Strike the Blood - Volume 22 - Chapter 4.3

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The sky of Nod shuddered with a screech-like roar.

This roar wove huge magic circles in the sky and became spells chanted at an ultrahigh density impossible for human vocal cords.

The magic circles created and amplified a shockwave accompanied by a destructive ray of light. It was Freikugel Plus’s ritual spell artillery attack.

The beam of light mowed down the MAR soldiers and the moss-covered soil of the cape with them. A tilt-rotor transport craft caught in the attack lost its balance, falling into the sea of clouds below.

Even so, as she kept her silver-colored recurve bow raised, Shio’s expression was hard and tense with fear.

The ritual spell artillery attack beam vanished, leaving the gouged soil exposed to sight. Wriggling upon it was a horde of bizarre monsters—a horde of soldiers covered with white exoskeletons.

“What are these things?! They shrugged off my artillery attack…?!”

Shio’s voice trembled with nervousness. Freikugel Plus’s ritual spell artillery attack could exhibit might close to that of a Fourth Primogenitor’s Beast Vassal for a brief instant. These skeletal soldiers had taken a direct hit from her attack, yet remained active, virtually unscathed.

“Ahh, those must be Spartoi.”

Still in Avrora’s arms, Mogwai whistled, visibly surprised. Shio narrowed her eyes, perplexed.

“Spartoi? What are those…?”

“Apparently, artificial demons made from culturing dragon cells. They’re not sentient, but they have magic resistance equal to a dragon. They’re tough. That bastard Shahryar Ren must’ve figured out normal troops weren’t gonna cut it so he sent these things in.”

“Like it’s not your problem, too?!”

Shio bit her lip as she notched a fresh arrow, but the Spartoi moved faster. They closed the distance, moving like bugs as they assaulted Shio before she could take aim.

“Rosen Chevalier Plus, Boot Up—!”

Yuiri leaped in, swinging her silvery long sword downward. Charging undaunted into the horde of Spartoi, she sliced into them along with their thick exoskeleton armor. Granted an effect equal to slicing through space itself, Rosen Chevalier Plus’s slicing attacks were effective even against Spartoi, with flesh as hard as that of a dragon.

“Yuiri!”

“Shio, get back! Take care of Avrora and Glenda!”

Cutting down six Spartoi in the blink of an eye, she’d apparently gained a feel for fighting them. Yuiri smiled strongly toward Shio and the others.

Yet as she watched, the expression rising over Shio was one of surprise, foreboding, and despair.

“No, Yuiri! Not yet! They’re still moving!”

“Eh…?!”

The Spartoi she thought she’d defeated were rising behind Yuiri once more. They weren’t so much regenerating as forcing their sliced bodies to reconnect, which was more than sufficient for the hollow Spartoi, which lacked internal organs.

The cutting edge of Rosen Chevalier Plus was so fine, it kept them mostly intact.

“Why, youuu…!!”

Shio shot a cursed arrow toward the regenerating Spartoi. A small-scale whirlwind arose to envelop Yuiri’s surroundings, blowing the Spartoi remains in every direction. It wasn’t a real solution, but even the Spartoi couldn’t bounce back right away if they were missing body parts. Denying them their combat abilities was good enough for the moment.

“Ohhh…not bad, missies.”

Mogwai spoke with obvious praise. Avrora’s blue eyes were wide open as she clapped excitedly.

“This is nothing.”

Shio replied with a strong tone as her shoulders rose and fell. The fight with the Spartoi made her truly understand the peculiarities of Nod and its lack of demonic energy.

Magic spells and ritual spells greatly resembled each other, but there was a fundamental difference in how they worked. Magic used real-world elements like ley lines and celestial bodies to create supernatural phenomena. In contrast, ritual spells drew on the living energy from the caster’s own flesh and blood and the natural world.

Shio and the others were able to use ritual spells in Nod, where magic energy did not exist, through the caster sacrificing her life force, using it as fuel to generate ritual energy. The Spartoi were probably able to function in Nod because they were constructed from a dragon’s flesh.

The issue being, Shio and the others could only use as much ritual energy as their bodies could withstand.

If anything, thanks to being unable to borrow strength from ley lines or the natural world, their ritual energy depletion was more severe than on the surface. On top of that, Freikugel Plus wasn’t exactly a ritual energy–efficient weapon. The same applied to Yuiri’s Rosen Chevalier Plus. Prolonged combat was dangerous. They had to concentrate their forces as much as possible and settle this as soon as possible.

“Where is Kiriha Kisaki…?”

Shio posed this question to Avrora, standing right next to her. Avrora gasped and lifted her face.

“She is…right behind thee.”

Avrora’s unexpected reply made Shio unwittingly spin around. Shio’s back was struck by the impact of someone suddenly kicking her hard.

“Out of my way, Shio Hikawa!”

Shio heard Kiriha’s jeering voice as she rolled on the ground, with Avrora caught up in the process. A severe, hot wind blew at her back. An incandescent beam unleashed by the dragon raced past Shio and the others from overhead.

“What’s the big idea?! That’s dangerous, Kiriha Kisaki!”

Enduring the pain at her back, Shio looked behind and lodged her complaints.

Hah?! Kiriha’s scornful glance seemed to say, before immediately returning her gaze to the copper Flame Dragon whirling in the skies above.

“I wonder, are the Lion King Agency’s monkeys incapable of speaking a single word of thanks for saving them? I have my hands full against a dragon. I have no time to worry about deadweight.”

“No time? I thought you Priestesses of the Six Blades were experts in antidemon beast combat?”

“Would you like to trade places with me, then? Right now perhaps? You should be thanking me for holding an ancient dragon at bay without proper manpower or equipm—!!”

Before Kiriha finished her words, the Flame Dragon belched fire once more. Shio and Kiriha picked up the still-on-the-ground Avrora on both sides, hastily fleeing outside of the flames’ effective range.

“Hold back an ancient dragon? Don’t you mean being chased around by it?”

“Shut up. I’ll kill you…!”

Shio’s unwittingly caustic remark caused Kiriha to shoot her a hostility-filled glare. Being forced to run around in circles had apparently piled up quite a bit of stress upon her.

“That girl you called Glenda, can’t she fight?”

Kiriha surveyed the area as she posed that question. The dragon girl with steel-colored hair should have been inside the tower at the tip of the cape at present. She didn’t seem to be hiding, but rather, doing something that she felt she had to do.

“Hey… Don’t tell me you want to make Glenda fight that thing head-on?!”

Shio objected to Kiriha’s line of questioning as she gazed up at the huge Flame Dragon overhead. Even if she was a fellow dragon, the ancient dragon Kreyd was at least twice as large as the barely hatched Glenda. Shio didn’t think it would be much of a contest.

For her part, Kiriha sullenly tapered her lips.

“What? She’s a dragon, too, right?”

“Keh-keh…sorry to disappoint you, but that ain’t happening. She’s in no condition to do that right now.”

Mogwai, clinging to Shio’s hip, interrupted in a grandiose tone. Tossed when Avrora rolled to the ground, he’d apparently hastily clamped on to Shio’s skirt.

“What do you mean? Is that related to why you were holed up in this facility?”

Shio picked Mogwai up roughly. From the comfortable touch, weight, and feel of the material, he really did seem to be just a teddy bear.

“Sorry, but no time to explain that. He’s comin’.”

“What?”

Mogwai dodged the subject as Shio looked up at the dragon overhead.

Kreyd the Flame Dragon wasn’t breathing fire, perhaps out of fear Avrora would be caught in it. In turn, he landed at the center of a force of Spartoi, digging up the ground as he touched down. Enveloped by an incandescent glow, his huge body suddenly shrank, turning into a large-statured dragon-man with scales covering his entire body.

“What does that ancient dragon intend to do…?”

“He released his dragon form so he can take Avrora with him…!”

Kiriha and Shio stepped forward to shield Avrora.

Yuiri put distance between herself and the group of Spartoi, getting into a low, guarded stance.

Shio and Yuiri, unaccustomed to fighting demon beasts, found this kind of fight easier than taking on a huge dragon, but Kreyd the Flame Dragon didn’t feel any less intimidating in his dragon-man form. Working in concert with the Spartoi arguably made him even more dangerous.

“Avrora…Florestinaaaaaa…!”

White steam leaked out of the edges of Kreyd’s lips as he roared.

Avrora, hiding behind Shio and company’s backs, drew in a sharp breath in fear.

Seemingly controlled by the dragon’s thoughts, the Spartoi began advancing all at once. They accelerated at an incredible rate that contrasted with how weighty their exoskeletons looked.

“Tch! Back me up, Lion King Agency!”

Arbitrarily dropping those words in Shio’s lap, Kiriha raced out toward Kreyd. Ignoring the destroyed but soon to regenerate Spartoi, she must have wanted to neutralize Kreyd first.

She hated taking orders from Kiriha, but her assessment was on the money. Shio notched a fresh ritual arrow and aimed at Kreyd. She tried to draw Kreyd’s attention to her to support Kiriha.

Kreyd’s attack proved swifter. Before Shio could even fire her cursed arrow, his enormous jaw opened wide, and the dragon-man released a scorching beam.

“Wait…! He can breathe fire in humanoid form, too?!”

The unexpected counterattack startled Shio, making her break off her ritual spell artillery attack. Grabbing Avrora, she leaped to the side to evade the flames. Using physical enchantment past her limits made her entire body groan, but she had no time to care.

“Black Thunder—!”

Kiriha accelerated to superhuman speeds, slamming her forked spear into Kreyd’s thin flesh. She’d imbued her spear with the ritual of pseudo-spatial severing identical to that of Rosen Chevalier Plus. No matter how resilient a dragon’s flesh, it absolutely could not withstand such an attack…if Kiriha’s attack actually hit.

“Wha…?!”

Kiriha’s expression twisted in shock. In dragon-man form, Kreyd’s reaction speed far exceeded Kiriha’s acceleration, even with her ritual energy at its utmost limit. Kiriha’s attack futilely sliced through the air as she was struck by an impact in turn.

The swing of Kreyd’s dragon-man fist made a dull sound of bones breaking echo forth. Ricercare flew out of Kiriha’s hands. Her left arm bent at an unnatural angle, Kiriha smashed to the ground, unable to even cry out as she rolled around.

“Kiriha Kisaki!”

“Miss Kisaki!”

Shio and Yuiri both shouted. Seeing Kreyd with an eye on the fallen Kiriha, the pair instantly leaped forward, each launching simultaneously timed attacks.

“—Reverberate!”

“Rosen Chevalier Plus!”

Shio used all the spell tablets she had on hand to summon bird-of-prey-style shikigamis. Using these as a distraction, Yuiri unloaded a lethal slicing attack. Their paired attack was timed so perfectly, it was as if they’d worked it out beforehand. Surely even a dragon’s reaction speed couldn’t defend against this.

Shio’s and Yuiri’s thoughts were easily shattered by the dazzling beam. Kreyd’s breath of incandescent flames burned away Shio’s shikigamis in an instant and blocked Yuiri’s approach.

Blast winds slammed Shio all over her body. As she lost her sense of equilibrium, her consciousness grew distant. She’d somehow evaded a direct hit from the flames, but she couldn’t fend off the shockwave as well.

Also, in the corner of Shio’s hazy vision, she saw Yuiri slowly fall to the ground. Yuiri had been bathed in Kreyd’s flames head-on from point-blank range. Her upper half cruelly burned by flames, she collapsed onto the molten soil, her silver-colored long sword clanging as it rolled across the ground.