Ch. 112: Interrogation after Battle
Loren had noticed the True before Lapis had called him.
A priestess, which wasn’t a frontline occupation, doing close combat against a True would be difficult, so Loren knew that he should back her up, but there was a reason he couldn’t do so.
It was because as he had been mowing down the undead, he himself had caught the attention of the dragon zombie.
Because of that, Loren, who was now its target, was having to deal with it.
Loren was taller than most, but the dragon zombie still towered over him with its long body, and if it could make use of it, Loren would be killed without being able to do anything.
But that didn’t happen because the dragon zombie couldn’t move its body properly.
“Well, it’s rotting, so…”
The only way it could attack was using its front legs and its head.
Its body and tail were completely rotten, and as it walked, parts of it crumbled and released foul smelling liquid, so if it were to attack with them or make sudden moves, it looked like they would crumble away completely or rip off.
But although its methods of attack were limited, if even one of them hit, it would do a great amount of damage, or even kill him, so there was no room for Loren to let his guard down.
He dodged the bite that came down from over his head, then jumped back out of range of one of its front legs as it swiped at him.
As Loren swung his great sword at the leg before it retreated, rotting flesh and rotting juice flew around, letting out a foul smell in the area.
Since the dragon zombie was an undead, it didn’t feel any pain.
But as if it at least felt disturbed that a blade cut into its leg, it slammed it onto the ground, trying to crush Loren.
But Loren had already moved.
He had run across and landed a blow on its other leg.
Loren tried not to think about the flesh and juice that flew around again, but since it had the body of a dragon, although it was rotting, it had a hard body, so Loren’s great sword didn’t stick that deep.
On top of that, since the dragon zombie didn’t feel pain, it felt no hesitation either, so with all the immediate retaliation, Loren couldn’t put much strength into his blows.
“This is getting nowhere.”
‘Ah, you’re thinking about something bad, aren’t you Onii-san?’
Shayna called out to him in the back of his mind as she seemed to notice something, but Loren took no notice and gripped his great sword tighter with both hands, and until then he hadn’t been spreading his legs out much so he could retaliate as soon as he dodged an attack, but he spread out his legs wide, as if rooting himself on the spot.
‘Onii-san? What are you doing? Don’t tell me…’
Shayna, who had been borrowing Loren’s sight and watching the battle against the dragon zombie, saw it slamming its front leg towards Loren, who had changed his stance, couldn’t help but let out a scream-like thought to him.
But Loren ignored that as well, and as the dragon’s leg came down on him, Loren’s arms swung his sword with great strength and momentum, and the blade lodged into the leg, way deeper than before, and as steel met bone, a metallic sound rang out.
Of course, although Loren’s attack was powerful, it wasn’t enough to cut off the dragon zombie’s leg.
But it was enough to swerve the attack off course, and the leg landed right next to him, barely missing.
By then, Loren had already pulled his sword out, and using the momentum, he spun around and landed another blow, strengthened even further, onto the leg that had hit the ground.
As she heard steel hitting bone again, Shayna watched in disbelief.
Although their opponent was undead, it was still a dragon, and was hard to believe that a human could divert its attack with just the strength of his arms.
Moving straight to his next attack was unbelievable, and both attacks cutting through its flesh and going down to the bone was unbelievable as well.
On top of that, even though so much force was behind the blows, the great sword wasn’t even chipped the slightest.
‘I’m lost…Onii-san, are you really human?’
“Never mind what I am, so lend me some of your mana!”
When Loren said that, Shayna realized.
It seemed that those attacks had been strengthened by the self-enhancing technique that Lapis had taught him.
But dealing with an attack from a dragon cost a significant amount of mana, and Loren didn’t have much in the first place, so with the last two blows, he had almost depleted his mana.
‘I see. In that case, I’ll give you all the mana you need Onii-san.’
The amount of mana that a no life king, the highest ranking undead, was immense.
Shayna wasn’t a complete no life king, so she didn’t have as much as real ones, but it was still way more than Loren had.
But since Shayna only had her astral body, if she used all her mana, she would be erasing her own existence, so there was a need for her to save a portion of it as she lent the rest to Loren.
But it was still more efficient and would cost less mana if Shayna were to use spells through Loren’s body.
Loren was fortunate that the dragon zombie wasn’t in a good shape.
The rotting had spread quite well, so it was crumbling away in many places, which made it impossible for it to use its breath attack.
It went through the motions a few times, but every time it did smoke started to pour out of holes in its body, and it couldn’t cast its breath.
If it could, then its fight against Loren would’ve been going on differently, but in the current battle between them, the dragon couldn’t hit the self-enhanced Loren, and after its attack missed, Loren would deal a powerful blow, so slowly but surely, cuts started appearing on its legs, neck, and head.
Meanwhile, Lapis, who was going against a True, was being hit repeatedly.
The True vampire who called himself First, was shooting spell after spell at Dia, who couldn’t move for some reason, and Lapis, who stood in front of her, trying to protect her.
“What happened to that attitude of yours, hmm? This is very one-sided.”
As First asked Lapis, bullets of fire shot out from his palm, and it melted away into the air as it hit Lapis’ defensive barrier.
But that wasn’t the end of First’s attack.
He continued to use spells of different elements at her, while Lapis continued to block them with her barrier.
“I’m just getting started you know. Can you block everything? Do you have enough mana left?”
Even at First’s taunting words, Lapis’ expression didn’t change.
Her eyes continued to gaze at First’s face, and only her hands moved, not letting any of his attacks get through.
First soon started to feel irritated.
From what he could see, his barrage of weaker spells didn’t seem to penetrate Lapis’ barrier at all, so he decided to use a stronger spell.
“Can you block this spell…Ugh!?”
First tried to ask Lapis in a cool fashion, but immediately jumped away as he felt a shock followed by pain on his cheek.
The spell he had been constructing had dissipated because of his sudden movement, but what surprised First more was that Lapis was standing where he had been a moment ago, with her fist swung through.
“What…what just happened?”
Judging from the circumstances, the only conclusion First could come to, was that Lapis saw that he was about to use a powerful spell, instantly closed the distance between them, and punched him away.
But First denied that thought.
After all, all Lapis had been doing was blocking his attacks.
It was difficult to think that she would be able to move close to him in such a state, wearing priest clothing, at a speed that a True like him couldn’t sense.
On top of that, damaging a True with just a fist was unbelievable.
Trues, which were high rank among vampires, couldn’t be hurt by steel weapons of adventurers, and even if they had weapons made of silver, which undead were weak to, although they would feel quite a bit of pain, it wouldn’t be lethal.
But the punch that Lapis threw had enough force behind it to make him jump away.
“How in the world…”
“Are you done attacking? I’ve grasped a good idea of your capabilities, so I’d like to start my attack.”
“What…”
First tried to ask her what she meant, but a loud cracking sound came from his face.
Before he could even realize that he had been punched in the face, Lapis’ fist dug into his stomach, and as he bent over to clutch his stomach, Lapis dropped her elbow on the base of his neck.
The blows would’ve killed a human, but to a True, it was far from lethal.
As First tried to keep from blacking out from the pain and impact, he swung his arms around and started to back off, Lapis jumped back with leisure and muttered.
“I guess you’re insensitive to pain and shocks since you’re an undead.”
Undead of lower ranks, such as the dragon zombie Loren was facing off against, would be able to continue attacking without concern for pain, but vampires were highly intelligent, and maybe because they retained the forms they had before death, they could feel pain.
But since they were still undead, their sense of pain was dull, so even if they received attacks that would kill the living, it wouldn’t be a lot of damage.
“It won’t be worth my time breaking you since you don’t scream or feel fear.”
“What are you…”
“I want to ask you before you break. What did…what the hell did you do to her?”
When she pointed to Dia, who still couldn’t move, the atmosphere around Lapis changed.
Her gaze became harsher, and First stepped back a few steps at the pressure she was now emitting, as if it was a physical barrier.
Lapis continued to glare at him as she walked closer.
“If you tell me I let you die easily…”
“Who do you think you’re talking to!”
The lightning bolt he shot as he finished was softly brushed away by Lapis’ left hand, and as he stepped in, trying to deliver a blow that will get past her defenses, Lapis grabbed his right wrist, so the punch never reached her.
“Impossible! You’re stronger than a True!?”
First tried to shake off her grasp, but no matter how much strength he put in, his wrist didn’t budge, as if it was stuck in place.
“H-how is this possible!?”
“I’m the one asking the questions, not you. Answer them when you feel like it. I’ll make sure to listen.”
No matter how hard he shook and pulled, Lapis’ grip didn’t loosen even slightly.
So First decided to use a spell at close range, so he raised his left palm towards Lapis, but as soon as he did so, his right wrist was immediately crushed by Lapis, and his eyes widened as he watched her rip it off.
“Handing me your left hand after you handed me your right is praiseworthy.”
Lapis laughed as she held First’s left wrist.
It immediately started to creak, as if screaming from the immense strength and pressure Lapis squeezed it with.
“I must answer to your praiseworthiness. Alright, I’ll deal with you kindly.”
As Lapis said ominously, First tried to lunge at her with his fangs in desperation, but as soon as he opened his mouth, both his fangs were snapped.
First covered his mouth with his now handless right arm in shock, but before he could even say anything about losing his fangs, his left wrist, which was still within Lapis’ clutches, was crushed as his right wrist was.
Following both his wrists and fangs, First’s shoulder was then grabbed and crushed, and his knees were crushed with a kick as well, making him unable to stand, leaving him in a kneeling position in front of Lapis, looking up at her.
11
“It’ll be a while before things to settle down over there. Let’s being, shall we?”
Glancing over at Loren, Lapis gripped both of First’s shoulders with her both hands.
Listening to his flesh and bone being grinded together, First finally realized that the girl in priest clothing wasn’t who she seemed to be.