Chapter 5: The Final Ingredient

Chapter 5:
The Final Ingredient

 

POV: ODA AKIRA

 

“OKAY, what’s next on our list?”

Since we obviously couldn’t fight very well having to lug around giant tusks, we’d decided to make a quick pit stop back at home base before heading out again. We had a few accidental monster encounters on the way back, but that couldn’t be avoided in this forest. If anything, we were the intruders messing with the native ecosystem here, so I couldn’t even blame them.

Gilles spread out the large map of the area we’d been shown a while back on the large dining table while Kyousuke read the next item off the list Noa had given us. “Looks like the next thing we need is something called an ‘Orghen’s Organ.’ But which organ do we need? Does it matter, or will any of its innards do?”

I turned to look at Noa, who was leaning against the wall by the door with her arms folded, trying not to get involved. She shook her head. “Nope. I dunno what the word ‘organ’ refers to in your world, but here, a monster’s organ refers to their mana

stone. Most monsters can’t go on living once it’s been removed, you see,” she said with a snicker.

Now that she mentioned it, I did recall a few times down in the labyrinth where I ripped out the mana stone of a monster clearly struggling to stay alive, and it died. I’d simply chalked it up to coincidence, but apparently there was a correlation there after all.

“So, all we need to do is find one of these orghen things, and we’ll have everything we need to cross over to the demon continent?” asked Kyousuke, dubiously. But…the list did call for only one organ, so presumably that was all we needed.

Amaryllis and Amelia entered the room from a different door, chatting happily. Apparently, they’d gotten on well while we were gone. I knew the fact that Amaryllis had done what she could to medicate and heal the illnesses of the elven captives imprisoned with her made a good impression on Amelia, so I’d had a feeling the two would get along, but I never would have expected them to become good friends.

“It is said that an orghen’s mana stone is the largest in the world. If inserted into a magical device, it would generate an unfathomable amount of mana. There’s just one problem,” Noa said, pausing for effect. “The orghen that live in this forest are constantly on the move, and it is nearly impossible to predict where they might go next. Even I have only encountered one in my lifetime.”

With that, Noa walked into the next room (which I believed she’d been using as a storage room) and then dragged a giant object back with her.

“Is that…a mana stone?” the hero asked in disbelief.

I honestly couldn’t believe it myself. I watched as Noa set the giant mana stone— which was probably as big as I was tall—gently down on the ground.

“This is the only Orghen Organ I own, but it’s quite old by now and thus its remaining mana is rather weak. You wouldn’t be able to make it all the way across the ocean with this old thing. It’s also a bit on the small side,” Noa explained, and I nodded in understanding.

So this is the amount of mana you need to cross oceans, eh…? “It sounds like our main issue will be that it’s nomadic,” I said.

The fact that it never stayed in one place for too long might make finding it an even harder task than slaying it, and we couldn’t just split up and scour the entire forest, because there were too many other dangerous monsters lurking about. At the same time, just searching for it blindly without any plan in mind seemed like a fool’s errand. I was scratching my head, struggling to come up with any ideas, when I felt a presence approach me. I looked up to see that it was Amaryllis, and she was staring fixedly down at my hand.

“Wh-what’s up?” I asked. I’d seen Amaryllis talking with Lia and Amelia plenty, but I hadn’t really had a chance to speak with her much since arriving. I wondered what she wanted from me.

“Oh, pardon me. I was just wondering where you got that ring you’re wearing,” she said, pointing at my finger.

She wasn’t pointing to the “ring” Amelia had carved into my finger but at the actual ring on my right index finger, which Crow had given me during our mission to rescue Amelia from her captors. Both rings, as well as the symbol of my pact with Night, were visible, because I always took my gloves and handguards off whenever I was inside. Granted, the symbols of my bonds with Amelia and Night couldn’t be removed even if I wanted to, but I just now realized I’d left the ring on since receiving it.

“This? I got it from Crow. What about it?” I asked, and Amaryllis looked down at the ring again—only this time, her gaze was charged with mana.

“What a fascinating magical device you have there. Correct me if I’m wrong, but couldn’t you just use that to solve our current predicament?”

I looked down at the ring and remembered what Crow had told me when he gave it to me.

“Wait! Is that a Dowsing Ring?” Noa cried, walking over to examine it closely like Amaryllis. The two of them were getting a little too close for comfort, actually.

“Back off, you two,” said Amelia grumpily, as if reading my mind. The two smaller girls relented, but their eyes remained locked on my finger. It was a little creepy.

“Right, he said it can guide me to whatever it is I’m searching for,” I said. Then, as a test, I closed my eyes and thought long and hard about the large mana stone Noa had shown us. I wanted it.

No, I needed it.

“Oho! Incredible! It works just as advertised!” Noa cheered.

I opened my eyes to see a red beam of light shooting out from the ring and onto the wall of the room. Apparently, it was pointing not at the magic stone on the ground but at one that must still have been lodged inside of an orghen, deep in the forest. And just as Noa said, it appeared the beast was constantly on the move, as the beam of light undulated ever so slightly.

It seemed our problems had been solved, and it was all thanks to Crow. I called for the battle unit to head out immediately, but just then, Night and Tsuda came running into the room in a huff. They were supposed to be on a team with Crow and Lia. Was it really a good idea to leave the two of them by themselves?

“Oh, good! They’re here! We made it just in time!”

“See, I told you they’d both be here! Maybe you should try listening to me for once!”

“Well, maybe you need to learn to sound surer of yourself!!!”

I was surprised to see how well Night seemed to be getting along with the hero’s party members after such a short time together. But I really wished he would quit with the hissing because it was super obnoxious.

“What’s up, you guys?” I asked them. It seemed like they came here looking for someone—maybe on urgent orders from Crow.

They collected their breath and looked at each other, then Night proceeded to explain. “Hey, hero. Yes, you with the gaping maw. You need to come with us,” he said. The hero, who’d been standing there with his mouth wide open, dumbfounded, quickly corrected his error.

“…And Noa as well,” Tsuda chimed in hesitantly. “We were asked to come get both of you.” I tilted my head, puzzled. From the way they were talking, it didn’t sound like Crow had been the one to ask them.

“By whom? My worthless son?” Noa replied.

“Oh, no. By your daughter, actually,” Tsuda clarified.

Night had seemingly wanted to leave that part unsaid, but Tsuda let it slip as though it were nothing. But wait a minute. Isn’t Crow’s sister supposed to be dead?

As we all stood there in baffled disbelief, Night graciously sated our curiosity with additional context. “…We came across a magical device made by the previous hero which has allowed both him and your daughter to materialize in our world, but only for a single day.”

He explained it about as concisely as he possibly could. I had been under the impression it was just as impossible to call back the dead in this world as it was in ours, but apparently the last hero was just that talented. I supposed he had to be, considering it wasn’t easy for a hero born in this world to stack up against the ones summoned from ours. Noa seemed to buy this explanation as plausible, yet she didn’t seem particularly enthused by the chance to speak to her dead daughter. Granted, I hadn’t known her long enough to be able to tell what she was thinking from her facial expressions alone, but it was plain to see that she was not delighted, and I had to wonder why.

“I see… Then let us go. Lead the way, you two,” she ordered.

“Well, if they called for me too, I guess I’ll go. Maybe the previous hero has something really important to tell me,” the hero mused.

Noa left the room in order to get ready—presumably to change into some better traveling clothes. The hero was already in his combat outfit, so he and Tsuda headed out first. As soon as they were out the door, the rest of us sat down again.

“Well, now that Satou’s out of the picture, I suppose we need to rethink our strategy,” said Gilles. Kyousuke and I both nodded.

“For sure. If we tried to stick with our previous battle plan, that’d put way too much of a burden on Kyousuke.”

The hero had the best stats of the battle unit aside from me, with pretty solid attack and defense, as well as great observational skills. If I was the lone wolf type who tried to break through the enemy’s defenses and finish them off ASAP, he was the type that worked as a team and encouraged his party to try to defeat them together—and Kyousuke and Gilles had both spent their entire journey working with him as part of that team. It wasn’t as though we could just force ourselves into a different party makeup, though. Just like how you couldn’t put introverts and extroverts together in school and expect things to go well. The only reason their existing party setup had been split into groups this time was because we had a pressing reason to.

Of course, I hadn’t seen the other heroes fight as a party very much, but I knew they at least had to be good enough to make it through the forest. From what little I’d heard from Kyousuke, it hadn’t been an easy journey, but what I found most interesting was how the noncombatants in the party had stepped up to the plate during the latter half of the trek, when both Kyousuke and the hero were suffering from severe exhaustion. The two of them always overexerted themselves, and Gilles confirmed this to be the case. To be fair, up until now, they’d simply been moving from town to town doing odd jobs for the guild—nothing that could potentially get them killed. But that might be why they didn’t know how to reel themselves in during battle, a skill that would have helped them stave off needless exhaustion on their way here. It had even taken me a while to learn that.

“Just thinking in terms of overall combat ability, I think it would be best to move forward with me as the centerpiece of our strategy. Any objections to that idea?”

Both Gilles and Kyousuke shook their heads. From what little Noa told us about the orghen, I had a feeling losing the hero would make it a lot harder to defeat. Thankfully, we had the ring to guide us in its general direction now, but we’d likely encounter a lot more monsters on our way to it, and those battles would wear us down.

“That said,” I continued, “I do want to figure out how to best make use of you two and your teamwork. Got any ideas, Gilles?”

“…Hm, perhaps. Let’s see what I can come up with.”

 

After we finished our prep meeting and a preliminary gear inspection, we gathered up our equipment and some food and headed out.

“I need an Orghen’s Organ… I need one.” I said to myself repeatedly, calling forth the beam of red light from the ring. We would follow it exactly where we needed to go. With me taking point, the three of us set off in the direction it indicated. “Wow, it’s actually taking us even closer to demon territory.”

I frowned, realizing this meant the monsters we’d be encountering would be even stronger. If an orghen could just come and go as it pleased through this part of the forest, then it had to be an apex predator. Perhaps it was something akin to the Lord of the Forest the hero’s party had accidentally awakened. It certainly had to be at least as powerful as the final boss of a labyrinth, like Night had been. I’d gained quite a few levels since facing Night but probably still couldn’t come out of a battle like that unscathed. Maybe it was a mistake to not bring Lia and Tsuda with us as well.

“How exactly does Noa expect to make us fly through the air, anyway? I feel like you’d need a small aircraft to carry all of us at once.”

With myself, the seven other heroes, and Amelia and Night, there were already ten of us. Add Noa, Crow, and the others to the equation, and we had fifteen. Thanks to the hero, Noa likely had the gist of how aviation worked and could probably buff out the remaining kinks through magic, but it seemed Kyousuke still didn’t comprehend why Amelia and I were so confident that Noa would be able to ferry the whole lot of us over to the other shore. As we made our way in the direction of the light, I explained how the Extra Skill World Eyes — which Amelia and I both possessed— worked.

“A skill that allows you to view the stats of another… Fascinating!” said Kyousuke.

“Hang on, are you serious?! That’s actually possible?!” Gilles exclaimed. Maybe Commander Saran hadn’t told him about my stats.

Actually, wait a minute. I never even mentioned World Eyes to Commander Saran, did I? Because at the time, I had no idea what it did. “Yeah, it’s an Extra Skill of mine. I don’t know the full extent of its abilities, but as of right now, I can at least say for sure that it lets me view the stats of other people and things. I’ve never encountered an enemy that was able to prevent me from doing so, at least.”

There had been times I’d forgotten to check a foe’s stats, or hadn’t had enough mana left to do so, but I had yet to meet a foe that could actually block me from using World Eyes if I really wanted to. Gilles nodded at last, as though he’d finally wrapped his head around the idea.

“I see. Yes, I suppose with an Extra Skill, it might be possible.”

Extra Skills were several orders of magnitude more powerful that regular skills, after all, and it was entirely possible that there existed another Extra Skill out there capable of concealing one’s stats from those with World Eyes. Though it seemed Extra Skills were quite rare even among demons, so I wasn’t too worried about that at present.

“World Eyes, eh…? I have to wonder if such a skill might be able to see far more than just another person’s stats,” Kyousuke muttered offhand, scratching his chin.

I couldn’t help but flinch, thinking back on the horrific scene I’d witnessed the first time I tried using World Eyes down in the Great Labyrinth of Kantinen—a vision of the other heroes lying dead on the ground while I, alone, stood towering above them. I was so terrified that this vision might one day become a reality that I decided to never use World Eyes for anything but checking an enemy’s stats ever again. As a result, I hadn’t really leveled the skill up at all. Amelia’s was at a much higher level due to her using it frequently.

I could only imagine what all she could see with it now.

“…Who knows? I’m not sure how much more I’d want to see, to be honest with you,” I replied simply.

I didn’t know why I’d been shown that vision, or whether it was a future that was destined to happen, but despite my curiosity, I knew deep down it would probably be best not to know. I’d learned the hard way I should probably just trust my gut on things like this.

“I tend to agree. I’m not sure why, but it just feels like too much power,” said Kyousuke, presumably reacting to what his Intuition skill was telling him. This was a skill of his that had already been at a high level from the moment we were summoned here; my Detect Danger skill was telling me the same thing.

“Glad we agree. Now c’mon, it can’t be much farther now.”

The red light was still pointing in the same direction, but the fluctuating and bouncing around it was doing had gotten a lot more noticeable. When I said this, my companions both immediately got serious. It randomly occurred to me that both Kyousuke and I had done an awfully good job adapting to this dangerous world.

“The fact that we haven’t encountered a single monster thus far worries me. Be on your guard,” Gilles said.

We’d all been ready to draw our swords at a moment’s notice, yet that hadn’t proved necessary. Compared to the amount of attacks we’d suffered on our way to home base, and the fact that we were now far closer to demon territory made me suspect only a few truly powerful monsters roamed these parts. My Detect Presence and Detect Danger skills hadn’t alerted me to anything yet, but that was perhaps concerning in and of itself.

“Hey! There it is!”

Now, I was fairly confident in my own skills, though never to the point of relying on them entirely. But the fact of the matter was I was utterly unable to sense this particular monster until it appeared right in front of us.

“Akira!”

Kyousuke cried out in distress to warn me, and I just barely managed to jam my daggers between its claws before it tore me to shreds. However, it had still taken me by surprise, and unable to brace properly for the impact, I was sent flying. I hadn’t struggled so hard to block an enemy attack like that since I was still a low-level assassin down in the Great Labyrinth of Kantinen. I hurtled through the air for what felt like ages before finally crashing into a tree some distance away from Kyousuke and Gilles.

“Akira!” Gilles cried out from far away.

“I’m all right! Don’t worry about me!” I called back, picking myself up off the ground. Never had I been so grateful for my inhuman defense and stamina before. Despite the incredible velocity with which I’d crashed into the tree, I was able to hop right back up with only a few light scratches.

Given how far away Gilles’s voice sounded, it seemed best to operate under the assumption we wouldn’t really be able to provide backup for each other during this fight. I could only just see through the trees that there was not just one but two giant monsters over by Gilles and Kyousuke. But just as I was about to dash over there, an even bigger monster stepped directly in my path. And despite being right there in front of me, my Detect Presence and Detect Danger skills weren’t responding at all.

We’d been ambushed.

They looked nothing like the animalistic monsters we’d encountered before and more resembled the sorts of monsters you might see in fantasy illustrations. They had batlike wings; long, thin arms and legs; and at least ten beady, red, spider-like eyes with which they were glaring down at us. They also had long tentacles dangling down from their mouths, all of which were wriggling and waggling around as though they had minds of their own. They were completely black and utterly repulsive in every single way. Other monsters we’d encountered had been kind of cute in a weird way, but these were just…not.

As I watched cautiously, waiting for its next move, I noticed the light from my ring was pointing directly at the one in front of me. “I see. So, you’re an orghen, eh?”

I could definitely understand how a monster like this could contain a mana stone as tall as I was. Most of the monsters I’d taken mana stones from had been humanoid, but I could tell from one look that these things were at least as intelligent as people were. They might not be as clever as Night, but they certainly had more wits about them than any of the other enemies we’d faced. Perhaps monsters just looked more disgusting as you got closer to the demon continent. I had dearly hoped the orghen were outliers, though, and that most would be cute and cuddly like Night.

“Whoa!”

As I stood there observing, the orghen had grown impatient and lashed out with its mighty claws. Last time, it had caught me off guard, but this time I was prepared to defend against its attack. Despite having arms only about as thick as my own, a single swipe of its claws was enough to uproot several trees from the immediate vicinity. It was for this reason I opted to try to deflect its attacks rather than block them. Hell, if it hadn’t been me who’d taken that last attack, it probably would’ve ruptured someone’s internal organs.

I wondered why it singled me out. We were all equally oblivious to their presence, so surely anyone would have done. And usually, the wild monsters of this forest judged their enemies’ abilities on instinct and went for the weakest party members first. For example, all the way to the safe house, monsters were constantly attacking Amaryllis first. So it confused me that these monsters had picked me, whose stats were objectively the highest out of the three of us.

Regardless, after deflecting the attack, I put some distance between me and the monster, and then used World Eyes to take a peek at its stats.

 

ORGHEN KING

RACE: Monster

HP: 32000/32000 MP: 50000/50000

ATTACK: 600000 DEFENSE: 45000

SKILLS:

Control (Lv. 7) Wind Claw (Lv. 5)

Healing Magic (Lv. 6) Intellect (Lv. 3)

EXTRA SKILLS:

Invisibility Penetrating Eye

 

AKIRA ODA

RACE: Human CLASS: Assassin (Lv. 88)

HP: 33650/34600 MP: 11700/119000

ATTACK: 25400 DEFENSE: 13600

SKILLS:

Mathematics (Lv. 5) Negotiation (Lv. 5)

Assassin Tools (Lv. 8) Assassination (Lv. 9)

Curved Swords (Lv. 9) Short Swords (Lv. 9)

Conceal Presence (Lv. MAX) Detect Presence (Lv. 9)

Detect Danger (Lv. 9) Intimidate (Lv. 8)

Roar (Lv. 4) Dual Blades (Lv. 6)

Mana Control (Lv. 8) Bewitchment (Lv. 5)

Buff Up (Lv. 2)

EXTRA SKILLS:

Understand Languages World Eyes (Lv. 2)

Shadow Magic (Lv. 8)

 

Seeing our stats side by side, I couldn’t help but gawk. Its defense was one thing, but how in the hell could it possibly have an Attack of 600000? Judging from its name, it was presumably the leader of all the orghens, but even so, its stats were considerably higher than even those of the Demon Lord’s daughter. Monsters didn’t have classes, so it was difficult to compare them in terms of level, but if they did, this one probably would have been a much higher level than me.

In other words, it was an extremely powerful enemy that even my best attacks might not be enough against. Feeling much more wary all of a sudden, I readjusted my grip on my daggers. I hadn’t felt as concerned for my life since I had to duel with the demons, and before that, not since the Great Labyrinth of Kantinen. But despite my anxieties, I still curved my lips up into a defiant smirk. My heart was pounding like crazy, and I could feel the adrenaline coursing through my body. I opened my eyes wide and looked up at the beast, and I could feel my pupils expanding. Now this is what I’m talking about. Finally, a worthy opponent!

“Mwa ha ha… HA HA HA!”

I had completely lost control of my emotions as I brandished the Yato-no-Kami daggers like a beast gone mad.

 

POV: ASAHINA KYOUSUKE

 

“Ha Ha Ha…!”

After Akira went flying and then entered into a staredown with the monster, Gilles and I looked at each other,

both a little unsettled by the sound of faint laughter coming from our stranded companion. Even the monster seemed a little taken aback by Akira’s reaction, as it halted for a moment. These monsters seemed awfully humanlike in a lot of ways.

“What’s gotten into him?” Gilles asked worriedly, and I shook my head.

Something told me Akira was simply enjoying himself, for whatever reason. I expressed this to Gilles, and he seemed downright confused. Indeed, it was hard to comprehend, but we had no way of knowing why exactly Akira was laughing. All I knew was he was an absolute force to be reckoned with on the battlefield, and so he probably found it fun whenever he got the chance to go up against a real challenge.

“Something tells me we won’t each be able to take them down one on one,” Gilles said calmly.

I nodded, looking away from Akira (who could probably fend for himself) and turning to face the monsters closer to us. These two were smaller than the one harassing Akira but still quite a bit larger than us. Assuming Akira could handle the big one, we would have to defeat these two on our own. In terms of survivability, it would probably behoove us to bide our time until Akira could back us up, but something told me the monsters wouldn’t just wait around for that.

“I’ll go first, starting with the left one. Cover me,” Gilles said, never taking his eyes off of the monsters.

I held up the Hakuryuu sword I’d brought with me from the castle, its pure white blade shining in the light. Usually, I used a different sword, but for whatever reason, I felt compelled to use this one this time. It was probably my Intuition at work. It was the same skill that had alerted me to the monsters’ presence where Akira’s Detect Presence and Detect Danger skills had failed, but it also didn’t give me any concrete information on where the enemy was located. These enemies were able to conceal themselves from Akira’s skills but not Intuition.

“Hyaaaah!!!”

Gilles dodged and weaved through the monster’s claw swipes, got up close, and sliced off the tentacles hanging from its mouth. I moved in and used my sword to break its claws to protect Gilles, who then attempted to kick off the ground and, with a mighty leap, decapitate the beast before it had a chance to react. After reaching the peak of his jump, he began hurtling downward with his sword aimed directly at the monster’s neck.

“Wait, Gilles!” I cried, sensing something ominous, but Gilles followed through, eager to seize a quick victory.

There was a shrill metallic noise as Gilles’s sword snapped in two, right at the center of the blade. It was a strong sword too, tempered by Crow himself, and well cared for. He’d even had Crow take a look at it before we left home base, so there couldn’t have been a problem with the sword. Which meant the monster’s neck was so tough that the sword simply wasn’t strong enough to pierce it. That explained why these monsters were able to come and go as they pleased through this extremely dangerous part of the forest, at least.

His weapon broken, I quickly collected the now-vulnerable Gilles and retreated with him to a distance safe from the two monsters’ attacks.

He was silent for a while, perhaps in shock due to having his beloved sword broken so easily, and he simply grasped it in his hands as he allowed me to carry him away. I didn’t quite know how to console him, particularly because I had no idea how long he’d been using that sword or just how much it meant to him. The last thing I wanted, however, was for him to snap on me and go for a furious suicide attack with a broken blade.

I always seemed to make things worse in situations like this. Maybe it was because of my soft-spoken nature, or because I struggled to express my thoughts in words, or because my expression was too vacant, but it only ever seemed to make people angrier. In the past, I hadn’t even realized what the issue was, only that people seemed to get upset when talking to me, and so I tried to keep my interactions with others to a minimum. Until I met Akira. If he and I hadn’t grown close enough for him to feel comfortable pointing these issues out to me, I likely never could have interacted with others normally, and I would certainly not have volunteered to leave the castle with Tsukasa and the others.

I wanted to return the favor to Akira, and more importantly, be of help to him as a true friend, but he was already so strong, and he had Amelia and Night to assist him, so it felt like my help was unnecessary. The least I could do was return the favor to Gilles who’d helped us escape the castle. I removed the sword I wasn’t using currently from my belt, sheath and all, and forced it into Gilles’s hands. I tried my very best to choose my words carefully so I didn’t insult or confuse him.

“Here, take this,” I said. “I know you may not have the Curved Swords skill, so it may be a bit cumbersome to use, but it’s better than being completely unarmed.”

I couldn’t allow Gilles to die here, and I couldn’t allow myself to die either. I had to save this man however I could. Giving up a sword did mean I wouldn’t be able to use my Dual Blades skill, but I would manage. I laid Gilles down in the shadow of a nearby tree, then leapt out in front of the monsters. So long as I swung my sword with the intent to make shallow cuts as opposed to sever, I was fairly confident my blade would not break in the same way. And thankfully, katanas were uniquely skilled at slicing things up as opposed to chopping them off. It had come in handy when we had to fight a large turtle-like beast in this same forest with a hard shell. No matter the monster, and no matter how thick its skin, there would always be a soft spot to exploit.

The monsters, apparently not having expected me to return, quickly lunged out with their tentacles and claws. They’d moved a bit from where we’d previously clashed, presumably on their way to help the bigger one fight Akira. As soon as they recognized I was alone this time, they approached me cautiously, probably convinced I was trying to serve as a decoy. While they were clearly more intelligent than most monsters, they were by no means as smart as humans or Night. If I were them, and I realized there was a third threat who was now unaccounted for, I would have congregated around the big one to help take out the largest threat, Akira.

The fact that they were not doing this told me they had decided the two of them could easily take me down or that they were confident Gilles was no longer a threat. Another possibility (that I didn’t really want to consider) was that they had a skill like Akira’s that allowed them to view others’ stats and had decided they could beat me based on that. There was nothing worse than allowing an enemy to see your hand prematurely.

“…Let’s do this,” I whispered to myself, after taking a deep breath.

It was my normal pre-match ritual that I did between bouts during kendo meets. During team matches, I got encouragement from my teammates, but in singles matches, this was how I pumped myself up. I was a little surprised I hadn’t done it even once since coming to this world, despite having taken part in actual combat almost every day. It was a simple gesture, and yet I could feel it calming my heart and mind. Obviously, a school kendo match and an actual life-or-death battle were two very different things, but for me, they may as well have been exactly the same.

“Hup!”

I started with the orghen’s legs and quickly discovered the shins and knees were much too hard for my blade to do much damage. However, I was able to slice right through the back of its knees, and the monster cried out in pain and fell, tumbling to its knees—implying that I had cut right through muscle. It could no longer support its massive weight. The monster’s face was now within reach, and I used my sword to trace around it, looking for any soft spots.

“Aha! Now I’ve got you.”

It all happened in about a second. The other monster, apparently not able to keep up, seemed utterly astonished when its friend fell to its knees, and stood there, blinking. I examined the areas I’d just sliced and confirmed my theory that, while the creature’s vitals were well guarded, their joints and eyes were relatively soft and vulnerable. If my sword was to break, I could always switch to using two daggers like Akira.

Feeling reinvigorated, I gripped my katana with both hands. This time, I would cut true.

“It seems I might just be able to take down both of these things by myself after all!”

 

POV: ODA AKIRA

 

AFTER A HEARTY CACKLE, I licked my lips. As much as I wanted to just let loose the full power of my Shadow Magic, I couldn’t deny the possibility I might lose control of it, and then we’d have another situation like when a past hero accidentally destroyed half the demon continent on our hands. I needed to keep my cool, especially since Gilles and Kyousuke were here with me.

“Shadow Magic, activate.”

I hoped they’d understand me going overboard— at least a little bit. My shadows wriggled and squirmed violently in accordance with the heightened tension I was feeling. To consume such gigantic monsters with considerably smaller shadows would take an exorbitant amount of mana, however, because the creature wasn’t going down without a fight.

“Shadowstep.”

Gripping both daggers, I lunged at the beast. I knew it would be difficult to drag it in while it still drew breath, so I was hoping to find another solution. Really, all I needed was the giant mana stone, so I was happy to let my shadows devour the rest.

I swung my daggers at the monster’s neck but was quickly thwarted by its massive claws. However, just after this, the monster stopped dead in its tracks. The shadow that should have been behind it was no longer there, having been absorbed by my Shadow Magic, which proceeded to impale the monster from behind. When the shadows came bursting out the front, they grazed my cheek. Shadowstep was a technique that connected my shadow with the shadow of my opponent and brought theirs under my control. Because it required getting up close and personal, however, and the position of the sun wasn’t always ideal, I had scarce few opportunities to use it.

“Oh, come on, guys. Quit messing around,” I told the shadows as they tickled my cheek.

This was a life-or-death situation, and their childish behavior had just destroyed my focus. The shadows quickly drooped as if depressed and slithered out from the orghen’s stomach. The monster began coughing up dark red blood; I was a little surprised at how close the color looked to human blood.

I watched as the gaping hole in its stomach writhed a bit before sealing back up.

“Oh, right… I forgot you can use healing magic,” I said, rebuking myself for the lapse. It seemed much closer to regeneration skill than simple healing magic—but I suppose I should have expected no less from a “King.”

Because I couldn’t just obliterate the thing and risk damaging the mana stone inside, the only way I could prevent it from regenerating over and over was to slice its head off in one fell swoop. There was a good chance it could regenerate entire limbs, after all. I tried my best to come up with a plan, all the while deflecting its claws and cutting through tentacles that tried to wrap themselves around me. The one major downside to having broken the Yato-no-Kami in two was that my blades had a significantly shorter reach. My attacks simply couldn’t hit my foes unless I got right up in their faces. Thankfully, I had my Shadow Magic to cover me for just such cases.

I didn’t think there even existed another type of magic as easy to use as Shadow Magic, provided you had sufficient mana reserves. Most monsters were easy enough for it to devour, and it converted them right back into mana, which allowed me to get back at least part of the casting cost. They could slice, skewer, and eat up anything in their path, and they could even be used as a shield if need be. They were extremely faithful but also a little playful at times. Sure, most people probably couldn’t get past the mana consumption problem, but I had to wonder what might happen if someone with nearly infinite mana reserves like Amelia got ahold of this skill. Though with nothing to stop her, that might be a bad idea, as the shadows might just swallow up the entire world (not that I think she’d let that happen, of course).

I fended off the tentacles with my dagger and waited for an opening. It would be rather simple to just slice them all off as they came, then go for its throat, but I was beginning to feel uneasy about the orghen’s actions. I didn’t know why, but when an opportunity to slit its throat finally presented itself, I resisted the urge and leapt out of the way.

“…I get it now. You’re trying to get me to destroy my weapon, aren’t you?” I muttered as I landed on a high tree branch. The orghen’s many eyes widened as though it understood my words.

Every monster I’d encountered in the Great Labyrinth of Kantinen with the “King” suffix attached to its name had been a real tough contender. Perhaps due to their greater intellect, they always had a bunch of goons with them that they could order around and arrange into battle formations, and they would often wait in the little nooks and crannies for a chance to jump out and ambush me while I was taking a break. You had to always be on your guard.

And yet, this Orghen King had higher stats and skill levels than anything I’d ever encountered, so I couldn’t simply try to go for its neck to finish off the threat. Come to think of it, the fact that it had those easily cuttable tentacles covering its throat was a bit strange—almost like it was trying to lure people into thinking its neck was vulnerable.

The most obvious answer was that it was a ploy to destroy its foe’s weaponry. There were warriors who fought using their bare hands, but they wouldn’t dare to go up against the orghen’s sharp claws unarmed. Most foes would inevitably try to go for the finishing blow and take off its head and get their swords broken in the process. Many lost their nerve when they lost their weapons, and that would give the monster the perfect opportunity to take them out. Even I was a little flustered by how confident I was that I could take the thing down, only to be proven wrong. So that was what made this one a “King.” I didn’t know how it could accurately predict the way humans would try to combat it, but the strategy presumably worked on monsters as well.

“Sorry, big guy, but I’m afraid you underestimated me. Shadow-Clad!”

Having kept my shadows pooled inside my own natural shadow for a while in order to conserve mana, I now had them wrap themselves around my daggers. This was a technique I hadn’t used since my duel with Kilika, yet it seemed like the most effective solution available to me right now. After all, I knew its neck was sturdy, and that trying to cut it would only break my daggers. But with Shadow Magic enveloping the blades, they became several orders of magnitude more deadly and would surely be able to cut right through the Orghen King’s neck.

I kicked off from the branch I’d been standing on. Seeing that I was making a break for its neck, the monster shot out its tentacles and claws, all of which were easily swallowed up by my shadows and disappeared on contact. The path to its neck was now unobstructed, so I drove my daggers down into it. There was a satisfying crunch, and a moment later, the Orghen King’s head was divorced from its shoulders. I landed on the ground behind the beast and called off my Shadow Magic as I turned to hear the beast let out its final death wails. As soon as I confirmed it had stopped moving altogether, I let out a heavy sigh of relief.

That had taken a lot more mana than I anticipated—things could have gotten a little dicey if it had resisted any longer. I was utterly exhausted from the battle and mana consumption, but I still had to dig out the mana stone from its body and somehow carry it back to the safe house. Speaking of which, how were Kyousuke and Gilles faring? The fact that the two smaller orghens hadn’t come to the King’s aid suggested they’d already dispatched them, but I figured it would be a good idea to reconnect with them ASAP, just in case.

I quickly carved out the mana stone from the Orghen King (which, again, was larger than my entire body) and headed to where they had been to find that they had only just finished their battle. Kyousuke was so covered in blood that I wondered how he’d taken the beasts down, and Gilles looked a bit sullen, but I was relieved to see them both safe. Neither of them had a skill like World Eyes, so they couldn’t have known for sure that the beasts were in fact Orghens, so they’d just destroyed them, mana stone and all. I was surprised to hear that Kyousuke had taken it down by searching around for the monster’s soft spots and then driving his sword all the way through. That must have been why he was drenched in so much blood.

Gilles’s sword had broken against one of their necks, I learned, so Kyousuke had given him one of his own swords. Then, he took down both orghens without even using his Dual Blades skill. Gilles had still not recovered from the shock of his trusty weapon breaking and was just kind of spacing out. Thinking back on how it felt at first to see the Yato-no-Kami split in two to form my daggers, I could certainly understand the feeling.

Kyousuke gathered up the fragments of their mana stones (which were still far bigger than anything you’d find down in a labyrinth) and put them in a bag. Then as we were about to head home, I watched his face twitch when he saw the massive mana stone I was going to lug back. It had been difficult enough just to carry it over to where they were standing, so I had to wrap my black scarf around it in order to form a makeshift sling. Thank God I always wore that thing.

“That thing’s huge.”

“I know…” I sighed with a nod.

I could already tell that it was going to be backbreaking work getting it to home base. Even with two other people to help carry it. Gilles seemed to falter a bit when I asked for his help, and while it was certainly possible for just Kyousuke and I to carry it, we wouldn’t be able to react quickly in the event of a monster ambush, and there was a chance the mana stone could get broken in a skirmish.

As the two of us struggled to think of a solution, there was a rustling sound from a nearby thicket. I assumed it was a monster, perhaps smelling the blood on Kyousuke’s body. He and I quickly got into combat positions but let down our guard upon seeing what actually came out to greet us.

“Oh, it’s just another Rabbot.”

The Rabbots were a series of sentry robots Noa had created to guard our home base. With both long-range and short-range combat abilities, as well as self-regeneration functionality and poison with every one of its attacks, they were devilish little things that only exemplified Noa’s crafty personality. I thought it unfortunate she couldn’t come up with a name for them that was a little less lame, but they were excellent security guards. We hadn’t encountered any monsters since we got to the safe house thanks to them, which had made it a lot easier to relax and feel safe there, and I’d noticed the other heroes were very grateful for that as well.

As I stared at the Rabbot, I noticed something seemed a little off about it. The robot before us had a different chassis from the Mk 11 we’d encountered the first time we met Noa. The Mk 11 was a bit slimmer, with protections for its joints and a regeneration function that made its body very tough to scratch. But this one was covered in scratches and had clearly been made with much stronger arms. Though it also looked like it had been well taken care of, as there were traces of scratches that had been obviously tended to.

“It says ‘Rabbot Mk 3’ right here,” said Kyousuke, who’d gone around to check its back.

I went back there with him and verified that the model’s name was indeed handwritten there in big, boorish letters and scrawled in childlike handwriting. I was beginning to second guess my assertion that it had been well taken care of.

“I think this might have been the robot that ferried us back to the safe house after we collapsed from exhaustion,” Kyousuke said.

Which meant this was likely a specialized robot that Noa made for hauling heavy objects around. As if to prove this theory, the Rabbot walked over and picked the giant mana stone we’d been struggling to carry right off the ground, and, using another set of arms that came out of its back, it picked up the bag of mana stone fragments as well. With its help, we’d be able to make our way back to home base without having to worry about being taken unawares.

With me in the lead, Kyousuke bringing up the rear, and the Rabbot and a still-depressed Gilles in the middle, we began making our way back to home base. Gilles didn’t say a word the whole way and simply held his sword close to his chest. When we arrived at our destination, we found that Noa and everyone else had already made it back.

“Hey, good, you’re back… Wait, what the? Gilles?” the hero asked.

“He broke his sword. Take him over to Crow, would you? So, how’d your meeting with the previous hero go?” I asked.

“Later! Gilles comes first.”

I couldn’t know how much that sword meant to Gilles, but there was nothing I could do to help him with that. He needed to speak with a proper blacksmith.

Upon entering the building, Amelia—who had been busy making dinner with the rest of the girls—quickly ran over to greet me, happy to see that I was safe. Night hopped up onto my shoulders and smiled contently. I gave him some chin scritches, and he purred like a proper house cat. I couldn’t express how grateful I was to have found two wonderful companions, especially after being lost and alone when I ran away from Retice Castle.

Noa said she wanted to finish up with us before dinner, so everyone except for Gilles and Crow headed back outside. With something like a blueprint in hand, she led the way to the same open area she’d used to “train” the other heroes. All the materials had been gathered there.

Everyone’s jaws dropped when they saw the massive mana stone, which was a fair bit bigger than the one Noa had shown us as an example. The moment Noa realized she’d be able to use that stone (possibly the largest in the world) however she saw fit, her eyes started glimmering greedily, and for once she was acting the age she actually looked. I asked about the mana stone she already had, and she told me that she’d gotten it from fighting a regular orghen with her bare hands. I didn’t know whether to be impressed by her confidence or terrified by her insanity. Still, that at least explained why she hadn’t warned us about their unique strategy of trying to break their foes’ weapons—she couldn’t have known that if she’d only challenged one unarmed. I mentioned this to her, and she suddenly recalled just how thick the monster’s neck had been, and nodded in understanding as she began to go over all of the materials once more. When she reached the last item on the list, the “Orghen Organ,” she nodded and turned to face us.

“We have everything we need now to ferry you all across continents. Now it’s time to start building,” she said.

Apparently, we were all going to get to witness her Extra Skill. She asked everyone to take a few steps back, but the other heroes seemed too confused trying to figure out what she was about to do, so I had to help pull them back. After confirming we were all a safe distance away, Noa held out her hands toward the pile of materials and called forth her Extra Skill.

“Activating Extra Skill… Creation! Let the construction commence.”

The materials glowed and floated up into the air, where they were brought together and began to glow even brighter, to the point that I had to close my eyes and turn away for fear of going blind.

“…It is done,” she announced, letting out a sigh of relief.

I opened my eyes, unsure how much time had passed. There in the middle of the clearing, , where a pile of raw materials had been only moments ago, was a large, fully-fledged ship. But not just any ship—one with wings. It wasn’t quite as big as the Searunner which had taken us from the elven domain to the land of Brute, but it was still more than large enough to hold our entire party. I was at a loss for words. On further inspection, I realized the outer hull was made from the shells of those highly defensive turtle monsters she had me hunt dozens of earlier.

“This is ridiculous, dude…”

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine her making something this impressive. Noa nodded, pleased by my genuine admiration of her abilities.

“It’s my first time making something so large, you know,” she said, explaining that she’d run test after test based on the hero’s explanation of aviation before finally arriving at the final blueprints. It was no wonder she’d locked herself up in her room the entire time we were off gathering materials. “My original plan was to try to make something that could get you to the very edge of the Volcano continent, but because you brought back a mana stone far bigger than predicted, you might very well have enough fuel to make it all the way to the very center of the continent. But, of course, I know no journey is without its unexpected setbacks.”

Ignoring how ominous that last bit sounded, I realized the reason she’d designed it like a traditional ship was so that it could remain afloat in the event it fell from the sky into the ocean, in which case the aquatic functionality would automatically kick in—though I prayed it would never come to that.

“Man, I’m surprised you had enough mana to create something so massive,” I said in awe, walking up next to her as she gazed upon her creation with glee. I’d been under the impression that all Extra Skills used an exorbitant amount of mana.

“Are you kidding? Of course I didn’t have enough for that,” she said, shrugging her shoulders as though I’d just said the dumbest thing imaginable.

But then, how did she do it? I asked this aloud, and she pointed over at the Rabbot Mk 3 that was standing a little ways away, carrying something fairly massive in its arms.

“I used the remaining mana from the Orghen Organ I already had in my possession. It was close, but it was just barely enough to get the job done.”

It was right after the other heroes walked inside the ship to check out its interiors that I noticed she was teetering unsteadily on her feet, and I quickly reached out my left arm to support her. She was probably suffering from serious mana exhaustion but wanted to put up a tough front so the other heroes didn’t start thinking she was any less of a badass.

“Sorry,” she said.

“Don’t worry about it,” I replied. “But…what were you planning to do in the event that it wasn’t enough mana? Just die?”

I’d suffered from severe mana exhaustion before, so I knew how scary it could be. She was trying her best to act like she was fine, but she was definitely in danger back there.

“No, I have no intention of dying until I see my son through his final moments. That said, I’m quite grateful to you for helping avenge my daughter, you know,” she said, refusing to stop talking even though she was surely on the brink of passing out.

Amelia and Night both tried to chime in, but I raised a hand to stop them, feeling it would be best to at least hear her out.

“It should have been me, you know,” she went on. “I should have been the one to kill that worthless man, instead of making my son waste so many years of his precious remaining time in this world. It seems all I ever do is make mistakes,” she said, starting to nod off, and I let out a sigh.

Talk about your dysfunctional families. “Y’know, Crow told me you only drank that immortality potion by accident, but you did it on purpose, didn’t you?”

I didn’t know if Noa just couldn’t bear the thought that, as a human, she would die before she got to see her still-unborn beastfolk son grow up, or if there were complications during childbirth on account of her son being of a different race. This world’s medicine probably also wasn’t nearly as advanced back then as it was now.

“You’re right. I did. I don’t know what came over me, even knowing that there was a good chance we both might die if I didn’t drink the potion. I feel terrible about it to this day. But seeing him alive and well has always been my greatest source of happiness,” she said before finally losing her grip on consciousness.

My left arm alone couldn’t support her entire weight, so she started falling—but a pair of arms was there to catch her.

“…Why don’t you try saying that to my face sometime, you old hag?”

Crow had caught his mother and was now carrying her limp body in both arms. I couldn’t quite make out his face through the shadow of his bangs, but it seemed Noa’s words had quite an effect on him. Honestly, I was just trying to goad an answer out of her as a bit of a trick before I noticed Crow walking out the back door, but hey—if it solved some family issues for them, I’d consider it a win.

“Wow, Akira. You’re more of a troublemaker than I thought,” said Amelia.

I pretended not to know what she was talking about and simply followed Crow as he carried Noa toward the ship.

“What, you didn’t know? Master’s always been like that.”

“Oh, I knew, all right. Remember, I’ve known him longer than you have, Night.”

As the two of them bickered over who knew me best, we stepped inside the airship Noa had created. I would have really preferred to not let them ruin this touching mother-son moment.

“The thing that terrifies me more than anything else in the world…is when I try to reach out for something and my fingers touch nothing.”

I thought back on that night, when, in the dim moonlight, I saw Crow at his most vulnerable, when he said those words to me.

“Well, I’m glad they found something to hold onto this time.”

 

A few hours later, as the full moon shone down over the land, we set forth on the final leg of our journey. Our destination: the land of demons.