Ch. 71: Exterminating After Retreat
As the slime came closer and closer, Loren and the others stepped back farther and farther.
Meanwhile Feim, who had been conscious the whole time, was still tied up together with Al and the other students, who were unconscious.
Loren and the others were pulling Ain and Cloud, who had been knocked out, away from the slime as they retreated, but the slime ignored all the showcases and the items littered around it and continued to chase after them.
“Do we burn it?”
Loren suggested a method that was very effective against slimes, but Klaus disagreed.
“Fire is no good in here. It would burn the cases and items around it. I won’t stop you if you’re willing to pay for the damage.”
“I can’t let my debt get any bigger.”
Although some of the items were protected, but there were things such as doc.u.ments and paintings that were stacked up without any protection as well.
If they were to use fire, there was no telling how much damage it would cause.
Of course, the bill would be sent to Loren and Lapis would be the one who would pay it, so Loren’s debt would skyrocket.
“Loren let’s burn it. I’d love to be the one to do it.”
“Lapis…”
Lapis’ eyes sparkled at the idea of Loren’s debt increasing.
As she started pulling at his sleeve, excited that she could increase his debt without any effort, Loren sighed at softly pushed Lapis towards the slime.
Lapis, who was now unintentionally right in front of the slime, panicked and hid behind Loren’s back.
“What are you doing!?”
“Shut up. I’ll burn it so go get tangled in there!”
“No way! Who would benefit from me being covered in tentacles and slimes…Would you, Loren?”
She dropped her voice and asked hesitantly, with a meek face, and when a question mark appeared on Loren’s face, she raised her fists in front of her chest with a determined look on her face.
“If Loren, who’s always getting the short end of the stick, will benefit from it, I, Lapis, will gladly go and be covered with tentacles and slimes. Here I go!”
Loren grabbed Lapis’ collar and threw her behind him as she started walking up to the slime and cut down the tentacles that were reaching for her.
“I’m jealous that you two are so close, but are we going to keep on retreating like this?”
Klaus didn’t have his weapon drawn.
He couldn’t because he was pulling Al and the others with all his might so they wouldn’t get caught by the slime.
Ange and Parme were helping, but they could only carry one between the two of them, so Klaus was dealing with three of them on his own.
“Can’t we run past this thing once we reach the entrance?”
Although it was a giant slime, it wasn’t wide enough to fill up wall to wall, so there was s.p.a.ce around it.
Loren thought it would be possible to run past it, dodging its tentacles, but Klaus shook his head and said in a bitter voice.
“While carrying them?”
Al and the others, all tied up, were quite heavy.
Loren and Klaus could carry one of them each and run, but there were four of them, and if Loren were to carry two of them, he would be considerably slower, and it would increase the risk of getting caught by the slime.
And even if they were to let the girls carry them, even one would be hard, and they wouldn’t be able to dodge the slime, much less run.
“Fighting wouldn’t really work either.”
Loren cut through more tentacles that reached forward.
Although they were cut, the tentacles were almost liquid, so even if they were splattered everywhere, they were absorbed by the main body and nothing changed.
“There’s no end.”
“Ange, can you do something with your magic?”
Ange, who was pulling Ain’s body, shook her head.
“I can’t do anything about a slime that large with my magic!”
“This isn’t good.”
They were able to keep a distance between them and the slime while discussing what to do since it was slow, but they couldn’t do so anymore.
The slime suddenly sped up.
Loren thought that it got irritated that it couldn’t reach its prey, but it was a slime, which shouldn’t have any emotions, so he couldn’t understand why it suddenly sped up.
The slime barreled towards them.
Surprised at its sudden change in speed, Parme slipped and fell on top of Cloud, who she had been dragging.
As the slime attacked, not missing the opportunity, Loren threw Al, who he had been carrying, grabbed Parme’s hand, and pulled her back with all his strength.
“Ahh!”
Parme sank right into Loren’s arms, letting out a cute scream that didn’t fit her personality, but there was no way for Cloud to escape.
His body was immediately pounced on by the slime and was swallowed whole.
“Ahh…I…”
“Don’t think about it! It was an accident, got it!? Go help Ange if you’ve got time to think.’
As Parme was stunned in his arms, as she heared noises that sounded like bones breaking from inside the slime’s body, Loren slapped her on the cheek and pointed towards Ange.
Loren muttered under his breath as he watched her stagger towards Ange in bewilderment.
“Should we just feed these guys to it and run while it’s busy with them?”
“I can agree to that.”
As Lapis started kicking Al’s body forward violently, Feim, who was being carried by Ange, started struggling, so Ange and Parme had to hold her down.
“Well, we have to have the culprits so we can explain to school…”
“Wouldn’t one of them be sufficient?”
“Cloud’s death was an accident, but Ain was just being used.”
“Then how about handing over Feim as the culprit and leaving this one?”
When Loren pointed at Al, who was still being kicked forward by Lapis, Klaus went silent with an awkward expression.
Even though the revival of the evil G.o.d was just a coincidence, Klaus didn’t seem to want to show Al much mercy since he had plotted it in the first place.
But he didn’t seem to think that it was enough to feed him to the slime, so all he could do is keep his silence.
“I agree with leaving all of them behind!”
Ange, who was carrying the struggling Feim with Parme’s help, agreed with Loren.
It seemed that it was because it was just too much work, rather than really wanting to leave them, so she was leaning towards dropping the extra weight and making sure to save themselves.
“Let’s just leave them! We can just let Parme do the testimony.”
“I-Of course I’m planning to testify…”
Parme, fl.u.s.tered that she was suddenly mentioned, agreed, and when Ange looked at Klaus, he turned towards Loren with an uneasy air around him.
“Then I guess we’ll go with leaving them when it comes to the worst…”
“Loren!”
Right as Loren made the heartless decision, Lapis let out a warning.
The slime, which had been consuming its prey, suddenly stopped and started chasing after Loren again, faster than before.
The slime seemed to have sped up since it wanted more after it finally tasted its first prey, and Loren, who was closest to it, was a second too slow to respond.
“d.a.m.n it!”
Loren cursed and lifted his great sword in front of him like a shield and was pounced on by the slime while in that position.
Loren, as he was taken in by the slime all the way to his shoulders, moved his great sword around and tried to peel it off him.
“Loren!”
“Don’t mind me! Run past it while you can!”
The black blob that tried to swallow him slowly stole his ability to move due to its viscosity.
As he still struggled, Loren stopped Lapis, who was about to run towards him to help, and yelled at them to escape while he kept it busy.
“But!”
“Just go! I can handle this on…”
The slime covered his head before he could finish.
Although he was able to take a deep breath before it did, he knew that he would end up like Cloud if he couldn’t do something before suffocating, so he started swinging his great sword around.
If he could destroy the slime’s core, the slime should die, and he would be free.
The problem was that he couldn’t see it since the slime was pitch black, and that even if he managed to find it, he might not be able to crush it since he couldn’t move his arms like he wanted to, but he knew that acting was more important than thinking, so he continued swinging his sword recklessly.
‘Onii-san! I’ll help!’
Loren frowned as he heard Shayna’s voice in his mind.
(Lapis will notice!)
‘But if I don’t help, Onii-san will die! We can worry about that later!”
The slime’s grip on him tightened as time went on, and Loren’s movements were getting slower since he was trying to move while holding his breath.
If he couldn’t do something, he soon wouldn’t be able to move a finger, and would either be crushed or suffocate to death.
(I guess I don’t have a choice! Do it!)
‘Here it goes! Energy drain, full power!’
With Loren’s permission, Shayna deployed her ability without restraint.
The energy drain, powerful enough to kill normal slimes in an instant, started eating away at the black slime from inside, but as expected of a slime summoned by an evil G.o.d, its grip on Loren showed no signs of weakening.
But at the same time, Shayna channeled the life energy siphoned from the slime into Loren’s body.
Loren, who was almost out of air, converted the life energy into strength and started swinging his great sword again.
(Don’t screw with me! No way I’m going to be eaten by a slime!)
Something clicked in the corner of his mind.
Although he was suffocating, with his newfound strength, Loren’s arms started moving at a speed incomparable to the speed he was moving before.
Even with close to no air, relying on just the strength Shayna was giving him, the great sword started accelerating, overpowering the slime as it started ripping through it, the pieces starting to fly around splattering all around, and somehow managed to find the core.
As he felt the sensation of his sword hitting something, Loren put more strength into his arms and pushed. Eventually the core split in half, and his sword struck the floor.
At the same time, the coreless slime couldn’t keep itself from dying, losing its viscosity, and as it spread across the floor like plain liquid, Loren managed to take a deep breath to come back to life, before falling to his knees, and dropping to the floor with a splash.
