Chapter 342: The Tin Knight and the Kingdom of the Underground (7)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 342: The Tin Knight and the Kingdom of the Underground (7)
The environment of the underground was barren.
No, it was beyond barren; for any ordinary surface-dweller, merely existing there was life-threatening.
The very elements of nature—the dust that scattered on the wind, the breeze that blew—were laced with a toxic miasma.
Most of the people transported to the underground were largely unaffected.
Those who carried the lineage of the Lion Duke, the golden monkeys, the vampire pair, and the magic dolls all possessed a natural resistance to the underground’s toxicity.
Witches like Franka Aglaia, Algind Goodwitch, and Gale Elilaz, while not naturally resistant, had the magical means to deal with it.
But there was one exception.
The group that had been transported while fighting one of the eight generals, the doppelgänger Dicondra, was in a different situation.
Unlike the other battlefronts, which were far from populated areas, Dicondra had appeared in the very heart of the royal castle.
Furthermore, the battle between Dicondra and a woman named Billina had been one of close-quarters combat, so the people nearby had been able to watch from a short distance rather than fleeing to avoid the attacks.
The pillar of light that fell where Dicondra was defeated had swallowed not only the direct combatants, Billina and Alonso, but every last one of those spectators as well.
As a result, countless people from the royal castle were unceremoniously dumped into the horrific environment of the underground.
“Gasp… haah… haah…”
“I-Itchy. My body is so itchy!”
“Cough! Cough!! Ugh, blargh!”
One man gasped for breath like a dying patient. Another frantically scratched at his skin where it had brushed against a single blade of grass. Another coughed until he began to vomit blood as if it were water.
Though they hadn't been attacked by anyone, Alonso pounded his chest in frustration as he watched his subjects slowly die, exposed to nothing more than the environment itself.
“You, court mages! Please, I’m begging you, do something! I’ll give you a fortune if you can save them!”
“Your… Your Majesty. My apologies. We are doing our best, but our resources and manpower are critically insufficient!”
“The symptoms are too varied, and the causes too numerous. If it were the air, we could purify it. If it were the ground, we could levitate, but here, the entire environment is malicious—it’s no different from poison to humans!”
In keeping with Alonso’s preference for the practical and effective, the royal castle of the Ionian Kingdom was home to several highly skilled mages.
While they might not have been on par with the mages of the Empire or the Magic State, they were skilled enough to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them.
But even they were helpless in this situation.
They had been transported to this strange land with nothing but the clothes on their backs.
There were far too many patients to help, and the mages’ mana was finite.
In fact, to be blunt, even the knights and mages who could wield mana were only slightly better off than the civilians; their complexions were worsening all the same.
Unless one’s body was inherently different, like those of the Lion Duke’s bloodline, simply reinforcing the body with mana didn’t grant resistance to poison. The most it could do was allow them to endure a little longer with their stronger bodies and greater stamina.
“Hah, how utterly frustrating!”
Alonso struck his chest, expressing his vexation.
If a powerful enemy had appeared to threaten his subjects and people, he would have charged forward to fight, heedless of his own wounds.
But even the strongest knight could not fight against the natural environment itself.
Looking down at his loyal vassal, Marquis William Hemming, whose face was pale as he gasped for breath, Alonso turned to Billina, grasping at straws.
“I will reward you handsomely. Please, can you not help my subjects and my people?”
“Hmm…”
Billina wore a troubled expression.
It wasn’t because her journey to meet the goddess had been unexpectedly delayed.
While it was true that the goddess was her highest priority, the goddess she served was one who had helped Billina and her kin without asking for anything in return.
As one who called herself a follower of such a being, Billina could not simply ignore this crisis to pursue her own goals.
Thus, the reason for her troubled look was something else entirely.
“Please wait a moment.”
Billina plunged the crude sword she held into the ground.
The sword grew as if it were a tree, soon transforming into a proper tower of bone. Billina stood before it, clasped her hands, and closed her eyes.
After some time, she opened her eyes again, her expression not particularly bright.
In a way, the result was exactly what she had expected.
“…For now, there is a way to improve the condition of those who can wield mana. It requires a bit of finesse, but they can purge the poison by manipulating the mana within their bodies in a specific way.”
“However,” Billina added.
“I do not know how to help the ordinary people. Among all the souls I possess, not a single one has ever experienced a situation like this.”
That was right.
Billina’s power was spirit channeling.
It was the ability to receive a spirit into her body and borrow its knowledge and skills.
In other words, what the souls she possessed could not do, Billina could not do either.
The collective intelligence born from tens of thousands of souls was indeed powerful, but it was not omniscient.
Just as Alonso let out a sigh and Billina awkwardly began to teach the knights and mages the mana control method for detoxification, a sound echoed.
Gric? Kiruuuuuuuu!
With a bizarre cry that was difficult to attribute to any animal, a group of small, green humanoids appeared.
They were monsters, less than half the height of a grown man, with grotesque faces and green skin.
“…We’re surrounded.”
At Alonso’s murmur, the faces of the kingdom’s party hardened.
The green monsters didn’t look particularly strong individually, but their numbers were immense.
Worse, ninety percent of their own group consisted of patients who could barely move.
No matter how powerful Alonso and his knights were, fighting to protect the patients in this situation would be anything but easy.
This was especially true since Alonso and Billina had not had a proper rest or treatment for their wounds after their fight with Dicondra.
Just as tension gripped the entire party…
THOOOM!
A great tremor echoed from somewhere.
THOOOM!
At the tremor, which sounded like the tolling of a great bell, everyone’s gaze turned toward the source of the sound.
There, a woman dressed in black was walking down the path.
Billina’s eyes widened.
THOOOM!
In the woman’s right hand was a black staff.
In her left, she held a silver birdcage. Every time she touched the edge of the cage with her finger, a sound like the striking of a giant bell rang out.
With every step the woman took, black mana pulsed from her feet like a wave.
And wherever that mana touched the land, something clawed its way out of the ground.
They were beasts, they were abominations, they were unidentifiable monsters.
Countless creatures left behind in the underground rose to their feet to the woman’s left, right, and rear, following in her steps.
The sight was like a ghastly procession with the woman at its head.
Kki, kiriiiu!!!
Grataw! Kiga!!!
Kwratir!! Kikirua!!!
The ugly green humanoids shouted something at the woman in their own tongues.
Swinging their crude weapons wildly, they seemed to be threatening her.
Their eyes were filled with clear hatred and hostility.
But the woman was unfazed.
She merely narrowed her eyes slightly at the hundreds of green humanoids baring their killing intent toward her, then slammed the staff in her right hand into the ground. Thwack!
Black mana filled in the missing bones.
Black mana replaced the rotten flesh.
Black mana returned to the dead their lost skin, their claws, and their fangs.
Immediately after, the ghastly procession let out a roar.
■■■■■■!!!!
■■■■■■!!!!
■■■■■■!!!!
If the green humanoids, despite being the same species, had threatened the woman in different tongues, the members of the ghastly procession, despite being different species, roared as one.
The will contained within that roar was absolute and self-evident.
Block the woman’s path, and you too will be made a part of the dead.
The hostility and loathing in the green humanoids’ eyes were crushed by a greater fear.
In the end, the green humanoids turned their backs and fled.
After watching them go with a placid expression, the woman advanced toward the kingdom’s party.
Seeing the looks of awe and astonishment directed at her, the woman, Dorothea, clicked her tongue lightly and spoke.
“Gather the patients. It looks like we need to get the poison out first.”