The Killing Blow

“[Aero Flood]”

Esta’s chant was heard, and a typhoon like magic that roared through and swallowed the Dead Lich’s earth magic was fired.

Probably a compound magic of wind and water elements, it completely overwhelmed the Dead Lich’s earth magic and………….further absorbed the earth into its own attack, and then rushed all together towards the dead lich.

A magic that turned the opponent’s own magic towards them on the way, Esta’s magic was basically a big reversal magic.

I’m sure the Dead Lich was hoping to use the fake Dead Lich’s to absorb some attacks and attention from itself, but Esta’s magic simply enveloped all of them at the same time and blew them away.

The fakes did try to create a wall with their bodies to try and defend the Dead Lich but…….

They were instantly annihilated by the [Aero Flood] that also had the Earth magic absorbed into it.

The tattered Dead Lich remained alone as he watched the [Aero Flood] approach it. I wondered how it’ll try to even block this but, perhaps it felt that making a futile struggle was beneath it as——-The Dead Lich simply opened its arms wide and let the magic swallow it whole.

It was all cloudy when the battle began, but as the battle ended, the sun shone through the now parting clouds over Ralf, who had deflected all the fireballs and Esta who had fired the final killing blow of magic, as if proclaiming them victors.

[Flare Blast] and [Aero Flood].

Due to consecutively firing two powerful compound magic, even Esta was feeling the fatigue as her body bent over with her hands on her knees.

The land around the area that had been first ruined by the Dead Lich’s earth magic and then further destroyed by Esta’s magic was proof of the scale and extremity of this battle. And I walked through this devastated land back towards those two.

“You two, good job. That was one hell of a magic battle.”

“………yes, I will admit even I feared for my life during that.——-and yet I made such a selfish request of you, I can only apologize.”

Tired and exhausted from the battle, yet Esta bowed in apology towards me.

Certainly, she was uncharacteristically selfish today with her demands but, as in the end she did finish the battle without taking a single hit as promised.

…………of course, even a single hit in a battle like this could have resulted in death though.

“You don’t need to apologize. I did promise to not interfere until you get hit once after all. It was just that the Dead Lich had done something strange, so  I was about to jump into the battle of my own accord, so you didn’t do anything wrong Esta.”

“But, deep inside even I did feel that it was dangerous. Yet I made such a selfish request of you.”

“But you were confident that you’d beat it though right?”

“Yes, of course. There’s no doubt about that.”

“Then its fine. Even from my eyes, who knows nothing about magic, that final attack was simply perfect………So, was it all worth it?”

“It was! It was an enemy, a monster no less but——–I learnt a lot from seeing the Dead Lich’s magic up front. I’m glad I faced it head-on.”

I don’t think she realized it herself but she was actually laughing and smiling during the battle after all.

There aren’t a lot of monsters that are so adept at using magic so it must have made for some good experience for Esta.

“Ralf as well, you did well protecting her. I’ll be honest, I thought you got done in when I saw those 6 fire ball barrage hit you.”

“I know I stopped you from interfering but honestly, I was panicking all the way! I mean the fire balls were manageable but I could see that big earth magic come right at me after all!”

“I know Esta’s magic completely nullified it but………Ralf, hypothetically speaking, could you have actually blocked that earth magic?”

“Nahh………that’d be a bit much, though I think I could have at least made sure that it didn’t hit Esta at least, maybe?”

Saying that, Ralf laughed coolly.

You know, even his personality is a good fit for the tank role.

Of course, his innate talent and his job as [Holy Knight] are still huge part of it but, I really think his personality that often puts others ahead of himself makes him a really good fit for the tank role.

Well, I don’t how he does it when he goes dungeon diving solo so perhaps there’s more layers to him that I don’t know yet.

“Look at you acting all cool. I’d like to say a line like that once in my life as well.”

“Ehhhh, really? You’re not just pulling my leg are you!?”

Looking slightly embarrassed, he grinned happily. Though that was more of a minus.

What a waste, especially after he made such a cool line.

“All that aside, how did it go for you Chris? It seemed like you guys were done pretty quickly.”

“I mean it’s my fault for going all out from the start, but it really was boringly easy. Snow fought very well as well so I hardly even broke a sweat.”

Snow also came up to nuzzle on to me while wagging its tail.

At first it wasn’t too comfortable with it but now Snow seemed to have gotten used to wearing its personalized armour, and was able to move normally today as well.

“I wasn’t really able to watch Chris-san or Snow at all because I was preoccupied with the Dead Lich but……..once again, thank you very much for taking care of all the rest of the enemies just so I could focus on the Lich!”

“Give your thanks to Snow if you want to. Halfway through, I was basically watching your battle from the side. And it was Snow that continued to take care of all the skeletons that continued to pop up.”

“Is that so! Snow, thank you so much!”

Snow purred happily from having its head patted and rubbed by Esta.

——-Alright, enough talking and let’s return to Edestor.

I wanted to collect a proof of subjugation from the Lich but did anything even survived after this battle………

Afterwards, all three of us split up and searched for something but only the red jewel that was in its right eye remained, so we just took that as our proof.

With that, we left the western plains, and returned back to Edestor.