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235th Chapter. New Mission (4)

A bizarre energy began to spread beyond the dense green forest.

The immense evil that was hard to approach made my legs tremble like a aspen tree.

Clearly, when I looked from afar through the window, I felt no such energy.

However, it was only after approaching that I could grasp the nature of this forest and what was lurking in front of those ruins, as if I was opening a lid to discover its contents.

“If they were ordinary people, they would have been hypnotized by this overwhelming evil and walked straight in. Then…”

It would be like a Venus flytrap luring in its prey with the scent of flowers, waiting to devour them when they got too close.

Fortunately, the villagers weren’t caught in its grasp, but it was reported that a few soldiers had fallen victim.

“Do the villagers know that such monsters exist?”

“Well, we told them. But it’s not surprising for spirits to pop out in this place known as the land of death…”

Some villagers have recklessly attempted to get close, shrugging off the risks.

There were residents who approached secretly to hunt the massive ore but naturally never returned.

But in this land teeming with spirits, countless people had disappeared without a trace.

So, it was common practice to occasionally capture criminals for labor or hire mercenaries for protection.

If someone chose to wander in alone and lost their life, that would be their own responsibility.

And yet, many were still curious and attempted to step onto this path.

“The spirits here are on a different level compared to the usual ones scattered around. It’s not something you can solve by hiring mercenaries. That’s why we’ve been blocking the way, selling the Viole family’s power bit by bit.”

As a result, the villagers grew increasingly fearful of the Viole family’s authority.

Plus, Harkel prohibited hiring skilled mercenaries to prevent the villagers from slacking off in their tasks.

After all, he knew well that if their salaries decreased while their workloads increased, the villagers’ complaints would boil over.

That’s why, when requesting a mission from Aligieri, he demanded a student who lacked presence.

A nameless student with good skills would be easy to sneak past the watchful eyes of Viole’s enforcers.

“Then, what you’re saying is that you never intended to stop us from the start.”

Having roughly understood their situation, I narrowed my eyes.

If the knights don’t interfere… then the lengths I went to last night to let my hair down would have been all for nothing.

“I shouldn’t have done this!”

I immediately grabbed my long brown hair and chopped it off, throwing it onto the ground.

How could I not be insane? The affectionate barrage I had unleashed on the soldiers when entering flashed through my mind.

“Gross!”

With a feeling of indescribable nausea, the food I had eaten this morning began to emerge.

The feeling of shame for committing an unforgivable act in this world felt like it would shatter my head.

“Dammit…”

“I’m sorry.”

Luska, realizing that was a blunder too, patted my back and apologized.

But why are they so obsessed with the sight of me in women’s clothing? Did they awaken some strange fetish?

If they enjoyed it so much, they should try dressing as women themselves!

“Wait, you were a guy?”

“What? You got a problem with that?”

The knights who were enamored with my long-haired appearance looked utterly shocked.

Had I moved them to such an extent? Their faces resembled those of lost nations.

[Degradation Rate Decreased: -600%]

[+60000 Credits]

That number was proof of the degradation rate decrease.

“Then, I’m suddenly excited by a guy like you…”

The knights, realizing reality, struck the ground in despair.

Screaming that they would never be able to marry a woman again, it seemed they were firmly misunderstanding that they were into something ‘else’ entirely.

‘This is insane! For real.’

『Fortunately, you won’t have to live your life a virgin.』

`Shut your mouth.`

『….』

As Muto chimed in again, I threatened him with the drops of my manifestation.

Only then did he shut up and quietly disappear…

Caw-caw!—

At that moment, the sound of crows echoed.

I wondered where it was coming from when suddenly Aisha materialized out of nowhere, shrieking.

“Why are you suddenly acting like that?”

Caw-caw!—

Instead of answering, Aisha continued to screech like an animal, glaring at something.

And then, flapping her wings, Aisha began to fly in that direction.

“Hey! Where are you going!”

I found myself in a difficult situation. That direction was towards the ruins, the very spot where I sensed that unpleasant energy.

However, I couldn’t leave Aisha behind, so I had no choice but to follow her.

Fortunately, she wasn’t flying very fast, allowing me to keep up while running.

“Why is she acting like that all of a sudden?”

“That’s what I’m wondering.”

Luska, following closely behind, asked me, but honestly, I didn’t know either.

It was likely that a resonance between spirits drew them to each other, but unless it was something special, that didn’t generally happen.

In fact, Muto, despite being a spirit, was calm, unlike Aisha.

『(Wink)』

Though, winking at me like, ‘I did well, right?’ was disgusting.

“Are you perhaps enchanted by this strange energy?”

“Why would she be enchanted when we’re holding up fine?”

“Then why…”

Soon, we emerged from the thick trees to reveal a wide clearing and a large cliff.

That cliff was indeed the ruins we had been observing all this time.

Fortunately, Aisha had not gone far and was hovering right in the middle.

However, it felt like it was too good to be true.

“Aisha! What are you doing!”

『….』

“Why aren’t you answering?”

Seeing her owner speak without any reaction, I had no choice but to let a drop of my manifestation fall on her head.

The sound was akin to water being splashed onto heated metal, sizzling.

Since spirit power and magic repel each other, it was akin to pressing hot iron onto Aisha’s head.

Yet still, Aisha remained unresponsive.

“Why on earth is she doing this?”

“Get out of the way!”

At that moment, Luska grabbed my waist and kicked off the ground.

Thanks to Luska pulling me, I could finally see what was rising from where I had been standing.

Swish-swish-swish!—

A colossal mass of tentacles surged up, towering higher than the great trees.

We felt an even more ominous energy from those tentacles than we had earlier.

“Could that possibly be…!”

Luska fainted at the sight of the ominously stretching tentacles.

By the time the knights arrived, they too looked extremely serious upon seeing the tentacles.

“That’s it! That’s exactly what we were talking about!”

They quickly urged us to run, trying to grab Luska and myself to escape.

But their bodies refused to move, almost mockingly.

Tiny tentacles had already emerged from the ground and were grasping our legs. It was already too late to flee.

Boom!—

A massive explosion resounded as something colossal erupted from the ground.

Countless tentacles were connected to it, sharing its dark and murky hue.

Stretchy and flexible, it resembled a cephalopod spirit, but it bore a solid horn on its head.

With a dragon-like upper body and wings sprouting from its back. And its vertically slit purple eyes.

That figure was undoubtedly a dragon.

Yet, it had an immense number of tentacles sprouting from its waist and tail… it could be described as a chaotic being.

『A dragon-type spirit… I’ve never seen one before.』

“Can we defeat that thing?”

『Defeat it? That saying about hitting an egg against a rock fits here perfectly.』

I already knew, and Luska had sensed its presence even without me saying anything.

The speed at which those tentacles rose was terrifying.

If Luska hadn’t foreseen the danger and saved me, I would have been done for.

This was an utterly despairing situation, but it wasn’t without a glimmer of hope.

[Remaining Credits: 999999] (Cannot be increased further.)

[Stat Points: 400] (Cannot be increased further.)

An astounding sum of over 900,000 credits was now in my hands.

Usually meant for cash use, it could also be utilized to boost my stats or acquire skills.

The reason for such a pile was the political maneuvering I had done disguised as the Enviel during the festival.

At that time, I had essentially deceived the imperial citizens, hence the mountain of credits piled up.

However, the system restricted me from exceeding that 900,000. The same applied to stat points.

`If I use this to max out all stats and various skills, it could be worth a shot, but…`

I had tried it out before.

But I had to recall my experience while playing Devil Aka.

It’s great to level up a game character’s skills, but if you overdo it, the character often couldn’t handle the power and suffered damage.

Despite raising support skills like detection and healing excessively, damage was still dealt.

`Jenny’s Silver Age is the same.`

In reality, Jenny’s Silver Age skill level starts past 100 from the beginning.

It reflected the inability to control that power within the game context.

So, exceeding one’s capabilities would lead to significant damage to the character and self-destruction.

Then how about stats?

It was the same.

There had been a player who adjusted all stats to 99 using cheat codes.

Did they clear it easily? No, they were unable to progress in the game.

Every time the character attacked, their HP would keep depleting… which led them to game over even before Chapter 1, just from defeating a weak monster.

Thus, maxing out stats and skills is essentially a suicidal act.

I learned the lesson not to be greedy for excessive power, but… I was left with no choice in this situation.

Boom!—

Massive tentacles flew like ballista bolts and pierced into the ground, cracking the forest floor with a loud noise.

I could barely dodge those tentacles through my magic, and even the smaller incoming tentacles could be evaded thanks to my extraordinary reflexes.

Luska wasn’t sitting idle either. She batted away the flying tentacles with her double-edged sword and charged toward the spirit.

The sight of us acting as though we read each other’s moves made the knights gawk in astonishment.

Countless tentacles followed suit, but Luska and I dodged or deflected them all.

Eventually, we reached the spirit’s eye.

I swiftly summoned Leviathan to stab its right eye, while Luska aimed for the left eye, but…

“Ugh!”

Suddenly, it felt as if a hypnosis had taken over me, an overwhelming drowsiness washed over.

Luska immediately showed dark circles under her eyes and plummeted to the ground, captured by the small tentacles like a rope.

I fell into the same predicament, unable to free myself despite wishing to.

Even the mighty Luska’s shoulders drooped completely, as the tentacle tip brushed her face.

“Ugh!”

And then, we both saw its gigantic mouth.

The knights attempted to help us with powerful strikes or magic, but they couldn’t land a single scratch on the spirit.

Next, they too got caught by the tentacles.

The worst possible situation had unfolded, and despair clawed at us as we saw no way out.

『It’s okay now.』

A girl’s voice resounded. At the same time, the dark tunnel-like maw of the spirit closed.

And the storm of tentacles that had been raging came to a halt.

『I’m here now.』

That girl’s voice transformed into Aisha, now appearing as an elf girl.

I realized that this was her form from when she was still alive.

At that moment, I recalled another piece of information regarding this area.

This was Aisha’s homeland.

Though it had become the land of spirits after being burned, those spirits were likely the elves who had died alongside Aisha.

Thus, deducing the identity of that spirit became an easy task.

『You can stop now.』

As if recollecting her past life, Aisha gently touched the spirit’s face, soothing it.

 

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