THE ENEMY IS EVERYWHERE!
The second phase of our air battle against the fighters is proceeding so smoothly that the first phase feels like a distant nightmare.
There are several reasons for this, but the biggest is that we opened with a preemptive attack.
Along with the dragons, the Demon Lord and I helped unleash an enormous Wind Magic attack on them.
Before, the wyrms and aircraft were so mixed together that this would’ve been impossible, but once the Demon Lord eradicated a whole bunch of fighters, it became a lot easier to separate friend from foe.
And we’d have to be morons not to jump at that chance.
So we smashed a giant mass of air right into the swarm of fighters that were flying toward us.
A “mass of air” might not sound all that impressive, but trust me, it was crazy.
Picture the big hurricanes you sometimes see on the news and stuff.
If you’ve seen trees getting uprooted and whole houses blown away, you’ll understand just how destructive wind can be.
We controlled that wild force with magic and even compressed it to make it stronger and stronger before hitting the planes with it.
Wind Magic might make you picture sharp, cutting whirlwind attacks or whatever, but in reality, it’s a lot bigger and blunter than that.
I mean, we were hoping it might even damage the UFO while we were at it, that’s how big it was. Those stupid little fighters didn’t stand a chance.
As a result, more than half of the second swarm of aircraft was brought down by that one blast.
Wary of being rounded up again, the aircraft started spreading out quite a bit after that, so we didn’t get to use the same move again.
Kind of frustrating, since we probably could’ve really wiped all of them out in one go if they stayed close together.
Still, it was extremely effective.
With the momentum of that preemptive attack behind them, the wyrms have been taking down the remaining aircraft one by one.
Although unfortunately, even that giant spell didn’t damage the UFO one bit.
The barrier protecting the UFO is so damn strong that even though the magic definitely hit it, it didn’t budge an inch.
Will the bazooka Potimas gave me really be able to bust through that thing?
I’m definitely worried.
Still, things seem to be going in our favor for now.
The amount of fighters is finally getting sparse. Either the UFO figured that we’ll just blow them away again if it sends out the rest of the aircraft all at once or it’s finally running out of spares.
Since they’ve got the advantage in numbers now, the wyrms are dealing with the aircraft no problem.
The aircraft seem especially cautious of the Demon Lord, who was wreaking havoc on them not too long ago.
Wherever she goes, they’re giving her a wide berth.
They know if they get too close, she’ll jump on them and destroy them.
So for now, the Demon Lord is staying on top of her dragon, firing off little spells from time to time.
Although each time she does so, another aircraft goes down, so I guess they’re not really “little.”
Still, it’s not nearly as flashy as the way she was jumping from plane to plane before, so we’ll stick with “little” for now.
“Heh-heh! Outta my way! Wind dragon Hyuvan coming through!”
And then, of course, there’s a certain someone who’s getting super carried away.
I don’t need to tell you who, I’m sure. Especially since it just said its name itself.
Cut it out, will ya, Hyuvan?
If you keep doing stupid stuff, it’ll make me look stupid, too, since I’m riding on your back.
I can see how it’d want to get carried away, though.
Not long ago, things were going so badly that it was fully prepared to die, but now the tide has thoroughly turned in our favor.
Yep. It probably has to get this amped up if it wants to forget all the corny lines it was saying before.
I get it. I really do, bud!
Sometimes you say something that seems appropriate in the moment, but when you look back later when you’re in your right mind, it seems really embarrassing in retrospect!
That happens to me all the time!
I mean, like, all the time!
That’s why you always gotta keep yourself in check, or you’ll say something in the moment that you might regret!
But then something hits me.
Aren’t things going a little too well?
I mean, there are plenty of factors as to why it’s going this well.
There’s a good reason that we’re pushing forward like this.
But if I step back and look calmly at this forward-moving situation, I can’t help but feel like something’s wrong.
Things were going so poorly for us before, so how did the tables turn so fast in our favor?
It’s almost like we’re being guided this way on purpose.
For just a second, I get goose bumps.
I check the wyrms’ current state with Detection again.
The fighters and the UFO, too.
Those guys exist outside of the system, so skills like Analyze don’t work on them.
That means I can’t find out their exact strength and abilities, but there’s an even worse effect: My Future Sight doesn’t work on them.
I don’t know what they’re going to do next.
In this case, however, I think I can take a good guess.
The UFO is preparing something big.
“Take evasive action—now!”
I send a warning to all the wyrms via Telepathy.
If I tried to shout, it would only come out as a garbled shriek.
That’s why I used Telepathy, although I’m not sure if it helped at all.
Since my panicked warning startled a good amount of the wyrms into obeying, I’d like to think it did some good.
But there were still significant losses.
For just a moment, the sky is completely filled with light.
The UFO just fired a huge laser beam.
It swallows up anything it touches, aircraft and wyrms alike.
When it dissipates, there’s nothing left in its path.
It’s all been evaporated into nothing.
Dammit!
We’ve been had!
The reason there were fewer fighters was so that they wouldn’t get caught in the sights of the UFO’s main gun!
It was trying to catch the wyrms off guard, too.
So that it could wipe them all out!
We were aiming to take down the fighters in one big blow, so it’s only natural that our opponent would try to do the same thing.
Why didn’t I notice?!
The fighters are just one of the UFO’s weapons.
No matter how many of them we take down, it doesn’t really solve anything.
I should’ve realized that. Our real enemy is the UFO, not those stupid planes.
The UFO, the one that withstood that giant wind spell without a scratch, is our opponent, and the aircraft are just extras.
But I forgot about that and assumed things were going well just because we had the fighters under control.
And this is the price we pay for that: half of the wyrms’ numbers.
We even lost a few dragons, too.
Looks like they got even for the hit we landed before.
The UFO is a giant superweapon, so of course it would have powerful equipment.
Especially since it’s also carrying a bomb powerful enough to blow up an entire continent.
“Ahhh, dammit! They got us good. We really screwed the pooch!”
The wind dragon Hyuvan howls with rage.
“Gotta thank you, though. Any later, and we would’ve been up in smoke, too.”
I make a gesture at it not to worry about it.
Since I’m riding on its back, I don’t know whether it can see me or whether it’d understand even if it could, but whatever.
It’s the one who responded promptly to my warning and took evasive action.
Thanks to it, we didn’t get blown away.
If Hyuvan had gotten hit, then obviously I would’ve eaten it, too, since I’m on its back. It doesn’t need to thank me for saving both our lives.
Although I do have the Immortality skill, so I probably would’ve survived even if we did get blown to smithereens.
But I’ve got bigger fish to fry than thanking each other right now.
We have to get the wyrms back in line, or the UFO will come after us.
If I were the UFO, I know I wouldn’t miss a chance like this.
Sure enough, the UFO deploys a whole bunch of fighters.
I guess it still had plenty of them in store after all.
If all those fighters attack our side right now, the wyrms will scatter and get picked off one by one.
I’ve got to get them back into formation to take on the aircraft.
As I look around in a panic, I see an even less welcome sight.
The UFO’s main gun, the one that just fired on the wyrms, is slowly changing its angle.
Now it’s turning toward our troops on the ground.
Damn that UFO. It figured out that the wyrms were too quick a target, so it decided to go after something easier.
Since the dragons are all scattered, it knows it can do more damage by firing on the tightly packed troops below.
Clearly, this UFO is equipped with some top-notch AI.
Seriously, enough already.
Aircraft coming after our guys in the sky, the UFO’s main gun pointing at the ones on the ground.
We’re in danger on all sides.
If we don’t do something fast, we’re seriously screwed.
“White!”
As I try to come up with a plan, someone sends me a telepathic message.
It’s the Demon Lord.
“I’ll take care of the fighters, so you do something about that flying saucer’s main gun!”
Do something?
I mean, I’ll try my best, but is that really the kind of thing I can do anything about?
“White one.”
Another voice enters the telepathic conversation. This one must be Potimas.
“Use the weapon I gave you against the enemy’s main gun. That should be enough to destroy it.”
Oh yeah, now that he mentions it, I do have that thing.
The bazooka, the thing Potimas gave me so we could break into the UFO.
The idea was to use it to bust through the UFO’s exterior so we could get inside, so I guess it can probably destroy the UFO’s main gun, too.
I mean, if it can get through the exterior, why not?
But then I’d be using up the bazooka’s only shot on the gun. How are we supposed to get inside?
“But we won’t be able to break in if she does that.”
The Demon Lord raises the same concerns I had.
“Fear not. It is more than powerful enough to destroy the main gun. It will destroy the outer wall along with the emplacement.”
Ahhh.
So it’s gonna blow away the main gun along with the wall behind it, and then we’ll get in through there?
Hrmmm. Is that really gonna work?
Well, I guess I have no choice but to trust him on that right now.
“’Kay.” I answer shortly.
“’Kay?”
“She means ‘okay, no problem.’”
Potimas doesn’t understand my shortened response, so the Demon Lord explains for me.
Yeah, it’s kinda convenient to have her around at times like these, since she usually gets what I’m thinking.
“Gotcha. So we gotta fly on up to that big ol’ gun, right?”
Hyuvan, who was listening to our conversation, confirms our course of action.
I nod.
“You got it, boss! Hang on tight!”
With that, it speeds toward the main gun.
As if guessing our intentions, a bunch of fighters start swarming us.
“Tch!”
“Ignore them—keep going.”
Hyuvan seems concerned about the planes, so I try to tell it to just focus on moving forward.
As the fighters come toward us, I ward them off with Wind Magic.
They’ve got the same barrier as the tank, so my beloved Dark Magic won’t work on them.
Which means I have to use Wind Magic, whether I like it or not.
Seriously, you never know what’s going to come in handy someday.
I figured I might need Fire, Water, and Earth Magic, and I really do use them in everyday life from time to time, but I never imagined I’d need to use any other kinds of magic.
I mean, Dark Magic is more than adequate for attacking.
It’s stronger and faster, since my skill level and experience with it are higher, so it doesn’t make sense to use other kinds of magic that I’m not as used to.
Man, it’s a good thing I still leveled up my other magic skills, though.
This just goes to show that you can never have too many skills.
Even my other totally useless skills might turn out to be my saving grace one day, maybe! At least I hope so.
Seriously, when am I supposed to use Shieldsmanship and junk like that?
Is there even any shield out there that’s stronger than my body?
All right, yeah, I’m getting off topic here. Back to fighting the aircraft.
They must sense something about Hyuvan and me, ’cause they’re coming after us like nobody’s business.
I guess that might be for the best, since it buys the other dragons time to recover, but since I’ve got to destroy the main gun over here, I don’t have time to mess around with these damn planes.
That’s why I told Hyuvan to keep moving forward.
As I knock the pursuing aircraft out of the sky with Wind Magic, we keep heading toward the UFO.
Luckily, the main gun doesn’t seem capable of firing in rapid succession. It appears to still be charging, so there’s no sign that it’s about to fire or anything.
Still, that doesn’t mean we’ve got time to mess around.
If I don’t destroy that main gun before it fires again, our forces on the ground will be wiped out.
That gun was strong enough to blow away a dragon without leaving a trace, so even the strongest part of our ground troops, the queen taratects, would be far from safe.
I can’t afford to miss.
Ugh, if it wasn’t for this UFO’s stupid barrier, I could just teleport right in front of the UFO’s main gun and blow it away with the bazooka, easy as pie.
Normally, I can use Short-Range Teleport to get to anything within eyeshot, but apparently, it doesn’t work like that when that damn mystery barrier is in play.
I guess it’s because Spatial Magic can’t do anything until you’ve designated a point in space for it to work on.
But it’s impossible to designate any space within the barrier. If I try, I’m just wasting energy.
And even if it’s not touching the barrier directly, any space that’s too close to the barrier is still hard to target properly.
The mystery barrier seems to act on space itself, so maybe that’s why.
Dammit, these barriers are a pain in my ass!
Who the hell developed such a dangerous thing?!
It was Potimas, obviously!
I wish that guy would just drop dead already.
Preferably in the past, before he has a chance to develop this damn barrier.
Does anyone have a time machine I could borrow?
I just wanna pop in to whenever Potimas was born and kill him on the spot.
Then the past would get rewritten, so the barrier would stop existing in the present.
Whew. Okay. Time to stop thinking about stupid things and focus on my job.
I can ward off the fighters without a problem, and the Demon Lord is bringing them down left and right while protecting the wyrms, so I should be able to destroy the main gun before it fires its second shot.
If I miss with the bazooka, then we’re totally screwed, so we have to get as close to the UFO as possible so I can fire from a distance where I can’t possibly miss.
…Huh? Wait a second.
Get close to the UFO?
Q: Where am I keeping the bazooka again?
A: In Spatial Storage.
But if I’m near the mystery barrier, I can’t use Spatial Magic.
Well, shit!
I won’t be able to take out the bazooka if I’m too close to the UFO!
And since Hyuvan is a speed-centric dragon, we’re getting closer to the UFO by the second.
It’s practically right under our noses already.
Uh-oh. I gotta take the bazooka out fast!
Panicking, I hurriedly try to pull the bazooka out of Spatial Storage.
It’s stupidly big and long, practically the size of a telephone pole.
Dammit! This thing is huge! How am I supposed to get it out?!
And of course you choose this exact moment to show what you’re made of, you damn grunt!
How are you speeding so close to the UFO without losing a second?
C’mon! Slow it down a little!
I won’t be able to pull out the bazooka!
This is a stupid yet serious predicament I’ve found myself in here.
But somehow, I barely make it in time!
Just as I manage to pull the bazooka out entirely, the effects of the barrier make the entrance to my Spatial Storage disappear.
Geez, that was close.
If that had happened while I was still taking out the bazooka, it might’ve gotten broken in half.
Or, like, gotten split between two dimensions or whatever.
“Nice! You ready, girlie?! Here goes nothin’!”
Seeing that I’ve got the bazooka out, Hyuvan charges right toward the main gun.
Pretending that our plan never came this close to being totally ruined, I put on a blank expression and ready the bazooka.
Seriously, nobody needs to know that the ground troops almost got blown away because of my stupid miscalculation.
Whew. Good thing I made it in time.
Seriously.
I steady the bazooka on my shoulder.
There’s no complicated mechanism involved in firing this thing. All you have to do is pull the trigger.
Although you need to be crazy strong just to be able to hold up this giant thing.
The UFO’s gun is right in front of us.
Even a total noob wouldn’t be able to miss from this distance.
Perfect!
With that decided, I pull the trigger.
Bad move, as it turns out.
Between the stress of what just happened and the relief of making it in time before the second shot could be fired, I guess I was a little too careless.
I stupidly forgot exactly who made the bazooka in my hands.
Light blasts out of the bazooka.
This bazooka is apparently a similar weapon to the UFO and the aircraft, since it shoots a beam of light instead of physical ammo.
Now, that’s all well and good.
The problem is, the light also blasts out of the other end, right toward me.
Uh-oh.
As soon as that thought crosses my mind, I relinquish my tight hold on Hyuvan’s body, shoving off as far away from it as I can.
It’s not like I did that with any real forethought, but it would’ve gotten caught up in it if I stayed there, so I think that was the right move.
Caught up in what, you ask?
The exploding bazooka, that’s what!
The light from the bazooka hits the UFO’s main gun head-on.
True to Potimas’s guarantee, it busts right through the gun and blows through the wall beyond it.
That’s also good.
But the light from the bazooka also blows away the hands I was holding it with.
Not only that, but the shoulder that was supporting it and even my human head.
In fact, my whole damn human half goes flying off, and half my spider body gets blown up right with it.
Luckily, I’m able to avoid any more damage thanks to the fact that I’m now free-falling away from the light.
That also distances me from the barrier’s range enough that I can use magic again.
Forcing myself to stay conscious, I desperately cast Healing Magic on myself.
Thank goodness I learned Miracle Magic, the advanced form of Recovery Magic.
Otherwise, I could never have recovered from half my brain being blown away.
I probably still wouldn’t have died, thanks to my Immortality skill, but I wouldn’t be able to think with my whole head missing.
Even half my brain being gone is a huge problem. It takes time to heal that kind of injury, so I’m not gonna be able to fight for a while.
Obviously, normal Healing Magic takes a lot of time to restore a missing body part.
Especially a complicated organ like the brain.
In fact, if I didn’t have both Immortality and Miracle Magic, I’d be dead right now, wouldn’t I?!
Yeah, I know, that must have been exactly what Potimas was trying to do!
Yes, that bazooka did exactly what he said it would.
It destroyed the main gun and made a hole for us to enter the UFO.
The fact that it’s one use only was true, too.
I mean, obviously you can’t use it a second time if this is what happens!
How are you gonna fire it again when it blows itself up, not to mention takes the person who fired it down with it!
Which means Potimas intended to kill whoever used it—either the Demon Lord or me.
I knew that guy was our enemy!
How evil do you have to be to go after our lives while we’re trying to save the world here?!
Gravity carries me toward the ground.
Most of my power is focused on healing my brain right now, so I can’t reposition myself in midair.
I gotta finish healing my brain before I crash into the ground!
Luckily, it turns out I’m worrying for nothing.
Something catches my body from below.
“You okay, lady?!”
Hyuvan scoops me onto its back right in midair.
Ooh, nice catch, buddy.
I know I called you a grunt and all, but you’re my favorite person in the world right now.
Dashing gallantly to the rescue when I’m in danger? You just gained a massive opinion modifier with me.
I can’t use Telepathy properly just yet, so I tap its back to let it know I’m all right.
“You’re alive! You had me sweatin’ it out that you was dead, you stinkin’ idiot!”
Hey, I’m not an idiot, and I don’t stink.
Ahhh, my spider brain is finally intact again.
Boy, Miracle Magic is crazy, restoring half my brain in such a short time after it was blown away like that.
Guess they don’t call it “Miracle” for nothin’.
“Hang in there! I’ll find someone in a jiff who can use Healing Magic!”
Hyuvan’s all worked up now. Sorry, pal, but I’m already on it.
It seems like it’s about to turn around and leave, so I stop it with a telepathic message.
“It’s okay. I can heal myself.”
We can’t turn back now.
I’ve gotta bust into that UFO right away.
“What? You sure?”
“I’m sure. Please bring me there.”
I point at the UFO with a spider leg.
I should be able to finish healing by the time we get back up there, so it’s no problem.
Right, I’ve got a job to do.
I’ve gotta get my revenge on the dirty bastard who’s on his way into the UFO right now!
Heh-heh. Just you wait, Potimas!
I’ll make you pay for trying to kill me!
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