Chapter 157
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 157
Chapter Title: Conquest of the Fortress of Indolence
“Mi……tra?”
[Lucille?!]
Inside the mental world.
The place where only Cheon-ho and Mitra could exist.
No longer.
Standing beside the startled Mitra was Lucille.
And Cheon-ho was taken aback as well.
Lucille, who had been holding Mitra alongside him, had suddenly vanished. And Lucille’s voice had come from within Mitra.
Mitra’s blade was still imbued with the divine power of the five goddesses. It was far more stable than it had been during the battle with the Curse God.
Lucille, her already large eyes widening further, looked the golden-eyed woman—Mitra—up and down, and was genuinely stunned.
She had imagined Mitra as something like a small, cute animal.
It was only natural for her to be shocked by Mitra’s stunning beauty, a vision truly befitting a goddess of the sword.
Mitra, equally startled, stammered before suddenly clapping her hands with a sharp smack. She hurriedly summoned a portal of light.
The newly acquired holy sword skill.
The extra skill just shy of an ultimate technique.
[As expected!]
Her hunch had been right. The skill icon depicting an overlapping sword and wings had activated, radiating brilliant light.
Holy Sword Skill: Union.
Combining the powers of Mitra and Lucille into one.
[Lucille! Take my hand!]
As Mitra reached out emphatically, Lucille reflexively grasped her hand. The divine power on the blade surged even stronger.
It was only natural. After all, it was Mitra and Lucille who had absorbed Evnail’s divinity. Now united as one, it formed a far more complete divinity than either could achieve alone.
“Anyway, here goes!”
Cheon-ho hoisted the divinized Mitra high overhead.
Inside the mental world, Mitra gripped Lucille’s hand tightly.
And without thinking, Lucille asked,
“B-but, Lady Mitra.”
[What is it?]
“Do you really cry ‘waaang’?”
This wasn’t the time to ask, but the words had slipped out.
The gap between the Mitra in her imagination and the real one before her was just too vast.
“Pfft!”
Cheon-ho burst out laughing. He couldn’t help it. All he could do was hold his position.
[We’ll talk about that later!]
Mitra barely suppressed her urge to waaang, her face flushing red as she spoke. Lucille nodded. Together with Mitra, she gazed straight ahead—through Cheon-ho’s eyes—at the Fortress of Indolence.
The hero, the angel, and the holy sword.
Cheon-ho raised Mitra high. He unleashed the power of the five goddesses.
Each goddess had a color symbolizing her essence.
Yellow for the sun goddess Aiter.
Green for the sky goddess Teresia.
Blue for the dawn goddess Eos.
Red for the war goddess Evnail.
White for the nameless fifth goddess.
A brilliant cascade of multicolored light erupted from Mitra’s blade tip, soon enveloping Cheon-ho and his surroundings in a towering pillar of radiance.
The magic circle glowed in response, and the gods and goddesses stationed at each cardinal point channeled their divine power.
The power of the five goddesses converged in the heavens.
Guided by the God of Armies, it condensed. At the will of the God of Cavalry and the God of Spearmen, it took the form of a javelin.
A colossal javelin.
Dozens of meters long, it shimmered in five radiant hues.
[Let’s go.]
Mitra declared. Lucille gritted her teeth, pouring forth every ounce of strength she possessed. Cheon-ho swung Mitra. The targeted javelin rocketed forward like a bolt. Then it split. Midair, it shattered into dozens of javelins, raining down upon the Fortress of Indolence like a storm. It was akin to a carpet bombing.
Vision filled with a riot of colors.
Deafening roars erupted from the sky’s mingled lights, and the ground trembled violently. The ambient demonic energy in the area was instantly purged.
The angels clasped their hands in prayer.
They gazed upon the hero wielding the holy sword at the magic circle’s center.
It was as if a scene from myth had been carved out.
Cheon-ho slowly lowered Mitra and took a long breath as he looked ahead.
The light was dissipating. Like an aurora, the five goddesses’ colors wove their veils across the sky before melting away, revealing the Fortress of Indolence beyond. The Curse God’s barrier was no more.
The God of Armies rose from his seat. He drew the sword at his waist and commanded,
“Advance.”
The quiet order spread swiftly, and horn calls echoed from all directions. Angels unfurled their wings wide, roaring battle cries as they charged.
The supposedly impregnable Fortress of Indolence.
The evil gods’ stronghold anchoring one axis of the fifteenth floor.
But now, it was all in the past.
[Main Quest ‘Conquest of the Fortress of Indolence’ completed.]
[Hidden Quest ‘Conqueror of the 15th Floor’ completed.]
Half a day later.
The banners of the good gods flew over the Fortress of Indolence.
* * *
On a grand scale, humans and monsters, good gods and evil gods were not so different.
They all required food, clothing, and shelter.
In that regard, the interior of the Fortress of Indolence was not much different from the Fortress of Justice.
Dormitories for monsters, shrines for evil gods, a pillar leading to the depths.
The God of Music watched quietly as Kamiel gleefully demolished the evil gods’ shrines.
“No real resistance.”
“Looks like they all fled.”
The Fortress of Indolence was practically deserted.
A few monsters lingered, but they weren’t defenders who had stayed to fight—they were the weak ones abandoned.
Not a single evil god remained.
It wasn’t a bad outcome. They had seized the fortress without a single casualty.
But it left a sour aftertaste.
“Feels kinda suspicious, right?”
“Yeah, they gave it up way too easily.”
It made sense.
The Curse God was dead, his divinity seized.
Objectively, it was a clear defeat for the evil gods.
Abandoning the fortress could even be seen as strategically sound, preserving their forces.
But this was the Fortress of Indolence.
The site of one of only two pillars connecting to the depths on the fifteenth floor.
Its fall meant the good gods now controlled every path to the depths.
“Are they abandoning the upper and middle layers?”
“No idea.”
The good gods and evil gods were in vastly different positions.
The good gods’ goal was to reach the deepest depths before the Great Labyrinth fully devoured the Labyrinth World.
Sever the connection between the Great Labyrinth and the Labyrinth World.
That was their sole path to victory.
Thus, the evil gods’ win condition was equally straightforward.
Defend the deepest level.
Prevent any from reaching it.
Inciting battles in the upper and middle layers to cut supply lines was merely one tactic.
It wasn’t even necessary.
The God of Healing had estimated the Great Labyrinth at thirty floors total.
The assault team had reached the twenty-third so far.
“Ah, whatever. The God of Healing sis will figure it out. That’s her job.”
“Yeah, yeah. Let’s just focus on helping out.”
Having reached their non-conclusion, the God of Music and the God of Painting resolved to take it easy.
They would emulate Kamiel, who cackled as she wrecked the evil gods’ shrines.
But just as the God of Music reached for her hammer—
“By the way, where’s the hero?”
They hadn’t seen him since the conquest.
At the God of Painting’s question, the God of Music grinned like a mischievous imp.
“Tripartite summit.”
“Tripartite summit?”
“Tripartite summit.”
The God of Painting blinked, then grasped it. She flashed an equally impish smile.
* * *
Mitra’s mental world.
On the Siliphian Plateau, where dry winds blew, the hero, the angel, and the holy sword sat forming a triangle.
A strange tension hung in the air as Lucille spoke first.
“Hero, you said she was small and cute.”
Lucille furrowed her brows as she said it.
It was more a simple question than an interrogation, but to Cheon-ho, it somehow felt like the latter.
He straightened up and replied,
“No, well… she was originally small. About yay high?”
[Hold on, I was never that small.]
Cheon-ho gestured below his solar plexus while seated, prompting Mitra’s protest.
It might be fine standing, but sitting like that made her sound tiny.
“No, really, she was this small. At first, I worried I’d accidentally step on her. And she started out as a total stick figure.”
[Ugh… B-but that was only for a moment! She changed right away. Into a cute girl, I mean.]
“Wait, admitting she was cute now?”
[W-wasn’t I cute?]
“Well, yeah, you were cute. But you’re the one who always insisted you weren’t.”
[Uh… b-but…]
As Mitra blushed and hemmed and hawed, Cheon-ho chuckled and said,
“You’re cute. Small, adorable, cutesy, just precious.”
[U-uuuum.]
Unable to withstand the blunt praise, Mitra could only cover her face with both hands.
Lucille watched the exchange between Cheon-ho and Mitra in silence. Her expression was oddly sulky.
“Anyway, got it. So Lady Mitra was a small, cute girl. Not some baby animal.”
“Y-yeah.”
[Y-yeah.]
Cheon-ho and Mitra both shrank back unwittingly in their replies.
It wasn’t anything scold-worthy, but it felt like they were being scolded.
To shift the conversation, Cheon-ho fired back with a question of his own.
“But what about you, Lucille? What did you imagine Mitra would be like?”
“Huh? Well… um…”
Lucille trailed off, then began drawing in the air with her finger. Light trailed from her fingertip, quickly taking shape.
A small, fluffy puppy.
[Hmm… So that’s how it was. That’s how I looked to you, Lucille…]
She had thought herself a magnificent holy sword in action.
Mitra mumbled in disappointment, and now Lucille floundered.
“B-but the hero said you cry ‘waaang’…”
“Ah, that part’s true. Mitra really does go ‘waaang’ when she cries.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really. Even Mitra can’t deny it. Cats go meow, dogs go woof, Mitra goes waaang.”
[Uuuuuuum.]
Mitra covered her face with both hands again, reduced to groans. True to her nature as an upstanding holy sword, she couldn’t lie.
[A-anyway! I’m not small anymore. Not some cute animal—I’m a proper adult now.]
Mitra puffed out her chest proudly as she spoke, and Lucille nodded.
Quirks in speech and manner aside, her appearance alone could pass for a goddess without exaggeration.
“You’re pretty.”
[Huh?]
“So pretty. No—beautiful.”
Lucille beamed her angelic smile.
Pure and innocent, without a trace of ulterior motive.
[I-is that so?]
Mitra cleared her throat with a hem-hem, then scratched her cheek with an ehehehe grin.
Cheon-ho couldn’t help but smile.
“You used to be so confident back then.”
The first time Cheon-ho had entered the mental world.
Mitra had boasted that he’d be stunned by her true form.
[W-well, that’s because Leon praised me so much. Honestly, he overdid it so much I wondered if he was lying, but unlike some people, Leon’s so earnest he never lies, so I figured it was believable and…]
As Mitra twirled a lock of hair and mumbled, Lucille blinked and asked,
“Lady Mitra, you’ve never actually seen yourself?”
[Huh?]
“Your own appearance.”
[No. Never have.]
“What?”
This time, Cheon-ho was shocked too.
As they both leaned in close, Mitra instinctively shrank back, flustered, before mumbling her answer.
[W-well, see, I’m basically a sword at my core, right? Lately I’ve been in the mental world a lot because of the hero, but usually I spend my time just as a sword. Hmm, I’ve seen my sword form plenty of times, though.]
She hadn’t met Leon in the mental world anywhere near as often.
They could converse just fine with her in holy sword form, without needing to enter.
“So you’ve still never seen your true self?”
[…Pretty much. Leon described it for me, but he’s no good at that sort of thing…]
Pretty. Anyway, pretty.
That was Leon’s praise in a nutshell, every time.
“You never wanted to see?”
[Huh? Well… N-no, I never really thought about it before. But now… yeah, I kinda do.]
Wondering how she stacked up against someone as angelic as Lucille.
At Mitra’s response, Cheon-ho made an incredulous face and said,
“Then just look.”
[Huh? How?]
“You can recreate the whole Siliphian Plateau, even switch between day and night, but you can’t make a single mirror? Worst case, conjure a clear lake.”
[Ah, aaaaah?]
For all her holy sword prowess, Mitra had her clueless moments in the oddest places.
“Might as well make it a big one. Full-body size.”
[O-okay. I’ll give it a shot.]
Mitra shot to her feet, extended both hands forward, and focused. Moments later, a pristine full-length mirror materialized before her.