Nacht was overjoyed. She had hardly seen such a splendid display of firepower outside of bullet hell games. She spread her wings and released her magic, vanishing just before one of the sinister rays of light struck her, leaving only an afterimage to be pierced by the shot.
“Stop scurrying around, you cockroach!” Erin shouted. Nacht took a brief moment to appreciate the implication that those black menaces existed even in this world before Erin, who had underestimated Nacht’s speed, began activating more of her abilities. “Combat Mode Shift: Lightning Bullets!” she declared, looking carefully down her sights. Nacht watched the milliseconds pass as Erin pulled the triggers. “Fire!”
The very instant the shots went off, Nacht simply twisted her upper body out of the way. It was like she could see them coming before they were even fired. The bullets zoomed past her like a streak of light and vanished harmlessly into the sky.
“No way!” protested Erin. “Reload... Full Fire!” There was a flash like lightning. A score of bolts shot from Erin’s guns, like the heart of the storm itself. Her first strategy had been to try to overwhelm Nacht with the sheer number of bullets. Her second had been to raise the speed of her shots as much as she could. And now, she was trying both methods at once. Nacht, however, wasn’t watching the bullets. She was watching Erin, predicting her shots, leading them one way and then evading. Dodging bullets was one of Nacht’s specialties. She had spent wholly unreasonable amounts of time training with her friends in closed spaces, dodging wholly unreasonable numbers of projectiles. Erin wasn’t about to overcome her evasion ability just by making her bullets a little faster.
“Phantom Wyrm,” Nacht said, invoking a skill. Her form flickered, then vanished.
“Huh?!” Erin exclaimed. “Are there more of her?!” In fact, there were not. What Erin was seeing was nothing more than afterimages. Between Nacht’s natural agility and the boost from her skill, she was now faster than Erin could follow with her eyes. “In that case, take this!” the girl said, preparing another ability. “Guidance of the Fairy King!”
This was the first Nacht had heard of that ability, but Erin’s movements gave her a pretty good idea of what it did. The barrels of Erin’s guns were pointed ahead of Nacht’s trajectory, waiting for her. It was as if she could see where Nacht was about to be. Her ability must have been one that let her see into the future.
Erin’s barrels lined up perfectly. She grinned, assured of victory, like a fisher waiting patiently for a fish. “Sixfold Demon Shot...Set!” A set of six guns appeared behind her, bright red and seeming to move with wills of their own. Each one was as long as Erin’s entire body. All of them were pointed at Nacht. “Load: Ruin Bullets! Fire!”
As Erin pulled the triggers of Black Cross, the living guns behind her fired their own bullets—although, speaking honestly, they were more like artillery shells. Each of them was affected by the unique enchantment of her Ancient-tier weapon: Absolute Aim. Its effect was simple. As long as the bullets were fired, they were guaranteed to hit. In the game, even if you turned around and fired in the direction opposite your target, the bullets would curve through the air and hit their mark. There was no escape, whether you took to the sky, went underground or underwater, or even fled to the opposite side of the continent via fast travel. It was a shot that could not be dodged. Even if Nacht made off to the very ends of the world, those bullets would pursue her. That was why Erin felt so assured of victory. After all, the only thing she had to do was hit Nacht a single time.
But if she thought such a simple trick would be enough to hit Nacht, she had another thing coming.
“Still taking me lightly, I see,” Nacht remarked. Erin had forgotten one thing: Nacht knew the name of the Black Cross. Therefore, it stood to reason that she would know its abilities as well. It wasn’t impossible for Nacht to be taken by surprise, as Sakura had once done despite her lower level, but as long as Nacht knew what attacks were coming, she had no shortage of countermeasures. “Milia Draconum Sacramentum...” Nacht uttered, her voice sounding oddly melodic. Those were the words of absolute power. They echoed, heavy and strong. And then, Nacht began her counterattack. “Enhance Spell! Ars Draconis: Atomic Ray! Now go!”
A small dragon of light appeared on the palm of Nacht’s hand. It spread its wings, then seemed to vanish. A second later, it darted silently forward like the thinnest beam of light. It was hardly a showy attack at all. The light dragon was a shy creature, after all. The only sign of its passing was the clash of light it left in its wake. The Atomic Ray struck the demon bullets directly, blasting them into pieces.
“What?!” Erin said, stunned. “I... I don’t believe it...”
“An unavoidable attack, guaranteed to hit your target,” Nacht said. “But the bullets it fires are slow. They’re not hard to shoot out of the sky.” The broken fragments of the bullets were just as unerring, but all they could do was dirty the frills of Nacht’s dress, Night’s Embrace. She dusted them off with an air of undeniable superiority. “We still have some time,” she said. “Wanna keep going, Erin?”
Erin simply glowered in silence as a cloud drifted in front of the moon. It was no wonder. From that poor girl’s perspective, it was like the final boss had suddenly shown up in the middle of town. Not that Nacht felt the least bit guilty for it, though.