The Bishop (2)

The first move belonged to the Bishop.

He raised a finger, pointed it straight at me, and spoke.

The Bishop rattled off a string of incantations in half a breath, like a rapper spitting bars. Before the last syllable had even left his lips, his mana arranged itself with surgical precision and seeped into the ground.

What the—?

Crunch-crack-!

I'd barely finished wondering when the earth beneath my feet surged upward with no warning at all and clamped down on my legs. I panicked and tried to yank myself free, but mana-reinforced soil wasn't about to crumble that easily.

"[Sword of Pain]."

Unlike the knight, who had wrapped his technique around a physical blade, the Bishop drew five swords of pure mana straight out of thin air. The violet mana blades shot forward at a terrifying speed.

With my legs pinned, dodging was out of the question.

But I had Noah.

KA-KA-KA-KANG!

My mace, wreathed in Mana Weapon, pulverized the purple swords into glittering fragments. The Bishop let out a sound of genuine admiration.

"Hooh... so this young lady of yours doesn't feel a trace of pain either. What manner of artifact is that, exactly? Don't tell me it's an actual relic?"

"Who knows. Why don't you take a guess."

"How amusing."

THWACK!

I broke free of the irritating earthen shackles. It was the first time I'd been hit by an attack of that type, so I'd been caught off guard—but now that I understood how it worked, there wouldn't be a second time. All I had to do was watch for the incantation, watch for the mana arranging itself, and get out of the way, just like before.

Still, this was the first time I'd seen a cultist chant something other than a skill name. And in a strange language, no less—almost like a mage's magic...

Here it comes again!

With the Bishop's chant, his mana embroidered a beautiful pattern across the empty air. What sprang from that pattern was a tiny wisp of flame. Just as I was thinking Fireball? and raised my sword to swat it away, Noah stepped in front of me and wrapped her body around mine.

"It's going to burst!"

"What—"

KOO-KWA-BOOM!

Rumble-rumble-rumble—

The flame, which had been streaking toward us at high speed, elegantly unraveled itself about two meters ahead of us. The shockwave packed destructive force utterly disproportionate to its tiny size; what Noah's body couldn't block passed straight through and hammered into mine. It felt like being beaten black and blue by a hundred people at once—I nearly doubled over and threw up. The searing heat riding the shockwave chapped my lips raw.

But I held on.

Noah, however, still hadn't let go of me.

"Six more remain."

"What—"

KU-KU-KU-KWOOM!

Before I could even get the question out, the explosion I'd thought was over erupted a second time. The surrounding air had heated up so much that every breath I drew felt like it was cooking my lungs from the inside.

...

Counting the first one, the explosions came a total of seven times. Exactly as Noah had said.

I slipped out of her arms and shakily steadied my stance.

"It's finished. Vicious business."

"How did you predict that?"

"I simply translated the Latin. The incantation was O flame, bloom seven times over."

"Astonishing! Fluent in the Ancient Language, no less? Ever since the Curse of Babel was laid down, it's been next to impossible to learn unless one is a mage. Could this young lady of yours happen to be my junior?"

Having eavesdropped on our exchange, the Bishop's eyes had gone perfectly round. Genuinely shocked, it seemed.

Also—junior? Where did that come from?

Noah calmly swept the superheated air away with the wind pressure of her mace swing and replied.

"If by 'junior' you mean a mage, then no."

"Then how ever did she master the Ancient Language? There are ways, I suppose, but... truly an extraordinary case."

"Were you a mage yourself?"

"I devoted eighty years of my life to the arcane arts."

The Bishop poured out both magic and the evil god's authority. And yet the mana cocooning him didn't waver in the slightest.

Once the topic turned to magic, the Bishop grew talkative.

"Regrettably, magic is a terribly unfair creature. It never gives back in proportion to what you put in."

"Is that why you threw yourself into a cult? Using ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠humans as sacrifices?"

"And what's so wrong with that?"

He met my sarcasm with a counter-question. An absurd one, at that.

"Uh, obviously it's wrong? You're treating people like tools."

"Every human alive lives as somebody's tool whether they like it or not. Especially in a society built on class like this one. Even the Emperor, perched at the very summit of power, is nothing more than a tool in someone's hands."

"Ha! Let's not twist the facts, shall we? At least we don't torture people by inflicting horrific agony on them, the way you do."

Where did he get off spouting sophistry like that? I shot down the Bishop's logic in a single stroke. Even he seemed to have nothing to say to that, offering only an awkward chuckle.

"Well... I suppose that's how it looks through the eyes of an unbeliever who cannot grasp the meaning of pain. There's a logic to it. I like logical people."

"Well, how flattering."

"Nothing to be flattered about. My desire to keep the two of you has only grown stronger... Now then, let us begin again."

"Not a chance!"

FWIP!

Noah and I, as if we'd rehearsed it, charged at the Bishop at the same instant. The common cultists scrambled to block us—but an Awakened running with mana coiled around their body was, for all intents and purposes, a human battle tank.

WHAM!

The believers who'd tried to bar our way went sailing into the sky as if they'd been hit by a dump truck. They had no wings, and so—

"Make an offering."

"Uuuooohhh..."

At the Bishop's low whisper, the cultists hanging in midair from colliding with us let out hollow, strength-drained moans. Their bodies twisted like braided dough—and then they turned into a single rope!

"Holy crap! What is this?!"

"A noble sacrifice."

Dozens of living humans, transmuted in an instant into a glistening crimson rope, bound me and Noah faster than the eye could follow. I scrambled to untangle the rope before whatever was coming could land—but the unpleasantly warm cord simply pulsed and throbbed against me, refusing to come loose in the least. It even withstood Noah's strength.

The Bishop sauntered over to us at a leisurely pace.

"Well? The power of a god? Magic can't hold a candle to it, can it?"

"...Maybe that's just because you had no talent for magic?"

"HAHAHAHA! Not an unfair point."

[Chains of Pain]!

The Bishop flared the blood-red magic stones embedded in his palms and swept his hand through the air. Crimson chains materialized out of nothing, lashing the cultists and the two of us together into one bundle.

"...What are you doing?"

"First, we begin by shattering that artifact protecting your minds. After all, pain has a way of changing a person."

"..."

"These chains share the suffering the believers endured, exactly as they felt it. Go on—see how long you can endure."

Ch-sh-sh-sh...

The chains shivered and rippled. I could see the wave that had begun among the cultists creeping steadily toward our end of the line. Pain, presumably.

I hurriedly dialed Beast's Senses down to their lowest setting.

'That buys me some time. But how the hell do I get out of this rope?'

Even cranking my aura to its limit to reinforce my body, the rope held fast. I couldn't yet project Sawtooth Sword Aura from anything but my blade either, so I was completely neutralized. Worse, this creepy rope seemed to have some kind of energy absorption built in—my strength just drained away into it unchecked.

'I knew it'd be strong, but this strong...? No—not the time for that. How do I...'

Ignoring the dull waves of pain lashing my whole body, I racked my brain furiously. The Bishop possessed strength far beyond what I'd estimated. A head-on brawl with someone like him would be insanity. Something unorthodox—no, first I had to get free of this rope.

Thankfully, I wasn't out of hope.

'Sensory Impartation is the only play. If his mind cracks, maybe this rope comes loose too.'

My trump card—held in reserve, never even used on the knights, saved for exactly this kind of situation. The only problem was that using it required making contact with the Bishop in some way...

...

About fifteen minutes crawled by. The seven-odd red chains from the beginning had multiplied to match the number of cultists still standing, and now I was trussed up in hundreds of them.

Yet against all expectation, the Bishop seemed flustered by how perfectly fine we looked.

"An artifact... no, a relic? No—even a relic shouldn't be able to withstand a load like this."

"Ignis, septies iterum oriri debes."

"Give it up. You can't cast magic merely by reciting words."

For some reason, Noah had been reciting the Bishop's incantations verbatim for a while now. No pillar of flame—not so much as a spark—had come of it. The Bishop looked at her with something like pity and offered up his hypocritical advice.

"The components of magic are mana and will. Mind you, the structural pattern of the incantation and the mana matters too."

"...Is that all it takes?"

"Ha! Hardly. Anyone with the makings of a mage must receive Baptism at the Magic Tower—without exception. Only then can magic be wielded at all."

"Baptism?"

"Mm... the elders explain it as a procedure for connecting with the God of Magic, though frankly I have my doubts about that as well. Well, set magic aside. Beside the true authority of a god it's not even so much dust—magic was never suited for combat in the first place."

Shaking his head, the Bishop came closer again and began searching us over with meticulous care.

"...Incidentally, you remain untouched even after all this ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠time."

"..."

"Hm-hm... If pain won't work on you, then neither will the Education. Let's have a look at what you're hiding, shall we?"

SNICK!

The Bishop drew a crimson rod from his palm and probed every inch of my body with it. The way he prepared for even the unlikeliest contingency was disgustingly thorough.

But then... he never dreamed I had a technique called Sensory Impartation, did he?

I had agonized over this talent for a long stretch after acquiring it. Like the cultists' abilities, it was a bizarre power operating entirely outside the normal rules—odd, incomparable to ordinary skills—which meant it could serve as my trump card at any time. Because of that, tuning it against the strong, rather than the weak, was the correct approach.

'The hard part was finding the right kind of pain.'

Lovrick was a veteran, yes—but he was still just an ordinary human, and even he endured the ordinary pain of blade cuts in stride during a fight. Which meant plain, mundane pain wouldn't cut it. Thanks to Noah's healing I'd been able to sample some ferociously violent sensations firsthand... but what I actually needed was the kind of agony that sheer willpower simply could not endure.

After rounds and rounds of deliberation, what I settled on was narrow in scope—but against a male opponent, the optimal pain without question.

...And since I'd tested it on my own body personally, the performance was guaranteed.

FWA-KRING—!

A sound no one could possibly have heard rang through my skull all the same. Such horrifying agony ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that merely recalling the experience made my whole body shudder!

And that pain rode up the crimson rod the Bishop was busy rifling through my body with, traveled straight back along it, and was delivered in full to its owner.

Tripled.

"GKAAAAAAAH—!"

As if to purge everything from the back of his throat, the Bishop clutched his nether regions and collapsed where he stood. The scream lasted only a heartbeat. His breath had apparently seized up entirely, because all that came out of him after that was a strangled gghk-gghk and a trail of tears.

No matter how accustomed a man was to pain, he'd never once experienced this kind!

CRACK!

"It's broken!"

The rope and the chains binding us came undone in one clean instant. Apparently it was the sort of technique that unraveled when its caster took a hit.

Perhaps as a side effect of the skill shattering, every cultist still linked to the chains lost consciousness and dropped where they stood. I snatched my fallen sword off the ground and hurled myself at the prostrate Bishop.

Die!

KAANG!

But just as my blade descended, an opaque shield welled up out of nowhere from the Bishop—still curled into a ball like a potato bug, writhing in agony—and turned my strike. I pulled on every scrap of aura I had left, forged a Sawtooth Sword Aura, and swung.

GAGAGAGAGAK!

KANG!

The shield crumbled helplessly before the sawtooth aura. But the moment it shattered, another one sprang up in its place. Break it and break it, and more kept coming.

"Damn it! How many shields does he have??"

WHAM-WHAM-WHAM-WHAM!

KAGAGAGAGAKANG!

Noah and I hammered the shields like possessed things. And with each shield that cracked, I could see the gems on the bracelet around the Bishop's wrist going dark one by one. That was the count of his stored spells, most likely.

Just one gem left now!

Almost got i—

"Kuheheheheh... so THIS is pain! Truly re...markable!"

Somehow the full three seconds had already slipped by. The aftereffects clearly lingered, though—the Bishop's legs were trembling pathetically, like a newborn fawn's. He glared at us with eyes brimming with fury. His mouth began to open in slow motion.

"[Face the pai—]"

"Ignis!"

POP!

At Noah's curt single word, a small flame flashed and burst right in front of the Bishop's eyes. The light wasn't especially bright—but it was the kind of situation no human being could fail to flinch from. The Bishop's eyes screwed shut.

"GRAAAAAH!"

CRACK!

The final shield at last shattered to pieces under the Sawtooth Sword Aura.

Pouring out every last ounce of strength I had in me, I threw my entire body into the blow and drove my sword into the Bishop's heart.