Chapter 67
Deliver Us (2)
Davide felt pressed for ti. Though it was an unexpected situation, he worried that the Imperial Princess might get hurt.
There was no way the Imperial Princess would die, but he was afraid of what kind of retaliation might co even from a re scratch.
“Please.”
I spread my legs and raised the crystal sword. Its durability was in shambles, but its sharpness alone was exceptional. It was more than enough to land a decisive blow.
‘It’s gotten a bit heavier.’
As my demands increased, the crystal sword had gradually begun to strengthen. The only noticeable change was its weight, but even that was encouraging.
“What the hell is that doing now. Seriously.”
I frowned as I looked at the giant’s right hand, which seed to have flown in through the blasted passage.
Those things, which should never have gathered in one place, had clearly converged. I couldn’t see the legs, but they might have rejoined by now.
“Phew.”
I steadied my hastening heart. To be honest, would it be my fault if the Imperial Princess got hurt? Yes. I had agreed by contract to ensure her safety.
“……This just got more urgent.”
The fully revealed right arm floated in midair. With the head destroyed, it was in its first enhancent state.
It was fast, but simple—nothing I couldn’t dodge.
“Hup.”
The rocky arm, covered in bizarre characters, moved viciously. Instead of swinging, it threw a punch straight at , which I easily evaded.
The crystal sword would surely shatter in a single clash, so I conserved it as much as possible. I tapped at it with the Astral Gauntlet, gauging its durability.
“Lighter than I expected.”
The attack that passed over my head felt heavy, but the shock transmitted through the gauntlet wasn’t that significant.
“Well now.”
After I avoided several of its attacks, it seed thoroughly provoked. The right arm suddenly changed its pattern. Perhaps judging to be nimble, it tried to grab instead.
―Snap.
Unwilling to waste any more ti, I imdiately shifted into an offensive stance. The mont I raised my sword, I snapped my fingers.
The glass marbles I had secretly scattered across the ground exploded, spewing electric currents. The intense heat hindered its movent, and the current caused a minor shock.
I sharply drove in during that opening.
―Boom.
The crystal sword, unrivaled in sharpness, split the wrist of the giant’s hardened right arm and bit deep. The Thunder Horn Mark, fueled without hesitation by the stamina I had recovered with Worden’s potion, let out a strange sound.
“How troubleso.”
The explosion of the Thunder Horn Mark was enough to utterly crush the wrist. Watching the severed hand collapse with a thud, I clicked my tongue lightly and imdiately dashed forward.
I needed to check on the Imperial Princess.
“You have co.”
I arrived at the cavern where the head had once been. The Imperial Princess was sitting atop the cross-section of the vertically severed left arm. With a sword of the Imperial Knight Order planted into the ground for support, her eyes glead.
“……I am relieved that you are unhard.”
Not only was she uninjured, she didn’t even look fatigued. Covered in blood, I felt an inexplicable sense of unfairness, but I was relieved that she was safe.
“Do I look at peace?”
The Imperial Princess asked back with a serious expression. The speed that had been gradually decreasing began to rise again.
“That’s right. I am at peace. It was too easy.”
“Ha.”
When I hurried over and arrived right in front of her, the Imperial Princess gave a rather refreshing smile.
I let my face go cold for a mont before quickly smoothing it over. I intended to avoid giving her any grounds to nitpick.
“You. Davide.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“It is growing tireso. Is there a way to get out?”
The Imperial Princess openly displayed her boredom.
“First, we should—”
Before I could even finish speaking, the cavern shook violently. The Imperial Princess staggered greatly, and I fell over in an unsightly manner.
The tremor was incomparable to anything we had felt so far—it felt as though the entire room had been torn out and shaken.
***
“Haaah!”
Winter, her stamina depleted, was exhausted from the long run. She had kept her mouth shut and done her best so as not to be a hindrance, but even that had its limits.
In the end, when Winter tripped over her own feet and fell, Worden imdiately scooped her up. Carrying her like luggage, he ran with all his might.
“Could you~ run a little~ faster~?”
Canis, who had been blocking the monsters’ charge from the very back, groaned. Gritting his teeth, Worden forced out more strength even with Winter on his back.
Canis summoned a mass of crystals to obstruct the monsters’ path. Thanks to Worden, Winter regained a bit of stamina and assisted Canis by firing Divine arrows.
“Do you see~ anything?”
“The air? The flow’s changing!”
The perceptive Worden sensed a subtle shift in the airflow ahead. It ant the straight corridor had a different structure further on.
“Ugh, haa. Huh?”
At so point, the slope changed. There was no visible difference in appearance, but the angle of the ground beneath their feet twisted ever so slightly.
“Stop? Stop!”
“Oh dear~ this is quite troubleso~”
Worden’s trait, Adrenaline, activated. A trait that increased agility when danger was sensed. Before he could be consud by the accompanying exhilaration, Worden quickly halted in place.
Canis, who had been following at a fair distance, showed signs of concern. Not far behind them, an enormous number of bandage monsters were in pursuit.
“A trap~ perhaps~”
“Switch? Crystal.”
At Canis’s words, Worden silently shifted his stance. The quick-witted Canis promptly ford a small lump of crystal and handed it over.
Grinning as if delighted by the rush of exhilaration, Worden fired the crystal at high speed.
“The path’s blocked~”
Knowing through Davide that Worden’s instincts were exceptional, Canis scanned the surroundings with complicated eyes.
Winter, who had been sprawled out, barely managed to rise and helped Canis.
“W-wait? J-just a mont!”
There was nothing particularly unusual about the corridor. It looked identical to the one they had been running through. Canis began tapping around the area.
Winter, her face pale as she examined their surroundings, discovered sothing strange—sothing they had not noticed before.
“Did our Winter~ find sothing?”
Canis waited as Winter suddenly stared at sothing. Winter stood frozen, her mouth hanging open as she fixed her gaze on a single spot.
“Letters. They’re letters!”
“Hm?”
Winter imdiately dropped flat onto the ground. Pulling out the notebook she always carried, she began furiously writing sothing down.
At Winter’s words, Canis’s eyes glead as she examined the surroundings. Sixty-centiter square stones. A wall made of six such stones joined together.
“You’re right~ sothing’s changed.”
Each corner of the squares forming the wall had turned black. So had all four corners stained, while others had only one.
“I wonder if our Winter can read it~”
“Crystal? Crystal.”
“Oh dear~”
The blackened corners gathered into a certain pattern. Winter had not been wrong to call them letters.
However, Canis had never seen such characters in her life. She was itching to ask Winter, but urgent voices rose from behind them.
“Seems we’ve got no choice~”
Canis took position beside Worden. She created a heap of small crystals, perfect for scattering across the floor.
“The numbers? There’s a lot.”
“I can~ see that too.”
The corridor was pale and hazy. With explosions of fire and ice occurring one after another, steam naturally ford.
Since the space wasn’t sealed, the steam was quickly absorbed into the walls, but Worden was launching so many attacks that it never fully cleared.
“About how many~ do you think there are?”
“Hmm? Around 200?”
“……Oh my. That’s more than I imagined~”
Canis’s crystals and earth magic didn’t deal significant damage. She used her crystals to form a barricade and glanced back.
Winter’s notebook, which she was scribbling in like a madwoman, had just passed four full pages.
“This! This! Silent Bell! Everyone, gather!”
At Winter’s urgent cry, Canis grabbed Worden by the collar and dashed over. Even while being dragged, Worden’s hands never stopped moving.
“Please!”
Winter pulled out Silent Bell and swung it more fervently than ever before. Clang, clang. The sound was so desperate it almost seed cheerful at a glance.
The group, their heads pressed close together, tilted their heads in confusion. Davide had clearly told them not to ring Silent Bell unless absolutely necessary.
They had realized from Davide’s explanation that the dungeon reacted to the ringing of Silent Bell. He had not been pleased with the dungeon changing.
“This is scary~”
Canis began to whine. As their attacks lessened, the bandage monsters gradually crept closer. Worden, without the slightest movent, kept his eyes fixed on them.
Winter quietly closed her eyes and continued ringing the bell. Fresh tears stread down along the dried tracks on her cheeks.
“Oh my~”
Silent Bell rang too many tis to count. Even its solemn resonance, heard this closely and this often, began to feel sowhat loud.
Just as Canis readied herself again to block the bandage monsters, she felt the space separate. As if in zero gravity, the group began to float, and the space they occupied started to move.
“How rude~”
With the violent shift, the group was flung about in all directions. Worden let out a short exclamation, as if amused, while Winter, tossed around and crashing hard, cried out in pain.
“Aaah! Aah!”
Unlike the others, who had so sense of balance, Winter had no choice but to roll wherever the moving space carried her, and her entire body beca covered in dust.
“Winter~”
“Ahh… hngh.”
It hurt more than she had expected, and Winter let out a low sob. She bit her lip tightly to hold back her tears, but they slipped out between her teeth anyway.
“Winter~ Winter~”
Perhaps she had rolled badly; the index finger of her left hand hurt as if it were dying. She clutched her hand and groaned for quite a while, yet no one ca to help her.
As the pain subsided sowhat, Winter realized that Canis had been calling her all along.
“Yes, I’m alive. What is it?”
“What could~ that be?”
Winter turned her head toward where Canis was pointing and involuntarily gaped. At the center of the rged space stood sothing grotesque.
“W-what?”
A gigantic blackened hand rose up from the floor. Its fingernails protruded far out, like the claws of a beast.
What froze the group in place were the pupils covering the hand. Wrist, fingers, joints, back of the hand, palm. Eyes were embedded everywhere, each one casting an intense gaze.
“At first glance~ it looks like quite the monster~ I’ve never seen anything like that~ What about you, little sparrow?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen or heard of it.”
Such a grotesque form was sothing she had neither seen nor heard of before. An instinctive revulsion inherent to being human rose within her. Winter swallowed dryly.
“Get a hold of yourselves.”
An unfamiliar yet familiar voice. Winter hurriedly turned her head. In the distance, she saw Davide walking slowly toward them, drenched in blood.
Beside him followed a woman with unfamiliar dark crimson hair.
“We greet Your Highness, the Imperial Princess.”
Before Winter could cry out “Senior!”, Canis stepped forward first. She dropped to her knees with ease before the woman standing beside Davide, exuding noble dignity.
Startled for a mont, Winter quickly knelt as well. She even kicked the back of Worden’s knees, forcing him to kneel when he remained standing blankly.
“That is enough.”
To think that Robe, who had acted with them, was actually the Imperial Princess. Winter repeated the Imperial Princess’s low voice over and over in her mind.
“More importantly. You. Davide.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“It seems you know where this place is. And what that is as well.”
I looked toward the end of the Imperial Princess’s gaze. The black hand embedded with dozens of eyes. Having cleared the ga before, I knew its identity well.
“There is also a religion in the desert.”
“That much I know as well.”
“I do not know the details, but it is said that the desert tribes worship a blackened God of Death.”
“That thing is related to that god? It is certainly black.”
A structure shaped after the god worshipped by the desert tribe. It was not sothing that should appear here.
“The tastes of the desert tribe are peculiar.”
At the Imperial Princess’s words, everyone nodded. Upon seeing sothing so grotesque, no one would wish to rely on it.
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