Chapter 297
Having more or less dealt with the enemy's fourth wave, the fifth wave—the Hell Beasts—emerged from the vertical shaft. Seeing them, I clicked my tongue without thinking. The reason was that things had turned out exactly as I had feared, in the worst possible way.
"Their numbers have decreased, but now they're clearly all powerful individuals. This is as troublesome as it gets."
The number of Hell Beasts emerging from the vertical shaft had fallen considerably. However, nearly all of them were large individuals over three meters tall. Even if the enemy's numbers had decreased, the rise in quality made a difficult battle inevitable.
Until now, the Golem units and Undead units had taken damage, but their numbers had not decreased. From this point onward, however, there would likely be times when we had to use them up as meat shields. I did not intend to recklessly expend them, since this fifth wave might not be the end of the battle.
"Gwooooooaaaaaah!!!"
"Gyaaaaaaaah!!!"
As I was determining our strategy from this point onward, two enormous Hell Beasts emerged from the vertical shaft. They were in a class of their own compared with the other individuals, standing nearly ten meters tall. Those two were certainly stronger than any of the ones we had faced so far.
One of the two Hell Beasts naturally had a grotesque form. It had a lion's head, the torso of an anthropoid ape, and six powerful arms, each with one more joint than a human arm. Its feet were covered in rough scales reminiscent of a fish. The Hell Beast walked on two legs and tightly gripped an indigo club in its right hand that looked as though it had been carved from a giant tree.
The other Hell Beast could be described in a single phrase: a super-heavyweight pill bug. However, as one would expect of a Hell Beast, its appearance was bizarre when examined closely. Its spiked shell was covered in countless sharp spikes, while countless blazing legs peered out from between the plates. Its strangely long antennae each had a tooth-filled mouth at the end, making them look like eyeless snakes.
"Grandpa! I'm takin' the pill bug!"
"Very well!"
The two people closest to the enormous Hell Beasts charged at the monsters without the slightest hesitation. No matter how powerful the enemies were, I could not imagine Jigorou and Genzuro losing. All right, then. We would devote ourselves to our own battles!
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The two enormous Hell Beasts had climbed up from underground onto the stage that was the battlefield. Jigorou and Genzuro made their decision immediately: these monsters were their prey.
"Grandpa! I'm takin' the pill bug!"
"Very well!"
Jigorou loudly declared that he would take one of them, his voice carrying across the entire battlefield. Genzuro agreed and faced the grotesque giant that was his target, hoping it would prove worthy of showcasing the full extent of his skill.
"Grrrrrrrrr..."
"Hmm. It is likely a high-ranking Hell Beast, but by level, it does not seem much different from us."
The eyes of the Hell Beast glaring down at the much smaller Genzuro held the vigilance characteristic of a beast confronting a formidable foe. Seeing this, Genzuro guessed that it was somewhat more intelligent than the other Hell Beasts, while also being considerably stronger as an individual.
Even as he observed it, dozens of Hell Beasts attacked Genzuro. He naturally swung his sword, accurately striking and killing them at their vital points, including their necks. Amid the explosions, shouts, and screams echoing across the battlefield, the area around him alone seemed wrapped in silence.
"GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!"
"Hmm, a damaging roar. It only shaved off a little through my exoskeleton, but... with more room around me, this is easier."
The grotesque giant roared as though it meant to crush Genzuro outright. Even when the air vibrated violently, Genzuro suffered almost no damage from the roar thanks to his sturdy exoskeleton. The Hell Beasts around him, however, suffered devastating damage.
The high-defense individuals that Ruby had struggled to defeat were one thing, but the Hell Beasts with high attack power and poor defense were pulverized into dust en masse. It was completely friendly fire, but although the Hell Beasts formed a horde, they were not comrades. Thus, the grotesque giant showed no concern whatsoever as it brought down the club in its right hand.
"Grrrrr! GRAAAAH!"
"Hoho! What tremendous strength! That is power I could never produce with my size... No, perhaps Jigorou could manage it."
The blow, backed by overwhelming mass, shook the earth and caused the air to tremble as it approached, intent on crushing Genzuro. Yet Genzuro dodged the Hell Beast's club with an expression of awe and something resembling enjoyment, while still retaining plenty of composure.
If anything, the other Hell Beasts suffered a more miserable fate. While dodging, Genzuro craftily guided the club toward areas crowded with Hell Beasts, dragging them into the path of each blow. Thanks to his quick thinking, he had already eliminated nearly twenty percent of the Hell Beasts that had appeared in the fifth wave.
"Dodging it over and over is fine, but I still prefer cutting down my enemies... so!"
With that, Genzuro raised his greatsword overhead and brought it down on the club, which had struck the ground and come to a stop. However, the resistance that came back made him frown despite himself. Even with a single stroke from Genzuro, who had cut through every enemy he had faced until now, he had only managed to shave a thin layer from the surface of the enormous indigo club.
The instant his blade touched the club, Genzuro realized that he must not assume it was ordinary wood simply because it looked like wood. This substance was even harder than steel.
"Goodness, it really is a game. Who would have thought there was such mysterious wood, harder than metal...? Hahaha! How interesting!"
Even with his skill and a high-quality weapon at hand, there were still substances he could not cut. Genzuro rejoiced at this discovery and set himself a goal: before defeating this Hell Beast, he would definitely cut through the weapon it carried.
Restricting one's own battle in this way could be called a kind of 'challenge play.' If Izam heard about it, he would be appalled that Genzuro was doing such a thing on a battlefield. Unfortunately, Genzuro was the sort who became more fired up when he placed conditions on his victories.
"Kuhahahahahaha! Amazing! It's amazing, hey!"
While Genzuro was steeling his resolve to cut both the enemy and its weapon, Jigorou laughed uproariously as he dug in his feet and tried to hold down the pill-bug-like Hell Beast rolling around. His feet carved two parallel lines into the ground, which the Hell Beast, curling into a sphere, immediately leveled. Considering the difference in their sizes, the sight was almost comical from the outside.
However, a pill bug over ten meters long was rolling around. The damage it caused covered a wider area than the grotesque giant's club. Moreover, with the pill-bug Hell Beast spewing flames from between its shell plates, the Hell Beasts caught up in it had no chance. The number of Hell Beasts burned by the pill bug's flames and crushed beneath its mass had surely already surpassed a hundred.
"A contest of strength is a bad matchup for me, huh!? Then... heave-hooooooo!"
Jigorou had been able to act recklessly because the flames had no effect on him and his arms were protected by his gauntlets, but he seemed to acknowledge that he could not win a direct contest of strength. Instead, he redirected the force he had been using to stop the pill bug's advance, now applying it from below to lift the creature upward.
Amazingly, the pill bug rose just slightly off the ground. Not letting that moment pass, Jigorou slammed a high kick into it. The pill bug's trajectory veered from the force of his absurd strength, and it came barreling toward the grotesque giant fighting Genzuro.
"GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!"
"Heh-heh! Now that's what I call nice batting!"
The grotesque giant had been growing frustrated at its inability to hit Genzuro as he moved across the ground. It swung its club at the pill bug charging toward it, seemingly taking out its frustration on the creature. Though its swinging form was a complete mess, the giant's extraordinary strength, generated by its massive body, sent the pill bug flying more than a hundred meters.
When it collided with the club, part of the pill bug's shell cracked with a crunch, and flames roared out from the exposed section. Needless to say, the Hell Beasts in the place where it crashed to the ground suffered yet another wave of casualties.
The pill bug writhed and struggled to get back up, but someone moved in to follow up with another attack. That someone was, of course, Jigorou.
"Ha-ha! A pill bug flipped onto its back is pretty disgusting, huh!? When it's this big, it's even worse!"
Laughing with genuine delight despite his words, Jigorou climbed onto the exposed belly, where countless jointed legs writhed. He seized one of the pill bug's burning legs and twisted it off at the joint. Then he used the severed leg like a spear and drove it forcefully into the pill-bug Hell Beast.
The pill-bug Hell Beast let out an indescribably unpleasant scream and thrust the two antennae growing from its head toward Jigorou. Due to the pill bug's size, the antennae were as large as giant snakes. Poison coated the neatly lined fangs visible inside their gaping mouths, and even Jigorou would suffer serious damage if he were bitten.
"Hey, is that all you've got? You're way too slow!"
However, those fangs never reached Jigorou. He pierced one antenna with his horn, dodged the other, and bit it off. Then, while crushing the severed tip underfoot, he resumed the process of driving the jointed legs into the creature's body.
"Huh? What a tenacious bastard..."
Having failed to counterattack with its antennae, the pill-bug Hell Beast resorted to its final measure. It curled its body up around Jigorou, attempting to crush him along with itself through sheer force.
Jigorou tried to escape by tearing off the jointed legs as though clearing away obstructing brush, but the legs kept closing in with the determination to never let him escape, even if they had to be torn apart. He was finally caught. In its curled-up state, the pill-bug Hell Beast once again heated its body until flames began leaking from between its shell plates.
The pill-bug Hell Beast must have been certain that it had secured the small enemy's death. But it was too late to realize that the opponent it had caught was nearly its worst possible matchup—and that capturing him had been a terrible mistake.
"Gih... Gyaaaaaaaaah!?"
Violent golden lightning raced across the entire body of the still-curled pill-bug Hell Beast. The electricity leaked into the surrounding area through the spikes on its shell, turning the Hell Beasts weakened by the battle into dust all at once.
"Aw, that's all it took to knock you out?"
The pill-bug Hell Beast twitched and convulsed, but Jigorou emerged from between its shell plates without a care. He had completely endured the Hell Beast's flames through his excellent resistance and martial techniques, then released a full-power discharge of lightning in return, electrocuting it.
By enclosing Jigorou and taking his full-power attack head-on, the pill-bug Hell Beast had been reduced to the brink of death, and it was also afflicted with paralysis. Jigorou looked disappointed that it had been weaker than expected, then destroyed the Hell Beast's head with a kick and delivered the finishing blow. Behind him, the grotesque giant's head was flying through the air alongside its club, which had been severed halfway through.