Volume 8 - CH 15

Translator: Silver Editor: Namorax

「Liberating Rione」Part 3

Although the battle seemed to be in constant flux between attacker and defender, Williahsfim took the skeletal monster’s attacks without much issue.

The devil occasionally unleashed a massive fireball from his mouth, but Williahsfim easily dispelled them by creating tornadoes with his magic. The unfortunate undead caught in the crossfire were burnt to a crisp or blown away by a violent gust of wind.

Those two… those two didn’t care about the undead they wiped out with the magic they unleashed upon each other. In fact, it appeared Williahsfim intentionally provoked these destructive attacks out of the monster.

Williahsfim knocked one of the demon’s swords out of its hands with his tail, an act which had the unfortunate effect of reducing the surrounding chimeras to ash when it landed.

While the demon was busy looking towards its fallen sword, Williahsfim channeled magic into his tail and unleashed a wind blade powerful enough to sever one of the demon’s wings, sending it spiraling out of the air.

《Humph, I guess you aren’t a worthy enemy after all……》

Williahsfim gripped the demon’s head with his hind legs and accelerated the monster’s descent before slamming it into the ground.

The undead in the crash zone simply vanished after the earth-shaking impact.

The demon tried to fly away several times, but without both wings its attempts were in vain. By the time Williahsfim descended, the dragon king’s victory was all but assured.

Glancing over to Ariane and Chiome revealed that the battle had already swung in their favor.

Cardinal Tismo’s enlarge body didn’t seem capable of superhuman speed, but that didn’t stop him from leaping into the air and trying to crush his enemy with his weight, his sea anemone-like head spewing corrosive juices all over the place.

However, Ariane and Chiome had already grasped his movement pattern and had managed to injure the cardinal through their combined efforts.

Despite already having lost one of his arm tentacles, the cardinal tried to strike Ariane with his remaining arm, but Chiome managed to halt his attack by impaling him through the chest with a water spear.

There was no way Ariane would overlook such an opening.

She switched from retreating from the tentacle to severing the appendage with her flaming sword in one graceful motion.

Suddenly, Tismo began convulsing uncontrollably as a stream of incomprehensible screaming originated from his sea anemone head.

Ariane and Chiome remained vigilant and observed their opponent from a safe distance. All of a sudden, the stumps of his tentacles regenerated as if they’d never been severed.

The wounds on his body remained. Were the tentacles the only parts of his body capable of such regeneration?

While I was pondering such things, the two ladies immediately resumed their attack on the cardinal.

However, as opposed to their previous attack formation, Chiome changed in from the front, making herself the prime target of the cardinal’s tentacles, while Ariane flanked him.

Tismo attempted to halt Ariane’s assault by spewing more of his corrosive juices, but the number of wounds on his body increased, while the fluids showed no sign of connecting.

Dividing his attention between the pair proved to be a costly mistake as Chiome managed to skewers both of his tentacles and pin them to the ground with her water spears, inserting a second and third spear for good measure.

At the same time, Ariane stabbed her flaming sword deep into Tismo’s body.

The scream that exploded from Timso’s orifices was indescribable.

I doubted that she had dealt a fatal blow, but it was clear that Timso couldn’t beat those two.

It was apparent that my companions had the upper hand in their battle.

A spider chimera’s attack drew me back to the present and I used 【Dimensional Step】 several times to retreat to a safe location.

Williahsfim, Ariane, and Chiome were now a considerable distance away from the undead army, which allowed me to be at ease as I resumed my search for the veiled man.

When we first met, the veiled had said ── “Weren’t you the silver-clad knight who defeated our Palermo?” ── This meant Palermo had been that guy’s subordinate.

If that was the case, then the veiled man was the Pope of the Hiruku religion.

I hadn’t expected to encounter him outside his stronghold, but his presence here made sense if he was the only one who had the means to mass produce the undead.

Not only that, the pope’s comment brought numerous possibilities to mind.

When I caught a glimpse of his face, I attacked in the heat of the moment, but now that I had time to cool my head, the right course of action has become unclear.

Could I bring myself to kill the pope?

The pope’s real face behind the veil…… it was a skull similar to mine, with red lights shining in the empty sockets.

He might have similar circumstances to my own.

Why was he wrapped up in Hiruku’s machinations?

If given a chance, I’d like to have a conversation with the pope, but I had a feeling that his actions here already answered my questions.

Still, that was only a guess on my part.

The furious undead horde chasing after me would be a hindrance to any conversation I tried to start up. If he was someone like me, then he shouldn’t die from the kind of attack required to eliminate the horde from the equation.

“I know I’d eventually have to use this again…… Ponta, why don’t you go wait in the sky? Things are about to get a little hectic.”

Ponta uncoiled herself from around my neck and flew into the sky with her magic as she replied:

“Ky〜un!”

I looked as Ponta’s fluffy tail disappeared before returning my gaze to the battlefield.

I took a deep breath and evoked the spell.

“Come! 【Steadfast Seraphim of Judgement: Guardian Uriel】!”

At that moment, I felt a massive amount of mana leave my body as a giant magic circle appeared at my feet, with a multitude of stone pillars rising from the ground at its edges, creating a protective wall around me in the process.

The barrier sealed in the fastest of the undead horde with me, the magic formation instantly converting them to light particles which proceeded to drift skyward.

The center of the formation suddenly unleashed a golden pillar of light towards the sky as a hymn began to play from some unknown source. From that pillar emerged a humanoid figure.

Just like Michael, the figure was five meters tall.

The Seraphim’s whole body was wrapped in beautiful golden armor, which appeared to be a more elegant version of the heavenly knight armor set.

However, there were six large, beautiful wings on its back. Releasing golden feathers with each stroke, it was obvious what kind of being this was.

It carried a massive war hammer over its shoulder and a wore a helmet that completely covered its face.

One of the four heavenly knight skills, 【Steadfast Seraphim of Judgement: Guardian Uriel】.

The seraphim angel, with his overwhelming presence and sanctity, calmly raised its head toward the sky.

『～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～！！！』

At that moment, an angelic voice that could only be described as heaven’s roar emerged from within the helmet, reducing the undead within its range to light particles which were blown away with the wind.

The stone blockade at the formation’s edge was similarly reduced to light particles which allowed everyone to see what was happening.

At the same time, the seraphim gradually shrunk until it was two meters tall and safely hovered behind my back.

“AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!”

A scream escaped my lips as the overwhelming power of the higher being forced itself into the ill-fitting container that was my body.

Every fiber of my being rejected experiencing this sensation more than once, but using this was necessary, so I clenched my teeth and held onto my consciousness.

When I saw Ponta anxiously looking on out of the corner of my eye, I slammed my fist into my trembling legs and stood up straight.

The seraphim’s divine aura had already vanished, and the undead had resumed their fearless change.

It was convenient that the undead horde was targeting me instead of being scattered around Soulia’s outer wall like last time.

This made it easier to kill a lot of undead with a single blow.

I can release the heavenly knight skill early thinks to that.

I stared straight ahead, took a deep breath and concentrated on unleashing one of the seraphim’s authorities.

The seraphim flapped its wings as it hovered behind me and mimicked my movements.

As if he could detect what I was about to unleash, Williahsfim cut down what remained of the skeletal demon, ran as fast as I’d ever seen him move before, scooped up Ariane and Chiome before escaping into the sky.

“Kyun!”

Even Ponta noticed the change in the flow of this battle and landed on her usual spot atop my helmet with a relieved cry.

Although I considered the range of the heavenly knight’s annihilation skills beforehand, this was the first time I actually used the authority in reality, so I was a bit relieved that my companions had moved well outside the danger zone.

The authority I was about to use was considered to be a spell of mass destruction.

『【Meteor Ray Distortion: Meteorum Perditio】』

A massive and complex magic formation appeared in the sky when the seraphim raised its enormous war hammer above its head. A multitude of glowing meteors suddenly erupted from the formation and slammed into the ground the undead stood upon.

Once their light blinked out, the meteors exploded with a deafening roar and shook the earth itself.

For a brief moment it seemed as if the meteor shower had stopped, but then a giant lump of blazing hot rock appeared in the sky and gradually fell to the planet’s surface…… When it made contact with the ground, a cacophony of explosions was ignited, and I was left blinded throughout the entire event.

The extremely high temperature scorched the earth and liquefied the sand, with the resulting airborne particles reducing visibility to zero in the immediate area.

“Cugh Cugh! …… The range far exceeds what Michael is capable of, I’d better seal this one away.”

Uriel was still floating behind me while I endured my coughing fit and attempted to blow away the dust to survey the area.

“Ki ~yushi! Ki ~yushi!”

Ponta used her tail to clear away the dust, but she still sneezed several times and had to use her paws to block it from entering her nose.

After a while, the dust was blown away by the wind and the field of vision gradually improved. There was no sign of the undead horde, only an enormous crater remained in their place.

“!? As expected, this……”

That much power…… no, there were no words for the devastation I’d just unleashed.

If the authority of the seraphim Michael was capable of changing the topography, then Uriel’s was capable of utterly destroying the topography.

A few undead remained on the fringes of the scarred battlefield.

Only a handful of spider chimeras had managed to survive 【Meteor Ray Distortion: Meteorum Perditio】, whereas all the undead soldiers had been annihilated.

There was no point in leading them back to the rear base.

Although it was an impressive outcome, I couldn’t see the veiled man anywhere.

Could he have vanished along with the rest of the undead horde…… that couldn’t be, right?

Since he could use transfer magic just like me, he could’ve escaped at any point between the authority’s activation and execution.

If the Pope indeed had escaped with transfer magic…… then we’d next encounter each other in his stronghold, the holy city of Arthus.

As the thought crossed my mind, I looked west, towards Hiruku’s capital city.

However, the steep peaks of the Rooteos Mountain Range blocked my view and made it impossible to see the holy city.