The monsters’ cries of agony, loud sizzling, and the stench of burning flesh reached the battlefield. The flying monsters that had emerged from the underground caught fire when they got within a few meters of the black dragon, and they dropped down to the ground, trailing flames like meteors.
It’s so hot there, they burned to death just from getting near it…
Umineko gulped. He was protected by the strange black glow, but the monsters weren’t so lucky.
The dragon positioned itself by the labyrinth entrance and was burning the remaining monsters.
What’s going on…?
Umineko had seen monsters squabbling among themselves, so he guessed it was something like that—except this time, it was just between boss monsters, and now the winner had gone to slaughter the rest of the monster horde. He felt he ought to be cheering for the black dragon…except that, in the end, they’d be left with a dragon powerful enough to quell an invasion.
“But I have this power…”
Umineko decided to trust the power he’d been blessed with for reasons unknown. If it allowed him to one-shot the other monsters, who knew what his limit might be?
“M-Master! What are you doing?!” shouted his second-in-command.
“I’ve never been stronger! I’m going to defeat that black dragon and earn the title of dragon slayer!”
He was about to rush off when the irritated sub-master stopped him.
“Are you joking?! The dragon’s our ally!”
“What? An ally?”
Umineko stopped in his tracks.
“You’re feeling stronger because that dragon gave us something like a buff. Let’s just watch and not get in its way.”
The sub-master understood the situation. The battle was already over. The players who had been bathed by the black light had received Theodore’s Dragon Lord’s Protection stat buff. But now a white light enveloped the players too.
At Fort Sandras, the players who were hiding in their inn rooms witnessed the fort being cut in half and then swallowed by a sea of flames.
“What the hell’s happening?!”
“It was that giant knight standing outside that did it!”
The town filled with screams. The buildings in the line of fire had been smashed into the ground. None of the players and NPCs who’d been inside them could have survived.
Amid the shouting and chaos, two sparsely dressed people were just standing motionless on the main road.
“Did the progression guilds lose…?”
“No, they couldn’t…”
This man and woman had been hiding out in an inn, engaging in an activity to help them forget about the harsh reality, when a strong tremor shook them off the bed. The inn had collapsed, but they’d managed to crawl out of the rubble and escape onto the main road. There, the sight of the damaged fort had rendered them speechless.
The walls around the fort town were broken, and monsters were flooding in. The man and woman saw flying monsters defecate over the fleeing NPCs; their droppings exploded on contact and blew the NPCs to smithereens. The soundscape was a mixture of people screaming, explosions, and monsters breathing.
The pair grabbed each other by the hand and broke into a run toward the southern gate, which led to Koane Monastery.
“Where…where are we going?”
“We might survive if we make it as far back as Calloah!”
“What, you want us to run all the way to Calloah?! Wataru may still bring this under control, you know!”
“If monsters are in the town, that means they’ve already failed! If you want to die, do it without me!”
The battlefield had indeed been in shambles since the Ancient Knight Rimpeller’s appearance.
The man and woman nodded at each other and continued running to the southern gate. As they did, they heard buzzing behind them growing closer and closer. They turned and saw a group of players frantically trying to get away from giant wasp monsters.
Voracious Wasp Level 43
Carnivorous insects found in the Tsulgur Primeval Forest, believed to eat anything that moves. Although acute hunger can drive them to cannibalize their nestmates, these social wasps normally cooperate to catch prey. Their stingers are strong enough to pierce steel, and their venom is capable of melting flesh.
The players who had avoided the battle were still frontline fighters. They banded together to fight off the wasps, but their slapdash teamwork was too poorly balanced to be effective.
One of the wasps was approaching to try to break into the middle of the players’ formation. The close-range players at the front saw this as their chance and ganged up on that wasp—but then the other wasps, as if they’d been waiting for such an opening, made it to the rear-row fighters and managed to snatch one of them.
“Aaaah! Aaaaargh!”
“Kenjirou!”
The wasps swarmed the healer called Kenjirou in midair, ripped him to pieces with their sharp fangs, and promptly devoured him. One of the front-row fighters furiously charged at the wasps, throwing the battle formation into chaos. Everyone was fighting for themselves.
“We…we have to help them…”
“Don’t be stupid! The town’s lost! Saving one or two players now doesn’t make a difference!”
The man kept running, pulling the woman with him. The woman saw a wasp nimbly snatch another player while a second wasp delivered the lethal sting.
“H-heeelp…!”
“Nooo! I don’t want to diiie!”
The woman felt sick when she saw the last of that group get eaten alive. Without slowing her steps, she threw up.
Scenes from hell were playing out along the road—people getting trampled by giant pigs, skewered with spears, or snatched up and carried away by monstrous birds.
The man and woman could hear breathing behind them, and the tapping of claws against the paving stones. The monsters were getting closer and closer. They couldn’t tell exactly how close these creatures were, but they had a feeling they might be caught before they made it to the southern gate. The woman was too terrified to look behind her in case one of the monsters bit her head off. She forced herself to run as fast as she could, desperately praying in her head.
Dear God… Please, I beg you, save us!
The next moment, something happened.
“Making merry chasing terrified prey?”
The woman felt as if the temperature around suddenly dropped below freezing. She couldn’t look back, but not because she thought it was too dangerous—her body simply refused to move. Even though she’d stopped in her tracks, her companion wasn’t pulling her arm. He, too, had been paralyzed by fear.
The beasts’ panting began to grow distant, as did the sound of insect wings beating.
“Oh? Now you’re the ones running away?”
The voice sounded bored.
The next moment, the woman heard what sounded like a large number of objects bursting at once. A spectacular cluster of light rose to the sky, where it dissipated. The monster noises ceased.
The woman very cautiously turned her head and saw an all-white girl standing with her back toward them.
She’s not human…
It took only one look to tell that. The girl filled the woman with primal fear, as if she were looking at death incarnate.
“Miss.”
The woman shuddered, realizing the girl was speaking to her.
The girl turned toward the man and woman. She was terrifyingly beautiful, but the expression on her face was deathly cold. She looked them up and down.
“Why are you dressed like that?”
“Like what…? Oh…!”