The moment the words left her lips, Cordelia surged forward like a launched arrow. Her eyes had gone blood-red, and the aura around her blazed crimson, her body consumed by the berserker mode that turned her into a living weapon.
Two seconds.
The Ogre Emperor reacted instantly, swinging a massive fist toward her with all the subtlety of an avalanche. Cordelia darted to the side, and the blow slammed into the ground with earth-splitting force, carving a crater several meters wide. Dust and dirt exploded into the air, obscuring the battlefield for an instant.
Through the swirling haze, Cordelia pivoted, sprinting behind the beast with lethal grace.
Then it froze.
Not just halted, it stopped, as if caught in invisible chains. A sudden, unnatural stillness clung to its limbs. Lilith stood in the distance, her eyes closed, voice raised in a piercing chant as ancient syllables spilled from her lips like lightning.
Four seconds.
Cordelia didn’t hesitate. She raised the holy sword high, then brought it crashing down in a horizontal arc, cutting clean through the beast’s right Achilles tendon. There was a sharp snap, more like a twig cracking than flesh tearing, and the Emperor’s right leg collapsed beneath it. With a thunderous crash, the monster dropped to one knee.
Six seconds.
Spinning on her heel, Cordelia twisted into a second strike. Using her full momentum and the torque of her berserker strength, she drove the blade toward its left leg. The swing came faster than the eye could track, its force enhanced by sheer centrifugal force.
The sword connected with bone.
And shattered it.
Flesh exploded in a spray of dark blood as the Ogre Emperor dropped to both knees, the ground trembling beneath its bulk. For a moment, it seemed like the tide had turned.
Then Cordelia clicked her tongue in frustration.
The first injury, the tendon she’d severed, was already beginning to mend.
It was regenerating, even now.
“How much punishment does this bastard need?” Cordelia growled, swinging her sword in wide, brutal arcs.
Her blade bit deep into the Ogre Emperor’s flesh again and again, carving gashes across its monstrous body. Each strike was a slash of defiance, relentless and furious. The ground beneath them was slick with blood. She wasn’t just cutting; it was butchery. If there was ever a definition of “mincing something into ribbons,” this was it.
Eleven seconds.
Her assault became a dance—a whirling storm of steel and crimson, a ballet painted in gore. Blow after blow, dozens of them, and yet the beast kept breathing. Still, she didn’t stop. Couldn’t. Not when every second mattered.
Then she leapt.
With a single surge, Cordelia launched herself into the air, flipped her grip, and brought her blade down in a perfect, savage arc across the creature’s thick neck. The steel kissed its carotid artery, severing it in one clean, final motion.
She landed with a roll, barely upright, and immediately turned toward Lilith.
“So that was your plan from the start,” she muttered. “I was the distraction. The timer. Buy enough seconds to open a real shot. Guess I didn’t land anything that overrode its healing, but hey, whatever gets it done.”
With a bitter little smile, she staggered back from the monster, retreating as the clock hit its final tick.
Twelve seconds.
The Ogre Emperor dropped to its knees, finally wounded deeply enough to falter. It tried to rise, its legs already regenerating, its muscles twitching with grotesque resolve.
But then, it happened.
A voice echoed across the battlefield, cold and resounding.
“For the second time today, Golden Roar: Dragus Genocide.”
The world turned gold.
There was no warning. Just a sudden eruption of blinding, violent light that swallowed the landscape in a storm of pure brilliance. It was less magic and more annihilation, raw mana converted into golden devastation, a spell that didn’t just attack but erased.
The flash faded.
Ash drifted on the wind. The air itself seemed to hum with trauma.
Lilith watched the aftermath in silence, then clicked her tongue.
“Even with all that, it’s still not enough,” she muttered. “S-rank, even at its lowest classification… Koharu’s going to have to end it.”
Her gaze sharpened.
They’d cracked the shell.
Now came the final blow.
Even carbonized, the Ogre Emperor was still alive.
Lilith let out a dry, incredulous laugh. Its flesh, what little remained, was blackened, flaking away in chunks. And yet, beneath that charred ruin, she could already see it: skin regrowing, bones reknitting. It was trying to come back.
“Still, it’s done,” Lilith called out. “One more hit and it’s over. He’s barely holding together.”
Before she could finish the sentence, Koharu was already in motion.
“Oh, shut up! I’m already on it!” she barked, her voice half fury, half triumph. “And for the record, who are you calling a damn amateur, you gloomy little witch? Ugh, forget it! Just die already!”
She raised her hand, and lightning howled in response.
“Type-Zero Electromagnetic Control: RAILGUN!”
The final shot ripped through the air like a thunderclap, a condensed embodiment of rage and divine precision. It struck the Ogre Emperor dead center.
And this time, he didn’t heal.
The explosion was devastating.
Flesh scattered like shrapnel, limbs disintegrated in mid-air, and what remained of the Ogre Emperor was blown across the battlefield in a rain of burning meat. The impact alone sent shockwaves rippling through the ground.
Silence followed.
They all watched the aftermath, eyes locked on the drifting fragments. Waiting.
Five seconds passed.
Then ten.
Fifteen.
Thirty.
Still nothing.
No regeneration. No twitch of life. No dark miracle.
At last, the silence cracked, giving way to a slow, collective exhalation.
“He’s done?” Cordelia asked, breathless.
Lilith nodded. “No mistake. That’s a corpse.”
But before relief could settle in fully, the sound of applause echoed across the field.
“Bravo. Truly, bravo. That was spectacular. Ogre Kings, the Emperor himself, the rest of the horde, all wiped out so cleanly. I must say… you girls are trouble.”
Everyone turned toward the voice.
Cordelia froze in place.
All the color drained from her face, replaced by a cold, clammy pallor. Her entire body locked up, knees trembling. The fear in her eyes was equal parts panic and recognition.
Lilith, by contrast, exhaled long and slow. She lifted both hands slightly, an expression of exasperated resignation clouding her face. She’d seen creatures like this before, too many times while traveling with Ryuto. She knew what they were looking at.
At the edge of the battlefield stood a boy. Or at least, he looked like one.
Short, barely a meter and a half tall. Slim to the point of fragility. He couldn’t have weighed more than forty kilos, and he looked no older than ten.
But sprouting from his head were unmistakable horns, curved and glinting in the light.