Ch.171Chapter 171

I push through the bandits and move forward.

The comical impact sounds and screams assault my ears.

These extremely contrasting sounds gave me an eerie feeling.

“His Majesty Absolute is running! Everyone protect him!”

At the Lintpia knight’s shout, all our knights’ gazes turned toward us at once.

The bandits who had been chasing me to capture me were startled by this momentum and stopped in their tracks.

The knights charged at the bandits with unified battle cries.

The bandits who had been acting like they would flee reluctantly crossed swords with them.

Thanks to this, we could more easily make our way to the territory.

But the distance to the territory was too far.

At this rate, the knights fighting defensively to protect me would surely get hurt.

“Huntsman, Asti, and Princess! Hold onto me tightly!”

They looked at me with confused expressions, but soon seemed to understand when they saw the wings extending from my back.

If running was too slow, flying was the solution.

“Hurry!”

At my shout, they all clung to my body at once.

When I carried them one by one, they were quite light, but having three people hanging on simultaneously was definitely not easy.

However, it wasn’t impossible.

Flying high would probably be impossible.

So I had to bet everything on my reflexes for a low-altitude flight.

After flapping my wings a few times, I positioned myself prone in the air.

The Princess screamed “Eek!” thinking I was falling, but fortunately that wasn’t the case.

The ground seemed close enough to touch if I stretched out an arm.

I was flying at barely that altitude.

“We’re going to hit! Be careful!”

The Huntsman warned me while keeping his eyes forward even in this situation.

Fortunately, I was able to twist my body just in time to avoid an accident.

At this point, I had no choice but to fly in a gentle arc.

“He’s using an Outer God’s power! Shoot him down at once!”

“What?!”

At the bandit leader’s shout, some bandits took out arrows and aimed at me.

I didn’t mind them shooting arrows at me.

I could somehow dodge them by maneuvering.

But I hadn’t yet escaped the crowd.

This would only increase unnecessary casualties.

And the more time spent recovering victims, the success rate of our operation would drop exponentially.

“Hold onto me tight, Raedan Tanthyn.”

“…!”

The Huntsman’s voice reached me then, and I reflexively wrapped my arm tightly around her shoulder.

What the Huntsman pulled out was a revolver I had seen once before.

“Huntsman, what are you planning to do with that…?”

“Brace for recoil. Accuracy will suffer.”

With those words, the Huntsman began rapid-firing the revolver toward the bandits, almost as if shooting randomly.

Pyong, pyong, pyong, pyong!

My body threatened to shake violently with each shot, but I gritted my teeth and endured.

Amazingly, the near-continuous firing was successfully suppressing the bandits who were trying to shoot arrows.

Finally, we were in a situation where hitting just one more shot would eliminate all the bow-wielding bandits.

But.

“She missed…!”

At Asti’s cry, I saw the Huntsman’s and the Princess’s pupils contract.

It wasn’t that the shot had missed, as Asti said, but that the bandit had twisted his head to dodge it.

The bandit drew his bowstring with a composed yet serious expression, and the arrow came rushing directly at me.

The arrow’s trajectory was coming at an angle that would pierce through all my possible movements, more accurately than I had anticipated.

No matter how I dodged, either I or the Huntsman would be hit.

In this critical moment.

“Huaaaaaap!”

With a throat-scraping battle cry, some figure flew in and cleanly cut the arrow targeting my side in half.

I looked back while flying at tremendous speed.

There stood a warrior holding axes in both hands, with one arm raised high.

“How dare a cursed arrow like that try to block the path of a knight who will bring glory to our empire! I won’t forgive this!”

The warrior shouted and charged at the bandit who had aimed at me.

His speed was so overwhelming that it was difficult to follow with the naked eye.

“Tanthyn! We’ve almost reached the territory!”

At the Princess’s shout, I looked ahead and saw the gate, left unguarded and open because the line had been broken by the fighting with the bandits.

This is where the real beginning could be said to start.

#

Even after entering the territory, our flight didn’t stop.

Largely because we were still far from the Princess.

Despite what must have been motion sickness, none of those clinging to me showed any sign of discomfort.

I suppose that means everyone is betting everything on this mission.

“Will the warrior be alright? He charged at Candel alone earlier…”

“He’s said to be equal in skill to the vice-captain, so Candel’s quantity-based attacks won’t even scratch him.”

Was she worried about the warrior who had cut the arrow flying at me and charged ahead?

The Princess spoke in a slightly gloomy voice, and I answered with logical reasoning.

The warrior, who reminded me of a berserker, was incredibly tough in a different way from the sturdy-looking vice-captain.

Someone who would never fall no matter how many hits he took.

Considering that he had no problem with the headbutt I delivered when he was brainwashed during Gaia’s rampage, I couldn’t imagine this person dying in battle.

“First, we need to find the vice-captain. After advancing with him, we must summon the Greater Outer Gods here.”

“Come to think of it, the line is broken from here.”

The Huntsman said, turning his head this way and that.

“Not a good situation.”

“Look, I can see the line over there.”

As the Huntsman muttered in a lowered tone, Asti spotted something and pointed.

The vice-captain was there.

But he wasn’t alone.

Massive numbers of god-kin were pouring in.

They surrounded the vice-captain’s team, looking for an opening to attack.

The situation looked dangerous at a glance.

I immediately took out the party flute from my pocket and blew it.

Hearing the flute’s sound, all the god-kin’s attention turned to me.

This gave the vice-captain’s team a momentary opening.

“Huaaap!”

I saw the vice-captain thrust his greatsword into the ground.

Simultaneously, large cracks appeared in the ground, and some of the surrounding god-kin were thrown back, creating a gap.

As I blew the party flute, Bell, Fiore, Zumiya, and Apta manifestations began to form.

In a place like The Gardener’s garden, they would appear instantly without waiting time, but here we were within the Princess’s power range.

It would inevitably take time.

Which means…

We need to help the vice-captain and buy time.

“Princess, please stay here!”

“Yes…!”

I left the Princess on the roof of a tall building and flew down with the Huntsman and Asti to join the vice-captain.

As we were about to land, the two touched down in quite stylish poses and immediately joined the battle.

Asti with red energy in both hands.

The Huntsman with a double-barrel shotgun.

While they were putting out the immediate fires, I thought I should cut off the flow of god-kin coming from behind.

With my body now free, I flew high into the sky.

The god-kin charging in from outside.

They were no different from the bandits, and the fact that they had entered here in groups at this timing meant they were just as selfish as the bandits.

Beings who thought only of their immediate survival, not of any bright future.

I gathered breath in my mouth.

I channeled all the heat in my body to my mouth as if drawing it all up. After some time, the fireball grew so large that I could barely contain it with my open mouth.

This made me appreciate once more why Zumiya, who could fire such things instantly, was a Greater Outer God.

The vice-captain seemed to notice what I was doing and shouted to his team.

“Knights! Quickly retreat through the gap the Huntsman created!”

“Yes, sir!”

At the vice-captain’s order, the knights began to move away from the god-kin’s position.

His battle experience was truly impressive.

Thanks to this, I could fire comfortably.

Whaaaack!

With a sound like boiling fire, massive flames poured from my mouth, completely engulfing the god-kin.

All the god-kin in that area were covered in flames and disappeared as if they had never existed.

The buildings there all burned away and disappeared too.

Only the people frozen by the Princess remained intact.

I landed on the ground briefly.

To check on the Huntsman, Asti, and the Princess.

And incidentally to confirm the vice-captain’s condition as well.

Since the Greater Outer Gods had almost fully manifested, we could depart right away now.

As I was thinking this and approaching the vice-captain…

“Tanthyn! Behind you!”

At the vice-captain’s shout, I immediately turned around.

There was a god-kin holding an enormous hammer, about to bring it down on me.

“Die!”

Normally I wouldn’t mind taking a hit, but this hammer was too big.

Yeah.

Big enough that I might die instantly if hit?

“No!”

“Tanthyn!”

At that moment, Bell, who had just finished manifesting, ran like mad trying to save me, but the distance was too great.

Meanwhile, the hammer continued to fall toward my head.

Time seemed to slow down.

It felt like I could move and escape right away, but the problem was that my body was also moving slowly.

Ah, is this how it ends so anticlimactically?

I never imagined there would be a god-kin who wasn’t swept up in the flames.

If I die, we’ll suffer a major defeat in this war.

As I was being consumed by all sorts of thoughts…

Tup.

There was a sound.

But I felt no impact on my head.

No intense pain either.

Only a trivial sound reached my ears.

“Phew, not too late.”

That honorific speech that somehow felt aggressive.

When I was losing my composure at that speech pattern that made me think “you might as well speak informally”…

The hammer that was about to strike me down was turning to dust and scattering.

The god-kin, realizing something was wrong with his hammer, contorted his face, but as soon as he saw the face of the being using strange honorifics, he collapsed as if his legs had given out and crawled away.

She didn’t bother chasing after that god-kin.

She seemed to have business with me.

“If you survived, you should say so. I would have helped earlier.”

When that being finally turned around and met my eyes, I couldn’t help but laugh.

Because it was someone I never expected to appear in this situation.

“You trying to do a good deed? The sun must be rising in the west, Gaia.”

Gaia snickered at my words and said with her characteristic sneer:

“I’m trying to believe you. Your words.”