CH 519

The moment they heard that voice, Rei and the others turned their weapons to face it.

The voice came from the back of the room……from where Oricule had been sent flying earlier.

Except for Vosk, who had never met Oricule directly, there was no doubt as to who the voice belonged to.

His left shoulder blade arm and right arm had been cut off by Rei, Elena’s sword whip had slashed his body all over, and Vihera’s fists had made notable dents into the armour covering his body. Set’s attack had also bent Oricule’s head in a direction it should not be in.

An ordinary human would definitely have died from those injuries, but Oricule just stood up as if it didn’t matter as he forcibly reset the bones in his neck with his remaining left hand, making a cracking sound.

It was a very unexpected sight, but Rei and the others didn’t seem too surprised as they readied their weapons to respond to anything that might happen.

However, it was different for Vosk.

After all, he hadn’t known anything about Oricule, so he had just thought it was a monster lying there in the distance.

Hearing Oricule speak so clearly, Vosk assumed it was a very high ranking monster.

Monsters that could speak where that rare. But normally, for low ranking monsters, their speech would be unclear or broken. But, in the case of Oricule, Vosk had no issues hearing what he was saying.

If he had heard the details from Essetus before entering the room, he wouldn’t have been so confused, but he had been in a hurry and didn’t have the time to do that.

「Hey, hey, hey, hey, what the hell is that monster? ……Is that some kind of abnormal species?」

Still, Vosk was able to half guess the enemy’s true identity due to his excellent intuition.

Rei replied to Vosk while keeping his Death Scythe ready and eyes on Oricule, who started walking over to his arms that had been cut off.

「Rather than a monster, he’s a former human. To be exact, he’s the person in charge of the side of Church of Holy Light that handled the abnormal species. His current state could be considered as an abnormal human.」

「……Seriously……not just turning monsters into abnormal species, but humans as well? Is that possible?」

「It’s only because it’s possible that he exists in his current form. More importantly, he’s pretty strong. Pree, leading her dolls, ended up like that.」

With those words, Rei glanced over at Pree, who had been thrown to a corner of the room like rags.

Following Rei’s gaze……Vosk realised who it was in the corner. His eyes went wide as he spoke.

「Hey, is that……is that really Pree? Her dolls are difficult to deal with, aren’t they? Against them……」

When Vosk and the others had entered the Marschel residence, they had been attacked by the dolls.

Many of them had been injured by the dolls, who attacked without any murderous intent. In serious cases, some had even lost their eyesight or had fingers cut off.

Even so, there had been no deaths because all the adventurers the Silva family had gathered were highly skilled and because most of the dolls inside the Marschel residence had been sent to fight in the basement.

「Uhh-……kill……kill me……」

Such a voice leaked from Pree’s mouth, but Rei and Set were the only ones who heard it and they pretended they didn’t.

In the first place, they didn’t have the time to worry about Pree.

As everyone watched Oricule, he picked up his two arms that had been cut off……

「Hey, you got to be joking.」

Seeing the scene happening before him, Vosk voiced his disbelief.

After all, after placing on of his arms that had been cut off against the wound, blue bubbles, similar to the colour of Oricule’s skin, were produced before the arm were reconnected.

The same went for Oricule’s second arm as it was just as easily reconnected.

While Vosk couldn’t believe what he was seeing, Rei and the others remained silent as they just kept their weapons at the ready.

Of course, they hadn’t thought that Oricule could recover so easily, but seeing the abilities he had already demonstrated, they didn’t think it was strange for him to be able to do so.

(Now then……how do we kill him? It hurts to have magic blocked like this. We’ll have to manage without magic somehow……)

Rei thought to himself as he watched Oricule reconnect his arms and suddenly thought of an idea.

(Yes, if magic from the outside is ineffective, then maybe from the inside……inside, inside? Come to think of it.)

He turned to glance at Pree, who was currently suffering from an extreme amount of pain.

Among the gems that Pree had used when fighting Oricule, the ones that had caused a powerful bomb-like explosion passed through Rei’s mind.

Of course, he guessed that he would be able to deal significant injuries using an attack that would destroy the body from the inside, like 『Dancing Fire Snake』 , but even so, if there were other more powerful means of attack, it would be best to utilise both.

(In that case, someone has to go to Pree and bring back the gems……)

The problem is who should go.

No, there was only one person who could.

Rei, Elena, and Vosk still had plenty of strength to spare and would be needed in the fight. Vihera had almost no magic power left, but her physical strength was still fine and could be counted as part of their fighting force. Set wasn’t someone they could leave out either. It would be best if Yellow was able to do it, but Rei felt uneasy about entrusting him with something that put their lives on the line.

If Essetus was still in the room, it might have been a different story, but there was no point thinking about it now.

In this situation, there was only one person left……

Rei turned his gaze towards her.

「Mm?」

She must have noticed his gaze on her. Byune asked if anything was wrong.

Vosk was standing right next to her, but she didn’t seem to mind.

It might have been because Pree was her clear enemy, and more than anything else, thanks to Vihera, Byune also no longer surrendered herself to her hatred.

But even so……no, that was why Rei hesitated to ask Byune to go over to Pree and bring back the gems.

(No, I don’t have the time to hesitate like this……do I?)

The fact was that Byune only had her daggers left and she also was the weakest among them in terms of raw combat strength.

Rei spoke up, despite his faint sense of guilt for asking Byune to do something difficult for her.

「Byune, I’m sorry, but there is something I want you do to do.」

Rei spoke in a low voice as he kept an eye on Oricule, who was moving his reconnected arms to check their current state.

「……」

Byune silently prompted Rei to continue.

「In order to kill Oricule, we’ll have to do something about his magic repelling skin. I want to use the gems Pree has in order to make sure.」

「Wait, Rei! Those gems are……」

「I know!」

Vihera, who had been listening into their conversation, couldn’t help but interject. However, Rei immediately stopped her as he kept talking.

「I’m not saying to use the gems made from sacrificing Byune’s parents. In the first place, doesn’t Pree have other gems? Besides, that detonation ability seems to be Pree’s last option, so there’s a high chance it can be used with any gem.」

「……True. Well, since she made and wore so many gems, there’s a high chance, but……」

Vihera didn’t finish her words..

It was fine to not use the gems made from the sacrifice of Byune parents. But even so……the other gems must have been created from the sacrifice of other people.

Understanding that, Vihera couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable about it.

However……Byune reached out for Vihera’s waist. As if to say she was fine and to leave it to her.

「Mm.」

「……I understand. If you say you’re fine, I won’t say anything more.」

「I’m really sorry.」

Rei gave a brief apology.

Vosk, who was listening in nearby, didn’t know the details of what had happened since Rei and the others had reached the room. Still, he understood that it was better for him to not say anything here.

「All we have to do is to hold Oricule down until Byune brings back the gems. Is possible, if we can cut away his limbs like we did earlier to reduce his strength, that would be best.」

Everyone nodded at Rei’s words……and Oricule spoke out, as if he had been waiting for them to finish.

「Are you done with your discussion? Even though I was checking how my body was doing, I’ve been waiting a while. I won’t bore you too much.」

Oricule spoke with a grin on his face.

It seemed to be the negative influence of the Chaos Seed. Already, he was starting to enjoy combat……no, all that was left was the feeling of enjoyment from trampling all opponents that resisted him.

(It was probably his last resort and not something that had been fully tested. ……Well, it seemed like they were still in the process of experimenting the creation of abnormal species from monsters, so that’s not too surprising.)

Rei thought to himself as he readied his Death Scythe.

Next to him, Elena held her sword whip in her hand while Set gave a cry, ready to attack at any moment.

Vosk stood beside Set with his huge claymore and Vihera looked at Rei for a moment before shaking her head slightly and taking up her position next to Elena.

Byune moved to a position a little further away from them.

And then……the final act of the extended battle began.

「HAAAAaah-!」

Rei was the first to rush in. He dashed forward several steps with his incredible leg strength before moving into a leap.

However, his target wasn’t Oricule, but a place several meters to his right.

「Huh?」

It seemed even Oricule hadn’t expected Rei to move to his side rather than attack him.

That said, Oricule, before transforming into an abnormal human, might have been able to see through Rei’s intentions.

However, while his pure combat ability had increased through his transformation, his calm judgement and analytical abilities seemed to have deteriorated, so Oricule could no longer predict Rei’s actions.

Ignoring Oricule’s confusion, Rei activated the Shoes of Sleipnir as he pushed against the air.

As if bouncing off a wall of air, Rei activated a skill using the Death Scythe.

「Wind Hand!」

As the skill activated, a tentacle of win extended out from the Death Scythe’s shaft and shifted the tip of Oricule’s second arm upwards, creating a gap.

「Hm?」

Oricule noticed that as he voiced his suspicion, but Rei’s movements didn’t stop there.

「Pain Burst!」

He used the skill that doubled the amount of pain felt again.

Upon hearing the name of the skill, Oricule remembered the pain from earlier and retreated on reflex. Thanks to that, the Death Scythe only slashed through his leather armour and into his chest shallowly.

Under his leather armour, he had a 40cm slash about 5cm deep through his blue skin, a side effect of his transformation.

Even so, looking at Oricule after his transformation, it didn’t seem like a wound he would need to worry about.

However……

「GAAAAAAAH!」

Even if the injury itself was small, the pain he felt was still doubled.

Just like when his arm had been cut off earlier, the depth of the wound and the pain he felt didn’t match, causing him confusion.

「HAAaaAH-!」

「Let’s do it!」

Taking advantage of this opportunity, Vihera swung her gauntlet covered fist.

Oricule, naturally, wouldn’t just let her attack and tried to intercept with his second arm……

「Gurururu~!」

At that moment, Set used Evil Eye Impact, sending a small shock to Oricule’s right shoulder and stopping his movements for a moment.

But even though his movements were only stopped for a second, it was a fatal gap in this battle.

Oricule’s second left arm was sliced away at the base by a powerful blow from Vosk’s claymore. Then, as if chasing the previous attack, a series attacks came slicing through the air, and the next instant, Oricule’s second right arm was cut off as well.

Seeing this, Rei turned his attention to Oricule’s second arms and judged that if they left them as they were, Oricule would just reconnect them again. The next moment, Rei stored one of the arms away into the Misty Ring.

「Hah!?」

As Oricule shouted in astonishment, Rei dashed over to where Oricule’s other arm had fallen and stored it into the Misty Ring as well.