The three Chimeras readied their claws and fangs in pursuit as though they knew the location even inside the light. Their targets were Shizuku, Nagayama, and Suzu, these three. However, their fangs and claws could not reach the three, since three shields of light appeared before each of them and the attacks were averted in a hair’s breadth, and the angle slightly moved while the shields were crushed by the Chimeras’ attacks.
They were the mid-ranked defense spell, “Heaven’s Interruption.” It was the higher ranking version of the beginner-ranked light defensive magic, “Light’s Interruption,” where more than two shields produced at the same time. Even the “Barrier-user,” Suzu was using this magic, and by replenishing the destroyed edges of the shield in high-speed, it was possible to stall time though it’d soon to be destroyed when weakened. In this respect, Kaori could not reached Suzu whose specialty was barrier, since she could not use it like such as even when her aptitude towards light element is high. At best, she could only do minute adjustments to the shield.
However, the shields were helpful. At the moment Suzu’s strong barrier was destroyed in a blow, Kaori realized her barrier would be useless, so she chose a method to avert the attack. To begin with, she didn’t expect the incoming attacks would be the same as before, so it was more like a sink or swim situation. She was lucky it went well.
The three Chimeras whose attacks were averted, became irritated and moved to attack again. The time she gained was only a moment. It was as though the Chimeras didn’t find it troublesome. However, there was no change that the most expensive thing to buy was time, even if it was just a moment. Kouki and the others didn’t miss that moment.
“Get away from Shizukuuuu!!”
So, is it okay to attack Nagayama?, No one said just a sentence. Perhaps because of anger, Kouki roared and used “Ground Shrinker” to immediately reached the Chimera near Shizuku. Kouki’s movement speed was so fast that he left after images. He swung his Holy Sword towards the Chimera’s neck, and the sword became shinier.
At the same time, Ryuutarou took on the Chimera that went to attack Nagayama with his thrusted fist in a karate stance. Rather than a direct attack, he thought it’d be faster to attack using the gauntlet-type artifact’s ability, shock wave. A war cry came from Ryuutarou and magic power was supplied to the gauntlet.
Furthermore, Eri, who caught the blown away Suzu, thrusted her hand out, began to chant when she felt the same crisis as Suzu, and powerful fire magic was activated. It was a mid-ranked magic called “Sea of Flame,” and just like the name, it was a ranged magic that manipulated tidal waves of flame. Even agile enemy would not be able to easily avoid it.
With sublime power and speed, Kouki swung the Holy Sword down from an upper stance. While Ryuutarou’s thrusted fist drew out a form that couldn’t even be more splendid and resulted in a violent shock wave that went forward just like a cannonball. Eri’s deathbringer, crimson tidal wave surged to swallow its target, turning it into ashes and dusts.
However…
“”ROOOAAAR!!””
“GuUURawwwr!!”
Unbeknownst to them, some things had hidden themselves. Three shadows roared and attacked Kouki’s party right before their attacks would directly hit their targets.
“”Hmmmph!?””
The suddenness of this situation made Kouki and Ryuutarou felt chills running down their spines. Two of the shadow rushed towards Kouki and Ryuutarou with tremendous power, and the metal maces in their hands were swung with great speed.
Kouki immediately used the sword’s centrifugal force to twist his body while Ryuutarou raised his left hand towards the incoming mace instead of his thrusted out right hand. With his balance broken, Kouki rolled on the ground, and Ryuutarou was blown away by the enemy’s second attack, a punch, after he defended against the mace.
What attacked Kouki and Ryuutarou were demonic beasts with appearances similar to Brutal, with a height of 2.5 meters. However, even though they were similar to monsters in RPGs such as Orc and Ogre, the Brutals were like pigs while these demonic beasts were considerably smart. Furthermore, their Brutal-like bodies were strengthened to their limits. In fact, the strength and speed from the previous surprise attack could not be compared to Brutals.
On the other side, even though Eri didn’t receive any direct attack, the psychological impact she received was greater than Kouki and Ryuutarou’s. Reason being, the shadow that suddenly appeared opened its mouth and begun to inhale the surging tidal waves at once. WoOOOoosh! The expansive flame gathered at a single point and disappeared. The shadow inhaled all of the flame in only tens of seconds.
What appeared in the space where the flame and heat disappeared was turtle-like demonic beast with six feet. The shell on its back was dyed in crimson, just like the rampaging flame that earlier changed its target to ashes.
In the next moment, the turtle with six feet finished absorbing the flame and once again opened its mouth wide. At the same time, the shell on its back shined intensely and red light appeared inside its opened mouth. It was just like how energy was collected before a laser beam was fired.
Seeing that, an impatient expression appeared on Eri’s face; she had no room to spare since she had just fired her magic. However, her impatient was blown off by the usual cheerful voice of her best friend in her arms.
“Don’t underestimate me! Come in succession o’ light of protection and be revived as long as I have the will, “Heaven’s Interruption”!”
In a moment, ten light shields appeared in succession before Suzu and Eri. All of the shields were set up diagonally at 45 degree angle. The super-high temperature beam was fired by the six-legged turtle at the same time the shields appeared, and parried upward through where the shields were crushed.
Even so, the power of the beam was greatly above the attack from the previous demonic beasts, since it only needed a moment to pulverize a shield. Suzu was gritting her teeth and chanted in succession to construct new shields one after another. It could be said it was as expected of a “Barrier-user,” the shield’s construction speed rivaled the speed of the shield’s destruction and succeeded in parrying the six-legged turtle’s beam, barely.
The parried beam hit the dungeon’s ceiling accompanied with great tremor, pulverizing its surroundings, and the scattered scorching minerals fell down like a rain.
“Damn it! What’s just happened!?”
“Just what are those demonic beasts!?”
“Shit, let’s defeat them now!”
Only until the situation progressed this much did Hiyama’s gang and Nagayama’s party slipped out of their confusion and prepared to fight. The wounded Shizuku and Nagayama were also healed completely, and they began to respectively attack the Chimeras.
Shizuku entered the super-high-speed world, and not even her after image could be seen. Voom! Her figure disappeared with a sound of exploded air, appearing right behind the Chimera in the next moment, and she used the sword drawing technique to unsheathe her swords that had returned to their sheaths before anyone noticed.
“No Beat,” it was a skill that enable movement without preliminary action. Rather than simply moving with speed without leaving any after images, one just could not catch up with her movement, which rapidly quicken and slowed. In addition, her sword drawing and slashing speed were further increased by the skills derived from Swordsmanship. The speed of the naked blades was even faster than what an ordinary living being would recognize as a swift flash.
To return the blow she received a while ago, she used one of the Yaegashi-style secret techniques, “Void Severing.” It cut even the space just like its name; at one moment one could see the silver-colored trajectory of the sword, and the Chimera’s snake tail was severed into two in the next moment.
“GURAaaaaWR!!”
Raising roar of anger, the Chimera turned around and swung its sharp claws. However, its attack only cut through the air; Shizuku had already moved to the other side. She swung her two swords, and cut the Chimera’s flank.
“Kuh!”
Shizuku used her speed to steadily damage the Chimera. However, Shizuku’s expression didn’t clear up, inadvertently leaking a sound as though she had been bitten a bitter bug. It was because her calculation had been wrong. In reality, Shizuku had wanted to cut the Chimera’s body apart with the first strike, but she could not do that, and the snake tail entered her slashing range instead. Even the second slash that supposed to cut the Chimera’s body in even halves were stopped when it quickly bent its body right before the slashes reached it.
The Chimera could not keep up with Shizuku’s speed. However, it was not like it could not respond to her. It could not see her figure, so it was barely able to respond to Shizuku’s extreme speed using its reflex speed; a truly troublesome opponent. It was something more than troublesome for Shizuku who wanted to finish the fight quickly and rescue the others.
Afterwards, she swung her swords for the third and fourth times, and though there were numerous wounds on the Chimera’s body, they were too shallow to become a mortal wound. In addition, the Chimera began to become accustomed to Shizuku’s speed. An impatient expression appeared on Shizuku’s face.
The bad things continued for Shizuku, no for all of them.
“CAAAWWWW!!”