I contracted Sword Beam once more, pointed its shortened length toward the beast’s heart, and reextended the blade of light as fast as I could, causing it to fly out and pierce Vlad right through the heart. I yanked the blade sideways and a geyser of blood sprayed out along its path.
Still, the blood reversed course and began to flow back into the monster’s body.
“Didn’t you hear me?! Useless!” Vlad shouted, letting loose a massive volley of ice bullets.
I drew my shield and countless projectiles crackled on its surface all around me. Thanks to my beam, I was unharmed, but the dome shield covering the city below was blackened from within in various places. I realized that the heavy smoke, with nowhere to escape, was trapped inside the shield. Carbon monoxide poisoning from inhaled smoke was one of the most common causes of death in a fire. It would take a good long while for smoke to pervade the entire town, but my opponent was immortal. If the fight dragged on like this, everyone in the city could die. On the other hand, if I dropped the shield to ventilate the smoke, the city would once again become a prime target.
“Impeccable timing,” said Vlad, smirking at my back.
I turned back to face my opponent and saw countless black spots darkening the sky.
Those spots...
A swarm of demons. Among their numbers were wyverns just like the ones I’d seen on so many hunter’s bulletins. Their timely arrival could be no coincidence.
“You’ve brainwashed all these monsters...”
“Yes! I prepared these forces for the unlikely event of my plan’s failure. They’ll have no trouble destroying this blasted town! If you drop this damned shield, that is. If you don’t, well... They’ll just start invading other towns,” Vlad said.
I was clearly being threatened. The Vampire Lord was holding the people of every nearby settlement hostage to force me to lower my shield. Of course, I could do no such thing. I had to annihilate Vlad before he could give any orders to the horde.
If I tried to take the demons out one by one with Sword Beam, they’d just scatter and flee, but if I used Death Beam, I could get them all in one go!
“Hyyyaaaa!”
I put my wrists together and opened my hands to fire the massive bluish-white beam. The beam’s trajectory followed the movement of my hands, its pale glow devouring monsters one after another. Their bodies evaporated the instant the light touched them.
I hadn’t fired Death Beam since leaving the abandoned mine all those weeks ago, but its destructive power was just the same as I remembered. Moreover—
“Wha?! What is that?” said Vlad, face trembling and expression overwhelmed. The beast was probably surprised he couldn’t buy more time with his army, but it was still an unexpected reaction.
Vlad was immortal: the very existence of a being like that is to bide its time. Why, then, would Death Beam cause so much consternation?
“Come to think of it...” I said to myself. I thought back on Vlad’s speech and suddenly a hunch came to me. Vlad had said something interesting while bragging about immortality, something he wouldn’t have had to say if he really was immortal.
“Are you sure you’re just a human?” he shouted.
“What you see is what you get: I’m a human!”
“If that’s true, then how do you wield such power? A man of your capabilities would be given a suitable position in the Demon King’s army if you willed it. I could put in a good word for you! Leave these insignificant humans behind and surrender yourself to the Great One!”
I couldn’t imagine that he’d made the invitation out of kindness. Vlad wanted me to join him because he feared for his own safety. The way my Death Beam had him scrambling to protect himself seemed to affirm my suspicions as to the true nature of his “immortality.”
“Well? What will you do? Come over to our side? Or perhaps—”
“I’ll never surrender! I have no interest in any position among your ranks!”
“If you would bow to the Demon King, this world could be yours! If you would submit, even the riches of an A rank adventurer would seem paltry beside your gains!”
“Status, fame, fortune—I don’t need any of it! My heart is fulfilled by the life I already lead!”
Until I came to this world, I had been dead even while I lived. I’d been sleepwalking through a succession of dull, insipid days with nothing to even hold my interest. Studying hard to find a good career hadn’t brought me anything like happiness. It had emptied me. I had been alive, but I had not lived.
But things had changed.
With the knowledge of the three words imparted upon me by the goddess, my life had completely changed.
Living true to “laser beams” had helped me make friends. It had taught me the joy of protecting people I cared about.
Living true to “animal ears” had given me something to like. It had taught me the joy of loving.
Living true to “collection” had expanded my interests. It had taught me the joy of being exposed to the unknown.
Together, all three had taught me the joy of being alive.
Just as the goddess had told me to, I had found the things I loved and started leading a good life.
I wouldn’t let that be taken away from me!
“I’ll defeat you. Then, I’ll keep on living for the things I love!”
“You’ll defeat me, will you? Ha, you fool! You think you can defeat an immortal?”
“I know I can! Because you aren’t immortal in the true sense of the word!” I said. When Vlad was gloating earlier, he had said, That kind of magic can’t kill an immortal.
Subconsciously, he had prefaced his boasting with the critical admission that “that kind of magic” couldn’t kill him. In other words, different magic existed that could. Just like any monster, Vlad’s life would be annihilated if his devil stone was destroyed.
Normally, the devil stone was in the same part of the body where a heart would be. Vlad had taken the form of a human, so I had pierced the left side of his chest, but he was a monster. The internals of his body were not guaranteed to be the same as his outward appearance suggested.
If there was a devil stone inside his body, then it would of course be unnatural for him to remain calm after having his chest pierced. Furthermore, if he really was immortal, he wouldn’t be trembling with anxiety over the sight of my Death Beam. “That kind of magic,” it seemed, did not include such a powerful laser.
The difference between Sword and Death Beam was pure scale. Vlad couldn’t be defeated by a precision attack, but a broad strike could fell him. In other words—
“Your devil stone is extremely small and you can freely move it around inside your body! Is that right?”
A moment of shock twisted Vlad’s features. He allowed only an instant of vulnerability before immediately resuming a relaxed grin.
“That’s right. It’s just as you say: I can change the position of my devil stone—my one weakness—at will!”
“Then I’ll blow your whole body away!” I shouted.
As long as his devil stone remained intact, Vlad could just keep regenerating. He could move it around as much as he wanted, but if I blasted his entire body away, it wouldn’t make a lick of difference. That was why seeing my Death Beam had so flustered him.
That being said... Even though I had revealed his trick, Vlad’s face betrayed no sense of disturbance. He was still looking at me with the same cocky smile.
“Did you think that I would just sit back and wait while you asked your trifling questions?” he said.
“What are you—”
“Ha, now you see! But no matter, it’s too late!”
Far in the distance, suspended high in the sky, was an enormous, bluish-white cluster. It was as if a pocket of clear blue sky were falling over the night horizon. Terrifying in its overwhelming scale, the object became clearer as it grew. It was a great mass of ice. If it made landfall, half of the city would be instantly crushed. The resulting shock wave would kick up enough rubble and sediment to level the remaining half. The entire capital would be returned to the dust from which it came.
Vlad had been channeling magic power into his cane all throughout our conversation. It usually took multiple people to wield a magic item that powerful, but he had so much magical energy that he was able to do so alone.
I was still shielding the city with my dome, but I couldn’t be sure it would be of any use against such an enormous chunk of ice. It was incomparable to anything I’d defended against before.
I, however, had no intention of blocking.
I had come to understand over these past two months that despite the phrase “laser beams” referring to one desire, there were different kinds of satisfaction involved. Lasers are, essentially, lines of light. Both the line and the light were pleasant to work with. I felt good when I made the light of my beams as bright, luminous, and dazzling as possible. I felt good when I made the lines of my beams as long and true as possible.
Nothing felt as good, then, as the Death Beam.
“You’re persistent for a human, but you’ll reach the limits of your magic soon enough! At this rate, keeping up your defenses will...” Vlad trailed off when he noticed my expression. “Huh?! What amuses you so?” He raised his eyebrows in suspicion.
What amuses me, huh? You’ll see.
“Just knowing how good it’s going to feel when I put everything I’ve got into this next shot, that’s all!” I said.
I drew my hands down to waist level and began to produce a ball of light between them. Ten centimeters in diameter, twenty centimeters, thirty—it gradually swelled.