The Ground Groaned
Koo-goong.
Goong.
Tapagol, all of five foot three, swelled in an instant to the height of a high-rise. His body grew heavy, the soft earth caved beneath him, and a crater opened where he stood. He kept growing until even the trees of the forest warped and crumpled around him.
"He looks bigger than before, doesn't he?"
"So it would seem."
For some reason Paranet agreed in a thoroughly cowed voice.
"Power is boiling up in me! Is there nothing here I may smash?"
His voice was so enormous it seemed to roll through the whole forest, and the deep, heavy bass of it only made the echo worse.
"Smash what? Just get back here! Next time there's a chance, I'll call you for sure!"
"Understood."
In a blink, Tapagol returned to his original size.
"Seeing it like this, I really am curious how Gigantification works."
It was an ability worth coveting. If he ever met an enemy too huge to handle and could swell up the way Tapagol did, efficiency aside, it sounded like it would be fun.
"You ought to have a go at Paranet sometime. Even if you both fight until you die, the worst that happens is you get unsummoned. Isn't he the perfect opponent?"
"With Paranet, you say?"
Tapagol did not look particularly pleased by the idea.
"What, you don't want to?"
"Ought one not fight an opponent of matching caliber?"
"What did you say? You, Tapagol! I am as an elder brother to you, and yet..."
Paranet flew into a rage, but Tapagol did not so much as look at him.
"Please summon me when a true crisis arises. On reflection, I have no wish to waste this power on trifles."
"R-right."
The way Tapagol brushed past Paranet's murderous glare without a flicker was honestly impressive.
"Tapagol. Master summoned you to guide the way. And yet you puff yourself up and let your tongue run wild."
"I merely spoke the truth."
Tapagol's eyes flashed, bright and sharp, and even then he refused, to the very end, to give Paranet his gaze.
His personality's changed a little, hasn't it?
Once he had been indifferent. Now he had a temper. It might have been the change that came of growing strong in so short a time, or it might have been the influence of absorbing the King of the Undying.
Provoked by Tapagol, Paranet could not settle his excitement for quite a while.
No wonder he has an area taunt. He's frighteningly good at getting under Paranet's skin.
"Tapagol. You said you only absorbed half the power from the King of the Undying, right?"
"That is correct."
"Then can you take in more?"
"Not at present. He is curled in on himself. I believe an opening will come to me only if I charge him prepared to die."
"Even though you've already taken half?"
"Yes. He clutches what matters most and will not yield it. Should that be taken as well, his very existence would be nullified. What I absorbed amounts to little more than his outer shell. Not the yolk. Not the true core."
"And you got this strong anyway?"
"That Master is surprised pleases me."
"I'm even more pleased than you are."
Tapagol's growth had been something Yujun never expected. He had rarely summoned the golem precisely because there had seemed to be no room left for him to grow. If he had come this far, that changed the conversation entirely.
Just looking at him, he's already stronger than Paranet.
Paranet had grown proficient in the Heavenly Demon Divine Art and made real progress as a fighter, but Tapagol's specs were simply overwhelming. Items might still leave Paranet with the higher raw stats, yet the moment Tapagol gigantified, the fight itself would cease to be a fight. And Tapagol could grow far stronger than this.
The King of the Undying. If he absorbed that thing down to the last scrap, just how strong would he become?
What would have happened if I'd given that book to Paranet?
Yujun shook his head. The odds were high that Paranet would have been devoured by the King of the Undying. He did not possess a will anywhere near as close to perfect as Tapagol's. Even Yujun, who had Equanimity, would have struggled to endure it. Paranet would never have managed. Was this not the same Paranet who, until not long ago, had carried the humiliating nickname of coward?
Looking back now, the book falling into Tapagol's hands had been something very close to heaven's own luck.
"Tapagol, do you know where the Peace Contribution Shop is?"
"I shall search."
Tapagol nodded.
"It seems possible."
"You found it?"
"If I slay a single undead."
"An undead? Why an undead?"
"If I learn the sensation by which Peace Contribution accumulates, I can also locate the shop where it may be spent."
"Hm."
Honestly, he had no idea how that was possible. But if Tapagol said he could do it, then Yujun might as well leave it to him. What else was there to do?
"Wait a moment. I'll check whether there's one nearby."
"I will do it myself. I cannot trouble Master."
Tapagol used Gigantification again. In an instant his eye level rose until it seemed to meet the sky. He glanced about, and then he fired a laser toward a single point in the distance. Yujun had known the golem could shoot lasers from his eyes, but the range had grown. The beam flew a considerable way.
Tapagol released the gigantification.
"It is done."
"What's done?"
"I have obtained a sample. I shall now locate the Peace Contribution Shop."
"All right. I'm counting on you."
Yujun did not understand the principle, but Tapagol would handle the rest. Manuela and Yenil watched him work through it so neatly that expectation kindled in their faces as well. While they waited, Yujun meant to set in order the insights into Swordsmanship he had gained during the event and shape them into theory, but Tapagol found the shop almost at once.
"It lies quite far."
"Where?"
"A place that smells of Demon God Worshippers. A branch of the cult."
"The shop is at a branch? You're sure?"
"Yes. I cannot be certain it is a branch. I am certain the Demon God Worshippers swarm there like insects."
"A place like that would have to be a branch. Or the cult's main body. If you're right, is this a coincidence?"
"I do not know."
Of all the places in the world, a branch of the cult. If the System had intended it, that in itself was suspicious. In that case, the Demon God Worshippers were likely to know the shop's location already. They would be trying to keep other players from using it. Even if they made no effort to bar the way, walking into a place where they gathered was suicide.
"This works out better."
His hands had been itching to use a sword anyway. He also wanted to test the power of Barbarism against enemies he could kill without a second thought. Frankly, few things came with a cleaner justification than killing Demon God Worshippers. From what Tapagol said, the branch sounded fairly large, and a stage of that size would be hard to find.
"Shall we head out now? If the event wore you out, you can rest."
"All we did was eat, sleep, and study. I'm fine."
"I am the same. I am in fine form. There is no need to worry."
"Good. Tapagol, if we go without spatial teleportation, how long will it take?"
"Even if we do not measure by Master's pace, and fly across at the party's speed, it would take a full three days. It lies on the opposite side."
"So we have to use teleportation?"
"We may arrive a short distance from the branch. I do not know the coordinates."
"You don't?"
Without exact coordinates, spatial teleportation could not be used. If the destination happened to overlap something solid, a body could be smashed into paste. Thanks to Tapagol he had one extra life, but throwing that life away on something so stupid would be unbearably hollow.
"Then... we have no choice but to fly there ourselves?"
"Yes. That is so."
"I've got a good idea."
If the problem was that matching Manuela and Yenil's speed would cost them three days, the problem vanished the moment he stopped taking them along. Yujun turned to the two of them.
"I'll go on ahead."
"And then?"
"Wait at the Golden Temple."
Manuela's eyes went wide.
"Oh? That works?"
"Simple, right?"
"Yeah!"
"Yenil, you needed time to study magic anyway. You'll have to come out eventually, but still."
"You have my thanks for the consideration."
"Go on in. I'll be there soon."
Yujun took Manuela and Yenil by the hand himself and left them at the Golden Temple. With no other players and no Demon God Worshippers, there was hardly a safer place. He unsummoned Paranet as well. Now only he and Tapagol remained.
"Come here."
"Yes."
He scooped Tapagol up in his right arm. The golem was a little bulky at his side, but of course he was not heavy.
"We're going. Just tell me the direction."
"I-it is embarrassing, Master."
"Hey. Don't make it weird. Hurry up."
"Due east, for now."
Yujun activated Barbarism and kicked off the ground. He had no intention of flying with a Fly spell. He meant to run, so he could feel what Barbarism actually did.
Crack!
His body shot forward like an arrow. The muscles of his legs swelled as if they might burst, and the unbearable speed bloodshot his eyes. It was not enough strain to harm him, though, and he had no thought of slowing down.
"Master, are you not too fast? If we strike something, I believe I will die."
"I'll show you the limit of speed."
"Your manner of speech is strange."
"That's because I'm faster than anyone."
Even as Tapagol tilted his head, Yujun accelerated, and accelerated again. The scenery around them changed visibly with every second. He burst out of the forest and came face to face with a great host of the undead.
Peace Contribution was better in greater amounts. Undead were better in greater numbers. Experience was better in greater amounts. An experience event was underway at that very moment. Experience lay scattered before his eyes. Peace Contribution lay scattered there too. The moment the thought landed, Yujun drew his sword and plunged into the undead legion.
The undead had not even registered his existence. When a commotion suddenly erupted in the middle of their long formation, they were left blinking in confusion.
Shhk. Crunch.
At first the noise was not so great. Only the sound of something breaking, over and over, until the mages began to cast and the scale of it swelled.
"What is happening."
"One of the living has attacked."
"One, you say."
"Yes."
"Who."
"I do not know."
"I see."
Two liches flew toward the place that had become a shambles. Someone was moving busily inside a pall of smoke. Dozens of undead rushed him and were annihilated in the space of a blink. The living man in the smoke was not even casting, and still the undead were swept away as miserably as leaves before a broom.
"Who is it."
"I do not know."
"Who is that man."
"I do not know either."
One lich bustled about, demanding an identity, and every answer was the same. All the while, countless undead kept surrounding that single figure and vanishing, again and again. The liches gathered and tried to raise the fallen, but for some reason the undead would not return.
"What is going on."
"I do not know."
"Why will they not rise."
"They will not rise for me either. To share the lot of these half-witted liches... it puts me in a foul mood."
The lich lord's situation was no different from the liches'. The undead host fell into chaos. They had been gleeful at the thought of invading a kingdom and occupying it, only to run aground on an obstacle none of them had expected.