At the time when a great crisis had befallen Orario(?), the battlefield was also entering a new phase.
"I've got a bad feeling about this."
"Then what, you want us to land an attack like that and act like nothing happened? Where's your conscience?"
"No, that's not what I meant..."
It felt like something even more terrible was happening somewhere farther away.
Still...
Hmm. It also felt like maybe that wasn't it. Probably just my imagination.
Accepting that, Arphia flexed her hands over and over as she stared at the Black Dragon.
-■■■■■■■■!!!
"Ugh... That's one disgustingly loud voice."
"So even the Black Dragon was a monster after all. Crude to the bone."
A ferocious roar seized the space.
Just that one bellow made my skin tremble. A sigh escaped me before I could stop it, because it felt like this was where things were really beginning.
It had finally landed a meaningful hit. It was still a long way from a fatal wound, but aside from the injury left by the Mercenary King, it had undeniably achieved an unprecedented feat in this very moment.
We had to keep up this momentum. In a large-scale battle like this, momentum and flow were everything. The Empress understood that painfully well.
The moment you lost the flow, the battle tilted with it. Even more so against an overwhelmingly superior foe like this.
"Hey, did you find anything out?"
We needed a clue. A clue that would let us keep this momentum going.
A stepping stone toward victory.
"...Something feels off."
"What? What does?"
At the abrupt remark, the Empress let out a puzzled voice.
Ignoring her, Arphia kept checking the strength in her own grip and deepened her confidence in her hypothesis.
She had spent the entire opening of the battle adapting her senses, so she was the one who could feel the inconsistency.
"The moment you get close to the Black Dragon, you weaken."
"...You mean [Status Down]?"
[Status Down]. A curse that turned a Falna that should never weaken into something like that.
Thinking of the dreadful curse that made the whole body heavy and the body refuse to move as intended, the Empress shuddered and frowned in confusion at the same time.
"I don't feel anything like that."
But it was also a curse that would be easy to notice if it were applied, precisely because it was so powerful. The Empress had been afflicted by [Status Down] several times before, and she could clearly tell the sensation apart.
Did it really feel like that? She glared at the Black Dragon, but no particular sensation came to her.
"It's not [Status Down]. The Falna itself is weakening."
"What do you mean..."
"The black monster is a divine assassin, was it? Probably because of that, the power of the Falna is being weakened."
Arphia spoke calmly, but her expression was anything but calm. Her brow twisted as she glared at the Black Dragon as though looking at something loathsome.
The Falna itself was weakening. She knew, and felt, just how immense a cruelty that was to the heroes of the divine age.
"A Falna that should never weaken is weakening. The farther away you are, the weaker the effect, but that also means the closer you are, the stronger it gets."
"...Exactly how much?"
"The rear line is Level 1. The front line is Level 2."
"This is fucking insane..."
Well, they said if something was so absurd you couldn't help but laugh, that's exactly what this was.
"No wonder. I thought it was flying back too easily."
The Black Dragon was strong, sure, but it had seemed strange that the giant figure had been taken down so absurdly. Apparently the giant figure hadn't escaped the effect either.
"Damn it."
Information was important, yes, but information like this would only crush morale. For the Empress, who wanted to keep the momentum going, this was the last thing she wanted to hear.
"One hundred meters. I'd say that's probably the range where it has no effect at all."
"A hundred meters? The only ones who can fight at that distance are you and me."
Even if Arphia could ignore it, the Empress had to maintain a certain distance for the sake of contingencies. In the end, that meant Arphia was the only one here who could fight without any flaws.
And even Arphia probably couldn't bring that thing down alone.
"There's no way around it. In a situation where the Falna itself is weakening, the only things we can do are attack from outside the effective range..."
"Or use some absurd enhancement strong enough to ignore the effect."
Then another voice suddenly cut in.
"Zard..."
Zard, who had approached without anyone noticing, listened to the two of them and curled one corner of his mouth.
"Good timing. I've got something suitable."
Zard said that while holding something in his hand.
"You mean that..."
A black fragment in Zard's hand.
A shard of the Black Dragon's scales, broken off by Arphia's attack.
"Hey, if you eat that you'll die— you crazy bastard?!"
Before the Empress could stop him, Zard shoved it into his mouth and chewed it up.
Crunch, crunch. A horrifying sound, like someone chewing on a lump of metal, rang from deep inside his body.
"Ghk...!"
Grrrk. His entire body screamed.
The price of coveting power beyond his station had come.
Enhancement beyond the limit. His flesh cried out, unable to bear the power, and begged for an end.
It was screaming that he would die like this, that he had to stop now.
The cries of soul and instinct rang out.
He ignored them.
Suppressing his weak mind with sheer grit, Zard devoured the Black Dragon's fragment completely.
It was a shard so small you couldn't even call it large as a joke, barely the size of a finger joint, and yet the change was violent.
"UOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!"
With a roar that was half battle cry, half scream, Zard charged. For an instant, he radiated a pressure even greater than the giant figure's.
"That crazy bastard..."
The Empress clicked her tongue as she watched him. She knew Zard's skill grew stronger depending on the monster he consumed, but she also knew the limit was clear.
The Black Dragon was undeniably an existence beyond the limit. Eating that could mean death.
He still seemed to be fine, but no one knew when he would hit his limit. And when that happened, what awaited them was annihilation.
"Damn it... Everyone, get ready for battle! Cover Zard!"
In the end, she couldn't stop him because she knew this was the best option too.
Adventurers were those who adventured. They were the kind of people who committed absurd acts of madness in order to bring down something far above themselves.
Betting your life on it was almost too tame to count as madness.
"Zard will hold it down and Arphia will attack! Keep it going— damn it..."
The Empress's orders trailed off.
"We're being pushed back..."
Zard, supercharged by the Black Dragon's fragment, was certainly strong. At this very moment, he might even be stronger than the giant figure.
He had achieved an enhancement close to a Rank Up, and yet... even so, the enemy overwhelmed him.
-■■■■■■■■!!!!
With the Black Dragon's roar, the full assault began. The thing that had until now maintained the attitude of dealing with insects unleashed its ferocious whole body, trying to kill Zard without mercy.
The balance was still hanging by a thread, but no one could fail to see that they were being pushed back in real time.
At this rate, Zard's desperate stand would end in vain.
There was no room to assist. That battlefield did not allow the weak to interfere.
Every time the Black Dragon's blow and Zard's greatsword collided, a tremendous shockwave and a pained groan rang out.
Zard's body was bursting apart. External impact and internal power ravaged him from the inside and out.
Arphia kept driving magic in, but the Black Dragon ignored it and focused only on Zard.
It had instinctively realized that dealing with Zard came before dealing with Arphia's attacks.
Zard, having achieved super enhancement, was that strong.
He was simply still insufficient against the Black Dragon.
If he ate a little more of the Black Dragon's fragments... No, power he couldn't bear would only bring destruction. He had no intention of valuing his life, but if he died, it would truly be over, so he couldn't even try.
Kagak— In a split-second lapse of awareness, the Black Dragon caught Zard's greatsword in its teeth. It clenched its jaw, and Zard's weapon snapped instantly.
Weapon destruction. While he hesitated at the death of his own partner, the Black Dragon's maw opened wide.
Light appeared. Black light, as if it would swallow everything.
The reason dragonkind was the strongest. An overwhelming breath attack.
As Zard sensed his death in the prelude that seemed to contain the cosmos itself—
"[Ataraxia]."
Clack—
Arphia struck the Black Dragon's head.
In an instant, the Black Dragon's jaws snapped shut. And as if following that, smoke from the explosion leaked out of its closed mouth with a tremendous roar.
-■■■■■■■■!!!!!!!
The loudest scream yet. It had inflicted an injury close to severe, if not fatal, on the Black Dragon. Even if it was a wound bordering on self-harm, a wound was still a wound.
"Pathetic fool. To let your guard down in the middle of a fight."
"...Sorry. I'm alive."
He let out a bitter smile at his weapon, cut off cleanly in the middle, and looked toward the screaming Black Dragon.
'Ataraxia...'
The chant Arphia had used was clearly a defensive spell, not an offensive one.
Zard was no expert in magic, but anything pushed to the extreme could usually be made to work. He could roughly understand how Arphia's attack had just been carried out.
She gathered the magic that should have covered her entire body into one hand and struck with it. That was all.
And with only that, Arphia's attack surpassed the Black Dragon's defense.
[Martellato]
The new skill Arphia had manifested through sublimation.
Its effect was compression of magic. It enabled super-compression far beyond the realm of ordinary compression.
It was a skill that turned Arphia, who specialized in wide-area annihilation, into a pure firepower monster.
Skills are the embodiment of experience. More intense, more striking experiences are crystallized into the form of skills, leaving an indelible mark on a person's path.
That skill was very similar to the rabbit's skill. The difference was that it couldn't be stacked, but on the other hand, it could be used without stacking first.
In other words, what the rabbit couldn't do, the witch could.
-■■■■■■■■?!
The spears of [Sound] pierced the Black Dragon.
Speed approaching the swift. Power impossible to believe from a no-chant spell, further amplified as it ravaged the Black Dragon's body.
"[Ataraxia]."
Smack!
She slapped away the Black Dragon's face as it charged with its maw open. Its head bent sharply despite its massive size.
The application was astonishing enough—using a spell meant for defense as an attack—but the power behind it was enough to make him shudder.
The armor of sound that should have wrapped her entire body remained in one hand. The invincible armor that had never been pierced was now becoming an unbreakable spear, battering the Black Dragon.
Movement that was impossible to believe from a rear guard. Firepower impossible to believe from a no-chant spell.
Maybe Arphia was the most perfect adventurer in this place. Zard thought that, and without missing the chance, launched a decisive assault.
"UOOOOOOOOO!!!!!"
Kagak! Sparks flew as the greatsword was gradually ground down. But perhaps because he was focusing on the wounds, the Black Dragon was also shedding scales little by little, increasing its injuries.
But the situation was not good. No matter how well they fought, Arphia was still a rear guard in the end, and Zard himself had a time limit.
According to the information they had heard, this battle was at best only the opening clash. If they couldn't seize complete control of the battlefield now, they might as well have no chance at all.
Because he wasn't doing it properly, the mage couldn't fight as a mage. He wanted to buy Arphia time, but unfortunately Zard had no confidence he could completely hold the Black Dragon back.
If only there were one more person. Someone equal to him, or greater...
That was when it happened.
"GROOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!"
Just as a beast's roar echoed out, the beast that had split the sea surged upward.
A thick hide covered its entire body, and the warrior's eyes, heavy with weight, had been completely devoured by savagery, leaving only a ferocity that wanted to smash everything.
Complete beastification. The giant's hidden card, the technique that discarded reason and turned him fully into a beast.
It was a technique he had been unable to use until now because, as a leader, he could not afford to lose his reason. But now, all he needed was power.
The giant's form after abandoning reason was, quite literally, that of a lion. Fierce, rough, and at the same time savage.
Its mindless movement had lost its usual finesse and simply charged straight at the enemy.
Like a beast. But the price of abandoning reason was clear.
-■■■■■■■■!!!!
Bang—! The moment the Black Dragon and the lion collided, the Black Dragon's body caved inward.
The giant fought the Black Dragon with his entire body, as though his own flesh and hide were the perfect weapon.
It was a movement that had discarded reason, yet it still contained logic. The giant had lived his whole life as a warrior, and even after losing his reason, he had not forgotten the movements engraved into his body.
Even with the sudden interference, Zard did not panic and joined the attack.
The shattered greatsword and the beast's claws flew in a frenzy. Though they weaved chaotically, the two slashes never once overlapped, drawing countless lines through the air.
Kagak—Kwagagagak! The greatsword and claws broke and chipped away. In proportion, the Black Dragon's scales, which had seemed as if they would never break, also began to be shaved off, bent, and torn away little by little.
The Black Dragon panicked. At the unexpected intrusion of strong foes, it showed an opening for just an instant.
"[The curse of blessing, the curse of birth-]"
Without missing that opening, the witch's confession rang out.
Everything happened in less than a few seconds.