Chapter 147

147 – The Third Stratum – The Realm of Vampires and Underlings 2

「Alright, I get the gist of it.」

The Water Hero Wraith says with a wide grin on his face.

Creating something like a wall of wind, the bats weren’t able to bite him.

「The further apart the manipulated blood is from the manipulator…the weaker the influence. So there’s a limit to how far they are able to use their own blood once it’s out of their body.」

A thrown blood knife can change its trajectory in mid-air.

One such knife was headed towards Fran, but Wraith raised a defensive wall with Earth Magic to block it.

Fran immediately closed in on the attacker and sent them flying with her right arm.

Perhaps due to being too far from its owner, the blood weapon could not keep its shape as a knife and returned to being liquid.

「Moving around the placement of their Magical Energy organ using shapeshifting is pretty interesting, but there are only so many places you can move it to in the body.」

Forcibly shifting around the placement of your internal organs alone is an amazing feat, but one has to think of balancing the other organs.

Forcibly moving it was manageable, but changing its position would be a hassle.

In other words, creating a space in time for an instant evasion is limited.

Also, there is no place to hide the organ in the lower parts of the body. Even if you forcibly moved it down there, it will soon become obvious where it is.

In the end, he arrived at the conclusion that it is better to blow apart their entire upper body in order to kill a Vampire in one shot.

「If you wanna beat them without them regenerating, this is the way.」

Both Wraith’s and the Crimson Wizard Michelle’s explosion magic blew up at almost the same time. Various Vampires were defeated.

「Then there’re the ones that can turn into mist… When they become mist, they can’t think, right? Which means they thought about where they are going to materialize beforehand, so…about here?」

Just before they are crushed by Fran’s grasp, they turn into mist and then materialize in a place a little bit away.

But then, just as that Vampire felt a weird pressure on their chest, they burst open in the next instant…defeated.

Thanks to the Defeat Mechanic, all that gets splattered around is Magical Energy particles, but still…what a fearsome technique.

…This is just a guess, but I think he placed a box or ball of compressed air at the materialization spot.

The Vampire materializes there without realizing it. It’s like having a bomb in your body.

「But man, they’re tough. They’re difficult to aim at, and defeating them in one hit eats up Magical Energy. Vampires are troublesome Monsters.」

Says Wraith, giving high praise to the enemy.

While he, himself, remains unharmed.

It’s hard to believe that this is his first actual raid battle. He’s so stable and strong.

Despite the Vampires steadily dealing damage to the Adventurers, they were annihilated.

And now, the conclusion to the Hero of the Cursed Sword and the Impaling Daughter’s battle draws near.

Countless blood cones shoot out from the ground aiming to pierce Herv, but she simply smashes them, parries them, steps on them, and sometimes ignoring them completely while she forcibly closes the distance between them.

「Come on, Haagenti! Let’s end this!」

「Bring it…!」

Haagenti called back all the blood that she could and clad her right arm with them.

I guess she’s already determined that she can no longer escape Hervor’s fists.

The distance between them vanished as they exchange fists.

The space around them shook, the trees rustled. There was a sound as if the forest itself rang out and the hair of all the Adventurers in the vicinity swayed as if hit by a shockwave.

「…Tsk, what was that「Bring it!」all about, Haagenti…?」

Herv was smiling with a complicated expression.

In terms of the match, Herv is the victor.

But that wasn’t what she wanted from a simple, pure head-on collision.

「Big Sis!」

The Rock Crushing Martial Artist Amelia ran towards Herv, ignoring all the wounds that she herself has.

「I’m fine, I’m fine. Although, I don’t think I can grow this back.」

Herv said, jokingly, showing her right arm which was completely gone all the way to the joint.

In response to Herv’s way of doing things, Haagenti laid bare her fighting spirit…or so it seemed.

At the moment that they clashed, the armor of blood that covered her right arm changed its shape into the fang of a beast.

That fang was successfully thrust deeply into Herv’s right arm.

But at the same time, Haagenti was hit hard enough to send her flying into the forest, knocking over countless large trees, and was defeated.

But her actions have cost Herv her right arm.

「She must be pretty darn loyal. Haagenti thinks that the one deep within can defeat me. That’s why she did this, thinking that she could help make it easier in any small way that she could.」

Haagenti, who witnessed Herv’s healing ability first hand, probably knew that she wouldn’t be defeated by the loss of her right arm. While her subordinates were being wiped out, she prioritized taking her right arm with her, rather than winning.

Benefiting the team’s chances of winning, rather than winning as an individual.

「Hahaha! I can’t help but get excited, I really want to meet this Vampire Queen already!」

While they were talking, her wounds closed up and the leaking of Magical Energy stops.

If you think about how she’s a Hero who fights with her fists, snatching away one of her strongest weapons is a huge achievement for Haagenti.

The group then made their way through the forest without letting their guard down, and finally arrived in front of the mansion.

The Adventurers enter the entrance hall of the mansion and are greeted by a single male Vampire in a butler outfit with a large crowd of maids.

And then they got ready to…explain the rules of the Raid Battle.

The Vampire Queen Carmilla, one of the Demon King Army’s Big Four, serves as the Floor Boss of the third stratum.

She sleeps in a coffin atop a stone altar in a room within the mansion that is set up to look like a church.

The Vampires in the forest are tasked with protecting her and those that lose to them are not worth any consideration.

However, if those that possess the strength to brave the forest reach her place of rest, Carmilla will awaken.

And in order to protect the door that leads to the fourth stratum under her, she will swing her blades of blood at the Adventurers.

That’s right. So that she never leaves her post as guardian of the fourth stratum door for even a moment, she sleeps atop it.

At least, that’s the setting.

The exterior of the mansion is always the same, but the interior…or rather the structure of each room is different each time.

It is not possible to locate the church from other Adventurers’ videos.

In addition, they will need three items to get to Carmilla’s resting place. A rusty candlestick, a corpse’s candle, and a black flame.

When you light the candle with the flame, place it on the candlestick, and then set it in front of the door of the church, it will open.

Usually, all the members of a party will search each room, sometimes falling into a trap or getting ambushed, they find items, other than the three important ones, like keys to unlock locked rooms, maps, etc that get them closer to reaching Carmilla.

However, this time there are a large number of people and the rooms have been set up under the condition that they will be searched by a full party.

The Aerial party, Hervor party, Scathach party, and Wraith & Fran each search one room.

For TV, this is a welcome proposal.

A large number of people fighting all at once is the exciting part of a raid battle, but leaving that aside, the fans of each party still wish to see their favorites party play an active role.

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Splitting up the group to fight their own battles is…the easiest way to do that.

「Hmm…I don’t really mind, but I have two questions.」

「What ever is it?」

The butler answers Herv.

「Why are you generously explaining on and on about the rules?」

「In order to deter any violent behavior. This shall be the final explanation. As soon as we have verified that a room or the mansion itself has been destroyed in this Clear, Lady Carmilla will seal the path leading to the Demon King with her life. We cannot allow such uncouth intruders to have an audience with her Highness.」

This sort of item hunt system isn’t particularly unique, but there are quite a lot of Adventurers who are impatient or ill-tempered.

There are people who listen to the explanations and regard it simply to mean that the objective is in the basement, so they start digging through the floor to get to it.

You aren’t allowed to do that in the first place, but warnings are given so that they won’t attempt it.

All that stuff about Carmilla sealing the way with her life is just set dressing.

She doesn’t actually have the ability to do that and the Adventurers are normally just disqualified.

Adventurers acting with the intent to shorten their Clear time by simply razing the mansion obviously have to be disqualified.

「Hmm. So we gotta follow the rules, huh? Sure, we’re intruders after all. It’ll be bad if we ignore the rules and become unable to tango with the Demon King. So that’s the first question, my second one is…are you guys not gonna fight?」

I can’t tell from how Herv’s looks if she realized it or not, but there aren’t any butlers or maids in the regular third stratum Clear.

Instead, there would be a single letter placed atop a table in a dark entrance hall with the minimum rules written on it.

This time, it’s a Raid Battle, a big stage. So we wanted to add a little more flare to it…at least that’s one reason.

The other reason is, of course…

「We are Lady Carmilla’s subordinates as well and know of ways to eliminate intruders.」

「Great, that’s just how I like it… Hey, you’re not gonna disqualify us if we bust up the mansion, right?」

「Defeating us will legitimize the Clear.」

「You guys get me!」

And so, it quickly developed into a battle.

The butler and maids were soon defeated by the fierce fighters who came through the forest.

Each party began their item hunt.

For instance, the Hervor party.

「There’s a piece of paper here that’s clearly a hint. Let’s see…『A light that is darker than darkness itself, in a place closer to death than the ground, it is…』uh…what does this say?」

Herv passes the piece of paper that she found on top of a table in a certain room to the Summoner Margret.

「That is『imprisoned』, Sister Herv. Certainly, that is a difficult expression.」

「No, I got the meaning. I just couldn’t read it, thanks.」[1 TL Note: As a translator, I feel you, Herv.]

「I live to serve…is what I wish to say, but are we not allies? It’s only natural that we complement each other.」

「…That was a close one. I almost asked 『What were you doing at School, big sis?』. Was it the right call to follow Maggie’s footsteps?」

The Gunner Emeline purposefully wipes her sweat, but then the Martial Artist Amelia bonks her on the head.

「You said that out loud!」

「Ow. No violence! You’re acting like a wife, Ames.」

「Hah?!」

Putting aside the friendly banter between those two, Herv and Margret continue their conversation.

「So this black flame is somewhere underground? It says it’s imprisoned, so maybe it’s in a treasury or something.」

「Yes, I believe so.」

「Should we check it out first? It’d be great if we can find a key too, but maybe I’m just thinking too much.」

Herv scratches her head with her remaining left arm.

「Why don’t we head over there to investigate first?」

「…Yeah, let’s do that. I’ll leave the thinking to you, Maggie. Countin’ on ya.」

Margret smiled happily.

「Yes.」

The leader of the Aerial party is versatile so Aerial is in charge of solving riddles as well. There’s also the Alchemist Louie, who is also smart, and they both tackle the problems together.

The Scathach party is similar, the leader and the Hunter Suuri are the brains of the operation.

The Warrior Hamill moved a book in the study which triggered a trap. They all almost fell down the hole that appeared, it was quite the scene. Thanks to the Magician Theo’s threads, they were didn’t fall.

If they had, they would have been pierced by the sharp spears at the bottom.

In a show of the open-mindedness of youth, Wraith and Fran solved the riddles together.

Somehow, Fran seems to talk more when she’s with Wraith.

And Wraith’s smile as well is naturally gentler when he’s with her.

Some time passed.

The Adventurers were standing together in front of a door.

The Hervor party found a transparent box, inside which burnt a pure black flame.

The Aerial party found the corpse candle, which has a skull pattern on its surface and is constantly moving.

And the Scathach party found the, somehow screaming in pain, rusted candlestick

Also, Wraith and Fran found the floor plan for the mansion as well as the keys that are required to get the other items.

With all their powers combined, they reached the church.

Atop a long, narrow stand made of stone, the three items were combined and placed… With a rumbling sound, the stone door opens.

At the end of the aisles was a stone platform where a coffin lies on top.

However, the coffin lid was already opened slightly.

「To those who have made it thus far, I welcome thee. You seem like formidable Humans.」

A dress steeped in black decorated with red here and there.

The outfit was extravagant yet suggestive. 

The red-lined veil covered her head, a black mask covered her eyes. Long, beautiful golden hair and a smile that bared her fangs.

As to the degree of skin exposed, her breasts are exposed as if she were wearing lingerie, her abdomen and back are freely exposed and even her thighs are exposed enough to draw the eye of the viewer.

Some parts of the costume are in the form of bands, and they cover the body in a way that connects those lines to each other.

However, the area of cloth used is quite wide. This is because only the front part of the dress, aside from the back, is exposed.

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And from her back grow the large wings of a bat. The little batwing antennas on her head are also lively.

Overall, she gives off the feeling of a bewitching and beautiful female Monster.

「You’re Carmilla, right? We went through a lot of shit to get to you, so I hope you’re strong. And if you’re as strong as Haagenti believes you are, all the better.」

Carmilla smiled and gave a little chuckle.

The third stratum Floor Boss fight…begins.