“Operation: Save Cedaraille from a giant spider” was currently underway now that everybody had some time to recuperate their mana and stamina. Since we needed speed and moving everybody as one unit was faster than going individually, I became everybody’s car.
Before we left, I also gave Tamae, Nishio, Misaki, Kazumi, and Kohaku the [Hestia’s Retainer] title. As otherworlders, they already had access to the SP system but none of their titles gave them increased experience nor skill proficiency. Unlike Saori’s garms, who were too prideful, the students accepted my proposal immediately. After giving them a thumbs up and gaining five new more followers, we began ascending.
Moving from floor 19—the deepest you could go before the boss arena—to ten was easy enough to do since all I needed to do was fly up using [Wind Blast]. So, Tasianna, Ellaine, Nishio, and Yorshka supported me with [Tailwind] and [Wind Blast] while I concentrated purely on my flight, needing my parallel minds to stabilize myself during this trip. With how much my size and weight had increased since I last seriously tried to fly, back when I was still a D rank, I guess this was like relearning how to walk? Not like I was an expert back then either.
The moment we reached floor ten, Yorshka advised me to use the dungeon break paths since flying straight upwards was impossible now, due to the indestructible dungeon ceilings and walls. The only places the titanic spider could move through were the holes the dungeon left for monsters to move from one floor to another, left soft enough for monsters and adventurers to widen in case they didn’t initially fit. A severe mistake by the dungeon.
At this point, I randomly mentioned my scale-dust rocket booster when I complained how slow I was moving, which prompted Ellaine and the students to add how they saw me flying around while they were fighting the cultists. When I told Yorshka I wasn’t sure if I could do that without using [Solar Beam]’s overdrive mode and how I really couldn’t control my flight, the knight suggested concentrating all the heat around my wings while everybody else complemented it with wind spells.
Truthfully, I was sure I could mimic the rocket blasting without being in overdrive, since it only required me to regulate my body heat and pump it higher and higher until it reached the point where my scale-dust exploded from under my scales. I told Yorshka that excuse simply ‘cause of my embarrassment. It wasn’t a lie that I couldn’t control my flight, and when I saw Yorshka able to easily fly in her dragonewt form, I was just reluctant to show my incompetence in front of her and to everybody else I knew.
Nevertheless, the moment Yorshka mentioned a solution to my problem, I had to give it a try. People’s lives were on the line, this wasn’t the time for shame or pride. Thankfully, it worked! Unfortunately, that didn’t help how bad I was at it. Speeding up and slowing down my flame boosters was just foreign for me at this point, much like when I first practiced driving with my Papa.
Not like I was old enough to get my license …
We got through the different floors really fast, like rocket-speed fast with my boosters. Yet, my lack of practice caused me to smash into the ceiling, crash land and drag my body against the ground, or cause forest fires from floor nine to five. It astounded me how I always end up causing fires like this. How annoying. Thankfully, Tasianna was on top of things and doused everything I set on flames.
From floor three and onwards, we seemed to have caught up the spiders, as we found a trail of them. They were only rank Gs and Fs though, making me believe the bulk of the force had already made it to the surface. A concern that was confirmed just a few minutes later.
When I emerged out of the dungeon, I was able to witness the behemoth-like queen spider, even looking from up here in the sky. My attention was also drawn upwards, noticing that it was the middle of the night. Being in a dungeon, I couldn’t track the time properly, but I really wished the sun were up for this fight. I was so frustrated that I had to let a roar out.
At this point, I understood my advantages when I had a full or empty solar core. [Overheated] was a huge problem, as it prevented me from using [Symphonie des Feuergottes] longer than the adagio movement, my second phase. An empty solar core also meant no [Solar Beam] and a lack of infinite regeneration.
If I were to fight the spider on my own, it would be impossible for me to last very long against it in my current state. However, that was why I had a party.
[“Everybody, focus on the fodder! Yorshka and I will delay the mother rachonoid as long as we can, so eliminate her children, those skittering giants before they reach the city! We came too late to save everybody, so let’s give it our all to prevent any more deaths. That includes yours, nobody dies today! Let’s do this, Aurora and The Magical Biscuits! Mission commence!”] I gave a speech to pump everybody up.
“By your will, Lady Hestia! Aifli eir Vintral!” With both her fairy and ice wings, Tasianna descended first, preparing to soften everybody’s landing.
“Hai, Hestia Oujo-sama! (Yes, Princess Hestia!)” As four garms jumped out of Saori’s shadow, blue mana expelled from her body as she turned back into a massive fenrir. She jumped down first, leaving her garms behind to allow everybody who couldn’t fly to mount them. [“Nishio-san, work with Tasianna to soften your fall with wind magic. Garms, the hunt begins!”]
[“Yes, Alpha!”]
“The Magical Biscuits, let’s save some lives! Let’s show Sensei how much we have grown in this past year!” Tamae announced to everybody before mumbling, “This is so h-high …” in a shaky voice as she mounted Uno with Nishio.
As the garms jumped down, I could hear Tamae’s, Kazumi’s, and Kohaku’s screams of panic. It seemed they didn’t brace themselves properly.
It seemed Grimnir also was allergic to heights. “A tazong should not be d-doing this!”
On the other hand, Ellaine seemed like she was used to heights, looking down without flinching. “Just saying, but riding a griffon or a manatech gargoyle is far worse, Mister Grimnir.”
As everybody began their fall down, I stopped my scale-dust engine, activating my white flames to heal any damage I sustained from my flight up to the surface. Sure, [Draconic Barrier] prevented the majority of the damage, but a few of the landings were pretty rough. I probably would have broken a bone or two were it not for my barrier.
To reduce the amount of mana and stamina I would use during that mad dash to the surface, I also deactivated my [White Flames]’s automatic healing until now. Now was the time for battle.
As I approached the spider, a System message caused Yorshka and I to groan. I gazed down, noticing a heatwave was gathering around the queen as yellow-glowing spider threads created platforms for her army of children. I gulped.
[“So that’s a Territory … It’s giving me the chills,”] I said.
“That’s how it is, sadly. Her [Tyrant’s Aura] is probably oozing out like crazy to facilitate the elemental distortion from the mana as a conduit. Our goal will be to disable it, so all of us can bombard it with our attacks. As long as that is up, the heat will evaporate or melt everything before it can hit her … Thankfully, keeping it up drains quite a lot of mana.”
The white dragoon then jumped off, staying in the air with [Air Walk]. She was in her original form, a full dragonewt with white scales and carapace covering her whole body and her dragon-like head. “Norder Style: Silver Dragon’s Skyfall!”
A translucent dragon, shining like silver, was created by her mana, cladding Yorshka like a veil. At the same time, I turned some of my white flames into a shield, aiming to prevent the heatwave from hurting her before she hit the spider.
With one movement of her spear, the dragon moved by her command, shooting forward with her as they smashed against the spider’s cephalothorax. Even from up here, I could feel the shockwave from the impact, shaking not only the sky but also the earth. It sent my bones rattling, as I couldn’t fathom just how much damage that caused.
Unsurprisingly, the rachnoid felt it. Felt it hard as she shrieked like a banshee, struggling to keep herself balanced on her legs.
Jeez, so this is the power of a dragoon going all-out. I wonder if Farron was like this before his debilitation-huh?
Eh? How did I just gain followers?
Was it from the survivors from below? The adventurers? I did nothing idol-like at all, so why did I just gain followers? Regardless, I can worry about that later, for now, it was best for me to join the fight.
Wind Blast!
With my white flames fluttering around my body, I blasted myself to the side of the spider as I noticed something fly away from my dispersing flame shield. It was Yorshka and her entire body was cloaked in flames as if somebody had doused her in flames. I caught her and fanned the flames away, only to see her scales covered completely in burns.
She was thankfully alive, but she told me staying even a moment in the Territory cost her 10% of her health. She might not be as resistant to fire as I was, but that was still crazy. A normal person would have just been burned into a crisp the moment they touched the aura, a fact I hoped everybody else but us remembered from our briefing.
Yet, even with those terrible wounds, Yorshka grinned widely as I healed her. The fire in this dragonewt’s eyes burned brighter and mightier than the inferno she had just tasted. [“Haha! I can do this, don’t worry! I just need a moment to break its skull! One moment!”]
“Awraaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” a bone-chilling howl shook the burning woods beneath me, causing my body to tremble as if thunder struck me. I snapped my head down.
Using [Air Walk], Saori slowed down her descent before dive-bombing a group of spiders about to attack some adventurers, creating an explosion of black lightning as she hit the ground. She glanced at the scared adventurers for only a moment before jumping up and using [Dark Tendrils] to jump around like Spiderman or Tarzan. Her well-developed forelegs gained from her evolution were like sledgehammers covered in white fur; combined with the static lightning they produced, every time Saori slammed her leg down, rachonoids ranked D or below would blow up into pieces.
Thanks to Yorshka’s attack, the rachonoids’ advance had slowed down drastically, reacting to their mother being attacked. When the molten core rachonoid recovered from her damage, her children seemed to have regrouped, eyeing our attacking force. Using the flaming hot spider web to traverse both ground and sky, the spiders surrounded their mother like a fleet of fighters protecting a capital ship.
The bear-sized rank C rachonoids, armored in hard exoskeleton and mail of flaming spider silk, immediately engaged Saori simultaneously. They began targeting her with fire breath, silk attacks and leg slashes, however, they were engaging a B rank with skills made for night fights.
If you attacked her, she would dodge the strikes with superhuman agility. Even if you were to hit her, her [Stygian Blades] granted her [Shadow Armament] covered body the ability to leech health and heal any damage, while each kill increased her [Bloodlust] stat booster. The spider queen might have dwarfed Saori’s elephant-sized fenrir form by a mile, but her children stood no chance against this one-woman army.
She roared once again as the fur on her body stood up from the static electricity, surrounding her in black lightning. This wasn’t meant to only intimidate her opponents after she ravaged their ranks, but a war cry for the coming of her support. Ice daggers and water beams flew from the hands of a fairy-winged wind elf, six human adventurers cleaved through anything standing in their way with teamwork, four garms began their hunt, and a single taz was smashing spiders open like pinatas.
Sacred Field! Music on!
“Is this the fated battle, the light shines
It’s blinding my sight
But I’ve gotta hold on, the stage calls
The cries of a thousand, the flames of war will descend ”
“Hestia, the spiders will 100% be killing people at this point. The first objective isn’t to risk our lives to stop it at all cost, but to stall it long enough for Cedaraille to react. Trust the Duke of Greenveil,” Yorshka told me during the briefing. Perfect, really, since I needed time to wear this thing down.
I need to draw the spider’s attention away from Yorshka. Let her find her moment to deal damage while I support and keep her alive. As long as I have mana, I can heal-tank-support-artillary mage-warrior this!
“Adventurers of Cedaraille—Ah, shut up you stupid insect.” As Yorshka was about to give a speech to the surviving adventurers, she was interrupted by a spider trying to jump on me mid-flight, only to quickly dispatch it with a stab to the head. “I am Yorshka, the White Winged Dragoon! Rank A adventurer and a Knight-Captain of the Knights of Aurena, the holy knight order of the Church of Aurena! Hear me, if you wish to defend your home, then I beseech you to fight with me and my companions! Run for your lives if you must, but know that the Goddess is on our side today! Will you fight with me?”
Her ending was perfectly timed as the spider mother roared out and raised one of her legs, causing the flame web to move and rain down spiders on me. Holding her spear up high, Yorshka steadied her legs on me as I began evasive maneuvers with my [Wind Blast]. Blood and flames sprayed as Yorshka’s counters and my spells eviscerated the army of critters.
I then threw Yorshka off me before braving the Territory of the spider. My scales, thankfully, survived the heatwave well enough with [Draconic Barrier], but I felt the heat piercing right through it. Just as I was about to hit the spider, my white flames activated, meaning I actually took damage.
Me? Getting hurt by flames? Urgh, not a good day to be a fire dragon. Haa!
I endured before ramming my tail into the spot Yorshka had stabbed, causing the spider to roar. Sadly, my blade was shallow. The exoskeleton protecting its abdomen and thorax were too hard and with this constant heatwave pushing me back, it made it hard to land a decisive hit.
As I was hanging onto the spider, lava exploded from the wound, sending me back. I was then forced to fly away to avoid getting slammed by the building-complex-sized spider into the ground. Honestly, at this point, it looked more like a lava lake.
“FIGHT!”
As I was floating above the spider after dodging its slam, my ears picked up the war cry of adventurers. Influenced by Yorshka’s speech, the able-bodied adventurers began to group up around Ellaine, Grimnir, and the students. Some looked hopeful, some desperate, but all of them seemed to realize that, until support came from the city, this was the only safe space available. With my [Sacred Field] acting like a lighthouse to draw them in, my plan to group them up was successful.
Seeing this only invigorated my spirit. I might have been damaged and the Territory showed me I couldn’t brute force this, but who bloody cared? I would continue doing what I did best!
Magic circles began to appear around me, blasting the spiders with projectile spells as well as creating [Bedrock Blades] and [Terra Walls] to stall for time. The Territory acted as a natural defense, burning away the majority of my spells, only agitating the spider to cast her own fire, earth, and lava spells.
[Flame Explosion], [Petal Flames], [Inferno Blast], [Blazing Twister], four spells I dearly missed from when I still had [Fire Magic] and [Inferno Magic] were used against me, ravaging the landscape around us as the rachonoid tried to swat me down. My intangible spells like [Lightning Bolt] and my wind and storm spells managed to hit the spider, but its exoskeleton protected it from those attacks. To actually deal damage, I needed something stronger, like [Omnictus] or [Solar Beam].
Thankfully, my job wasn’t to be the damage dealer.
“Lookie here, Nordor Style: White Dragon’s Descent!” Faster than Yorshka could speak those words, her body crashed onto the spider’s abdomen, breaking through its carapace once again. If I remember correctly, I think I heard a spider’s heart was located at the top of its big butt. If Yorshka managed to hit it, that would deal a lot of damage.
Unfortunately, Yorshka missed and was burned as she retreated with [Dragoon Jump]. I caught up to her and healed her, but already by the second jump, her silver-scaled armor looked like it was melting into her skin.
I then grabbed her and threw her to the side as the rachonoid sent out a fire breath at us. I dodged it and landed, casting [Rumbling Might] to cause a minor earthquake to unbalance the creature. I then cast [Terra Wall] to block her sight, but she simply melted through them with her flames.
Her attention still remained on Yorshka, though, to the point she shot out flaming spidersilk from her butt. With immaculate skill, the silk turned into something like a projectile weapon, tracking Yorshka as she flew around like a hummingbird. Keeping half of her eight eyes on each of us, the spider queen was able to attack and defend against me with her front legs while preventing Yorshka’s lunges from connecting using her spells and silk. Even if the silk didn’t hit Yorshka herself, the silk led her family towards the dragoon, preventing the latter any clear shot.
For a boss-type monster, it was dealing with the two of us well enough. Too well. My normal set of spells weren’t dealing enough damage and I still had too little scale-dust left to create the devastating explosions I could usually do. Yorshka was evading attacks instead of dealing damage ‘cause I couldn’t distract the spider long enough. [The Will to Fight and Survive] was helping us regenerate and we were stalling as planned, but the spider queen kept moving forward.
I had to create an opening for Yorshka to attack!
Omnictus? Symphonie? They will take too long to prepare without [Purple Flash], but I can’t use my mana up as if it’s infinite right now. Still too tired from before.
As I was contemplating another plan, a thunderclap interrupted my thought before I noticed black lightning striking the spider’s butt, stopping her spider silk production. Both of us snapped around to see a giant wolf covered in shadow armament standing on the flaming spider web from the Territory without being burned too severely
[“Need a hand?”] Saori spoke.
I was shocked to hear her voice, responding back the second I heard it, [“Saori? The plan was for you to stay away from the aura! You need to cull the spiders, not enter the range of the whole army!”]
Saori was our attack party’s third hardest hitters, having the stats and skills to wipe out anything below her league. She made sure the rank C rachonoids were kept off the others, but even she would be overwhelmed if all the spiders protecting the queen were to charge at her right now. She shouldn’t be here, she should be helping the others.
[“Trust Tasianna, Hestia! You know how strong she has gotten! With Ellaine, Grimnir, my garms, and my students to support her, she’ll make sure those spiders learn why she’s part of Aurora!”] Saori retorted. [“Besides, your Divine Quest is to stop this thing from moving towards Cedaraille? You two aren’t faring too well.”]
“She is right, Hestia! We require more aid!” Yorshka agreed before kicking the air, shooting down like a shooting star to tear through layers of webs before doing the same by jumping back up. “Change of plans! Saori-sensei, I leave the distractions to you. Control the legs and use precise electric shocks against the cracks I left behind! Hestia, I’m sorry, but this heat is getting to me. My organs feel like they’re melting even with your healing. I need you to take up more of an offensive position.”
Can’t be helped.
[“Understood!”] My wolf partner and I responded.
Hesitating no more, I began materializing two large white magic circles in the sky.
Two parallel minds were on [Aerokinesis] duty to spread my buffs to everybody fighting the horde, two were preparing [Omnictus], and two more were busy keeping me afloat with [Wind Blast]. Six parallel minds were preoccupied, leaving me with four left and my own, although I was the one responsible for controlling our body.
Six minds couldn’t do anything, but I still had four minds to cast spells to support Saori and Yorshka. Healing spells and terra spells to slow the spider down. With Saori preventing the spider from using her silk using intangible dark magic and stygian lightning, Yorshka was able to dance around the spider like a hornet, destroying the webs around the spider to reduce her defenses.
Underneath us, the situation seemed to be deteriorating. Tasianna’s ice magic could be seen from this far away, but I couldn’t see how they were all faring, worrying me a bit. Rank Ds and lower rachonoids were still advancing towards the city, though I couldn’t detect any rank Cs headed that way. My guess was they were preoccupying Tasianna and the others.
As I was thinking about the others, the rachonoid queen suddenly stood up with her two sets of hind legs and then rammed her front pairs into the ground, causing rocks to rain on me from below. Using [Molten Guard] to protect myself, I managed to evade this attack outright. Yet, when I dispelled the spell, I suddenly recoiled a bit as I witnessed the rachonoid queen eating her own children.
Oh, gods!
With her front legs, she picked up several of her C rank children, killing them instantly before throwing a handful of them into her mouth. Her [Cannibal Lv. 2] activated, healing the wounds Yorshka had dealt with her dragoon jumps.
[Cannibal] seemed like a pretty simple skill, but I guess eating your race shouldn’t be rewarded by an even stronger effect. Still, being able to heal your wounds was a pretty scary skill for this boss-type monster. Yorshka, Saori, and I could only watch as her exoskeleton regenerated since, in the next moment, she released another magma explosion.
Crap!
This explosion was even stronger than the last one, probably ‘cause she had some time to charge it up during our assault. Splashes of molten rocks flew around me, forcing me to dodge them like I was in a bullet-hell minigame. That was when my [Foresight] and [Danger Perception] exploded inside my head like a bomb, warning me like a siren for the first time since this fight began. The warnings I had before couldn’t be compared to this one, and I understood why in the next second.
Piercing through the lava wall were six yellow-glowing scythe legs. Like six grim reapers, they swung at me at a frightening speed. Trapped against the sprays of magma, my [Foresight] was calculating at a lightning-speed to help me figure a way out of this without sustaining immense damage. Unfortunately, there were none. The only solution it could think of was to endure the damage.
Panzer, Molten Guard, Terra Wall, Air Shield, Tai—Scheiße! What the hell are you six doing! Focus on defense!
My decision to not cancel the tasks of my six occupied parallel minds meant there was a small lag where they stopped their spell to switch to what I needed to protect me. I spread myself too thin, and those few valuable seconds cost me six spells.
Brace for impact! Wind Blast!
The reaper’s claws came slashing in from the sides like a hug. If I couldn’t cast defensive spells to protect myself, well, then I had to gamble that the spider wouldn’t have its mouth open.
Blast off!
The scale-dust stored inside my wings, having regenerated over time, began to spark under my scales as I increased my body temperature. The explosions increased inside as I cast [Wind Blast] behind myself, pushing me forward. As the scythes inched closer and closer towards me, in my desperation to get out of its attack, I poured even more mana into my body. I began to overheat.
In mere seconds, I caused my body to warm up to the point it felt like my insides were burning. [Core Regulation] meant I wouldn’t actually overheat, but it still felt like it. My insides felt like they were boiling as I didn’t have enough time to prepare myself. It burnt. I felt trapped in a sauna inside a volcano. However, this heat was worth it all in the end.
My body exploded on fire similar to [Solar Beam]’s overdrive mode as my recently restored scale-dust burst in flames. Like a rocket, I was blasted forward, escaping the death trap as I crashed directly into the rachonoid’s eyes.
It screamed out as I somehow managed to pierced one of its eight eyes with my tail. Due to the recoil of the impact, I was knocked backward, tearing it out of its socket.
An even louder, tinnitus-inducing screech was let out of its mouth.
As nice as this was, the pain my body was feeling from overheating it was causing me to lose control over my body. [Aerokinesis] and [Omnictus] were all canceled in my panic. I had to concentrate on cooling myself down. Unfortunately, it seemed the spider wanted revenge. With its large mandibles exposing its mouth, it lunged forward in an attempt to consume me.
I was unable to respond to its attack.
“GriGRI!” A rough laugh, followed by the sound of a missile ending with a loud bang sent both the spider and I crashing onto the ground.
Hot! Hot! Hot! Smaller! Smaller! Water!
“Ayaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!”
My skin was flaring red like a sunburn, my body felt like it was being cooked inside a stew. It wasn’t to the point I felt as if I was melting, thankfully, but I felt like my body was being deconstructed somehow.
I opened up my storage, unleashing all the water stored inside it since my days in that cave with the orcs. Yes, I had carried extra water with me ever since my early days in the Belzac forest as an rank E dragon. As the cold water splashed onto my body like a waterfall, I felt like I was drowning for a moment before it all stopped. The heat finally stopped.
I let out heavy breaths. Wet with my sight covered in steam, I took out a dragorade to drink. When my vision cleared up, the crackle of an acquaintance entered my ears.
“Grigrigrigrigri!”
The slazzigula?
I stood up, swung my wet hair to the side as I noticed a white humanoid serpent clinging onto the giant spider, undeterred like a berserker by the Territory’s flames.. A burn scar covered one side of its face while six flaming wings kept him mobile in the air, slashing the rachonoid with flaming swords created from its gauntlets. Saori and Yorshka were apparently supporting him, using lightning and dragoon dives to kill off the surronding spiders.
They were ignoring the slazzigula and treating it as an ally.
Why is it here?
“Time to earn some davi, ya drunk bastards!”
“Fuck, the damn soldiers are coming! Fight faster!”
“Shit, the nobles and the knights! Come on, move deeper, deeper! There seems to be a horde being fought over there!”
“For the Greenveil duchy!”
I jolted my head around, noticing a rowdy crowd of humans and beastmen, all equipped in different armor and weapons fighting and pushing hordes of weak rachonoids back. Without glancing at me, they ran past me, avoiding the fight against the mother rachonoid to rush towards the fight happening in the distance, where Tasianna’s ice had already frozen parts of the forest.
When that happened, numerous men and women equipped in identical gear came into view. With either spears or swords, they rushed forward with a wide range of emotions. Some were frightened by the sight of the horde of spiders, others looked exhausted or drunk, while a few looked serious like veteran fighters.
“Lady Priestess, are you all right?” While the adventurers mostly ran past me, mostly ‘cause the ones who looked strong dragged anybody who tried to speak with me away, a few guards seemed to show their worry to me.
I didn’t notice those adventurers during my fight, however, considering the corpses lying on the ground, they must have fought for a while … meaning, oh shit. Don’t tell me they saw me.
… I had a feeling I couldn’t hide it forever but … Haaaa. Verdammte Scheiße.
Curses flew around in my mind as I realized this predicament of mine. As the guards began to worry about me, the slazzigula suddenly crashed somewhat close to me, burning up like a wickerman. I reached my hand out, dragging the flames covering his body away before healing his wound.
Its wings were deactivated as it pushed itself back up, shaking its head from the impact. It looked over to me and growled, “Griiii!”
‘Why aren’t you helping?’ Is that what you just said? I just saved your body skin, you thick-headed lizard! Salamander!
“S-shit! Stay behind us, Lady Priestess. The Godde—” the guards cried out, but I interrupted them.
“Yeah, yeah, Goddess will save us all.”
I wasn’t sure if I understood the slazzigula correctly or if that was just my imagination, but I slipped past the three guards standing in front of me and advanced towards the giant serpent. Standing before it, I spoke with it.
[“I’ve no idea why you’re here, but shut up, okay? You just had to fight me and make me tired, and I’ve been fighting that damn thing the whole time while you did fuck all. Don’t come at me like that!”]
It then pointed at its clean, healed skin. The charred scales were still there but they’d probably disappear after it molted.
[“Consider that healing a truce. You’re here to take that spider down, right?”]
It nodded.
[“Allies until it’s dead, then. Go, I’ll help! We need to bring down its Territory!”]
I had no idea why the slazzigula was helping us. Was it the dungeon commanding it? Was it its own will to beat the boss of the dungeon? I mean, the only way for the slazzigula to make it up here this fast must have been the dungeon’s will at the very least. However, it didn’t matter right now. We needed help to take this rachonoid down, so anything or anybody was an ally.
Speaking of the devil …
“Skyward Arrow!” The sound of another missile appeared, once again piercing the rachonoid. The first time, I believe it was the slazzigula’s flaming spear throw, but this time it was an … an arrow? No, a mana arrow!
“This is my land! I am the Duke of Greenveil! Those who dare desecrate the land my house has been holding for generations will be judged and punished! I will pierce your heart with Everhunter!” High in the sky, riding on top of a majestic armored griffon with the symbol of House Greenveil embed on the breastplate, a man equipped in glamorous green and brown armor shot another arrow at the spider’s head. As it recoiled, the man looked at the incinerated woods, noticing the slazzigula and me. “Lords and ladies of Greenveil duchy, as it is my authority as the ruler of these lands, granted to me by his Majesty, the King, I order you to purge my land of these rachonoids. However, do not dare harm any of our allies here! If I hear you disobey my orders, I shall have you judged and punished! Now, for my honor as Lord Duke Isaac Albreaus Greenveil, fly with me, nobles of Greenveil!”
An army emerged from Cedaraille. Knights and mages riding on griffons, hippogryphs, and gargoyles appeared in the sky, all wearing eye-catching armor or robes with emblems stitched onto them. Mages and archers mounted the walls of Cedaraille, waiting for their respective superiors to give the orders. Meanwhile, the foot soldier had already advanced with the adventurers into the woods.
“Trust in Duke Greenveil,” Yorshka told me. Well, the cavalry certainly has appeared. As the slazzigula jumped back into action while the flying knights and mages began preparing for their assault, I noticed a few white-robed priests appeared from the wall. Seeing as how the archers and mages looked at the priests, and the gazes they returned, I had the feeling they were about to cast [Prayer].
Yeah, sure, after a million years maybe if you have to do that dumb song! The main forces have arrived, time to switch to full support.
I took out a mana potion and a dragorade, drinking both of them down quickly. I then checked my Profile, refreshing any buffs that had timed out in the meantime.
I then activated [Aerokinesis], checked that I still had [Blessing of the Goddess of Light (Moderate)], and sang.
“Is this the fated battle, the light shines
It’s blinding my sight
But I’ve gotta hold on, the stage calls
The cries of a thousand, the flames of war will descend ”
Drove up to the maximum, my voice was being transmitted to everybody in the sky and earth. Nobles riding their flying mounts noticed my singing while anybody acquainted with me ignored it and continued their assault, including the slazzigula which I saw as an ally for now.
“The carnage of the blazing sun
Blood rain from swords and claws
The strive to pierce the sky
The light that beckons you forth ”
Instead of surprise, wonderment began to fill their faces as their eyes widened from the effects of [Idol] and [The Will to Fight and Survive]. The knights yelled their war cries as the mages chanted their spells.
“I couldn’t just stop now, my heartbeats
The show must go on
You cannot silence my voice now
Be dazzled, be humbled
I’m destined for the stars
Prepare for a beatdown, no mercy
Gonna overwhelm them
A chance for the spotlight
Don’t regret getting burned to ash ”
“Fire!”
“Spells out!”
As if they took my singing as a command, archers and mages began to shoot projectiles from on top of the wall, destroying any rachonoid child approaching the wall. The foot soldier cheered as they finally received the support they desperately needed, advancing forward towards the next targets. I could feel them praising me as they ran past me. Even the guards who attempted to protect me joined the assault team, thanking me for the blessing of the Goddess.
At this point, the white-robed priests on the wall were glaring at me, the one attracting the most attention next to the spider. My unique skill [Idol] allowed me to share certain buffs with others while I was acting like an idol, and one of those sharable buffs was [Prayer]. Everybody who could hear me had [Blessing of the Goddess (Moderate)] right now. I had no idea what was going on in the priests’ and priestesses’ heads, but all I could say was that I had no other choice.
This was the fastest way to give everybody the buffs needed and boost them up.
“The carnage of the blazing sun
Blood rain from swords and claws
As the music drops, our emotions will run wild
Top the world
The strive to pierce the sky
The light that beckons you forth
The promise to stand fast
Family and Friends
The Will to Fight and Survive, yeah! ”
I transferred completely to the support role while Saori, Yorshka, the slazzigula, Duke Greenveil, and his army attacked the spider. The boss-type monster was finally facing a raid large enough to challenge it. Preventing casualties was my job now as a healer, so I was casting [Major Heal] and [Sacred Field] like crazy to keep everybody alive through the Territory as well as using [Terra Walls] and [Molten Guard] to protect people from projectiles and silk attacks.
“Lady Hestia!” a clear voice entered my ears. A voice I knew very well.
“Tasianna! Everybody!” My eyes shined when I saw everybody had survived their encounter. Tasianna, Ellaine, Uno, Song, Sarasa, Quatre, Grimnir, Tamae, Nishio, Misaki, Kazumi, and Kohaku; all of them were dirty and their armor was battered and damaged, but none of them looked too terrible.
Well, except for Grimnir, who had his armor destroyed in the dungeon. He was running around in some mana clothing Saori threw together for him.
“We somehow managed to slay all the rank C spiders with Tasianna’s and the garms’ help. The soldiers and adventurers seemed to have it handled after we cleaned things up. Hestia, how is the situation?” Ellaine informed me, looking greatly exhausted but bright and energetic.
As words were unneeded, I showed her what everybody was doing to the giant spider. Looking at it, the numerous nobles, led by the Saori, Yorshka, the Duke, and the slazzigula were decimating the rachonoid, pushing it right into a corner.
Her Territory was waning as the heatwave was waning, sometimes letting Yorshka attack without being burned. Her exoskeleton broke but none of her children were close to her to feast on. Blood began to ooze from her body like lava, while two of her legs seemed to have been damaged too much.
Mana Eyes?
[“Saori, get back to the party! Get down here!”] I called over to Saor, stopping her from shooting more lightning bolts.
Once next to me, she transformed back into a wolfkin. Once Saori and I equipped our party bracelets and were reinvited into the party, I spoke up.
“[Tor Eiclere’s Finulaflei] and your new custom spell, Saori! Let’s do it!”
However, she and Tasianna stared at me and responded with, “What?”
“Come on, you guys aren’t actually intended to give over that rachonoid’s experience to the Duke or the slazzigula, right? Right? The Duke wants the kill just as much as us, right, Ellaine?
“Well, killing this B rank would bring great prestige, yes. Also, receiving more levels would increase your authority,” she replied immediately.
“Exactly. Let’s not chance it. Yorshka is in our party, we’ll let her deal the last hit. We need to burst the raid boss down with super hard-hitting attacks, lowering its health and tiring it enough to have it disable the Territory. Then, boom! Yorshka kill steal! Are you guys in?!” I could feel my mouth curve into a devious smile as I stared at them expectantly.
Both looked at each other, before they turned around and shared my smile.
Mwuhahahaha!
I sent our plan telepathically to Yorshka, who agreed immediately. Saori, Tasianna, and I stood before the spider, readying our spells. Saori’s custom spell was something we’ve been experimenting with, yet, we never really finished it. That meant, it hadn’t been accepted by the System yet. However, we had the details down, she just had to execute it perfectly.
I first produced some fire with my remaining scale-dust, turning it into a spear just like the slazzigula. In my dragonewt form, my Job skills were once again active, meaning I had [Fire Abnormality Effect: Dread] again. I threw the spear with all my might, piercing the spider with it. It might have not done any damage, but I saw that [Dread Burn] was successfully applied.
The three of us drank mana potions and dragorade, restoring our mana pools.
Purple Flash. Purple Flash.
Magic coursed through our bodies. Two purple magic circles appeared in my hands, a large black one was in Saori’s, while Tasianna conjured up a cyan one underneath the spider.
“Let’s do this! Omnictus! Symphonie des Feuergottes!”
“Lady Hestia, guide my hand!”
A red and white magic circle half the size of the spider suddenly appeared above the spider, sending an incandescent beam of holy energy and a flaming waterfall onto the spider. Weakened by [Dread Burn], the spider’s resistance against fire was partially countered while she had that status effect, making it susceptible to my fire spell.
Tasianna’s field of eternal snow began to buffet the spider, freezing its blood and lava before swords of ice pierced it. Not only the Duke but also his army of nobles and the slazzigula had to retreat from our spells, understanding how they would only turn into friendly fire if they didn’t.
The fire, holy, and ice spells wrecked the spider’s body, leading it to collapse before my smile widened even further. Its Territory was finally down. The raging inferno protecting the spider dissipated like a fading flame, fully revealing the dark cracks covering the monster’s exoskeleton.
The moment this happened, lightning began to crackle around Saori.
Black electricity covered her whole body, sending her hair and fur up in the process. Streaks of red lightning also appeared among the black ones. Although they were red, they felt more like a dye, colored by the red scarf made from my mana she was wearing. As the black magic circle in her hand grew as large as a cannon, she released it.
“Please, work … please. Hadean Dragon Thunder!”
Like a howl of a wolf, the giant thunder bolt shot out like a thunder cannon, striking the spider. The spider’s exoskeleton was already being destroyed by Tasianna’s and my spells, exposing its flesh to be turned to ash by Saori’s new custom spell.
Fire, holy, ice, and dark. All our main elements completely wrecked the rachonoid’s body.
Once the spell dissipated, the silhouette of the spider could be seen limping inside the smoke. Before anybody could respond, a translucent dragon descended.
“Norder Style: Silver Dragon’s Skyfall!”
The air and earth shook once more, the ground shattered from Yorshka’s dragoon dive as she landed directly onto the spider queen’s head, now entirely exposed. As seconds passed, Yorshka seemed to be struggling to break through the spider’s skull, which made me notice something.
Sing! Sing! Buff her up! I reprimanded myself.
“The carnage of the blazing sun
Blood rain from swords and claws
As the music drops, our emotions will run wild
Top the world
The strive to pierce the sky
The light that beckons you forth
The promise to stand fast
Family and Friends
The Will to Fight and Survive, yeah! ”
Cracking could be heard the moment I began singing again, buffing Yorshka up with all the buffs I had on me. Nishio and Tamae both began casting spells on me, knowing their knight guardian needed their support.
The power of her entire party channeled into her. Her efforts and damaged body roared out once more as her mouth released a powerful warcry. “HRAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!” she cried!
Seconds passed and finally it was over.
W-what?!
Yes! A free level up! Idol song slot! Wow!
There was a lot for me to process, but that could be left for later. First things first, we had to deal with the issues before us, for example, the slazzigula.
The white salamander stood over the rachonoid. It gave me a small glance, growling in disappointment at the fact that we intentionally stole the kill credit. Nevertheless, the hostility ended there, it picked up some spider silk, took out an organ from the queen’s abdomen before retreating back to the dungeon. Its actions were baffling, but I was thankful we didn’t need to deal with it too. Not like another fight would be smart with all the people around.
Goodness gracious, it’s finally over!
The fight to protect Cedaraille was over.
AbyssRaven With that, the spear ended the spider. Territory certainly burned people.
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“Operation: Save Cedaraille from a giant spider” was currently underway now that everybody had some time to recuperate their mana and stamina. Since we needed speed and moving everybody as one unit was faster than going individually, I became everybody’s car.
Before we left, I also gave Tamae, Nishio, Misaki, Kazumi, and Kohaku the [Hestia’s Retainer] title. As otherworlders, they already had access to the SP system but none of their titles gave them increased experience nor skill proficiency. Unlike Saori’s garms, who were too prideful, the students accepted my proposal immediately. After giving them a thumbs up and gaining five new more followers, we began ascending.
Moving from floor 19—the deepest you could go before the boss arena—to ten was easy enough to do since all I needed to do was fly up using [Wind Blast]. So, Tasianna, Ellaine, Nishio, and Yorshka supported me with [Tailwind] and [Wind Blast] while I concentrated purely on my flight, needing my parallel minds to stabilize myself during this trip. With how much my size and weight had increased since I last seriously tried to fly, back when I was still a D rank, I guess this was like relearning how to walk? Not like I was an expert back then either.
The moment we reached floor ten, Yorshka advised me to use the dungeon break paths since flying straight upwards was impossible now, due to the indestructible dungeon ceilings and walls. The only places the titanic spider could move through were the holes the dungeon left for monsters to move from one floor to another, left soft enough for monsters and adventurers to widen in case they didn’t initially fit. A severe mistake by the dungeon.
At this point, I randomly mentioned my scale-dust rocket booster when I complained how slow I was moving, which prompted Ellaine and the students to add how they saw me flying around while they were fighting the cultists. When I told Yorshka I wasn’t sure if I could do that without using [Solar Beam]’s overdrive mode and how I really couldn’t control my flight, the knight suggested concentrating all the heat around my wings while everybody else complemented it with wind spells.
Truthfully, I was sure I could mimic the rocket blasting without being in overdrive, since it only required me to regulate my body heat and pump it higher and higher until it reached the point where my scale-dust exploded from under my scales. I told Yorshka that excuse simply ‘cause of my embarrassment. It wasn’t a lie that I couldn’t control my flight, and when I saw Yorshka able to easily fly in her dragonewt form, I was just reluctant to show my incompetence in front of her and to everybody else I knew.
Nevertheless, the moment Yorshka mentioned a solution to my problem, I had to give it a try. People’s lives were on the line, this wasn’t the time for shame or pride. Thankfully, it worked! Unfortunately, that didn’t help how bad I was at it. Speeding up and slowing down my flame boosters was just foreign for me at this point, much like when I first practiced driving with my Papa.
Not like I was old enough to get my license …
We got through the different floors really fast, like rocket-speed fast with my boosters. Yet, my lack of practice caused me to smash into the ceiling, crash land and drag my body against the ground, or cause forest fires from floor nine to five. It astounded me how I always end up causing fires like this. How annoying. Thankfully, Tasianna was on top of things and doused everything I set on flames.
From floor three and onwards, we seemed to have caught up the spiders, as we found a trail of them. They were only rank Gs and Fs though, making me believe the bulk of the force had already made it to the surface. A concern that was confirmed just a few minutes later.
When I emerged out of the dungeon, I was able to witness the behemoth-like queen spider, even looking from up here in the sky. My attention was also drawn upwards, noticing that it was the middle of the night. Being in a dungeon, I couldn’t track the time properly, but I really wished the sun were up for this fight. I was so frustrated that I had to let a roar out.
At this point, I understood my advantages when I had a full or empty solar core. [Overheated] was a huge problem, as it prevented me from using [Symphonie des Feuergottes] longer than the adagio movement, my second phase. An empty solar core also meant no [Solar Beam] and a lack of infinite regeneration.
If I were to fight the spider on my own, it would be impossible for me to last very long against it in my current state. However, that was why I had a party.
[“Everybody, focus on the fodder! Yorshka and I will delay the mother rachonoid as long as we can, so eliminate her children, those skittering giants before they reach the city! We came too late to save everybody, so let’s give it our all to prevent any more deaths. That includes yours, nobody dies today! Let’s do this, Aurora and The Magical Biscuits! Mission commence!”] I gave a speech to pump everybody up.
“By your will, Lady Hestia! Aifli eir Vintral!” With both her fairy and ice wings, Tasianna descended first, preparing to soften everybody’s landing.
“Hai, Hestia Oujo-sama! (Yes, Princess Hestia!)” As four garms jumped out of Saori’s shadow, blue mana expelled from her body as she turned back into a massive fenrir. She jumped down first, leaving her garms behind to allow everybody who couldn’t fly to mount them. [“Nishio-san, work with Tasianna to soften your fall with wind magic. Garms, the hunt begins!”]
[“Yes, Alpha!”]
“The Magical Biscuits, let’s save some lives! Let’s show Sensei how much we have grown in this past year!” Tamae announced to everybody before mumbling, “This is so h-high …” in a shaky voice as she mounted Uno with Nishio.
As the garms jumped down, I could hear Tamae’s, Kazumi’s, and Kohaku’s screams of panic. It seemed they didn’t brace themselves properly.
It seemed Grimnir also was allergic to heights. “A tazong should not be d-doing this!”
On the other hand, Ellaine seemed like she was used to heights, looking down without flinching. “Just saying, but riding a griffon or a manatech gargoyle is far worse, Mister Grimnir.”
As everybody began their fall down, I stopped my scale-dust engine, activating my white flames to heal any damage I sustained from my flight up to the surface. Sure, [Draconic Barrier] prevented the majority of the damage, but a few of the landings were pretty rough. I probably would have broken a bone or two were it not for my barrier.
To reduce the amount of mana and stamina I would use during that mad dash to the surface, I also deactivated my [White Flames]’s automatic healing until now. Now was the time for battle.
As I approached the spider, a System message caused Yorshka and I to groan. I gazed down, noticing a heatwave was gathering around the queen as yellow-glowing spider threads created platforms for her army of children. I gulped.
[“So that’s a Territory … It’s giving me the chills,”] I said.
“That’s how it is, sadly. Her [Tyrant’s Aura] is probably oozing out like crazy to facilitate the elemental distortion from the mana as a conduit. Our goal will be to disable it, so all of us can bombard it with our attacks. As long as that is up, the heat will evaporate or melt everything before it can hit her … Thankfully, keeping it up drains quite a lot of mana.”
The white dragoon then jumped off, staying in the air with [Air Walk]. She was in her original form, a full dragonewt with white scales and carapace covering her whole body and her dragon-like head. “Norder Style: Silver Dragon’s Skyfall!”
A translucent dragon, shining like silver, was created by her mana, cladding Yorshka like a veil. At the same time, I turned some of my white flames into a shield, aiming to prevent the heatwave from hurting her before she hit the spider.
With one movement of her spear, the dragon moved by her command, shooting forward with her as they smashed against the spider’s cephalothorax. Even from up here, I could feel the shockwave from the impact, shaking not only the sky but also the earth. It sent my bones rattling, as I couldn’t fathom just how much damage that caused.
Unsurprisingly, the rachnoid felt it. Felt it hard as she shrieked like a banshee, struggling to keep herself balanced on her legs.
Jeez, so this is the power of a dragoon going all-out. I wonder if Farron was like this before his debilitation-huh?
Eh? How did I just gain followers?
Was it from the survivors from below? The adventurers? I did nothing idol-like at all, so why did I just gain followers? Regardless, I can worry about that later, for now, it was best for me to join the fight.
Wind Blast!
With my white flames fluttering around my body, I blasted myself to the side of the spider as I noticed something fly away from my dispersing flame shield. It was Yorshka and her entire body was cloaked in flames as if somebody had doused her in flames. I caught her and fanned the flames away, only to see her scales covered completely in burns.
She was thankfully alive, but she told me staying even a moment in the Territory cost her 10% of her health. She might not be as resistant to fire as I was, but that was still crazy. A normal person would have just been burned into a crisp the moment they touched the aura, a fact I hoped everybody else but us remembered from our briefing.
Yet, even with those terrible wounds, Yorshka grinned widely as I healed her. The fire in this dragonewt’s eyes burned brighter and mightier than the inferno she had just tasted. [“Haha! I can do this, don’t worry! I just need a moment to break its skull! One moment!”]
“Awraaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” a bone-chilling howl shook the burning woods beneath me, causing my body to tremble as if thunder struck me. I snapped my head down.
Using [Air Walk], Saori slowed down her descent before dive-bombing a group of spiders about to attack some adventurers, creating an explosion of black lightning as she hit the ground. She glanced at the scared adventurers for only a moment before jumping up and using [Dark Tendrils] to jump around like Spiderman or Tarzan. Her well-developed forelegs gained from her evolution were like sledgehammers covered in white fur; combined with the static lightning they produced, every time Saori slammed her leg down, rachonoids ranked D or below would blow up into pieces.
Thanks to Yorshka’s attack, the rachonoids’ advance had slowed down drastically, reacting to their mother being attacked. When the molten core rachonoid recovered from her damage, her children seemed to have regrouped, eyeing our attacking force. Using the flaming hot spider web to traverse both ground and sky, the spiders surrounded their mother like a fleet of fighters protecting a capital ship.
The bear-sized rank C rachonoids, armored in hard exoskeleton and mail of flaming spider silk, immediately engaged Saori simultaneously. They began targeting her with fire breath, silk attacks and leg slashes, however, they were engaging a B rank with skills made for night fights.
If you attacked her, she would dodge the strikes with superhuman agility. Even if you were to hit her, her [Stygian Blades] granted her [Shadow Armament] covered body the ability to leech health and heal any damage, while each kill increased her [Bloodlust] stat booster. The spider queen might have dwarfed Saori’s elephant-sized fenrir form by a mile, but her children stood no chance against this one-woman army.
She roared once again as the fur on her body stood up from the static electricity, surrounding her in black lightning. This wasn’t meant to only intimidate her opponents after she ravaged their ranks, but a war cry for the coming of her support. Ice daggers and water beams flew from the hands of a fairy-winged wind elf, six human adventurers cleaved through anything standing in their way with teamwork, four garms began their hunt, and a single taz was smashing spiders open like pinatas.
Sacred Field! Music on!
“Is this the fated battle, the light shines
It’s blinding my sight
But I’ve gotta hold on, the stage calls
The cries of a thousand, the flames of war will descend ”
“Hestia, the spiders will 100% be killing people at this point. The first objective isn’t to risk our lives to stop it at all cost, but to stall it long enough for Cedaraille to react. Trust the Duke of Greenveil,” Yorshka told me during the briefing. Perfect, really, since I needed time to wear this thing down.
I need to draw the spider’s attention away from Yorshka. Let her find her moment to deal damage while I support and keep her alive. As long as I have mana, I can heal-tank-support-artillary mage-warrior this!
“Adventurers of Cedaraille—Ah, shut up you stupid insect.” As Yorshka was about to give a speech to the surviving adventurers, she was interrupted by a spider trying to jump on me mid-flight, only to quickly dispatch it with a stab to the head. “I am Yorshka, the White Winged Dragoon! Rank A adventurer and a Knight-Captain of the Knights of Aurena, the holy knight order of the Church of Aurena! Hear me, if you wish to defend your home, then I beseech you to fight with me and my companions! Run for your lives if you must, but know that the Goddess is on our side today! Will you fight with me?”
Her ending was perfectly timed as the spider mother roared out and raised one of her legs, causing the flame web to move and rain down spiders on me. Holding her spear up high, Yorshka steadied her legs on me as I began evasive maneuvers with my [Wind Blast]. Blood and flames sprayed as Yorshka’s counters and my spells eviscerated the army of critters.
I then threw Yorshka off me before braving the Territory of the spider. My scales, thankfully, survived the heatwave well enough with [Draconic Barrier], but I felt the heat piercing right through it. Just as I was about to hit the spider, my white flames activated, meaning I actually took damage.
Me? Getting hurt by flames? Urgh, not a good day to be a fire dragon. Haa!
I endured before ramming my tail into the spot Yorshka had stabbed, causing the spider to roar. Sadly, my blade was shallow. The exoskeleton protecting its abdomen and thorax were too hard and with this constant heatwave pushing me back, it made it hard to land a decisive hit.
As I was hanging onto the spider, lava exploded from the wound, sending me back. I was then forced to fly away to avoid getting slammed by the building-complex-sized spider into the ground. Honestly, at this point, it looked more like a lava lake.
“FIGHT!”
As I was floating above the spider after dodging its slam, my ears picked up the war cry of adventurers. Influenced by Yorshka’s speech, the able-bodied adventurers began to group up around Ellaine, Grimnir, and the students. Some looked hopeful, some desperate, but all of them seemed to realize that, until support came from the city, this was the only safe space available. With my [Sacred Field] acting like a lighthouse to draw them in, my plan to group them up was successful.
Seeing this only invigorated my spirit. I might have been damaged and the Territory showed me I couldn’t brute force this, but who bloody cared? I would continue doing what I did best!
Magic circles began to appear around me, blasting the spiders with projectile spells as well as creating [Bedrock Blades] and [Terra Walls] to stall for time. The Territory acted as a natural defense, burning away the majority of my spells, only agitating the spider to cast her own fire, earth, and lava spells.
[Flame Explosion], [Petal Flames], [Inferno Blast], [Blazing Twister], four spells I dearly missed from when I still had [Fire Magic] and [Inferno Magic] were used against me, ravaging the landscape around us as the rachonoid tried to swat me down. My intangible spells like [Lightning Bolt] and my wind and storm spells managed to hit the spider, but its exoskeleton protected it from those attacks. To actually deal damage, I needed something stronger, like [Omnictus] or [Solar Beam].
Thankfully, my job wasn’t to be the damage dealer.
“Lookie here, Nordor Style: White Dragon’s Descent!” Faster than Yorshka could speak those words, her body crashed onto the spider’s abdomen, breaking through its carapace once again. If I remember correctly, I think I heard a spider’s heart was located at the top of its big butt. If Yorshka managed to hit it, that would deal a lot of damage.
Unfortunately, Yorshka missed and was burned as she retreated with [Dragoon Jump]. I caught up to her and healed her, but already by the second jump, her silver-scaled armor looked like it was melting into her skin.
I then grabbed her and threw her to the side as the rachonoid sent out a fire breath at us. I dodged it and landed, casting [Rumbling Might] to cause a minor earthquake to unbalance the creature. I then cast [Terra Wall] to block her sight, but she simply melted through them with her flames.
Her attention still remained on Yorshka, though, to the point she shot out flaming spidersilk from her butt. With immaculate skill, the silk turned into something like a projectile weapon, tracking Yorshka as she flew around like a hummingbird. Keeping half of her eight eyes on each of us, the spider queen was able to attack and defend against me with her front legs while preventing Yorshka’s lunges from connecting using her spells and silk. Even if the silk didn’t hit Yorshka herself, the silk led her family towards the dragoon, preventing the latter any clear shot.
For a boss-type monster, it was dealing with the two of us well enough. Too well. My normal set of spells weren’t dealing enough damage and I still had too little scale-dust left to create the devastating explosions I could usually do. Yorshka was evading attacks instead of dealing damage ‘cause I couldn’t distract the spider long enough. [The Will to Fight and Survive] was helping us regenerate and we were stalling as planned, but the spider queen kept moving forward.
I had to create an opening for Yorshka to attack!
Omnictus? Symphonie? They will take too long to prepare without [Purple Flash], but I can’t use my mana up as if it’s infinite right now. Still too tired from before.
As I was contemplating another plan, a thunderclap interrupted my thought before I noticed black lightning striking the spider’s butt, stopping her spider silk production. Both of us snapped around to see a giant wolf covered in shadow armament standing on the flaming spider web from the Territory without being burned too severely
[“Need a hand?”] Saori spoke.
I was shocked to hear her voice, responding back the second I heard it, [“Saori? The plan was for you to stay away from the aura! You need to cull the spiders, not enter the range of the whole army!”]
Saori was our attack party’s third hardest hitters, having the stats and skills to wipe out anything below her league. She made sure the rank C rachonoids were kept off the others, but even she would be overwhelmed if all the spiders protecting the queen were to charge at her right now. She shouldn’t be here, she should be helping the others.
[“Trust Tasianna, Hestia! You know how strong she has gotten! With Ellaine, Grimnir, my garms, and my students to support her, she’ll make sure those spiders learn why she’s part of Aurora!”] Saori retorted. [“Besides, your Divine Quest is to stop this thing from moving towards Cedaraille? You two aren’t faring too well.”]
“She is right, Hestia! We require more aid!” Yorshka agreed before kicking the air, shooting down like a shooting star to tear through layers of webs before doing the same by jumping back up. “Change of plans! Saori-sensei, I leave the distractions to you. Control the legs and use precise electric shocks against the cracks I left behind! Hestia, I’m sorry, but this heat is getting to me. My organs feel like they’re melting even with your healing. I need you to take up more of an offensive position.”
Can’t be helped.
[“Understood!”] My wolf partner and I responded.
Hesitating no more, I began materializing two large white magic circles in the sky.
Two parallel minds were on [Aerokinesis] duty to spread my buffs to everybody fighting the horde, two were preparing [Omnictus], and two more were busy keeping me afloat with [Wind Blast]. Six parallel minds were preoccupied, leaving me with four left and my own, although I was the one responsible for controlling our body.
Six minds couldn’t do anything, but I still had four minds to cast spells to support Saori and Yorshka. Healing spells and terra spells to slow the spider down. With Saori preventing the spider from using her silk using intangible dark magic and stygian lightning, Yorshka was able to dance around the spider like a hornet, destroying the webs around the spider to reduce her defenses.
Underneath us, the situation seemed to be deteriorating. Tasianna’s ice magic could be seen from this far away, but I couldn’t see how they were all faring, worrying me a bit. Rank Ds and lower rachonoids were still advancing towards the city, though I couldn’t detect any rank Cs headed that way. My guess was they were preoccupying Tasianna and the others.
As I was thinking about the others, the rachonoid queen suddenly stood up with her two sets of hind legs and then rammed her front pairs into the ground, causing rocks to rain on me from below. Using [Molten Guard] to protect myself, I managed to evade this attack outright. Yet, when I dispelled the spell, I suddenly recoiled a bit as I witnessed the rachonoid queen eating her own children.
Oh, gods!
With her front legs, she picked up several of her C rank children, killing them instantly before throwing a handful of them into her mouth. Her [Cannibal Lv. 2] activated, healing the wounds Yorshka had dealt with her dragoon jumps.
[Cannibal] seemed like a pretty simple skill, but I guess eating your race shouldn’t be rewarded by an even stronger effect. Still, being able to heal your wounds was a pretty scary skill for this boss-type monster. Yorshka, Saori, and I could only watch as her exoskeleton regenerated since, in the next moment, she released another magma explosion.
Crap!
This explosion was even stronger than the last one, probably ‘cause she had some time to charge it up during our assault. Splashes of molten rocks flew around me, forcing me to dodge them like I was in a bullet-hell minigame. That was when my [Foresight] and [Danger Perception] exploded inside my head like a bomb, warning me like a siren for the first time since this fight began. The warnings I had before couldn’t be compared to this one, and I understood why in the next second.
Piercing through the lava wall were six yellow-glowing scythe legs. Like six grim reapers, they swung at me at a frightening speed. Trapped against the sprays of magma, my [Foresight] was calculating at a lightning-speed to help me figure a way out of this without sustaining immense damage. Unfortunately, there were none. The only solution it could think of was to endure the damage.
Panzer, Molten Guard, Terra Wall, Air Shield, Tai—Scheiße! What the hell are you six doing! Focus on defense!
My decision to not cancel the tasks of my six occupied parallel minds meant there was a small lag where they stopped their spell to switch to what I needed to protect me. I spread myself too thin, and those few valuable seconds cost me six spells.
Brace for impact! Wind Blast!
The reaper’s claws came slashing in from the sides like a hug. If I couldn’t cast defensive spells to protect myself, well, then I had to gamble that the spider wouldn’t have its mouth open.
Blast off!
The scale-dust stored inside my wings, having regenerated over time, began to spark under my scales as I increased my body temperature. The explosions increased inside as I cast [Wind Blast] behind myself, pushing me forward. As the scythes inched closer and closer towards me, in my desperation to get out of its attack, I poured even more mana into my body. I began to overheat.
In mere seconds, I caused my body to warm up to the point it felt like my insides were burning. [Core Regulation] meant I wouldn’t actually overheat, but it still felt like it. My insides felt like they were boiling as I didn’t have enough time to prepare myself. It burnt. I felt trapped in a sauna inside a volcano. However, this heat was worth it all in the end.
My body exploded on fire similar to [Solar Beam]’s overdrive mode as my recently restored scale-dust burst in flames. Like a rocket, I was blasted forward, escaping the death trap as I crashed directly into the rachonoid’s eyes.
It screamed out as I somehow managed to pierced one of its eight eyes with my tail. Due to the recoil of the impact, I was knocked backward, tearing it out of its socket.
An even louder, tinnitus-inducing screech was let out of its mouth.
As nice as this was, the pain my body was feeling from overheating it was causing me to lose control over my body. [Aerokinesis] and [Omnictus] were all canceled in my panic. I had to concentrate on cooling myself down. Unfortunately, it seemed the spider wanted revenge. With its large mandibles exposing its mouth, it lunged forward in an attempt to consume me.
I was unable to respond to its attack.
“GriGRI!” A rough laugh, followed by the sound of a missile ending with a loud bang sent both the spider and I crashing onto the ground.
Hot! Hot! Hot! Smaller! Smaller! Water!
“Ayaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!”
My skin was flaring red like a sunburn, my body felt like it was being cooked inside a stew. It wasn’t to the point I felt as if I was melting, thankfully, but I felt like my body was being deconstructed somehow.
I opened up my storage, unleashing all the water stored inside it since my days in that cave with the orcs. Yes, I had carried extra water with me ever since my early days in the Belzac forest as an rank E dragon. As the cold water splashed onto my body like a waterfall, I felt like I was drowning for a moment before it all stopped. The heat finally stopped.
I let out heavy breaths. Wet with my sight covered in steam, I took out a dragorade to drink. When my vision cleared up, the crackle of an acquaintance entered my ears.
“Grigrigrigrigri!”
The slazzigula?
I stood up, swung my wet hair to the side as I noticed a white humanoid serpent clinging onto the giant spider, undeterred like a berserker by the Territory’s flames.. A burn scar covered one side of its face while six flaming wings kept him mobile in the air, slashing the rachonoid with flaming swords created from its gauntlets. Saori and Yorshka were apparently supporting him, using lightning and dragoon dives to kill off the surronding spiders.
They were ignoring the slazzigula and treating it as an ally.
Why is it here?
“Time to earn some davi, ya drunk bastards!”
“Fuck, the damn soldiers are coming! Fight faster!”
“Shit, the nobles and the knights! Come on, move deeper, deeper! There seems to be a horde being fought over there!”
“For the Greenveil duchy!”
I jolted my head around, noticing a rowdy crowd of humans and beastmen, all equipped in different armor and weapons fighting and pushing hordes of weak rachonoids back. Without glancing at me, they ran past me, avoiding the fight against the mother rachonoid to rush towards the fight happening in the distance, where Tasianna’s ice had already frozen parts of the forest.
When that happened, numerous men and women equipped in identical gear came into view. With either spears or swords, they rushed forward with a wide range of emotions. Some were frightened by the sight of the horde of spiders, others looked exhausted or drunk, while a few looked serious like veteran fighters.
“Lady Priestess, are you all right?” While the adventurers mostly ran past me, mostly ‘cause the ones who looked strong dragged anybody who tried to speak with me away, a few guards seemed to show their worry to me.
I didn’t notice those adventurers during my fight, however, considering the corpses lying on the ground, they must have fought for a while … meaning, oh shit. Don’t tell me they saw me.
… I had a feeling I couldn’t hide it forever but … Haaaa. Verdammte Scheiße.
Curses flew around in my mind as I realized this predicament of mine. As the guards began to worry about me, the slazzigula suddenly crashed somewhat close to me, burning up like a wickerman. I reached my hand out, dragging the flames covering his body away before healing his wound.
Its wings were deactivated as it pushed itself back up, shaking its head from the impact. It looked over to me and growled, “Griiii!”
‘Why aren’t you helping?’ Is that what you just said? I just saved your body skin, you thick-headed lizard! Salamander!
“S-shit! Stay behind us, Lady Priestess. The Godde—” the guards cried out, but I interrupted them.
“Yeah, yeah, Goddess will save us all.”
I wasn’t sure if I understood the slazzigula correctly or if that was just my imagination, but I slipped past the three guards standing in front of me and advanced towards the giant serpent. Standing before it, I spoke with it.
[“I’ve no idea why you’re here, but shut up, okay? You just had to fight me and make me tired, and I’ve been fighting that damn thing the whole time while you did fuck all. Don’t come at me like that!”]
It then pointed at its clean, healed skin. The charred scales were still there but they’d probably disappear after it molted.
[“Consider that healing a truce. You’re here to take that spider down, right?”]
It nodded.
[“Allies until it’s dead, then. Go, I’ll help! We need to bring down its Territory!”]
I had no idea why the slazzigula was helping us. Was it the dungeon commanding it? Was it its own will to beat the boss of the dungeon? I mean, the only way for the slazzigula to make it up here this fast must have been the dungeon’s will at the very least. However, it didn’t matter right now. We needed help to take this rachonoid down, so anything or anybody was an ally.
Speaking of the devil …
“Skyward Arrow!” The sound of another missile appeared, once again piercing the rachonoid. The first time, I believe it was the slazzigula’s flaming spear throw, but this time it was an … an arrow? No, a mana arrow!
“This is my land! I am the Duke of Greenveil! Those who dare desecrate the land my house has been holding for generations will be judged and punished! I will pierce your heart with Everhunter!” High in the sky, riding on top of a majestic armored griffon with the symbol of House Greenveil embed on the breastplate, a man equipped in glamorous green and brown armor shot another arrow at the spider’s head. As it recoiled, the man looked at the incinerated woods, noticing the slazzigula and me. “Lords and ladies of Greenveil duchy, as it is my authority as the ruler of these lands, granted to me by his Majesty, the King, I order you to purge my land of these rachonoids. However, do not dare harm any of our allies here! If I hear you disobey my orders, I shall have you judged and punished! Now, for my honor as Lord Duke Isaac Albreaus Greenveil, fly with me, nobles of Greenveil!”
An army emerged from Cedaraille. Knights and mages riding on griffons, hippogryphs, and gargoyles appeared in the sky, all wearing eye-catching armor or robes with emblems stitched onto them. Mages and archers mounted the walls of Cedaraille, waiting for their respective superiors to give the orders. Meanwhile, the foot soldier had already advanced with the adventurers into the woods.
“Trust in Duke Greenveil,” Yorshka told me. Well, the cavalry certainly has appeared. As the slazzigula jumped back into action while the flying knights and mages began preparing for their assault, I noticed a few white-robed priests appeared from the wall. Seeing as how the archers and mages looked at the priests, and the gazes they returned, I had the feeling they were about to cast [Prayer].
Yeah, sure, after a million years maybe if you have to do that dumb song! The main forces have arrived, time to switch to full support.
I took out a mana potion and a dragorade, drinking both of them down quickly. I then checked my Profile, refreshing any buffs that had timed out in the meantime.
I then activated [Aerokinesis], checked that I still had [Blessing of the Goddess of Light (Moderate)], and sang.
“Is this the fated battle, the light shines
It’s blinding my sight
But I’ve gotta hold on, the stage calls
The cries of a thousand, the flames of war will descend ”
Drove up to the maximum, my voice was being transmitted to everybody in the sky and earth. Nobles riding their flying mounts noticed my singing while anybody acquainted with me ignored it and continued their assault, including the slazzigula which I saw as an ally for now.
“The carnage of the blazing sun
Blood rain from swords and claws
The strive to pierce the sky
The light that beckons you forth ”
Instead of surprise, wonderment began to fill their faces as their eyes widened from the effects of [Idol] and [The Will to Fight and Survive]. The knights yelled their war cries as the mages chanted their spells.
“I couldn’t just stop now, my heartbeats
The show must go on
You cannot silence my voice now
Be dazzled, be humbled
I’m destined for the stars
Prepare for a beatdown, no mercy
Gonna overwhelm them
A chance for the spotlight
Don’t regret getting burned to ash ”
“Fire!”
“Spells out!”
As if they took my singing as a command, archers and mages began to shoot projectiles from on top of the wall, destroying any rachonoid child approaching the wall. The foot soldier cheered as they finally received the support they desperately needed, advancing forward towards the next targets. I could feel them praising me as they ran past me. Even the guards who attempted to protect me joined the assault team, thanking me for the blessing of the Goddess.
At this point, the white-robed priests on the wall were glaring at me, the one attracting the most attention next to the spider. My unique skill [Idol] allowed me to share certain buffs with others while I was acting like an idol, and one of those sharable buffs was [Prayer]. Everybody who could hear me had [Blessing of the Goddess (Moderate)] right now. I had no idea what was going on in the priests’ and priestesses’ heads, but all I could say was that I had no other choice.
This was the fastest way to give everybody the buffs needed and boost them up.
“The carnage of the blazing sun
Blood rain from swords and claws
As the music drops, our emotions will run wild
Top the world
The strive to pierce the sky
The light that beckons you forth
The promise to stand fast
Family and Friends
The Will to Fight and Survive, yeah! ”
I transferred completely to the support role while Saori, Yorshka, the slazzigula, Duke Greenveil, and his army attacked the spider. The boss-type monster was finally facing a raid large enough to challenge it. Preventing casualties was my job now as a healer, so I was casting [Major Heal] and [Sacred Field] like crazy to keep everybody alive through the Territory as well as using [Terra Walls] and [Molten Guard] to protect people from projectiles and silk attacks.
“Lady Hestia!” a clear voice entered my ears. A voice I knew very well.
“Tasianna! Everybody!” My eyes shined when I saw everybody had survived their encounter. Tasianna, Ellaine, Uno, Song, Sarasa, Quatre, Grimnir, Tamae, Nishio, Misaki, Kazumi, and Kohaku; all of them were dirty and their armor was battered and damaged, but none of them looked too terrible.
Well, except for Grimnir, who had his armor destroyed in the dungeon. He was running around in some mana clothing Saori threw together for him.
“We somehow managed to slay all the rank C spiders with Tasianna’s and the garms’ help. The soldiers and adventurers seemed to have it handled after we cleaned things up. Hestia, how is the situation?” Ellaine informed me, looking greatly exhausted but bright and energetic.
As words were unneeded, I showed her what everybody was doing to the giant spider. Looking at it, the numerous nobles, led by the Saori, Yorshka, the Duke, and the slazzigula were decimating the rachonoid, pushing it right into a corner.
Her Territory was waning as the heatwave was waning, sometimes letting Yorshka attack without being burned. Her exoskeleton broke but none of her children were close to her to feast on. Blood began to ooze from her body like lava, while two of her legs seemed to have been damaged too much.
Mana Eyes?
[“Saori, get back to the party! Get down here!”] I called over to Saor, stopping her from shooting more lightning bolts.
Once next to me, she transformed back into a wolfkin. Once Saori and I equipped our party bracelets and were reinvited into the party, I spoke up.
“[Tor Eiclere’s Finulaflei] and your new custom spell, Saori! Let’s do it!”
However, she and Tasianna stared at me and responded with, “What?”
“Come on, you guys aren’t actually intended to give over that rachonoid’s experience to the Duke or the slazzigula, right? Right? The Duke wants the kill just as much as us, right, Ellaine?
“Well, killing this B rank would bring great prestige, yes. Also, receiving more levels would increase your authority,” she replied immediately.
“Exactly. Let’s not chance it. Yorshka is in our party, we’ll let her deal the last hit. We need to burst the raid boss down with super hard-hitting attacks, lowering its health and tiring it enough to have it disable the Territory. Then, boom! Yorshka kill steal! Are you guys in?!” I could feel my mouth curve into a devious smile as I stared at them expectantly.
Both looked at each other, before they turned around and shared my smile.
Mwuhahahaha!
I sent our plan telepathically to Yorshka, who agreed immediately. Saori, Tasianna, and I stood before the spider, readying our spells. Saori’s custom spell was something we’ve been experimenting with, yet, we never really finished it. That meant, it hadn’t been accepted by the System yet. However, we had the details down, she just had to execute it perfectly.
I first produced some fire with my remaining scale-dust, turning it into a spear just like the slazzigula. In my dragonewt form, my Job skills were once again active, meaning I had [Fire Abnormality Effect: Dread] again. I threw the spear with all my might, piercing the spider with it. It might have not done any damage, but I saw that [Dread Burn] was successfully applied.
The three of us drank mana potions and dragorade, restoring our mana pools.
Purple Flash. Purple Flash.
Magic coursed through our bodies. Two purple magic circles appeared in my hands, a large black one was in Saori’s, while Tasianna conjured up a cyan one underneath the spider.
“Let’s do this! Omnictus! Symphonie des Feuergottes!”
“Lady Hestia, guide my hand!”
A red and white magic circle half the size of the spider suddenly appeared above the spider, sending an incandescent beam of holy energy and a flaming waterfall onto the spider. Weakened by [Dread Burn], the spider’s resistance against fire was partially countered while she had that status effect, making it susceptible to my fire spell.
Tasianna’s field of eternal snow began to buffet the spider, freezing its blood and lava before swords of ice pierced it. Not only the Duke but also his army of nobles and the slazzigula had to retreat from our spells, understanding how they would only turn into friendly fire if they didn’t.
The fire, holy, and ice spells wrecked the spider’s body, leading it to collapse before my smile widened even further. Its Territory was finally down. The raging inferno protecting the spider dissipated like a fading flame, fully revealing the dark cracks covering the monster’s exoskeleton.
The moment this happened, lightning began to crackle around Saori.
Black electricity covered her whole body, sending her hair and fur up in the process. Streaks of red lightning also appeared among the black ones. Although they were red, they felt more like a dye, colored by the red scarf made from my mana she was wearing. As the black magic circle in her hand grew as large as a cannon, she released it.
“Please, work … please. Hadean Dragon Thunder!”
Like a howl of a wolf, the giant thunder bolt shot out like a thunder cannon, striking the spider. The spider’s exoskeleton was already being destroyed by Tasianna’s and my spells, exposing its flesh to be turned to ash by Saori’s new custom spell.
Fire, holy, ice, and dark. All our main elements completely wrecked the rachonoid’s body.
Once the spell dissipated, the silhouette of the spider could be seen limping inside the smoke. Before anybody could respond, a translucent dragon descended.
“Norder Style: Silver Dragon’s Skyfall!”
The air and earth shook once more, the ground shattered from Yorshka’s dragoon dive as she landed directly onto the spider queen’s head, now entirely exposed. As seconds passed, Yorshka seemed to be struggling to break through the spider’s skull, which made me notice something.
Sing! Sing! Buff her up! I reprimanded myself.
“The carnage of the blazing sun
Blood rain from swords and claws
As the music drops, our emotions will run wild
Top the world
The strive to pierce the sky
The light that beckons you forth
The promise to stand fast
Family and Friends
The Will to Fight and Survive, yeah! ”
Cracking could be heard the moment I began singing again, buffing Yorshka up with all the buffs I had on me. Nishio and Tamae both began casting spells on me, knowing their knight guardian needed their support.
The power of her entire party channeled into her. Her efforts and damaged body roared out once more as her mouth released a powerful warcry. “HRAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!” she cried!
Seconds passed and finally it was over.
W-what?!
Yes! A free level up! Idol song slot! Wow!
There was a lot for me to process, but that could be left for later. First things first, we had to deal with the issues before us, for example, the slazzigula.
The white salamander stood over the rachonoid. It gave me a small glance, growling in disappointment at the fact that we intentionally stole the kill credit. Nevertheless, the hostility ended there, it picked up some spider silk, took out an organ from the queen’s abdomen before retreating back to the dungeon. Its actions were baffling, but I was thankful we didn’t need to deal with it too. Not like another fight would be smart with all the people around.
Goodness gracious, it’s finally over!
The fight to protect Cedaraille was over.
AbyssRaven With that, the spear ended the spider. Territory certainly burned people.
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