by Fujino Omori
He aimed for everything he could see and shouted at the top of his lungs.
“FIREBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLT!!”
A giant bolt of flame.
“—”
As soon as the Amazon disappeared from its field of vision, the enhanced species saw the burning red jaws.
The other monsters had pounced on the hole and sunk their claws into the black robe, only to be incinerated in the next moment by the Firebolt.
The deadly stream of fire that washed down the passageway swallowed the entire horde.
“O—OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!”
As the burning monsters howled, the enhanced species—which had also been swallowed up in the surge of flames—was thrown far down the passage with a force like a river overflowing its banks. It had avoided immolation thanks to the spirit protective cloth, but together with the rush of crimson fire, it was hurled against the wall at the end of the passage.
The crystal wall exploded into fragments, and the horizontal column of flame raged on through the Dungeon.
The enhanced species was burned all over its body. It fell through the broken wall into the large room on the other side, and it collapsed onto its back.
“…Mr.…Bell!”
Lilly pushed back the Goliath Robe covering the hole, stuck her face into the passage, and called his name like she had once before.
She could see him there, farther down the passage that was cleared now of monsters and steaming with the heat from countless melted magic stones.
A lone boy, walking through the shimmering haze left by the flames.
To her, that figure walking quietly through the swirls of sparks looked incredibly heroic.
Lilly trembled as she watched him. Even Welf and the others who poked their faces up gasped.
Lilly wanted to fly from the hole and throw herself at him. She wanted to hug him, sobbing, and inundate him with a chaotic mess of apology and gratitude.
But the flame of the warrior was still burning in his eyes.
He was looking straight ahead, his whole body aflame with outrage and determination to slaughter his powerful enemy.
In that case, there was one thing Lilly could do. She rolled out of the hole, withdrew a glass vial from the pouch at her hip, and handed it to him roughly.
“Mr. Bell!”
“—Thank you.”
That was all he said after taking the High Dual Potion, one of Nahza’s new concoctions, from her hand. But it was enough.
Aisha emerged from her tunnel, walked past the hole where Mikoto and the others lay piled on top of one another, and smiled at Bell’s back.
“…Bell Cranell! Finish that thing off before we all drop dead!” she said.
“Sorry about this, Bell, but we’re counting on you!” Welf added, a rueful smile on his face as he crawled out of the crater.
Bell did not turn toward them, replying only by raising one hand.
He drank down the last drops of the High Dual Potion, wiped the corner of his mouth with his arm, and walked toward the hole in the Dungeon wall.
He was insane with anger.
What was this?
What had just happened?
It should have been the perfect hunt. After he finished off the brown female, he was going to kill the other humans, and then eat their magic stones. But—
Why is that human alive?!
I thought you fell over the waterfall!
Why didn’t you die?
Why? Why? Why?
This was the first time anything like this had happened.
There was no way he could allow something like this.
It was unacceptable for a human to exist who did not follow his expectations as a hunter.
They were just prey, just food. Nothing more.
Fury and loathing rose like smoke from his body.
The blue cloth rubbing against his skin strained and screeched at its overuse.
He gnashed his fangs and stood up.
“UOOOO…!”
If you’re coming, then come. I’ve eaten enough magic stones.
He was different from what he had been a short while before. His power had swelled to incredible heights. It would be easy to twist and crush that human’s skinny arm.
Fire could no longer affect him. Perhaps he should drag the human underwater again.
The Dungeon was his mother. Within his mother’s womb, he could gain endless strength. But the humans had no tricks for gaining strength. This time, he would stop his prey’s breath at the source.
His eyes gleaming with the desire to kill, he glared at the boy who appeared from beyond the hole.
Bell stood on the rim of the hole he had blasted open with the Firebolt, looking down on the scene before him.
It was a peaceful, watery room. Water covered more than half the large space, and in the center there was a mass of crystal fifty meders in diameter. It looked like an island floating in a large lake. He did not see any monsters. None, that is, except the enhanced species that stood in the center of the island, taking him in with a gaze full of murderous intent.
Bell leaped down from the rim and jumped across the lake, using the crystals that protruded from the water’s surface as stepping-stones, until he reached the island where the monster waited. Nothing stood between them now. On the flat, sparkling blue ground, beneath the light from the white crystals studding the ceiling, Bell and the enhanced species faced each other.
“GRRRRRR…!!”
Bell’s eyes met those of his opponent as it let out a deep growl. It was quite a bit larger now. Standing before the grotesque giant, the emotion that the adventurer felt in his heart was almost certainly rage. This monster had hurt his friends and killed many of his fellow adventurers. It had cruelly tormented the elves. Bell was not the kind of fool who could stand by silently as this creature sadistically and calculatingly rampaged through the Dungeon to satisfy its own greed.
But he also knew that from the monster’s perspective, his rage was absurd. Wounds and even life itself were the price of adventure. Everything was done at the adventurer’s own risk. It was a mistake to see this fight as revenge for Luvis’s arm. Bell and his party were intruders trampling destructively through the Dungeon. They were the invaders.
Bell understood this, and he gazed at the enemy before him through adventurer’s eyes. He would obey the laws of the Dungeon—and kill the monster he now faced.
“…”
“HAA…”
Bell silently drew both of his knives.
The red-eyed monster exhaled a murderous breath.
An instant later, their bodies quivered and they kicked the ground.
Bell and the enhanced species charged at each other, shattering the silence of the room and transforming the little island into a fighting ring.
“Oof!”
“OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!”
The monster had the upper hand in their first collision. Its power had grown beyond what Bell expected, and its arm sent the thrust of his blade flying backward. To avoid the monster’s pursuit, he rolled over the ground and kicked its flank.
The moss huge flew at him again, its teeth bared precisely as if it were smiling. Bell fought back.
“Here they go…!”
Hearing the battle cries, Lilly and the others raced to the hole in the wall.
Welf panted, Ouka held Chigusa in his arms, Mikoto supported Haruhime with her shoulder, and Aisha stood with the parasitic vines twined around her body. Even Luvis, Dormul, and the other dwarves and elves pushed through their pain and gathered by the hole to watch as the fight began.
“Hey, you guys! Are you just going to stand there and not help?” Daphne panted as she ran to catch up with the others watching the fierce battle. Her opinion, delivered with extreme frankness, was that in the current situation, they would together be able to give the monster a good beating.
“Bad idea. If you get hit by those seeds and implanted with vines, you’ll just
be a burden on Bell Cranell,” Aisha countered. Daphne flinched for a moment at the sight of the Amazon hugging the vine-covered half of her body, but then renewed her argument.
“B-but…we can use arrows, and maybe we could get another level boost! Rabbit Foot shouldn’t have to take on that monster all alone—!”
Cassandra interrupted her, pointing toward the room.
“D-Daphne…look…”
Daphne glanced suspiciously back at the fight.
“OOOOOOAAA!!”
“…!”
Bell had managed to get his knife past the monster’s arm and was now slashing its body relentlessly. Taking advantage of his small size in relation to his opponent, he hopped from its left side to its right, then bent forward almost to the ground and slipped around to its back side. He was unleashing a series of close-range attacks—not so much hit-and-run as rush, dodge, and repeat.
The flashing purple-blue and white blades pounded against the monster, chipping away at its wooden armor frame and mossy flesh.
“D-did that monster get stronger by eating magic stones?!” Daphne blurted out.
“I think so. But more than that…”
Aisha narrowed her eyes.
“…Isn’t Bell Cranell moving faster than the last time we saw him?” Ouka said from beside her, lowering his voice in terror. In his arms, Chigusa opened her eyes a tiny bit in surprise.
Only Mikoto, standing next to the group, broke into a cold sweat.
No way…
There was something familiar about the feeling that came over her as she registered the difference between Bell now and Bell when he was last with the party.
It wasn’t that he was moving faster. It was that his movements had much more vitality to them now.
Kind of like when Haruhime gives us the level boosts…
Mikoto cleared her throat, conscious of the weight of the renart on her shoulder.
When Mikoto received level boosts, she often felt like her body was out of control. Her mind was not able to keep up with the suddenly increased power emanating from her physical body.
What if Bell had been in the same situation before he separated from the group?
What if his mind and body had been out of sync?
That happened when the drastic physical changes that occurred when one leveled up outpaced the sensations produced by the mind.
A shiver ran down Mikoto’s spine.
So all this time, Sir Bell has been—
Probably, first-tier adventurers were able to bring their mind and body into sync after one major battle. But Bell was still immature—and more importantly, his rate of growth was insanely fast. Even more so than an ordinary person, his mind couldn’t keep up with his body.
But what if his experience in the lower levels had finally taken care of the problem?
Mikoto’s violet eyes widened as she watched the boy toss his opponent about between his knives. She thought back to something Takemikazuchi had said when he was training her before the expedition.
Were you fighting with your body and your mind out of sync?
Mikoto was right.
My body is working better than before.
Bell realized it in the midst of fighting the monster. His body was following the exact track his mind laid down. The lags in his attacks, defense, and retreat—so small before that he wouldn’t even notice them without a conscious effort—were gone now.
The sensations inside his body were clearer than ever before.
That uneasy feeling is gone.
Strangely enough, the grand battle with the iguaçu—those creatures who put their very lives at risk to dive-bomb him—had brought his mind and body into alignment.
Now that his body was fully under his control, it seemed obvious. He could see just how much the vessel of his physical being had been throwing him around, even when he first arrived in the lower levels and even during his first fight with the enhanced species.
Now his body was working how he wanted it to, as if all the gears had finally clicked into place. He was able to meet his opponent’s movements.
“OO, OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!”
He could see the uneasiness rising in the enhanced species’ eyes as it took in this new Bell, who fought in a completely different way than he had in their last encounter.
The superhuman strength that crushed the crystal ground underfoot didn’t even make a scratch on the boy. The tree roots, which extended from the monster’s legs into the ground and then up again for a sneak attack, were severed before they could do their work. The attacks that had tormented so many adventurers in the past had no effect.
The monster roared, as if to chase away its uneasiness. Then bumps rose all over its body. Facing Bell at close range, it fired a hail of seed bullets at him.
They’re not as fast as the iguaçu!!
Bell did not lose his composure. Compared to the terrifying crimson streaks he had encountered earlier, the seed bullets looked practically stationary.
He tracked their trajectories, and moving his arms so fast they appeared to blur, he slashed down every last one with his knives.
“…!!”
The astonished monster had no time to regain its footing before Bell launched into a powerful slashing attack.
“GUO?!”
In response, the moss huge unleashed a counterattack fueled by its fighting spirit and superhuman strength. Blows nourished by the lives of countless of his own brethren rocked the scratched dir-adamantite armor covering Bell’s body. This time they inflicted real harm.
The monster was the stronger of the two, and it had greater defensive abilities.
In all likelihood, Bell could not match its overall potential.
But Bell was faster.
Now that his mind and body were fully linked, his true ability gave him an advantage on the battlefield.
Even more importantly—
He’s slow!
The enemy standing before him was incredibly sluggish.
Bell had a standard to hold this monster to.
A monster that was truly beyond the realm of the ordinary.
A monster that was far faster, far stronger, and far crazier than the one before him.
Bell had fought that monster. And he had vowed to fight that worthy opponent again.
I want to beat him.
He wanted to beat the warrior who had appeared before him even after being reborn.
I want to beat him.
He wanted to beat the warrior who had battered him with his ferocious strength and his double-edged ax, Labrys.
This time, I want to win!
He wanted to beat the brave minotaur who had carved defeat into his body on that moonlit night.
His status burned high.
The fierce struggle with the moss huge had ignited the passion deep within Bell, and now, as he thought about the black minotaur, it exploded to the surface.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!”
“…!!”
The extreme-speed slashing attack far outstripped his enemy’s ability to respond. It was a Rabbit Rush.
Like he had with the iguaçu, Bell carved a whirlwind of black and sparkling white arcs in the air. Both his mind and body sped up. A typhoon of moss flew from the enhanced species’ body.
Finally, a horizontal slash inflicted from directly next to him sent the massive body flying backward. Now a good distance separated Bell and the moss huge.
“AAAAAAAAAAA…!!”
“…!”
But even as pieces of the monster’s body continued to peel away, new moss grew to fill the wounds. Soon it appeared the Rabbit Rush had never even happened. Bell gaped.
Its recovery speed was extremely fast. Even when it was shredded to pieces, the living moss immediately began to regrow. A simple superiority in the number of wounds inflicted would not be enough to take down this monster that had consumed so many magic stones. With the Undine cloth wrapped around its body, Firebolts
clearly wouldn’t do much, either.
Plus, even though Bell had drunk the High Dual Potion, his whole body was still feeling the aftermath of the recent full charge. If the battle lasted very long, the balance would probably tip in the monster’s favor.
So neither knife attacks nor magic would work, and a drawn-out battle would put Bell at a serious disadvantage.
In that case—a single blow was the only option.
Bell would take out his enemy with the strongest single blow he could manage, one that left no room for recovery.
He slipped Hakugen into its sheath and held the Hestia Knife in his right fist with a backhand grip. He raised it to chest level, then thrust out his left hand.
“Firebolt!”
The column of electrical fire that required no chant to activate was instantly released.
But Bell was not aiming it at the enemy in front of him. Instead, he channeled it into the jet-black blade of the knife in his right hand.
“…?!”
Neither the monster nor the adventurers watching from outside the room could believe their eyes.
Bell’s actions did not end with his infusion of magic into the blade. As soon as the magic was released, he started charging.
“—”
Ring, ring.
The chime vibrated in the giant’s ears. Its eyes fixed on something.
The Firebolt, which should have sent masses of sparks flying when it exploded into the knife and whose mass of flame should have dispersed, was instead being pressed onto the blade of the knife by the particles of white light that the boy was releasing.
No, not pressed—focused.
“The flames are gathering in the knife…”
“An enchantment…? No, I don’t think so…What is that?!”
Even from their position at a distance, Ouka and Daphne could see what was happening. The crimson lightning was converging and condensing. The knife wore a blazing armor of flames, which in turn was wrapped in a thick gauze of light particles.
The hieroglyphs etched into the knife pulsated with white light as if they were resonating with the flames.
It was a dual charge.
Bell’s investigations had led him to home in on the focusing property of Argonaut, and he’d used that to develop a new application of the skill. In other words, he’d figured out how to charge his magic and his knife attacks at the same time.
