Out of His Depth
Even without deploying the Absolute Ring Set, Berick had fallen for a purely verbal taunt with pathetic ease, roaring in fury.
"Awoooooooo—!"
"I'll kill you! Stanashila Aljeeeen! I'm going to rip that insolent mouth of yours to shreds!"
Hearing the beast's deafening howl layered directly over Berick's shrieking voice made it nearly impossible to tell what he was saying. For that matter, was Berick actually controlling that colossal creature, or what? Honestly, with the way the monster wolf looked like it had swallowed him whole, leaving only his upper torso protruding from its brow, the entire spectacle was inducing some serious cognitive dissonance.
"Pheeew..."
I exhaled a thick plume of cigarette smoke and glanced sidelong across the battlefield.
"Gwahahaha!"
"Graaaarrrgh!"
"Spill their blood! Hack their flesh to pieces!"
"A warrior's only road is atop the edge of a blade! Glory awaits in the death match!"
Whether a divine-grade giant wolf had manifested or not, the barbarian warriors were completely berserk, their eyes rolled back in ecstasy as they tore into the werewolves. Still, they were no longer holding onto the overwhelming, one-sided advantage they had commanded earlier. The moment Stanasila Berick burst onto the scene, the attention of our Master-rank powerhouses had been sharply divided.
"...Latipi."
"Yes, Lord Aljen! Give me your command!"
The moment I called her name, Latipi dropped to one knee. Her large, doe-like eyes sparkled with anticipation, and her long elven ears twitched eagerly. She clearly saw this as her golden opportunity to prove her worth, practically vibrating with enthusiasm.
"Can you hit the bastard stuck in that giant wolf's forehead?"
"That is an easy task!"
"...Easy, you say?"
I cast a skeptical glance toward the mountain-sized beast. Given the staggering distance between us, Berick's head jutting out of the wolf's brow looked barely larger than a grain of millet.
"Naturally! If you desire it, I can strike him down this very second!"
"Ho... Impressive, Latipi."
"Y-You flatter me excessively!"
When I gently stroked her soft blonde hair, Latipi's cheeks flushed crimson. A giddy, bashful smile broke across her lips as her long ears twitched and fluttered with delight.
"Then I'm counting on you. Put some real weight into it."
"Yes, Master!"
Nocking an arrow without a heartbeat's delay, Latipi drew the bowstring back in a single, picture-perfect motion. The wooden limbs groaned under terrifying strain, bending to an angle that looked ready to snap. Yet despite the monstrous draw weight bearing down, not a single muscle in her slender frame trembled.
"An arrow! Do you truly believe a mere arrow could harm me? How foolish, Aljen! You still have no inkling of the power I have attained!"
Berick's frivolous, mocking laughter drifted across the plains, but neither Latipi nor I paid his posturing the slightest heed.
Whoooooosh—!
"Oh..."
The next instant, a stupendous storm of aura and spirit mana converged upon the nocked arrow. A miniature vortex spun violently around her boots, as though she had momentarily become the very axis of the world.
"...Hup!"
The moment she held her breath, the arrow vanished into thin air, rocketing forward so fast it shrank into a microscopic dot.
...KBOOOOOM!
"Whoa...!"
Wait, it hadn't flown in silence—it was just moving so impossibly fast that the sonic boom only caught up an instant later. I nearly lost my footing from the concussive shockwave, but Muriel caught me from behind in a secure, practiced embrace.
How the hell could a simple wooden bow unleash that kind of cataclysmic force? Seriously, there were far too many freaks in this world who treated the laws of physics like polite suggestions.
"Gahahahaha! Futile! Utterly futile! Did you think a pitiful trick like that could touch someone like me?!"
Hearing that boastful shout, I looked back toward the beast. Right before Berick's brow, a violent clash of raw energies was unfolding. A shimmering barrier forged of an ominous, inverted holy power was grinding against Latipi's maximally reinforced arrow, showering sparks that illuminated the sky even from this distance.
"Hmm..."
So it wasn't a conceptual authority or an invulnerability gimmick—he was just brute-forcing a barrier with compressed energy. It was hard to tell whether that grotesque energy was demonic mana or inverted divine aura, but as long as it wasn't a true Divine Authority, it didn't really matter.
"Hrrrngh!"
With a guttural heave, Berick deflected the spent arrow. His eyes blazed with wrath as he glared in our direction. Following his gaze, the colossal wolf rolled its crimson pupils toward us, wrinkling its snout and baring fangs like jagged stalactites.
"Is the elf beside you another Master? What absurd luck you possess! To have gathered three Masters beneath your banner already! I suppose that wench was your hidden trump card!"
"...Huh?"
I tilted my head, blinking at him. We were far apart, making it difficult to read subtle micro-expressions, but that smug, pompous smirk plastered across his face was an absolute spectacle.
"Stunned because your little strike was thwarted? I don't blame you! Even an Emperor would struggle to deflect an attack of that caliber! You had every right to be confident! However... hehehe...!" Berick chuckled low in his throat, overflowing with intoxicating delusion, his lips curling into a manic sneer. "Against the current me, such parlor tricks are laughably inadequate! Mortal standards no longer apply to my existence! I have transcended humanity! Hahahaha! Allow me to deliver a prophecy in place of a false prophet like you! Despair shall be your only harvest! Every scheme and weapon you muster will amount to nothing! In the end, you shall fall beneath my heel and beg for your wretched life!"
"Ha... Look at you, all puffed up. Berick, do you honestly think you can handle three Master-rank fighters?"
"Does it defy your belief?! Naturally, it would! Even I can scarcely fathom the terrifying heights of my current power! Tremble with your own eyes as you behold it! Witness just how strong I have become! See the majesty I have seized!"
The moment his pompous rant concluded, the mountain-sized wolf threw its massive muzzle toward the heavens.
─AWOOOOOOOOO—!!
"Not this again...!"
A tempest of raw conceptual presence swept across the earth, shaking the ground beneath our boots. I gritted my teeth and braced myself against the shockwave, but the sheer metaphysical pressure was enough to send thin trails of blood trickling from my nose and eyes.
"...That roar is quite troublesome. And there is no conventional way to deflect it," Muriel murmured, stepping forward. "Lord Aljen, would it not be prudent to take shelter inside the carriage?"
"Ha. Muriel, do you honestly think I'd crawl inside just because you told me to?"
"Haaah... Truthfully, I expected nothing less." Muriel gently dabbed away the blood from my face with a silk handkerchief, her eyebrows arching in mild reprimand. "Honestly. You behave worse than an unruly child."
Her unexpectedly petulant pout coaxed an involuntary chuckle from my lips.
"Ngh...!"
"Urgh..."
"Ah."
This wasn't the time to be loafing around. Jolted back to reality by the groans behind me, I turned to check on Vivian and Arpe. Fortunately, neither was critically injured, though blood was streaming freely from both their noses and ears from the roar's concussive weight.
"...Muriel. Escort Vivian into the carriage."
"Understood."
"I-I'm fine! Orabeo—hic...!" Vivian clamped her mouth shut mid-sentence, stealing anxious, hesitant glances at me. It was frustrating enough to make me sigh, but now wasn't the time to lecture her.
"It's an order from your party leader. If that beast howls like that again, you'll just be wasting stamina for no reason. Get inside."
"...Yes..."
Deflated, Vivian gave a subdued nod and trudged unsteadily toward the carriage.
"Allow me to assist you, Lady Vivian." Muriel swiftly moved forward, supporting the young girl into the reinforced cabin.
"Lord Aljen, what about me?"
"Arpe, you might need to step up shortly, so stay on standby."
"Ugh... But I'm bleeding, too!"
"You'll live. A little nosebleed won't kill you."
"Isn't that blatant favoritism?! Absolute favoritism! No matter if she's your little sister, how can you treat an Imperial Princess like this?! If I weren't your friend, you'd have been executed for lèse-majesté ten times over by now!"
"Yeah, yeah. I hear you."
"Oooogh, you are insufferable...!"
Ignoring Arpe's indignant whining, I swept my gaze back over the battlefield.
"Gwaaaaarrrgh!"
"Kieeeeh!"
Perhaps emboldened by the giant wolf's roar, the werewolf horde grew noticeably more savage, driving the barbarian line backward with violent ferocity. Even with Tsarkhella fighting at full throttle without holding back her lightning—unlike our other concealed Masters—our side was gradually losing ground as a whole.
Is that roar a Divine Authority...?
Or maybe it was just an overpowering broad-spectrum buff. Given that the giant wolf was likely Kubel's physical avatar, an authentic Divine Authority wasn't out of the question, but if Berick was the one in the driver's seat, the odds of him wielding true divinity were slim. Still, we couldn't rule out the possibility entirely... Well, whatever. When the enemy commander was an idiot who couldn't even tally how many Master-rank combatants were standing on the field, his defeat was already written in stone.
"Gwahahahaha! Reduced to bleeding from every orifice just from a beast's roar?! Pathetic! Utterly weak, Stanashila Aljen!"
"Phew... Making your own younger sister bleed and laughing about it. Your personality really is irredeemable dogshit, Berick."
Sneering at him under my breath, I focused my consciousness entirely into the Absolute Ring Set.
"So, how long are you going to stand up there giggling to yourself? Long-distance banter is fun and all, but since you talked such a big game, shouldn't you be charging in by now?"
"...What?"
It seemed he had been expecting me to cower in terror, shivering in despair. Just how high on his own fumes was this guy that he assumed reality would dance to his delusions? Looking at him was almost pitiful. Then again, I supposed it made sense. A mortal suddenly gaining the reins to a god's... well, a dead god's corpse would probably make anyone giddy with power. Still, letting him prance around unchecked was another matter entirely.
"Shut up. And get down here."
The moment I channeled my intent into the Absolute Taunt Ring, a razor-thin filament of crimson energy pierced straight through spatial distance, sinking deep into the mountain-sized wolf.
─GRRAAAAAAAAGH!!
─Wh-What?! What is this?! Why can't I—! S-Stop! Halt! It is not time to charge yet!!
Panic seized Berick as he desperately ground his teeth, fighting with all his might to rein the monster in. But the giant wolf's eyes burned with rabid, unbridled bloodlust, fixating squarely upon me as it thundered forward in a mad dash.
...One body, but two separate consciousnesses?
Tilting my head at the absurd sight, a faint smirk tugged at my lips as I sent an instantaneous tactical command through telepathic transmission.
—Everyone, get ready. The moment my counter lands, dump all your firepower into it at once. Arpe, prepare your buffs.
—Understood.
—Leave it to me!
—Repositioning immediately.
Listening to the sharp acknowledgments echoing in my mind, I tilted my chin up toward the incoming monstrosity.
Fwoooosh!
The wolf barrelled toward me shrouded in a tempest of sickening, inverted energy. The sheer kinetic momentum was breathtaking, like watching an out-of-control industrial excavator tearing down a hillside.
─KWOOOOOOOH!!
─I said stop, damn youuuu!! He shouldn't be allowed to die this easily!!
Accompanied by Berick's frantic shrieks, the wolf's jaws unhinged wide enough to swallow a manor whole, plunging straight down to grind me to dust. At that split second, the violet radiance of the Absolute Evasion Ring erupted around my body.
Skrrrrt! Craaackle!
Accompanied by that bizarre, rubbery sound effect that never failed to feel uncanny, my limbs and spine warped into an unnatural, impossible curve, effortlessly slipping right through the trajectory of the earth-shattering fangs.
─Wh-What...?!
Berick's face froze in utter bewilderment, his smug certainty that I was about to be obliterated shattering instantly.
"Double the return."
KABOOOOOOOOOM!!
The moment the ink-black energy of the Absolute Counter Ring detonated, the mountain-sized wolf was violently repelled backward—at exactly twice the speed and kinetic force it had charged in with.
─GYAAAAAAAAGH?!
Watching Berick let out an unsightly shriek as he tumbled through the air, I barked a telepathic command to the rest of the retinue.
—Now! Unleash everything!
"Hyaaaaaap!"
"Hup!"
"Haaah!"
Leading the charge with blazing fervor, Rebecca lunged forward, flanked instantly by Muriel, Nemeth, Wendy, Lira, and Cacciola. The radiant light of their Aura Blades elongated and whipped out like lethal scythes of pure energy, carving into the colossal wolf's exposed frame. Simultaneously, another spirit-infused arrow from Latipi streaked through the air, aimed dead center at Berick's skull.
─Krrgh...?! Wh-What the hell is this...?!
"Oh... Not bad."
Astonishingly, Berick managed to deflect the onslaught. He was wheezing and gasping for breath as if his lungs were on fire, but parrying the synchronized assault of seven Master-rank combatants simultaneously was undeniably an incredible feat.
─G-Gwaaaaah!
CLAAAANG!
Unleashing a violent burst of inverted divine energy, Berick blew back the converging Aura Blades and shattered the oncoming arrow, frantically forcing the wolf's massive body back onto its paws with a look of pure panic.
─Wh-What is this?! How?! How are there this many Masters here?!
"Tell me about it. One thing led to another, and here we are."
─Kgh...!
Looking like he had just had a bucket of ice water dumped over his head, the intoxicating high of absolute power evaporated, leaving Berick staring wide-eyed at harsh reality. His frantic gaze darted left and right, desperately hunting for an escape route.
"Arpe. Deploy the Open Birdcage."
"Yes!"
Without a moment's hesitation, Princess Arpe produced the cube-shaped artifact from her robes and triggered its mechanism. Instantly, the surrounding fabric of space warped and stretched like warm taffy, expanding into an infinite, enclosed pocket dimension.
─What in the heavens is this now...?!
"No running away, dear brother. It's been so long since we last met—shouldn't we spend some quality family time together?"
─You bastard...! STANASHILA ALJE—EEEEN!!
Berick's furious, hysterical scream reverberated like thunder across the artificial domain. Listening to his impotent rage was music to my ears, and a broad, radiant grin spread across my face.
"Whoa... That is an exceptionally evil expression on your face..."
I decided to pretend I didn't hear Arpe muttering beside me.