Chapter 185: The Tin Knight and The World Inside The Library (5) +Illustration Added
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 185: The Tin Knight and The World Inside The Library (5) +Illustration Added
If they defeated Gale and reached the Normal Ending, Dorothea and her companions would have to shoulder the burden of the guardian in her stead.
But if they lost to Gale and reached the Bad Ending, that would be just as nonsensical.
“What kind of ridiculous rule is this?”
“I doubt the will of the book wishes to hear the word ‘ridiculous’ from you lot, who are the very embodiment of the word. So why don’t you just play along?”
Despite Gale’s chiding, Dorothea remained defiant.
“A game is only meaningful when both parties agree to enjoy it. You abduct people who enter the library and then expect them to play fair? Just because you’re made of paper, did you crumple up your conscience too?”
“Well, I can’t exactly defend that part.”
Though she agreed, Gale did not back down.
Dorothea’s eyes narrowed.
“So you’re really going to do this?”
“But this is a rare opportunity, isn’t it? A stage where I can fight without worrying about prying eyes or outside interference.”
Tap!
A sharp sound echoed as Gale struck the ground with the cane in her hand.
Whereas Dorothea’s wooden staff was long and heavy, the classic image of a wizard’s staff, Gale’s metal cane was shorter and more elegant.
Combined with her hat and a tailcoat that seemed to have been modified, she looked just like a magician on a stage.
“Shall we dance, Dorothea?”
“Tsk.”
Dorothea scowled but couldn’t bring herself to refuse outright.
Beside Dorothea and Gale, the Tin Knight and the White Knight had stepped forward at some point and were now facing each other.
[The Tin Knight is burning with fighting spirit ahead of the tag-team match!]
Seeing his obvious excitement, Dorothea sighed and scratched her head.
“Fine. I’ll play along, but you have to help me with something later.”
“Help you? Of course.”
“…It feels weird for me to say this, but shouldn’t you ask what it is first? What will you do if I ask you to hand over the sacred treasure on your foot, regardless of who wins?”
“A witch is always true to her contract. You don’t seem like the type to use this for vicious extortion. And well, if I’m wrong, I’ll humbly accept that my judgment was flawed.”
“Still such an idealist.”
Letting out a sigh, Dorothea readjusted her grip on her staff.
Then, without looking back, she spoke.
“Adel, Sophia. Stay out of this one. But if anyone else tries to interfere, stop them.”
“Ah, yes!”
“Understood.”
Adelaide and Sophia retreated.
The soldiers and animals in the audience held their breath.
The king and queen watched from their thrones with wide eyes.
The being who had prepared this stage, the stage itself, trembled lightly.
And then.
The Tin Knight and the White Knight leaped.
The White Knight struck first.
It was a natural move, as the reach of his spear was nearly twice the length of the Tin Knight’s sword.
A straight, fast thrust that tore through the air.
The Tin Knight raised his shield to block the attack, but a deafening clang erupted the moment the shield and spearhead met.
Kaaaaang!
“……!”
Adelaide, who had stepped back to watch the duel, widened her eyes.
Normally, the Tin Knight’s strategy would have been to deflect such a thrust with his shield and then close the distance to the enemy’s chest. This time, however, the Tin Knight’s body was pushed back a full step.
It wasn’t that his deflection had failed.
It was just that the force of the thrust was so overwhelming that the remaining power alone was enough to push the Tin Knight back.
And as if that were only the beginning, the White Knight’s follow-up attacks rained down on the Tin Knight.
KABOOM!
It was an offensive that lacked neither power nor speed.
The spear’s trajectory was straightforward, with no particular tricks or feints, but that was precisely why each and every blow was incredibly heavy and perfectly precise, with no wasted motion.
With every exchange, the Tin Knight was pushed back, and the mere aftershocks of his deflections carved great scars into the earth.
But, to put it another way, that was all.
Despite facing a stronger and faster opponent, not a single scratch appeared on the Tin Knight’s body.
The finesse to handle mana. The flow from one exchange to the next. The psychological warfare to restrict and guide the opponent’s moves.
The White Knight’s hardware was undoubtedly superior to the Tin Knight’s, but the Tin Knight’s experience and skill prevented his opponent from easily gaining the upper hand.
No, on the contrary, he began to slowly tip the scales in his own favor.
[The Tin Knight says he’s starting to see the pattern!]
Kaaang!
The full step he had been pushed back was reduced to half a step.
Then he held his ground, and on the next exchange, he actually advanced.
And not just by a single step, but enough to instantly close the distance and get inside the White Knight’s range.
Slash!
A large gash appeared on his chest, but the White Knight remained unfazed.
Instead, as if he had expected this much, he calmly created distance and swung his spear again.
The two mana-infused weapons clashed.
*
Dorothea’s party had collected a total of four of the kingdom’s sacred treasures.
The Key of Opium, which could open any lock.
The Chalice of Tuberose, which allowed one to see what was normally unseeable.
The Belt of Amaryllis, which enhanced the wearer’s overall physical abilities.
The Gloves of Haider, which could store all sorts of items.
And of these, the one that had most dramatically boosted Dorothea’s power was, without a doubt, the last one.
As Dorothea swung her hand, dozens of animal carcasses fell from the empty air.
Most of the fresh corpses, which had barely begun to decay, were wolves, but among them were also large birds and bears.
When the dark mana of necromancy touched the carcasses she had collected during her travels, they rose as if granted new life.
Perhaps because they weren’t just bare bones or bodies roughly formed from mana like usual, they looked so intact that one might believe they had been resurrected, save for a slight sense of unease.
Grrrrrrr!
The pack of several dozen undead faithfully followed their master’s will and charged toward their enemy.
Gale did not move.
On one side were beasts enhanced by necromancy; on the other, a small, slender girl.
The outcome seemed obvious.
Necromancers specialize in debuffs through various poisons and curses, and in wars of attrition using the undead.
Alchemists excel at pure physical attacks more than any other school by using material transformation.
Wizards can freely manipulate the elements and are unmatched in wide-scale destruction.
So what about Enchantresses?
Some would say they were a school not suited for combat.
While they were unparalleled in crafting magic tools, they had few means of directly attacking or destroying things, so they were considered inferior in direct combat, though they could serve in a support role from the rear.
This assessment wasn’t entirely off the mark.
Indeed, most Enchantresses were either novices in combat or were limited to enhancing their familiars with various enchantment spells.
But some Enchantresses thought differently.
“—If all we can do is enhance and support, why not just enhance ourselves?”
CRUNCH!
The head of a wolf, filled with vicious killing intent, was crushed, snout, teeth, and all.
It wasn't caused by a massive heavy weapon, nor by an attack spell.
It happened simply because Gale had swung the cane in her hand downward.
What followed was a festival of one-sided violence.
Thwack! Crack! Crunch! Splat!
Each time Gale took a step as if dancing, the surrounding undead collapsed like background dancers.
The power of each blow was so brutal that the undead bodies felt like water balloons filled with blood.
Of course, Dorothea wasn’t just standing by and watching.
Clink. Clatter-clatter-clatter.
With a sound like clear jade beads, several green orbs rolled to Gale’s feet.
The next moment, they exploded with intense mana.
KABOOOOOM!
Mana, poison, and curses erupted.
The power of the spell, learned from Shylock and amplified by Dorothea’s own excess mana, was threatening enough to instantly turn a vigorous young man in his twenties into a terminal drug addict.
Logically, it was an attack one should never use unless they had the venomous intent to kill their opponent.
Of course, Dorothea didn’t hesitate.
Holding back was something you did when you had the luxury to do so; doing it against a monster was just reckless bravado.
As expected, Gale emerged from the smoke with nothing more than a little soot on her.
Countless magic characters floated in the air as if they had a will of their own, enveloping Gale’s body.
“Tch!”
Just as Dorothea clicked her tongue and was about to pull a new catalyst from the Gloves of Haider, a voice called out.
[The Tin Knight says to put up a barrier!]
“What?”
Dorothea failed to immediately follow the Tin Knight’s advice.
It wasn’t that strange, really.
It was rare for a newbie to instantly execute a veteran’s instructions.
The little lion, who acted almost without delay the moment a command echoed in her head, was the abnormal one.
Click!
Right after Gale tapped the ground with her shoe, her body flickered and seemed to vanish, only to reappear in the air above Dorothea.
A blow that could shatter a boulder came crashing down without mercy.
“Whoa!”
Gale let out a cry of surprise.
A golden rope had shot out from somewhere, spreading out like a net and catching her cane.
Dorothea didn’t have Adelaide’s reflexes or instinctive movements.
But she did have the preparedness to make up for it.
“I thought you left that behind because it wasn’t helpful at first, but it seems you brought it along after all!”
“Don’t talk to me in the middle of a fight!”
“I love that you answer me anyway!”
“I hate you!!”
As Dorothea grabbed the rope and poured mana into it, the golden strands multiplied explosively and lunged at Gale.
Gale swung her cane to bat the ropes away, but the hair, being both tough and elastic, merely rippled without breaking.
It was the limitation of a cane, not a blade.
But that, too, was only for a moment.
『Cut』 『Flame』 『Continuous』
Several magic characters intertwined, creating new words with new meanings. The next moment, Gale’s cane glowed red-hot.
Slice!
Like a hot knife cutting through butter, the golden rope that had held so stubbornly was severed in an instant.
Restoring it with mana wasn’t difficult, but it was meaningless against that attack.
Therefore, instead of trying to bind Gale again, Dorothea struck the ground with her staff.
Black mana spread out like a wave, and the wolves that had clearly been defeated by Gale once before restored their bodies and rose again.
Some of them even merged to form a three-headed dog—no, a three-headed wolf.
Gale easily knocked down the resurrected wolves, but in that time, Dorothea had pulled out a new catalyst.
When she shattered a tightly sealed jar, a woman’s spirit, chilling to behold, glared at Gale with the whites of its eyes flashing.
—KiyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaA△△□□□■■■■!!!!!!!!!!!
It was a scream so dreadful it could weaken both mind and body, a sound one would fear to hear again in their dreams.
The sound itself seemed to have direction, with most of its vibrations aimed at Gale, but the mere aftershock was enough to make the audience bleed from their eyes, noses, and ears before fainting.
This one seemed to have hit Gale quite hard as well; about a fifth of the characters hovering around her body turned black and fell away, and Gale herself staggered for a moment.
Gale tried to strike the woman with her cane, but it only cut through empty air.
Spirits summoned by low-level necromancy were immune to physical attacks but were easily dispatched by a knight’s sword energy or a mage’s magic. This one, however, was a special creation of Dorothea’s.
Each time the woman continued to scream, Gale’s barrier of characters was rapidly chipped away.
Just then, Gale combined her characters once more.
『Sound』 『Sound』 『Sound』
Dorothea’s face turned pale.
The instant after she reflexively covered her ears.
Gale’s cane struck the ground directly beneath the woman.
─────────! ! ! ! !
A sound that surpassed a certain level could not be articulated with language.
The courtroom trembled from the boom, which was more like a shockwave, and the soldiers toppled over.
Faced with a sound that was not only loud but also imbued with conceptual power, the woman’s spirit summoned by Dorothea could no longer hold on and vanished.
Gale puffed out her chest with a triumphant look, while Dorothea glared fiercely and prepared her next spell.