The ominous premonition had been right. As soon as they reached the center of the fog, fierce war cries erupted from all directions.
“Woooooagh!”
At the same time, the sound of drums rang out. It was a signal announcing the charge of the orc warriors. Mixed in with it were the rough breaths of medium-sized monsters such as ogres and trolls. The heroes tensed themselves and prepared to fight back.
“Enemy attack.”
“Maintain formation.”
Daimon also clenched his fists and glared into the fog. The clock was nearly at zero, and thus he knew nothing about the enemy’s size or formation.
“What on earth has he prepared?”
Anxiety slowly welled up inside him, but Daimon steeled his heart. In the meantime, the enemy attack began. The first to reveal themselves were orc infantrymen gripping glaives.
Orc warriors clad in rough but sturdy-looking armor poured from the fog as though a dam had burst. Even at a glance, their numbers were enormous. Their bloodshot eyes gleaming, they charged the hero party.
Shing! Shing!
A desperate melee erupted. Weapons clashed everywhere, and bright-red blood spurted into the air. Corpses stripped of life collapsed here and there. Most of those falling were orc warriors. The heroes had been selected from among the finest high-ranking knights, and even when caught by a surprise attack, they were not easily defeated.
“Kuaaaargh!”
Orc warriors whose torsos had been severed collapsed where they stood with dying screams. Even so, the ranks of the charging orc warriors seemed endless. Then the medium-sized monsters surged forward. Legions of ogres and trolls wielding enormous battle axes slammed into the flank of the hero party, producing its first casualties.
“Graaagh!”
A hero struck by a gigantic battle axe went flying, his waist bent at a grotesque angle. Even anti-magic armor was useless against the heavy weapons of medium-sized monsters. The inside of the fog soon became a chaotic scene of splashing blood and flying flesh.
A wild melee had broken out in which it was difficult to distinguish friend from foe because of the dense fog. The members of the Kasim Mercenary Band were also swept up in the chaos and scattered in all directions. The heroes had no choice but to divide into groups of two or three, covering one another as they engaged in a frantic bloody battle. Daimon was no exception.
“Damn it!”
A dazzling streak of light shot out like an arrow. It pierced the brow of a troll that had just raised its battle axe. The troll, suffering a massive shock to its brain, died on the spot, its gigantic body crumpling helplessly to the ground. After killing the troll, Daimon threw himself forward without hesitation and unleashed a continuous barrage of Magic Missiles.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Two orc warriors charging at him were struck by the Magic Missiles and fell. A bitter smile formed at the corners of Daimon’s mouth.
“As expected of Verkis. He’s forced us into a situation where we can’t use high-level magic…”
In a situation where friend and foe were tangled together, he could not use advanced spells such as Energy Bolt or Hell Fire. They would inflict damage on his allies as well. Moreover, Daimon had noticed something strange about the orc warriors. He turned over the eyes of the orc warrior he had just felled, and felt his mind turn cold.
“You made them Berserkers. How despicable…”
If every charging orc and medium-sized monster was a Berserker, then this was no ordinary problem. Even the carefully selected heroes would inevitably struggle against mad warriors who charged at them without feeling pain.
The Berserk spell. It was a spell that turned its target into a frenzied warrior who had lost all reason. A Berserker felt no pain even after being wounded and swung its weapon without end until its life force was exhausted. In a word, it was a terrible spell that reduced its subject to a living weapon of slaughter.
Once the spell’s effects wore off, a Berserker had almost no chance of surviving. The spell consumed all of the body’s potential in an instant.
In the past, there had been cases in which several kingdoms of Truvenia cast the Berserk spell on their knights and led their armies to victory. Yet from an overall perspective, it could never truly be called victory. Most of the knights subjected to the Berserk spell lost their lives once the spell was dispelled. Those who survived after enduring countless hardships became invalids, no longer capable of wielding a sword. The kingdoms, having pointlessly lost most of their military strength, had no choice but to walk the path to ruin.
For that reason, the Berserk spell had long since become a forbidden form of magic. And yet, astonishingly, that very spell had been recreated by a dragon. After burning an orc warrior charging at him with a Fireball, Daimon ground his teeth.
“Verkis. Just how wicked do you have to be before you’re satisfied?”
Turning every orc warrior into a Berserker meant that they would launch their attacks without the slightest regard for their own deaths. As if to prove it, successive explosions began to erupt from within the fog.
Boom! Boom-boom-boom!
There were surely allies and enemies mixed together at the heart of every explosion. The unfortunate heroes must have fought frantically alongside the orc warriors, only to meet their deaths without even knowing what had happened. Daimon’s eyes blazed with fury.
After casually killing an ogre that had charged at him without fear, Daimon threw Increcia wide open.
Rumble, rumble, rumble!
Russellant, who had been waiting inside, appeared. At the same time, the four great Death Knights, led by Helberton, approached through the fog. Since their spirits were connected, there was no need to call them aloud.
“First, I need to draw Verkis’s attention to me.”
Explosions continued to ring out from within the fog. Without a doubt, heroes were continuing to die beneath Verkis’s magical attacks. Taking the Death Knights with him, Daimon mounted Russellant and flew into the sky without delay. He had to draw Verkis’s attention to himself in order to minimize the heroes’ casualties.
Although he had risen into the sky, he still could not see anything. The entire ground was blanketed in fog. Occasionally, flames surged upward amid the explosions, revealing that Verkis’s attack was continuing. Daimon cast a voice-amplification spell and shouted with all his might.
“Verkis! Stop this despicable nonsense and settle this here and now. If you have the courage, come up here!”
But the only answer was a cold, mocking laugh.
“Sorry, but I don’t want to. I’ll settle things after I’ve wiped out all the little fry.”
“You damned bastard. How can someone like you call himself a dragon? If you claim to belong to a great race, then act like it.”
But Verkis was not so easily lured by Daimon’s provocation.
“Pointless wordplay doesn’t work on me. Say whatever you want. I’ll fight here.”
Daimon had no choice but to descend to the ground. Judging from the situation, Verkis seemed determined to kill every hero gathered here. His eyes burned with fury.
“Damn it… In that case, I’ll wipe out those worthless orcs first.”
Just as he was about to charge forward with Russellant, a despairing scream suddenly burst from within the fog.
“Gaaaaah!”
At the same time, a dull metallic clang rang out. It was a sound Daimon could never forget.
“Looks like they’ve deployed a Bronze Golem.”
If a Bronze Golem had come, then an Iron Golem must have come as well. Realizing what was happening, Daimon sent the Death Knights in that direction.
“I’m counting on you.”
The heroes might be able to handle a Bronze Golem, but an Iron Golem was beyond them. Only Grand Master-level Death Knights like those could stand against it. After they departed, Daimon, still mounted on Russellant, began tearing through the fog in every direction.
“Move!”
When a gigantic Bone Dragon charged forward with a shrill cry, the heroes who had been fighting frantically hurriedly threw themselves aside. They could not help but be startled when an enormous monster suddenly burst from the fog.
But the Berserker legion they had been fighting was different. Having lost their reason to the spell, the Berserkers charged fearlessly at Russellant. There was no more fitting expression than a mantis trying to stop a chariot. Their courage was admirable, of course, but they had never stood a chance against him.
Russellant mercilessly trampled the charging orc warriors and lashed them with his tail.
Crack!
The orc warriors struck by the fiercely swinging tail were crushed from head to toe and sent flying. As Russellant had been made using an Ancient-class dragon as his base, his destructive power was beyond imagination. Any creature struck by that tail, carrying the full weight of his massive body, would be devastated—even a Twin-Headed Ogre.
Daimon, perched atop Russellant’s head and raining down Magic Missiles, repeatedly shouted at the top of his lungs. He was warning the heroes to stay alert.
“Dodge however you can. I don’t have the leisure to look after you too.”
Hearing those words, the heroes threw themselves aside with all their might. Each had been carefully selected from among the finest, and their movements were exceptionally agile. The enormous, skeletal tail of Russellant swept toward the orc warriors and medium-sized monsters that had lost their opponents.
Wham! Wham-wham!
Thanks to Russellant and Daimon rampaging madly across the battlefield, the hero party was finally able to reorganize its lines. Before Russellant, who trampled or lashed with his tail anything that got in his way, even the orc warriors under the Berserk spell were helpless. After crushing an ogre that blocked his path beneath his feet, Russellant opened his jaws wide.
Fwoooosh!
The Frost Breath he exhaled froze an entire squad of orcs huddled closely together. Russellant’s performance was even more devastating than Verkis’s magical attacks. He was shaking the orcs’ entire formation to its foundations. Verkis, who had been engrossed in his magical assault, soon realized that as well.
“Heh heh heh. As expected of the Dragon Slayer.”
Perhaps deciding that he had to break the stalemate, Verkis sent the last remaining Iron Golem toward Russellant. Among his forces, the only being capable of confronting the Bone Dragon was the Iron Golem. The Bronze Golems were currently locked in a frantic melee with the Death Knights.
Until now, the two sides had barely maintained a balance. If the Iron Golem were removed, the result would be obvious. But Verkis had no time to think it over.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud.
As heavy footsteps approached from within the fog, Daimon tensed sharply.
“It’s the Iron Golem. I should launch a preemptive attack.”
At his command, Russellant turned and whipped his tail with tremendous force. The tail attack appeared impossible to stop, but unfortunately, it did not work this time.
Clang!
A gigantic iron hand had seized Russellant’s tail.
“Is it finally time to avenge Zikrate?”
Without a moment’s hesitation, Daimon leaped down from atop Russellant’s head. Russellant was already charging straight at the Iron Golem that had wrapped its tail around itself. The bloody battle between the Iron Golem—the pinnacle of golem craftsmanship—and Russellant, the Bone Dragon created from an Ancient-class dragon, had finally begun.
This was not the first time an Iron Golem and a Bone Dragon had fought. In Arcadia, an Iron Golem had already once crushed the Bone Dragon Zikrate to the brink of death.
But the situation was different now. Russellant was by no means inferior to the Iron Golem. His strength and size far surpassed Zikrate’s, and he began a fierce battle against the Iron Golem without yielding an inch.
The first attack Russellant unleashed was Frost Breath.
Fwoooosh!
It was not particularly effective against the Iron Golem. But Russellant followed up by ramming his body into it, forcing the Iron Golem to release the tail it had been gripping tightly. Then Russellant’s merciless assault began.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
The Iron Golem effectively angled its enormous shield to block the repeated attacks of Russellant’s tail and claws. However, perhaps unable to withstand the tremendous force behind the tail strikes, it was forced to retreat step by step. Watching the battle, Daimon threw himself forward.
“Judging by the situation, this won’t be settled easily. I need to go support the heroes.”
If they exterminated all the orcs and medium-sized monsters throwing themselves into the fight with their bodies, they would no longer need to fear Verkis. No matter how skilled a dragon was at magic, there was a limit to the destructive power a single dragon could wield.
That was precisely why Daimon intended to join the melee himself. Dozens, then hundreds of streaks of light formed around Daimon’s body as he ran. They were Magic Missiles, exceptionally effective in a chaotic battle.
Pop-pop-pop-pop!
The Magic Missiles shot forth and struck straight through the gaps in the armor of the orc warriors fighting the heroes. The orc warriors transformed into Berserkers froze without even managing to scream. Then they were finished off by the swords of the heroes they had been fighting.