Somehow, I Don't Feel Like Losing
"The other regions are more or less holding up, but the Snowy Mountain is pretty much impossible to get into."
"So it's Absolute Zero… I take it."
"Yep."
Ever since the monster unleashed Absolute Zero, the Snowy Mountain had transformed into a frozen hell. Granted, several hours had passed since then, so the worst of it had surely settled — but even so, there was still no way to endure the extreme cold.
"Rankers like Vlack and me can force ourselves to move, but everyone else is the problem. Even when they can move, their skills probably won't fire properly."
"…That's… a serious problem."
Serious in every possible way.
Scratch. Scratch.
"That's why everything went up in flames again for a while after you went down, Miss Lily. Your stream's still running, you know."
Right. The stream was still on. I turned my head toward the camera.
"…Lilha?"
"Oh, come on. I'm going to catch it, so don't worry yourselves sick."
I intended to give it everything I had. To protect Talikal and Sre, I had to hold the line with everything in me.
'Because if I do—'
Thunk.
Yena set down her knife, speared a slice of apple with her fork, and popped it into her mouth. CRUNCH! The sound rang out loud and clear. She chewed away, cheeks working, and swallowed.
"…You're certainly enjoying that."
"Oh, this? It's buff food."
"Eat it regularly and you get a permanent stat boost, y'know."
So saying, Yena stuffed another slice of apple into her mouth. I honestly couldn't tell whether she'd brought the apple for me or for herself.
"Oh, right. The Hatchling, remember?"
"You mean Sre."
"Yes. Sre."
Mmmmhhh… Sre was still fast asleep, murmuring in her dreams. Yena gazed at her for a moment, then shoved the knife and plate into her subspace inventory and rose from her seat.
"Be careful. From now on, people really might come for her — no matter what it costs them."
The more they despaired of ever killing the monster, the more convinced they became that there was no hope left — that they had to stop not just a kingdom's doom but a continent's annihilation — the more they would turn on Sre.
And if they couldn't kill her themselves, they would demand 'the greater good' of me.
"…Don't worry. That will never happen."
As I've always said — if anyone can beat me, I'm perfectly willing to hand her over.
'If they can win, that is.'
Hisssss…!
"……"
"How does it look?"
"Hmph!"
Flutter. Draped in her golden cloak, Leo pulled her hand away from the barrier at the knight's words. Despite holding a contract with the ice spirits, her fingers ached with cold. If they pushed through like this, everyone but Leo would freeze solid — the knights of the Empire were strong, but they were somewhat vulnerable to this kind of extreme low temperature.
"It's impossible. But it's not like there's no wayyy…"
"And what way would that be?"
"The Grand Duke of Extreme Magic."
The Grand Duke of Extreme Magic. Like the Saintess Nea and the Duke of Yellow Embers Roverian Chen Imperium, a duke who held a seat among the highest ranks — an epithet earned for magic taken to its very extreme, surpassing even the rank of Archmage.
"We need the 'Barrier of Severance' from Karia Machelpid, the Grand Duke of Extreme Magic! You know, the thing we saw back then!"
The Barrier of Severance — a consumable item created by the Grand Duke — carried the power to briefly sever its user from the world itself. In simple terms, an item that granted a moment of 'invincibility'. Though it was a somewhat different beast from ordinary invincibility.
Normal invincibility reduced incoming damage to near zero, making any hit meaningless. The Grand Duke's Barrier of Severance, by contrast, essentially made you vanish from the world for a short time.
Sgaredo's bitter cold was fierce enough to pierce even invincibility — but what if its target had simply ceased to exist?
'It can't hit what isn't there!'
With no target to strike, even that killing cold became meaningless. Of course, they would have to drop the barrier to mount a real attack — but they could at least get within range first.
"Ah… the Grand Duke of Extreme Magic, you say?"
"Yes! If it's hard for her to come in person, she can just send the item!"
If the Grand Duke of Extreme Magic herself came, then no matter how strong that dragon was, the raid would be cleared as a matter of course. But having one of the Empire's Swords descend in person was another matter entirely. Leo and the knight order alone were already causing a stir — what if the Eight Swords came too? And not just any of them, but one of the top three among the Eight Swords?
"Hmm."
'Well, I suppose it wouldn't matter much.'
Frankly, Leo wasn't fully a creature of the Empire, but neither was she its enemy. She held an imperial title and lived under it, and even at this very moment she was moving as one of the Empire's Swords.
'I really don't want to fight Miss Lily, though…'
In honest truth, Lily scared her a little more than the Grand Duke of Extreme Magic did. In raw power, the Grand Duke obviously held the advantage.
'Somehow, I just don't feel like I'd lose to her.'
Miss Lily had this strange, stubborn aura — a feeling that she simply would not lose.
"We will reach out to her at once. However, the Grand Duke of Extreme Magic is exceedingly busy, so it will not be easy to—"
"Anything works! Hurry hurry!"
Flap-flap-FLAP!
Her hair turned a brilliant white. The spirit of light wrapped itself around Leo's body, and behind her spread a pair of snow-white nymph wings. High into the sky she soared, and a colossal sword of light took shape in her hand.
"I'll land one hit and come baaack!"
FWOOSH!
The light flew. And then it plummeted.
Sgaredo, the Frozen Bitter Cold — Remaining HP: 84%
The spear flew. Racing alongside the snow-white lance came a roar from Sre's throat, and the spear's charge at last tore through a section of the monster's bulk.
"To the left!"
"Ugh!"
KWAKAKAKAKA!!!
The retaliation came hard on its heels, its sheer scale almost laughable for the damage it had supposedly taken. The blizzard swallowed the Snowy Mountain whole, and the monster, seizing the opening, poured out even more of its authority over bitter cold.
A breath that blanketed the entire mountain.
I swung my spear in a full circle and warped the flow of mana.
KWAAAAAAAH!!!
Everything — everything but me and Sre — was swept away. The rankers who had struggled and clawed their way up this far were annihilated to the last. The damage we'd dealt was pitifully small, and the monster's health still brimmed over.
Sgaredo, the Frozen Bitter Cold — Remaining HP: 78%
Psssshh…
KRRROOOAAR!
I hurled the last of my spears, then turned Sre around.
"Let's pull back."
One week had passed since the raid resumed after a full resupply. And the health we had shaved off amounted to a mere five percent.
The World Boss's remaining health stood at 78 percent. It was being chipped away, steadily if slowly, but the overall picture looked anything but promising.
The various kingdoms, cowed by the overwhelming World Boss — a calamity beyond all reckoning — refused to step forward, and anyone short of a top-tier ranker couldn't even get within reach of it. Leo, who had carved off a full three percent on the first day before dying, seemed to have sensed something, and for a week now she hadn't made another attempt. With Leo standing down, the Empire naturally stood down with her. And Lily herself, no longer burning through power the way she had on day one, had shifted to a conserve-and-chip strategy — so the pace slowed even further.
It was around the time that serious talk of DoEn's ruin — and of the game's operator controversy — began to accelerate.
"…It most certainly will not."
Drak, who had been watching all of it unfold with detached eyes, turned an unsettled gaze upon someone. A woman with hair of deep blue. Beautiful beyond measure, mighty in strength, and — beyond even that — possessed of the means to break this crisis wide open.
And yet.
'Why on earth…'
Talical looked for all the world as though it might come crashing down at any moment. But he knew. Or rather, he could not not know. The mission entrusted to him long ago was what moved him, and never once — not a single time — had the future he beheld been defied.
This time too, even without lifting a finger, Talical would remain safe.
"……"
And yet Drak denied the outcome he had been certain of for centuries.
An inexplicable dread crept over him. Surely that woman was not one to abandon the kingdom to its ruin. She would throw everything she had into holding back the end, and the future he had seen had shown her carrying no new Masterpiece or the like.
So why did he feel this anxious?
Drak looked at her. Her expression seemed faintly sorrowful — and yet, somehow, unmistakably smiling.
"…I suppose there's nothing to be done."