Chapter 448: Dragons, O Dragons! Part Twenty-Five

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Siegwurm: "Ghh... kuh kuh kuh, yes... yes indeed. Humans, will you surpass me? Will you slay a dragon? Yet if you show me a different answer, that too is good! That radiance itself shall become the answer to my countless ages. Has the tide of life, inherited and flowing onward, surpassed the Divine Era? No! Humans, you must surpass it!! O Dragon Law: Notorious! With your radiant judgment, purge from these heroes the immaturity that leaves them unworthy!!"

???: "Gwah!"

???: "What the—!? I got thrown back!?"

???: "I'm fine, though..."

???: "Notorious... Is that the status ailment called B.I.G.!?"

???: "So it rejects anyone below a certain rating!"

A golden "circle" radiates out from Siegwurm, sorting those it sends flying from those it does not. As though none of that matters to her, a fox-masked ninja races forward.

Akitsu Akane: "Noirlind-san! You landed head-first—are you okay!?"

Noirlind: "Guh... ooooh... Fool, do you think something like this could bring me—ahem!—bring this one down...!!"

Siegwurm: "Then I suppose I may strike you until you do fall?"

Noirlind: "Gubeh!?"

Akitsu Akane: "That was a kick!!"

Noirlind reels back after taking a kick to the throat, with Siegwurm as the culprit. The fox-masked ninja, Akitsu Akane, strengthens herself from within with a Skill, swiftly forms and cuts hand signs, and activates ninjutsu... or rather, a Blade-Hiding Art.

Akitsu Akane: "Blade-Hiding Art... Chasing-Mouse Sparks!!"

Pop-pop! With comically light sounds, palm-sized fireballs appear around Akitsu Akane. They race through the air toward where their caster is looking—toward Siegwurm—each following an irregular but unerring path as they seek the gold.

Siegwurm: "Something of this level is not even worth blocking!"

Akitsu Akane: "That's why I do this! Blade-Hiding Art: Shiranui Bud!!"

Each Chasing-Mouse Sparks fireball seeks its target with its own individual movement. Like mice darting around, they are difficult to catch—and, at the same time, they are deliberately avoiding the shortest route.

That means the huge fireball traveling the shortest route, even at a lower speed, reaches Siegwurm before the smaller fireballs that were launched first. The small fireballs then arrive and burst. That fulfills Shiranui Bud's condition of "using fire near the large fireball," and the large fireball releases the intense heat stored inside it all at once.

Siegwurm: "Ngh... It has no effect!!"

Akitsu Akane: "Then I'll keep doing it until it does! I... won't give up!!"

Dagger at the ready, she presses forward, forward. For whatever whim has taken him, Siegwurm is standing on two feet on the ground, and his mobility is lower than it is in the air.

Before the sweeping tail can smash her body apart, Akitsu Akane leaps. With the effect of Hermes Boot, she runs through the air and dives all the way into the range of her blade.

Akitsu Akane: "Haaah!!"

Siegwurm: "I will commend that courage. But to think you could drive a blade into me with your strength alone—laughable!!"

Even the slightest shudder of Siegwurm's body is enough to knock aside a dagger wielded by a tiny human.

Then a claw comes crashing down from above toward Akitsu Akane, about to bite into her body when—

Siegwurm: "Hm... a log!!"

Akitsu Akane: "Auto Utsusemi!!"

Ninja, a hidden Job derived from Thief. Among its techniques, the Blade-Hiding Art: Utsusemi can, once raised past a certain level of proficiency, be activated automatically without using hand signs.

Strictly speaking, it is not completely automatic. The condition is that the player must recognize the incoming attack and consciously intend to activate it. Even so, being able to use the substitution technique when both hands are occupied is a major strength.

Akitsu Akane: "As I thought, with my attack power..."

Noirlind: "Move!!"

Akitsu Akane: "Noirlind-san!!"

In the instant Akitsu Akane draws Siegwurm's attention, a massive pitch-black body launches itself forward with every muscle flexed, shoving the air aside as it crashes into the golden dragon.

Noirlind: "Guh... even this, you can stop...!!"

Siegwurm: "A beast may imitate a human, but...!!"

Rust: "...You're giving humans too much credit. A human would die if a lion played with them."

Siegwurm: "Nghh!!"

An arrow tears through the air and strikes near Siegwurm's eye. Made of magic, it is not erased on contact with Siegwurm while he is not clad in his golden aura. The burst of magic at the eye—a place he cannot help but react to—makes his body flinch ever so slightly.

Noirlind immediately beats his wings wide to pull away from Siegwurm, then fires his breath.

The breath is not erased either. It engulfs Siegwurm and burns—

Siegwurm: "Impudent!!"

Noirlind: "Tch!!"

Golden wings hammer the air. As if declaring that even without his radiant fighting spirit something of this level does not so much as hurt or itch, the pressure kicked up by Siegwurm's wings blows away Noirlind's breath clinging to his body.

Rust: "...I knew it, but he's way too tough."

Akitsu Akane: "Rust-san! That—what about that robot-looking armor...?"

Rust: "Conserving it."

Akitsu Akane: "How ecological!!"

A momentary stalemate. But that gap, not even ten seconds long, is more than enough for the pioneers who can step beyond the golden gravity field to reach this place.

???: "Good evening. In accordance with the alliance pact, Team 10PM... is here to assist in the battle against Siegwurm."

???: "Ah, hello. I'm SF-Zoo's errand runner. Sorry—our leader got all fired up fighting the white dragon... I came to tell you that SF-Zoo will keep Bryleinyego pinned down!"

???: "Oh, terribly sorry. I'm Massive Dynamite of Black Blade. Psyger-100 is a little occupied right now... she said she might be late."

Players arrive one after another. Warriors who fought bravely on the way here and earned positive judgment within the gravity field ready their own weapons, stare down Siegwurm, and gather as if surrounding the gold.

???: "Hey, um... did you tame Noirlind?"

Akitsu Akane: "Huh? No, nothing like that. But we're fighting the same opponent, so it's that thing! 'The enemy of my enemy is my friend'!!"

Noirlind: "Hmph. Swarming out in droves... Do not think you insects have any right to complain if I crush you underfoot."

Tension drifts through the air for an instant. So this one is the same kind as Deuredhowl, the players think, and their enthusiasm starts to cool a little.

But as though warming that cooling mood back up, Akitsu Akane speaks to Noirlind, and the black dragon answers her. Put in cruder, more everyday terms, he looks like nothing so much as a "textbook tsundere," and some of the hostility directed at Noirlind dissipates into thin air.

???: "Wait, he's a moe character?"

???: "That's extremely acceptable."

???: "Hold on, can Color Dragons actually be tamed...?"

???: "No, that's not it. If I remember right, Library tested messing with enemies in ways other than combat and found that their reactions change... Maybe there's some hidden parameter?"

In fact, players who frequently pull stunts on monsters raise a hidden parameter called Wildness, but no one here is able to reveal something that is kept secret on the surface.

???: "Pencilgon doesn't seem to be here, and the Saiga up above isn't either... Can't be helped. For now, P.T. Overwerke, clan leader of Team 10PM, will take command! You aren't obligated to obey, but if you're willing to follow, listen up!"

Some Players: "Aye!"

Some answer him; others have already dashed forward. P.T. Overwerke mentally sorts those who refused to enter his chain of command into the category of "Mobs" and rapidly turns his thoughts over, building a plan.

Yes—this moment, powered by the high motivation called a hobby, lets his brain work far, far more pleasantly than making documents while the face of some boss with all the awareness and none of the competence is burned into the corner of his mind—!

P.T. Overwerke: "Akitsu Akane... that's right, isn't it?"

Akitsu Akane: "Y-yes!"

P.T. Overwerke: "At least for this battle, we can consider Noirlind to be 'on our side,' correct?"

Akitsu Akane: "U-um..."

Rust: "...That's fine. In the extreme, think of him as a tank on the same side that won't follow orders. That's what our leader said."

Still firing arrows while receiving Mold's buffs, Rust defines the black dragon's value as a fighting asset in Akitsu Akane's place when she falters for words.

In truth, the clans belonging to the alliance centered around Wolfgang already know about the plan to defeat Siegwurm with Noirlind as its core. But in front of an unspecified crowd, visibly showing a "guarantee" matters.

P.T. Overwerke: "All players, launch your attacks in sync with Noirlind's! We've got an absurdly powerful asset here—if we wipe ourselves out with friendly fire, we'll be a laughingstock!! Magic-artillery group! Boo-Nasu has full authority over attack timing. The support group starts us off; from there, synchronize and hammer in your attacks!! If you don't understand something, ask one of our members!!"

Compared with Black Blade and Wolfgang, whose members all maintain a high level of individual strength, Team 10PM deliberately chooses more standardized equipment. That prioritizes making it easier to keep everyone in step during the planning stage—and that, above all else, is the greatest strength of seasoned corporate slaves.

P.T. Overwerke: "Wolfgang tried all sorts of things for us, so we've figured out several of his tricks! Tell magic nullification from Skill nullification by the effects!!"

Siegwurm: "Fufufu... fuhahahahaha!! Splendid! Very well, heroes... I accept your challenge!!"

P.T. Overwerke: "Switching between magic nullification and Skill nullification... Maybe the legend of the Master of the Sword being strongest ends today?"

Clad in golden knightly garb, P.T. Overwerke draws a sword from his inventory and takes his stance.

It is neither a holy sword befitting the master of attendant swords, nor a dragon-slaying spear-blade befitting a blazing hero.

P.T. Overwerke: "Highest-tier Job in the magic-swordsman line... Rätsel, the Mystic Sword. Allow me to show you the art of sword and magic made one."

He raises Ritus, Ritual Spirit Sword, enhanced by a special strengthening method available only to those who have taken the Rätsel, the Mystic Sword Job, and strikes a grand pose.

Stop calling Rätsel, the Mystic Sword "a bargain-bin Master of the Sword who can only hold two swords no matter how hard he tries"!!