Chapter 446
Ssshhhhhhaaaa!
Cutting through the currents of the sea, Simon was advancing while mounted on the undead Deimos.
His feet were fixed firmly on Deimos’ body, while in his hands he was scanning the nautical chart that Dick had brought.
‘Let’s see this.’
Simon recalled the words he had heard from the guide earlier today, at the Deimos Museum.
—This marks Deimos’ current location. In Pharonna, they’ve been tracking Deimos’ movements starting a month before the event! At this speed, he and his vassals will pass by tomorrow afternoon.
Deimos circled the seas of the entire continent at a fixed speed and route. And tomorrow, he was scheduled to pass through the narrow strait between the Pharonna Peninsula and the nearby island.
The estimated arrival time, tomorrow afternoon.
If they could reach Pharonna a bit faster, they could wipe out the nagas in one strike. But Deimos’ speed never changed. The Randolph Gang must have also made their calculations before staging this.
“In the end, this is the only way.”
Lowering his gaze, Simon saw the undead Deimos swimming powerfully through the currents, darkness flickering across his white bones.
“Think you can do it, Deimos?”
He could feel Deimos’ uneasy thoughts, strained with tension. Gently soothing his summoned beast, Simon checked the chart again.
“Any moment now, it should… ah!”
As if waiting for his words, it appeared.
Far ahead, the middle of the sea had darkened. It wasn’t still, but writhing, slowly, slowly drawing closer.
Not a single creature. But tens of thousands, even millions of sea creatures swarming into a massive ‘cluster’ beneath the surface.
‘…All those are marine life?’
The scale was so beyond imagination that his mind froze for a moment. Through their link, Simon could feel Deimos also writhing in wild unease.
“Don’t worry. I’m not sending you against that.”
Moments later, the Deimos horde was right before his eyes.
Simon activated the oxygen-supply magic circle that Maelyn had developed, then returned the trembling Deimos into subspace.
Splash!
And dove into the sea.
A freezing sensation jolted his whole body. Spread before him was a silent, primordial world of calm ocean depths.
But there was no time for awe. At top speed, he swam toward the black mass.
‘…Whoa.’
Countless black, wriggling forms loomed, blanketing the sea as they drew closer. Even the local sea monsters were magnetized, joining the mass as if pulled by an unseen force.
The mass swelled ever larger.
At the very head of the swarm was an impossibly huge monstrous whale.
The true adult ‘Deimos’, bearer of the title Ruler of the Sea.
“……”
Am I insane?
What am I even here to do?
The instant their eyes met, Simon felt cracks splintering in his mind. Every cell in his body blared in red alarm.
Truth be told, he had nursed a tiny hope—maybe, if the impossible happened, if luck piled upon luck, he could actually capture the adult Deimos.
But standing here, he realized how utterly stupid that thought had been.
At the very least, he had to know the difference between possible and impossible. Simon erased that idea from his mind, completely.
‘Stay sharp. Just think about what I can do now!’
He bit his lip until blood welled. Pain steadied him. Forcing the terror down, he faced Deimos head-on.
Deimos too had noticed him, but paid little mind. Compared to that colossal bulk, Simon was no more than a speck, a trifling insect of land.
‘It’s madness, but…’
With a fierce twist of his mouth, Simon spread his arms wide.
‘I have no choice but to do this!’
Wooooong!
Woooong!
In his hands bloomed Phantasus Original – Sleep.
The plan was simple.
Put Deimos to sleep, strip the marine life of its command, then herd them with his own undead Deimos back to Pharonna.
And with that force, smash the naga swarm and save Pharonna.
‘Sorry, but I’ll be borrowing your army!’
He drove his concentration higher.
The world grew quieter, his heartbeat slowed.
‘More. More.’
Sound vanished.
Even time itself seemed to flow sluggishly.
Feeling his mind ascend, Simon poured everything into the magic circles in his hands.
The opponent, the adult Deimos and his horde.
All Simon had, two flimsy magic circles traced in his hands.
But he stood firm.
‘A Sleep that works on humans isn’t enough!’
Simon’s eyes blazed open.
‘I have to pour everything I have into it, raise the spectrum of firepower itself!’
Gushhhhhh!
Simon fed an overwhelming torrent of Darkness into the magic circle, beyond its capacity.
The balance inside broke, circuits tore, formulas shattered—but he didn’t stop. If a circuit broke, he reconnected it. If a formula tore, he redrew it. He clung on until destruction, but never let go.
—Think of black magic as a warrior’s scarred body! Constantly adapting, shifting, evolving to meet circumstances!
A vast expansion, far beyond what the circle was built to endure.
The structure warped, ripped apart again and again, but he refused to yield. He bound it all together, no matter how tattered.
‘Failure, wounds, all just part of the process!’
Sparks seared through his mind.
‘Take every scar as the pain of evolution!’
The circle warped grotesquely at its limit, hardly recognizable as a magic circle anymore.
Simon gripped the shrieking, twisted fiend of a circle with both hands.
‘I can do this!’
Darkness backflow tore blood from his lips, his eyes reddened, but—
He felt exaltation rising like a tide.
His eyes seized all things.
His hands clutched the whole of existence.
No limits, no lines, every failure another stitch binding the wreckage.
Then—
‘!’
Crack.
He felt something shatter, and sunlight break through.
Ssshhhhhhhaaaa!
From the flat, two-dimensional circle, three-dimensional tendrils burst forth.
Endless demand for evolution against a circle at its limit—caught in that tug of war, the circle did not explode, but instead broke through into an entirely new form.
‘Ah!’
The three-dimensional tendrils extended, blossoming into a flower of circles.
One circle branching into many, distributing the overload across its siblings.
This was it.
‘The realm President Phantasus spoke of!’
With a grin, Simon raised his eyes to the looming Deimos.
Kwooooooaaaahhh!
Had the colossus noticed this tiny speck scheming?
It opened its vast jaws.
The surrounding seawater was sucked in like into a void, dragging Simon violently toward the maw.
‘Ghhhk!’
Still holding concentration, Simon tied off the circle in his right hand, finishing it. He aimed it, ready to fire.
‘Take this!’
Not Phantasus’ work, but a true original only he could wield.
<Simon Original – Sleeping Deimos>
A deep blue flash streaked out, striking the whale’s palate. The curse landed cleanly.
‘One shot isn’t enough!’
He completed the left-hand circle too, and fired again.
This time it struck the throat, stacking the curse twice.
But—
Kwoooooooaaaaaaa!
Deimos showed not a trace of weariness.
‘Even this isn’t enough?’
Despair trembled at the edges of his mind. His body was on the verge of being sucked into that cavernous maw when—
Thunk.
Deimos closed its mouth. The violent current halted, bubbles rising in its place.
Gooooooohhhhh—
In the silence of the deep, Deimos’ great eye turned to Simon.
It had not fallen asleep. Yet it had, of its own will, stopped its attack.
—Keeeeeek!
—Karaaaak!
Behind him, sea monsters spotted Simon, flashing teeth and thrashing tentacles. But Deimos’ resonance restrained them, forbidding any strike.
‘What is this…?’
Simon stared in shock.
He had cursed it, yet Deimos showed no hostility.
‘Is it… feeling comfortable?’
The giant whale bumped Simon playfully with its enormous head, nudging the tiny land-creature.
Even as he was shoved back by the current, Simon spread his hands once more.
‘I don’t know what’s going on, but still!’
The Sleep curse Phantasus had taught him was different from other curses, it made the target relaxed, content.
Deimos did not think Simon had attacked it.
And instead, it wanted to feel even more at ease.
‘Up to 5 stacks!’
Simon built the same curse again. In his current Compello state, where concentration was pushed to its absolute peak, he made full use of Darkness’ nature to remember and replicate.
And at last—
‘This is the final one!’
5 stacks of Sleep.
From the 6th stack onward, imbalance between the Sleep curses would occur, weakening the effect instead. Meaning, 5 stacks was the limit.
After using every last Sleep, Simon left the rest to fate.
[…]
Of course, Deimos did not fall asleep under the power of the curse.
There was no way a colossal creature like this could be forced to sleep by a hastily cobbled curse.
Nevertheless, unmistakably, Deimos felt a pleasant drowsiness.
Srrrrrr—
And so, the whale prepared to sleep of its own will.
There was nothing particularly special about a whale’s slumber. It simply set its body upright, and stayed completely still, without the slightest movement.
This was how a whale slept.
—Karakarakarak!
—Kkiririk!
As the whale sank into sleep of its own accord, the strength of the waves it emitted was cut in half. The marine monsters and fish enslaved by its resonance were released, and some among them darted toward Simon.
Groooowl!
“Khup!”
The oxygen from the oxygen-supply magic circle had run out.
Holding his breath, Simon swam. The pitch-black horde of monsters closed in and surrounded him.
But in the sea, escape was impossible. Tentacles of octopus-monsters coiled around his body, while shark-like monsters bared their teeth close behind.
‘Now!’
As Simon was dragged down by the tentacles, he opened subspace.
And then—
—Woooooooooo!
A new “Ruler of the Sea” emerged.
* * *
“Hold them! Hold them!”
Meanwhile, the battle on the Pharonna Peninsula had stretched well past dawn.
Necromancers of Pharonna, the Keyzen students, and the mercenaries were holding the coast against the naga, but fatigue weighed them down and defeat seemed certain.
The lateness of the night, the peninsula’s closed-off location, and above all, the endless swarm of naga along the coast—all made quick reinforcements from outside impossible.
“Reinforcements! They say the lord’s castle is in danger with its barrier broken!”
The messenger shouted the report. The necromancers fighting on the beach showed faces twisted in outrage.
“Reinforcements? We’re desperate here too!”
“We should just flee on our own! If the necromancers gather and make a fortress, we can last at least a few days!”
Such words began to spread, thick with despair.
“Have you all lost your minds?”
When enraged Maelyn approached, several necromancers flinched.
“If we withdraw now, the residents and tourists in the lord’s castle will be slaughtered! You know that, don’t you?”
A middle-aged necromancer shook his head.
“Hmph, you must not know the field yet, young lady, but in cases like this, there’s no answer.”
“I’ve got children. I’m not going to die a dog’s death in some backwater!”
“You people…!”
“Maelyn! Calm down!”
Kamibarez pulled Maelyn back.
“If you’ve still got energy to bicker, then help us fight!”
Dick shouted, hurling a potion flask.
Sticky liquid spread across the ground, and when the naga tried to crawl over it, they were stuck fast and couldn’t move.
Snap!
Dick lit a lighter and tossed it backward. Flames roared to life, and the naga shrieked in agony.
“Where’s Simon?”
At Dick’s question, Kamibarez shook her head.
“He hasn’t come yet.”
“Ah! I’m getting worried. That idiot didn’t actually go after Deimos, did he?”
“…I was thinking the same.”
Ssshhhaaaa!
The only one still holding the line amidst the worsening battle was the Mercenary King, Arthur.
“Hahahahaha!”
Perhaps because he was a swordsman before a necromancer, he fought fiercely while minimizing his use of Darkness, relying on his blade alone to take on monsters.
Of course, in that case, it wasn’t Darkness that would run dry, but stamina—but Arthur’s stamina was far beyond that of any human.
“Guess he fights well, because he’s a fool.”
That was Maelyn’s judgment.
Click, click!
And behind Arthur, a journalist was busily filming with his magic camera.
“A desperate situation! Comrades turning their backs! Yet the king of mercenaries fights to the end! Ahhh!”
Tears welled in the eyes of the man behind the lens.
“This will be the last article of my life, and I couldn’t ask for better!”
“Hey, old man. You shouldn’t be here.”
Dick said curtly, stepping toward him.
“Don’t come closer!”
The journalist swung the magic camera toward Dick, and the Keyzen student flinched without realizing, halting his step.
“I know we’ll all die on this island!”
The journalist declared firmly.
“Even if my body is devoured by monsters, this camera and my article notes will remain! I’ll dedicate my life to leaving behind the record of these heroes!”
“What nonsense.”
“Professional duty, I suppose. Just leave him.”
Maelyn sighed.
Meanwhile, the naga swarmed ashore, and the necromancers who had been planning to flee had already disappeared.
Kamibarez clenched her fists tight.
“One Mercenary King alone can’t hold them! We must all fight together!”
“She’s right.”
Gasping, Arthur stabbed his sword into the sand, and beside him stood Maelyn, Kamibarez, and Dick.
“E–everyone!”
Arthur’s eyes shone with tears of emotion.
“You’re willing to join me in a glorious death…!”
“No one’s dying, you idiot!”
Maelyn screamed. Kamibarez lifted both hands, Darkness swirling as she said:
“It’s too soon to give up. If we hold out a bit longer, Simon will come back! If it’s Simon, he’ll find a way…!”
At that very moment—
—Woooooooooo!
With the coming dawn breaking through the dark, a ship-horn-like cry shook the Pharonna Peninsula.
Superb.
When are we getting more free chapters?
Thanks for the new chapters
Very good story and translation but half the chapter aren't for free and it is wayyyy too expensive will it stat like tjis foreve or will it get free after some time