Chapter 72
- Splosh!
Every step sent black water splashing.
“……….”
To Akion, its strange stickiness and foul odor were unpleasant, but
the veteran holy knights were sadly familiar with it.
“The blood has rotted.”
“Blood?”
“There’s a branch of black magic that uses blood. Blood magic, favored by vampires….”
Yet they simultaneously felt puzzled and certain.
“Since they live by drinking blood, they wouldn’t leave it to rot like this.”
“In other words, there’s a good chance none of the enemies this time are vampires. More importantly, the absence of those pointlessly clever blood-sucking vermin… means this has nothing to do with black magic, at least.”
If even those skilled at strategy weren’t involved… other black-magic groups were probably similar.
They judged that black magic had not been involved in this incident at all.
“That’s what makes it even more horrifying. How could this have happened without black magic?”
That was what made it feel even more alien to the Saintess.
If it wasn’t the doing of that cunning, clever vampire from her Saintess Death Beam days, then who on earth had committed such a gruesome act?
- Splash, splash.
They made their way through the hallway like that.
The hallway was covered in a pitch-black membrane, blocking the view outside.
And….
“What is that…!”
“Stay still.”
There were even several figures walking through the hallway.
Something clung to their eyes like black blindfolds, turning them into inverted eyes.
- Tap!
Then, even when one of the holy knights pushed one of them, it walked away as though nothing had happened.
“I learned this during the investigation, but there’s a rumor that a ghost lives in this dormitory.”
- Gulp.
The Saintess swallowed as well and began to speculate.
“Things like suddenly tripping while walking down the hallway… phenomena where it seems someone must have hooked or struck you to make you fall.”
“And, Saintess… are you saying that this is actually that phenomenon…?”
“Yes… I investigated, and there were no ghosts.”
In reality, something made of that rotten blood had reversed the field of vision of everyone in the dormitory,
“So… I suppose we’re like invisible ghosts to them. For now.”
Those who weren’t were trapped in a space that was the same yet had a different view, and could interact with the outside only in this way.
- Gulp….
An unsettling law explainable by neither divinity, magic, nor science.
If this had been exploited, how many people would have died?
Everyone felt even more keenly that they had stepped into the realm of the Outer God.
“Then… Saintess.”
“Yes. We’re in a terrible hurry.”
- Splash splash splash!!
But the veteran holy knights and the battle-hardened Saintess were all seasoned crusaders.
They felt the need to fold away their fear and seek out the source so they could destroy it.
“Hek, hheek!”
“Oh dear, the saint is tired.”
“Please ride on my back!”
“Hheek, what? On the Saintess’s back— Uwek?!”
The dormitory liberation unit charged forward, their heavy holy armor clanking.
They ran and ran toward the place where the stench was strongest.
But the hallway didn’t end.
“Damn, I think this is a trap!”
“It seems they noticed our intrusion and twisted the hallway around!!”
- Kyaaah!!
At the same time, something black and translucent screamed from beyond the hallway.
- Splosh splosh!
“Enemy! Five!”
“Their bodies are translucent!”
They were five translucent slimes in the shapes of women.
“Saint, hold on tight!”
“No, how am I supposed to do anything in this situation….”
All the holy knights drew their swords, and the Saintess drew her Holy Light Sword as well.
“Three, two, one until impact!!”
“Shields forward!!!”
- KWAANG!!!
The five slimes collided with the heavy-armored holy knights clad in divine power.
- Sizzleee!
The slimes melted when they met the divine power and recoiled in pain.
“Divine power works!”
“But it’s a bit different from black magic. Those suffer burns when divine power touches them….”
“It feels like they’re canceling each other out, but who cares! Spears forward!”
- Thrust thrust!!
The five slimes were riddled with holes and hacked apart in an instant by the veteran holy knights’ practiced coordinated tactics.
- Kyaaah!!
“Damn it, they regenerate endlessly!”
“That’s holy healing, isn’t it?!”
Yet they simply regenerated the holes in their bodies.
With magic that was familiar to the knights, no less.
“I get it now… What was being canceled out was the other god’s divine power dwelling in their bodies!”
The place they had entered was the realm of the Outer God.
Only apostles of the Outer God could possibly emerge from there.
- Keeeeing!!
“I’ll go ahead and deal with them!”
In that case, the Saintess, who could draw up an overwhelming amount of divine power, would be the perfect counter.
Just as the Saintess drew her Holy Light Sword,
“Um, Saintess.”
“Saint, I’m sorry, but we’re in combat right now!”
“No, I mean, can’t you just shine it without that slit?”
“Ah.”
Akion taught her the proper way to use it.
- Click.
She removed the slit covering the flashlight for use as a Holy Light Sword,
and when the Saintess pointed the flashlight forward again,
- KWAaaaaaaaa!!!
“Kieeeeeek!!!!”
The former Saintess Death Beam burst forth and incinerated the slimes.
More precisely, it felt like they had been broken down at the molecular level. Anyway.
- Sparkle sparkle!
“…….”
Moreover, every wall and floor touched by the Holy Light Sword—no, the Saintess Death Beam—was left spotless.
- Clack.
- Click, click.
All the holy knights sheathed their swords and weapons, then took out the flashlights they had prepared for emergencies.
Then they removed the slits for the Holy Light Swords and….
- KWAaaaa!!!
“Kieeeeeek!!”
“Hahaha!!! Like moths to a flame, apostles of the Outer God!!!”
“Burn to death, all of you discarded pawns used by your father, the Outer God!!!”
They began a merry extermination operation with absolutely no tension.
“Kya-ha-ha!! All of you die!! Drop dead, you interdimensional parentless orphans!!”
“…….”
The Saintess was the most excited of all.
Akion, being carried on the Saintess’s back, wondered whether this was really okay.
*
Having broken through the route in an instant, they soon
- Squish, guk, krk….
“This is the place.”
found themselves standing before a dormitory room from which all kinds of organic matter were spreading.
< Astera Eneresis >
The room of the person presumed to be either the culprit or the victim.
Rotten black blood was oozing from beneath the door,
“Wait, does anyone hear a woman crying?”
“I do as well.”
“……It’s coming from inside the door.”
A sobbing sound continued to come from within.
“There may be a sacrifice or a captive inside.”
“Understood. Let’s enter a little defensively.”
For the sake of any other victim who might be inside, they all decided to enter carefully.
And the holy knights,
- KWAANG!!!
“The Holy See is here!!!”
“Sinner, come out at once!”
“No.”
kicked the door open and charged in all at once.
And inside was,
“Gasp….”
“This can’t be…!”
a room completely covered in all kinds of black organic matter.
The writhing things, their veins protruding, led to the tattered bed in the room.
Uwek, ugh, hik, hwek…….
Where had the blue streaks amid her silver-white hair gone? They had become purple streaks tinged with red.
The bewitchingly beautiful woman was wearing an old-fashioned academy uniform.
Yet despite the broken, aged traces covering every corner of the room,
there was one difference: the academy uniform was immaculate.
Wasn’t it as though she had dressed herself up neatly for someone to see?
- Glorp, glorp.
“Oh, my, hee, hee, I’ve, become, a, great, mage, sob, ugh, hik.”
“……”
If not for the thousands of black veins extending from her back.
“Good Lord Almighty….”
The dense divinity emanating from it
was so intense that even the Saintess, one of the Holy See’s three greatest wielders of divine power, was horrified.
Then they all noticed the book lying in front of her.
“That…!”
A dark-red grimoire covered in black organic matter.
It was surely the interdimensional intruding object the Lord God had mentioned.
“Oh, my, I’m, useful, now, too, right? Hee, heehee, so, please, don’t, do, that, to, me, like, you, did, to, Akion, sob, sniff….”
“Everyone, prepare….”
The moment Akion pointed at it, they all nodded and moved Akion behind them.
Then they drew up their divine power─.
“Light!!!!”
- Click
- KWAaaaaaaaa!!!
“Aw, crap.”
They unleashed a combined Saintess Death Beam.
In other words, they all fired holy beams at full power from their flashlights.
Rescue the victim? Reclaim the grimoire?
Once they fired the holy beams, the bad guys would be purified and the good ones healed anyway, so why bother distinguishing between them?
- KWAaaaa….
“Phew, we used quite a lot of divine power.”
“Even if it is the Outer God’s divinity, this should reduce it to dust.”
Following that principle, the holy knights fired their Holy Light Death Beams for several dozen seconds,
- Thud!
“Hmm?”
They heard a gloomy, sinister, bizarre heartbeat that inspired fear.
- Thud! Thud!
It was a heartbeat full of murderous intent, as if a dragon that had entered the eternal sleep of death had returned as an undead.
“……”
- Rumble rumble!!!
The source of the sound was the grimoire floating in front of Astera Eneresis.
The heartbeat and tremendous amount of mana pouring from the grimoire were all being sucked into Astera.
The grimoire was drying up as though it were staking everything on her.
And Astera’s streaks and eyes were changing from purple to a reddish purple.
She floated in the air and pointed at them with one finger.
《Hostile target encountered. Initiating Oblivion Protocol.》
“Ghk?!”
A tremendous amount of energy suddenly burrowed into their heads.
More precisely, it was an energy that rummaged through their memories, and they all began to suffer.
《Executing procedure to reduce hostile target’s resistance rate.》
“Damn it, that thing’s divinity is attacking us now…!!”
“Grrrr!! Resist!! Draw up your divine power!!!”
Even the tinfoil hats seemed useless, as the holy knights clutched their heads and cried out in pain.
“Hngh, ngh…!”
- Crackle, crack!
Even the Saintess seemed to be affected, as her halo began to shake wildly amid static.
《Memory incineration procedure progress: 34%….》
“Gurgh…!”
While everyone was suffering,
the Saintess realized that the grimoire was the source of the twisted thing that appeared to be Astera Eneresis.
《Procedure progress: 67%….》
“If we could just take that, that alone…!”
Yet no one could resist the mental attack penetrating even their tinfoil hats, and they twisted in agony as their memories were erased.
Conversely, that was the target’s only major method of attack.
The moment they took the grimoire, the twisted thing possessing Astera’s body would be neutralized.
《Procedure progress: 98%….》
“This?”
- Grab!
《Huh?》
And Akion, who was unaffected, approached as soon as he heard it and snatched the grimoire from Astera.
At that absurd sight, the veteran holy knights, the Saintess, and even the ‘something’ inside Astera all
stared blankly at Akion.
《How?》
“Saint, are you all right…?”
“No, I’m more concerned about all of you. What’s wrong with everyone?”
Because he was completely unaffected by the mental attack.
Thus….
“Yeah, got it.”
“Huh?”
“Graaahhhhh!!!!”
- KWAaaaa!!
“Jeez, you scared me!”
The ‘something’ inside Astera was expelled into the interdimensional realm as the price for losing its medium.
- Ssssss….
“The room is returning to normal!”
“Its divinity is disappearing too! Really, really…?!”
At the same time, the room, which had been filled with black organic matter, was purified, and the Outer God’s divine power attacking their minds faded away.
The warm sunlight pouring through the cleared window gently shone down on Akion, who stood with his back to it.
“Saint…!! What on earth are you?! Wait, the mark too—are you perhaps a saint…?!”
“O-oh…! O Saint…!”
“No, where did ‘saint’ suddenly come from?”
At the sight, everyone from the elderly veteran holy knights to the Saintess
began calling Akion a saint and praying reverently.
The situation had reached the point where Akion felt he might really be canonized.
Deciding that this wouldn’t do, Akion hurriedly picked up the collapsed Astera,
- Crash!
“Eek!”
“S-Saint!!!”
“Ha ha ha! You lack even the strength of this old man!”
Forgetting his own weakness, he fell sprawling to the floor.
“Let’s go to the healing center first! I’ll carry Miss Astera on my back. Everyone, could you look after the Saint?”
“Of course! Leave him to us, Saintess! We’ll treat the hero who seized the grimoire with the utmost care!”
“But our hero looks exhausted, so let him ride on this old man’s back! Ho ho ho!”
“Aw, come on….”
Amid the teasing holy knights, Akion nearly died of embarrassment.