I should have known better than to think a simple trick like this is enough to take down a veteran like Jordan.

He swings his mallet and make the blades explode without looking up. Even though the sneak attack failed, the diversion was long enough for the three of us to get out of the predicament.

I figure that the longer we stall this fight, the more disadvantage we’ll be in. Therefore, I decide to use Coinchenn’s power.

All of a sudden, I’m much faster than Amesaki-senpai and Ichika who were running in front of me. Just when Jordan is about to raise his mallet, the tip of my spear is inches away from the middle of his chest.

Again, I was aiming at his chest with every intention to kill. Once again, my attack couldn’t reach him. This time, all he did was jump one step backwards. At the same time, he poses like he’s planning to throw the mallet at me.

Before he could throw it, Ichika is already right in front of him. I hear Jordan clicks his tongue and quickly changes his stance back to a fighting one. And he did it right on time too, as Amesaki-senpai thrusts her sword towards him. He blocks her thrust with his mallet while dodging Ichika’s overhead swing by slightly moving his body.

I use this chance to crouch low and aim my spear at his left rib. This time, my attack finally connects.

Jordan grunts painfully. He grabs my spear’s shaft and pulls the tip out. Since he’s much stronger than me, he manages to do it easily.

Amesaki-senpai and Ichika try to attack him again. Before they could, he lifts me up with only one hand through the shaft and swings me like an oversized hammer left and right in quick succession. As a result, both the girls are hit and fly away like baseballs.

Somehow, I manage to keep on grabbing my end of the shaft. I would definitely lose to him on a tug-of-war, so I decide to make him let go instead.

I make a pillar of murky water rise up from the ground and gives him a shower. He immediately let go.

I quickly look to both side. Both Amesaki-senpai and Ichika are already on their ground and charging towards Jordan. I decide to let them charge in first and look for an opening once more. Pretty cowardly of me, I know. The thing is, I don’t fancy getting my neck grabbed again, and I seriously doubt that he would fall for the same trick a second time.

That said, my decision ended up to be a wise one. After Jordan got stabbed by my spear, he became very wary of it. It’s literally a once bitten, twice shy moment. He’s constantly looking over at my direction to make sure that I’m too far away to stab him. As a result, he starts to have a hard time guarding and countering attacks coming from Amesaki-senpai and Ichika.

On a side note, he cauterized the wound I gave him by zapping it with his lightning. From the way he did it, I could tell that he’s done it a few times before. That said, it’s probably hurting a lot since the tip of my spear is coated with salt water. Honestly, I couldn’t tell since he’s being expressionless right now.

I figured that he might want another stab wound, so I take up a thrusting stance and wait for a chance. Right on time, he has both his hands full from parrying attacks. I waste no time and charge in.

And then things start to take a turn for the worse for us.

The tip of my spear was inches away from Jordan’s body when I hear an ear-splitting hiss coming from the left. I look towards the direction and suddenly, I realize that I have ophidiophobia.

I’m currently looking at a giant snake that’s at least five meters long. Its head alone is much bigger than my entire body. And its fangs… don’t even get me started on its fangs. Those things are plain murder weapons, and that’s minus the venom that are inside them.

How do I know the venom’s dangerous? Drops of those things are dripping from the fangs, and they make loud sizzling sounds when they hit the ground. Also, the green poison are corroding the floor at an alarming rate. It’s even smoking. The venom smells extremely terrible too. I don’t want to smell them if I can help it. I should have brought a gas mask along if I knew this was going to happen.

Its body is covered with shiny black scales. I serious think that even Amesaki-senpai’s Ensifer or Ichika’s Masamune will have trouble on making a dent on them.

I didn’t look at its eyes. Words has it that a basilisk can kill by just glaring at its prey. I don’t care whether it’s true. There’s no way I’m taking that risk.

It’s like I’m looking at Morcos’s serpent form again, except that this one is much bigger and has actual venom.

‘This is getting tedious, so I’ll be ending this.’

Brennan’s standing on top of the basilisk’s head and acting all smug. He looks towards the man with the guns.

‘How long are you going to fool around, Harrison? Should I remind you that we’re running on a tight schedule?’

The man called Harrison, who was still panting and getting cornered by Takayama, Sakuya and Yui just a moment ago, flashes an insane smile that could rival Brennan’s.

‘My apologies, Professor.’ he says in a raspy voice. ‘You know I couldn’t stop myself from doing this every time.’

‘Just end this already, won’t you?’

While they’re talking, Oomori and Mashiro proceed to attack Brennan with fireballs and wind. The basilisk counters the attacks by opens up its mouth wide and sprays out venom. The fireballs ignite the putrid poison before it could reach Brennan. As for the wind, the basilisk swipe them away with one swing of its tail.

Even when the huge snake is moving around vigorously like some kind of theme park’s ride, its owner Brennan can still stand on its head without falling or even show sign that he’s about to fall. It either he has a good sense of balance, or he’s very used to it.

‘As you command.’

Harrison turns to look at Takayama and Sakuya. His smile becomes even creepier.

‘Well, girls? How does it feel to beat up a seemingly weak man? It must feels very good, aye?’

Suddenly, all of his guns start to glow, even the ones he dropped on the floor. And then, six floating transparent human silhouettes appear and each of them pick up a gun. As for Harrison, he reaches out both his hands and makes a gesture like he’s a conductor at a concert.

He starts flickering with his fingers. At each flick, those silhouettes point their guns at the three girls and open fire.

I was expecting to see bullets coming out of those barrels. Instead, animals made from different materials appeared.

A crimson gorilla appear from the gun that I recall that fires out exploding bullets. When Sakuya tries to guard against its huge fist with her war fan, she almost got blown away from an explosion the fist caused.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

When the silhouette that’s holding the gun that contains poison gas bullets fires the gun, the bullet turns itself into a green gargoyle made of miasma. It mostly flies around and spits out poison gas. Yui tries to block it by using her barrier, but it’s so corrosive they even melted the barrier away. Sakuya is doing a good job on blowing those gas away with her fan so far, but I doubt she can keep at it for long, not with other bullets to take care of.

From another gun comes a black hedgehog. It basically just shoots out long, sharp needles that homes in on its targets. Instead of Sakuya, the hedgehog is keeping Takayama busy. The two of them starts to engage in a fierce shootout, with Yui deflecting some of the needles with her barriers..

There’s also an eagle made of ice flying around and aim for the girls’ openings whenever it sees one. Not only that, it can also shoots out ice feathers from its wings, making it a threat from both near and far.

To take care of it, Yui summoned a shikigami that I’ve never seen before in the original anime nor this version: a black raven as large as an eagle.

The two birds start to have a catfight, er, I mean, birdfight while midair. At first, I though Yui’s crow will have the disadvantage since Harrison’s eagle is made of ice, but then I notice that the crow’s beak is so sharp it can even peck off the sturdy-looking ice.

The fifth bullet turns itself into a transparent toad with the size as a rhino. When it opens its mouth, it releases a huge sphere made of wind. Although its travelling speed is slow, it explodes when it’s near its target, and the sound is loud enough to make someone deaf.

The supposedly normal bullets turned out to be the most troublesome one after the silhouette took over the firing. It transformed into a metallic gremlin that’s only around two feet tall. You’re probably expecting it to have some scary ability after what I said, but all it does is just hops around and irritates the two girls. You may think it’s no big deal, but imagine having to deal with this pest while trying to fight off five of its similar kind. Plus, the fact that it’s made of metal makes it hard to get rid of.

‘Dance to my tunes, ladies!’ Harrison says to the girls gleefully. ‘Oh, I would never get tired of making my opponents cocky for thinking that they have the upper hand, only to have their tables turned on them! The expressions they make when they fall into despair…’

He lets out a disgusting groan while trembling ecstatically. If I wasn’t occupied with Jordan, I’d have go there and knock his teeth out. Or try to. Those pets of his would surely try to stop me.

I was so distracted by the things over there I almost got kicked by Jordan at the stomach. Thankfully, I saw his right leg lifting up from the corner of my eye. I immediately raise up my spear diagonally to guard myself against the kick. Even though I manage to guard against it, the kick was so strong I got knocked back a few steps.

Right. I really have to concentrate on my fight. Amesaki-senpai aside, I can tell that Ichika is getting overwhelmed, so I pat her shoulder to signal to her that I’m substituting her to fight at the front so that she could catch a breather. No time for cowardice when your girlfriend is in trouble. She slightly turns her head and nods at me while smiling gratefully.

Since Jordan’s attack is mostly counters and has little openings, I figure that I should do the same and use only thrusts instead of swinging my spear around.

Also, I make curved, sharp barbs appear on the shaft of my spear so what whenever Jordan tries to parry my spear with his bare arm, he would get hurt from the barbs. I mean, a spear is much easier to parry than a sword since the only sharp part of the spear is the tip. Doing this would surely make him use his mallet more than his arm. I also make sure that I only aim for his upper torso so that he can’t use his legs.

As I hoped, Jordan has stopped parrying my attacks with his arm since it’s bleeding from getting stabbed by the barbs. Now he has to use his mallet to guard against attacks from all three of us.

After a while, I notice that Jordan’s starting to run out of breath. I guess a three-on-one is too much even for someone like him. Just when I start to think that we got this in the bag, he just has to ruin it.

All of a sudden, a blue magic circle appears right on top of him. I instinctively back away since even I could tell that the magic circle is bad news. Amesaki-senpai and Ichika do the same.

Jordan calmly raises his mallet and whispers a word that I can’t hear or read. Right after he did that, a lightning appears from the magic circle and strikes him. Instead of getting electrocuted and dies, both Jordan’s clothes and mallet transform.

Instead of the typical Lost Children robe, Jordan now wears a heavy-looking chain mail, leather pants and metallic gauntlets and greaves. He’s also wearing an iron helmet on his head. Mjölnir has transformed from a small mallet to a huge, two-handed war hammer which looks much more menacing and dangerous.

‘Goodness gracious, is everyone going all out now? I guess I should follow suit if I don’t want to feel left out.’

I turn to look at the person who spoke. It’s the woman with the veil and the chakram.

She was just leisurely spinning her chakram on her index finger. Suddenly, sharp edges appear from its edge, making it look like a buzz saw. Worse still, I saw an image of a four-armed man standing right behind her. It was just a second, so I can’t really be sure, but I really, really hope that I didn’t saw the Hindu God Vishnu.

Oh man. We’re in so much trouble. Turns out all of them made a contract with the spirit of their Regalias. On the other hand, we only have five contractors on our side. If none of us has any good plan, we’re definitely going to die here, or worse.

My eyes suddenly drift towards the ring on my finger.

‘... Amesaki-senpai, Ichika. I need the two of you to buy me some time. I don’t know how long it’s going to take, but I promise you that it’ll be done as soon as possible.’

Amesaki-senpai and Ichika nod without turning around or saying anything. Yup, the situation is that critical.

I disconnect myself with Coinchenn since I don’t know what will happen if I dive in with the sea monster still connected to me, and I put Gáe Bulg away. Next, I take out a white chalk and draw a pentacle on the floor.

Admittedly, it was very difficult. This isn’t the first time I’m in a real do-or-die situation ever since I come to this world, but it’s still nerve-wrecking. I’m not even sure how much will this help in our current situation, or if it’ll work at all.

…There. I’m done with the star. Now for the circle. Got to really concentrate on this part.If I accidentally drew an oval, the whole thing will get messed up.

‘That boy over there is drawing a pentacle! Nothing good can come from that! We need to stop him!’ I hear the woman shout.

Oh-oh. Wait wait wait. Calm down. I need to be calm if I want to do this. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Right. Let’s just ignore everything that’s going on around me and just focus on drawing the circle. I start to draw the circle.

When I’m halfway there, I see something flying towards me from the corner of my eye. Just when I’m thinking that I should put down the chalk and do something about it myself, I see someone charges towards the something and knocks it away. Based on the way the person moved, I reckon it was Oomori.

There, just a little bit more…

‘Not on my watch!’ I hear Jordan shouts.

‘That is my line!’ Ichika shouts.

I hear steel clashing with steel. Again, I do my best to ignore the distraction. After a few more nerve-wrecking seconds, I’m finally done. I get inside the pentacle at once.

I know the first part of my plan worked when I realize that I’m at the Greek Underworld instead of deep under the ocean. Also, a young woman is standing right in front of me instead of an overgrown fish.

The woman is wearing a black chiton, which is some kind of robe worn by the ancient Greeks. For some odd reason, she’s also wearing a transparent breastplate.

As for her features, her skin is pale as a sheet, while both her eyes and hair are of the darkest black.

I quickly get down on my knee and bow my head.

‘Styx-sama, it is a great honor to finally meet you in person.’ I say respectfully.

There’s a River God or Goddess for every Greek River, including the ones in the Underworld. Naturally, that makes the person right in front of me a River Goddess as well. It’s best to be polite.

Her, on the other hand, has little regards for formality.

‘Oh, stop being so stiff, won’t you?’ she says a bit irritably. ‘I know I’m literally a Goddess, but there’s no need for you to lower your head and start worshiping me.’

‘Well, if you insist.’

I slowly stand up. I want to form a contract with her as soon as possible, but my eyes are keep on getting drawn to the out-of-place breastplate that she’s wearing. She notices me staring and points at it with her finger.

‘It’s your fault I’m wearing this, you know.’ she tells me.

‘Um, how so?’

‘You asked your friends to put a limiter on me, remember? This is how it visualizes itself when I’m in my human form.’

‘Ah, I’m really sorry about that. You see, I don’t think I could handle your vast magic, which is why I need it. There’s also the fact that um, my entire stamina will be drained away if I use too much of your power at once.’

‘And I assume you’re here to talk to me about that?’

‘Yes. I wish to form a contract with you, Styx-sama.’

I know that I’m at a complete disadvantage when it comes to debating about the contract. First of all, it’s already tough that my I want to form a contract with a Goddess who’s hard to please in nature. And then there’s the fact that I’m out of time. I’m pretty much a fish on a chopping block now.

‘Very well. In exchange for lending you my full strength, I shall request that-’

Here it comes. I just hope that it’s not something ridiculous.

‘-I’m allowed to walk freely in the land of the living.’