Chapter 22: The Gatekeeper Beast (2)
The Chimera who had its sleeping place flooded seemed to be in a bad mood.
“Nina-san, I will cast [Surface Walk] on you.” (Makoto)
“No, don’t mind me. I feel like my footing will weaken, so I am okay like this.” (Nina)
“I see.” (Makoto)
So I have worsened the conditions for Nina-san, huh…
“Takatsuki-sama, I am counting on the support.” (Nina)
“Understood.” (Makoto)
I will do what I can.
With this much water, the variety of moves I can make increases.
“Lucy, I am counting on you to chant your magic.” (Makoto)“Okay. But it might avoid it.” (Lucy)
Lucy doesn’t seem to be too confident.
“I will hinder it, so go all out.” (Makoto)
“G-Got it!” (Lucy)
“If it gets dangerous, let’s not push it and return.” (Fujiwara)
Fuji-yan has the return item in hand and tells this to everyone.
“Then, let’s go!”, Nina-san lunges forward.
This girl really has no hesitation!
The Chimera seems to be receiving a certain extent of damage from Nina-san’s kicks, it is defending from them.
It seems to be keeping an eye on Lucy’s magic as well.
I would be in the third spot.
It is irritating, but thanks to that, you could say it is lowering its guard against me.
“Hah!” (Nina)
Nina-san shoots a kick.
She is aiming at the goat head.
Until there it has been the same as before.
[Water Magic: Mist].
Dense fog appears around the Chimera.
But if we were to cover him completely in the fog, we wouldn’t be able to tell the position of the Chimera, so I am covering only a few parts with mist.
The three heads of the Chimera.
The goat, lion, and snake heads.
The 3 heads had no openings because they were watching from three different directions.
By covering those heads with mist, we can hinder their vision.
A nice *pang!* sound was made. A clean hit onto the Chimera.
This time around it topples over.
“[Fire Magic: Fire Arrow]!” (Lucy)
Without letting that opening escape, Lucy shoots her spell.
But this is…
“The trajectory is wrong…” (Nina)
Nina-san says dejected.
Lucy’s spell isn’t heading towards the Chimera.
The Chimera must have sensed the danger, it hurriedly tried to get up, but seeing that the spell was going to miss, it seemed to be relieved.
But that’s naive, Chimera.
[Ice Floor], [Water Current].
I freeze the floor around the feet of the Chimera, and then move it with Water Current.
The Chimera seemed to be panicking from this and tried to stand firm, but it’s too late!
The thick fire arrow of Lucy hits the Chimera right on the front.
‘GIIIIEEEEEE!! VUUEEEE!!’ The lion and goat heads screamed as they got covered in the flames.
“This is our chance.” (Nina)
Nina-san says as she jumped over the Chimera.
She seems to be chanting.
“[Earth Magic: Giant Stone].” (Nina)
Aah, she can also use chant magic, huh.
A rock several meters big appears at the feet of Nina-san.
“Shoot!” (Nina)
And kicks it full force onto the Chimera.
The giant rock crushes the Chimera.
‘Guee!’ a painful scream came out from the Chimera, and it collapsed.
“D-Did we defeat it?” (Lucy)
“Wait, I will use [Appraisal].” (Fujiwara)
Lucy and Fuji-yan run towards us.
“Umu, it is dead. Great job, everyone.” (Fujiwara)
“Nina-san that was Intermediate level Earth Magic, right? You can even use magic like that.” (Makoto)
I thought for sure that she was only a close-range brawler, but she had a secret technique.
Silver Ranks really are on a different level.
“No no, it was because of the power of Lucy-sama’s magic, and the support of Takatsuki-sama to make it hit that it was possible.” (Nina)
Nina-san answers with a smile on her face.
Even though she managed to do the job of vanguard alone against the Chimera and dealt the finishing blow, she is this modest.
“Well, it is easy-peasy with my magic.” (Lucy)
I want this no-control mage to learn from her.
“Your magic didn’t hit at all, though?” (Makoto)
“Ugh.” (Lucy)
“You do miss every 1 out of 2 times.” (Makoto)
“Ah, shut up! It did end in a hit, so it is okay.” (Lucy)
I have a strong feeling of having forced it to hit, but fine, it ended well, so let’s leave it at that.
“Well then, let’s go!”, Fuji-yan is pumped up.
“If it is a facility from 1,000 years ago, maybe it has strong weapons?” (Makoto)
Honestly, I am also a bit excited.
This place gives me the feeling of a hidden dungeon.
We decide to gather the materials of the Chimera later, and proceed to the door.
The door is made of thick iron, but it wasn’t locked, so when Nina-san pushed it, it made a heavy sound as it slowly opened.
◇◇
“Looks like a laboratory.” (Makoto)
On the other side of the door, there were old shelves and machines we don’t know what they are for here and there.
They were all rusted, and were worn-out from weathering.
The mountain of riches that I was expecting!…that kind of development didn’t happen.
“What, this is boring~.”, Lucy complains.
“Now now, we might actually get something nice if we dig around. How is it, Goshujin-sama?” (Nina)
“Hmmm, I gave a cursory glance and I didn’t find anything that could be worth that much.” (Fujiwara)
He is probably using [Appraisal].
Fuji-yan is looking around.
Too bad.
Looks like it was a miss.
Well, there’s no way something as nice as getting gold and treasures would happen from a dungeon we found by luck.
“Hey hey, it goes even deeper.” (Lucy)
Lucy who had no interest in the laboratory had gone alone to check deeper.
“Oi, don’t move alone. It is dangerous.” (Makoto)
“It is okay. We defeated the gatekeeper, so there should be no monsters here.” (Lucy)
“The people that say those kinds of things are the first ones to die, in movies.” (Makoto)
“Movies?” (Lucy)
I will have to teach Lucy the importance of death flags at a later time.
“Ooh, it looks like this is the power room of the dungeon.” (Nina)
Seems like Nina-san had gone with Lucy because she was worried about her walking around alone.
I apologize for our child.
“Hooh! Power room?! If it is the power source of this artificial dungeon that has been active for 1,000 years, it should be quite the amount of energy.” (Fujiwara)
Fuji-yan shouts in excitement.
“Goshujin-sama, there’s an incredibly big magic crystal here.” (Nina)
Nina-san reports.
She is a good duo with Fuji-yan.
“Fuji-yan, did you find anything worth?” (Makoto)
By the way, I am walking at the back with [Detection] on.
I closed the iron door so that monsters can’t enter, and I am checking if there’s any monsters hidden, but right now it doesn’t seem there’s any problems.
“T-This is incredible! To think a magic crystal this big existed! It is an amount that would be able to cover the whole energy used in Makkaren!” (Fujiwara)
Looks like we have found something of worth.
I should go and check it out too.
“Wow, I haven’t seen a magic crystal this big even in the elf village. Ah, it prickled me.” (Lucy)
“L-Lucy-sama? It would be best not to touch it carelessly…” (Nina)
“Hoooh, if we bring this back, Makkaren will be reborn. But how did a gigantic natural magic crystal—waaaaaaaaaah?!” (Fujiwara)
“Goshujin-sama?!” (Nina)
“Fujiyan-san! What’s the matter?” (Lucy)
Eh?
“Fuji-yan, what happened?! Woah, this is impressive.” (Makoto)
When I entered the room deep inside, there was a magic crystal bigger far bigger than the Chimera, shining in seven colors…moving slowly.
Why is a crystal moving?
“We have to run away quickly! We have woken up something unbelievable!” (Fujiwara)
Fuji-yan is ghastly pale.
“What’s this, what’s going on?!” (Lucy)
Lucy is panicking as usual.
“…” (Nina)
Nina-san has positioned herself to protect Fuji-yan.
I also run close to where the 3 are.
“T-This is bad-desu zo. This is bad-desu zo…” (Fujiwara)
“Fuji-yan?” (Makoto)
I spoke to my friend that is muttering over and over.
The seven colored magic crystal slowly stretches up, and then, it pulsates as it changes form.
“H-Human?” Lucy says with a trembling voice.
The seven colored magic crystal changed to a giant humanoid shape.
The giant eyes look down at us.
A shining giant that is one size bigger than the Ogre I fought before was looking at us and…smiled.
Ah…this is a bad pattern.