Lament of the Undead Master and Servant (2)

"OAAAAAAAAAAH!"

The instant Ruby beheaded Catherine, Claude let out a heartrending scream. The cry seemed to rake the depths of our ears, and we reflexively covered them. My nonexistent eardrums felt like they were about to burst!

However, Claude apparently did more than scream. Several helmeted severed heads fell from between his ribs and turned to ash in midair. When that ash enveloped Catherine's body and head, her severed neck reconnected as though time had been rewound.

"Are you kidding me?! How's that fair?!"

"Nooooo! Don't come near meeeee!"

Perhaps Catherine had panicked, because she screamed and wildly shook her hair. That alone would have been bad enough, but a dome-shaped space formed around her.

The dome was roughly ten meters in radius, and its lurid purple surface reeked of danger. It was unquestionably a Skill. 【Queen's Dignity】 or 【Undead King's Cursed Realm】... The latter, most likely.

"Ugh?!"

"Ruby?! Get out of there!"

Ruby, who had been inside the dome's area of effect, suddenly began to suffer. When I looked at her, I saw all sorts of status ailment icons lit up on her marker!

"I-I can't move... I can't use my talismans, either...?!"

"Tch! Short Teleport!"

She can't use her talismans?! Did that mean items couldn't be used? It was extraordinarily troublesome that the effect did more than inflict status ailments!

More importantly, we needed to rescue her immediately. I used Short Teleport to move to her at once, then carried her outside the area and flew away. Once we were out of range, I tried to remove her status ailments with Dispel. As expected, they were caused by a curse, and I succeeded in removing them.

"Phew, that was a close one! Thanks!"

"No, don't thank me. My misjudgment put you in danger."

"But what are we gonna do? If they join up, the front line's gonna get trampled..."

I agreed with Shio's opinion as he fired arrows. Ruby being afflicted with all those status ailments in an instant was a serious problem.

To prepare for battles against Undead, everyone except Kanna and me, who had Status Ailment Immunity, had equipped 【Black Lantern Amulets】. Normally, that meant we barely needed to worry about status ailment attacks from Undead below Level 70.

Yet the space Catherine, who was in the Level 50 range, had created broke through that resistance. I did not know how it worked, but this meant that anyone who entered that space would be weakened. Catherine was crouching down for now, but if she merely nestled close against Claude's back, Jigoro and the others would become little better than fodder.

"I figured. Someone will have to keep them under constant pressure."

"But isn't just entering that creepy space dangerous? How are we supposed to keep them in check from inside it...?"

"Yes. Only a few people can do it. Probably just Kanna and me, since we have Status Ailment Immunity."

I had charged into that space to rescue Ruby, but I had not suffered any status ailments. That was presumably because it could not break through the resistance of 【Status Ailment Immunity】. If so, Kanna and I should be able to fight normally inside it.

However, Kanna was an indispensable fighter on the front line alongside Ragia for holding Claude back. I could not pull her away. That left only one person by process of elimination.

"Iris, take command of the rear group. I'll deal with Catherine somehow."

"...Understood. Beat her to a pulp!"

"Yeah, I'll give it a try!"

With their encouragement at my back, I charged into the cursed space. Claude seemed to move to stop my approach, but Jigoro and the others launched such a fierce attack that he had no choice but to deal with it. This looked like my chance to attack Catherine without interference.

"OooOOOOOO..."

"What was that?"

"The helmets are spilling out...?"

At that moment, Claude screamed again. Helmeted severed heads tumbled from the gaps between his ribs and fell onto the ash. The ash then transformed into headless humanoid figures, each of which had a fallen head placed atop it!

The clones Claude had created charged fiercely toward me. Was he planning to assign clones as guards if he could not come himself? What an overprotective bastard!

"Magic Circle Activation, Spell Adjustment, Air Hammer! ...No good!"

I slammed the clones all at once with a blunt weapon made from compressed air. The makeshift bodies formed from ash were blown away by that alone. However, the ash immediately gathered and formed new bodies. So even a King—no, a Queen—could not be defeated that easily!

However, although items could not be used, magic apparently could. What about martial skills? I was surrounded, so I decided to test it.

"Spin Slash! Good, it worked."

The martial skill that swept away everything around me activated without a problem and horizontally bisected the ash bodies. They returned to normal almost immediately, but this proved that even my martial skills could destroy them. If so, there were plenty of ways to fight.

As for my strategy, I would target their heads. The ash bodies regenerated almost immediately, and the heads were obviously their weak points. However, if their helmets were made from the same material as armor and shields, magic would likely be less effective. Physical attacks seemed likely to deliver the decisive blows.

"I'm not good at that, but I have no choice. Dispel. Then Strength Boost, Strength Boost, Agility Boost, Dexterity Boost, Dexterity Boost. Come on, let's go!"

I dispelled the buffs I had cast before the battle and applied stat enhancements for close combat. I did not raise my defense because Jigoro had told me, "If you take a hit, brother, we're goners, right? Better boost something else than waste time beefing up your defense." I should obediently follow the valuable advice of my close-combat mentor, Brother Jigoro.

Claude's clones had no weapons and merely tried to surround and crush me. I decided to call them Ash Vanguards and scattered them with wide swings of my scythe. Their ash bodies were so fragile that they collapsed from a single blow even without using a martial skill, which made things easier.

"Here! Bite Tail!"

With the dragonlike, skull-bearing tail that had changed thanks to Karu, I tried to bite through one of the helmeted heads. My strength had increased, so I could feel the helmet deform, but I could not crush it in one blow.

Still, it felt as though I could manage if I kept biting. In that case, I would simply keep trying as many times as it took!

"Aaaaaaah!"

"Whip Tail! Spin Slash!"

That said, if I focused too much on a single head, the other Ash Vanguards would swarm me. I swung my tail like a whip and swept them away with my scythe to keep them at bay. At the same time, I continued biting with the tip of my tail.

Crack!

After gnawing away at it for what felt like forever, the helmet finally cracked. Once that happened, the rest was easy, and I shattered the head inside without even using a martial skill. The crunching sound of chewing it was terrifying, even though it was my own tail doing the chewing.

Even after a head of their kind was destroyed, the Ash Vanguards' movements did not change at all. They simply charged in, trying to crush me through sheer numbers. Although they were parts of Claude, perhaps he could not control them precisely.

Or was it difficult for him to spare any attention for me because he was fighting Jigoro and the others? Either way, it worked in our favor. I would continue crushing them one by one.

"Oaaah..."

"Back off, you fodder!"

Perhaps Claude had sensed danger after I destroyed one of them, because he dropped even more helmets from between his ribs. Every one of them became an Ash Vanguard and charged fiercely toward me.

They tried to slip past the front line, but Jigoro, annoyed by them, crushed one of the heads with a kick. He did not seem to have done it deliberately, but I was grateful that he had reduced my burden.

"I suppose I'd better make sure I don't lose to that fodder..."

If I were defeated by an opponent Jigoro had called fodder, there was no telling what he would say afterward. To avoid disgracing myself, I would make the greatest effort I could.

From then on, a prolonged battle at a disadvantage continued. Jigoro and the others could do nothing but defend against Claude, whose every attack could become a fatal blow if they let their guard down for even an instant. Meanwhile, I had to destroy the horde of Ash Vanguards that kept appearing as if an endless supply were spawning.

"Are you underestimating me?!"

"The weight of his blows has lightened considerably, hasn't it?"

When I finally crushed the head of my tenth Ash Vanguard, Jigoro and Genzuro noticed a change in Claude. Jigoro kicked Claude's arm upward in anger, while Genzuro slashed at his shin and scraped away its surface.

I glanced toward Claude and saw that he still had roughly ninety percent of his health remaining. That alone was discouraging, but his attacks had definitely grown weaker. Eiji, who had previously been blown away whenever he failed to deflect an attack with his shield, was now being pushed back without being lifted off the ground.

"Everyone! Claude's level is dropping!"

"He's Level 90 now! His Race hasn't changed, though!"

"His level... dropped?"

Iris and Shiitake had apparently been using Appraisal between attacks. According to them, his Race had remained the same, but his level had returned to what it was before his evolution.

What was causing it? I had no time to theorize. I was destroying the Ash Vanguards while taking care not to be surrounded or stray too far from Catherine. I also targeted Catherine herself whenever I saw an opening. However, the Ash Vanguards always threw themselves in the way, so I had yet to land a single attack on her.

"Decapitation! Then Tail Thrust!"

I cut off a neck with my scythe, then thrust a spear-like spine from the mouth at the tip of my dragonlike tail through a gap in the helmet. Oh, it had pierced cleanly. A solid sensation traveled up through my tail.

By coincidence, killing one of them so smoothly created a large gap in the enemy encirclement. I could not afford to let such a perfect opportunity pass!

"Star Magic Circle, Spell Adjustment, Wind Blade!"

"Kyaaaaaaaah?!"

Five blades of wind slashed across Catherine. Her defense against magic must have been high, because the damage was not as great as I had hoped. An Ash Vanguard was closing in, but I had to press the attack instead of retreating!

"Fivefold Slash! Severing Tail!"

"Aah..."

A series of attacks from my scythe and tail dealt heavy damage to Catherine's slender body. Could I finish her off like this...?

"OAAAAAAAAAAH!"

With Catherine in danger, Claude let out another scream. The same phenomenon as before occurred, and Catherine's wounds healed.

Tch. Was he expecting me to kill her instantly with a single blow? Producing that much firepower would require considerable preparation. In our current situation, it was almost impossible.

"Ah! Her level dropped again!"

"Looks like Claude's level drops when he heals the queen or destroys the heads that keep spilling out, huh?"

I see, so that's how it worked. There had to be a limit on his ability to heal her so quickly. The more we reduced the resources he devoted to healing or protecting Catherine, the weaker Claude became.

Then the outcome of Jigoro and the others' battle depended on how much damage I could deal to Catherine while swiftly destroying the Ash Vanguards. It was a heavy responsibility, but... I would take it on!