Opportunities from the Game Become Reality Episode 188
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Opportunities from the Game Become Reality Episode 188
44. Center of the Incident (4)
"Who the hell are you!"
As if proving that the airship's scale wasn't for nothing, the number of Holy Knights visible at a glance exceeded 100, and the priests were even more numerous than that.
The Holy Knights drew Bless Swords, functionally similar to Force Swords, and the priests pulled out chained holy books.
Each of the Holy Knights wielding Bless Swords possessed combat ability on par with a High Knight, and the priests with chained holy books were nothing to scoff at either.
Moreover, the leaders commanding the Holy Knights and priests were Aura Masters, beings of the 7th Circle, and since Divine power had an advantage in compatibility against black mana, they were confident that no matter how formidable the enemy was even a Master-class black knight the clergy would not lose.
But...
"Charge."
At the single word from the black knight Selin wearing a butterfly mask, the Sword Auras drifting through the air began to multiply, filling the sky like a school of fish.
Their number alone nearly reached 100.
"W-What is this?"
Naturally, the clergy were dumbfounded by the sight that seemed to defy common sense.
Some Holy Knights even dropped the swords they were holding.
"It's a trick! A cheap trick of those vile demon worshipers!"
At that, the Holy Knight Captain shouted in desperation and unleashed a Saint Blade, the same as an Aura Blade.
But with Selin's ensuing sneer...
"Experience it yourselves."
The Sword Auras, like a school of fish, flew in at terrifying speed.
"Lady Sepia! Grant me strength!"
At that, pure white light enveloped the Holy Knight Captain, and he swung his Aura Blade toward the rain of swords that came like a massive torrent.
And the Holy Knight Captain realized that those countless Sword Auras were no mere trick.
The moment the foremost protruding Sword Aura collided with his Saint Sword, his blade was knocked back by the repulsive force.
The Holy Knight Captain widened his eyes because he believed Divine power could never be pushed back by black mana, and then the school of fish, as if hunting prey, engulfed him.
"Priests!"
In an instant, one of the Holy Knight Captain's arms was torn off.
Then his leg was torn off, and next, his abdomen was pierced through.
The Priest Captain and his subordinates, who belatedly came to their senses, poured out Saint Shields and healing magic to protect the Holy Knight Captain.
But it was all futile.
"Compatibility? That only matters when facing someone of similar level. Our difference is like heaven and earth."
The barrier tore like paper, and the speed at which his body was ripped apart by the Sword Auras far outpaced the healing magic's ability to restore the Holy Knight Captain.
With Selin's mockery, the Holy Knight Captain was reduced to a handful of flesh, losing his original form.
"H-How could this happen."
The clergy, including the Priest Captain, had to falter.
Though they had only exchanged a single strike, they could feel the overwhelming gap in level between them and the enemy.
"You bitch..."
No possibility of victory was in sight.
If they weren't clergy, or if the enemy weren't demon worshipers, they would have ordered the airship to retreat and then some.
But the Priest Captain and his subordinates, facing a demon, did not step back they stood in her way with faces resigned to death.
Selin clicked her tongue at the clergy's actions.
"I'd have preferred seeing faces twisted in fear, but priests really are so noble, aren't they."
As she waved her hand, a bloody wind blew across the airship's deck.
The swarm of Sword Auras swept across the deck like a typhoon.
The clergy's counterattacks and defenses were utterly useless.
When the bloody wind settled, barely half of those on deck remained.
In a single strike, 50 Holy Knights no different from Vanguards and even more priests had lost their lives.
Even after losing so many subordinates, the Priest Captain's expression remained unwavering.
That was enough to twist Selin's expression.
"How annoying."
And as if expressing her mood, the Sword Auras all drove into the deck at once, destroying the mechanisms beneath it.
-BOOM BOOM BOOM CRASH!
As a result, the airship lost its balance and began to slowly descend, and Selin, as if to end it here, raised her hand once more.
At her will, the swords stuck in the deck slid out and rose into the air.
Following that, the tips of nearly a hundred swords were aimed at the clergy.
"Goodbye, you fanatic bastards."
As Selin's finger pointed forward, the Sword Auras shot out in a straight line all at once, like bullets.
The clergy looked at that attack and thought.
That they had no means to stop it.
It was the equivalent of a death sentence.
"Ah, dear God."
But that was when it happened.
-GROOOOOM!
A blinding white light burst directly above the airship, as a powerful surge of Divine power swept through.
"Damn..."
At the same time, the Sword Auras that had been flying fiercely fell to the deck like kites with snapped strings, failing to finish off the clergy.
Selin stared at the sky and bit her lip.
"The Saintess."
Soon, a beautiful blonde woman appeared on the deck amidst a flash of light and landed softly.
At the same time, the atmosphere around them changed.
"We greet the Saintess!"
The overjoyed clergy bowed their heads in unison, paying their respects.
"Was it you who slaughtered your brothers and sisters?"
"And if it was?"
"You will not die an easy death."
An unexpected intruder.
She was Sharon Sylvester, a Saintess infamous even among the demon race.
Seeing Sylvester, who appeared as if she had been waiting all along, Selin hardened her expression coldly, but soon a bitter smile tugged at the corner of her lips.
"Granny, aren't you overdoing it a bit?"
At the same time, the Sword Auras that had fallen limply rose back into the air as if coming to their senses.
At Selin's sneer, the Saintess, unshaken, drew her personal staff from her subspace.
When facing an enemy wielding black mana, the Saintess displays combat ability on par with the 9th-circle.
A holy radiance that chilled one to the bone just by looking at it emanated from the Saintess.
"My Lady!"
But at the voice echoing from behind the deck, Selin spoke with a regretful expression.
"Sorry, but my fight with Granny will have to wait."
"What?"
And Selin's daggers scattered in all directions.
-CRAAAASH!
Some daggers tore further into the slowly descending ship.
"Hup!"
Some daggers targeted the clergy's throats.
With a hundred daggers wreaking havoc like that, the Saintess had no choice but to busily move to protect both the airship and the clergy.
But only for a moment while the Saintess was distracted, Selin drew out a short sword and unleashed a long Dark Blade.
She then drove it with all her might into the deck of the airship.
-THUD!
With that, the massive airship twisted left and right and began to slowly split apart.
Even if it was a non-combat vessel, a single Strike had torn an airship the size of a destroyer in two.
"Bye, Granny. See you around."
The airship fell into complete chaos.
There was no way she could just leave the clergy to fall into the sea like this.
But the Saintess had no intention of letting Selin, who was taunting her while fleeing atop her Sword Aura, go so easily.
"Who said you could just leave as you please."
The tip of her Saint Staff instantly pointed at Selin's rapidly distancing back.
-GROOOOOM!
A colossal light, painting the darkening sea-sky pure white, devoured the space along a straight line.
"Tch."
But that attack did not land as a fatal blow.
It merely consumed one of Selin's arms.
Having let her enemy slip away, Sylvester the Saintess bit her lip as if tasting bitterness, then moved to rescue the falling clergy.
"Y-Your Holiness! The compass has been stolen!"
And once all the clergy were secured, a severely injured captain approached the Saintess and bowed his head.
"So the woman in the butterfly mask was just a distraction."
When was the last time such a powerful demon worshiper had appeared?
The clergy realized that something was unfolding.
But in the end, the Holy Relic meant to track down demon worshipers had been taken from them, and the faces of the clergy who had barely survived were dark.
"For now, let us focus on recovering the belongings of our fallen brothers."
"Yes? Yes, understood."
But why?
The Saintess seemed to feel a sense of responsibility over the many deaths, yet at the same time, she didn't seem to care much about the stolen compass.
The clergy had no choice but to tilt their heads in confusion.
* * *
"Kuh! That old hag!"
"Are you alright?"
Selin, one arm turned pitch black, groaned in pain.
Her subordinates, who had succeeded in stealing the compass, looked at her with worry for they never thought they'd see the day she'd twist her face in agony like this.
Ordinary potions and healing magic are poison to demon worshipers.
So all they could do was stomp their feet helplessly.
"Ah, this won't do."
In the end, unable to bear the pain any longer, Selin called over the youngest of her subordinates.
"Antonis. Come here."
"Hup.... Ah, yes, understood."
At that, the black knight whose face had turned pale reluctantly approached her, and Selin placed her hand on top of his head.
And then.
-Sssssss!
"Kuuuugh!"
The skin of the black knight called Antonis began to dry up like a tree in a drought.
"Kuh, I can live now."
Then the light faded from Antonis's eyes, and she kicked him, now completely aged into an old man, off the hoverboard.
Selin raised her arm, now clean and restored.
The black knights who were Selin's subordinates and in the same position as Antonis stared blankly at the body abandoned to the sea.
"Give me the thing."
Selin, as if she couldn't care less about the likes of Antonis, demanded the stolen holy relic.
-Sizzzzzle.
As she picked up the compass-shaped holy relic, the smell of burning flesh wafted up.
It was because a demon worshiper had grabbed the holy relic with bare hands.
And her subordinates, the black knights, had to worry whether she might absorb someone else again since she had gotten burned on her palm.
Each of them had their own goals for becoming demon worshipers, but in reality, they served as Selin's emergency rations.
* * *
The compass that chased demons had been stolen.
That news was delivered to me through Saintess Sylvester.
But I wasn't all that flustered, because the theft itself was part of a plan.
'Operation Roach Bait.'
There's a kind of insecticide like that.
You make the bugs mistake the poison for food, trick them into dragging it back to their nest to share among themselves, and wipe them all out.
The compass the demon worshipers stole was precisely that insecticide.
From the start, it was a fake made to look real, with a location-tracking function thrown in as a bonus.
We planned to use it to pinpoint the enemy's position.
But rather than being pleased that the plan had worked, I had to wear an expression of disbelief at the sheer might of the demon worshiper who had appeared to seize it.
"This is insane...."
Saintess Sylvester reported the success of the operation and sent me footage of the battle between the black knight in the butterfly mask and the clergy and at that sight which defied common sense, I even sought advice from Blake, the Lordmaster.
"Is that possible? One person firing a hundred Sword Auras at once?"
The Saintess had not only driven off such a monster but even gained the upper hand, yet I felt that if I faced the butterfly mask myself, I would die a hundred percent.
In response to my question, Blake let out a low chuckle.
"Why?"
"No, it's just whoever that is, they're someone who thinks well."
I tilted my head at his incomprehensible words, and Blake shared his analysis from reviewing the footage.
"The fact that you can only use up to four Sword Auras is just a hypothesis. Because no one has ever used more than that. Me neither, and Arcia neither. But later on, someone might show up who can use five, or ten."
"Huh?"
"But this woman is only using four Sword Auras."
"Four?"
I demanded a more detailed explanation, and he slowed the footage to a hundredth of a second and continued.
"It's simple. She uses dark magic to make the swords fly, then she alternates casting Aura Blade across the flying swords here and there."
"I-Is that so?"
Hearing it, it was a surprisingly simple trick.
With that method, it certainly made sense.
Thanks to that, the terrifying existence was reduced to a trickster in terms of weight.
"But her Aura Blade activation is extremely fast is Darkblade always like that? She's activating it precisely on nearly every strike point. At this level, it's no different from fighting an enemy who truly uses a hundred Sword Auras, isn't it?"
"...."
"And this woman seems like a Magic Swordsman. Her dark magic is also at a considerable level."
That wasn't the end of it.
At Blake's continued explanation, I was left speechless.
"The ultimate enemy has appeared."
I spoke seriously to Blake, who was saying it cheerfully as if it were someone else's problem.
"Lord Blake, would you care to contribute to world peace alongside me?"
"No."
However, my proposal was rejected, and I had to rub my temples.