Before I begin with what happened from here on out.
Honestly, I thought nothing much would happen on this floor either.
In fact, everyone else seemed to think the same, because the atmosphere itself wasn’t all that heavy.
With this much fighting power, I figured we had more than enough force to clear an intermediate dungeon.
I mentioned it once before, but intermediate dungeons were usually the sort of difficulty that a few Experts could clear without much trouble.
But in our party right now, even excluding me, we had two upper-grade Experts, one 7th Circle mage, and even a Saintess.
By normal standards, we were over-specced.
Yes.
By normal standards, that was true.
***
It’s wide. Really wide.
Unlike the other floors, the size of a boss room doesn’t necessarily have much to do with clear time or difficulty, but…
Still, when a place is wide, it makes you think.
Because there are all kinds of possibilities when it’s wide.
For one, the boss could be ridiculously huge.
Or the boss might have a pattern where it goes berserk while moving all over the place.
Or there might just be a lot of mobs.
In any case, there was a possibility that something annoying would happen.
But it was just annoying. There wasn’t anything I was particularly worried about.
The 1st floor, and then the 2nd floor after that.
The Hero’s party had cleared them with performances that were practically one-sided slaughter.
I didn’t think the boss room would be all that different.
Of course, it would probably take a bit longer.
Still, clearing it was only a matter of time, wasn’t it?
I wasn’t raising a flag. Objectively analyzing our forces, this was a result anyone could reasonably predict.
It wasn’t carelessness. I was confident that anyone else standing here in my place would think exactly the same thing I did.
—Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud.
The sound of something approaching came from above.
The place we were standing in was surrounded on all sides by tall cliffs.
And the source of the sound was the top of the cliff.
Hundreds of adult Abraxases were glaring down at us, lined up in a row like a seasoned army.
But…
‘What are small fries like you going to do by glaring at us?’
Heh.
I’d already seen them swept away in droves by a single slash from the Hero with my own two eyes.
There was no way something like that could be scary.
They were probably waiting like that for the boss to appear.
“4th Circle Fire Magic—Fire Storm.”
—Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-boom!!
It wasn’t like this was some fair and honorable duel.
The first strike was always the key to victory.
The pillar of fire Signica summoned swept over the Abraxases and instantly devastated the battlefield.
“Keeeeek! Keeeeek!!!”
The Abraxases were caught in the storm where they stood and turned to ash.
However,
—Whoooosh.
Suddenly, Abraxases even larger than the other adults flew down from the sky, and with a flap of their wings, they extinguished Signica’s magic.
“Tch. I guess intermediate is still intermediate.”
Signica clicked her tongue as she spoke.
Monsters and demons.
They were lifeforms made of demonic energy.
Because of that, each individual had at least one means of offsetting magic or aura up to a certain level.
In some cases, their own demonic energy was simply of a higher level than the attack, so it wouldn’t work.
And at other times, they erased the attack through a specific action, just like now.
For example, the first case went like this.
Let’s say a mage attacked with 4th Circle magic.
But the monster that was hit was higher grade than the 4th Circle?
Then it would possess a fairly high level of resistance against 4th Circle magic.
The attack wouldn’t be completely ineffective, but it wouldn’t land properly either.
Of course, fights between humans were an exception.
This applied only to beings made of energy, such as monsters, demons, or spirits.
If humans wanted to block an opponent’s attack, they had to either use defensive magic or dodge. One of the two.
To put it bluntly, even a 9th Circle archmage would die if they were caught defenseless and stabbed badly with a knife.
Well, anyway… that was the first case.
The second method would be something like the wingbeats we just saw.
This was a phenomenon caused by the compatibility of powers.
To put it simply, it was “mana, aura < demonic energy,” so by spreading demonic energy through their wingbeats, they suppressed attacks made of magic or aura.
That meant if the enemy’s level was higher than ours, we wouldn’t necessarily lose, but we would definitely have a hard fight.
However,
we were an exception.
Because the Hero’s Demon-Bane trait stood above demonic energy.
To a certain extent, we could escape that absolute relationship of compatibility.
If none of our attacks worked, then we could just take the stance of “Hero, do it!!” and support only the Hero with everything we had.
This was also connected to what I said last time about the Hero’s party being this and that when it came to the demonic.
Anyway.
For that reason, even though the magic had been blocked once, it wasn’t actually that shocking.
Especially for the Hero’s party, this probably wasn’t their first or second time dealing with something like this.
Sure enough, Signica calmly began preparing her next spell.
“Buy me time. I need to chant.”
“Don’t you have anything Memorized from last time?”
Signica stared at Bell’s back for a moment with narrowed eyes.
“That… I changed it to Teleport because Bell had so many occasions to use Teleport thanks to someone.”
“What a shame.”
“…?”
While Eladrien and Signica exchanged a magical conversation only they understood, I carefully observed the enemies’ formation and organized the patterns I expected in my head.
I had no means of long-range attack, so I needed to think about these things in advance whenever I had the leisure, like now before the battle had begun.
If there was anything I was better at than them, it was only my extensive knowledge of dungeons and various situations.
Acting and thinking on my own in ways that could be useful.
That was the means by which I could prove my need and my value.
In a way, this was my first battle where I would be coordinating with them.
At a time like this, I needed to leave a good impression so that they would be more likely to regard and accept me positively in the future.
“Keeeeeeeeek!!!!!!”
The Abraxases that had flown in from somewhere just now landed on the tallest cliff directly across from us.
One of them had feathers glittering with prismatic light, and at a glance, that one looked like the boss.
The other three were the uniques I’d seen once before, with yellow feathers as their key feature and crests shaped like crowns.
The rest seemed to be elite monsters equipped with things like armor and helmets.
Both sides were ready.
Now, it was time to clash.
“O thunder that shakes heaven and earth, O lightning that calls forth the storm…”
Signica recited her chant.
“Keeeeeeeeek!”
At the same time, as if responding in kind, a unique monster’s cry created countless caves in the cliff.
—Dududududu.
—Flap. Flap.
From within them, baby Abraxases and adult Abraxases poured out until the space seemed ready to burst, charging toward us.
It was around then.
That I began to think something might have gone slightly wrong.
““Keeeeeeeeeeeeek!!””
The Abraxases standing atop the cliff all began crying out at once.
Not just once, but continuously.
The sound probably wouldn’t stop until we dealt with all of them.
If it had just been ordinary cries, that would have been one thing, but the sound inflicted an abnormal-status debuff when heard.
—Thud.
Ariel immediately sat down on the spot and began praying.
“Holy Art—Anti-Debuff.”
A circular pattern glowing yellow spread beneath our feet.
Thanks to that, the cries continued to be heard, but we weren’t rendered incapable of fighting because of the sound.
—Giiing.
Behind us, Eladrien was drawing her bowstring with magic power infused into it.
—Creak, creak, creak!! Fwoosh!
The arrow, drawn to maximum tension, shot from the bow in an instant.
“Star-Chasing Arrow.”
An arrow filled with green mana flew toward the enemies in the sky, who would be difficult for the vanguard to handle.
The arrow traced a path, giving off a beautiful light as though chasing after a falling star.
“Splitting Light.”
That one arrow divided into several clusters of light.
“Meteor Shower.”
Like a night sky pouring down stars, the arrows rained upon the enemy.
—Papapapapapak!!!!
“Keeeeek!”
“Kwek!!!”
With only a single arrow, the sky was cleared.
The small fry flying through the sky were driven down into the ground.
And so,
now it was our vanguard’s turn to step forward.
“Bright World Heavenly Light Sword, Third Form,”
Veronica’s sword, FiatLux, which had already been white, grew even more pure white.
“Heaven-Guarding Holy Flame Sword, First Form,”
My blade, too, turned dark red as it heated under the aura I had drawn up.
““Demon-Repelling Advent Light. / Dawn’s Sacred Flame.””
On one side, pure-white sword energy that had mercilessly butchered the Abraxases,
and on the other, flames that illuminated the darkness the light had yet to reach, bloomed and swept across the battlefield.
—Kwa-gwa-gwa-gwa-boom!!!!!!!
Our two attacks instantly cleared away the monsters that had approached nearby, securing a safe distance.
“Hoo…”
Compared to them, I was still lacking by a lot.
Veronica had swept away every enemy in front of her with a single form,
while I could only barely kill one adult Abraxas with one form.
That meant if I wanted to produce power similar to hers, I had to activate my forms several times in a short span.
Because of that, I tried to absorb as much as I could by watching her.
Her combat method was far more efficient than I’d expected.
—Whish! Whoosh!
She distinguished between adult and baby Abraxases, adjusting the strength of her aura each time she swung her sword.
On the other hand, every one of my attacks was at the maximum output I could produce.
‘And she wastes very little aura, too.’
That was the second difference between her and me.
In other words… her aura was a perfect straight line.
Because of that, her aura gathered well into one point and had high density, so when she killed an adult Abraxas, her sword didn’t get stuck halfway like mine had in the past.
In my case, however, my aura spread out in the shape of a fan.
That would let me kill baby Abraxases to some extent, but against durable adults, my sword would end up stuck halfway like last time.
Then I would have no choice but to raise my output and grind them down.
On the battlefield, every single one of those things was waste.
—Clang!
The claw attacks of the swarming Abraxases and cries fired from close range.
While dodging pecks that suddenly flew in from blind spots, I sharpened my sense for handling aura even further.
“Ugh.”
Because of that, there were inevitably moments when I had to allow attacks to land.
They were attacks I normally would have caught and avoided, but right now, I was focusing a little more on controlling my aura.
But taking a few wounds wasn’t much of a threat.
Unlike before, I wasn’t alone now.
Because behind me, there was a companion I could trust.
“Heal!”
As Ariel stretched her hand toward me, warm divine power immediately wrapped around my body.
And in just three seconds, it healed every wound on me.
‘I’ll make sure to thank her later.’
Thanks to her, I could try handling my aura even more boldly without worrying about getting hurt.
In this environment where failure did not immediately lead to death, I was growing faster than before.