Chapter 40 : Labyrinth (40)

KWA-AAAAANG!

Impact — and a deafening roar.

A cloud of dust rose, obscuring the view.

But when the One-Winged Angel’s tail whipped up a powerful gust, clearing the dust in an instant, the scene that emerged was far from expected.

Alje had been crushed beyond recognition — but not because of the violence inflicted upon her.

From the perfectly bisected shell of the girl’s body, a grotesque [mouth] emerged, scaled up a thousandfold from an execution worm’s.

One pair — and inside, yet another pair.

Two sets of jaws.

The hour hand and the second hand.

A bizarre structure.

If the outer jaws were to snap shut, they would not only sever their prey but also slice through the inner jaws along with it.

But this twisted, alien creature — even among monsters — seemed unconcerned by such details.

Its jaws clicked menacingly.

Finally revealed from wherever it had been hiding inside that small frame, the true form of the [mimic monster] was nearly on par with the One-Winged Angel.

Smaller than most large monsters — and yet still massive.

“……”

The mimic monster remained silent.

Perhaps it had never possessed vocal cords to begin with.

Its transformation into this form meant it had abandoned the pretense of deception — and no longer had any need for speech.

For a creature of its size, the silence was horrifying.

Not even the rustle of grass could be heard as it moved —and yet it was definitely moving.

The shell that had served its purpose lay in tatters.

The remains of the girl’s body, shredded and lifeless, dangled limply — and from the gaping holes in the broken form, countless legs began to emerge.

Those legs supported the massive [mouth].

Fur-covered beast legs.

Hooved livestock limbs.

Insectoid legs encased in chitin.

Each one different in shape, color, size, and length —and yet they moved in an eerie harmony, a grotesque display of balance and order that seemed almost like nature’s twisted form of art.

Art beyond human comprehension.

Click.

At last, the mimic monster began to move.

Despite their complicated arrangement, its many legs never tangled as they carried its massive form forward with incredible agility.

Compared to the enormous mouth and legs, the human-shaped torso was absurdly small —jerking madly as though it would snap apart at any moment.

Its head lolled at angles that would shatter any human’s neck, moving as though the bones had melted away.

The motion resembled a clock’s pendulum.

Legs like gears.

A head like a swinging pendulum.

The stillness broken only by the frantic, silent ticking of an unseen clock.

And then — the clock’s hand began to race forward.

Thud.

“Furururuk!”

The [mouth] shot forward at a speed too fast to perceive, clamping down on the One-Winged Angel’s body.

Its original aim had likely been the neck — but the target twisted with fluid grace, and the jaws snapped shut around the torso instead.

Though the feathers came away easily, beneath them lay layer upon layer of densely packed plumage.

And where the feathers ended, the flesh was no less resilient —far tougher than any normal creature’s hide, withstanding even the biting force of a mimic monster scaled up to hundreds of times the strength of execution worms.

The One-Winged Angel cried out, muscles tensing with unnatural power.

Its body, impossibly strong, became like an impenetrable fortress.

A creature defying the laws of nature —its very existence a mystery.

Should their numbers grow, the balance of the world itself would inevitably collapse.

CRACK!

Still caught in the monster’s grip, the One-Winged Angel twisted its flexible body and lashed out with a powerful kick.

Though the mimic’s torso was tiny compared to its overall size, it was a difficult target .

But the real target was the monster’s massive jaws.

As powerful as they were, even they couldn’t endure a blow with the force to crumble cliffs.

The grip loosened.

The teeth unclenched.

And the One-Winged Angel wrenched itself free.

Drip.

Drip.

Blood began to spill —a crimson line spreading across the iridescent feathers, wounds cutting deep enough to expose the organs beneath.

For an ordinary creature, this would have been a fatal injury —but the regenerative abilities of large monsters far surpassed their smaller counterparts.

As if reversing gravity, the exposed organs pulled themselves back inside the body.

The One-Winged Angel spread its single wing wide and flapped once more, releasing a shockwave.

The reason it was called an “angel” despite having only one wing.

WHOOOSH!

In an instant, it shot dozens of meters into the air.

The membrane stretched tight — far tougher and more resilient than even a ship’s sail — rippled and created powerful air currents.

Too brief to be called flight.

Too long to be called a glide.

Suspended in the air, the One-Winged Angel adjusted its posture with expert precision —its mastery over aerial movement more suited to a bird of prey than a land-bound creature.

Legs and tail rising upward.

Head angling downward.

What looked like a suicidal maneuver — for a large monster, it became a deadly charge.

SHEEEEEE!

“……”

Beak-like jaws pointed forward — and the One-Winged Angel dove, plummeting toward the ground like a falling star.

It was no simple, brute-force charge.

Though it had never learned mathematics, instinct and intuition guided its trajectory with the precision of a seasoned hunter’s arrow.

But the mimic monster’s response was just as formidable.

In a single step, its many legs moved with such speed that they created an illusion —as if it were folding the very ground beneath it.

In an instant, it had put dozens of meters between them.

But the One-Winged Angel adjusted mid-dive without hesitation, altering its course with seamless fluidity.

The wing membrane rippled violently, splitting the air with an earsplitting shriek.

Maintaining its incredible speed, the Angel’s dive corrected —and its beak-like head struck true, slamming into the mimic monster with devastating force.

[KREEEEEEE!]

For the first time —the mimic monster screamed.

The sound it made wasn’t the cry of any living creature — it was more like the sharp shatter of glass or the piercing whistle of wind escaping a poorly played flute.

The mimic monster was young, weak, and most of all, inexperienced when it came to wielding its own power.

And that inexperience was showing.

The mimic monster’s [mouth] was both its strongest weapon and its greatest defense — but because of its grotesque anatomy, the moment that weapon was compromised, the rest of its body became dangerously vulnerable.

The One-Winged Angel wasted no time exploiting that weakness.

The monster, charging wildly, found its own jaws forced wide open as the Angel deliberately wedged its body deep inside.

But unlike before, this time the Angel had driven itself in too far — and the sheer mass of its body kept the gaping [mouth] from closing properly, weakening its bite.

Of course, even in this state, the [mouth]’s razor-sharp cutting power was slowly digging into the Angel’s flesh.

If left unchecked, the One-Winged Angel would eventually be sliced clean in half.

‘But…’

“Hu! Rurururu!”

It only needed to kill its opponent first.

It was the same scenario Hans had faced with the execution worm.

A creature too reliant on a single overpowering weapon could only flail helplessly when that weapon was sealed away.

The mimic monster tried desperately to free itself, its dozens of mismatched legs thrashing and kicking.

But its frantic strikes only sent a flurry of iridescent feathers scattering, never once landing a decisive blow on the Angel’s log-like body.

Meanwhile, the One-Winged Angel, held fast by its waist, dug its claws into the mimic monster.

THUD!

And began using its own most formidable weapon: its head and beak.

Like a woodpecker drilling into a tree, like a master carpenter driving in nails.

THUD!

THUD!

THUD!

THUD!

THUD!

It attacked with relentless, mechanical repetition, using its hardened skull like a hammer.

The mimic monster’s body, built for speed and transformation rather than durability, crumbled and caved under the brutal assault.

The mimic monster did have regenerative abilities — but the damage being inflicted far outpaced its ability to heal.

It couldn’t keep up.

No matter how powerful a creature seemed, death came for them all.

Not even monsters were exempt from that law of nature.

Even the mighty One-Winged Angel would one day meet its end —burnt to ashes and devoured like fried chicken by the witches.

And those witches, who could level mountains with a wave of their hands, would in turn fall to the dagger of a child who had lost everything.

That child would grow up only to be dragged into a labyrinth and die at the fangs of some third-rate three-eyed beast.

Not even legendary monsters were exceptions to the cycle.

If truly invincible beings existed, they would have conquered the world long ago.

The very fact that these creatures were so rare was proof that they hadn’t managed to survive the competition.

The remains of the girl’s body, now so mutilated as to be almost unrecognizable, twitched feebly.

And to erase even that last trace .

The One-Winged Angel’s long neck arched gracefully.

The feathers on its head were long gone, revealing the bare, grotesque, grayish-purple flesh beneath.

With one final judgment, the hammer of its head fell.