#039 Sincerity
#039 Sincerity
"Well, well. You really were remnants of the Demon King Army."
A shocking fact.
The old man who had identified himself as Shax was, as expected, a member of Acedia.
"Master?!"
Lucius stepped in front of me to protect me.
Shax had been aiming his shotgun precisely at me from the start, and powerful magic bullets scattered from within it, targeting me.
An attack aimed precisely at my upper body.
The scattering magic bullets were far more than one or two.
"Tch."
I jabbed my staff into Lucius's side and deployed a barrier.
The black barrier I raised to protect Lucius and me—to protect all four of us—blocked the shotgun pellets along with the other skeletons' attacks.
RATATAT.
Countless weapons blocked by the barrier clattered to the floor.
"Scatter. Begin intercepting individually!"
I withdrew the barrier as soon as the enemy began reloading.
HUP!
Lucius was the first to leap forward, drawing his sword.
He had fiddled with the ring before charging out earlier, but I had not yet given the signal to take it out.
"Uh, th-there?!"
"Don't freeze up—fight!"
"Ah, yes! Yes!"
Morgen, who had failed to grasp the situation, also drew her gun and fired magic bullets at the approaching skeletons.
The skeletons advancing with spears and swords had their spines shattered by the magic bullets and tumbled across the floor.
THWIP-THWIP-THWIP!
The one cutting down enemies fastest was none other than Rosemas.
Without a moment's hesitation, she fired volley after volley at the skeleton archers, and the skeleton archers shooting from range began to fall one after another.
And then.
"How entertaining!"
My opponent was Shax.
More precisely, Lucius and I should have been fighting that black mage together, but Lucius was tied down by the skeleton soldiers.
"What are you so distracted by?"
"......."
Shax aimed the muzzle of his shotgun at me and taunted me.
My staff was pointed at him, but I could not focus on him completely.
"You seem to know a fair bit of magic, but I'm sorry to say the world isn't such a soft place. Heh heh."
"That's my line, Demon King Army trash."
It wasn't that the Demon King Army was trash, nor that the Demon King was trash.
So the insult didn't bother me at all.
"...You insolent wench. How dare you run your mouth."
"You're Acedia, aren't you?"
"Yes. Acedia. And Acedia does not forgive those who speak carelessly of the Demon King."
Clack.
Magic bullets began loading again.
Firing multiple magic bullets in a single shot....
'Wait.'
Just now, the way the mana entered the barrel...?
"Oh, damn...!!"
BANG!
"!!"
I raised a wall in front of me again.
The wall surging up from the floor blocked all of Shax's magic bullets, but....
KABOOM!!
The wall exploded.
I ran toward Morgen, who was within the blast radius, grabbed her, and rolled across the ground.
"Kugh...?!"
"Tch. What a shame. I almost landed a good hit."
The sound of Shax clicking his tongue echoed throughout the cave.
At the same time, the skeletons clattered their jaws, producing sounds as if mocking us.
"To dodge an explosive shot. Truly regrettable."
"You bastard... what kind of black mage are you?!"
Morgen shouted in anger.
Aside from commanding undead, his attacks were on a completely different level from ordinary black mages.
"I am a black mage."
"A black mage, yes. That just now was dark magic, after all."
Right.
It was dark magic.
"Bone Explosion. Corpse explosion."
"Ohh, you know your stuff. To have noticed that. What a shame to kill someone with such sharp eyes."
"I knew from the first shot. Your ammunition... is corpses."
Corpse explosion (屍爆).
Literally a spell that detonates parts of corpses. During the war five hundred years ago, they had fought by exploding actual corpses.
But why was it coming out of a shotgun?
Because the ammunition he fired was anything but ordinary.
"That shotgun—does it fire bones?"
"Precisely."
The shotgun Shax held had a remarkably wide bore.
I would have to dissect it to understand the principle by which the ammunition flew out, but these countless skeletons were both his summoned beasts and....
"Bones, you see, look soft, but they're actually quite strong, you know?"
Ammunition.
"Processing and firing them is fine too, but if you just pluck them out like this...."
He pulled a finger off a nearby skeleton and shoved it into the magazine.
"And launch something shaped like a bullet, you can kill any number of enemies."
Clack, clack, clack.
A grotesque twisting sound echoed from within, and Shax aimed the muzzle at me once more.
"You seem to know a fair amount about us. Who are you, and where do you come from?"
"What would you do if you knew?"
"I'd find out where such an insolent woman came from. A woman who dares to speak the Demon King's revered name carelessly and even curse it—you."
"......."
I was cursing myself with my own name, so why was he getting so worked up about it?
"Is it a crime to speak the Demon King's name?"
"No. Speaking the revered name of the great Belphegor is never wrong. But what did you say?"
"Son of a bitch."
Bang!
He pulled the trigger without warning.
I thrust my staff forward—
CLANG—!
The bone bullet Shax fired ricocheted off something and flew away.
"Are you all right?"
"...Oh."
It was Lucius.
Lucius had angled his blade to deflect the bone bullet, redirecting it toward the ceiling.
"Impressive."
"Thank you, Master."
Perhaps envious of how I had deflected Rosemas's arrow last time, he had deflected Shax's bone bullet with concise speed.
His speed, stamina, and strength were the physical prowess of a Holy Sword Hero, but deflecting an enemy attack at precisely the right moment was clearly an encouraging achievement.
"You... well, it doesn't matter."
SNAP.
Shax plucked another finger from a skeleton.
"If not fingers, then toes. If not those, then vertebrae. I can just fire those."
"Why not fire your own bones instead of flinging around the bones of innocent dead people?"
"...You insolent—"
Shax's expression twisted.
"Ah. Are you too old, so if you pulled your own, you'd only get bone powder?"
"You run that hole in your face without a care!"
"Well, it's a hole, not sealed shut, isn't it?"
"You insolent—!"
Shax erupted in fury.
His muzzle was aimed solely at me.
That was a good thing.
If his gaze was fixed on me, he wouldn't notice anyone else's movements.
"I intended to leave your form intact, but that's not happening now! I will definitely kill you!"
"That's my line."
Three, two, one.
"Haaap!"
Without me even needing to say anything, Rosemas, who had gathered a great deal of mana, dropped to one knee and fired a wind arrow toward the ceiling.
"What?!"
Because his attention had been drawn to me, Shax hadn't noticed.
That was clearly a fatal mistake, and the wind arrow Rosemas shot into the ceiling rose up and became a circular cloud.
"Arrow Rain!"
THWIP-THWIP-THWIP!!
At the same moment, countless wind arrows began pouring from the cloud.
The arrows raining in every direction shattered the skeletons' vertebrae in an instant, preventing them from rising again.
"...Huh."
"That was amazing, Rosemas!"
"...Hmph."
At Lucius's sincere admiration, Rosemas smiled faintly.
Perhaps that was the first genuine compliment Lucius had ever given Rosemas in all their conversations.
Or maybe not.
"N-now the tide has turned! Demon Shax! Throw down your weapon and surrender peacefully!"
With the tide turned, Morgen's confidence surged as she aimed her gun at Shax.
The little pistol was several times smaller than the shotgun, but the tide of battle was far more in our favor.
"Hm, surrender, is it."
Shax's muzzle was still aimed at me.
"How absurd. I'm simply dealing with intruders who barged into my home, and you speak of surrender?"
"Because you're Acedia."
"Ha."
Shax merely laughed as if dumbfounded.
Because of that laugh, I couldn't let my guard down.
"Do you think I'm at a disadvantage right now?"
"Aren't you?"
"Not in the slightest."
CREAK, CREAK.
From somewhere, mechanical sounds began to echo.
"I'd already won from the start."
Soon, the cave walls began to blur.
As if drawing back a black curtain, the darkness that had looked like walls vanished, and the things within began to reveal themselves one by one.
"What... is that?"
"...Automatons? No, how can there be this many automatons...?"
Automatons different from the Killing Spiders were spread out in every direction.
Each automaton aimed a shotgun-like muzzle at us, and each one was accompanied by a skeleton behind it.
Those skeletons were clearly meant to operate those killing machines while also serving as ammunition.
"If I so much as twitch a finger here, every last one of you dies."
"......."
Morgen's face went pale, and Rosemas's gaze naturally turned toward Lucius.
And Lucius sent me a look, asking for permission.
Now was the time to show the Holy Sword's power—
No.
'I mustn't let him come to rely on the Holy Sword.'
The Holy Sword was truly a last resort.
Wanting to use the Holy Sword just because things got a little hard was childishness.
Even if Lucius was one thing, the other companions couldn't be allowed to rely on the Holy Sword either.
You could say that hoarding something until it went to waste was foolish, but using the Holy Sword when there were plenty of other ways to handle the situation was excessive.
'It seems I'll have to show a bit of my own power.'
Maybe it was time to reveal just a little of my true strength.
"Lucius. Rosemas. Come to me for a moment."
"Yes, Master."
"What method...?"
"It's simple."
Leaning my body against Rosemas, I reached out toward Lucius.
"Rosemas. Just hold my body for a moment. Understood? Lucius, you...."
I gripped Lucius's hand tightly.
"From now on, something a little frightening is going to happen. But still—you trust me, right?"
"...Master."
Lucius gripped my hand tightly, his face full of conviction.
"I trust you."
"Good."
Possession.
I transferred my consciousness into Lucius's body.
And I knew instantly.
As expected, this body.
'It's perfect.'
It was perfect for me to possess and use.
"...Where is this?"
"It's the mental world, Lucius."
"......Master?"
Lucius saw.
A beauty who looked as if Witch Bel had matured by ten more years.
"Do you mind if I use your body a little roughly for a moment?"