NOVEL NEXT Chapter 31: (1)
Clash
「What? What’s with this eerie smell coming out of the fortress?」
Team Tanaka had been having a smooth sailing on their travel accross the mountains and valleys. But when Majide Fortress came into their view, they halted on their legs. A flock of dragons were flying about overhead and eerie roars could be heard from time to time from the fortress.
「Those black dragons. Don’t they look similar like the one that attacked us the other day?」
「Yes, they do-degozaru. Could this place be the nest of those dragons-degozaru?」
The Sukekaku duo gazed at the dragons in a carefree manner. They were completely unfazed by the spectacle. And there stood Tanaka, who seemed to be the only one who showed a serious expression.
「Even though paradise is right in front of us… Damn you, world. To think you’d prepare such a trap here of all places… Huh?! Don’t tell me, the recent favorable flow was set deliberately to lure me here?」
Tanaka felt that his knees suddenly grow weak. The confidence he had been building up up until now was feebly crumbling down. However, Tanaka managed to somehow stay on his two feet. The fortress at the front gate, and the pursuers at the rear gate. The looming dangers had forced Tanaka to hold his ground. In fact, though, the two matters couldn’t pose any danger to him at all. It was nothing but his usual groundless fear.
「Fufufu… I guess all I can say is it’s only to be expected, huh. However, I’m a man who has conquered hundreds upon thousands of anime and games. In my wisdom, there are countless ways to overcome this kind of situation!」
He stood up and glared fixedly at the fortress.
「Suke-san! Kaku-san!」
The two turned their gazes toward him. There, they saw the figure of Tanaka, whose eyes were blazing with ferocious will. It was the rare serious mode of Tanaka.
「… Let’s take a detour!」
Tanaka gallantly turned back the way they came from. He was seriously intending to run away.
「Huh? Don’t you want to return to the Empire as soon as possible? Let’s just pass through here.」
「You fool! It’s my creed not to steer away from these kinds of dangerous developments! Promises are meant to be broken!」
Tanaka was eager to run away at once. That back of his showed the melancholy of an adult who had experienced countless number of setbacks.
「Ah, Tanaka-dono.」
「What’s it now?!」
「It looks like the flock of dragons is coming this way-degozaru.」
「….」
When he turned his attention toward the fortress, he could indeed see that the swarm of dragons, which had been just flying about above the fortress, was heading towards their direction.
「… ku… kukuku, very well. And here I’d thought about sparing the lot of you, but to think you’d come at us yourselves….」
Tanaka turned around with an eerie smile on his face, his chuunibyou mode was activated in full throttle.
「Let’s go, you two! Formation ‘Twilight of the Gods’!」
「What’s that?」
「What is it-degozaru?」
「…. At a time like this all you have to do is play along! Play along! Forget it, just line up and shoot whatever attack you have already! Whoa… things seem to have gone crazy here! Anyway, anything is fine, let’s shoot them all down together!」
Tanaka began shooting magic even while half screaming to his two comrades. Suke-san and Kaku-san promptly followed suit. They had some room for experimentation last time, but that didn’t seem to be the case this time. The three attacked the dragons with all they had from the beginning. You couldn’t blame them, though, since the number of dragons currently coming at them was literally on another level compared to the previous one.
Including Suke-san, who had received support magic to strengthen his magic attack, the three continued to shoot down the oncoming dragons one after another with one-hit-kill level magic. As large stones came slamming onto the dragons at light speed, they turned into pieces of meat before crashing down one after another. However, there were simply too many of them. Team Tanaka’s line of defense was gradually shrinking down.
「The situation doesn’t seem too good for us here, don’t you think so, too? Should we try using a wide scale magic to shot them all down at once?」
「Stop! Please, anything but that!」
Tanaka’s past trauma was triggered. He screamed even louder than the moment the dragons were moving toward them. The previous incident with wide scale magic must have left a glaring scar in his consciousness.
「Kuh, one couldn’t overcome a crisis without sacrifice, they said. I guess it’s time to reveal another card of mine….」
The large stones that had been unleashed by Tanaka were increasing in number to two and then three. It was his newly acquired power… Multiple Chanting. Tanaka gradually pushed the defensive line back.
「Hahahaha! How’s that?! This is the power of magic that my companions, who are in slumber in hell, had bestowed upon me!」
Seeing that their situation was changing for the better, excitement rose in Tanaka. Kaku-san mumbled to himself as he gave Tanaka a sidelong glance.
「He’s as outrageous as usual, huh.」
Kaku-san might have been nothing but a bottom-tier spirit, but even in his point of view — based on the experience he had accumulated for countless years — Tanaka’s power was nothing short of abnormal. However, there was no point in being bothered by it now at this late in the game, so he decided to exclude anything related to Tanaka out of common sense. Kaku-san was nonchalantly being pragmatic about it. For the time being, he decided to focus solely on defeating the enemies in front of him.
After a while, the situation was steadily changing beyond the better. Let alone pushing back the defense line, the dragons were close to being annihilated.
「I did it… I’ve overcome the trap laid down by the world! Kukuku, and here I was intending to kindly take a detour. But now that I’ve done it, i guess it can’t be helped. Let’s pass through this place.」