Wrapped in Shields, He Charged Straight In...

Wrapped in shields, Yujun charged straight in — and tilted his head, face blank with bewilderment.

"Why isn't there anything here?"

The wide cavern held nothing at all.

"Yujun! Stealth was their whole specialty, remember? What if the boss monster's hiding too?"

"Fooling my senses?"

Honestly, he didn't think so. But if something really was concealed here, its stealth would have to be nothing short of extraordinary. He drew his focus tight ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and reached for the skill.

Something faint. A presence flickered at the very edge of perception, appearing and vanishing, just beyond his grasp.

There's definitely something here.

Manuela's guess had been right. And yet even with Super Concentration, he still couldn't pin the thing down? The realization threw him, if only a little. All the more reason to prepare thoroughly, just in case. He layered roughly eight shields around himself and waited, every sense honed to a knife's edge.

Whatever it was, it showed no inclination to rush him first. Something he took for the boss monster simply prowled the cavern in every direction, wholly absorbed in staying hidden.

Yujun drew up his mana. Magic was the surest way to strip stealth away.

"You all wait outside."

"Yeah."

"If you've got lightning magic ready, feel free to cast it with me."

"Perfect! I've been drilling one like mad lately."

Crackle. Hiss. Zzzt. Lightning flooded the cavern.

It wasn't a spell of overwhelming raw power, but its range was vast — loosed inside the cavern, it would leave the boss monster nowhere to flee. And this was Yujun, a man who reaped the benefit of every item imaginable. The magic he unleashed could not possibly be weak.

Cast the very same spell as any other mage, and the gulf in power was heaven and earth. To say his Fireball struck with the force of an ordinary mage's Meteor would be no exaggeration at all.

By that measure, even Thunder Wave ought to have dealt more than enough damage... and yet the thing hiding in the cavern took the blast and still refused to show itself. Common sense held that once concentration broke, stealth weakened with it. Had the spell failed to deal any damage whatsoever? Absurd.

A being whose presence he could not feel. He had never imagined such a thing could exist. Once, perhaps. Not now. Even with Barbarism and Super Concentration both active, he still could ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠not pinpoint the creature.

Is detection systematically impossible?

Being unable to locate his opponent, in a space of this modest size, left him at a brutal disadvantage. Push with raw magical firepower, though, and the dungeon itself might come down.

The one mercy was that the thing couldn't readily show itself either. It seemed to have a rough grasp of just how strong he was. Reveal itself before him, and it would die. Everyone present already knew that.

Yujun tightened his grip on the sword and swept his surroundings, on guard. He could feel it moving, constantly. He simply didn't know where. Swing at the wrong place here, and he would only be handing it an opening — so he began to slash wildly through empty air.

If it can't come because there's no opening, then I'll show it one.

But the boss monster's patience was beyond imagining. Quite some time passed, and still it did not strike.

"I lose."

Yujun cut Super Concentration short, and called the next skill.

He made a modest thirty blades. Any more would have been an excessive investment — thirty alone already felt as if they packed the space full. Dozens of swords, each bearing an attack power of 89,900,000, wheeled through the air like acrobats. Their edge was so keen that to say a mere graze meant death was no exaggeration whatsoever.

Paranet, who had come into the cavern with him, bolted for the exit in a hurry. Commanding that many blades with perfect freedom, Yujun drove a sword into every spot where even a faint presence brushed his senses. He repeated the process several times. Every time, the blades cut nothing but air.

"Oh, come on."

Irritation was starting to climb. Yujun slammed a fist into the wall.

"Huuergh!"

"Huh? What was that?"

A scream rang through the entire cavern.

"Not a ghost, though."

There was none of the bone-deep eeriness of a ghost's wail. He struck the wall again, and this time he put more strength behind it. The blow landed with a boom.

"Aaaagh!"

He heard it clearly. And it wasn't coming from any single place. The sound seemed to rise from the cavern itself.

Right. Something had felt off from the start. No matter how he chased the traces, they never came to an end. And the notion that something could move fast enough to fool his senses while only faintly betraying its presence — honestly, it didn't hold together.

Even if someone were dead set on hiding their body, it was fair to say they could not deceive his senses. For that to be possible, the other side's stats would have to overwhelmingly eclipse his Agility. Yujun's Agility was not merely high. He possessed sensory abilities as well, and Super Concentration and Barbarism on top of that.

If the boss room itself was the boss monster, that would change everything.

No wonder he hadn't caught on. Who would ever imagine the boss room was the boss monster? The walls looked like perfectly ordinary packed earth. Of course, he still couldn't be sure.

In the very instant he raised his ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠sword to stab the wall, the wall heaved violently, and yellow liquid jetted out from between tiny points. The stench was beyond imagination. Yujun's face twisted, and he fell back. A sticky fluid clung to his shield. If that had touched his body...

He hauled his mana up to the brim. Unaware the boss monster was this place itself, he had been holding his magic in check for fear the cave would collapse — but there was no need for that anymore. Whether the cave came down or not, he couldn't say. Taking this boss, though, seemed to be the kind of fight where he would have to accept that much.

Whether or not it sensed what he intended, the boss monster resisted with violent force. The earthen floor beneath his feet reared up and flung him toward the ceiling.

An ordinary mage would have had the casting forcibly canceled, mana lashing back in a vicious backlash. Yujun was no ordinary mage. For one whose will itself became magic, the jolt did him no harm at all. From the hand not gripping his sword, a colossal orb of flame and Chain Lightning tore free, braided together.

Combining magic was supposed to take elemental affinity into account, but Yujun could force the union regardless. Lightning screamed, and a tremendous explosion filled the cavern.

"Grrraaaaaagh!"

The entire cave seemed to scream in agony, a resonance so deep and low it might have come from the stone itself.

Whoa. Its body might be even bigger than I thought.

His ears weren't merely ringing. His eardrums ached. The cave was sturdier than he had expected.

I thought it was done for... was it just milking the pain? And how big is this thing, anyway?

He could hardly claim to have explored the whole cave. There seemed to be something more beyond the cavern.

"Kuoohhhhh!"

This time it was less a scream than a roar of rage. A massive shockwave — he couldn't even tell where it had come from — crashed over the party. The barrier he had raised beforehand held it back, but the wave had been so fierce that cracks spidered through that sturdy ward.

"...That was close."

He landed without so much as a stagger and drove his sword into the earth.

An insight born of his Barbarian state. His Swordsmanship had advanced a great deal, and still this was the first time he had ever called on Weapon Earthquake. He didn't spare a thought for what came after. He unleashed the skill at full power.

The ground groaned, and a tremendous vibration tore outward in dozens, then hundreds of branching lines. It was a skill that spared allies any harm — and yet Manuela, Yenil, Paranet, and even Tapagol all flopped flat onto the floor. The shaking was simply too violent to keep their footing. Only Yujun remained upright, perfectly steady.

"M-Master! We are quite all right, are we not?"

Paranet asked, visibly startled. Yujun nodded.

"If it looks dangerous, just run for the Golden Temple. Nothing to worry about."

"Grrraaaaaaah!"

Its lifeline was absurdly tough. Maybe because the body was so enormous. He couldn't begin to gauge how big the thing was. The one fortunate point was that, amid all this chaos, the creatures that reeked of filth had yet to appear.

Scarcely had the thought formed before a massive volume of liquid erupted from the cracking walls. As if a dam impounding ten million tons of water had simply ceased to exist, an incredible quantity burst free. In an instant the cavern was flooded with the fluid. Yujun raised a second magical barrier inside the first and watched. The yellowish liquid was weaker than the shockwave — endurable.

"Kuoooh!"

"What?"

"I-I think it's moving?"

The boss monster they had taken for a cavern began to move. It wasn't the feeling of the ground itself shifting. It rose. A familiar sensation, as if they were aboard an airplane.

Behemoth? That's a name from the Bible.

But wasn't this far too large for that? He had always known the Behemoth as a monster of the land. No — until now, he hadn't even known whether it truly existed. And yet here it was, flying. At a tremendous speed, no less.

"Manuela, do you know anything about the Behemoth?"

"Never heard of it..."

"Yenil, you?"

"I have never heard of it either."

"Really?"

Strange. On Earth it was a being of myth, mentioned now and then in all manner of forms. And yet the people living on the very Continent where the Behemoth had appeared didn't know its name.

Well, by that logic, orcs and elves existing doesn't make much sense either.

Yujun decided to talk it over with the party — how to handle this.

"Pulling back to the Golden Temple would be premature, right?"

"I think we should watch for now!"

"Harp. Why do you think that?"

"The Behemoth might be heading for the gate, you know? Then we wouldn't have to go around ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠searching for a gate to Caesar."

"Caesar? That place they called the paradise of Giant Monsters?"

"Yes!"

"Won't it be dangerous?"

"It's fine! If it's you, Dad, you'll beat them all! And the stronger the enemy, the faster you'll get stronger. Oh — and I'll get stronger right along with you!"

"So you're saying we should go, for the sake of my growth?"

"Yes!"

"All right. What do the rest of you think?"

At Yujun's question, Manuela thought it over, then spoke.

"If it's a new place none of us have ever been, we might get our hands on all sorts of unusual crafting materials, don't you think? ...I think it'd be fun!"

"I have no particular thoughts. I formed a contract with you, so I shall follow."

Having won Yenil's agreement as well, Yujun smiled and nodded.

There was no guarantee the Sky Behemoth was bound for Caesar, but he decided to trust Harp's instinct this once. He himself doubted the creature was simply flying with nowhere to go. Meanwhile, the Behemoth's bodily fluids that had filled the cavern drained away completely. Had taking to the sky simply left it no attention to spare for this place? It was suspicious, the way it had suddenly stopped attacking the intruders inside its own body.

Hit it once more, and would it suddenly crash?

The thought flickered through him, but it seemed he would only lose out, so he let it go.

"Well, there's nothing to do while we're stuck in here, so let's go take a look."

The place he pointed to was a hole large enough for even Paranet to pass through with ease. The space beyond the cavern.