Chapter 435: O Dragon, O Dragon! We Race Toward the End of Our Longing — O Dragon, O Dragon! Part Twelve

With the Odinu Clan, a clan of giants, joining the battle, the players dealing with the white dragon had suddenly begun to regain their momentum.

But now they had been pushed back once again, to the point where it was fair to call the situation a disadvantage.

It was unclear whether the addition of the giants—people who looked to average around three meters tall—had triggered some kind of system processing on Bryleinyego's side, but the production pattern that had previously created human-sized lesser dragons had changed.

Unidentified Player: "Humanoid!?"

Unidentified Player: "Tanks and rear support... That bastard! It's actually copying our roles!!"

Unidentified Player: "Wait, wait, wait! Nobody said anything about giant-sized ones!!"

Until now, the lesser dragons had been six-legged creatures shaped like ants. Now they stood upright on their two hind legs and resumed their advance with arms shaped according to their respective "roles."

On top of that, giant-sized lesser dragons around three meters tall had begun to appear as well. Their numbers were still small, and the giants were managing to deal with them, but only barely.

The pressure of being pushed back little by little instead of collapsing all at once was something the other dragons could not create, no matter how strong or troublesome they were, because each of them was ultimately only an "individual." This was a kind of tension only Bryleinyego could create—a dragon of the "swarm" that produced clones.

Reiji: "O-whoa-ah... Crap!"

Another player failed to withstand the pressure of the swarm. A tank-type lesser dragon forced him backward and knocked him flat onto his back.

The surrounding lesser dragons immediately closed in around their unfortunate victim, clacking rows of mismatched fangs of uneven size as they moved to take his life.

Reiji: "H-hey, wait—"

That man, a player named Reiji, had, for better or worse, not been killed even once from the beginning of the decisive-battle phase up to now.

So this was his first experience of the terror of being surrounded like a victim trapped by zombies and beaten down by a mob of creepy dragon knockoffs.

But fortune had not abandoned Reiji.

Sunraku: "And that's five kills!!"

Trails of red and green—no, blue-green—swept across Reiji's vision as the lesser dragons were closing it off.

A moment later, all five lesser dragons were destroyed, their shattered effects drifting through the air like snow.

Sunraku: "Hey, you okay...? Hm?"

Reiji: "Y-you saved me... What is it?"

She held a straight sword with a blade split evenly between red and blue-green, as though two gemstones had been stretched directly into the shape of a sword. Despite being the one who had done the rescuing, she stared closely at Reiji's face with a puzzled look.

Even if the mask itself was expressionless, it was modeled after a woman. With it coming that close, it was only natural for Reiji's healthy young man, as a healthy young man, to start stirring.

And judging by the voice, the player inside was probably a woman too. With someone who looked like a queen of jewels coming that close...

Sunraku: "...Weren't you in Secondale sometime around summer, with a female friend or someone?"

Reiji: "Huh? ...No, wait. Sunraku... Don't tell me...!!"

Sunraku: "Ohhh, I knew it! Seriously? You really can't underestimate the RNG behind chance encounters!! Man, you really saved me back then! I wanted to thank you, but we were complete strangers, so even if I tried to find you, there was no way I could!"

The mysterious female player grabbed Reiji by the arm and hauled him forcefully to his feet, then turned the grip into a handshake and pumped his arm up and down.

Or rather, she was Sunraku—the very person from back then.

Reiji: "But isn't Sunraku a male character...?"

Sunraku: "Oh, this? It's a sex-change item. You can get one as a reward from Ctarnidd."

The bombshell came out casually, but Sunraku talked as though somebody had poured lubricant straight into his mouth, so it never even occurred to him that he might have said too much. Reiji, meanwhile, had no room to worry about that either: his wholesome healthy-young-man sensibilities were starting to wobble under that sexual, trans-ish wickedness.

Sunraku: "Man, I'm glad I finally got to thank you. Really glad. Anyway, I'm going to rack up some score... Let's keep at it!"

Reiji: "Ah, wait—"

Sunraku: "One-man-army game!!"

Reiji stared blankly as Sunraku (?) charged back into the battlefield at a speed that seemed impossible for someone wearing heavy gemstone armor, then suddenly snapped back to himself.

Reiji: "Why the hell am I getting all worked up over a guy posing as a girl online...?"

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Magnificent! Absolutely magnificent, Empress's Supreme Treasure Gear, Tsaritsa Series!

Bilac had said something about "jewel craftsmen or whatever...," but the dress section woven from Tsarberyl Imperial Treasure Crystal was light and easy to move in despite how it looked.

And this full equipment set "currently" had a passive MP-recovery effect. Each piece activated separately, so if I equipped all four parts—the head, torso, waist, and legs—even an MP pool like mine would completely recover in five minutes.

On top of that, its magic-reflection effect meant that even a lesser dragon's breath attack (small) dealt no damage at all!

And then! Once I filled the gauge and pumped myself up with various enhancement Skills...

Sunraku: "EX-Calibur Mode!!"

In that instant, it devoured all of my mana at my discretion, and the crystal blade extended all at once.

This was the expanded form built into Glittergrit, Crystal Sword of Heroic Radiance—the ability to consume MP and physically lengthen the blade!

It wasn't some blade made of mana. The actual blade itself got bigger, so the required parameters went up too!

It was heavy!!

Sunraku: "Which is why... this is how you use it!!"

I brought it down in a single vertical slash on a giant-type lesser dragon. With my HP adjusted and the gauge at one hundred percent, the finishing move "Glitter Sword" became available.

The lesser dragon was probably designed to be easy to cut through from the start. Letting the sword's weight carry the blow, I severed it with a single stroke, then turned around holding the blade after it had shrunk again. I didn't actually need to strike a pose like this, but I had those "seconds" to account for.

The giant lesser dragon, now marked by a vertical line, tried to counterattack...

Its body suddenly froze in an unnatural position. Then the wound carved into it began to shine...

Sunraku: "Justice served!"

A! HUGE! EXPLOSION!!

...Seriously, how much effort did he put into this? Sure, villains and monsters in special-effects hero shows tend to explode, but still.

The finishing move "Glitter Sword" smooths out the attack motion and deals additional damage. Put simply, the sword stops getting deflected; a few seconds after the slash, the target takes additional damage... and if that damage delivers the finishing blow, the target explodes.

Sunraku: "A toy..."

Maybe he thought the overall design hid it well, but I hadn't missed the huge "EX" worked right into the blade design.

Still, it was nice that the blade kept the motion calculations from immediately before it expanded. Some games take control away from you in midair the instant you activate a finishing move. Watching a character fall while performing a finishing-move animation that gives no thought at all to landing is pretty funny, though.

Another slight downside was that, because it belonged to the two-handed sword category, it occupied both the left and right equipment slots. But I had ordered it as a two-handed sword in the first place, so that was really just a matter of how it felt.

I cut down the ant-shaped lesser dragons one after another, occasionally helping players on the verge of death back to their feet and earning even more score.

Strange. I felt like someone should have come over here by now...

But no one did.

Sunraku: "Tch. What, you want me to shine even brighter?"

I drove Glittergrit, Crystal Sword of Heroic Radiance into the ground and activated EX-Calibur Mode while it was still planted there. Since I had invested in Bradion, my basic movement options had been heavily restricted. Still, Bradion had its own merits. That only meant I had to prepare substitutes and make do with them.

I sprang into the air, operated a window, and summoned another weapon into my hand.

I had known from the start that its matchup gave it an absolute advantage, but I had wanted to try Glittergrit first, so I had held off using it. But these things were spawning at the rate of fodder enemies in a one-man-army game.

Time to bring it out.

Long ago, this dragon-slaying blade had been driven into Naga, a dragon-serpent that was no true dragon, and had spent all that time doing nothing but rotting and rusting away. It had originally been a spear, had been snapped by its former wielder, and had then been shortened even further. It had lived quite the eventful sword-life—or whatever you would call it...

But now was the time for it to display its true power.

Sunraku: "Roar, Areadbhair! Raise your flames! Burn the dragons away...!!"

The jet-black blade became wreathed in fire as though it had been waiting for this very moment.

It sliced the giant lesser dragon in two with cutting power matching—or even surpassing—Glitter Sword with its system-assisted ease of cutting.

I stepped over the huge body as it collapsed with flames pouring from its wound, then charged toward a place where a group of lesser dragons had gathered, though I had no idea what was there.

Sunraku: "I don't really know what's going on, but I'm racking up kill score!"

The fact that a general-purpose effect comes close to the cutting power of Areadbhair's specialized effect really shows off Imron's skill.

Though Areadbhair's effect is passive, mind you.