The Extra Prince Sets Out To Conquer The World

Arisa, who had escaped the center of the forest, looked back.

“Hmph~ They’re not pursuing? I was going to hit them hard if they followed.”

She snorted disappointedly and summoned various undead hiding among the bushes.

The forest filled with negative-dimensional mana was a good environment for utilizing undead.

Especially the mana at the center of the forest could further strengthen high-level undead, and hiding in that thick mana could temporarily deceive even the senses of transcendents.

“Ahaha, as expected of the little lamb.”

Javan smiled forcibly, clutching his severed arm while sweating profusely.

Arisa laughed cheerfully as she stored the undead in her shadow.

“Nyahahaha! I thought your survival ability was like a cockroach, but you surprisingly got hit, old man?”

If it were the usual Javan, he would have been badly injured at most, but his limbs would have been intact thanks to his unique survival instincts and self-preserving actions.

As his survival instincts were valued even more than his versatile skills, losing an arm and nearly having his head cut off was quite unexpected to her.

At her question, Javan smiled awkwardly.

“Haha, I let my guard down, that’s all. Isn’t there a saying that even monkeys fall from trees?”

Seeing Javan consciously making a distorted expression, Arisa shrugged.

“Well, it’s none of my business, but you’ve already screwed up, so don’t overdo it.”

At Arisa’s advice, Javan smiled bitterly.

The insight deeply engraved in her mad eyes pierced through his guilt.

He, who always observed his surroundings, couldn’t concentrate this time because he was only concerned about the gem containing Lila.

Because of that, he was injured here and there in addition to his severed arm, which was unlike him.

“Nyahaha, let’s run away before the witch wakes up. I don’t want to die a dog’s death.”

Arisa, who would have usually teased Javan smugly, quickly summoned a giant skeletal bird from her shadow and mounted it.

-Kieee!

The skeletal bird screeched, forming a membrane of mana on its wings and flying high into the sky.

Jade sent a message that he had stolen the banshee and Dorothy’s familiars and started to break the seal.

“It’s going smoothly.”

I hummed, looking at the magicians crawling on the ground.

About half of “Arcana 01, The Magician’s” subordinates who had entered the forest died in the explosions of the dynamite I had scattered throughout the forest.

Most of them didn’t even have a description of their appearance, let alone an illustration, so I didn’t know what the consequences of their deaths would be.

Well, those who died from mere dynamite made by stabilizing nitroglycerin with diatomaceous earth wouldn’t have a big impact anyway.

The problem with diatomaceous earth was that its stability was so good that the explosive power died along with it.

It would have been nice if I could make gelignite (gelatinous dynamite) using guncotton instead of diatomaceous earth, but it was tricky to handle in terms of stability.

However, what was certain was that about 30 percent of that bastard “The Magician’s” forces had disappeared today.

“Ugh…!”

“Urgh…!”

The magicians crawling on the ground and groaning in pain noticeably withered.

The place they had arrived in a frenzy to survive the explosion was above the mana extraction magic circle I had instructed Jade to install, and as I chanted the activation spell, their mana began to be sucked out without resistance.

They were all being squeezed for mana as mana batteries to break the seal of the witch Dorothy.

I was also charging magical tools with mana at the same time.

The magic crystals for mana charging had already been filled six times and were on the seventh charge.

Although it wasn’t to the extent of containing the power of an apostle like in the Constellation Labyrinth, it was still a magic crystal used by Geor, who had been one of the Eight Sages of the Magic Way, so its capacity was no joke.

With this much, I could operate Geor’s floating fortress, the “Doll’s Castle,” several times.

“They look extremely miserable.”

Yard clicked his tongue and frowned. As he said, the experience of having mana forcibly extracted was a pain that was hard to easily endure.

Of course, it would still be less than my mana circuit development.

“Why? Do you feel sympathy for them?”

At my playful question, Yard smiled bitterly and shook his head.

“Aren’t they on the same side as those who tried to use Lila?”

“That’s right.”

“Then sympathy is a luxury.”

Yard coldly looked down at those crawling on the ground, struggling to escape the pain.

“I’m glad then. You won’t tell me to show unnecessary mercy.”

I nodded and took out a spirit gun from my pocket.

Then I aimed the muzzle at the magicians crawling on the ground that I recognized.

Swish!

“Ugh!”

First, Arwin, the commander-in-chief of the management unit.

I killed the guy who would succeed “Arcana 16, The Tower” after Nivel died in the future.

Arcana’s executives were not irreplaceable, and even if they died, they were immediately replaced with new ones.

Therefore, there was no need to risk my life to kill those who could be replaced.

Of course, that didn’t mean killing them was meaningless.

After all, it meant that if I killed them to the point where they couldn’t be replaced, the organization would collapse.

Swish! Swish! Swish! Swish!

And I killed them one by one in the order of those who owed a lot to that bastard “The Magician” and had been loyal to him.

The magicians who had struggled to survive in the explosion and used up their strength fighting against the steel golem’s fragmented bodies died in a powerless and miserable manner.

Hmm, killing them filled up the mana all at once.

It seemed that the force they had been enduring to avoid having their mana stolen disappeared as they died, so it was sucked out all at once.

“Aaargh! P-Please spare me!”

“Why are you killing us!”

The magicians babbled nonsense. Of course, I’m killing you because you’re enemies.

“If you just don’t resist, I won’t kill everyone, so don’t worry. You all need to live and supply mana.”

I spoke smoothly.

I had already divided who to kill and who to spare through the interrogation of the captured “1st Management Unit”.

It seemed that the necessary mana had been fully charged.

I had killed those who needed to be killed, and I had almost accomplished the purpose of luring these guys here.

Now I just needed to wrap things up, but something fell from the sky in lumps.

“Dolls?”

The lumps were dolls of a familiar shape.

They seemed to be dolls based on the “Jack Module” of the Puppet Technique school, which was similar to Sage Geor’s basic dolls, with some modifications.

“Arcana 16, The Tower” Nivel di Proberin had arrived. Judging from the fact that the person who should be in the capital was already here, it seemed she had flown here almost without rest.

I wanted to call Abassael and have them face each other, but he needed to concentrate now.

Nivel’s dolls severed part of the magic circle exposed on the forest floor as they landed.

“Gasp! Gasp!”

“R-Reinforcements! We’re saved!”

The magicians were overjoyed when the magic circle that had been forcibly extracting mana collapsed.

Anyway, I had extracted more than enough mana.

“She’s not coming down in person.”

Nivel was looking down at this place while riding a giant bird doll in the sky.

It was a typical movement for a puppeteer.

It was rare for a magician with several combat dolls as familiars to jump into the battlefield along with the dolls.

However, it was a mistake to only send down the dolls, as they were not clearly visible due to the black fog covering the forest.

“Sorry, but I can’t release them yet.”

Boom! Boom! Boom!

I easily dealt with the dolls by detonating the dynamite near where they had landed.

The dolls caught in the explosion were shattered and scattered here and there.

Dolls based on the “Jack Module” had low durability in exchange for low mana consumption.

It was unavoidable as it was a standard lineup that any official puppeteer could handle.

“Shall we attack?”

As Yard took out a dagger, I smiled and said,

“It’s okay. I was going to release them anyway. Let’s just stall for time.”

The management unit had to return to the western front, unlike the others.

There were over 200 combat magicians who had come here.

A battalion-level magician force was not simply a battalion-level special force.

If a skilled battalion-level magician force died here, it would have the firepower equivalent to at least an infantry regiment, or perhaps a brigade, so the power vacuum would be too large.

I took out a doppelganger puppet from the subspace and started intercepting.

The doppelganger puppet held a huge longbow and shot arrows that should be called half-spears rather than arrows.

Swish! Swish!

Every time an arrow was fired, a sonic boom occurred, indicating that the arrow was flying at the speed of sound.

“Kyaah!”

“Oops, my mistake.”

I had just meant to threaten them, but I ended up shooting them down properly.

There was a large hole in the wing of the bird doll that was spinning and crashing to the ground.

I used the communication magical tool I had looted from the management unit to summon Jade.

“Jade, how much longer until the seal is released?”

-It’s almost done. You can start.

At Jade’s okay sign, I immediately summoned Abassael.

“El, start.”

-Understood.

Abassael’s mana began to spread throughout the forest through the magic circle from quite a distance away.

Using the stakes brought by the management unit to replace the huts, the forest’s sealing magic was redesigned in reverse.

Using Abassael’s mana as a primer, the mana extracted from the magicians accumulated in the stakes scattered throughout the forest, forming a magic circle encompassing the entire forest.

“Aaaaargh!”

As a bonus, a mana storm swept through the places where the magicians were still crawling around due to the aftereffects of having their mana extracted, and curses were engraved on their bodies.

The curse placed around their necks was weaker than the one used on the Scaface Family that dominated the dark side of the empire, led by the cat-eared Chepel, but it added more secrecy.

They probably wouldn’t even know that I was holding their lives in my hands right now, just feeling a little pain.

After the curses were fully engraved and the mana storm subsided, the dolls controlled by Nivel jumped out from the bushes and retrieved the magicians.

At the same time, the dolls hiding in the bushes began to fire magic bullets in my direction to cover the rescuing dolls.

“Hmm, what should I do?”

I had already put leashes on them and done everything I needed to do, so I could just let them go.

No, I was rather grateful that they were collecting them on their own.

But it would be a shame to just let them go, so I decided to return fire.

“Navi.”

-Meow~!

At Navi’s cry, hundreds of wind arrows were fired in the direction of the dolls and Nivel.

The dolls dragging the injured were damaged, making it seem like a fierce battle.

If they had given up on rescuing the hostages and charged at me to kill me, a truly fierce battle would have unfolded.

However, Nivel was preoccupied with taking the hostages out of the forest, and I just wanted to let them go, so the retreat naturally took place.

I said to Yard,

“Is it okay not to chase after them and take revenge? If you pursue them now, you might be able to catch at least Javan.”

At my words, Yard smiled bitterly.

“You know what? Yuan, you really have a bad personality.”

“No, why me?”

When I replied innocently, Yard let out a small sigh.

“You know better than anyone that if I indulge my greed here, it will only give the enemies more time to deal with it. But you’re making a proposal that I want to take a bite out of right away, so how can anyone say you have a good personality?”

“That’s too much, interpreting my consideration like that.”

When I giggled playfully, Yard apologized, smiling.

“…I’m sorry. If I hadn’t insisted on rescuing Lila, who had become a banshee, according to my own greed, you definitely wouldn’t have let the enemy go like this and would have caught them all.”

He’s sharp. My original plan was to have Precia and Jade catch the enemy’s rear.

At Yard’s question, I shrugged, feigning ignorance.

“Now that the seal is broken, let’s go and say hello.”

The witch’s mana was surging at the center of the forest.