Chapter 739: One shouldn't eat things randomly picked from the ground

Seiji felt that he had a huge advantage, so he autoattacked, and was forced to type GG... that didn't happen at all.

The Sakura samurai "army" looked impressive, but that was all there was to it. They were only strong because of numbers, yet numbers were their only strength.

The "General" samurai demons were several times stronger than the regular Sakura samurai, but the Generals were still much weaker than the tree demons. For the knight order members, these Generals simply required a few extra hits to take down.

After quite some time, the knight order successfully destroyed the entire "army".

Eight of the Generals in the army dropped crystals that were twice as large as ordinary crystals dropped by the small fry. The shininess was about the same.

Apart from the Generals, a total of five ordinary Sakura samurai dropped crystals, fewer than last time.

In the third wave, the General level samurais became nothing more than the small fry! Since the average mob enemies became more difficult, the knight order had a much more difficult time.

Upon reaching the final boss battle, a "King" level samurai demon appeared.

The "King" demon had a similar physical appearance to the "General" demon. It was just that the King's demon horse was equipped with horse armor, and the King's body size was a bit larger and he gave off a stronger aura. The King was also glowing faintly red.

Numerous General-level demons appeared next to him as if they were his bodyguards. A sea of countless ordinary Sakura samurai demons appeared as well, forming an army that was more than three times stronger than the second wave!

This time, Seiji didn't shout while charging hot-bloodedly.

"It's time to use that move." Seiji intentionally spoke such a classical line while looking at Kaho.

Kaho indicated nonverbally that she was ready.

[Mana Exchange]!

Seiji used their contracted connection to send Mana to his Spirit-branded Retainer.

"Ahn..."

Kaho instantly felt a thick and warm sensation entering her body. She couldn't help but moan because it felt too comfortable.

Her face flushed red as she did her best to bear it. She used the Mana she received to activate Koumei's power.

Everyone saw her beginning to glow red as blood-red runes appeared in her eyes. A large number of colorful beams of light reached out from her back, instantly extending for more than ten meters, and forming a gigantic pair of beautiful rainbow wings!

She was extraordinarily beautiful, and had a stunning aura about her. Her appearance astounded everyone except for Seiji, who had seen it before.

Kaho then extended her palms, causing the blood-red runes within her eyes to glow. A dense shadowy insect swarm suddenly materialized, and speedily expanded into a dark red cloud while heading directly towards the Sakura samurai army!

The samurai demons seemed to sense danger as they suddenly attacked!

But, it was too late.

The shadowy insect swarm suddenly materialized completely, and became much clearer. These physical insects overwhelmed the demons like a torrential flood!!

This was the power of numbers being overwhelmed by an even greater power of numbers.

To sum it up simply, the insect swarm instantly destroyed the Sakura samurai demon army. However, Mika and the others were all shocked at the visual impact of what just happened.

Thousands and thousands of spiritual demons had instantly been devoured by the insect swarm... Even though everyone knew that the insects were their allies, they still felt scared.

These were still insects, after all. The scene wasn't pretty to behold at all, especially for all the girls.

They could only try to get accustomed to it.

Seiji had Kaho destroy all the ordinary Sakura samurai demons with her insects, leaving only the Generals and the King for everyone else to deal with.

"How do you feel?"

"Alright."

The blood-red runes within her eyes faded as the rainbow wings disappeared. Apart from feeling slightly tired, Kaho didn't feel anything else off at all.

This meant that Koumei was being quite obedient, which was a good thing.

This time, nine of the Generals dropped crystals, while ten ordinary Sakura samurai dropped crystals. The King didn't drop any crystals at all.

And then, the fourth wave... the boss monsters of this wave included multiple Sakura samurai armies together with many tree demons!

Seiji supported Kaho with his Mana once more to release a powerful swarm of insects that got rid of all the ordinary Sakura samurai demons. This left only the Generals, Kings, and tree demons behind for everyone else.

Two Kings dropped crystals during this wave, and these crystals were three times the size of ordinary crystals, along with being slightly shinier.

Only three of the tree demons dropped crystals this time. Just like the previous wave, nine Generals dropped crystals, while fifteen crystals were obtained from ordinary Sakura samurais.

After killing off this wave of monsters, everyone successfully powered up. This training session ended here.

Seiji's companions improved their power and gained experience. They all learned new techniques or improved at using their current techniques. All of these were a great harvest.

However, Seiji felt that the greatest harvest of all this time was the Inner World Crystals!

These crystals were only dropped by the spiritual monsters that weren't under Kazuko's control.

Kazuko didn't know why these monsters had appeared even though she didn't summon them. Neither was she able to increase nor decrease their numbers. She could sense that they were different from the ordinary experience mist providing monsters, but her senses were limited. And, she was unable to sense ordinary samurai loot-dropping monsters.

Basically, their appearance was random, and Kazuko could only sense them on a limited scale.

It would seem that Kazuko's control over her Domain had decreased, but Seiji felt that she had actually leveled up instead.

Previously, no such loot-dropping monsters had appeared in her Domain. Now, they could appear, which was obviously a good thing. Although the loot-dropping monsters were only appearing at random, he felt that Kazuko would level up her ability even further in the future, making it possible to control and summon such monsters!

It was highly likely that Kazuko's Domain's powers had leveled up due to the Realm of Cherry Blossoms' influence. He didn't know if she would level up her powers even more in the future, but he was looking forward to it.

As for these crystals, he figured that there were more usages to them apart from using them as a points' substitute in his system.

Yukari wasn't the only one who wanted to eat them. Hisashi and Kaede also mentioned that they felt a strong urge to eat these crystals. Mika, Hoshi, and Kaho all said that they had a small urge to eat these crystals. Mayuzumi said that she didn't feel anything at all.

Seiji felt that this had to do with their differing methods of absorbing the experience mist.

Yukari, Hisashi, and Kaede all had to personally absorb experience mist. Mika absorbed experience mist through Mashiro, Hoshi absorbed experience mist through his summoned spirit eagles and his elven emblem on his hand, while Kaho had Koumei and Mayuzumi had Idelia.

Those who personally absorbed experience felt the strongest urges to eat these crystals. Those with spirits living within themselves had weaker urges to eat these crystals. Mayuzumi, who had an outside summoned spirit, felt nothing at all... Seiji felt like this was a reasonable hypothesis.

As for Seiji himself, although he didn't feel any desire to eat these crystals, the mysterious system possessing him wanted to "eat" them (as these crystals could be used in place of points). So, technically, this also counted as wanting to eat them?

He decided to have Kaho ask Koumei about the crystals. He learned that Koumei indeed wanted to eat these crystals as well, but the insect demon didn't know anything about the crystals. It simply felt an instinctive desire to eat them upon seeing the crystals—just like Yukari and the others.

Seiji decided to ask his bonded spirit Yomi about the crystals.

"From what I can tell, these crystals can be beneficial for spiritual power. However, it's quite possible that there are hidden downsides. I don't recommend directly eating them."

One shouldn't eat things randomly picked off the ground. That sounded quite reasonable to Seiji.

However, his dating sim system wouldn't get an upset stomach, because his system didn't even have a stomach, haha!

System: Hey!

Seiji: 'Just joking.'

He figured that there would be no harm in using the crystals to upgrade his Spirit House.

He would try to obtain more information on these crystals in the future.

Everyone had given the crystals they gathered to him. Seiji took all the crystals into his room for privacy before opening up his system.

He saw that there was now a [Pay with crystals] option in his system's function of opening the door to his Spirit House. 1 crystal would be used up to open the door each time.

What exactly counted as 1 crystal, with all the different sizes and qualities? There was no specific explanation.

Seiji then checked the Spirit House rooms, and saw that they all now had the additional option of being constructed for crystals instead of points.

The [Bathroom] option which had required 299 points would cost 12 crystals to construct.

[Shower], [Bedroom], and other such 369 point rooms required 22 crystals to construct!

Opening the door to the Spirit House required a payment of 33 points each time. With that 33:1 conversion rate, the [Bathroom]'s crystal construction cost would actually be the equivalent of 396 points! The [Shower] and other such rooms would thus cost 726 points!!

Seiji's cheeks twitched after he finished his calculations.

This was such a pitfall his system had given him!!