“Calmly, calmly.”
Elaine repeated the same words to herself literally while moving her body calmly.
“Grghh…”
Swish-
She sliced off the neck of a ghoul stretching its arm from the right.
Swash-
Immediately spinning around, she also beheaded another ghoul rushing from the opposite side.
No unnecessary motions, just concise and efficient moves.
Swash- Swishh-
Maintaining the tempo, there was no hesitation in her swings.
‘Dammit.’
“…I’ve really hit my limit!”
And yet, this was truly her limit. Severed bodies of ghouls tripped her steps, while more ghouls approached unnervingly close.
‘Too many…!’
Although individually weak in combat power, the sheer numbers of ghouls were overwhelming. Despite continuously decapitating them, more kept streaming in.
She was one step away from being surrounded – or rather, already surrounded as ghouls began attacking from the sides and behind.
‘If only the path was a bit narrower!’
If the passage had been slightly narrower, she could’ve held out longer using the linear terrain.
“Dammit!”
Swishh- Swash-
Quickly swinging her sword, she cut off the heads of two ghouls attacking from behind, exclaiming harsh words.
There wasn’t even time to check if Cynthia and Emily had managed to evade safely. Ryu’s voice, which was beside her moments ago, had gone silent.
“Grghh…”
“Aaah!”
At the low, eerie voice from the side, Elaine swung her sword in surprise.
Swash-
She felt the cutting sensation, but not on the neck. Having lost her composure, she’d slashed too low.
“Ahh…”
Seeing the ghoul’s arm, completely unharmed, coming straight toward her face, Elaine reflexively closed her eyes.
As she did, she thought: a knight closing their eyes mid-battle – disqualifying.
Swash-
“Hmph.”
“…”
A quiet breath was heard. Not feeling the dreaded touch on her face, Elaine cautiously opened her eyes.
“Uh…”
The ghoul standing right before her was gone. Well, not gone – its head was laying on the floor.
Swash- Swishh-
What caught Elaine’s sight next was a fast-moving black figure. So fast, it was barely visible.
One sure thing was that the black figure was advancing quickly while slashing.
Into the darkness filled with ghouls.
Swash- Swishh-
Thud- Plop-
“Ah…”
Only when a ghoul’s head rolled and hit her foot did Elaine snap out of her daze.
Around her, all the ghouls lay decapitated on the ground.
Swash- Swishh-
Even as Elaine took a moment to observe her surroundings, the sound of swinging swords continued without pause.
She could only stare blankly at the black figure, Ryu, cutting down ghouls.
Too fast to discern clearly, yet her eyes couldn’t tear away ironically.
Ryu’s sword was fast, but also firm and heavy.
Despite covering an area that one person shouldn’t be able to handle, not only was he managing, but advancing forward through the straight passage.
“What the…”
Swash- Swishh-
Ryu was mercilessly slashing through the ghouls.
Elaine followed the sword’s trajectory in a daze.
Though she couldn’t fully track it with her eyes, it was a sword style she’d never seen.
The moment she saw it, the word ‘violent’ came to mind.
But it was undeniably powerful.
‘Strong.’
It was like seeing her father’s back.
The unshakable reliability that could block any attack like an iron wall.
Though it wasn’t the St. Claire sword style, it exuded an even greater sense of reliability.
‘I had no idea the gap was THIS big…’
Though she had sensed her inadequacy during the Golem Hit and kidnapping incident, she had no idea that a classmate could have such a wide gap in skill.
She didn’t expect that she’d find it difficult to even follow Ryu’s movements with her eyes.
With his lively steps contrasting with his heavy sword, Ryu kept advancing forward.
Beyond the range of Emily’s light.
“Ahh, lack of visibility is dangerous!”
Only now did Elaine call out when she saw Ryu disappear into the darkness.
But it was already too late.
“…Ah.”
Elaine stopped herself from rushing forward.
The countless bodies of fallen ghouls laying around.
It didn’t seem like she needed to worry about Ryu.
“…”
“Hmm… Guess it’s been a while since I’ve done this. My body feels all stiff.”
When she first picked up the sword, she thought everything would be business as usual, but it wasn’t.
It seems that anything needs consistency. Wielding a sword and fighting with physical movement wasn’t as easy as she thought since it had been a while.
“At times like this, magic should really be used…”
Swash- Swishh-
Chopping down countless ghouls one by one made her think so.
If she could cast even one range spell properly, she wouldn’t need to suffer like this.
Swash-
Still, it felt invigorating to unsheathe her sword and move her body after a long time.
“Since the test difficulty is quite high, I suppose using this much power is acceptable?”
Swishh-
While cutting the last ghoul faintly visible within Emily’s light range, she thought.
There were still countless ghouls lingering in the dark.
Better to take care of them before more emerge.
Stepping forward, thick darkness greeted her.
The deep darkness beyond the reach of light.
“Perfect.”
With this darkness, not only the people at the back but also any observers somewhere would see nothing.
No need to cut them one by one; she could cut them all at once now.
Hummm…
As mana was infused into the sword, it began to vibrate slightly.
Standing firm.
Holding the sword horizontally, she prepared to swing forward.
Not a bit more, not a bit less – only forward.
Since the academy’s own dungeon creation was supposedly involved, she didn’t know what might happen if she lost control of her strength and included the sides in the attack range.
If the dungeon collapsed, it would be a major problem.
“Don’t overdo it. Just right.”
Murmuring to herself, she gripped the sword’s handle tightly and swung it.
Whooshh- Swishhh-
A single horizontal swing sent an invisible energy wave forward.
Drawing a perfect semi-circle, filling the passageway precisely, it stretched forward.
Riiip-
“Ah. This feeling is why I collect artifacts.”
Together with the sound of ghouls falling, an exhilarating sensation filled her body.
The sword she had now was one among the artifacts discovered in a dungeon long ago.
A sword that sharpened and expelled the infused mana.
According to Eddi, it was once wielded by a hero who slayed a dragon.
A legendary sword whose blade darkened with dragon bl**d and whatnot.
Though she simply called it the Black Shadow Sword.
How well it suited her.
The blade was black, the ejected mana and sword aura were black too.
Using the Black Shadow Sword for the first time in a while with its skill even made her feel good.
Without the usual opportunity to openly use the abilities hidden in the Black Shadow Sword, she was glad to finally use it.
Probably no one saw.
“And given how hard this test was, I had to show this much.”
Swash-
Cleaning up the few ghouls that managed to dodge the intangible wave as she moved forward, there was no trace of any remaining ones she could feel.
“Hmm~”
A pleasant tune unconsciously came out.
The pleasure of annihilating numerous monsters at once, the sense of satisfaction, was amazing.
“Learning magic would allow me to do this more often, huh.”
The thought of getting a ‘skill’ sooner couldn’t help but arise.
“Master Ryu?”
“Yeah. Everyone alright?”
“Um… yes.”
Responding immediately to Elaine’s distant voice.
Now that I think of it, is Emil a bit better than before?
‘These are supposed to be Undead. There was no mention of this in the map Eddi gave me.’
The map Eddi had given me as a present one day turned out to be the map for this dungeon exploration.
And not just an ordinary map, but one with quite detailed descriptions marking which trials would appear at certain points.
I don’t know how Eddi got it, but it was certainly a big advantage to have a map.
Having checked it earlier, I planned to move quickly as there were no particularly difficult trials.
‘An unexpected trial, right?’
There was no mention of Undead on the map Eddi provided, so that was the only conclusion I could come to.
‘Need to keep this in mind just in case.’
“How far are you from here, Master Ryu?”
“Yeah. Coming. Wait there.”
Hummm…
I sent a few rolling ghoul corpses to the storage room. Although they were made by the academy, these ghouls were surprisingly realistic.
Since the Black Shadow Guild had almost no information on Undead, surely having these would come in useful somewhere.
“Sniff… h-hic…”
“Emily is still like this?”
“She… she’s quite shaken.”
Emily was still curled up, hugging her knees and trembling as she sat down.
Though Cynthia was diligently patting her, it didn’t seem to have much effect.
Elaine answered my question without breaking eye contact with myself as I emerged from the darkness.
Elaine’s gaze on me was almost excessive, making me suspect that she might have seen the technique I used earlier.
‘Nah, she couldn’t have, right?’
Trying to rationalize that she couldn’t have seen it, I sat down beside her to check Emily’s condition.
We’ve already passed the surprise trial, so we should hurry if we want to be first.
“Emily, are you oka…”
BOOMMMM!
“Ahhhhhh!”
Just as I was about to check on Emily, a massive explosion sounded from the side.
The sound of something being utterly destroyed along with a shower of dust falling over our heads.
Now what’s going on?
