Seeing Selena's status, Hajime is floored by what is shown, "Wow you're so broken now. I guess your job class had something to do with why it took you so long to wake up. Just look at all those skills, I only have lightning field as one but to you, it looks more like a derivative skill of whatever this lightning release is."
Looking at Hajime, Selena says, "This makes it easier for me to keep up with you." Punching his chest with a little laugh "How else would I keep up with… whatever it is you're working on?"
Selena gestures at the pile of, what looks like a lot of rock and broken pieces of what could arguably be handguns.
Hajime looks at what she is talking about. Seeing the pile of failed creations he tells her, "I'm trying to make a Revolver. All of these stones have effects like blow up under pressure and glowstone all around us will make a great flash bang" smirking at all his ideas for his survival in this hell.
"I see," she says while smiling at his ingenuity. "Well while you work on that, I want to see what my job class can do."
"Sure why not"
Selena weaves hand seals for the first time, and produces only a single ice spear for her trouble.
"That isn't very impressive" Hajime says with a look of disappointment at all the hype he thought her class would bring.
"Shut up stupid its my first time and I don't want to mess it up!"
"Mmm, I guess that makes sense, given your class has not been seen in the world till you came," he says while nodding at his claim.
"Well I'll practice while you make your gun. Do you mind making one for me too?"
"Sure, but it will take some time. I haven't even finished one yet." He says while he gestures at all of the piles, "These are all me trying to find the right ratios for the blast rock I'm compressing."
As he was watching over his work to make the perfect bullet, he began to look back on how events played out. After going through what he had he couldn't help but wonder if Selena knew more than she was letting on. Even back at highschool she always had that shit eating grin. "But the first thing is to get out of the depths of hell before I think about this. She never gave me a reason not to put my trust in her." Unknown to Selena, Hajime had conflicting thoughts about her motives.
After some time in silence Selena started a conversation.
"I know that this isn't my area of expertise, but why not try a very minimal amount and work your way up?"
"Na, I got my own way. You just be you and figure out your class. At least you don't have to say those ridiculous chants."
"Yeah, I get goose bumps hearing those sometimes. Kind of cringe."
"Well, what else can you do besides an ice spear?"
"Hmm," Selena starts thinking about what would be best to show, when a thought comes to mind. She smiles wickedly as she starts to go through the 30 signs required, taking about 5 minutes to complete with her messing up the signs and having to start over. Finally she spawned a handful of small ice crystal spheres and threw them at Hajime while turning back and saying, "Fire in the hole!"
At that moment Hajime figure he fuck up as he got pelted with a lot of small hail to his whole body. "Oh, you want to play it like that huh?" as he flicks the biggest ice shard that he found back at her.
"Aww, no, stop!" Selena raises her hands to protect herself from the on coming volley.
This brought a smile to Hajime. He had been tense until Selena came back and brought this much needed dose of their old life.
That night Hajime created a hole and to his surprise Selena vomited water out of nowhere.
"Uhh, is that even clean water?"
"What are you talking about?" Selena asked, confused at the question.
"I mean you totally vomited that out, right?"
"I created it from magic" she says and did not bother to correct him on what chakra is at this time. After finally getting herself cleaned up and looking down she saw her own reflection and saw that most of her hair had turned white, just like Hajime's, but her bangs stayed red like her original hair color.
The next few days were spent with Hajime finishing up creating his weapon and Selena trying to master her chakra skill. On the first day, Selena was trying to stick on the walls to walk up them, leaving Hajime in confusion on what she was doing. Although he did laugh a lot when she fell and hit the back of her head. The second day consisted of the same thing, but instead she was walking on the walls. This time, she fell on her head most of the time when she ran out of chakra. The third day was the most fun for Hajime, he got to throw small rocks at Selena to try to break her concentration. She had a few close calls when she dodged, but was mostly successful in getting this down. This training was only possible with the help of the healing rock since it helped to replenish her chakra faster. With this, the only time she has to stop, is when she mentally exhausted herself, but with this she pushed herself to the limit each time.
"You sure are getting your sick kick watching me do this aren't you?"
"I don't know what you could be talking about," Hajime says while smirking at her after she fell for the 6th time from getting a rock thrown at her face.
"By the way, why are you doing those hand sign things anyways?"
"Well this wall walking skill will help me control the output without having to burn all of my mana I have on a few casts."
He nods, understanding what she means. "Hey, just let you know I finished my gun and bullets." he says while showing her the finished products. "It was done a while ago, but I need to make more bullets. So I decided to keep making them while I help you fall hehe. Also the name of this baby is Donner" he says with a hand over his first partner in crime.
"Thanks pal, glad I could help" She says with sarcasm, all the while getting a closer look at Donner. She smiles at seeing the iconic gun for the first time in person. She turns to him and asks, "So how does it work?"
"So I activate my lighting field, point, and shoot. It is as simple as that, the rest is on my bullets, hehe" he says while rubbing his nose. "Selena, are you ready to hunt down some prey?"
"Umm, Okay? What did you have in mind? Is it that rabbit looking thing or the bear?"
"I'm not strong enough to kill the bear." he says while shaking his head, "We need to get more skills and level up more before we are ready for that bear."
As the two head out to find their prey, they come across a lone kick master rabbit. Slowing down, Selena walks on the wall to get an angle for her attack. After setting up their kill box, Selena performs the hand signs launching ice spears at it from the left. At that same moment Hajime pointed Donner to where he predicted it would jump and fired. By dumb luck the rabbit jumped into the path of the bullet making it their first kill as a team. It was too bad the second kick master they found was not so easy, and Selena ended up taking a kick to her side to give Hajime enough time to reload after missing his first clip on kick master.
"Oww that hurts" Selena says, rubbing her side with a hand.
"Here take this," he says while giving her one of two healing potions that she brought with them for this exploration. "Okay, now let's go back and eat these and see what skill we get from them."
"Wow, give a girl a minute to get herself together, will you!"
"I don't see any girls though," he says with a smirk as he walks away towards their current base.
"One of these days a girl is going to whip you for that cheek. Also guns in a fantasy world are so cheap Hajime!"
"I don't want to hear that from the one who doesn't have to chant to cast spells."
"It's in my job class." She retorts, sticking out her tongue at Hajime as they get into their base and cook the meat using a lightning field.
"Wow, it tastes like shit too!"
"I don't know what you were expecting Hajime" she says, looking at him in puzzlement.
Ignoring her, he pulls out his stats plate and checks what skill he got from the rabbit.
After looking at the skills page, he saw the new skills that were added to his list.
"Huh my stats increased, just like when we ate the twin tail wolves. Though eating more of them doesn't help our status when we already ate them once." After awe at his new gain, he saw the skill "Air Dance" and the derivative aerodynamic and supersonic step.
"Why don't you try it, lady first" Selena gestures at Hajime bowing 90 degrees.
"Ya ya" he waves his hand as he tries to recall the last two fights with the rabbit. He recalled when they changed direction in mid air like in the game Devil May Cry. With that image in mind, he hopped a little off the ground, imagining a platform only to crash on it since he didn't jump high enough.
"Smooth move, hehe"
"Why don't you try to use the skills yourself!" he huffs while glaring at Selena.
Knowing she was no better, she thought of a funny idea and tried to use supersonic step aiming at Hajime as her whoopee cushion. As she activates the skill, she dashed quickly at him and both ended up falling down once again.
"Hahaha you're right it is not so easy!" She felt the six pack Hajime had developed. She started blushing and quickly got off and extended her handout to help him up. 'She is softer than she looks.' He thought with a slight blush as he looked at her as she was getting up, opening and closing his fist.
Taking the hand, he scratched his head. "Thanks… also, you totally did that on purpose."
"Hmm that sounds like a statement not a question. I would never," she said with a grin on her face.
"Anyways I'm guessing that was supersonic step"
"Yeah. Hey Hajime."
"What's up?"
Selena touches his shoulder before saying, "Tag your it." Then, using supersonic step, she dashed to the other side of the cave.
"Oh ya, not if I have anything to say about it." He activated the skill like Selena and they started their game of tag.
After a few hours, they got used to supersonic step and aerodynamic, laughing on the ground, both panting. It is too bad for the cave they were in to have many new holes with the impressions of their bodies on it due to lack of control. QQ.
"Hey Selena, can you do me a favor?"
"Sure I can. What's up?"
"I want you to cover me while I take on the bear. I don't want any help."
Know something like this is going to happen. "Why is that?"
Looking at his missing arm he said "it's something I need to do alone. If something stands in my way I have to kill it." Those thoughts filled Hajime. Although Selena was there, he was not as ruthless as in the original work. But his mindset on enemies did not change.
Put the back of hand over his face. "Sure I'll standby for you, but know you're not alone in this okay?" she says worrying about him.
He smiles while balling up his fist, "yeah," confidence oozing from him. "You said you wanted a gun too," he says, deciding to change the topic to something a little lighter. "Do you have a design in mind for it," he asks as he pulls out Donner and inspects it.
Seeing the heavy talks were over she grabbed a rock and began to carve out the rough details of the handgun she wanted. It ends up looking like Hades from Black Cat, and instead of opening up like Hajime's revolver, it was a side loader.
Seeing what she wanted, he was laughing at the fact she didn't make it easy on him. He was thinking of making something similar to his but his synergistic/chunni spirit couldn't help but want to make it.
A few days went by and, after many more broken prototypes, he finally made it.
Looking at the end product, Hajime smirked, liking the design of the gun. He was thinking about changing his revolver if he ever recovers his arm. "Here Selena," he called out to her, only to see that she was on the wall casting her ice spear spell to try to get used to multi-tasking. "Maybe one day you cast faster than my quick draw, haha."
"Shut up before I throw you across the room."
"Maybe I'll just keep your new partner then."
"No please, I want to see it." She says as she tries to get behind him to see her revolver.
Smirking, he pulled it out like he was ready to shoot it. "I'm getting good at this, you know." He says puffing out his chest in pride as he hands over the gun to Selena.
Holding it in her hand, she was thinking 'I can finally learn those needlessly pointless gun skills for those fights that are too easy, but I can't be bothered to try.'
"What are you going to name it? I was thinning Otto" Hajime asks, breaking her out of her thoughts.
"No, that stupid name for such a cool gun."
"Oh yeah, what do you have in mind then, madam?" he asked in a condescending tone.
"Its name will be Abraxos!"
"Hmm," Finding no fault in the name, Hajime asks, "Where did it come from, if I may ask?"
"It's the name of a very loyal, brave and smart wyvern."
"That is oddly specific" he says, looking at her oddly.
"Oh yeah, Donner the Reindeer?"
"You don't know when to shut up sometimes." Pissed off that his partner was being compared to deer of all things. He pulled open her cheeks hard and low kicked her knowing it wouldn't really hurt her.
"Oww" she says while rubbing her butt, "I think you broke my butt."
Hajime was annoyed that she just couldn't stop being a fool. So he walked away to make some more bullets for her.
After he was done making rounds for Abraxos, he says, "Okay we ready to find that fuckin bear". Selena sees the first glimpse of Hajime blood lust. They use a combination of aerodynamics and supersonic step to rush through the floor, looking for the bear.
Once they spotted the bear in the distance, they stopped mid-air and caught their breath. With thumbs up he dashed over to it.
"Hey there Stupid bear, have you eaten any more arms lately?" He shouted at the bear to grab its attention.
The bear turned to Hajime and was a bit confused since it was used to everything running away from it.
Seeing that the bear didn't see him as a true threat, Hajime let a lot of kill intent leak out while pointing Donner at it. The bear was growing weary seeing an unfamiliar object be pointed at it. The bear leapt to the side at the point when Hajime's blood lust reached its peak, and Hajime shot at it. Hajime, knowing that each shot he missed brought him closer to death's door, started to use supersonic step to run around the bear. Seeing that its prey opponent was able to move just as fast as it, started to use its special magic on its claws and threw an air slash where Hajime had been last. Miscalculating one of his dashes, he hit the wall and stunned himself.
Seeing a chance, the bear slashed at him and Hajime didn't know if his bullet would be strong enough to break through the magic. He shot three rounds towards the 2 air slashes and was lucky that the first two negated the slashes. The third shot got through to the bear's arm, lopping it off just like when he had lost his. Seeing his chance, Hajime threw his flashbang, since the bear was not only in pain but also in shock that it lost in a contest of power to its unknown prey. It didn't move away and saw the bright light making it unable to see, so it started to cast air slashes in front of it in the hopes of making its attacker unable to kill it. While casting air slashes blindly, it took a few steps away from when he had been to attempt to regain its vision. Seeing his chance, Hajime used a supersonic step to run at the bear's cut off arm and used a lighting field to follow the blood trail back to the bear. The bear got stunned from the electricity flowing through it. Hajime finally saw his chance to get his revenge and fired at the bear's head.
After the bear's eyes stop glowing, Hajime looks at the ceiling of the cave. Seeing the fight was over, Selena walked over to Hajime's side to see her hero that she had read about in her past life, be formed.
"You know, all I ever wanted to do is to go home Selena. This world is so unfair and unreasonable. I don't even care about the people here. They all left us to die in the pits of hell."
Selena places her hand on his shoulder, and asks, "You already had your life planned out before we came here, didn't you?"
"Yeah. I want to join my father in the video game company he is currently working for while also helping my mom on the side with her fan mail and any other miscellaneous tasks."
At that moment Selena dropped her hand from his shoulder, and looked down with a concerning face as she wondered, 'What am I working towards after this crazy adventure?'
Hajime looks over towards Selena and notices that she has a look that she normally has when she is lost in her thoughts. "What's wrong, Selena?"
"Hm? Oh it's nothing," She says waving him off before changing the topic, "Well, we may as well go further down this place. Even more so, since we can't go back up."
"Hmm?" Hajime looks at Selena and wonders if everything is alright in her head. "Why do you say that?
"I wandered down to find you, and the floor that I was on didn't have any way to go up. So that leaves only one route left" She explains while keeping to herself, 'I really don't want to waste time anyways, since Ehit would have already closed the way back.'
"I see. Well we will need to prepare everything we are taking to go down then. Ammo, the healing rock, a backpack to load our stuff…"
Seeing his bad habit play out Selena chopped his head and said "We can ready that stuff after we get back to base. Out here we can still run into mobs."
"And who was it that was zoning out first?" He asks with a smirk. As he is reloading his gun, he then continues, "Regardless, you are right. Let's go back to base." Selena goes and grabs the bear's body and lifts it over her head and carries it back to base while Hajime covers them both.
The next day, they had made all their preparations to head down and were lucky that they had already found the stairs down as they were hunting the newly named claw bear. Arriving at the top of the stairs, Hajime and Selena look at each other and, with a confident smirk on both of their faces, fist bump before heading down into the abyss.
Little did Selena know, the labyrinth was not the same as what she remembers from the light novel that she had read when she was alive.