So I Came to Catch It
Users of Deoen before Lily's arrival had always used their skills passively.
They spent a set amount of mana or a substitute resource to prepare a technique, then channeled it for a set cast time to produce a set result. No matter how much more mana they had or how fast they moved, the process and the outcome were always the same.
Of course, there were exceptions.
Skill fusion. Or abilities that stepped outside the 'frame' entirely, like those of spirit mages and other spectral classes.
But skill fusion was something only the supremely dexterous or the genuinely gifted could pull off, and...
'Spirit classes were called anomalies from the very beginning, after all.'
In practice, more than 99.99% of all users simply moved the way the system told them to.
A clean, powerful force — but a force with clearly defined limits.
And then I showed up and threw that whole paradigm into chaos.
'Active manipulation of mana.'
Was it because I'd gone so far as to craft Mana Condensation Stones and lecture my way through every detail? Users woke up to a new world, as if a wall that had been blocking them their entire lives had suddenly crumbled. Their 'restrictions' loosened bit by bit, and they began to pour out that power freely.
But still.
"It, it wouldn't go that far, though."
What I'd taught them, at the end of the day, was simple mana handling. Maybe Leo, who'd progressed on her own, was a different story — but the balance system reacting to lessons that covered nothing but the absolute basics? I couldn't wrap my head around it.
"What I shared was a tiny fraction of the whole. Honestly, you'd be hard-pressed to even call it 'teaching.'"
Frankly, that much was just learning how to walk.
"Everyone's standards are different. I only trained with you briefly myself, but I'd say I'm at least thirty percent stronger for it," Vlack said, his voice brimming with confidence.
It was true that his showing in the first round had been on a completely different level from the players without the Grand General title. Even a top-ten ranker couldn't easily handle him once the growth gap and balance adjustments came into play. And yet Vlack, holding only the rank of General, had coordinated with Chukachip and seized victory against an enormously buffed unicorn.
'Granted, that only became possible because Leo was caught first.'
Well, a win was a win.
As I sank briefly into thought, Vlack must have read something in my expression, because he shook his head.
"I'm not saying it's your fault, Lily. It's just that nobody expected the balance adjustment system to fail this badly. When we tested it, the difference was never anywhere near this pronounced..."
"......"
"In any case, the lectures themselves are no problem at all."
"Of course it isn't my fault."
What this amounted to was teaching a crawling baby how to walk, only for the system to recoil in astonishment — 'What?! Humans can WALK?!' — and slap an UNMEASURABLE tag on everything.
I hadn't even taught them to run, let alone fly.
And even if I had, 'merely' flying wouldn't have been enough to beat a level-one-ceiling Celestial.
"Uh, r, right. No fault on your end, of course."
"So is anything actually being changed, then?"
"For now, we've decided to proceed as is. This isn't an issue affecting only one team — Raguel, who never attended your classes, is also bypassing the balance system."
'Raguel.'
The youngest of the Seven Archangels of the 'Angel' Guild, the guild that wielded the guild-wide buff Light's Grace. The name grated on me, but the guild itself had proven remarkably useful. In particular, her near-infinite stream of never-miss arrows was a rarity even in the old days.
Even if that power did come from the system.
"That said, per-level stats, growth buffs, and resource buffs will all roughly double compared to before. Enough to make a fight of it, at least."
Even then we wouldn't lose, but if their growth went smoothly, they'd be able to pull off the original plan — the 'harassment' role. That was what Vlack chose to believe.
"Anyway, that's the end of the announcement. It's been relayed to all the other teams as well. Let's take a short break, then have a quick meeting about round two."
"Actually, I'd like to say something about that."
Devil raised his hand, sneaking glances at me. The moment I turned to look at him, his eyes darted elsewhere.
"Ahem! That Lily is strong, you know."
"Lily?"
"...Lily n-n-no, noona. Ugh, whatever! Point is, she's strong!"
"She's strong?"
"......She's strong, I said."
Good. Progress, at last.
When I beamed at him, cheeks flushing, Devil hid his red face behind a curtain of black flame.
"Whatever! Human or not, can't we just smash the Core from the start? Eh?"
And what was with that half-hearted "eh?"
"That is one approach. The question is whether it'd actually work."
Redberry sounded distinctly pessimistic.
She had a point — smashing a Core that an enemy team was actively defending was no small feat. On top of that, the Mock Siege system strengthened the Core's defenses whenever Generals or Grand Generals were present inside the castle walls. Could even Lily punch through the players' interference and shatter a Core buffed to the extreme?
I nodded.
"It's not impossible. I'd just rather not use it now."
If I pulled out the Spear of Annihilation, there'd be nothing to shatter. Honestly, I figured a good hammer blow would probably do the job too. The Core was hard enough that even a single strike of the Spear couldn't crack it in one hit, but it didn't move, and it had no skills. Even a General could break it with about two minutes of diligent hammering.
Frankly, beyond those two examples, I'd just thought of a few more ideas. But if I opened that door now, the upcoming third round would become a problem.
"Starting from round three — once we've secured two wins — alliances become possible. And with high probability, both remaining teams will come for us."
I said 'once we've secured two wins' as if it were a given, yet not a single soul in this room wondered for a moment whether Lily's team — the team with me on it — could possibly lose. And rightfully so. If one team pulled ahead, the smart play was to eliminate that team's chances of victory first before fighting among yourselves. The alliance rule itself had been created to prevent exactly one team from running away with everything.
"They haven't shown us everything yet either. Just like us, they'll have an ace up their sleeve."
Everyone had grown immeasurably stronger compared to a year ago. Famous rankers, every one of them — surely they had hidden trump cards beyond their well-known abilities. To prepare for all those variables hitting at once, I needed to keep asymmetric strategies like a one-touch Core destruction in reserve.
"So what's the plan for the next match, Denyo?"
"Hmm... we played the last round fast, so let's take this one slow."
Above all, I had to catch Raizaka at least once.
"So I came to catch it."
"Grrrrr..."
The Chaos That Brews Calamity — Supreme Dragon Ryzaka regards you with hostility!
It was almost heartwarming to see Raizaka greeting me after so long. Looking at that colossal body and that staggering aura, a strange wave of nostalgia washed over me. It felt like only yesterday that I'd fought it back when I had no divinity, dumping every last resource I had short of Sacred Fire into the battle.
In truth, not that much time had passed. Three weeks, maybe, at most.
Back then, Raizaka really had felt like a towering wall. Of course, that didn't mean Raizaka was weak now, or weak in general. Raizaka was the last of the chaos bloodline wiped out by the demon clans, the traitor of all dragons. It carried blood strong enough to tear the wings from the Dragon Lord of its era and cast him down in ruin.
Kyeeeeeeeh!
But this was still a pitifully frail specimen running on less than five percent of its true self. This much was child's play.
I drew out my hammer, then paused and looked back at myself.
'Ah, right. It was the other way around — I'm the one lying down getting fed.'
I could barely muster one percent of what I'd been back then. Who exactly was calling whom weak here? Truly, drunk on 'small' power as I'd been, I'd gone a little strange. This blood of mine would never tolerate such power.
As I stood there wearing a hollow smile, Raizaka kept hurling murky breath after murky breath at me, trying to pin down my weaving, dodging form. But it meant nothing.
"GRAAAAAGH!!!"
Missing me was its own punishment.
'Time to wrap this up, I suppose.'
I'd gauged its strength sufficiently. I'd drawn enough aggro as it was.
I drove both feet into the ground. Crunch! The earth swallowed my ankles up to the bone, and the hammer in my hand trembled violently, hissing out brilliant white steam. Divinity crested like a flood. The enormous creature filled my field of vision.
Power — move.
"Grrr...?!"
In a flash of blinding white, Raizaka's entire upper body went airborne.
The Chaos That Brews Calamity — Supreme Dragon Ryzaka has been slain!
Slayer — Lily Elbrit.
The Dragon's Blessing flowed into me.
And with it, a question I'd been turning over in my mind finally crystallized into certainty.
"I knew it."
There was nothing special about it at all. It was barely distinguishable from a level-thirteen buff — the max-level buff of the Mock Siege. No wonder Leo so rarely used the Extreme Dragon's power mid-battle. There was no reason to go out of her way and break her usual combat balance for this.
"Right?"
As I turned and said so, a wave of gold descended before me. Golden hair fluttered in the wind, and an aura I'd never seen from Vlack's fights came pouring off her in torrents. Mysterious armaments orbited around her, and within her body flowed a authority potent enough to startle even me. Twin spears and a pair of golden eyes gleamed, cold and sharp.
"...This one I didn't expect. But as it happens, I've prepared something too."
Shaaang!
Shaaang!
"Come at me. With your spear."