CH 78

“Ahn♪”

“Kihi!”

The clash lasted for but a moment. In that short moment, the difference between their prowess could already clearly be seen.

In response to Reis charging at full speed, Leila simply waved her hand lightly as if brushing off a fly, and slapped his face. Its force was heavier and sharper than the average adventurer’s fist.

Due to his charging momentum combined with the impact as though bumping onto a wall, Reis lost his consciousness for a moment. When he came to, his body was already flying in the air. He soon rearranged his stance and landed, but as his body suddenly lost strength, he fell to his knee.

S-ranked criminal and S-ranked demon. Although both were similarly S-ranked, the difference between “criminal” and “demon” was simply too huge. Even if they were criminals, in the end they were merely people who took pleasure in killing others— reaching out toward world destruction level monster was simply as though reaching out to heaven itself.

Besides, even though their ranks were of the same, the implications were way different. Reis’ rank implicated how dangerous he was to people around him, while in Leila’s case, it implicated how dangerous she was to humanity as a whole.

“–haa…! The hell with you, for a mere woman’s slap, wasn’t that unusually too powerful?”

“Ufufufufu ♪ Kitsune-kun could easily withstand something on this level, though.”

“For real?… so that guy really is a monster, huh… Kihi…Kuhahaha!! Interesting, now I’m wanting to kill him more and more…!”

“I understand that feeling ♪ Kitsune-kun is indeed interesting, cute, cool, and above all tasty, after all♪”

That moment, Reis resolved himself for his death.

He wasn’t so incompetent to be unable to perceive how powerful his opponent was. Instinctively, he understood that the woman in front of him, Leila, possessed much more overwhelming prowess than him.

However, he had no intentions of ​​running away. He simply and earnestly gave himself in to madness, for someone who murdered others for enjoyment, powerful people were his preys. Moreover, of the finest quality.

—if I destroy this huge wall, will I be able to cut her abdomen?

“I’ll confirm that when I kill her! Kuhaha!”

So he laughed— should he die, then that was that.

Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, over and over again, crush the heart, cut open the lungs, cut off the liver, pull out the intestines, gouge out the eyeballs, smash the brain, tear off every muscle, pulverize the bones, dismember the limbs, he was someone who’d been living through cruelly murdering others as such.

And at that moment, such feeling was flooding within him.

Reis kicked the ground. Brandishing his sword, he charged forward in full strength with the intention of surpassing his own limit. If he couldn’t kill her now, he simply needed to grow enough until he could kill her. He simply needed to grow this very moment, he simply needed to surpass his limit however many it was.

“!?”

“Raaaaaaagh!”

At the first charge, that was without a doubt his full power.

However, during this second charge, he was charging at Leila in even faster speed than the first one. He was surpassing his limit. The madness, the greed of murder, the instinct of a pleasure-seeking murderer, they propelled him to a higher height.

Surprised by his unexpected speed, Leila solidified the miasma at once and blocked the looming sword.

—it was just a breath away from Leila’s neck.

Should she don’t manage to stop it, the sword would’ve cut her neck. Due to a few moments late, some of Leila’s white hair was cut.

“Gyahihi! Just a bit more…!”

Reis bloodshot eyes were wide open, he madly laughed as he pressed forward his sword that was blocked by the miasma. He seemed to be still sane, but the power he was currently exerting was without a doubt much stronger than before. Leila also similarly got her eyes wide open.

However,

“…Ufu♪ Ufufufufufu♪ Ahn… feels so good, it makes my heart throb fast!”

While hugging her own body, Leila slovenly laughed. Her red eyes were ablaze. Madness was oozing out of her face. That’s right, the madness of “Red Night”.

The next moment, jet black miasma were vigorously exuding from Leila’s body. As if it were an eruption, the embodiment of ferocious menace of death itself.

“Kuhiyahihi!”

“You seem to taste disgusting♪ very disgusting, but— I’ll still eat you without leaving anything behind.”

Both of their madness collided and created sparks.

“Kuhahaha! The color of your eyes have changed! Just what the hell is that guy? The guy was a monster himself, but to also have this kind monster around, has he gone crazy?!”

“Ufufufufufu♪ I won’t let you kill him, Kitsune-kun is mine♪ Because I love Kitsune-kun very much, after all.”

Kicking the ground at the same time, Reis’ sword that was swung from above was faced with Leila’s miasma-made black knife and made a metallic sound. The sound of weapons hitting each other resounded for the second, third time, and so on. In an instant, they clashed over and over again.

At a glance they were equal, but in actuality Leila’s knife had left injuries on Reis’ body several times, while she managed to block all of his attack.

No matter how many limits he’d surpassed, the difference in their prowess was simply that overwhelming.

“Ahn♪”

“Tch… Kihihi!”

The sound of sword collisions ceased, and both of them took some distances.

Leila held a black knife in her respective hands, she played with them as if she was doing juggling.

On the other hand, Reis’ sword was chipped here and there. It was obvious that there was also a big difference in their weapons.

“Still not enough, huh … Kuha! Interesting…!”

However, Reis hadn’t given up just yet. No, he still wanted to enjoy fighting.

Rather, against someone whose prowess limit was unknown, perhaps he might be able to eventually overcome fear itself.

“Come on, entertain me a little more.”

Smiling as usual, Leila said so. Even with cold sweat pouring down, Reis charged forward once again.

◇ ◇ ◇

Meanwhile, the battle against the Goblin King was very intense. And as expected, the adventurers were the ones in disadvantage. Although none of them had died yet, through their experience and wisdom after defeating several Goblins and Crazy Monkeys, they had deemed that overturning such differences in number was nigh impossible.

Little by little, the adventurers were pushed backward.

“Kuh… there’s no end to it…!!”

“Stay focused! Haaa!”

“Gruaaa!”

When the newbie leader pushed a wolf demonic beast away, the female adventurer finished it off. They’d been protecting each other’s back, thus they could still maintain the state where none died.

“Watch out! Uooh!!!”

“Bugaaaa!!”

Fatigue could start be seen from the other adventurers as well. The number of demonic beast killed was still around fifty. Even if they somehow managed to kill the seemingly never-ending horde of demonic beast until the very last one, there was still the Goblin King awaiting them.

The tide was totally against them.

It wasn’t like they were scared stiff as before, but given the fact that they still had no conclusive solution, it was impossible to avoid annihilation. A sense of impatience was accumulating little by little within the adventurers’ minds.

However, it wasn’t like there was completely no hope for them. When the powerful adventurers from Grandile Kingdom came to their aid, they’d be able to reverse the tide at once.

However, no matter how fast they marched, at best they’d still need five hours to arrive there from Grandile Kingdom. And as it hadn’t even been an hour since the battle begun, that hope could be said to be outside their reach.

Still, since that was their sole hope, all they could do was fight with all of their might. They were clinging onto their wish to protect the town.

“!? Everyone! Watch out!”

“”Wha!?””

Then one of the adventurers shouted. That instant, everyone there noticed the change around the demonic beasts.

—The goblin king that was supposed to be waiting on the rear, was emerging forward.

Then, when the adventurers tried to retreat, the goblin king smashed the ground using its club and blew them away.

“Ga…!!?”

“Aah…!!!!”

“Gofu…!!”

Several adventurers who were relatively in front were blown away by that attack and rolled backwards.

Looking at them getting blown away as if garbage, everyone realized the difference between their prowess and the Goblin King’s. They realized that with their current prowess, they had no hope of defeating it.

“Kh… uaaaah!!!”

“Oi, wait! Calm down!

Looking at that scene, perhaps unable to hold the impatience, one of the adventurers gave in to despair and charged straight to the Goblin King. Someone tried to stop him, but seeming unable to hear it, the adventurer didn’t stop his stride.

And then,

“Hmph…”

Along with the Goblin King’s scornful laugh,

“—-!!”

The adventurer was squashed by the swung club… and died.

“Wha…!”

As all of them were lost of words, the voice of someone gasping could clearly be heard.

Lifting the club leisurely, the Goblin King looked down on the adventurers, and opened its mouth.

“How annoying… a fly like that, shouldn’t stand before me….”

When the Goblin King said so, the other demonic beasts attacked the lost of words adventurers at once. The adventurers, who were startled after being distracted by the goblin king, were slightly late to respond.

However, in battle a moment of negligence meant death. Getting their arms bitten off by the wolfs, getting beaten by the goblins’ clubs, the adventurer group’s strength was greatly shaved off. The maintained equilibrium crumbled due to a single crack.

The danger of annihilation was upon them.

◇ ◇ ◇

Around the same time, on the other side, inside the devastated lord’s room where documents were scattered about, a youth and a middle-aged nobleman were facing each other. Behind the youth there was a girl who was wielding a sword.

While the youth was faintly smiling, perhaps quietly observing the situation, the girl was quietly standing behind him. On the other hand, the noble man seemed to be trying to distance himself away as far as possible from the youth.

As additional notes, the noble man showed an expression as though he was terrified.

One of the reasons was probably due to the youth’s skill “Eerie Constitution”, but even without it, he was still terrified of the youth.

“Ahaha, there’s no need to be that scared, you know? After all, I’m just an H rank adventurer, you see?”

“Guh..!”

Toward the youth’s words, the noble man ground his teeth.

“Umm… Duke Orba, was it? I don’t really understand things about the splendor of nobles, the height of their status, and so on, so do excuse me for my rudeness, alright?”

“….you bastard… why are you helping that brat?!”

“Well, actually I like children a lot, you see? Just look, don’t I look totally like a caretaker?”

“Like hell I care…”

“Please do care, moreover now that I’m talking to you. Since you cared enough to even sent that kind of murderer to me, after all.”

When the youth whistled, it was hard to tell what reason he came for, rather, he acted as though he came there just to play. With cold sweat pouring on his back, the noble man also pondered what reason the youth came there for.

Then, the youth slowly approached the noble man step by step. With a black knife in hand, he leisurely approached him. In response, the fear within the noble man grew even further.

“…S, stay away!”

“Please don’t be like that, I’m very fortunate to meet someone with a grand name such as duke in a place like this, so let’s have some friendly chat, alright?”

“Kh….!”

“Ahaha, you don’t have to be that nervous, you know? Since people even say that I’m such a friendly youngster, I’m sure we’ll get along just fine.”

Hearing the youth’s words, the girl who was standing quietly behind him inwardly thought ‘Stop lying as though you’re breathing’.

“Come on, what’s your favorite color, Duke? Eh? Mine? Let’s see… I think I like every color, except red, that is.”

Having said that, the youth thrust the black knife into the noble man.