The Ghoul's Altar (5)
The night raids had changed in character.
Skeleton soldiers barely showed themselves anymore. When they did, it was only one or two at the very start. The main force of the assaults now consisted of hollow-faced husks — gaunt, withered things whose sunken features looked as if the flesh had been scooped out of them.
For all their emaciated frames, they moved with a startling agility. And though their speech was primitive, they called to one another and formed ranks.
Organization meant that, once gathered, they could produce a force greater than the sum of their individual strengths.
In other words, they were no longer a rabble.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The man-eaters, human skulls dangling from their belts, dressed their lines and hurled femurs in unison.
Clack! Crack!
Rachel's spear tip batted every one of them aside.
She advanced with her spear leveled, the mage and Tiria supporting her from behind. A vortex of mana and holy power tore through the monsters' formation.
The fighting continued until dawn.
Unable to endure the sunlight climbing over the horizon, the ghouls dissolved with wet, phlegmy death rattles. Only then did the three of them find a moment to rest.
Rachel set down her spear and dusted off her hands.
"Good work, Colonel. You too, mage."
"Well fought."
"……"
One voice was missing.
Tiria had already crawled into the lifeboat and passed out cold.
The mage's eyes met Rachel's. No long exchange was needed. The two of them climbed into the lifeboat and lay down as well.
"Uh… hmm."
"Ahem."
Lying face-to-face was awkward.
No — past awkward. A strange heat was rising between them.
On the last island they had slept in each other's arms, and even then it hadn't felt quite like this.
The mage murmured through half-lidded eyes.
"Thank you."
"Hm?"
"Earlier, when I fought that man — thanks for coming the moment I called."
She had no idea what he was saying.
Two months of surviving a deserted island with this man, and they still couldn't hold a proper conversation. Beyond basic greetings and the vocabulary of combat, she understood almost nothing.
Rachel's taciturn nature played a part, but the greatest reason was the presence of Saintess Tiria.
Ever since Tiria had joined them, Rachel had barely exchanged a handful of words with the man. Nearly everything he said, Tiria summarized and passed along.
With Tiria asleep, the two of them had effectively been thrown back a month.
The events of the afternoon suddenly surfaced in her mind.
The mage had launched a sudden attack on that unidentified man and left him critically wounded. At the time, Rachel had already been coiled to spring — before the mage even called for her.
It had been an instantaneous judgment.
If even that had been some collusion between the mage and the stranger, her intervention would shatter it. And if they truly were strangers to each other, there was no reason not to help the mage and strike.
"I never trusted you from the start."
That was what had made the movement possible.
"Even if you betray us now, it wouldn't hurt me. The Colonel is here. The two of us can take watch in shifts. It'd be harder, sure — but not impossible to survive."
"……"
"So if you're thinking of stabbing us in the back, you'd better drop the idea early."
The mage tipped his head, then closed his eyes. He didn't seem to have understood so much as simply grown too drowsy to do anything but react at random and drift off.
It was uncomfortable.
The sleeping arrangements. The meals. Everything.
Above all, the inability to talk was the worst of it. She and the mage were slowly picking up each other's words, but it was still nowhere near enough.
Should I ask the Colonel to teach me the Magic Kingdom's language?
The thought would surface — and then she would remember that this man was the enemy who had killed her comrades, and shake her head.
A Saintess of Purification had gone missing. A new rescue party would come soon enough. They would probably even mobilize the Sacred Engineering Unit to break whatever barrier sealed this place.
Right. Just hold out until then.
Amid the deepening conflict, Rachel's eyelids closed as well.
We slept a solid five or six hours, straight through until noon.
"Living the good life, aren't we, Major."
I woke to my subordinate's insolent remark to find the Valkyrie and the Saintess each occupying one of my arms.
"What the hell."
No wonder I'd been so warm. Were these women not hot at all?
I gave them both a gentle shake. The Saintess woke first and let out a bloodcurdling scream; an instant later the Valkyrie shot up, snatched the spear from beside her head, and swept the surroundings with a sharp gaze.
Once they grasped the situation, the two servicewomen reacted exactly as their usual temperaments would suggest.
"Hmph."
That was the full extent of the Valkyrie's commentary.
"Why was I linked arm-in-arm with you?"
"How should I know?"
The Saintess came at me half in reverse-accusation mode.
"The sun's high. Let's eat first."
Sleeping through the day in place of the night had cost us the entire morning's routine, but there was nothing to be done about it. Not when the monsters had come pouring in all night without rest.
Over a lunch of the fish and fruit we'd stockpiled, we discussed strategy.
"I think we need to force a decisive fight as soon as possible."
"You think so too?"
All three of us being officers, the judgment came fast.
A prolonged war of attrition favored the enemy. So we would eat as heartily as we could, then head for the mountain summit where the demon was likely to dwell.
Once the demon was dealt with, the monsters' offensive would ease — just as it had on the merfolk island before.
"It took a beating from magic stones and holy power both. It has to be running on fumes."
Today might be our last real chance.
I gathered every magic stone I had crafted in the meantime. The Saintess performed her morning prayers to replenish her Sephiron, and the Valkyrie hid the lifeboat in a safe spot beneath the rocks.
Then, each of us shouldering our kit, we set out for the mountain.
The island wasn't particularly large, so the climb itself was easy. Following the stream meant we never had to worry about thirst. The only real problem — hunger — we solved by cracking open the fruit we'd brought as field rations.
"What exactly is that monster supposed to be?"
"Judging by appearance alone, it looked like a ghoul. The kind that lures people to its lair and devours them. As for classification… I'm not sure. An ordinary monster, or a demon? It could even be a monster that evolved."
"Any other possibilities?"
"Well. There's exactly one other possibility — but it's not realistic."
"Which is?"
"A demonkin."
"The Demon King's direct subordinates?"
The Saintess nodded.
"The Church says their kind went extinct centuries ago… but I don't know. Something about this island feels wrong."
"What does the scripture say about them?"
"Mmm, it's hard to put into words. Deceiving people? They're said to be masters of every cunning trick imaginable. Because they're linked directly to the demons, they can use Burnt Offerings without paying a price, and also…"
That was when the fog began to roll in.
The sunlight vanished without warning. Leaves rained down as if someone had sprayed defoliant over the canopy. The lush greenery turned a dead gray-white.
"This is…"
It was deep enough that I couldn't see an inch ahead.
The Valkyrie, who had been walking in front, was gone.
"Valkyrie? Valkyrie!"
No answer came back.
Sensing something was wrong, I was about to pick up my pace when the Saintess caught my arm.
"Mage. Stay calm."
"Ah."
I'd panicked for a second.
"Thank you."
A Valkyrie who came running the instant I called her name — who answered in less than a second — not hearing my voice made no sense. She had almost certainly been teleported somewhere.
"This is definitely the ghoul's doing. It means to split us up and hunt us one by one. Stories of parties that died exactly this way are recorded in the scriptures. Move carefully."
"Do you have a plan?"
"The two of us have to keep going. Just like this — staying close. We climb while searching for Major Brokenheart. All the way to the summit. If it comes to it, we bring the ghoul down. That's practically the only way to stop this fog."
The moment the Saintess finished speaking, bestial howls rose from every direction.
Not mountain animals.
Not animals of any kind.
I could feel them drawing closer from places I couldn't see — abominations and corrupted spirits that belonged in the legendary demon realms of myth.
The Saintess gripped my arm tightly and drew her baculus.
"Don't leave my side. Not for anything."
Rachel, walking point, felt the wrongness the instant the fog closed in and spun around.
"Colonel? Mage?"
The two people who had been chattering away moments before were gone. She backtracked and searched the surroundings, but nothing was visible.
Only after calling their names several more times could Rachel face the reality of it.
This was that monster's doing.
"Hoo."
She steadied her breathing and tightened her grip on the spear.
The stone spear the mage had made for her. Compared to the holy lances used in modern warfare it was thoroughly primitive — but the tip was a magic stone, and its destructive power exceeded anything she would have imagined.
Magic stones normally held Mana, but they could hold Ekirel as well. When Rachel poured her holy power into it, the Ekirel converted to Sephiron, and the weapon became something close to a true holy lance.
As expected of a first-class mage — the efficiency of the stone was absurd. Pour in ten units of holy power, and all ten came roaring back out.
Come at me if you dare.
Rachel filled the spear tip with holy power and pressed forward. She ran at a pace that wouldn't break her stamina — and beyond the fog, a towering shadow appeared, well over six feet tall.
It was yesterday's monster.
"What is it even saying."
Colonel Kasten had told her: bring down that man wrapped in black bandages, and they could escape this island. He was serving as its gatekeeper.
There was no other path left.
Rachel charged at the man.