Ultimate Gamer System: Factory Must Grow!-Chapter 96: Drowning Maiden

Plop!

While on the bridge, the two of them were merely soaking the water into their clothes, given how the metal grate was merely half an inch below the surface of the moat.

Now that Theo removed the bridge, however, the two of them fell straight into the deep canal.

There was a difference between the two of them, though, even if they were both dropped into the same circumstance.

A difference of Theo expecting it to happen, as opposed to this fiery-haired woman who was caught completely by surprise.

In a natural self-preservation instinct, she first relaxed her legs from around Theo's hips as she started to kick at the water.

And Theo didn't waste this opportunity to use both his hands and his legs to first push himself deeper into the water before quickly turning and then swimming away.

Using nothing but his memory of his surroundings to orient himself in the water, Theo quickly swam away from the molestation danger this girl represented, soon grabbing at the submerged end of his electrifying rod and using it to pull himself up to the concrete shore of his moat.

"Haaa…"

Breathing out all the carbon dioxide that had gathered in his lungs during the dive, Theo pulled himself up to the shore only to roll over to his back and take but a few seconds to breathe.

Even if he wasn't an exceptionally athletic person, this underwater escapade of his still left him slightly drained, all the more when coupled with the exhaustion caused by dealing with this weirdly clingy woman.

'She should be coming up from the water soon,' Theo thought, gritting his teeth and then standing up before retreating a few steps away from the moat…

Only to realize that this girl was now nowhere to be seen!

'Is she biding her time, trying to catch me by surprise again?' Theo considered the possibility, given just how hard it was to free himself from her hold.

Yet, as seconds went by and that woman still failed to resurface, Theo had no other choice but to consider another, equally likely chance.

'Don't tell me…'

Gritting his teeth, Theo moved back to the concrete shore of his moat, staring into the waters in an attempt to locate the girl underneath the surface…

But no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't see her!

"MY LADY!"

On the other side of the moat, the rest of the woman's group was now sprinting over the open field, their faces twisted in terror, their weapons already out in their hands as they used their blades to hurriedly cut through the straps of their armors, freeing themselves from the dead weight as they ran.

"Just what are the chances?"

Theo sighed out, before taking two steps back… and then rushing forth, only to pull his hands up above his head as he jumped and dived straight back into the moat.

'Where the hell are you…'

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Regardless of the discrepancy between what he himself saw in this girl through the lens of his system quest and how she reacted when seeing him… Theo wasn't the kind of man to stand aside and do nothing when a stranger was drowning!

Still…

'Come on! Where!'

Fully submerged and reaching roughly the halfway point of his moat's depth, Theo finally saw something.

'There!'

An unexpected shape resting at the bottom of his moat.

With a few pushes of his hands and the kicks of his legs, Theo swam even deeper… only to realize that rather than the girl, it was a broken-off part of the one monster that made it all the way to the moat!

'Shit!'

Cursing in his thoughts, Theo spun around…

'Wait, I'm stupid!'

Even with how deep Theo's moat was, it was nowhere near deep enough to make it hard for the light to penetrate. Or so would be the case if not for all the monster blood that continued to ooze out from its broken body parts, making Theo feel as if he was swimming in heavily diluted paint rather than actual water.

But that didn't mean he had no means to locate the girl even with no light at all!

'Let's go, building overlay!'

With the universal tool manifesting within Theo's hand, the situation changed.

The water itself appeared to disappear, replaced by nothing but the even grid of the land's layout, broken only by the monster scraps… and the desperately moving shape just a few meters away!

'There!'

Wasting no time, Theo kicked the water with his feet, pushing his hands out in the direction he quickly swam up. And when his fingers finally grasped at some sort of wet, heavy cloth…

'Now!'

Rather than trying to just swim up, Theo ensured a proper hold on the other party before twisting his body, resting his feet down on the channel's floor and only then kicking up.

This moment of consideration allowed Theo and the girl to shoot up through the water rather than just swimming through it, quickly reaching the halfway point of the moat's depth.

By then, however, the girl in Theo's arms had pretty much ceased to move, bubbles of air suddenly escaping from her mouth signifying Theo had now mere seconds left.

'All you had to do was fucking let me go!' he screamed out in his thoughts as he desperately paddled the water away with his feet.

Three meters.

Two meters.

Some distance away, the water suddenly exploded as several shapes dropped into the moat.

A meter away.

Pop!

Theo's head broke through the surface of the water, quickly followed by his shoulders and thus the head of the girl in his arms.

Even though they'd escaped the water, however, she didn't start moving or coughing, proving there really wasn't much time left for Theo to act.

Thankfully, with all the level-ups he went through since his exile started, dragging the unconscious girl over to the concrete shore wasn't all that much of a problem.

Pulling her up, though, all the while trying not to cut her on the iron electrodes poking out from the concrete's shore, though…

'Just a little bit more!'

Gritting his teeth as he kneeled over the moat's edge, Theo pushed his arms to their limit as he first lifted the girl out of the water only to then collapse backward, using his own chest to soften the girl's fall.

This time, however, he didn't take his time to enjoy the feeling of her wet body pressing down against his own.

Instead, he instantly rolled over to the side, pushing the unconscious woman down on the ground before getting up himself and then rushing to put her properly on her back and then to tilt her head back and her chin up.

'Is she…'

Wasting no time, Theo twisted his head to the side before bringing his ear over to the girl's open mouth while his eyes pinned on the girl's chest, looking out for even the tiniest sign of movement.

'Shit!'

Not even with her airway in perfect position to breathe did the girl spit the water she most likely swallowed.

And that, against all of Theo's own wishes and dreams for how he wanted his first to ever happen, forced him to do what likely would get him a hefty lawsuit payout back on Earth.

"All of this because you couldn't let fucking go," he muttered before checking the girl's airways again… only to then squeeze her cheeks with his left hand and then lean down and seal her mouth with his lips.