Episode 35
“…Isn’t this too much? What crime have we committed! We left on a potion expedition believing nothing but a rumor, and now you’re saying we’re on a date with monsters!”
“Rapilta, you’re young. Have some spirit of adventure.”
“Have the wrong adventure once, and I’ll be done for.”
Rapilta, Albereu, and Pol spat out jokes. They glared at the Wight Knight.
“Can we win?”
When Albereu asked, Rapilta shrugged.
“A wooden shield is still a shield. It’s my main weapon. If I have a shield, I can take on an ogre.”
“I see. Then if you defend, I attack, and Pol provides covering fire as a supporter…?”
Pol nodded.
“We have a chance. We can defeat the other Wights too.”
“Yeah? Then….”
Rapilta gripped his wooden shield.
“Let’s go.”
***
Roki, arriving late, looked at the mercenaries and slaves who had been slaughtered miserably—no, who were being devoured.
The Wights that had been digging into the entrails of the mercenaries and slaves sensed a presence, raised their heads, and looked at Roki.
—Grrrrr….
Along with a rattling sound, black blood bubbled like foam from the Wight’s mouth.
Roki let out a sigh.
One Wight opened its mouth wide and charged.
Roki snatched its head.
Flinching at the slight splatter of black blood and Worm Feast, he twisted his body to avoid it.
Glancing at Saelleot, whom he was carrying, Roki threw the Wight he held at another charging Wight.
‘What a bother.’
Another Wight charged. He kicked it away.
Dozens of Wights swung swords or thrust spears at him.
Roki advanced while dodging them.
‘There are quite a lot in front and behind. They said it was a rural village, but was the reality even worse?’
The number was countless, as if all the villagers and the fortress soldiers had been infected.
Roki avoided the Wights’ attacks as best he could to avoid getting dirty.
And when he reached the wide space at the end of the secret passage, he saw familiar companions.
“…Haa… haa… Damn! Fuck!”
Rapilta breathed roughly, gripping a wooden shield abandoned by mercenaries.
Beside him, Albereu had collapsed with blood flowing from his head, and Pol lay as if unconscious, having dropped his staff from his hand.
Only Ajareu was unharmed, using Albereu and Pol as shields, huddling over them with his head and body draped atop theirs as he trembled in fear.
Before them stood the Wight Knight, towering.
“…It seems quite strong.”
The moment Roki finished speaking, the Wight Knight swung its morning star at Rapilta.
Though it was a simple motion striking from left to right, its speed was extremely fast, and its power was especially enormous.
Rapilta hastily turned his shield to the left.
His specialty.
Divine Ability, [Iron Wall].
The power to temporarily amplify the durability of objects in his hands, or of his own body.
When he used his Divine Ability, a transparent light enveloped the wooden shield.
Rapilta thought that even a rotting, moldy wooden shield could easily endure a blow from an average knight.
But….
Crack!
The technique collapsed far too easily.
The sharp spikes embedded in the head of the morning star clashed with the shield, blunting them. At the same time, cracks formed in the center of the shield before it shattered into fragments.
The Wight Knight smiled through its helmet and did not stop swinging its morning star.
Rather, it put more force into blowing Rapilta away. But Rapilta urgently spun his body to avoid the strike and charged at the Wight Knight.
He quickly grabbed a fallen sword nearby and thrust it into the Wight Knight’s plate mail. No, he stabbed it, but could not pierce through.
“…Ha, this… damn.”
Rapilta froze stiff with the sword thrust into the Wight Knight.
His ability was to ‘maximize defense,’ not to sharpen a dull blade.
With a blade that had lost all its edge, it could not pierce a knight’s armor, let alone—even without armor, it would not have been able to pierce the Wight’s hide.
“As I thought… it was too much….”
In an instant, his body was sent flying.
The Wight Knight had spun three hundred and sixty degrees and swung its morning star at him.
Rapilta bounced off, struck the ceiling, then bounced again and was slammed to the floor.
A terrible sound of bones crunching was heard along with the thud of a large chunk of meat falling.
“U… ack! Damn! Fuck…! So… this is… why Worm Feast… is disgusting….”
Once infected, an ordinary person is granted a body rivaling a monster’s—no, even stronger. Needless to say, a trained common soldier, not to mention a knight who had undergone extreme training.
The Wight Knight before their eyes was a monster that could easily fight three ogres, the kings of the forest.
“…….”
Roki began walking quietly.
The other monsters surrounded them with the Wight Knight at the center.
A complete dead end.
Cornered, Ajareu trembled, spotted Roki, and grabbed his pant leg.
“Hey! Nodeuin! D-do something! If you save me, I’ll give you everything! I’ll give you my entire fortune! I’ll give you everything I have, so please, from these bastards…!”
Roki looked at him, tilted his head, then raised his grabbed leg. And he kicked Ajareu away.
“Uwaack?!”
Ajareu bounced right back and was thrown before the Wights.
“W-what are you doing?! What is this…!”
Just as Ajareu was about to scream at Roki with reddened eyes, his mouth was blocked by a red hand.
The Wights each grabbed his head, body, arms, and legs.
“Mmmph?!”
Ajareu shook his head and tried to struggle, but he could not move at all against the Wights’ grip. Rather, the Wights pulled the parts they held in all directions as if each were claiming its own prey.
“Uuuuaaaarrgh!”
His arms, legs, neck, and body stretched abnormally, then gradually his skin tore, muscles snapped, and bones broke.
In the blink of an eye, Ajareu’s limbs were separated and torn in all directions.
The Wights lay flat on the ground, licking and running their tongues over the fallen organs.
They cleanly devoured every scrap of flesh and drop of blood, leaving nothing behind.
Roki sneered, watching Ajareu disappear like that.
He hadn’t liked his commanding attitude from earlier.
There was no reason to save that bastard when everyone was already as good as dead.
“…You’ve been chattering too much since earlier.”
Roki set down Saelleot, who was still trembling, near Rapilta’s group.
“…Are you alright?”
Roki asked Rapilta.
His body was in terrible shape.
His clothes were torn like rags, with blood flowing through the gaps. The arm that had held the shield was bent in an unnatural direction.
His face had a broken nose and was bleeding.
“I’m… n…ot… okay!”
Even so, he was barely speaking, still conscious.
“What about the others?”
Roki looked at Pol and Albereu.
“…This old man is still alive. However, his age prevents him from moving.”
Though he said that, Albereu was bleeding from around his eyes with them closed, as if injured. Looking closely, the steel boots on his feet were completely crushed.
He could not use his feet at all.
Pol seemed to have barely come to his senses at Roki’s words, fumbling with his hand to barely snatch up his staff.
Fortunately, he did not seem injured.
“I’m… still fine. But….”
Pol could not bring himself to say, ‘We’re already finished.’
The situation was the worst.
A single Wight was something normal soldiers could not defeat even if several charged at once.
There were a hundred such Wights. And one knight who surpassed such Wights was standing right there… there was no way to survive.
“D-damn! If I only had a proper steel shield…!”
Rapilta said that and laughed. In a way, it might be an excuse or lingering attachment.
Even with proper weapons, he could not have stopped them.
Above all, even if you killed the Wights one by one, Worm Feast would burst out. If even one touched your skin, it was no different from instant death.
Roki looked at Pol.
“Can you use magic?”
Pol shook his head.
“…No. I have no mana. And… even if I could use magic, there’s no way we could win….”
Pol struggled to stand with his staff, biting his lip as if in frustration.
Rapilta was the shield, Albereu the sword, and Pol’s role was to support them from behind. Even this ideal party had been reduced to this in mere minutes, so Pol thought that even Hoon in perfect condition would have no chance.
“…Do you need mana?”
Roki took out a blue potion from within his clothes and offered it to Pol.
“What is this…?”
“…I picked it up by chance in the Kelt Mountains. Drink it.”
“A potion? I’ve never seen a blue potion before…?”
Pol trailed off and struggled to open the potion lid.
It had no scent, and no energy could be felt from it at all. It simply looked like blue water.
This could not possibly be a potion. If such a thing existed, it would be….
‘…Could it be poison?’
Perhaps it was.
They could not survive this situation. Rather, if they could not die, they would be infected by Worm Feast and become Wights.
In this situation, there was only one best method: to kill oneself.
“Drink.”
“…….”
Perhaps not yet prepared, Pol’s hand shook.
—Kraaaaack!
The Wights would not wait for their actions and charged.
Roki grabbed a charging head with his hand and threw it.
As the Wights’ attack began, Pol’s hesitation vanished. He closed his eyes tight, put the mana potion in his mouth, and gulped it down.
At that moment… Pol’s eyes snapped open, looking at the mana potion with a gaze filled with shock.
His heart pounded, and blue energy swirled.
“Mana….”
…Recovered? And all the mana his body could possibly contain in mere seconds?! It was something impossible to understand with common sense.
He had taken only one sip. Yet all the mana that would take someone in peak condition, concentrating and spending time to recover, had been completely filled.
“…Huh! How is this possible…?”
“No time to explain. Cast a defensive spell or something.”
Before anyone knew it, his tone had changed.
Roki, who had been turned away, turned his head.
From behind the crow mask, he glared at Pol with shaded red eyes.
Pol felt a strange chill at that gaze, but there was no time to hesitate.
He planted his staff on the ground, closed his eyes, and executed a defensive spell.
A transparent membrane enveloped Pol, Albereu, Rapilta, and Saelleot.
Pol was shocked even as he cast the spell. Though he had activated magic, his mana did not decrease but maintained its original state.
As if mana recovery was still ongoing.
‘…Could it be, an all-purpose potion?!’
Pol looked at the potion, which still contained about seventy percent of the blue liquid, with shocked eyes.
The potion they had been searching for was right before his eyes.
Roki smacked his lips at Pol’s defensive magic.
The defensive magic looked weaker than expected.
‘…It’ll break with one wide-area skill.’
“Then….”
Roki aimed his crossbow at the Wight Knight and fired.
A bolt as large as a spear rotated and embedded itself in the Wight Knight’s plate armor. But it ended up lodged there, failing to penetrate.
The Wight Knight tilted its head and raised its morning star to strike down.
It showed no sign of pain whatsoever.
Roki lightly dodged the morning star and looked at Pol’s group.
Pol, manifesting the defensive magic, had his eyes tightly closed in concentration, continuously chanting the spell.
Rapilta and Albereu were conscious but unable to move their bodies at all, staring only at the ceiling. No one paid him any mind.
‘I wanted to travel as quietly as possible and find my junior, but.’
Roki repeatedly clenched and unclenched his hand.
‘…I suppose it would be alright to use a bit of strength.’
Black haze rose from his fingertips and transformed into flames.
It was one of Roki’s Avatar skills, a skill that inflicted magic damage over a set duration once the flames attached.
Roki spun his body and swung his fist at the Wight Knight. The Wight Knight raised its heavy arm to block it but… ended up being penetrated.
The flames rising from Roki’s hand melted the armor on the Wight Knight’s arm and burned away the flesh, muscle, blood, and Worm Feast.
Roki quickly pulled his hand back and stepped away.
The Wight Knight looked at its arm.
Black flames oozed and gradually spread.
The thick arm melted and disappeared without even leaving ash.
The wrist and part of the arm, having lost their connection, fell to the ground and twitched.
At that sight, the Wight Knight tilted its head. Soon, it twisted its face hideously.
As if enraged rather than in pain, it mercilessly swung the morning star it held.