Chapter 187: The Tin Knight and The World Inside The Library (7)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 187: The Tin Knight and The World Inside The Library (7)
Once upon a time, deep in the woods.
There lived a monster, a fearsome monster.
Its mouth was so large, it could tear anything apart.
Its claws were so sharp, it could grasp anything.
Its eyes burned like fire, it could see anything.
Did it look like a fish? No, for it had sensitive antennae.
Did it look like a grasshopper? No, for it had a long neck.
Did it look like a giraffe? No, for it had thin wings.
Did it look like a bat? No, for it had coarse limbs.
The monster resembled all.
The monster resembled none.
Now, the Jabberwock appears!
In a stone chamber where skeletons sang, laughed, and danced.
The Witch of the East spoke to the black-haired girl sitting formally on the floor.
“I’ve told you about it, but it’s best if you don’t use this unless you absolutely have to.”
The girl asked back, puzzled.
“You said it’s a convenient undead, strong and easy to make just by mixing various corpses as a catalyst. Why shouldn’t I use it?”
“Because you can’t control it,” the Witch of the East answered simply.
“I have an acquaintance up north who likes to play around with horses. His methods seemed quite useful, so I created a similar spell, but the result was, in a sense, too good. Unidentifiable, incomprehensible, utterly bizarre. That’s what this thing is. It operates on necromancy, but its source is something else, making it easy to summon but difficult to control. I might manage, but with your pathetic skills, it will be difficult.”
As if displeased by the assessment of her skills as pathetic, the black-haired girl asked with a sullen look, “What do you mean the result was good? It sounds like a complete defect—Ouch!”
After striking the girl’s head with her staff, the Witch of the East clicked her tongue in disappointment.
“Defect or not, its usefulness depends on the user, my foolish apprentice. Do you have a natural talent for magic? Or the venom to act without thinking? You have mediocre talent and are needlessly picky—a perfect recipe for dying a lonely death on the road. That’s why I’m telling you to keep something like this on hand.”
As her apprentice glared at her, clutching the spot she’d been hit, the ill-tempered witch curled her lips into a smirk and said, “In any case, there’s nothing better for creating a mess without a thought for the consequences.”
*
《──────#$&###@@#@%!!》
An indescribable shriek echoed.
It was the howl of a wolf, the cry of a bird, and the resonance of an insect.
And it was none of those things.
As the Jabberwock’s hairy foreleg flew toward the White Knight, the knight thrust his spear with all his might to counter it.
Crack!
The attack itself was a single point, but its result was an area of effect.
The moment the White Knight’s spearhead touched the creature’s flesh, the immense giant strength contained within it dispersed, causing the entire foreleg to burst like a balloon.
Fwoooosh!
The Jabberwock’s mouth swelled, and a massive torrent of flame poured out.
The tremendous heat, enough to melt not only flesh but metal, was unleashed, yet the White Knight’s body remained unscathed.
When the White Knight swung his spear like a pole, the Jabberwock’s head was struck and torn clean off.
As if this wasn’t even enough to slow him down, the White Knight was about to charge toward the Tin Knight.
Drip!
With a squelching sound, the Jabberwock’s foreleg, which had been blown off below the shoulder, sprouted back out and grabbed the White Knight.
However, while the original foreleg had been that of a mammal, the newly grown one was covered in reptilian scales and had a hooked claw for a hand.
Creeak, screeeech!
The White Knight tried to force open the foreleg squeezing his body and escape, but the Jabberwock threw him with all its might before he could.
The White Knight immediately broke his fall and righted himself, but then he paused.
The Jabberwock, which he had expected to launch a follow-up attack, had ignored him and was now pouncing on the unsuspecting audience.
Its head, like that of a giant mosquito, was sucking the spectators’ blood with its long proboscis, turning them into mummies.
“R-Run! Run!”
“It’s a monster! A fearsome monster!”
The audience seats descended into chaos.
The animals scrambled to flee, but each time, the Jabberwock extended a wolf-like/reptile-like/tentacle-like arm to snatch them up and devour them.
“My, what is all this? Ah!”
Gale, who had been blinking at the unexpected sight, raised her voice.
She had spotted the Tin Knight, who had retreated at some point, receiving a supply of mana from Dorothea.
The White Knight charged forward like a single spear with terrifying momentum, but before his spear could reach its target, the Tin Knight leaped out and stopped him.
The White Knight’s power, enhanced by Gale’s magic, was formidable, but the Tin Knight, now able to use mana freely, wasn’t pushed back significantly and put up an even fight.
Not only that, but the curse bullets fired by Dorothea shot toward Gale with a menacing aura.
Gale hit the ground and rolled. Thwack!
Gale’s body teleported behind Dorothea, but unlike before, Dorothea seemed to have read her movement and responded calmly.
Gale’s staff and Dorothea’s barrier clashed with a grating sound.
“To think you’d attack the audience to distract us and buy time to regroup! What a novel idea, Dorothea!”
Dorothea’s face crumpled.
It was all the more irritating because Gale’s expression and tone were not sarcastic, but genuinely complimentary.
She wanted to snap back that it wasn’t like that, but she couldn’t very well explain, ‘I originally ordered it to attack you, but it ignored me and started its own feast.’
She had heard from her master that it was a difficult spell to control, but she never imagined it would go berserk right after being summoned—no, created.
While Dorothea remained silent, Gale continued to chatter away, unconcerned. She’s always been a talkative girl, Dorothea thought.
“Jabberwock isn’t the name of a specific soul, is it? Did you cram a wide variety of souls into a single body specialized for regeneration and transformation, then just leave it without giving any one of them control? A very dangerous, and fascinating, technique!”
“Hmph!”
Dorothea snorted.
“Don’t try to understand a witch’s magic like an equation. Unidentifiable. Incomprehensible. Utterly bizarre. That’s all you need to know!”
“Hahaha, I’ve also learned about the esoteric arts of witches from my master. She said that ancient magic is a dream, an illusion, a belief. Trying to explain it with logic is tasteless. Well, I’m also an engineer, you see. Please think of it as an occupational hazard.”
Creek, creak. Dorothea’s barrier screamed.
But Dorothea wasn’t anxious.
The barrier was certainly being chipped away, but compared to the powerful attacks Gale had shown before, this was manageable.
And the reason was clear.
“…That character magic you use. It seems you can’t strengthen multiple targets at once. You can either use it on one target at a time, or its power weakens the more you divide it.”
“Yes, that’s right. You have a good eye.”
Gale affirmed it with almost absurd frankness.
“The number of words—no, ‘concepts’—I can use at once is three. And if the concept is too abstruse or high-level, even that number decreases or the spell fails entirely. Right now, I’m using it all to strengthen Sig, so all I can use are basic techniques like body enhancement and the effects of the magic tools I’m carrying.”
“You sure talk a lot. Are you looking down on me?”
Even though her guess was correct, Dorothea looked even more displeased.
Gale smiled.
“There’s no point in hiding what we both already know. My role is simply to keep you occupied, and that’s enough.”
Gale’s blue eyes turned to the other battlefield.
The White Knight was relentlessly attacking the Tin Knight like a gale, while the Tin Knight, unlike before, was merely holding on, unable to gain the upper hand.
It wasn’t that the Tin Knight lacked ability, but rather that the White Knight was receiving direct enhancement from Gale’s support, while the Tin Knight had no such assistance.
The Jabberwock, having feasted on the audience, was now interfering in the two knights’ battle with its incredible regenerative ability and bizarre powers. However, its attacks weren’t aimed solely at the White Knight but were being swung indiscriminately at both knights.
This was partly due to Dorothea’s lack of control, but also due to the nature of the schools of magic they had learned.
Enchantresses were, at their core, specialized in assisting and strengthening others. Necromancers, on the other hand, were a school that weakened others, not empowered them.
All she could do was summon a powerful undead like this and send it in as support.
But if she couldn’t even control that properly, it was no more meaningful than throwing a saboteur onto the battlefield.
The Tin Knight was impressive for holding its own in this situation, but its combat power could only be maintained as long as its mana was plentiful.
If its mana ran out, or if it showed an opening while trying to resupply, the White Knight’s spear would surely pierce it.
Gale preferred a direct confrontation over a victory through cheap tricks, but waiting idly while the opponent resupplied was another matter entirely.
That was less about being fair and more about looking down on her opponent.
In fact, even at this moment, Gale did not let her guard down against Dorothea.
She could get rid of the now-useless Jabberwock and summon a weaker but more controllable undead, or she could pull out some unexpected item using the Gloves of Haider.
In any case, she wouldn't give up the fight like this. She would surely make another move before the Tin Knight’s mana was depleted.
She should have.
‘…Why isn’t she moving?’
Strangely, Dorothea showed no signs of making a major move.
On the contrary, a faint smile was even playing on her lips.
“—I think you’re mistaken about something. The one who’s tied down isn’t me, it’s you.”
A look of confusion crossed Gale’s face.
Time was on her side, so what did being tied down matter?
She realized her mistake only after looking back at the battlefield where the two knights and one monster fought.
The Jabberwock, its body noticeably smaller as a price for its repeated regenerations.
The White Knight, whose minor wounds had steadily accumulated, was now in a precarious state.
And finally, the Tin Knight, who, just like before, remained largely unharmed.
“Huh?”
Only then did Gale realize something was wrong.
Three combatants of roughly equal strength were clashing, yet while two had visibly worsened, only one remained unscathed.
Was it because the Tin Knight was the strongest among them?
No, that couldn’t be.
In terms of individual power, the strongest was the White Knight, supported by Gale.
Was it because Dorothea had complete control over the Jabberwock and was supporting the Tin Knight?
That wasn’t it either.
The Jabberwock was literally attacking everything in sight, hostile to all.
The fact that Adelaide and Sophia couldn’t get close and were keeping their distance was proof enough.
Then, why?
Gale once again observed their battle carefully.
The White Knight attacked the Tin Knight.
The Tin Knight didn’t resist the attack and retreated significantly.
The White Knight tried to give chase, but just then, the Jabberwock’s tail slammed down on the spot where the two knights had just clashed.
The Jabberwock attacked the Tin Knight.
The Tin Knight blocked the attack with its shield.
The White Knight’s spear thrust out as if to pierce both the Tin Knight and the Jabberwock at once, but the Tin Knight rolled away, and only the Jabberwock was impaled.
“No way.”
As Gale’s eyes widened, Dorothea’s voice reached her ears.
“That thing’s specialty is a chaotic melee. And within that, its best skill is endurance.”
A fight where it fought efficiently, calmly, and composedly, using everything around it, conserving its strength, using minimal power to last as long as possible and take down as many enemies as it could.
Dorothea hadn’t been forced to send a saboteur.
Sending a saboteur was enough.
Gale quickly tried to stomp her foot on the ground, but a golden rope forcefully bound her leg.
Dorothea’s eyes silently snarled, as if to say, Did you really think I’d let you teleport and offer support so easily?
While Dorothea held Gale in place, the White Knight’s spear pierced the Tin Knight.
Right through its side, which had already been gouged out and was empty.
The White Knight tried to quickly retrieve his spear, but the Tin Knight was faster, using a throwing technique on the spear itself to hurl the White Knight away.
The White Knight tried to prepare for the Tin Knight’s follow-up attack, but he had to block the Jabberwock’s attack from behind, which delayed his movement for a split second.
Immediately after.
Unleashing all the mana it had stored up until now, the Tin Knight’s single strike cut down both the White Knight and the Jabberwock at the same time.