Nearly twenty days later, Isagi decided the time had come.
The preparations were complete. They were ready to take on [Alfia] and [Absolute Evil].
"In summary, that's roughly how it'll go…"
Before the stone gate.
Isagi laid out the battle plan in full detail to the girls assembled on the field, then switched his role card to [Land of Reeds].
As Haruhime cast her level-boosting magic to buff the entire group, the boy also distributed the various elixirs he'd been carrying, handing them out for everyone to take.
"We have roughly twenty minutes."
Haruhime was currently Lv.2, but thanks to the onmyoji gear specially crafted for her, the duration of her level-boosting magic had been extended from its original fifteen minutes or so to over twenty — the exact amount varied and was hard to pin down, but twenty minutes at minimum was a certainty.
This boss fight was not a war of attrition. It was a blitz.
Haruhime would not be participating.
There was simply no way to guarantee her safety inside.
"Let's move."
At the boy's command.
Everyone fell into the formation they'd agreed on beforehand and followed behind Isagi, stepping through the mist gate ahead of them.
Once again, he transformed into the massive iron-armored black wolf.
Isagi gripped the [Moonlight Greatsword]. This time, he would be fighting as the vanguard — and he would need to move fast.
Through over a hundred deaths.
Everything that was about to happen, Isagi could recite backwards with his eyes shut.
First.
Close the distance — no matter what!
Alfia and Absolute Evil were positioned at the center of the temple hall. Before she could whisper that ultra-short-form spell of hers, he had to be in her face!
"Evangelium."
Boosted by the elixirs and his forbidden technique, the speed he achieved surpassed even his own imagination. In the blink of an eye, he had crossed dozens of meters — and suddenly, they were eye to eye.
And so.
Even though the spell had already been completed, it no longer mattered.
Alfia used her own magic, 「Garden of Stillness」, to nullify the offensive spell 「Demon King Valion」 she had just released.
The reason was simple.
A magical attack with a full three-hundred-and-sixty-degree range, no physical form, and no means of defense or evasion — under normal circumstances, she could unleash it without a second thought. But what if there were allies nearby?
At this moment, Absolute Evil — coiled like a feathered serpent — was circling above the woman's head. The instant the boy drew close, it swooped down.
Like a devoted bodyguard, it launched itself at Isagi.
But that very presence was what constrained Alfia's freedom of action.
And it was precisely in that opening.
The girls entered the battlefield from behind the mist gate with perfect timing, sidestepping entirely what should have been the first wave of the combined assault.
At the same time.
Not a single second wasted.
Everyone moved into position and launched into the next phase of the operation.
As a mage, Alfia's natural response should have been to fall back — to put distance between herself and both Isagi and Absolute Evil before executing her next move.
But she did the opposite.
Instead of retreating, she pressed forward, weaving through the monster's serpentine body with nothing but her fists and feet.
One in the air, one on the ground.
In an almost crossing pattern, they launched relentless attacks at Isagi.
This too was within his predictions — in fact, for the next few seconds, he felt like he'd unlocked some kind of foresight.
Everything.
The monster's claws, its breath, its snapping jaws — and the woman's fists and kicks — all of it cycled through his memory in an overlapping, repeating loop.
In that moment, Isagi almost felt invincible.
Perfect evasion.
The boy's body blurred through a string of afterimages — a sight that left onlookers breathless.
And soon, Ais and Tiona joined the battle at full speed.
But not too close.
Because Alfia's 「Garden of Stillness」 would strip the level-boosting magic from the girls the instant they entered its range — so right now, their target was Absolute Evil, soaring overhead.
The dragon's body was enormous. Even coiled, it hovered at a height of at least ten meters above the ground.
And so.
What Ais and Tiona had to do was fly higher than it.
Golden wind swirled around the girl, and at the same moment, it scooped up the Amazon, wrapping around her and launching her skyward.
The two of them had rehearsed this move more times than they could count before the battle.
And then.
A torrent of scorching crimson came crashing down from above.
"Infernal Blood Slash!"
"BOOM!"
With Tiona's thunderous roar, the girl's massive fists and her great twin-bladed axe erupted like a volcano, detonating from above downward in a cataclysmic explosion.
The sky cracked open.
It was as though a massive wound had been torn in the air above.
Scorching crimson blood rained down, and in an instant, it was on the verge of swallowing both Alfia and Absolute Evil whole.
This strike was Tiona at her absolute limit.
The Amazon girl had taken a specially formulated poison — one that, according to her, had been obtained from the secret stash of her former teacher, Bache Kalif, one of only two Lv.6 adventurers in their Familia.
Extracted from the lethal magic [Vargus] that Bache herself possessed.
Its dual effect was fearsome.
It caused every internal organ and blood vessel in the body to rupture simultaneously within an extreme span of time, triggering catastrophic internal hemorrhaging —
And then, counterbalanced by the Nine-Cycle Soul Pill obtained from Isagi — no celestial elixir by any means, but still capable of opening the gate of vitality and mending what was severed — it kept the user alive and unbroken.
It didn't have the game-like effect of reviving someone on the spot after death.
But for a fixed duration after ingestion, it would forcibly prevent death, locking the user's life in place no matter what.
In short…
A blood-lock. The blade that commands fate itself.
Honestly, this feels even more depraved — but then again, it suits Tiona perfectly!!
The girl already possessed the skill [Berserk Fury], which amplified her offensive power the more grievously she was wounded. Stacked on top of that was [Grand Clash] — a skill that triggered only at death's door to massively boost all stats.
Right now, Tiona was a walking stat monster through and through.
And with that many multipliers stacked, the ultimate technique she unleashed was simply unstoppable.
Which was why, the moment that eruption of blood-red magma appeared.
Even Alfia felt the danger — and so she made a decision that was also well within Isagi's predictions.
"Soul's Stillness."
As the woman began to chant.
The silence domain of [Garden of Stillness] expanded once again, and the torrential downpour of blood-red magma was gradually dissolved — reduced to scattered droplets of rain, and then to nothing at all.
An invisible wind quickly carried the Amazon girl — already at her absolute limit — out of the battlefield, sweeping her back toward the distant mist gate.
Tiona had fulfilled her role. And in doing so, she had also confirmed a certain theory Isagi had been nursing all along.
Which was this.
Alfia actually couldn't control her magic with any real precision.
[Garden of Stillness] expanded outward from the woman herself as its center — it could grow larger or smaller, but she couldn't micromanage it; she couldn't, for instance, envelop one section of the range while excluding another. If she could, it would have been truly broken beyond all reason.
She'd be able to use magic herself while silencing everyone else's.
Fortunately, that wasn't the case.
And the result of that limitation was exactly what was happening now — a massive silence domain had formed, centered on the woman.
Within it, even Alfia herself was unable to cast magic.
This was a fleeting opportunity.
Because at any moment, Alfia could shrink the silence domain back down to its original size — and then turn her offensive magic against Ryuu-senpai and Ais from a distance.
After dying over a hundred times,
Isagi had long since figured out that the most infuriatingly broken thing about [Alfia] was this:
A woman who possessed two ultra-short-form spells — 「Garden of Stillness」 and 「Demon King Valion」 — could completely ignore enemy magic while freely unleashing her own offensive spells without restraint.
Because the chant time was simply too short, she could toggle between "silenced" and "not silenced" at will.
So to defeat her, you had to seize the split-second gap.
Just like right now.
Alfia's silence had swallowed Absolute Evil within its range as well.
Of course, the monster itself had no magical attacks to speak of — its breath wasn't condensed magic power either. So right now, the deep crimson radiance capable of burning through anything was still gathering inside its gaping maw.
But that was precisely why.
It gave Isagi something to work with.
"Ryuu, Ais."
"Understood!"
The two girls, already positioned at the far end of the temple hall on the opposite side, were ready and waiting. They fired the grappling hooks of their Legion Prosthetics straight at him.
The specially made cables — incredibly resilient — wound around both his hands as Isagi actively cooperated to let them catch.
And then.
Isagi's body was yanked forward at tremendous speed by the two girls.
And as he went, he took Alfia along with him — sweeping her off toward the far end of the hall at a blistering pace!
"?!"
Even a look of genuine confusion and incomprehension crossed the woman's face.
But this was Isagi's battle plan.
Under normal circumstances, Alfia could swiftly push him away with her invisible sound magic — even sever the cables outright — and send the two girls reeling with a strike from a distance.
But right now, she was inside the silence domain she herself had created. Even if she could activate magic, its power was drastically reduced — nowhere near enough to pose any real threat to him or the girls.
And most importantly of all.
Casting a spell required chanting — and no matter how short, you still had to open your mouth to speak.
So —
Cover her mouth!
Isagi's hands were occupied.
So instead, he could only throw open that great iron helmet of his wolf-jaw — as if lunging in for a bite — and clamp it down around Alfia's head, engulfing it completely.
And behind the helmet, of course, was his own face.
It was underhanded. Even a little absurd. But this was combat.
To create one single moment of opportunity.
To ensure Alfia could not use any magic whatsoever for these precious few seconds — Isagi went all in.
And immediately after.
Just as his side completed its mission, Lefiya and the others had finished preparing their spell.
The target: Absolute Evil.
Isagi and the girls would deliver the most powerful — and most improbable — strike imaginable, to take it down in a single blow.
And so, this was the combined assault of the city's two greatest elven mages:
"[Explosion Magic]!!"
____
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