Episode 045.
[Warning: The Evil God’s Avatar is descending.]
I got out of the boss room faster than anyone else.
“…….”
Even if it was called the Evil God scenario,
it was originally nothing more than catching the apostle conducting the ritual. There was never supposed to be anything like the Evil God descending.
“M-Master….”
Prisia, tucked under my arm, trembled as she somehow tried to burrow into my embrace.
But I had no leisure to answer.
Because I was squeezing out my mana and sprinting so hard the ground nearly burst beneath my feet.
I concentrated mana into my legs and ran at full speed toward the entrance we had first come through.
The density of mana I felt behind me had already surpassed the level of a boss.
A dissonance, as if space itself were being torn apart, poured out from behind my back.
“Fuck….”
A curse slipped out for the first time in a while.
Well,
just what kind of bastard had destroyed dozens of layers of barriers and even the sacred formation nailed down like a wedge?
This was absolutely not the work of goblins.
Because it couldn’t be, to begin with.
It looked as though someone had deliberately set out to kill me.
Just as the entrance began to appear far in the distance,
a chilling aura brushed the nape of my neck from behind.
++
[Warning: The ‘Evil God’s Avatar’ has manifested in the human realm!]
[Caution: This is an incomplete manifestation. In order to adapt its divinity, all stats are temporarily reduced by 90%.]
++
A stat reduction?
It was a hopeful message, but I did not stop.
“Holy Spear!”
“Storm Wave!”
A few adventurers tried to launch a surprise attack, just like I had earlier, but…
Wooooong—
The moment their bodies touched the light pouring out of the sphere,
“W-What just happened…? Th-They disappeared?!”
“This is impossible!”
They turned to dust and vanished, as if they had never existed in the first place.
“What are you doing?! Run, now!”
The Evil God that had only existed in the setting.
I didn’t know its overall stats, but rotten or not, it was still a divinity.
There was no way we could stop it just because its stats had been cut by 90%.
Maybe the Hero with a full endgame set could give it a try,
but as for me, an F-rank incompetent Hero, the result was obvious.
But the system did not stop there, and added something even more cruel.
++
[Warning: In commemoration of its first descent in 100 years, a special bonus will be granted.]
[‘Random Skill Copy’ has been activated.]
[One random skill from a random boss currently existing on the continent will be copied and granted.]
++
A random skill?
Could it be?
As I ran, I prayed inwardly to Goddess Aseria.
The destruction of the sacred formation? The descent of the Evil God?
Fine, all fine, so please,
give that bastard something like large-scale self-destruction or ritual suicide.
If that comes up, we can bring it down with only minor damage.
We can still win.
Just as I was thinking that,
Ding—!
The indifferent system notification pierced my eardrums.
++
[Copy complete: Plundered the unique passive of the ‘Demon King.’]
[Passive: Human Slaughter]
++
“…….”
My steps slowly came to a halt.
No,
I had no choice but to freeze.
This was no longer something I could calculate.
The Demon King’s exclusive passive,
and the worst authority that the Hero’s party had to break through first when they stormed the Demon King’s Castle.
Its effect was simple.
And because it was simple, it was all the more troublesome.
++
[Current number of humans within range: 284]
[The ‘Evil God’s Avatar’s’ attack power, health, and all stats increase by 284 times.]
++
“…Insane.”
284 times.
That was a number even the Hero wouldn’t be able to handle if he joined hands with the Demon King and ganged up on it.
It was no different from an outright death sentence saying, “YOU DIED.”
There was just…
no answer.
Wooooooong—!
Soon, a hand like faint mist protruded from the black sphere at the center of the altar.
When that hand drew a single line through the air, a spine-chilling rupturing sound echoed throughout the entire cavern.
Kugugugugung—!!
“…….”
Up ahead,
at the only escape route we had to get out through, enormous obsidian pillars rose up.
A perfect seal with not even a single gap.
The fact that it did not destroy the entrance might have been its mockery.
In an instant, the dungeon had turned into a massive prison trapping everyone inside.
“H-Huh…?”
“The entrance is blocked…? It’s blocked…!?”
The paladins and adventurers who had been following behind stopped in front of the obsidian wall and screamed like mad.
The mages swung their staves and poured all kinds of destructive magic into it, but the obsidian did not receive even a scratch.
“Move! I’ll break it!”
Gran swung his enormous axe and struck the wall, but instead, the axe blade shattered like glass and bounced away.
“…No, this can’t be… I have family waiting for me at home….”
“It’s all over now….”
The despair that began from someone’s mouth spread like a plague.
The Evil God’s aura, filling every direction, began to gnaw away at people’s minds.
“Hee, heeheeheehee!! We’re all going to die! We’re all going to die!!”
“The end is coming! The light has betrayed us!”
One adventurer, seized by madness, clawed at the floor and burst into laughter,
while the paladins and priests knelt and muttered prayers in hollow voices.
“Goddess Aseria… why do you give me such a trial? Why did the sacred formation…”
“Tyr! Please grant me the strength to overcome this hardship!”
“If this is the will of the gods, I shall humbly accept it….”
I set Prisia down and clenched my teeth.
A trial from the goddess?
The will of the gods?
You want me to die for that crap?
“…Bullshit.”
At that moment,
someone moved behind my back.
Old Man Gareth set down his black bow and took a black hourglass out from within his clothes.
A certain resolve had bloomed on his face.
“…Brat.”
“Old man.”
“Take care of Ellen.”
A heavy sentence, like a final will.
It was the trump card he had tried and failed to use against the monster of Inbium, the highest-grade self-destruct artifact, [Flames of the Firmament].
I instantly realized that, just like back then, Gareth intended to open a path using his own life as a catalyst.
However…
I silently shook my head.
“Old man, that won’t work.”
“…What do you mean?”
[Notification: By the Evil God’s authority, the use of all artifacts within this space has been sealed.]
[Remaining time: 23 hours 59 minutes]
Gareth, looking doubtful, tried injecting mana into the hourglass.
“…Ah.”
A hollow sigh slipped from between his lips.
That cunning Evil God bastard had cast a wide-area item seal the moment it descended.
With this, even if we had a top-tier escape artifact like an [Escape Rune], it would undoubtedly have been rendered useless.
“J-Just kill me instead….”
“We’re finished… Uwaaaaaah!!”
Once it became known that even artifacts had been blocked,
the mentality of the paladins and adventurers who had barely been holding on shattered completely.
It reached the point where some were clawing at the floor, screaming for someone to let them cut their own throats.
If that was the case, there was no helping it.
“There is one last method.”
“…Pardon?”
Gran and the adventurers, who had collapsed in despair, looked up at me blankly.
I took Prisia’s hand again and, without hesitation, started walking.
“Everyone, follow me.”
“W-Where are you going?”
“Where else? I’m going to get you out, so shut up and run.”
The place I turned toward was not the exit blocked by obsidian.
It was the side path on the opposite side, where deeper, darker darkness gaped like a maw.
“W-Why in the world would we go there?!”
A mage who had half lost his mind shouted in horror.
“There’s nothing down that path! On top of that, it’s full of traps and a maze, so it’s not easy to get out! We’ll all die!”
He was right.
To most adventurers and users, that side path was a death zone and a vicious infinite-loop trap that should not even be looked at.
But that was only under normal circumstances.
If we stayed still, death was certain, so were we supposed to just watch?
The odds were fifty-fifty.
“We can escape.”
I glanced at the Evil God’s Avatar, which was now beginning to take shape, and grinned.
I knew.
That hidden within that maze was a hidden stage that opened only under specific conditions.
‘No matter how much of an Evil God it is, it can’t interfere with the dungeon system.’
If it could, it would have moved the entrance or transformed the dungeon instead of blocking it with something like obsidian.
We could still get out.
For now.
If we were unlucky, we might end up warping all the way to the demon lands, but…
That would still be better than dying right here, wouldn’t it?
“Anyone who falls behind will be abandoned. Run!”
At that moment, several familiar figures walked out of the darkness along with ragged breathing.
“…Haa, haa. Tanas, you’re spouting nonsense again…”
“Captain? How did you get here…?”
“You should definitely have been tied up.”
The man standing there, barely supported by his companions while limping pathetically on both legs, was Kael.
“Everyone, stop! Don’t be fooled by that bastard!”
Kael spat bloody saliva with a tack and glared at me as if looking down on me.
“…….”
I did not ask how he had gotten in.
Why he had come in was what mattered.
It did not seem like he had come for revenge…
“Kael, what happened outside?”
The tremors that had shaken the dungeon and the destruction of the sacred formation.
Had a high-ranking demon or one of the Four Heavenly Kings appeared?
“I don’t know.”
“What?”
“I merely came to confirm your ugly true nature… Everyone, listen! I command you in the name of the expedition leader!”
“What kind of bullshit are you about to—”
“Heroes of Artem! Do not be afraid! This is nothing more than its last struggle, throwing up some fog!”
He calmly drew his magic sword.
It shone brilliantly, like a holy sword.
It must have been Kael’s trump card.
“Tanas… aren’t you ashamed? You’re going to tuck your tail and run like this? Do you intend to disgrace the name of Hero?”
At that confident shout, the eyes of the people driven into a corner wavered, and one by one… no, several of them moved toward Kael.
“The expedition leader… no, the true Hero, Kael, will stand with you!”
To them, it must have been easier to believe the sweet lie that the dungeon boss was making its last desperate struggle than to follow someone telling them to go into a trap-filled maze.
In fact, there were quite a few bosses like that from time to time.
“Let’s go.”
I did not stop them, nor did I try to persuade them.
Unlike me, they must have judged that they truly had a chance and sided with Kael.
If Kael’s group defeated the Evil God’s Avatar…
then he would become a real Hero.
I’m counting on you, Kael.
I hurried toward the hidden stage.
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