"According to this small summary entry they wrote about them…" I said, reading from my phone. "These guys are Giant Mole Birds, flightless birds whose front wings transformed into giant clawed limbs they use to dig underground. They are slightly aggressive when provoked, but their biggest threat is that they have begun eating crops from nearby farms.
So taking care of them will also help a few people."
"Ooh, I see…" Mark nodded, equipping his enchanted clothing's, which were some military clothes. "Every time I wear these clothes I feel a bit embarrassed, I used to be a big military junkie, not anymore though…"
"Haha, it's fine, you look good on them." I giggled, I had already equipped my own enhanced clothes which counted as armor as well. "It has been a hot minute since we have hunted some monsters instead of just the daily Hollows, isn't it?"
"Yeah." Mark nodded, taking out his Talking Magic Knife. "So we just raid the hole and hunt them all? Nothing tricky in there?"
"Hmmm, no, aside from being a bit labyrinthian, there shouldn't be anything tricky." I said. "Oh! It says in there that their leader, the Giant Mole Bird Queen might be resting there, she's the one that lays all the eggs for the colony to continue growing… She's a D Rank monsters, not too easy to hunt. It says in here that it has been reported to possess Eart Magic, so we have to be careful."
"We have hunted bigger and meaner things before, come on, we'll be fine." Mark was very confident today, holding his shield.
"I guess you're not wrong, sometimes I'm just overly cautious." I sighed, grabbing my big shovel-staff, Irene. "Irene, are you ready?"
"Any time, boss! Finally some time to shine!" Irene was excited.
"Umm, so what do I do?" Gabriel was excited to help.
We both looked at him and then decided his role.
"You'll be the Enjoy reading on NovelHub - your free online novel platform." I told him.
"Can you heal? If we get some injury, you can heal us." Mark nodded.
"Oway!" Gabriel nodded happily. "Let's go!"
Gabriel ran into the monsters, but they didn't see him- In fact, they couldn't see him at all… I guess Angels are also invisible to monsters.
However, they can still sense him and smell him, the two big birds, of around three meters each, noticed something odd as they glanced into the empty air.
They started freaking out, flapping their wings angrily and groaning at Gabriel.
We ended running to his help as we fought the birds, who once they put their eyes on us, attacked. They ran really fast towards us, opening their sharp yellow bills.
One of them leaped off the ground and kicked Mark, but he defended with his shield, which I had made for him back then.
"Oof, you're pretty strong, huh?"
Mark simply smiled as, in that moment, he swung his knife, piercing the bird's stomach with it and unleashing his flames.
The bird was instantly roasted alive…
Meanwhile, the other Mole Bird attacked me with sharp beak strikes, which I evaded by moving my body gracefully.
I moved my hand upwards, as a spear made of wood emerged out of the ground and impaled the bird all the way to its head, killing it instantly.
"Well, that's the beginning…"
I stored both bird corpses inside my Inventory as we prepared to go down.
"Wow, that was awesome!"
Gabriel was still amazed at our performance.
"We barely did much, these birds are not that strong." Mark said. "You would be really surprised if you saw us fight those Dream Dungeon monsters back then! Now those were challenges."
"I don't want to remember that dungeon… I was so scared over my daughter's safety." I sighed. "Now…"
We looked into the hole and then leaped inside, quickly landing on a huge section of caves. There were mushrooms and roots popping out from time to time.
The mole birds used their feces as pillars for the caves they dug, which became as hard as ceramic. This could potentially cause rather catastrophic changes in the environment and nature, so they needed to be hunted with urgency.
A big group of seven mole birds stopped us once we started moving, rushing towards us and attempting to fight us.
Two of them leaped into the air and kicked me, I used my shield to defend, while swinging Irene against their heads by imbuing her with some Spirit and Mana.
Both of the mole birds lost consciousness after being bonked in the head, falling on the ground. Two other attacked Mark, but he quickly cut them down with his knife.
SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!
Four powerful slashes cut trough the mole birds and burned them, killing them on the spot! The other three became alarmed, running away to bring out more birds.
"You're not going anywhere! {Thorny Vines}!"
I touched the ground and summoned several thorny, poisonous vines, wrapping them around their bodies and paralyzing them.
"Gabriel, shoot them down!"
I tried to call for his aid so he could also cooperate.
Gabriel suddenly waved his hands, summoning three spears of light.
The spears of light pierced the bird's bodies one after another, burning them with their light!
But they were so bright it forced us to cover our eyes a bit, or we would have gotten blind!
"W-Well, I guess that takes care of that…"
I placed the corpses inside my inventory as we continued our hunt.
We found several branching paths in these caves, but we decided to explore each one as we hunted down the birds.
They were rather brave, but too weak for us after we grew strong enough, so they weren't a challenge even when they ambushed us by a dozen.
Eventually, after hunting almost fifty of them, we landed on the last path we didn't explore.
And what greeted us there were ten more mole birds, and their queen, a gigantic mole bird covered on black scales, and with furious red eyes...