Chapter 101
The Poisonous Maiden VS The Intelligent Brute : Conclusion
The purple light pushed Sergio a few hundred meters before vanishing.
The indomitable warrior had blocked the powerful attack with his axe, which resulted in the precious artifact to have a dent in it. Sergio gritted his teeth as he fell on his knees, panting and groaning.
Niniweh then started to rattle in Sergio’s hand. The wings that formed the axe began to spread. The miniature eyes on the sculpture began to shine an iridescent glow.
“Stop,” Sergio scolded his axe. His tone then turned to that of a father coaxing his child to sleep. “Close your eyes and sleep, Niniweh. It is not yet the promised hour.”
Once he said this, the crystalline axe stopped rattling and settled down. Its wings closed and the eyes of the sculpture closed one more.
“Haah…” the man’s arms felt numb. It took him a minute to be able to properly unfold his fingers from the handle of his axe.
“A dangerous attack,” he commented. “It managed to put quite a dent into my HP. How long has it been since that happened?”
“W-what happened -? (Cough)” Kamiya groaned in pain as she dragged herself up by propping against her sword.
Sergio glanced at her and signaled for her stay.
He walked over to the boundary of the sea of purple smoke that came out of his opponent’s body and studied it.
Intrigued, Sergio slowly stuck his hand into the smoke. There was a bit of resistance and an unpleasant prickly sensation as if a thousand ants were nibbling at his skin. The smoke coiled around his wrist like a snake.
“I have never seen anything like it. It’s smoke, but it doesn’t act like one,” Sergio said as he waved his hand around inside the purplish smoke. Due to his constitution, he was largely unaffected by the smoke; but he could not shake this sense of unease.
“There’s something here, mixed in with the smoke. Something foreign…”
He could vaguely feel the presence of something hidden within the smoke. A presence that made him jerk his hand out.
“…”
The man then raised his weapon up and shouted. “Ground Dasher!!”
With a mighty swing, he turned everything in front of him into a scene of pure chaos. Trees were uprooted and the ground split apart, along with the sea of smoke. But then the smoke flowed back to where it was. Witnessing this, the man repeated his action.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
BLAM!!
Again, the sea of poisonous smoke was split apart, only to become one once more. Like the spirit of its user, the poisonous smoke refused to go.
“Choosing death over bended knees, did you?” Sergio took a few steps back, admiring this defiant act of Connie’s. “The Calendian King is a fool to not have fostered such an outstanding woman,” he paused. “Then again…the bloodline of a Knight who uses poison as a weapon? How ironic.”
After a few moments of deliberation, he nodded to himself and placed Niniweh upon his chest. At which time, the beautiful axe turned into a golden-green orb, which slipped into his body.
“We are leaving, Kamiya,”
Kamiya refused with a stern note. “No. I need to find my companion’s bodies. I need to at least give my party members a decent burial,” she paused as her voice trembled. “A - and Yuuji. I – I need to see him.”
“We have no time for that. We need to catch up with the King and get you healed up. I don’t know how to deal with what’s happening to you.”
“I don’t care about the King (Cough)! If Yuuji’s not there, nothing matters!! And you!! If you are so strong, you should have helped us!!!” despite having drunk a High Potion, the woman looked worse for wear.
“Helping the Hero to force his will upon an innocent woman?” the man growled. “You…you are too far gone. If it wasn’t that I owed him a debt I’d leave you for death.”
“Wha - ? Urgh!!”
Sergio slipped into her blind spot and punched lightly on her solar plexus. Despite having the body of a Demon, his slight punch of was enough to break through Kamiya’s defense and rendered her unconscious.
The man caught her by the waist and lugged her like a sandbag before dashing out of the forest.
A few feet from where they were, a pair of eyes peeked through a large bush. They followed the two figures before its owner retreated to the bushes.
“By Junnaveil’s Grace. I thought I was a goner.”
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As he was about to reach the edge of the forest, Sergio spotted a familiar figure riding on a horse.
“Bernardo!” the man bellowed.
“Sergio!”
The fat man was heavily battered, and his left arm was hanging on one side. But his eyes were still full of life.
“What happened to you?” Sergio asked.
“I fought the Centaur. I managed to escape her pursuit, but I had to sacrifice this arm,” the man groaned. “More importantly, where’s the Hero?”
The man pointed at his throat and moved the finger horizontally while sticking his tongue out.
“Ah,” the fat man answered in a deadpan voice. “And the rest?”
“Dead, most likely. From what I can see, their enemies were not that kind.”
“We failed then. Dammit!” he cursed. “And who’s that…wait, is that blood green?”
“This is Kamiya. Long story. We need to go. I don’t know what’s happening to her. So, we need to catch up with the King. Maybe he’d know what to do.”
“What do you mean?” Bernardo asked hurriedly. “That’s a Demon, you know! A Demon!!”
“I know! It’s on me, so shut up and follow me to the horses! We’ll take another exit!”
The two of them then found the horses still tied to the tree, spooked though they were. Sergio took one of them and released the rest to other directions to fool pursuers. With the passed-out Kamiya tied to the back, Sergio led them out of the forest.
They then rode Northwest to the border of Vorzenny and Calendia, where the King awaits.
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Meanwhile, back in the forest, the body of Cornelia Asterium Steelheart laid silently on the forest ground. Unmoving. Death-like. All traces of her transformation were gone, revealing raw wounds that bled red.
Something small was moving around her. Spitting, twisting, weaving. The little Golden Silkworm moved with tenacity unbefitting its small form. It spun its silk around her owner’s wounds, staunching the bleeding.
It worked silently, quietly, efficiently.
The poisonous slime called Chen moved within the confines of this smoke and gathered her as soon as soon as it could not feel the presence of the threat and quickly brought her and the others to safety.