The Night King’s presence shifted in an instant. The arrogance drained from his posture, and he collapsed to the ground, falling to his knees with a ragged gasp.
“Guh!”
“Father!” Routier cried out, already rushing toward him.
“Routier! Wait—” I reached to stop her on instinct, but to my surprise, it was Saria who held me back this time, not the other way around.
“Seiichi! It’s okay now!” Her voice was calm, certain. Completely different from before.
“Huh? What do you mean?” I asked.
“That man right now… that’s really Routier’s father. No question about it.”
“What?”
Now I really don’t get what the hell is going on…
Hadn’t that guy, the Night King or whatever, just said Routier’s father was dead?
While I stood frozen in confusion, the man—Routier’s real father, if Saria was right—struggled to lift his head, straining to speak through the pain.
“Nngh… not much time… listen closely.”
“Father, what’s happening—”
“Listen!”
“Y-Yes!” Routier flinched at the sudden force in his voice, her body tensing. But after a breath, she nodded quickly, eyes focused and obedient. Her father managed a faint smile.
“Good girl… Listen well. I… I’m being possessed. By something else. Something calling itself… the ‘Night King.’”
“Something else?”
He nodded weakly, breath shallow.
“Yes… Those lunatics in the Cult of the Wicked One… they used me… tampered with my body…”
Routier’s hands clenched into trembling fists as the words fell from his lips.
“What they implanted in me… you’ve already seen it for yourself. The Night King. A being that, true to its name, holds unfathomable power within the night. At night, it becomes… practically invincible. You could even call it… a god.”
“A… a god?” I echoed, barely able to process it.
“Like the Black Dragon God?” Routier asked.
“It’s on a different level. The Night King cannot be harmed or killed while night lasts. Not by magic, not by skill, not even by their so-called Wicked One…”
Hold on. That’s… absurd. An enemy who literally can’t take damage at night? What the hell are we supposed to do with that?!
We’ve fought guys with skills like “Suredeath” and “Resonant,” abilities so broken you’d think they were the final boss, right? But now there’s something even worse, something stronger than even the deity those cultists worship? That’s insane.
Seriously, what’s the Cult of the Wicked One even trying to do? Create something stronger than their god? And then… what? Control it? What part of that sounds like a good idea?
Wait a second, if everything Routier’s father said is true, then why did that Night King guy look like he was in pain when I hit him? Was that my imagination?
As I wrestled with that thought, Routier’s pale face turned toward her father. Her voice trembled, but she managed to speak.
“Th-Then… what do we do? How can we stop it?”
“There’s… only one way,” he said between shallow breaths. “You must… bring about… the morning.”
“Morning?” Routier repeated, brow furrowed.
The answer threw us all off. What kind of weakness was that?
Is it just because he’s the ‘Night King’? Is he weak in the daytime? Seriously? That’s way too simple.
Judging by the looks on everyone’s faces, I wasn’t the only one who thought that. Routier didn’t seem to understand the danger either, but her father, reading her expression, pushed forward.
“When morning comes… my will becomes stronger than his. I… can suppress the Night King’s mind… seal it away.”
“In that case—!”
“But… on this world… that’s impossible.”
“W-What? Why not?!”
“This planet… has no morning.”
“Huh?” The response came in unison.
Every single one of us stared, blinking.
No morning?
What the hell does that even mean?! Isn’t this just a dungeon?
I mean, sure, it looks like a starry night sky, but it’s underground, right?
Seeing our collective confusion, Routier’s father grit his teeth and forced himself to keep speaking.
“This place… is not a dungeon. It’s… another planet. You are no longer… on your world.”
“—!”
Wait, what?! When the hell did we hop planets?! We just walked down a staircase! A staircase!
I stared at the grassland around us, the endless starry sky overhead… and suddenly, the logic broke down. No dungeon I’d ever seen had felt this real. But if he was telling the truth, then…
We weren’t underground.
We weren’t even on the same world anymore.
“Because… there is no morning… in this place, that creature… is invincible. And worse still…” Routier’s father drew a shaky breath, his voice strained and flickering like a dying flame. “Because I am sealed here… no one… can teleport out of this world.”
“What?” I asked, instinctively taking a half-step forward.
“In other words,” he rasped, “you have no choice… but to defeat him… here… in this world without dawn…”
“But… Seiichi-oniichan’s magic can break seals,” Origa offered, stepping forward with quiet confidence.
Routier’s father, however, shook his head slowly, as if that kind of hope hurt more than despair.
“This is a seal… and yet it is not. To me, it is a prison. But to him… it is a convenient blessing. A gift. Undoing it… would change nothing…”
Routier’s lips trembled. “No… Then there’s no way to beat him…”
“I thought the same at first,” her father admitted. “But if it’s that man…”
“Wait, me?” I blinked, pointing to myself. “What did I do?”
His eyes, tired but certain, met mine. But before he could say more, his body suddenly convulsed. He clutched his chest, and a terrible scream tore out of his throat.
“Gghhh… GRAAAAAAHHHHHH!!”
“Father!!”
“Routier, no!” Saria shouted.
Through clenched teeth, his voice scraped out one final command. “K… Kill… it…”
“Father!! Stay with me!” Routier reached out, trying to crawl toward him, but Saria, now in her gorilla form, grabbed her in a blur and leapt back just in time.
An instant later, Routier’s father’s hand lashed out like a blade, striking the space she had just vacated with terrifying force, as if trying to gouge something from the very air.
Then, in the space of a breath, the shift happened again.
The warmth and humanity in his face vanished completely. In its place returned the suffocating, regal malice of the Night King.
“Ghh… hahh… hahhh… That wretched soul is persistent. It must’ve been that punch earlier. What kind of impact was that… to force him out like that?”
“Give him back!” Routier screamed, her voice cracking. “Give my father back!”
Without waiting for a reply, she summoned a massive giant of black flame behind her, the air around it rippling with heat and power. With a shout of pure fury, she sent the flaming titan crashing toward the Night King with a punch that shook the very ground beneath our feet.
But the Night King didn’t so much as flinch.