"I can do this."
AAAAAAAAGGH!
With a devastating scream, the sinister aberration, which the cube called an entity, lunged at me with murderous intent.
CRASH!
THUD!
It didn't matter what stood in its way, whether cubicles or desks, that thing destroyed everything in its path with overwhelming ease as it advanced so fiercely that it would have terrified any monster inhabiting this planet. The entity was coming straight for me.
And I waited for it, with an axe in hand.
"AAAAH!"
When it was less than a meter away, I swung the axe with all my strength and buried it into the side of its abdomen.
AAAAAAARGH!
The blow forced the entity to let out a loud scream of pain, possibly even more intense and deafening than any it had made before. Now that I think about it, it was surprising how much my eardrums had endured over the past few hours.
This thing, supposedly from another dimension, was meant to be affected by the axe, but apparently, the weapon being capable of harming it did not guarantee me victory.
AAARG… AAAAARRRC
The entity kept charging at me, trying to grab me with its hands.
"No, damn it, no!"
Before even one of its fingers could brush against my skin, I tightened my grip on the axe.
"MMMPH!"
Using every last ounce of strength my body had left, I lifted the entity off the ground by using the axe handle as a lever. I raised it above my head, bearing its entire weight on my shoulders, and then immediately swung downward, letting the full weight of the entity drive its fall straight into the ground.
THUD!
Without giving it a moment to recover, I jumped onto its body and, intending to make it bleed out, pulled my axe free from its stomach.
"…?"
For a brief moment, I could see the wound the weapon had inflicted. It was a small cut that exposed the inside of its flesh, but I quickly noticed something strange: not a single drop of blood came out.
—What the hell…?
I was stunned by what I saw, so much so that a chilling thought began to consume my mind. With greater focus, I stared directly into the wound.
"…!"
Looking inside this creature was a lot like staring into the depths of an abyss. In both cases, you saw an absolute darkness that seemed endless.
"Shit…"
Gazing at that darkness made that dreadful thought grow so intense that it echoed throughout my brain.
—If this thing doesn't bleed and has no organs, then how the hell am I supposed to kill it?
I was screwed. I just didn't know it yet.
AAAARG!
In a moment of carelessness, the entity tried to strike my lower body. I barely managed to dodge.
In response, I struck it repeatedly with the axe.
"Die, die, die!"
THUD!
THUD!
THUD!
After realizing the entity apparently couldn't bleed and had no organs, I completely discarded the idea of making it hemorrhage or targeting a specific organ. My new plan was to keep it pinned to the ground as long as possible and then cut off each and every one of its limbs. But I hadn't accounted for the resistance it would put up, nor had I given much thought to the mouth in its abdomen, which it used to bite down on the upper part of the axe.
"Oh no…"
Before I realized it, the entity struck me straight in the stomach.
"Aaac…!"
The blow sent me flying across the room.
For a few short but agonizing seconds, my body spun through the air until I finally slammed into a wall.
PAAAAAAM!
The crash echoed throughout the room, almost completely drowning out the sound of my bones breaking.
Before I could even regain consciousness—
"Buuuaag!"
I vomited a large gush of blood.
"Aaaggg… huaaa…"
—No, no, no… I can't breathe.
I wasn't sure if it was the pain or the blood still lodged in my throat. Either way, I couldn't even manage a single word.
AAAAAAAARRRGGH!
The entity took advantage of my moment of weakness.
Even with the axe still lodged in what could be called its second mouth, it ran straight at me with its hands outstretched.
"Aacck…"
It was too late. I was going to be killed, and I wouldn't even be able to let out a final scream of agony.
AAARRGH!!
Its hands were inches from grabbing my head, and I, having already accepted my death, shut my eyes tightly, hoping at least for a nearly painless end.
Beep.
[Warning, a strong magical energy wave is approaching you.]
"Eh…?"
[Brace yourself, sir.]
WOOOOOOSSSH!!
Suddenly, a strange greenish light burst in from the entrance and completely illuminated the room.
—What is that?
CRASH!
I was utterly stunned the instant the wall to my left was violently torn down. As it fell, that light shone on us with even greater intensity.
WWWOOOOSSSH!!
Then a mysterious force, invisible to my eyes, shoved me, the entity, and every object in the room toward the window.
Thanks to my quick reaction, I managed to cushion the impact by shielding myself with the remains of a cubicle.
CRACK.
"AAAAAAAH!"
Even so, my right arm suffered serious damage from bearing the weight of my entire body. At best, it was only dislocated.
AAAAAARRGG!
The entity wasn't in much better shape. It had also slammed violently against the glass, but in its case, the impact forced the axe, still stuck in its jaws, to sink even deeper.
AAAARR… AAAAG… RAAGGAAKKAAAA!
Its screams were intense, but there was also a faint tone of desperation in every sound it made.
—Well, at least now I know that thing can feel pain.
"Haha… haaa."
For some reason, thinking about that strange, unnatural deformity suffering made me laugh, which struck me as somewhat curious.
"Haha…"
I didn't consider myself someone who enjoyed others' pain, yet I couldn't stop laughing at how erratically that thing was behaving. However, the longer I watched it, the louder a phrase echoed in my mind:
—You deserve it.
BOOM!
The floor beneath my feet trembled, accompanied by the sound of distant explosions.
"Alright, that's enough!"
"Cube…!"
[Yes, sir?]
"What the hell is happening now?!"
[It appears there is a Sundrel on the first floor releasing large amounts of magical energy.]
"A Sundrel here…?"
[According to my scanner…]
Before the cube could confirm its answer, it was interrupted by a… well, I'm not entirely sure, but I think it was a scream of terror.
"AAAAAAAH, NO, NO, LET ME GO!!!"
"…"
I'm serious when I say I had never in my life heard a scream like that. It sounded heavily distorted.
"Why does it sound like that?"
[The sound waves of the scream are being dampened by the BT-regulators on both floors.]
The BT-regulators, as their name suggests, are devices capable of regulating the power of extremely destructive impacts through invisible force fields. They are installed in various areas of Regulus City to minimize the damage a superhuman might cause by failing to control their strength.
"NO, NO, HUAAAAAAG!!!"
—What luck. If it weren't for the regulators, I'd probably already be dead from that scream alone.
[More or less. Calculating the scream's level and the effectiveness of the 23 BT-regulators still active at 50 percent of their usual capacity…
You would not only be dead. Without the regulators, your body would have been reduced to nothing more than a large red stain decorating the floor, the walls, and part of the ceiling.]
"…"
—Thanks for the disturbing mental image, cube.
[You're welcome.]
AAAAARRGG!
—Great. Looks like this thing is ready for more.
[It would seem so.]
"Mmm…"
—Cube, you wouldn't happen to know how to kill this thing, would you?
[But of course I do, sir.]
"…"
AAAAAAGR!
The entity roared in fury as it prepared to leap at me.
—Well?
[Well what?]
AAAAAARRRG!
"You've got to be kidding me… SHIT!"
AAAAAAARRRG!
The entity leapt, trying to bring me down, but I moved in time.
I couldn't keep fighting. It wasn't just that I was injured. I also couldn't match its strength or endurance.
If I stayed in that office one second longer, I would end up dead. So the only solution that came to mind was—
"SHIT!"
To run. And fast.
I bolted out of the room so quickly that I nearly tripped over… rubble?
"Ah…!"
When I got back on my feet, I realized the entire hallway was almost completely destroyed and filled with debris.
"The Sundrel below…"
It was foolish to think that scream would only affect one room.
—That bastard wiped out the entire floor.
AAAARRRG!
I ran down the ruined hallway with the entity right on my heels, and as if that weren't enough, more obstacles appeared.
BOOM!
The entire floor was collapsing due to the immense magical energy leaking from the level below. In fact, I think the sublevels beneath this one have already been destroyed, so maybe I have less time than I thought to reach the damn third floor.
AAAAAAARRGG!!
BOOM!
The situation had completely slipped out of my hands. I hadn't been able to defeat the entity, and now it was chasing me along a path that was crumbling more and more by the second.
CRASH!
The floor I was running on began to fracture, forming cracks that led straight down to the first floor. To avoid falling into one, I had to force myself to run faster and jump farther than I normally could.
"Aaaah… aah… aah…"
I couldn't keep this up much longer. I had been ignoring the pain my body accumulated during the fight, but it was catching up to me.
"Tsk… cube…"
I clicked my tongue and said mentally:
—Stop beating around the bush and tell me how to kill this beast before it kills me first.
I wasn't sure whether it was my body's exhaustion or the collapsing floor. Either way, I had to get rid of the entity now or never.
[You must strike it without stopping until it stops moving.]
—That's it?
It couldn't be that simple… could it?
—What's the catch?
[You must do it with your weapons, of course. Just strike it and let the necronian steel snuff out its lights.]
—Just keep hitting it…
I slightly turned my head to glance at that aberration wearing a monster's head like a helmet as it closed in on me.
"Armament."
BEEP.
[—Necronian steel short sword.
—Necronian steel dagger.
—Necronian ammunition revolver.
—Necronian camouflage bracer.
—Necronian thermobaric grenade.]
The only weapon I could use right now was—
"Dagger!"
Instantly, a small double-edged knife appeared in my left hand, the only one I could still move without pain.
AAAAAAAAARRRG!
The entity was about to reach me, but I forced it back by slashing the dagger in front of it.
Zaaag.
With a quick, efficient motion, I sliced off two fingers from its right hand.
AAAAARG!
But the entity endured the damage and raised its left arm.
"…!"
BOOOOM!
It brought down a devastating overhead blow that would have crushed my body if it had hit. If not for the dagger, which I had thrown without even having time to aim, and which by some miracle embedded its blade into the entity's chest. That small attack distracted it just long enough for me to dodge the crushing strike.
C… CRA… CK.
But as I dodged, its blow slammed into the already damaged floor, the very floor that was on the verge of collapsing along with the entire level.
CRACK… CRACK.
Around its fist, still deeply embedded in the ground, multiple cracks began to form, threatening to create a direct path to the building's entrance.
"…"
Apparently, we were both aware of how delicate the situation was. That's why neither the entity nor I dared to move a single muscle.
CRACK…!
But at that moment, from deep within me arose… a dangerous caprice.
"…"
Slowly, I approached the entity. It only took three steps to stand face to face with that aberration.
AAARG?
Even it seemed confused by how sudden my action was.
"Mmm…"
Now that I was this close, I realized something.
AAAARRGH…
This thing was much taller than me. Even kneeling as it was now, it barely reached my neck.
"Ha…"
—How the hell was I able to lift it before?
"Well… since that's the case…"
FIIIUSSSH!
I jumped so high that I far surpassed the entity's height. Up there, I raised my left arm toward the ceiling and then—
"Sword."
I summoned my weapon, that great broken-edged blade I had used to defeat Ka'li. It appeared in my palm accompanied by a flash of light. Its weight was impressive, yet for some reason it felt lighter than the revolver or the axe I had wielded less than ten minutes ago.
Using every last bit of strength left in my arm, I swung the sword downward, using its own weight to drive the fall.
AAAAARRRGH…!
CRAAAACK!!
The strike was so fast the entity didn't even have time to react. By the time it did, it was too late. The blade had already pierced vertically through the beast's skull, slicing through its grotesque wolf-like mask.
AAA… aaarg…
Those were its final sounds before it lost all strength and collapsed onto the shattered hallway floor.