Somehow, whatever Seria noticed, I also noticed too. My head instinctively snaps to look.

That's a lot of bugs.

It's like something straight out of Starship Troopers. A carpet of insectoid like creatures. Even if you don't have a fear of insects or spiders, I think anyone would be rattled by this sight.

I saw a few isolated ones one the way, which Aeris steered us around.

These... are void spirits, right?

"Master-sama! Un... Eli-sama! Be careful!"

So that was what Seria's blast must have been about before.

"We have to fight them?"

"Mmmm... it seems they are attracted to the spirit-less souls of the other girls. We barely stopped them from consuming Kaede when we got here." Seria nods.

I thought she looked paler than usual. Yes... I guess the girls must have had the same creepy 'let's play' spiel that hit me. If Aeris hadn't have awakened... I would have listened and have likely been consumed as well. It's a good job, I guess, that Seria seems to know what she's doing.

Seriously, though, my heart skipped when looking at her adult version. She is like an Ivory and Ebony sculpture now... her face defined and gorgeously feminine, her yellow eyes turned predatory, and a long, slender body framed by the usual black twin-tails. Not buxom, but still... yes... like a Japanese pale beauty put in a fanservice outfit. And still oozing self-confidence as well... awkward cute blushes aside.

But enough of that...

"Can we escape before they reach us? And how do we get out of here?" I ask.

"We must return to a proper ley-line, Elijah-sama." Rishya answers.

"Mmm... then I should be able to force us back into it and leygate us to the closest destination." Seria confirms.

"But... we'll have to fight first, right?" Aria states, swinging her glowing spear in her funny magical girl noble fanservice outfit.

Yeah... they're almost upon us.

Michael suddenly stomps past me.

He holds his own staff aloft. I notice Rish is now sat on his seven-foot tall shoulder, and she points forwards.

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"Fire!" She shouts.

A giant bright white laser that can only be described as a Master Spark happens.

Its twice the size and power of the laser she fired before. Quicker too.

It sweeps along the approaching army and obliterates several hundred, for sure, before flickering out.

But they keep coming.

Seria then delivers another massive stroke of lightning, blowing a crater in the centre of the formation and sending many flying.

But the terrain repairs itself... and they keep coming.

Aria then kicks off, and impacts the front of the formation, dancing and skating around as her spear cleaves wildly.

"Can we help, Aeris?" I ask.

"Nnn... yes!"

Suddenly, she disappears.

Well... this is rather unexpected.

A large longsword suddenly appears in my hands, beautiful shiny steel the colour of her skin, set with a blue pommel and red hilt, like her eyes, and flowing with a veil of thunderous electricity.

"Use Aeris, Eli-sama!" I hear in my head.

I guess... I really am a bladesward now, aren't I? I smile to myself and try to kick-off like Aria did.

I literally blast off, causing a thunderclap. Woah! Woah! Holy crap!

I hit the formation of void insects like a bullet; and cleave a large one in half that’s about to hit Aria from behind.

Blade-Aeris grows to make sure I cleave through, and then lets out a blast of shocks that make all the void spirits judder, like I had just used that one spell I have. This is totally a cheat... it’s refreshing to finally have a proper one!

The paralysis type effect allows Aria to easily wipe them out.

Then another laser blasts past us. It briefly clears the space around.

"Onii-chan!?! You can fight..." Aria exclaims.

"I know... it’s weird... right? But it seems this girl is really useful, after all" I grin, staring at my sword. The blade ripples slightly, as though it is breathing. Somehow, I get the impression my sword is happy and grinning to herself.

Aria also grins back.

"Someone to fight beside me... eh? Ehehe..."

I jump over to her; and press my back against hers.

"Yep. Back to back. We did promise, right? That we would be monsters together." I say, looking over my shoulder at her cute face.

"Uh-huh!" She smiles radiantly back at me and blushes, then looks away, stabbing another void spirit with an offhand thrust.

I swipe at another. It’s a good job these aren't very intellectual enemies. They're like zombies. Spidery insect zombies. I imagine that most competent enemies would never be caught in the crappy swings that I'm making. Even though I don't know much about combat, I can tell they're shoddy, weak and trashy compared to what Aria and Kiku throw out.

Aria is taking out ten for everyone I do... but at least I'm helping, right?

Getting Kiku to train me is really probably a good idea now. And that Esraye girl, since she has metal spirit powers?

It reminds me, though, that we've not seen the mercenary group at all here.

Hopefully, they'll be alright.

I slash at another void spirit, cleaving it in twain.

Another thing I wonder is how I can tie this kind of fighting to using explosives and my sapper like skill-set from before.

Here's another! I impale it on the blade, and the shocks from the sword-Aeris make it explode in dust.

Exploding in dust?

That seems very much like those weird teleporting creatures from before. Though those were in a void-based dungeon, so it’s not a surprise.

Suddenly, all of the spirits suddenly stop surging at us, and simultaneously turn tail, dissolving into mist as they do.

What? What just happened?

Did they choose to retreat?

Considering their frenzy from before, I have a bad feeling about this.