Chapter 34:
A Battle of Magic
Mile was angry. Her armor and clothing were in tatters. Her hair was a mess.
However, this wasn’t the reason Mile was angry.
Her allies, her friends , had been hurt. They were very nearly killed. If she hadn’t made it in time, they would have been killed. Her dearest companions, who fought their hardest and risked their own lives just to save her.
“Impossible… No human could recover so quickly from that much damage! You… just what are you?!” The elder dragon raged.
Mile stoically replied, “Me? I’m a completely normal, ordinary little girl and a C-rank hunter.”
“Lies!! Show your true self!”
Bwoosh!
Shing!
“Wh…”
Knowing it would never learn the truth if it killed her, the dragon held back a bit, firing a small, non-explosive ball of flame Mile’s way. Thanks to Mile’s Lattice Power barrier, the flames were repelled as though they were nothing.
“I suppose I held back a bit too much… Well then, take this!”
Whoosh!
Shing!
“Th-then, this…”
Bwoosh!
Shing!
“I-Impossible! Very well, time to get serious…”
Bwoosh!
Shing!
“!…”
Bwoosh!
Shing!
Bwoosh!
Shing!
Bwoosh!
Shing!
“Wha…”
“Now, it’s my turn,” Mile declared. The elder dragon, stunned that its attack spells could be repelled so easily even when fired at full power, was silent. Mile let off an attack spell with a brief incantation. “Transmute the elements and channel phase energy. Phase energy beam, fire!”
Smeck!
With a very light sound, the spell shot into the elder dragon’s left shoulder, right where arm and torso connected. Without any regard for the magical protection likely affixed to the dragon’s body.
“Hm?”
The dragon’s jaw half-dropped, as if it could not comprehend the current state of affairs. It was impossible to read a dragon’s facial expressions, but anyone who looked at it now would agree that it appeared nothing more than flabbergasted.
And then, a beat later.
“Gaaaaaaaaah~~!!!”
The elder dragon’s cry resounded through the trees.
How had Mile’s magic, supposedly inferior to the dragon’s, won in a fire fight? Why had her disposition shifted so drastically?
The reasons were two-fold.
For one, Mile was incredibly angry. Her immense rage had banished the fear, despair, and resignation roiling in her heart to a far corner of her mind.
But more importantly, Mile had realized something: The difference between her and the elder dragon’s power wasn’t so great after all.
Mile’s abilities were perhaps half that of the strongest elder dragon in this world. However, this didn’t mean they were half that of the elder dragon now standing before her. Judging by its behavior, this elder dragon was probably dead average between the most powerful elder dragons and those who were complete incompetents. In other words, at about half the strength of the strongest elder dragon. By that measure, Mile by no means possessed only half of this particular dragon’s strength.
So, what if the strongest dragons were orders of magnitude higher in strength? What if this elder dragon wasn’t in their league?
In that case, the difference between Mile’s power and this dragon’s wasn’t so great, was it?
Plus, Mile had an advantage. She possessed all the knowledge and power of the imagination she carried from her past life.
She could conjure the image of a Type 94 naval gun or a 500-kilo bomb exploding, a beam weapon’s power or the effects of a nuclear bomb. Although it was very unlikely the nanomachines would allow her to conjure an actual nuclear blast.
These were powerful, offensive images that this world could scarcely begin to imagine. They granted her overwhelming superiority.
Plus, with her knowledge of the principles of physical phenomena, she could conjure a relatively concrete image as well. And the nanomachines would automatically account for any deficiencies.
In other words, compared to someone who possessed the same amount of magical power, Mile was capable of far stronger, far more efficient spells. And the effect of that was:
In a battle between two swordsmen, even when there was a reasonable difference in raw power, the battle wasn’t yet decided. The victory went to the one who could strike a blow to their opponent’s vitals the quickest. Even the weaker of the two could still manage to pull a sudden victory in the end.
However, if one could completely deflect the other’s magical attacks, while their own burst through the enemy’s shield as though it were paper, then there would be no contest.
The victory was decided before the battle had even truly begun.
However, just then…
“What’s all the racket up there? Shut up!”
“What’s going on?”
Two more elder dragons crept out of the hole.
Of these two newcomers, one was a rank larger than the first dragon who had appeared. It looked from Pauline and Reina, who were trying desperately to heal Mavis, to Dr. Clairia, who was poised to cast another protection spell at any moment, to Mile and her tattered rags.
Then it issued a scathing rebuke to the first dragon.
“Wence! How many times do the elders have to tell you not to abuse lower life-forms? Er… or are you the one being abused here?”
Staring at the blood pouring from the wound on Wence’s pierced shoulder, its eyes round, was the much-older elder dragon, Berdetice.
“Aha aha ha ha ha ha! That’s so funny, Wence! An elder dragon, an elder dragon tormented by a human! Goodness, if you always made me laugh this hard, I would have never turned you down for a date!”
As Shelala, the daughter of the chief elder dragon, rolled on the ground laughing, Wence was so indignant he forgot the pain in his shoulder.
“Damn these humans, making me disgrace myself in front of Shelala… I won’t forgive you!” Wence opened his mouth wide and let out another powerful breath attack.
“Wh—Stop that, you idiot!!”
Ignoring Berdetice’s order to stop, Wence let out not a single fireball but a full-powered Dragon’s Breath. Mile, standing before him, vanished, her body enveloped in flames.
“Wence, what have you done…?”
Seeing this senseless violence from Wence, who she had been ribbing and mocking, all the color drained from Shelala’s face. No human would ever be able to tell, but to a dragon it was an unmistakable expression of distress, and an understandable one. It would be like a human girl seeing a kitten slaughtered right before her eyes.
“You’ve violated the ‘Lesser Life-forms Protection Act’! A decree from our elders!”
Just as Berdetice began to speak, the young elder dragon, Wence, finally ceased his attack.
Standing there before their eyes was Mile, completely unharmed.
“Impossible…”
“What?”
“Huh???”
Wence stood there in disbelief. Berdetice and Shelala’s eyes were wide with shock.
Mile, however, was panicking. Just when she thought she could turn this battle around, one dragon became three. Her chances of victory were slim. Knowing she had no choice but to better her odds, she decided to fire an attack spell. Her aim: the first dragon to appear, the one who held so much malice for her and her friends. The other two seemed more diplomatic.
Judging by the state of things, it would be bad to kill him. The fighting strength of the belligerent dragon was weak, and she should probably try to work out a way to talk with the biggest dragon. If that was impossible, the third dragon was small, at least. With one of each size, depending on the circumstances, she might be able to eke out a victory.
So Mile thought as she fired a spell at Wence.
“Phaser, fire!”
The moment Mile attacked, the dragon known as Berdetice stepped out from behind Wence and put up a protection spell.
Shunk!
“Gaaaaaaah!”
Wence cried out as this time, the beam struck deep into his right arm. Berdetice, meanwhile, panicked, seeing how the spell had gone right through his full power protective shield.
“Shelala, get behind me! Calm down, Wence! We have to fight together!”
Berdetice was truly flustered. He was facing the impossible: a being who could harm an elder dragon.
Even though the chances were one in a million, he couldn’t allow harm to come to Shelala. Wounds could be mended with magic, but the idea of Shelala being hurt at all was unpleasant. He recoiled at the thought of what the chief and the elders, who were ever so fond of Shelala, would do to him if they found out he had exposed her to harm or let her know pain.
Knowing that Berdetice was on his side, Wence collected himself. The wound stung badly, but he knew he could count on Shelala and her special healing magic to put him back together once they were through. Now, above all else, their greatest priority was to remove this dangerous, uncertain element.
“Breath, release!”
At Berdetice’s signal, the three elder dragons fired their breath attacks toward Mile.
What of the “Inferior Life-forms Protection Act” Berdetice had mentioned?
That only applied to helpless creatures—a sort of warrior’s hypocrisy. When it came to situations of true danger, however, such rules were easily ignored.
No matter how much she reinforced it, Mile’s protection spell wasn’t impressive enough to completely shield her from a breath attack from three elder dragons. With a sharp ka-shing! , the lattice power barrier shattered easily, the course of the attack averted only slightly. Mile’s left arm was engulfed.
“Ngah!!”
Putting the searing pain aside, she forewent healing magic to fire another attack spell. “Phaser, fiiiiiiire!!!”
Shing!
However, with the strength of the dragons combined, their shield easily reflected Mile’s counterattack. And then, the dragons fired a combined breath attack once again.
Mile, her face contorted in pain, immediately put up another full-strength barrier. While it shattered again, it at least sufficiently repelled most of the breath’s power. The remainder of it still struck, however, and Mile was once again blown backward, sent flying into the stone walls of the ruins.
“Guh-haah!!”
Once more, Mile collapsed to the ground.
I can’t win.
Of course, I can’t. There’s no way I could win against three elder dragons.
But that’s not a reason to give up! My life and the lives of everyone else. That’s what’s on the line.
Mile clenched her teeth hard.
Okay then. It’s time to really do this. There’s three of them, so I need to summon up the strength of three, don’t I?
There’s Kurihara Misato, the girl who died at eighteen.
There’s Adele von Ascham, the young noble girl, whose consciousness was combined with mine at ten.
And then, there’s the girl I am now: Mile of the Crimson Vow, the C-rank hunter who fights alongside her friends, who’s achieved all I dreamed of in my past life.
All three of my lives, all three of their dreams. Their hopes and their feelings. If the enemies are three-fold, then I have to summon three-fold strength as well, don’t I?
And so, once more, Mile stood, staring the three dragons down all the while.
“Oho, still standing, are you? You should know there’s no way you can beat us. If you humbly admit defeat, and tell us everything, we’ll spare your friends’ lives and yours,” said the elder dragon, Berdetice.
To which, Mile replied, “You’re the ones who have no chance of winning. If you humbly admit defeat, and tell me everything, I’ll spare your friends’ lives and yours…”
“Hm…?”
“Bwa ha ha, what a funny little one! Humans are such precious things.”
Ignoring the elder dragons’ responses, Mile incanted her spell:
“Nanomachines!”
At the loudly shouted word, there was crackling all around, as though the air was freezing over.
“NANOMACHINES! JE VOUS COMMANDE…” So the elder dragons wouldn’t understand her spell, Mile commanded the nanomachines in a language found in her past life. Even if the nanomachines were unable to understand Terran languages, as long as they received her thought pulse, there would be no miscommunication. Plus, she got the feeling God had trained them in at least that much, on her behalf.
The next command she gave in Japanese.
“ Kurihara Misato, Adele von Ascham, soshite Mile ga meizuru. Waga meirei wo, saiyuusen de judaku seyo… ”
(“Kurihara Misato, Adele von Ascham, and Mile command you. Accept our commands above all others…”)
“No matter how many times you try, it’s useless. There’s no way you can pass through a shield formed by three elder drag—”
Ka-shnk, boom!
“Wh…”
The three elder dragons were dumbstruck as their protective shield was shattered in a single hit.
“N-no way… That’s impossible! The shield we three elder dragons have formed was shattered by some puny human’s Fire Lance…?”
Hearing this, Mile grinned. Yes, the time had come for her to say one of the lines she had hoped to speak at least once in her lifetime. She couldn’t hold back her joy.
“That wasn’t even my amazing Fire Lance. That was only a little Fire Ball…”
At Mile’s words, the dragons’ eyes widened in fear. Their jaws went slack.
However, that had been a Fire Lance fired at full power. It was important to bluff a little now and then in battle, after all.
Why was it that Mile’s magical power had suddenly increased so immensely?
It was just as the nanomachines had explained in their very first conversation, when the first water spell Mile had used after her awakening had gone so explosively:
YOU ISSUED A DIRECT COMMAND TO WE NANOMACHINES, SO THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE SPELL WAS INCREASED 3.27 TIMES OVER.
Given that, what would happen if Mile, with her level five authorization, issued an even more precise, clearer command than before?
Indeed, the result would be what you just saw.
“I-Impossible… This cannot be… W-we must attack at full power!”
Boom!
The three swells of breath were deflected and dispersed just before they struck Mile.
“H-how, how could this…”
“Thunder Bolt!”
Ka-boom!
A bolt of lightning struck Wence. With a great tremor, he fell to the ground, his eyes wide.
“L-Lightning? Her magic can control nature!”
Even an elder dragon wouldn’t understand the concept of electricity, so lightning magic was likely beyond them.
“Feel like surrendering yet? Oh, by the by, this magic can strike from above, so there’s no use hiding behind one another. If you don’t surrender now, then that one back there will be n…”
“Roooooooooooooaaaawwwrrr!!”
Berdetice let out a great roar in Mile’s direction. He absolutely couldn’t allow an attack to come Shelala’s way! The human could block any of their magical attacks, and they couldn’t block hers. And if the magic came from above, he couldn’t act as Shelala’s shield.
What could he do? The answer was simple.
If magic was no use, then he had to best her with a physical attack. There was nothing else to do. He charged her.
There wasn’t a creature alive who could stand up to an elder dragon in physical combat. He began to pick up momentum now, so that, even if he should be bested by the enemy’s attack magic, his body would still fall upon her and crush her.
This is it! Berdetice thought, but he was puzzled and a bit unsettled that the human showed no signs of moving.
Well, I’m sure she’s stunned senseless by the awe of an elder dragon coming her way! There couldn’t be any other reason.
Mile didn’t move, not even at the end. And just like that, Berdetice stomped upon her.
“Gaaaaaaaah!!!”
Berdetice suddenly found his right foot, which should have flattened Mile into the dirt, impaled by a silver sword.
Mile, after all, was skilled not only at magical combat but in close-range combat as well.
Berdetice lifted his foot in a panic, revealing Mile beneath it, standing unharmed. All the injuries she had taken were now completely healed. Her hair was back in order, as well. Unfortunately, however, her armor and clothing were still full of holes.
“Wh-why?! Why aren’t you smashed to pieces?!”
“Only a peon or a fool would blab the secrets of their techniques to the enemy, yes? Are you such a fool?”
“Wh-what…?”
Until the current battle, Mile had been convinced that her own body possessed half of an elder dragon’s sturdiness. However, owing to her previously shattered bones, she now knew that wasn’t the case.
If she thought about it, this made sense. Her bones, muscles, and tendons were nowhere near the size of an elder dragon’s, so she couldn’t possibly have half their strength or power. Not unless she had an orichalcum skeleton or woven-carbon nanotube muscles.
Even for a (so-called) God, it was probably impossible to make something human-sized, out of the normal human materials, that was stronger than a human. At the very least, impossible to do while still calling such a creation “human.”
So how had Mile prevailed?
It was her body-strengthening magic.
Compared to Mavis, Mile’s body and basic abilities were in a league of their own. She could withstand a fair bit of strengthening magic. Plus, Mile had gathered a number of nanomachines within her body. With this, she could administer healing magic to herself and petition the nanomachines directly.
In other words, even without drinking the microsoup, she could conjure the same effect. Times several hundreds, or thousands.
Naturally, this was still not enough for her to be able to flip an elder dragon or anything, but as long as she could withstand the weight, then with the barrier applied to her own skin and her sturdy strengthening magic, she could manage something .
Or rather, she had.
“Since you don’t appear interested in surrendering, I’ll just have to strike that one back there with my special magic. The magic that can lop off the head of any creature in an instant. My ‘headhunting magic’…”
“St-stoooooooooooop!! St-stop it, pleeeeeease!!!”
Thud!
As Berdetice pled desperately, there was a great rumbling. Everyone turned to see the elder dragon known as Shelala—who could be assumed to be a girl, from the way the conversation had been going—behind Berdetice, faceup on the ground, her arms and legs splayed.
Until now, Dr. Clairia had been standing in steadfast concentration, ready to raise a shielding spell for Reina and the others, should the need arise. Now though, she relaxed her shoulders and said, “ That’s an elder dragon’s pose of ultimate surrender.”
Wence was incapacitated, Shelala had surrendered, and Berdetice couldn’t continue to fight. Shelala’s safety mattered above all else. Even Berdetice himself had lost the will to fight. He hadn’t been fighting because he wanted to, after all. If they could resolve this by talking, there was no reason to go beyond that.
And now Shelala, who he was sworn to protect, had already surrendered. Berdetice had no choice but to lower his head, to signal, “Please, let us talk this over.” He couldn’t allow himself to be overwhelmed by anger at these unbelievable circumstances or his pride as an elder dragon.
And so, limply, Berdetice uttered,
“We surrender…”
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