Chapter 67

As I ran, I replayed combat simulations over and over in my head.

I had only one goal.

To cut down and kill the monster named Alti.

I was certain that if I didn’t kill Alti, I wouldn’t be able to get out of this alive.

She was prepared for death. She wouldn’t stop until she died.

Therefore, I had no choice but to kill her. I had no intention of saving someone who was trying to die.

My conscience would surely ache, and I would likely regret the choice—but even so, I would kill her.

Alti leaped backward, swallowing the surrounding flames as she attempted to compress them.

That action revealed that, unlike Teida, Alti did not excel at close-quarters combat.

When we had fought together in the Labyrinth before, her flame sword and physical strength had been formidable, but her swordsmanship hadn’t been particularly sharp. Compared to Teida, her movements were several steps slower.

As expected, I felt that my chances of winning were high.

If the odds weren’t in my favor, I wouldn’t have stayed behind alone.

I had confidence.

The confidence gained from rescuing Lastiara gave me the mental composure I had now.

That pride drove me to declare that I would save Maria as well.

I would kill Alti, bring Maria back to her senses, and it would be over.

Fortunately, there was a precedent for Maria’s Confusion (status effect where one loses their sense of self or becomes erratic) being quelled by cold air.

I tried to close the distance to Alti at full speed, but—

“Master—!!”

Maria, wielding a flame sword, lunged at me and blocked my path.

The compressed flame sword clashed against my own blade.

The lingering heat scorched my hands, and since the flame sword began to shift its shape to strike me, I was forced to pull back.

As I retreated, I pleaded with Maria.

“Maria, don’t get in the way! Don’t let yourself be deceived; those feelings are a lie! You’re just being manipulated by that monster over there!!”

However, my plea was in vain as Maria shouted, adding even more fire to her blade.

“This is a lie?! That can’t be true! You’re the one who’s a liar, Master!!”

Maria transformed her raging emotions into flames.

Fire erupted from beneath her feet, morphing into two serpents of flame.

It was Midgardsblaze, the spell she had shown during our Labyrinth exploration. Back then, a single serpent had left her exhausted, but this time, she had formed two instantly—without an incantation.

“What—!?”

I was shaken by Maria’s heartfelt cry and simultaneously stunned by the perfection of her magic.

Then, the two-headed fire serpent thrashed violently and opened its maws.

“You left me behind! You kept secrets! You did nothing but lie!!”

As Maria screamed, she swung her flame sword horizontally, sending the fire serpents lunging at me.

I shouted back while keeping my distance from the attacking snakes.

“There are certainly things I haven’t told you! But I haven’t lied to you!!”

“You did lie! You’re lying and trying to push me away because you hate me! You’re trying to abandon me!”

While making the two-headed fire serpent run wild, Maria continued to berate me.

I broke into a sweat from the heat of those flames. She was no longer the weak Maria from before. She had transformed into a fire mage capable of inflicting fatal wounds even on me.

Truthfully, I wanted to ignore Maria and fight Alti.

But if I didn’t stop Maria’s movements, I wouldn’t be able to easily close the distance to Alti in the rear. Their thorough division of roles between vanguard and rearguard was functioning perfectly.

“I would never leave you behind, Maria! Never! And I’m not lying!!”

If possible, I wanted to end this through persuasion.

The last thing I wanted to do was point my sword at Maria.

Such naive thoughts crossed my mind, and my mouth moved on its own.

“No, you are lying! To begin with, even that name is a lie! Every time you introduce yourself as Christ Eurasia! Every time you’re called Christ! You always act like it’s someone else’s business! You keep deceiving yourself with a fake name and refuse to reveal who you really are!!”

Just as I dodged the fire serpent, Maria leaped in, swinging her flame sword overhead.

I managed to block it with my sword.

It was an attack that clearly anticipated my movements. Her skills, Keen Eye and Hunting, were teaching Maria the optimal way to close in.

“That’s not true!! The name is certainly an alias, but—”

“I—I knew it!! It really was a fake name!! Master!!”

The moment I admitted it was an alias, the intensity of Maria’s flame sword increased.

The blade turned from red to blue, burning with enough fervor to melt my sword.

I reflexively parried the flame sword and put some distance between us.

Then, I regretted my tactical error.

That exchange confirmed that Maria was not speaking rationally.

She was likely just listing everything she had been suspicious of, following her emotions. Regarding my alias, she didn’t actually know it was fake; she had simply felt that way.

And because I had admitted it, Maria’s heat intensified.

I cooled my head, which had grown hot during the argument with Alti.

Trying to persuade her while fighting was having the opposite effect.

Maria could say whatever she wanted, but I had to choose my words carefully to calm her down. Choosing the perfect words while instant-death class magic was flying around was an impossibly difficult task.

Above all, the environment was bad.

This hill of fire had been burning through every bit of air for a while now, and the temperature was continuing to rise. Even though my body was sturdy due to my level, if the temperature rose any further and I lost more oxygen, I wouldn’t be able to think straight.

—Even as I was analyzing the situation, Maria’s flames continued to rage.

“If your name is a lie, then your origin is a lie too!! Living in the remote regions of Fania was a lie, wasn’t it?! Because there’s no place more remote than where I lived!! And yet, you didn’t even know about the Holy Birth Festival! There’s no way that’s possible!!”

The fire serpent, increasing in temperature, lunged at me with even greater speed.

I dodged it with room to spare.

It seemed I still had the advantage when it came to speed.

However, if I continued the battle here, that might change. My sweat hadn’t stopped for some time now. Even without taking a direct hit, there was no doubt my HP was steadily trickling away.

—I gathered all the information and made my decision.

I would give up on persuading Maria and aim to knock her unconscious.```

I’ll have to get a little rough; there’s no helping it.

“Maria, just bear with me for a second!!”

I dashed forward, intending to use hand-to-hand combat to knock Maria unconscious. However—

“No, Christ. Just stay there and listen to what Maria has to say.”

From the rear, Alti gave a cold refusal.

Alti held a sphere of condensed flames above her head and chanted a spell.

“『Kindle, Flash-Flame』 『At the Mercy of the World Serpent’s Slender Thread』… 《Agni Blaze》!!”

In an instant, a chill ran down my spine.

Aborting my approach toward Maria, I followed my instincts and leaped backward.

Right then, something streaked through the space between Maria and me.

That “something” was fire.

A thin line of white flame remained suspended in mid-air, looking as if it had sliced through space itself.

It was a flame like a thread.

It extended from the blaze floating above Alti’s head and pierced deep into the ground.

The area where the white flame struck the earth began to bubble and churn, melting the ground into something resembling lava.

I couldn’t even begin to guess the temperature of that white flame.

However, I knew instinctively that a direct hit would mean a critical injury.

The thread of white flame shuddered.

Through my magic, Dimension, I sensed a section of the ground behind me turning into lava. Then, the tip of the white flame burst out from that molten pool.

I twisted my body to the absolute limit, narrowly dodging the tip.

At the same time, I realized the truth: this white flame wouldn’t disappear. Furthermore, it was a high-speed flame that Alti, the caster, could manipulate at will. It was a thread of fire that sewed through the world like a flash of light.

The thread had passed through the ground to ambush me from behind.

“Master, you’re nothing but a liar! You said you didn’t like Lastiara! You said so…! But then you went to save her! You left me behind! You left me, even though you don’t love me, and went to the Lastiara you love!!”

Maria lunged at me while I was still off-balance from my desperate dodge.

I met Maria’s flame sword with my own blade, using the recoil to spring backward.

However—as I landed, the ground beneath my feet gave way into a slurry.

“—!”

A flash of light streaked up from the collapsed ground.

My face contorted as I faced the relentless, continuous assault.

I turned sideways and managed to dodge it by a hair’s breadth, but I felt with certainty that I was being cornered.

I couldn’t hold out against the onslaught of Maria and the white flames forever.

At this rate, I would be toyed with until my eventual defeat.

Therefore, I reached out toward the white flame that had just passed by my side.

I concentrated all my mana into my hand and constructed a freezing spell.

“—Magic: 《Dimension Overwinter》!!”

The effective range was only about the size of my palm.

I deployed a “Midwinter” spatial dimension within my palm and interfered with the white flame.

The spell Dimension: Winter had been unable to affect Alti’s magic.

However, with the high-density version, Dimension Overwinter, there was a chance. I concentrated the magic into a range even narrower than usual, pushing its density to the absolute limit.

But the moment I tried to analyze the white flame—I fell into an illusion where it felt like my brain was on fire.

“————!!gh!!”

The complexity of the fire magic, built upon such meticulous calculations, made my head spin.

But more terrifying than anything else was the sheer malice imbued within this spell to make it function. Magic constructed from offerings of resentment, bitterness, jealousy, and hatred threatened to overload my brain’s processing capacity.

Yet, if I failed here, my hand would melt away into nothingness.

“Dis—appear!! Argh!!”

Letting out a roar, I moved to strip the heat from the white flame.

Normally, it should have been impossible. However, by concentrating every drop of mana into my palm and forcing through several times the usual amount, I succeeded in forcibly dispersing the white flame into mist.

As the white flame scattered, I caught a glimpse of a winning chance.

My magic was highly compatible with fire magic.

I felt certain of it now.

Fire magic, which generates heat through vibration, found its weakness in my magic, which suppresses that very vibration.

“Yes!”

Thinking my odds of winning had improved, I turned my gaze back to Maria.

Determined to disperse all of Maria’s flames as well—my legs suddenly buckled.

“—Eh?”

“Heh, I’m surprised you could interfere with my flames… truly surprised, Christ. However, I wonder how much mana you lost just to erase a single one of my spells?”

Alti laughed.

I hurriedly checked my Status.

I was stunned.

The cost-benefit ratio was atrocious.

Just by erasing that single white flame, my MP had dropped by about 200.

Roughly a third of my total MP was gone.

“—Don’t ignore me! Master!”

While I stood there in shock, Maria’s fire serpents lunged at me.

I moved to reach out and disperse them, but I stopped myself.

If I erased these flames here, my MP would run dry. If that happened, I would lose any means of opposing Alti.

In the first place, it was doubtful if physical attacks would even work on Alti. There was a high probability that, just like Teida, she had an amorphous body that could only be harmed by freezing magic. If I didn’t save a minimum amount of MP, the battle itself would reach a dead end.

Sensing that my chances of winning through combat were thinning, I reflexively shouted back at Maria.

Even though I knew it was useless, I tried to appeal to her with words instead of force. The high temperature and mounting anxiety were stripping away my judgment.

“Maria!! Just calm down! If this keeps up, I’m going to die! If that fire hits me directly, there’s no way I’ll be okay!!”

“It’s fine! Even if your limbs burn away, I’ll take care of you…! Even if you lose your arms and legs, it’ll be okay as long as I’m here… I’ve become strong. It’s all thanks to you, Master. With this power, I can even earn money in the Labyrinth. It won’t be a problem—at that house! Let’s just live together, just the two of us, for the rest of our lives…!!”

Saying that, Maria pointed toward the house that was on the verge of burning down and showed me a radiant, full-faced smile.

Even as I fought in this scorching field, a chill went down my spine.

There was no hope for persuasion.

Looking at Maria’s smile just now, I finally understood that.

Lost for words, I moved to restrain Maria using only my physical abilities.

However, Alti in the rear wouldn’t allow it.

“『Sprout, Birth-Flame』 『Primal Sin’s All-Hinderance Sacred Fire』! —《Janua Blaze》!!”

Simultaneously, flowers of flame bloomed from beneath Maria’s feet.

Tching, I leaped back once more.

The flame flowers spread their lily-like petals and lunged toward me. By necessity, I had no choice but to distance myself from Maria. Furthermore, the flame flowers flickered, and something scattered from the center of the blooms. It drifted like pollen, falling onto the surrounding ground and causing new flowers to bloom.

Certain that this was a wide-area spell, I tried to pull back further, only to be blocked by a wall of fire behind me.

Surrounded on all sides by flames, my escape routes were completely cut off.

Facing a field of flame flowers that was multiplying exponentially, I racked my brain for a way to break through.

I checked all my options, searching for an effective move. I cycled through various combinations of my hand, but I realized that none of them were enough to break through the current situation.

My brain, spinning at high speeds, began to foresee my death.

Simultaneously, a shivering sensation crawled up my spine.

—The skill ‘???’ was drawing dangerously close.

I wouldn’t allow it.

That was the one thing I absolutely refused to accept.

If I acknowledged and succumbed to it, I would lose the ability to say anything to Alti, Maria, Lastiara, or anyone else ever again.

With that resolve in my heart, I searched.

I searched for a way out.

Then, I noticed a single card I hadn’t played yet.

“—Put all my skill points into Freezing Magic!!”

The ‘Display’ flashed across my retina.

The 11 skill points I had left untouched were added to Freezing Magic.

Furthermore, I deactivated the magic Connection, which had been applying a -200 MP modifier.

I poured every drop of my mana into Freezing Magic.

The chill of my deployed spell, Dimension: Winter, intensified.

My understanding of Freezing Magic deepened, and my grasp of molecular vibration expanded.

How could I stop the vibrations of the world? I caught a glimpse of that demonic path.

“Freeze!! Freeeeeeeeze!!”

I deactivated all other magic and focused solely on the cold.

An unprecedented level of frigidity was being refined.

I draped that cold around myself like a robe, bracing for the approaching inferno.

I suppose I could call it the spell Absolute Robe.

Next, I pulled a cloth from my Inventory, slashed open a water jar to soak it through, and threw it over my head like a cloak.

—And then, I ran.

I searched for a thin spot in the field of flame flowers and sprinted through.

But the petals of fire spread out to catch me. As several of them touched my body, a groan escaped my lips.

“—Gugh, aaagh!!”

The flame petals clinging to my back scorched my skin.

The cloth on my back burned away, and the fire began to char my flesh directly.

I no longer felt heat. There was no pain. Only danger signals echoed through my brain.

Ignoring it all, I ran.

Midway, Maria, who walked freely through the flames, stood in my way.

But I couldn’t afford to deal with her. Even as her flame sword slashed my shoulder, I sprinted past her, heading straight for Alti.

“You’ve come! Christ!!”

Alti laughed as she watched me charge recklessly.

It was the same smile Teida had worn that day.

“Altiiiiiiii!!”

I screamed.

Burning my mouth, burning my throat, burning my very insides—burning everything, I screamed.

“『The Omnipotent Flame that Shakes the World』! 『The Red Will within the Passion of All Creation』!”

Alti shouted her incantation.

Just like me, she was combusting her entire being to roar out her spell.

Likely, at the very moment I reached her, Alti’s magic would be complete.

Even so, I had no choice but to move forward.

The remains of my life pleaded that this was the only moment I had.

“『Blood-Spouting Bonfire』 『The Form of Discordance in Crimson Petals』! 『The World is Now Ablaze』—!!”

I ran with the intention of diving straight into the completed fire magic.

“《In Lavos Blaze》!!”

The completed flame was a sphere resembling a miniature sun.

The moment it flashed like a searchlight, my entire field of vision was swallowed by fire.

All my sensory organs ceased to function, and I felt my entire body charring.

Even so, I pressed forward through it.

I knew that even for the sake of self-defense, I had to keep moving.

I forced my burned limbs to move, guarding my head with my left hand while my right hand slashed through Alti’s torso.

Carrying the momentum of the strike, I passed behind Alti and continued forward.

As a result, I ended up taking the thermal energy of the small sun from behind—I concentrated my cold air toward my rear and tried to run through as if escaping.

However, the heat and impact surging from my back were immense. Unable to even break my fall, I was sent bouncing across the ground like a ball.

Although the cloak covering my body had burned to ash, the empowered Freezing Magic had saved me from a fatal wound.

And I still felt the sensation in my hand.

I had certainly cut Alti.

Slowly standing up, I checked Alti’s condition behind me.

Alti stood there, slashed diagonally from her shoulder to her waist.

While clutching the flowing blood with her hand, she looked at me and laughed.

Her blood was burning.

Despite sustaining a wound that would be fatal for a human, Alti was smiling.

It was a smile sufficient to convince me that the battle was far from over.

In place of my emptied MP, I shaved away my life force to chant a spell.

“Magic: 《Dimension - Gladiator》…”

It was decreasing… but not yet.

It wasn’t over yet.

Remembering the time I faced Teida, I silently watched my life force whittle away.