Fated Encounter (7)
Fated Encounter (7)
Only three minutes had passed since Nidhogg revealed his true power.
Odin realized just how arrogant she had been.
She had stood on the battlefield thinking that the power of Nidhogg she had glimpsed through magic was everything, placing her absolute trust in the Gleipnir she had created with human assistance, and imagining nothing but how she would work Nidhogg to the bone.
But Nidhogg had not been weakened at all.
In the meantime, whatever he had scavenged and eaten had made his power so strong that it was difficult to even compare it to the last time she saw him, and the Gleipnir she had barely managed to craft was snapped far too easily.
Fear is resurrected.
The same fear she felt when she first encountered Nidhogg began to crawl up from the depths of her heart.
Gods and Valkyries falling before Nidhogg's overwhelming power.
Everyone was doing their best to stop him, but their physical abilities were incomparable, and their magic was completely neutralized before the mysterious technique he used.
Circulation... was it?
A technique that reduces all magic that comes close back into magic power and steals it.
It was a high-level technique with an ability that lived up to its name.
"Odin. Odin! Get a grip!"
Jjak!
While the Valkyries were being shot down, Freyja approached Odin and slapped her hard across the cheek.
"Ah, ah..."
"What are you doing losing your mind right now! Do something!"
"B-But..."
"You're the only one here who knows Nidhogg in detail! Are you just going to stand there and watch all the gods and Valkyries get defeated?!"
"I-I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I never dreamed that Nidhogg would have his power perfectly preserved. If only I had checked properly..."
"Save those words for after this situation is over. Right now, just give me a way to deal with that thing!"
Behind the urgently shouting Freyja, countless Valkyries were still falling helplessly.
Only then did Odin come to her senses and grip her staff tightly.
Yes, Freyja was right.
The only one who knew even a little more about Nidhogg was herself.
I have to be the one to do it.
The moment Odin, having made that resolve, shook off her fear and stepped back into the battlefield.
"You, keep yourself busy with this until it's over."
Something flew like an arrow from beyond the rift that was still open.
A magnificent spear shining in gold.
Odin, who barely managed to block the spear with her staff, realized in an instant what that spear was.
Gungnir.
The divine artifact Odin used to cherish.
The identity of the thing that attacked her was the very weapon she had lost... no, the weapon she had left behind in that world.
"Eh?"
Odin lost her grip on reality once again.
Since Odin, whom I had left for last to deal with, was trying to join the fight again, I sent Gungnir through my main body.
As expected. Fighting against her (former) favorite weapon must have been quite a shock, as Odin was busy just trying to block the flying Gungnir.
"Ah, seriously! Odin! Get a grip!"
Freyja shouted as if frustrated while looking at Odin, but Odin's mind had already departed for somewhere far away.
I leisurely dealt with the gods and Valkyries again.
There was nothing better than this as an appetizer before the main course.
I disrupted their balance by creating gusts of wind with a light flap of my wings.
I swung my massive tail and struck them down as if catching a swarm of flies.
I roamed the sky freely, using the screams of the gods and Valkyries as background music.
Unless it was someone of Odin's caliber, there was no being who could interfere with me.
It was a gesture filled with such confidence.
Freyja, the only one among the gods besides Odin with enough power to potentially interfere with me, was busy just trying to save the falling gods and Valkyries.
"It is truly like dealing with insects."
The magic that occasionally flew toward me in desperation was sucked into the circular ring of light floating above my head.
It is a high-level technique called Circulation.
A primary technique of the Dragon King that decomposes lower-grade techniques or magic into their original form of magic power, absorbing it to gradually increase one's own power.
The gods, who had used the magic containing the authority of Gleipnir for a long time while holding me down and had even received a rebound from it being forcibly broken, did not have enough magic power left to use high-grade magic capable of overwhelming Circulation.
Before long, I succeeded in suppressing all the gods and Valkyries except for Odin and Freyja.
Because of Freyja's efforts to protect the gods and Valkyries, they didn't die, but just because they didn't die didn't mean they were fine; they all fell to the ground with broken bones or vomiting blood.
While Freyja, whose magic power was exhausted, hovered in the air panting, I quickly approached and grabbed her body with my foot.
"Kueut..."
"Do not resist. If you do, I might accidentally apply too much strength and crush your body just like this."
"Just kill me instead!"
"Anyone watching would think I'm the villain. It was Odin who provoked me first, after all."
"Are you trying to drive a wedge between me and Odin? You do such petty things for someone with your appearance!"
"Do not misunderstand. I am merely stating the facts."
These were the ones who ordered Linnea to monitor me.
And these were the ones who, upon realizing I noticed their magical surveillance, ordered me to bow my head and come under them.
And then what?
Driving a wedge?
I even spared them when I could have killed them, and they spout such nonsense?
Fine. Let's see that precious face of yours get smashed today.
I brought my mouth close to Freyja's face and opened it wide.
I had no intention of killing her, so I planned to control the Breath and blast it.
I inhaled, and just as a massive amount of magic power gathered around my neck to transform into a Breath.
"W-Wait a moment! Nidhogg-nim!!"
Linnea intruded between me and Freyja.
"Keup! Kuh-luk, kuh-luk!!"
The magic power backflowed from the recoil of stopping the Breath I was about to exhale, causing me to choke.
After catching my breath and calming down, I looked forward again to see Linnea still spreading her arms and blocking the way in front of Freyja.
I wondered why she was doing this, but I quickly remembered the reason.
Come to think of it, I had only been keeping Linnea by my side; she was still Freyja's subordinate.
To anyone's eyes, it looked like I was about to kill her boss, so unless she had a grudge against her superior, she would naturally try to stop me.
However, I had no intention of letting it slide.
"Step aside. I will specially overlook it this once out of consideration for our time together so far."
I tried to pressure Linnea with a high-handed atmosphere and overwhelming magic power, but she did not move.
Rather, she stood her ground even while trembling.
"Well, you know. I didn't actually plan to kill her? I was just going to scare her a bit. Huh?"
It was only half-true, as I was fully intending to mangle that pretty face, but with things like this...
"I-It's not that. I also think Asgard did wrong by Nidhogg-nim, but..."
"But?"
"Even if you are to punish them, now is not the time. Right now, those Fiend bastards are doing something strange over there."
"What?"
The Fiends appeared?
The direction Linnea pointed was toward Pyongyang, which Odin had blown away.
I hurried to turn my head, and just as she said, something was strange.
It was indeed a city where only ashes remained... but something was different.
Unlike Odin's illusion, it looked as if perception had been subtly distorted.
I used magic power to forcibly push away the strange things that created the illusion of a city where only ashes remained.
When I did, the dense magic power unique to Fiends was detected to the point where I wondered why I hadn't noticed it until now.
These bastards?
They were up to something while I was busy fighting Asgard?
Forgetting what I was about to do to Freyja, I released her and flew toward Pyongyang.
The goal of Odin and Asgard was at most world conquest.
But the goal of the Fiends was to destroy the world according to fate.
The nature was different, and the latter was overwhelmingly more malicious.
Therefore, I had to kill them before those bastards could do anything.
I was already fast, but having become as strong as my main body through the Wish-fulfilling Jewel, I arrived over Pyongyang in an instant.
Luckily, the Fiends were not scattered here and there but were gathered in a place where only the burnt remains in the center of Pyongyang were left, having set up something resembling an altar.
The Fiends, huddled around the altar, were performing a ritual while bowing toward an unknown entity.
It didn't matter who they were performing the ritual for.
What mattered was that it would never have a good effect on Earth.
Therefore, before the ritual could proceed any further, I fired a Breath toward the Fiend bastards.
Since it could get annoying if anyone survived because I fired it weakly, a full-power Breath without any restraint swept over the ashen Pyongyang.
The Breath, containing cold and toxicity, melted the Fiends and destroyed the altar they had built in one go.
However.
"You survived?"
While all the other Fiends died where the Breath passed, one Fiend, who appeared to be the leader, survived.
A mere Fiend endured a Breath so powerful that even Odin would have had to choose to dodge rather than block?
It was nonsense.
It wasn't that there was no damage; its lower body and right arm were frozen and turning to powder, and half of its face was frozen.
Even so, surviving was surviving.
"The... con... ditions... have... been... met."
"Dammit."
"I... am... the bait."
My sensitive hearing accurately understood what the bastard was saying.
I killed them all in an instant, but it seemed it was already too late to stop their trickery.
A black shadow, spreading like paint centered on the Fiend, swallowed the city.
The ashen, gray earth was dyed black.
And then.
Jjeo-eok.
A giant mouth that slowly emerged from beneath the shadow swallowed the Fiend in one gulp.
That mouth resembled a snake.
Its scales were black, and its size was massive enough to be compared to mine.
While my scales were a mixture of black and blue, that side was a black that swallowed even light.
Just what did you call?
Even if I wanted to ask, the only being I could ask had just disappeared into the monster's mouth.
Bait. He definitely said bait.
He called something? Summoned something using himself as bait?
And the entity that appeared to be summoned was a Giant Black Snake.
I didn't know its identity, but the magic power I felt from it was enormous.
Just then. The snake's red eyes met mine.
The snake, opening its mouth slightly, made a spine-chilling voice.
Shyaaaa—
『Who summoned me?』
"I didn't call you, so get lost."
As soon as I heard the voice, I got goosebumps and spat out a Breath along with a curse.