Ch.760The One Who Laughs Last

In a battle where death piles upon death, the weak and unlucky are always the first to perish.

Even the elite warriors from each race died like common soldiers in the chaotic melee. At the end of this brutal conflict, only a tiny minority of the strongest fighters remained—those who possessed the ability to protect their lives in any battlefield.

“Hah… hah…”

Even these powerful survivors couldn’t emerge from such an intense battle—one that had altered the very landscape—without injuries.

Even with my nearly perfect evasion technique, Defying Fate, I was covered in cuts and gashes, and had lost the strength to fly. I was reduced to jumping across Nidhogg’s body as my battlefield. How much worse must it be for the others?

Everyone was wounded and exhausted.

—-

Contrary to my expectations that we would be at a disadvantage, Demian’s group and the two guardians were increasingly dominating their opponents.

Millia’s arrows, compressed from the corpses of Dragonborn, and Asha’s explosive lance charges were punching holes through the high-level elemental’s body, breaking it down.

Most of the elemental poems fired by the guardians dissipated helplessly before Nigel and Jahan’s weapons.

“Not a chance!”

“Haaaaaaah!”

The fire elemental poems were absorbed by Aklindo, while the lightning elemental poems were sucked into Eberond’s holy spear.

Despite being clearly weaker than their opponents, they were gaining an advantage thanks to their weapons. Equipment differences are often decisive variables in battle. If that bothers them, they should have brought better weapons themselves, shouldn’t they?

“I’m running low on mana… couldn’t you just die already?”

Ophelia also maintained an iron defense, deploying fire barriers to block ice elementals and slicing wind elementals to pieces with blades of air.

Her bright red hair was soaked with sweat and clinging to her chest, suggesting she was approaching her mana limit.

Adding to this, Demian was wielding his greatsword with impossible dexterity, already incorporating my advice. He bent the blade’s trajectory in ways that defied reason, leaving the guardians desperately struggling to respond.

That’s to be expected. Slashes that completely ignore inertia, maintaining maximum speed while changing direction repeatedly—it would be incredibly difficult to counter.

To deal with this in close combat, one would need movements fundamentally fast enough to overwhelm the opponent.

“You, how on earth…!”

In truth, the guardians seemed to be falling behind not just because of the sword technique’s power, but for some other reason as well.

Judging by their shocked expressions as they pointed at Demian…

“How can you possibly use that sword technique…?!”

Their reaction suggested they had previously suffered at the hands of someone who fought in a similar manner.

—-

In the end, only sixteen remained.

Three fairy guardians. Two rangers.

Three winged Dragonborn.

Seven humans including myself, plus one Dwarf.

Nearly a hundred master-level fighters had been caught in the chaotic battle and died en masse.

If Lacy and Leopold had witnessed this scene, they might have lifted me up in celebration.

With things having reached this point, the hellish melee inevitably entered a lull. There simply weren’t enough forces left to continue the chaotic fighting.

Even the survivors had sustained injuries both major and minor and were too exhausted to rampage as they had been doing tens of minutes earlier.

“The casualties… are too great…”

Beherikes, with one wing completely torn off, muttered in a dejected tone.

Gone was his imposing figure that had fired lightning bolts reminiscent of a thunder god. Now he could barely wrap small sparks around his spear shaft, seemingly struggling to generate even that much power.

“This is… not elegant.”

Another Dragonborn who had been going on about elegance responded to Beherikes’ lament.

Astonishingly, this was a slender Dragonborn covered in pinkish scales. What was his name again? Macaoros?

Yes, that was definitely it.

He had introduced himself as Macaoros, one of the Five Dragon Kings like Beherikes.

Unlike Beherikes who fought with spear and lightning, this one had used only his claws, feet, and tail as weapons, attacking with dance-like spinning movements. The tail he had wielded so effectively had long since been bitten off by Nidhogg.

“……”

The remaining Dragonborn, blue-scaled with forward-curving horns, had maintained silence throughout the battle without even introducing himself.

Despite his imposing appearance, his skills were the lowest among the three, and he had survived thus far mostly due to good luck.

His luck was so remarkable that despite being covered in wounds to the point where no intact scales remained, he hadn’t lost any body parts completely.

The fairy guardians were in no better condition.

“Such humiliation, at the hands of short-lived species…!”

Tergillius knelt on one knee, clutching his bow that had broken into three pieces, grinding his teeth while sealing a split wound in his abdomen with elemental flames.

“Those council bastards…! They said we would be enough, but enough my ass…!”

Eirnesia glared at me with a blood-soaked appearance, muttering through gritted teeth, while Iberphalos, who had barely joined them, wore a face that had clearly lost all fighting spirit.

“Lord Tergillius, Lady Eirnesia, it’s not just about our objective. That blonde short-lived one…”

He was whispering something, but it was too quiet for me to make out what he was saying.

“…What did you say?”

Seeing how both guardians simultaneously looked at Demian in shock after hearing Iberphalos’ whisper, it seemed to be about Demian’s fighting style.

Wasn’t there one more guardian besides those three?

Disgelpierre, unable to regain momentum once lost, had been split into Disgel and Pierre, both now sprawled among the corpses on the battlefield.

—-

“Hah… hah…”

Our group wasn’t in much better shape.

Thanks to creating the chaotic situation while avoiding getting caught up in it ourselves, no one had died, but everyone was too depleted to continue fighting.

“I can still… yes, I can still move…!”

“Demian…!”

Demian, who had performed brilliantly even by my standards, had suffered full-body burns after being engulfed in flames right after cutting through Disgelpierre’s waist. Millia was just gasping for breath beside him, her strength completely spent.

“I’ve never struggled this much in my life…”

Asha staggered forward, supporting her lance with her one remaining mechanical arm after discarding her fuel tank, machine gun, and dented helmet. Ophelia had retreated far back after announcing that she had run out of mana.

“Huff… huff… Already tired, Ka’har? In a battle of endurance… I win…!”

“If you have… the strength to talk nonsense… try standing properly first…”

Nigel and Jahan had no strength or energy left, barely standing by leaning against each other for support.

Jahan could only open his left eye, suggesting his right was injured, while Nigel couldn’t even remove the rock fragment embedded in his thigh. Neither was in any condition to continue fighting.

“Heck… hieeeeck…”

We had managed to hold out this far thanks to Lena, who was now panting like an overheated dog after consuming too much holy power.

If it weren’t for her, someone would have fallen and perished long ago. And once one position fell, the remaining comrades would have collapsed in a chain reaction, unable to cover the gap.

While the miracle of healing couldn’t instantly regrow severed limbs, it could completely heal minor cuts within minutes—making it an invaluable asset in this kind of chaotic battle.

But we couldn’t expect any more help now that Lena was completely spent. If she tried to perform more miracles after depleting all her holy power, it would start consuming her lifespan.

‘Somehow… we made it this far.’

I muttered as I surveyed the battlefield—what had been a miniature version of a racial war, now reduced to exhausted casualties. I forced strength into my body that wanted to collapse like a water-soaked cotton ball.

The chaotic battle was over. Fairies, Dragonborn, and our group were all just gasping for breath, engaged in a staring contest.

Instead of gathering their last reserves of strength to deliver final blows at each other.

Why?

Because—

【 Khrarararararaaaaaa! 】

The most likely final victor would be that worm.

—-

Nidhogg, half-submerged in a lake of blood and dark mana, looked up at the sky and roared loudly enough to shake the mountains.

I sighed as I looked up at it, then turned toward the fairies and Dragonborn who were staring at the chaos dragon with expressions similar to mine, and taunted them.

“Hey, pointy-ears and lizards. What are you going to do about that? It’s gotten stronger than before the fight because of you.”

The dark mana permeating the area was approaching the level of a demon god’s arm, if not quite reaching it, and smooth scales were growing to cover its body in place of the broken carapace.

It looked at least twice as strong as when I had faced it one-on-one at the mountain peak.

“More nonsense from you…!”

“How is this our fault! Isn’t it yours?!”

Eirnesia, whose bleeding worsened as her blood pressure spiked, and Beherikes, who looked ready to breathe fire from his eyes, shouted angrily.

These shameless bastards, what are they saying?

How is this my fault? It’s yours.

The surge in its dark mana was due to the fairy bastards lavishly consuming mana to spam elemental poems and summon high-level elementals, and the dragon-like scales growing on its body—

“Not your fault? You gathered here to become dragons, but ended up becoming food to grow a dragon instead?”

—were because the Nidhogg had devoured and digested all the Dragonborn corpses scattered across the battlefield, incorporating their scales into its own flesh.