The gigantic vine armor stood before the Corrupted Spirit.
The one-meter-thick green armor was like the Wall of Sighs from myth, blocking all enemies from entering and enclosing a sacred paradise beyond mortal reach.
"It came surging up from below?"
Finn, who had been overseeing the entire battlefield, immediately fixed his sharp gaze on the base of the vine armor.
An attack from the lower floors had pierced through the ceiling, reached the 59th Floor, and transformed into a wall standing before the Corrupted Spirit.
That was what the traces suggested.
"Monsters from the 60th Floor… or even deeper… are protecting her?!"
Finn's eyes widened.
Incredible.
Yet, at the same time, reasonable.
The Valgang Dragons of the 58th Floor already possessed the trait of ignoring floor boundaries.
For monsters from even deeper levels to attack upper-floor Adventurers through the ceiling was not absolutely impossible.
When the Corrupted Spirit faced danger, the monsters below used that same floor-ignoring trait to protect her!
Judging by their strength, those monsters likely possessed power generally comparable to Lv. 5 or Lv.6 Adventurers!
For the current Loki Familia, indeed, for all Adventurers in Orario, that place was an absolute forbidden zone.
It was normal that Ryoji couldn't break through.
His strength was formidable, true, but most of it manifested in speed. His speed was peerless, yet his raw power remained only around Lv. 5.
Even using acceleration magic, his attack power still had limits!
To break through that vine armor, they would need…
"Gareth!"
"I understands!" Gareth roared.
He decisively abandoned attacking and raised both shields before him.
Enduring the crushing impacts of the tentacles, his massive body charged forward like a tank, recklessly advancing.
More than ten tentacle collisions crashed against his shields in succession,
Yet they couldn't force him back even a single step!
"Finn, I'll help too, "
Watching the difficult charge at the front line, Riveria couldn't help but raise her magic staff.
"No, wait, Riveria."
Finn did not join the frontline assault and remained in the rear as commander.
"I don't know why, but my thumb hurts. Really hurts! Something is definitely coming. You'd better not use your magic now, that's what my intuition is telling me!"
He bit down hard on his thumb, his eyes showing an anxiety that Riveria rarely saw from him.
"To make even you this agitated?"
Riveria looked at him in disbelief.
When acting as commander, Finn wore a mask of cold composure. He guided his companions with absolute calm, dispelling their confusion and fear.
In that state, Finn rarely revealed anxiety.
At least, Riveria hadn't seen it in years. Because Commander Finn was always the anchor of stability in the eyes of the Familia.
As long as Finn appeared calm and composed,
It meant there was still hope ahead.
But now,
At the foremost front line,
"WOOOAAARGH!!"
Roaring, Gareth ignored the tentacles through sheer unmatched defense and charged into the territory surrounding the Corrupted Spirit.
Left with no choice, she redirected all the tentacles previously used against Ryoji to stop Gareth, the new threat.
"Not happening!" Bete kicked out.
An explosion of flames destroyed several blocking tentacles.
"We're not gonna let the old man take all the glory himself!"
The Amazoness sisters swung their double-bladed sword and curved blades, cutting apart several more obstructing tentacles.
"Whoosh!"
Elsewhere, emerald wind broke through layer after layer of obstruction.
Using wind as her blade, Ais attacked the Corrupted Spirit from another direction.
Though the rain of tentacles was terrifyingly overwhelming, the Loki Familia Executives, standing at the very peak of Lv.5, were no pushovers either!
The moment they found even the slightest opening, they unleashed astonishingly coordinated counterattacks!
Ryoji stood behind them, staring at her like a hunting tiger.
The instant he found an opportunity,
He would pierce through her body with a single strike of Divine Speed!
Only,
His expression looked grim.
Because his own intuition was also screaming nonstop inside his mind,
Preventing his heart from finding the slightest calm.
Facing Gareth and Ais's dual assault, the Corrupted Spirit curled her lips upward.
Her smile mocked their efforts. Her eyes ridiculed them as utterly pointless.
As the battle gradually fell into a stalemate,
"Fire… come forth…" A smile bloomed across her face as a massive Magic Formation unfolded beneath the feet of her gigantic lower body.
Within that disaster-like magic circle, crimson magical light surged upward.
"A monster… chanting?!"
"You've got to be kidding!"
The Tiona sisters screamed in shock.
Magic was the privilege of rational beings.
Monsters, completely ruled by destructive instinct, could never learn chanting, or so Adventurers believed.
Even if her origin was a Spirit, the fact that she could still chant Magic after fusing with a monster left everyone stunned.
"Riveria, deploy a barrier!" Finn's expression changed violently as he barked urgently toward his Elven Royalty companion.
"Everyone else, bombard the spell! Frontline fighters, fall back immediately!"
"I, I understand!"
Shaken by the unprecedented situation, Riveria hurriedly raised her staff and began chanting.
Everyone on the front line, retreat.
Finn's thumb throbbed with unprecedented pain.
His terrible premonition had frightened even him.
It was enough to make him order everyone back, even those who had already reached the forefront, only twenty meters away from the enemy.
"What do we do?"
"Listen to Captain!"
Following Tione's lead, Ais and the others retreated reluctantly.
Meanwhile, Ryoji glanced at the floral armor, the vine armor, and the hundreds of tentacles.
He could only abandon the frontal assault and retreat with the others. Those three layers of defense had anticipated every type of attack.
Unless someone could force them apart with overwhelming power, breaking through was impossible.
Even Lightning Flint wasn't enough, the distance alone made sure of that.
At the same time,
"Volley Fire Javelins!"
Lefiya's Magic finally completed its chant.
A gigantic Magic Formation emerged in the sky.
Unlike the wide-area annihilation spell she had used on the 58th Floor, this time she compressed the fiery rain of arrows into a concentrated bombardment. While covering the Executives' withdrawal, it bombarded the Corrupted Spirit's multiple defensive layers head-on.
In concentrated mode, it possessed enough power to instantly kill even a Lv.5 Valgang Dragon.
But,
"Not even a scratch?!"
Lefiya stared in utter disbelief.
The floral armor covering the monster's lower body,
The vine armor before it, even under relentless bombardment, both remained as pristine as ever.
The countless green tentacles, on the other hand, were driven back.
Many were burned through and severed.
However…
Bzzzz…!
A haze of crimson particles poured from the Corrupted Spirit's body.
Shortly afterward…. The severed tentacles convulsed violently.
Fresh flesh buds wriggled out from the cut surfaces.
"…They regenerated?"
"What terrifying regenerative ability!"
Everyone was shocked.
And it wasn't just the tentacles.
The floral armor shattered earlier by Ryoji,
The vine armor was cracked by his collision,
After receiving the "blessing" of those crimson particles, they too restored themselves completely in the blink of an eye.
Powerful defense.
Terrifying regeneration.
Large-scale Magic.
There wasn't a single weakness to exploit.
(End of Chapter)
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