"Seriously, are you sure you're okay?"
After parting ways with the robed woman, I reunited with the [Hero] and explained what we were about to do. He asked me with a worried look on his face.
"No problem. I've spent years in a party with absolute geniuses... and people with massive egos. I supported them so they could perform at their best. Supporting just one person like you is child's play."
I answered the [Hero]'s question while recalling those guys...
"...I see. Good, then. Still, I never thought the day would come when I'd receive support from the Enchanter who guided the [Golden Dawn] all the way to the ninety-fourth floor of the Great Southern Labyrinth."
"You knew about me...?"
"Yeah. You weren't exactly famous among explorers in general, but Ozwald and his subordinates kept mentioning you, so it stuck in my mind. I'd like to fight you again someday—without any strings attached this time."
"Spare me. Fighting you again sounds like a nightmare. Besides, you won't exactly have the luxury for that from here on out, will you?"
"Hahaha... Yeah, you're right... This is probably the last time I'll be able to cut loose freely. So give me the best fight you can, Orun."
"Got it. Go wild however you want, [Hero] Felix!"
Once our conversation ended, the [Hero]—Felix—kicked off the ground and leaped into the air.
The robed woman had asked me for two things.
The first was to draw the dragons' aggro.
I still had plenty of stamina left to fight myself, but there was no guarantee the robed woman's plan would go perfectly.
In that case, it was far better to let Felix—who'd already had his stamina restored by her unique ability—go all out.
And the most efficient way to produce maximum results without wasting stamina was for me to support him as an Enchanter.
He'd been covering his own buffs during combat.
It wasn't just because there were no allies around; his movements were so practiced that it felt more like this was simply how he always fought.
Self-buffing with support magic can produce incredible performance when mastered.
However, because part of his resources are devoted to maintaining those buffs, it's practically impossible for him to output one hundred percent of his true strength.
To truly draw out one hundred percent, you need an Enchanter you can synchronize with perfectly—an unspoken understanding between you.
Well, unless you can manipulate ki, that limitation remains.
(It's been about half a year since I seriously played the role of an Enchanter, huh...)
With that faint nostalgic feeling, I began constructing the spell formula.
"[All-Stat Boost] [Quadruple Layering]!"
I activated the [Layering] technique I'd developed for logging purposes—this version worked on others too—in its fourfold form.
Felix's buff duration was roughly one hundred seconds.
It was nowhere near Oliver's level, but Felix also had exceptionally high magic resistance.
I used to belong to the Hero Party as their Enchanter.
And the fatal flaw of my buffs being weak was ultimately what got me kicked out.
But now, I've overcome that weakness.
That said, these buffs still have something like a usage limit, so it's not a complete fix.
"Hahaha! This is insane!"
Felix shouted excitedly as he turned a dragon into black mist.
"I'm glad you're enjoying it."
Muttering my reply to Felix's words, I continued constructing multiple spell formulas and activating magic one after another.
From our earlier fight, I'd grasped his personality and combat habits. I predicted his next moves and provided the perfect support for each.
When he swung at especially tough scales or unleashed wide-range flying slashes, I cast [Instantaneous Ability Surge Impact].
When he scattered magic around, [Amplification Chain Raise Repeat].
Against attacks coming from blind spots, [Reflective Wall].
And I used various other spells to create the ideal environment for Felix to fight in.
Thanks to Felix's godlike rampage, most of the dragons turned their aggro toward him and charged.
A small number tried to flee the area.
Those ones were turned into black mist by either my or the robed woman's attack magic.
Gradually, the dragons closed the distance to Felix, and the density of the swarm increased.
In proportion, my headache grew more and more insistent.
"Haa... haa... Shion...! Is it about time?"
"! Yeah, it's okay now. Thank you both. The two of you, get up into the air!"
The second thing the robed woman had asked for was to gather the dragons in one place as much as possible.
Once they were concentrated in a single spot,
"I'll wipe them out with my magic...!"
Hearing her voice, I activated [Space Leap] and teleported both myself and Felix into the sky.
Standing on a platform of mana in midair, I looked toward the robed woman and sensed magic gathering around her.
The dragons lost sight of Felix and, as if drawn by the magic, turned their attention toward her.
(This flow of mana... it's just like when Luna activates spirit magic...)
While I was feeling that strange sense of déjà vu, high-density, visible silver-white mana began leaking from the robed woman's right eye. A geometric pattern unlike any magic circle floated across it.
She tapped the butt of her staff lightly against the ground.
In an instant, the ground in a roughly one-meter radius around her froze over as if covered in frost.
Then the frozen ground spread outward in a fan shape ahead of her at incredible speed, creating a silver-white world in front of her.
"..."
"Orun, time for the finisher."
I'd been captivated by the scene on the ground, but Felix's voice snapped me back.
"Got it. I'm ready anytime. I'll match the timing."
"Then here we go!"
Felix shouted and activated his unique ability.
A repulsive force was generated between us in the sky and the dragon swarm below.
The upward force was canceled by Felix's ability, so it had no effect on us.
The downward force, unopposed, pressed the dragons toward the ground.
Adding my own [Gravity Manipulation] to increase the pull, the dragons were drawn irresistibly toward the frozen surface and crashed down onto it.
"...I've set everything up for you. Don't screw this up, Shion."
I muttered that while turning my gaze toward the robed woman.
The dense mana gathered around her was converted through a spell formula into actual magic.
"Spirit Magic... [Boreas Froststorm]!!"
The moment she activated the spell, an extreme cold wind surged up across the silver-white world.
The dragons' bodies began to freeze from the surface as the wind whipped over them, ice gradually encasing them entirely.
There is a spell called [Blizzard Extreme Cold] that produces effects similar to grand-class magic.
But this spell seemed capable of affecting an area far beyond what [Blizzard Extreme Cold] could manage.
Moreover, while [Blizzard Extreme Cold] is basically a trash-mob clearing spell that can only freeze low-magic-resistance inferior monsters at best, this one was powerful enough to freeze these dragons solid in a short time.
The robed woman's spell was a complete superior version of [Blizzard Extreme Cold].
...And it didn't feel like a simple freezing spell, either.
The dragon swarm was enveloped in agonized roars, but those cries gradually grew weaker until a mountain of frozen dragons remained in the silver world.
It seemed their bodies had frozen not just on the surface but inside as well. When they turned into black mist, the mist was trapped within the ice, creating ice statues that imprisoned the darkness.
Just as she had declared, she had wiped out the entire dragon swarm with a single spell.
"I've heard the rumors, but seeing it in person is something else. So this is the power of the [White Witch]... the Silver Sorceress..."
Felix muttered with a hint of fear as he watched the robed woman annihilate such a massive number of dragons in an instant.
Even I felt a chill run down my spine at that spell.
It seemed to have drawbacks—activation conditions, time needed to construct the formula—but if the entire silver world she created was under the spell's influence, then depending on how it was used, it could probably destroy an entire city.
While I was thinking that, the sound of cracking ice rang out, followed by a dragon's roar.
It was the black dragon that had been pinned to the ground by my ability and caught in the robed woman's spell.
The black dragon gathered ten purple mists into one massive clump of mana and fired it toward us.
"Felix, defense is on you! I'll take down the black dragon!"
"Leave it to me!"
Felix gave a fearless grin, raised his sword overhead, and swung down, cleaving the magic projectile in two.
While he handled that, I fixed my eyes on the black dragon.
"—[Land Form: Mont Zex]"
I transformed the magic sword gripped in my right hand into the shape of a bow.
With my left hand, I drew back the string. From the storage artifact on my left wrist, I summoned the condensed mana I normally used when activating [Magic Sword Fusion: Alteration], shaping it into an arrow.
As I nocked the arrow and compressed its mana to the absolute limit, the surrounding space began to warp.
I aimed at the black dragon and unleashed the strongest attack I could muster right now.
"—[Rei Ten]"
The jet-black arrow I fired pierced straight through the black dragon. Just like during [Heaven Flash], mana diffusion occurred.
Moreover, a gravity field formed at the arrow's point of impact. The jet-black mana that should have dispersed after diffusion was instead held in place in the shape of a sphere.
The area around the sphere warped under the gravity field's influence, sucking in the mountain of ice statues.
Anything swallowed by the sphere would be obliterated by the torrent of destruction from mana and gravity.
Once it had absorbed every last ice statue, the sphere gradually shrank until it vanished completely.
Where the jet-black sphere had been, literally nothing remained.
The black dragon, the ice statues, and even a massive chunk of the ground beneath them had been erased entirely.
"...Somehow my spell's impact feels kinda watered down now."
Once the dragon swarm was fully exterminated and Felix and I returned to the robed woman's side, she pouted and grumbled.
"No way. Without your spell, I couldn't have pulled off a move like that either."
"Both attacks were equally vicious—no real way to rank which was worse. Just thinking about one of them coming at me gives me chills."
Felix jumped in to smooth things over, but his eyes were sparkling as he seemed to relive our earlier attacks.
(Is this guy's personality for real? Is it really okay for a battle maniac like him to become the next emperor...?)
As I shot Felix a cold glare while thinking that, the robed woman apparently had the exact same thought and was giving him an identical look.
After a brief moment to calm down and refocus, I shifted gears.
"No time to relax yet. Felix, let's move on to the next step right away."
"I know. I'm ready whenever."
'Next' meant heading to Lugau.
Right now, in Lugau, the territorial army of the Legliff region and the [Hero]'s Imperial Guard were locked in combat.
We had to act to quell that fighting.
(That's how it should be, but... what's with this uneasy feeling? Like I've overlooked something... No—even if I have overlooked something, resolving the Lugau situation is still the top priority.)
"Robed woman, what are you going to do?"
"You're still calling me 'robed woman'... Wait, you're just letting me go? I thought for sure you'd try to capture me."
This woman is a criminal.
We teamed up this time, but that doesn't erase her crimes.
Normally, I should arrest her.
Then make her spill everything. She almost certainly possesses important information I don't know about.
But if I tried to capture her, she'd definitely resist.
I don't have enough stamina left to compete with her right now.
And right now, the Lugau situation takes precedence.
The longer we drag this out, the worse things will get—so we need to wrap it up as quickly as possible.
"I don't think I can capture you here anyway... I'm grateful for what you did this time. If you don't get involved with me anymore, I won't interfere this time either. But the fact that you tried to kill my disciple doesn't disappear. Don't forget that."
"...Yeah. I never thought I'd be forgiven. Well, since you're letting me go, I'll take my leave here. I have things I need to do too. —Oh, right, Orun."
"...What?"
"Keep walking straight down the path you've chosen for yourself, Orun. No matter what choices you make, we'll respect them."
"..."
I couldn't hide my surprise at those words.
They were almost identical to what Oliver had once told me.
Why would she say the exact same thing as Oliver...?
"See you, Orun. And [Hero], I'm looking forward to what you do next."
Seeing the sad expression on her face as she said that made my chest ache again.
Ignoring the pain, I turned my gaze away from Shion as she walked off into the distance and spoke to Felix.
"Let's head to Lugau, Felix. —To stop the fighting."
"Yeah. We'll stop the battle in Lugau... and question my father—the Emperor!"
Even while feeling that lingering sense of unease, I set off for Lugau together with Felix.