Since our target was so large, I probably didn’t have to worry too much about accuracy. For the same reason, it seemed better to hit it with one powerful blow rather than try to grind it down with a whole lot of small wounds.
Evidently Capitan and Diego were thinking the same thing, because they charged straight at the Greater Armorfish from different directions, hunting knife and spear aimed at its scales. Both were fast, but as a master of spirit, Capitan was faster. He had to have been using a technique I didn’t recognize, because while spirit was well suited to physical enhancement, the speed at which he was moving couldn’t be explained by that alone.
“Graaahhh!”
When he reached the point where he was below the Greater Armorfish, Capitan leaped up and swung his hunting knife at its massive body. The keen blade sliced through the air, and...
Clang!
...bounced back with a high-pitched ring.
“Hmm.”
While he must’ve been surprised, Capitan was no ordinary fighter. He flipped, regaining his balance midair, and landed perfectly on his feet.
That didn’t mean he was safe, though. The moment he’d attacked the Greater Armorfish, its glassy eyes had jerked around like a clockwork puppet’s, and its tail had started to beat the air vigorously. But while one might naturally assume that such a movement would be pointless, given that we weren’t underwater, everybody present knew better. If it could float in the air, then it could swim in it too.
Sure enough, the Greater Armorfish shot forward far faster than you’d expect from a creature of its size, its sheer bulk creating a pressure wave in its wake. As it moved, a noise rumbled out of its throat that was halfway between screeching roar and the sound of metal grinding on metal, and ten magic circles lit up on the ground.
“This is what you mentioned earlier, right?!” I shouted at Diego.
“Yeah!” came his reply from a distance. “Niedz, Lukas, Gahedd! Lesser sahagin incoming! They’re all yours—but don’t be reckless!”
“Got it!”
Their yelled exchange spanned enough time for the lesser sahagin to manifest. There were ten of them, just like the magic circles they had appeared from—too many for the trainees to handle alone. They could handle one at a time, but if even two sahagin ganged up on them, it could prove fatal. Given that, Capitan, Diego, and I would have to keep an eye on them and help out to prevent them from being cornered.
Still, the Greater Armorfish was proving to be stronger than I’d thought. Or, more accurately, harder than I’d thought. I’d struck it once, but my blow had bounced off ineffectively. It seemed like this was going to be difficult if I channeled mana or spirit alone...
“You’re telling me this is an upper-level boss?” Capitan said. “Suppose I can’t expect any less from the famous Dungeon of the Sea God’s Daughters!”
“No, something’s wrong!” Diego called out. “My spear pierced its scales last time! If it was always this strong, there wouldn’t be any adventurers left in Lucaris!”
That took me by surprise. “So it’s usually weaker?” I asked.
“Of course it is!”
“Now that you mention it, it’s a lot larger than the one I spotted in the distance last time,” Capitan said, irritation bleeding into his tone. “Has more of a presence too. Damn... A unique spawn?!”
Unique spawns were rare occurrences that broke the usual dungeon rules. The kinds of monsters that showed up in boss chambers were supposed to be the same every time, with only marginal differences in their strength and size. The chance of running into a unique spawn was so low that it only happened to the extremely unlucky.
Only the unlucky, huh? I was beginning to get the feeling that this was my fault, somehow. My luck was definitely the worst out of everyone here...
Capitan and Diego were still looking for a way to pierce the Greater Armorfish’s defenses when an idea occurred to me. “I’ll make an opening in its scales!” I shouted. “Both of you, strike there!”
Well, really, it was the only option we had. I wasn’t as seasoned as Capitan or as precise as Diego, but if all we needed to do was blow a hole in the enemy’s defenses? That was where my mana-spirit fusion came in handy. Adding divinity to the mix would make it more certain to succeed, but I wasn’t sure whether my weapon would hold up, and we no doubt had more fighting ahead of us.
Capitan seemed to realize what I was thinking. “Got it! Countin’ on you, Rentt!” he shouted as he began drawing the Greater Armorfish’s attention away from me.
Diego had no way of knowing what I was about to do, but it seemed he’d decided to put his trust in me—like Capitan, he switched up his strategy. With expert spearwork, he began herding all the lesser sahagin in the area away.
Thanks to both of their efforts, I had plenty of breathing room. I focused on channeling mana and spirit into my sword, and when I saw an opening...
“Here I go!” I shouted. “Both of you, stay clear!”
The Greater Armorfish was quick in the air, but not that much quicker than the other monsters we’d faced in the upper floors. Keeping up with it was simple; it was getting through the armor that was the hard part. On the other hand, if we could manage that, our victory would be assured.
When I was directly below the boss monster, I leaped, using my momentum to carry my sword into an upward slash.
Bam!
I hit my mark, and a section of the Greater Armorfish’s scales exploded outward from the inside—exactly what mana-spirit fusion was meant to achieve.
As I began to plummet to the ground, Capitan and Diego shot up past me, having leaped up slightly after I had. They aimed their weapons at the gap in the monster’s scales, and...
“That’s that,” I said.
I shouldn’t have relaxed, though, because that was the exact moment that the Greater Armorfish’s lifeless corpse began to fall from the air. I barely managed to land and scramble out of the way before it came crashing down onto the ground.
“Couldn’t you have put a little more thought into the landing?” I grumbled as we cleaned up the rest of the lesser sahagin.