Berserk of Gluttony (LN) - Volume 3 - Chapter 16

Chapter 16:

The Second Coming of the Chimeras 

I DOVE THROUGH the grassy fields and into battle, cutting off one chimera’s leg as I did. I slid to a halt by Lady Roxy’s side. 

“Are you okay?” I asked. 

She looked relieved to see me, and she quickly brought me up to speed. 

“Yes, somehow. But these monsters took us completely by surprise. I’ve never seen anything like them. Mugan suffered an injury protecting Miria, and the beasts’ coordinated ambush caught the other soldiers.” 

Even if she and Miria wanted to prioritize getting the injured troops to safety, they couldn’t run. Not while surrounded by three chimeras. However, by striking decisively and cutting off one chimera’s leg while I moved in, I’d also given us a little space to breathe. Luckily, it looked like these particular chimeras didn’t share Haniel’s speedy regeneration abilities. 

The now three-legged chimera could no longer support its own weight. It staggered clumsily, attempting to regain balance. Blood bubbled from the monster’s wound as the stump blackened. The grotesque creature was repairing itself, but at this rate, it would take at least a week to form anything remotely functional. 

“These abominations are called chimeras,” I told Lady Roxy. “You have to take out the core. That’s where they’re weak.” 

“The core?” 

“You see those orcs wired into their chests? The orcs power the chimeras’ souls. If you kill the core, you kill the chimera.” 

Honestly, I was surprised to see ordinary monsters in chimera cores. Haniel had used a human, which I’d assumed necessary. Yet here in front of me, two cores clearly held normal grunt orcs, while the third held a blue-skinned high orc. 

“I’m thinking, Fate,” said Greed. “Are we supposed to believe that rockface just so happened to crumble and uncover these empty chimeras, and lost orcs just so happened to wander into their empty cores? And that just so happened to all three chimeras at the same time?” 

“Yeah. I don’t like the sound of that either,” I said, “but we can question the details after we take care of the problem.” 

First, we had to get the wounded soldiers to safety. I wouldn’t be able to fight freely with them in the way. 

“Lady Roxy, can you fight?” 

“I’m ready,” Lady Roxy declared. “Miria, are you good?” 

“I’m on it,” Miria said. Even her excitable tone darkened in the face of this threat. 

The two of them were seasoned warriors. They read my intentions in my movements. We no longer needed to speak. I gripped the hilt of the black sword and moved in on the crippled chimera. It summoned a ring of fire around itself to stop me. At a glance, I knew my Fire Resistance would handle these flames; the chimera had only summoned ordinary fire, not the magical variety. 

I burst through the blazing wall and lifted my sword high to strike the chimera’s core. The beast shielded itself with its arms, and I used this opening to take aim at my real target—the chimera’s other front leg. I sheared the limb right off. 

The chimera pitched forward, and its flames dissolved. In the next instant, Lady Roxy leapt into the fray, and with one powerful blow, she severed the head of the orc entangled at the monster’s core. Its core destroyed, the chimera fell silent, unmoving. 

Two chimeras remained. I had an eye on them, but I hurried to Miria, who had kept both full-strength chimeras busy while Lady Roxy and I finished off the weakened one. 

“Hurry up!” Miria howled, darting around the field. “Ugh… I’m so dead, I’m so dead!” 

She was exaggerating. Her evasive movements were truly impressive, and her use of the flamberge was nothing short of masterful. Because her blade was imbued with the same elemental flame as the chimera’s fireballs, she was able to cut them down before the fire so much as singed her. I wondered whether this technique was something she’d picked up in the previous battle with the salamanders. If so, she learned fast. 

Miria might have been all sorts of crazy off the battlefield, but on it, she flared with wild potential. Still, no matter what I could learn from studying her maneuvers, I didn’t have the time. I had to move. 

“Miria, you’re clear!” I shouted. “Get the wounded to safety!” 

“Ugh, you’re the last person I ever wanted to save me, lich-man skull-face! I’ll never forgive myself! Anyway, thank you!” 

“Think nothing of it. But, please, look after Mugan.” 

“Leave it to me!” Miria said, and then, “Oh, Lady Roxy!” 

“Miria, I need you to get Captain Mugan and the other soldiers to safety,” said Lady Roxy. “Mr. Corpse and I will take care of the remaining chimeras. Once you’re clear, regroup with Northern and his men, and inform them of what happened.” 

“Understood. Be careful, Lady Roxy.” 

The girl was clearly reluctant to leave Lady Roxy’s side, but she did as she was told. She shouted orders to the soldiers who were still mobile, and together they carried the wounded to safety. Just a bit longer, and I’d be able to fight freely. 

“We take down the others like we took down the first,” I said, nodding toward Lady Roxy. 

“Got it.” 

We readied ourselves for another round, then dashed toward the chimera with an ordinary orc at its core. The high orc chimera cast a roaring firewall in our way, the flames far more intense than those the chimera we’d cut down had produced. 

I transformed Greed into the black scythe and sliced the fire into nothing. The momentum carried me into a second strike that neatly separated the grunt-chimera’s front legs from its body in a spray of corroded fluid. Lady Roxy once again leapt in to finish off the staggering abomination. 

Meanwhile, I turned to face the remaining high orc chimera. My job was to stop it from getting in Lady Roxy’s way. 

As I expected, the monster tried to throw another wall of fire in her path, but I sliced the flame away with the skill-negating power of the black scythe. At the same time, Lady Roxy chopped off the head of the grunt in the chimera’s core, spattering its bright blood across the charred grass. 

Now, we had only one chimera left to deal with. 

It was strange, but even though it was our first time fighting together, Lady Roxy and I moved as though we already knew each other’s maneuvers. I’d fought alongside Lord Aaron Barbatos and Myne, the bearer of Wrath, but fighting beside Lady Roxy felt the most natural. She clearly felt it too, because in the beat after the grunt-chimera collapsed, she looked at me with surprise on her face. 

“One left,” I said. 

“Let’s keep up the pace and make it quick. I need to check on my troops.” 

“Are you okay? Your breath is a little short.” 

“I’ll be fine. You gave me the last strike on each of those last two chimeras, and I’ve never taken in so many Spheres before. Thanks to you, I’ve leveled up multiple times.” 

“Glad to hear it,” I said sincerely. 

Lady Roxy put on a brave face, but she was confronting an enemy with stats well above her own. If she wanted to save her troops, this fight had no room for error. We had to finish the strongest chimera, and fast. 

I dashed toward the last chimera with Lady Roxy close behind. The monster threw firewalls in our way, but again, before the skill-canceling blade of the black scythe, these spells were useless. I cut the fires away as we ran, once again aiming to slice off the monster’s legs. 

But the high orc chimera wasn’t stupid. It didn’t let me use the same trick a third time. The firewalls were a distraction. The monster leapt backward, metal body gleaming, in an arc nearly thirty feet above the ground. Its landing point, however, was obvious. 

“We attack the moment it lands,” I said. Lady Roxy didn’t even need to acknowledge my direction. We moved in unison. 

If we timed it right, and I knew we would, the chimera didn’t stand a chance of avoiding our joint attack. We sprinted to the site of impact, ready for our chance to finish it off. 

We could not have predicted what happened next. 

As the chimera landed, the creature’s immense weight crushed through the ground we stood on. Together, our voices cried out in shock as Lady Roxy and I plummeted into cavernous darkness below. 

I engaged Night Vision as we fell, trying to get a sense of how far we were falling, but I couldn’t see the bottom. It was so deep. The landing was going to be bad. I grabbed Lady Roxy’s hand and pulled her close. 

“Huh?” 

“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m stronger than I look.” 

Lady Roxy didn’t reply. She simply let me carry her as we fell. A tremendous shock snapped through my back. We hit bottom , I thought, but there were no thoughts after that, and my consciousness faded out somewhere far, far away.