essence lost by the target to restore his own health to some extent...

Its consumption was relatively low, but not low enough to use freely. Gu Mo could only use it when he judged it necessary; he could not treat it as a regular skill.

At that moment, the black-haired girl glanced around before continuing down the corridor.

She paid no attention to Gu Mo's actions, having long since grown accustomed to some of her companion's strange habits. He often needed to wash his hands, for example, and he always liked to wave his hand through the air above fallen enemies' corpses. Perhaps he could not stand the smell of blood...

The mansion was large and exquisite, with paths extending in every direction around it. It occupied an astonishingly vast area.

Yet in Hidechiyo's senses, although some yokai were wandering inside the mansion, a greater and more chaotic mass of Yokai Energy radiated from somewhere farther away, and there were relatively more of them... But according to her perception, that distance and direction had already exceeded the mansion's boundaries and extended deep into the mountain itself.

So there was actually space inside the mountain? Was it hollow?

Hidechiyo pondered this, but her actions were unaffected. She continued following her senses directly toward the master of the Perpetual Darkness, intending to proceed step by step and solve this problem first.

After winding through countless turns, she clearly knew her target was right there, yet she had no way to travel in a straight line. She could hardly tear down the house; this was where her old father would retire in the future... The girl herself was not in a hurry. She had the patience for it. She was only worried that someone might not be able to hold on.

Still, having a constitution three points higher than that of the healthiest ordinary person had its advantages. Moreover, the Nine-Tailed Guardian Spirit seemed to be helping Gu Mo withstand the oppression of the Perpetual Darkness. Only he could feel the warmth and heat it radiated, which to some extent blocked the profound Yokai Energy and frigid atmosphere of that black-and-white world from eroding him.

Along with taking a sip of Sacred Water now and then... he lasted far longer than expected, at least without collapsing from exhaustion before they found the master of the Perpetual Darkness.

Looking into the room ahead, the black-haired girl's rose-red eyes were entirely unaffected by the dim, eerie lighting. She clearly saw the monster's true form.

It had a human body clad in black samurai attire, but its neck stretched thin and long, coiling like a snake. The head attached to it seemed to float in midair. It sat silently in the center of the room, meditating like a samurai. The sight was indescribably bizarre.

Rokurokubi.

A type of yokai whose neck could extend and retract freely. Some people linked them to Flying Heads, but they were actually two entirely different monsters.

These monsters were somewhat unusual. When their necks were not stretched out and their heads were not probing around like snakes, they looked no different from ordinary people. Not only could ordinary people fail to recognize them, but sometimes even they themselves would not realize they were Rokurokubi, genuinely believing they were humans and living as such.

There were many theories about the origins of these yokai. Some said they were people transformed by karmic sins, while others claimed they came from miserable, decayed corpses of those who had been strangled. Supposedly, if someone often experienced something like their soul leaving their body at night, that might be a sign of becoming a Rokurokubi.

With a glance, Hidechiyo signaled Gu Mo, then drew her blade and walked forward.

Gu Mo obediently took two steps back, opening a little distance. More importantly, he was making it clear that he knew better than to rashly step forward... A freeloader needed the self-awareness of a freeloader. Soaking up experience and picking up equipment was already nice enough. There was no need to steal kills and interfere with the expert's performance.

Hidechiyo moved without a sound, but just as she approached the room and before she even crossed the doorway, the Rokurokubi suddenly sprang into action.

Its long neck whipped around like lightning, and its head lunged at her in a bite, like a crouching cobra that had finally waited for prey to enter its attack range and immediately launched its strike without hesitation!

The black-haired girl remained expressionless, and not a ripple stirred in her cool, autumn-water eyes. This was the Perpetual Darkness, the enemy's domain. Sneaking close enough to launch a surprise attack without alerting this yokai had never been easy. Honestly, from the moment the two of them entered the Perpetual Darkness, it had surely already noticed them.

She raised her sword to block. The human head bit down directly on her blade with a crunch, seemingly sending a few sparks flying.

At the same time, the girl drew the short blade at her waist with her other hand and slashed at the long neck like lightning. Everything flowed as smoothly and naturally as though it had been rehearsed beforehand. She never needed to think too much; she could always instantly grasp the best tactics for fighting yokai!

Bang!

With a thunderous report and a flash of fire, the pungent scent of gunpowder smoke filled the air.

Shaking the Matchlock Gun in his hand, Gu Mo watched the Lesser Hungry Ghost ahead howl in agony. Its belly had exploded open, spilling its intestines across the floor in a bloody mess. Pale golden essence quickly turned gaseous, then dissipated and evaporated into the air. Gu Mo tugged at the corner of his mouth, stepped forward, and decisively chopped off its head.

While Axiu was dealing with the master of the Perpetual Darkness, he was naturally not just standing around watching. Instead, he was cleaning up the minor yokai at the edge of the battlefield. He had become thoroughly adept at bullying Lesser Hungry Ghosts and no longer found them difficult to deal with, just like this.

As for enemies such as ordinary yokai, in one-on-one situations where he was prepared, he could also handle them relatively smoothly without having to risk his life.

After all, he had talismans in hand, enchanted weapons, and attributes tailored to counter them to the fullest...

As long as yokai did not spawn directly beside him and leave him without any distance or time, he could naturally fight short-range opponents with long-range attacks fairly easily.

Looking at it this way, although he felt that he had not grown much, he was actually doing quite well. An ordinary person who could only fight Lesser Hungry Ghosts a month ago and could still only fight Lesser Hungry Ghosts a month later would never improve so quickly—just the physical changes brought about by the few points he had added would take someone else more than half a year even under ideal conditions of diligently training their muscles and building up their constitution.

A clear gleam flashed along his blade, untouched by any bloodstains, yet he still habitually flicked it before examining the Matchlock Gun in his other hand.

Its power was merely acceptable. Both its range and lethality reflected the relatively low effectiveness of this era's black powder, and its recoil was not that great either. The fact that he could fire it one-handed with twelve points of Strength made that obvious... Of course, at this distance, it could still kill a Lesser Hungry Ghost if it hit a vital spot.

Even if he had not finished it off just now, the little thing would have died soon enough. The only difference was between being directly killed and dying from bleeding damage over time.

Still, its shortcomings were too obvious. Gu Mo shook his head, somewhat nostalgic for the guns in games that could fire continuously without reloading... This handling was truly awful. Sighing to himself, he took out ammunition and reloaded.

He looked around but found no other targets. Just as he was about to turn back, the great fox beside him suddenly reacted.

He raised an eyebrow, tightened his grip on his sword and gun, checked his remaining talismans, and only then moved cautiously in that direction. Before long, he heard something from a room at the end of the corridor ahead: faint, muffled sobbing.

It sounded like a woman whimpering softly, as if she were terrified or trying desperately to suppress herself, not daring to make too much noise but unable to completely hold it in. The sound was fragile and pitiful, and its voice itself was so gentle and beautiful that it instinctively aroused the desire to protect her.

Gu Mo froze for a moment, then stared intently at the room.

The damaged paper sliding door sagged and had collapsed inward. Inside was pitch-black, the light too dim to make out anything... The sobbing came from within, and it was kept extremely low, without sounding overly deliberate. Someone with little experience might easily be deceived.

But Gu Mo had been steeped in all kinds of horror movies from later generations, so he had plenty of experience with this. Even if his memories of those old films were from a long time ago, they had at least implanted some strange bits of trivia in him about survival rules for horror scenarios.

He stared in that direction, slowly raised the freshly loaded Matchlock Gun, and took aim. He was about to have the great fox light the match cord, but after thinking it over, he lowered it again.

The room was too dark, and he could not see inside. He could only hear the sound and had no idea what the situation was. The gun's power was not reliable enough, and it was a point-to-point attack. Never mind missing a vital spot—the chance of missing entirely was even greater... His shooting skill was honestly not that good. Minamoto no Raikou had even mocked him for it during live-fire training.

Although there was an "aim assist" option in the Settings, he could only stare at it longingly because Game Settings could not be changed during a mission.

So he should not gamble on suddenly being a hidden sharpshooter.

He took out a Gunpowder Bomb, thought for a moment, then took out a Burning Oil Jar that had dropped not long ago. Holding the Gunpowder Bomb up to the great fox, he watched as the Guardian Spirit understood its host's intentions as always. The tip of a large crimson furry tail, like one made of burning flame, lightly touched the bomb's fuse.

A faint expenditure of spiritual power occurred, and illusory fire-aspected power seeped out from the Spirit World.

A speck of crimson fire appeared in reality, concentrated at a single point as it precisely lit the fuse.

Gu Mo raised his hand and threw the black Sengoku grenade. Made from black powder and a ceramic jar, the item flew across the fairly long corridor under his strength and smashed straight into that dark room... The fragile sobbing abruptly stopped, as though its owner had failed to react in time and been interrupted.

Inside the dark room, a woman wearing a gorgeous kimono, her face hidden beneath hanging long hair, had been making pitiful cries. Her eyes widened as she watched the black object fly in, roll around the room a few times, and reveal a match cord that had already burned to its end.

The next second, a deafening explosion tore apart the nearby paper screens and doors in an instant!

Black powder prepared through secret ninja methods unleashed an explosion far more terrifying than ordinary explosives of its kind, while sharp ceramic fragments sprayed in every direction, delivering a second wave of damage... The woman let out a resentful, agonized scream and covered her face with both hands. Her kimono was torn in many places, and sprays of blood burst forth!

Yet at that distance, she had suffered only superficial wounds.

Of course, it was not over yet. The very next instant, another black object flew in almost right on the heels of the explosion. The woman raised her head resentfully, and with some unknown trick, blew the object apart in midair.

Sticky black oil splashed everywhere... This one was not a Gunpowder Bomb.

Roaring flames instantly lit up the room, dispelling its former darkness. Gu Mo watched a massive snake with a woman's upper body and a length of five or six meters writhe madly in the sea of fire, shrieking sharply and resentfully. The Fire Bullet Talisman clasped in his hand was ready to be released at any moment.

It had originally been meant to ignite the oil jar. If the Gunpowder Bomb's blast had not ignited the oil jar behind it, he would have immediately thrown a talisman over to detonate it.

Now, it could add some extra damage as well...

The corner of his eye twitched as he watched the huge snake smash through the room, rush out of the flames, and pounce toward him while burning all over, filled with venomous madness. Gu Mo cursed under his breath and decisively unleashed the Fire Bullet Talisman.

Since the talisman had been crafted using his own mental energy and concentration, it was aimed by his mind and guided by intent. It was practically aim assist, so the fireball struck Snake Woman's head with explosive precision. Yet it could not stop the massive serpent, driven mad by pain.

Gu Mo took a deep breath. He had anticipated this, so he pointed directly ahead—

"I choose you! Pika... Nine-Tailed!"

It was as if a hurricane had suddenly swept through the narrow, enclosed corridor. Flames surged in the gale, and as Gu Mo felt his physical strength and mental energy drain away as rapidly as water released from a breached reservoir, a crimson fire fox appeared at his side.

Spiritual power manifested in the human world in a form visible to everyone. With cold, sharp eyes, the Nine-Tailed Guardian Spirit stood in front of Gu Mo.