Splash–!
Water gushed out after being carried up by the body, and as it splashed off to the sides, a large circular head was revealed from beneath.
With a body 35 metres in length, it was as big as apartments. A large cephalopod with the rank S- given to it, that could destroy one large city just by itself;
Kraken.
As it rose up from beneath the surface of the water, it raised a thick leg which was larger than human bodies.
“Front Guards! Spread out!”
Hearing Ryuunosuke’s shout, the superhumans that acted as the shields at the front line scattered, which was immediately followed by the thick leg swooping down like a large whip.
The target of its attack was a large box made of wood. From the monster’s perspective, it must have been the largest, and the easiest target to go after.
Kwaaang–!
The wooden box was instantaneously crushed into shatters and a large pillar of water reaching dozens of metres in height was created as an aftermath. Due to the overwhelming aftershock, some superhumans failed to dodge it properly and thus bled from their nostrils.
This was a true showcase of the might of large species. Even world rankers who could fight it alone wouldn’t be able to remain unscathed if they received an attack like that head on.
However, straight after the water pillar disappeared, something grabbed onto the Kraken’s leg. An artifact with a steel frame had left the broken wooden box as it tied up its leg like large chains.
Feeling its leg suddenly going heavy, the large squid used one of its other legs in an attempt to escape from the steel chain that bound its leg, but despite the tremendous power of the large species, the chains remained stiff.
“Did you think we came all the way here empty-handed–!?”
Ryuunosuke shouted.
Large species above the boss rank could rely on mana to have a rough understanding of the opponent’s intention. Rolling its black pair of eyes, the large squid stared at Ryuunosuke.
“Strike it–!”
In response to his words, the superhumans started moving left and right. Flames and lightning struck the body as ice picks that were a few metres long appeared from thin air. Those lances of ice were aimed at the squid’s eyes but were blocked by its large legs and deeply pierced the legs instead.
White liquid splashed from its wound. At the same time, parasitic monsters that lived inside the Kraken’s body ripped the squid’s skins apart and started crawling out.
Gaaaah…
Kraken’s [Fear] began to resonate and marked the true start of the battle.
While they were in the middle of their combat, the operators were gathered at one spot towards the back. In small-scale raids, the operators wouldn’t be a part of the battle at all but those that were currently present had their names listed on the world’s ranking list.
They therefore had a job as well, which was to deal with monsters that approached from a distance.
In other words, they had to take care of the mobs.
Occasionally, nagas, mermans and sea serpents would approach them but none of them came near Yu Jitae. That was because of their instincts which were more developed than humans.
Thanks to that, Yu Jitae took one step away from the battlefield, and carefully observed Ha Saetbyul’s actions.
A sea serpent jumped out of the water behind and aimed for her back. Turning around, Ha Saetbyul slashed with her sword and drew a line on the snake’s body mid-air.
She, who had feared even the fruit knives, was now able to use longswords at a high level.
Meanwhile, she spared some of her time to check the surviving superhumans and their exhaustion level. Her blessing, [Danger-sensing Eye] could sense the approach of an enemy but could also sense the death of a person as a risk factor.
Ha Saetbyul was looking for people that became weak.
Splash–!
That was when Kraken spitted out a barrel of poisonous ink at the leader, Ryuunosuke, who immediately responded by enchanting his arrows. Shooting five arrows that contained the aura of the wind, he created an artificial wind flow and dispersed it, but a portion of the ink landed on his armour.
Ha Saetbyul’s gaze stayed on Ryuunosuke for a long time, as her tongue licked past her lips inside the steel helmet.
“What a shame.”
Yu Jitae, who had merely been watching on, said that as the steel helmet turned towards him.
“Sorry what was that?”
“Like I said, what a shame. Don’t you think so.”
“…I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“Surely you feel a bit contradicted. It would be good if the body remained in full but if they are completely dead, it would be difficult to use them.”
As soon as his words came to an end, the pair of eyes hiding behind the steel helmet, was painted in red.
“Bastard.”
A unisexual voice escaped the helmet.
“Who in the world…”
Right when that existence wearing Ha Saetbyul’s skin was about to say something to Yu Jitae,
“Finished tying it up on the spot!”
A superhuman’s voice echoing from mana was heard by every member present. 7 of the 10 ‘Steel Restraints’ that had been prepared were sealing seven of Kraken’s legs.
It was time – Ryuunosuke floated up in the air as an enormous amount of mana gathered behind him. Soon, a 5 metre long longbow flashing in light as well as an arrow of light appeared from thin air.
Before long, a large person appeared behind Ryuunosuke’s back while holding that said bow and finally, his necklace, rings and earrings resonated from the mana and reverberated.
[Giant Godly Bow (AA)]
The mighty authority which raised Ryuunosuke to his current position was revealed.
“Monster of the depths.”
When Ryuunosuke opened his mouth, the large figure of a man pulled the bowstring back.
“May you enter a deep slumber.”
It then let go of the string.
In that instant, Ha Saetbyul who had let out a black poisonous fog to block Yu Jitae’s vision turned her body around, and Yu Jitae, who had been glancing through the smoke likewise moved his body.
After being shot, the arrow caused a large tempest. The surface of the water was suppressed by that aura and the water was pushed down by several metres following the trajectory of the arrow.
From the body of Ha Saetbyul who had jumped in a millisecond after that, a black aura came exploding out. At the same time, her body as well as the armour grew by a large margin and the metal around her body turned into tentacles of a horrendous beast.
What Ha Saetbyul was aiming for was Ryuunosuke who had just shot the arrow. His back was left completely unprotected.
Krrrrh…
[Extrication]
As she transformed into a full demon form, six tentacles left from her chest, back and shoulders in an appearance resembling a spider. The tentacles splashed the water and moved her body forward and acted like springs which allowed her to dash forward at a rapid speed.
At a speed resembling a cannonball, she shot herself towards Ryuunosuke.
The old archer was feeling a shortness of breath from the aftermath of a fierce skill, but sensed the danger and turned his head around.
Kwaaaang!
Right when his eyes were about to open wide, Yu Jitae closed the gap and grabbed on the head of the extricated Ha Saetbyul. He then rammed that large body into the water.
Kyuaaaaak-!!
Her face covered with tentacles roared with a splitting scream. While driving Ha Saetbyul’s head down, Yu Jitae started going deeper into the depths of ‘Hetheia’s Ocean’.
“Y, youuuu–!”
A voice that could belong to either a man or a woman left her mouth through the tentacles. She then used those tentacles in an attempt to rid herself of Yu Jitae and as thorns grew on the tentacles, they aimed for his neck and face.
Those ended up creating small scratches on Yu Jitae’s skin but couldn’t actually stop his movement. Despite blood leaving his face, neck and forehead, and merging with the water, Yu Jitae continued pushing Ha Saetbyul down to the very depths.
‘Hetheia’s Ocean’ consisted of water that was densely packed with mana. The water here resisted the movement of mana, and the depths could help severe the long-distance communication ability of the demons.
In here, the communication skill of Prototype X would never occur no matter what happened.
After going a few hundred metres into the depths, Yu Jitae judged that this was deep enough and threw Ha Saetbyul toward an oceanic plateau that bulged out from the ground. Like a missile being shot, the demon flew forward and created a hole inside the rock.
Along with a thud, the ground cracked open as a shockwave trembled the waters.
Ha Saetbyul stopped moving after being buried inside the rock.
However, something like this wasn’t enough to kill her and slowly, she raised her head. That horrendous red pair of eyes that revealed itself from behind the tentacles faced Yu Jitae.
After a short silence, the monster opened its mouth after glancing at Yu Jitae from his head to the toe.
“…You know me, right?”
The monster’s voice was clear despite being inside the water. Surprisingly, the unisexual voice from before was long gone, and Ha Saetbyul opened her mouth with her usual voice from before.
“You know me yeah? That face is very familiar. Haven’t we seen each other before somewhere?”
“…”
“Ahh, right. I knew I saw you before. I do remember it now. At the battlefield before, right? You know me as well, no?”
When he remained quiet, Ha Saetbyul raised her body.
“You know me; you do, right? We used to know each other in the past. Weren’t we quite close back then? I’m sure that was the case though? I’m about to recall those things from the past right now. If you know me, then say something, okay?”
“…”
“I’m sure you remember me. We were quite close, weren’t we? I think we held hands as well and lied down next to each other staring at the night sky. Besides, wasn’t it also you that I kissed? I think it was. Ohh right. How intriguing. It was you. Yes it was.”
He didn’t respond. She used her tentacle to raise her body up from the rock.
“Right? When I turned my head around back then from embarrassment, you kissed my forehead. Didn’t you? I remember it clearly, because that was my first kiss. Your lips were so rough that I wanted to give you some lip balms, but those were still very sweet.”
The man kept his silence.
“Why aren’t you saying anything? Did you forget me? Or are you pretending? What is happening? Are you testing me or something? Thatwasourfirstkiss. DidyouthinkIwouldforgetit? IfIknewyouwouldbothermelikethis,Ishouldhavebittenyourtongueoff. WhydidIikeaweakuselessmanlikeyoubackthen. Thinkingback, thosearesomedisgustingandworthlessmemories.”
From a certain point, her voice changed back to its unisexual tone. Within the darkness, a pair of crimson eyes were agape open – so circular that the eyeballs could drop out. With a shriek, “Kiyaaaak!”, Ha Saetbyul’s body began inflating and before long, she faced dozens of tentacles and tried to overwhelm Yu Jitae with them.
“Dieeeeeee—!!”
The tentacles gathered at her hands and created a large poisonous thorn. This was the final form of the demon, and a threatening amount of demonic aura gathered at the tip of the thorn.
Even then, the Regressor kept his mouth shut, and silently he raised his sword.
Kicking the water beneath his feet, Yu Jitae dashed forward at Ha Saetbyul.
The reason he didn’t take out his [Shapeless Sword (SS)], was because he wasn’t confident in controlling it so that it wouldn’t kill her. Shapeless Sword was an embodiment of killing intent. Since it always moved in an attempt to kill something, it sometimes escaped the Regressor’s control.
However, it was possible to have it fully under his control if he used it to cover an existing weapon.
Yu Jitae’s killing intent was added on top of the protector’s sword. It formed little protruding tips and began rotating itself along the blade.
[Shapeless Sword (SS) – Second Form]
A skill that had crushed the main gate of the Demon Archduke’s castle back in the demon world.
[Chainsaw Form]
Killing intent, that ground everything it touched to dust, rotated by the blade at a rapid speed. Due to the resistance and the fierce friction caused due the depths of the ocean, the killing intent as a result formed a huge tornado underwater.
“Dieeeeeeeeeeee!!”
In a fully enraged state, the monster ran up to him. The protector’s sword carrying a tornado within crushed the large poisonous thorn and the rotating chainsaw of killing intent started shredding past the tentacles that covered her body like an armour.
Confusion appeared in her crimson eyes.
Soon, the tip of the blade touched her body.
It was then.
The Regressor’s killing intent pushed away the mana in the depths of the ocean. A tempest struck the bottom of the sea, and the energy soared up before reaching the surface level, a few hundred metres above.
Being scattered away by the unprecedented killing intent, the sea water splashed until it reached the sky, and for a short period of time, a huge hole was created in the ocean with the Regressor at the centre.
“Uaaaak!”
“D, dodge it!”
Kraken’s body was affected by the shockwave and likewise soared up into the air. Fortunately, the superhumans who had created some distance after the raid following Ryuunosuke’s command, weren’t caught up by it.
But Ryuunosuke was baffled by the huge pillar of water that barely missed the sky.
What in the world was happening in the depths?
Even the dungeon outside the fissure started trembling as if it had been struck by an earthquake.
Meanwhile, the water came crashing down again before long and covered the area around the Regressor.
After all the tentacles were removed, there was only Ha Saetbyul lying down in a half-naked state, but because Yu Jitae retrieved his sword towards the very end, she was still alive. However, her authority as a demon was already lost.
Now was the chance.
She had gone through extrication, and had then lost her powers.
If it was now, Ha Saetbyul could be saved.
After finishing his line of thought, Yu Jitae was about to place the protector’s sword back into his waist, but that was when a message from Vintage Clock covered his sight.
[You have stimulated the mana provided from the other side of the Horizon of Providence.]
[The Authority, [Vintage Clock (EX)] is getting pushed away by the hostility sent from the other side of the Horizon of Providence!]
[Source of the Outbreak: [Arma’s Longsword]]
[[Arma’s Longsword] will try to kill Ha Saetbyul!]
[The Authority, [Vintage Clock (EX)] earnestly wishes you to stop the actions of the [Hostility]!]
It had finally come.
The sword hanging in his hand trembled in an attempt to shoot forward by itself. It’s target was Ha Saetbyul’s heart.
Adding strength to his grip, Yu Jitae held his ground.
He had predicted that this would happen.
Yesterday when he was sitting down on the tree trunk sharpening the sword, he had felt a different aura from the protector’s sword.
Protector.
It was the only existence right now that had met ‘that guy’ from the other side of the Horizon of Providence. Just like how it had been carrying that guy’s hostility in its body, the protector’s sword had likewise been carrying that guy’s mana within.
The reason Bom felt distressed over handing him the sword was because she had been worried about things turning out like this.
With a tremendous strength that even the Regressor found hard to ignore, the sword moved while aiming for Ha Saetbyul’s heart.
Rigid muscles appeared on Yu Jitae’s arm as veins popped out. The muscles inside his entire body transferred its power to his arm. The steel longsword that even withstood the burden that came with the usage of [Chainsaw Form] started being paved out by his fingers.
Soon, his skin started turning red in colour. A strength that exceeded a critical level was starting to break the capillaries inside the Regresor’s body.
Despite that, the ridiculous ‘Hostility’ that defeated an ‘EX’ ranked authority started slowly carrying the sword towards Ha Saetbyul’s heart.
Strength was added onto the Regressor’s grip.