Monster no Goshujin-sama - Volume 10 - Chapter 9

Chapter 9: Trampled Underfoot

“R-Retreat! Retreat! We need to regroup!”

The main force had suffered great damage from Rose’s attack and had no choice but to fall back, but the knights weren’t out of commission yet. Rose had used the greatest power available to her, but discounting the dead and severely injured, more than half their numbers could still fight. There were more than thirty of them. Disregarding their nature, they still lived up to their names as the very elite among all knights in this world. It would’ve been nice if they’d been annihilated, but things weren’t going to go that well.

Nevertheless, the knights weren’t going to recklessly charge in again. They couldn’t. They had no idea how many times Rose could use her combat fireworks—not that they even understood how they’d been attacked in the first place.

Rose’s attack was as successful as it could’ve been in taking the wind out of their sails. The knights obeyed their officer and retreated. The withdrawal was just temporary, though. Once they regrouped and strengthened their defenses, they were sure to come back. They could use reinforcement magic, so it was safe to assume they would boost their magic resistance. They would also surely heal the wounds they’d just suffered to a certain extent.

Even though she knew all this, Rose didn’t attack as they retreated. Her treasured combat fireworks had to be set in place, so she couldn’t pursue them. Even if she fired from here, the accuracy would falter with the increased distance. She only had one more volley, so it was better to save it.

She also had to consider her own condition. Magic tools consumed mana with each use, so Rose determined that getting them to retreat was good enough. Besides, in this case, having them recklessly charge in would be detrimental to her cause. She would have to use her last combat fireworks, which would inflict great casualties but probably wouldn’t annihilate them, then abandon this spot shortly after.

For that reason, temporarily repulsing them was more than enough. More precisely, that was the real goal behind using Rose’s greatest but limited attack two times in the opening act of the battle.

“Everything is going to plan so far.”

Even if they did come back, they would be more careful and slow their advance. That was sufficient. It wasn’t her job to annihilate the enemy, anyway. Her job was already done, so there was no need to push herself.

“In any case, it’s just as Lily said...” Rose uttered as she watched the backs of the retreating knights. She looked up at the sky, recalling the impish and charming smile of the sister she idolized. “This does feel a little like foul play.”

◆ ◆ ◆

White lightning fell from the sky. That was the only way to describe it, as the detached force of knights going through the forest encountered a problem.

“Gaargh?!”

The first to scream was the knight who’d made fun of his comrades in the main force moments ago. The other knights around him froze. After all, a giant white spider had crushed him flat.

“Wh-Why all the way out here?!” one of the knights muttered in fear at the sudden appearance of the enemy in their midst.

This force was meant to enter the village from a different angle while the main force drew the enemy’s attention. They were supposed to be the ones launching a surprise attack. They hadn’t expected to be the recipients of one. Why was this happening? Confusion and shock dominated their minds, and in the next instant, another emotion overtook everything.

The white spider swayed upright, revealing her face. Gerbera was beautiful. Even though the knights recognized her as a dreadful monster, they felt compelled to revere her. She was beauty incarnate, so much so that humans couldn’t comprehend it. Her bewitching looks made them forget about her lower body. The Great White Spider shone brightest when in the midst of battle.

However, in spite of her beauty, she looked haggard, as if she were suffering from a great disease. Violet patterns marked her skin like tattoos from the base of her neck to her cheeks, sapping away her strength.

Her condition was heartrending...which gave her an air of degenerated and corrupted beauty. She had an allure that would make certain types of men want to pin her down, torment her, and sully her. Unfortunately for these men, they were pretty much all that type.

“It’s the Great White Spider of the Depths!” one of the knights screamed, a fervor born of cruel delight in his voice. “There’s nothing to fear! Commander Travis has already cast his Holy Gaze on her!”

That fact was like an absolute guarantee to the members of the Fourth Company. They’d defeated dozens of enormous monsters that Travis had weakened with his sacred curse. Not even the legendary Great White Spider would be an exception. The sudden attack had caught them off guard. They questioned why she was here, but none of that would matter once they killed her.

The knight sneered, brandishing his beloved sword with a flourish of skill, and...

“Huh?”

A spider leg plunged through his abdomen as he carelessly stepped in.

“Hak...”

He vomited blood and dropped his sword.

“Wh...at...?”

The last thing he saw was numerous spider threads spreading over the entire area.

“W-Waaaah?!”

The scattered threads wrapped around the knights. Without wasting any time, Gerbera tugged on them. Because of her tremendous strength and the surprise nature of the attack, her threads dragged many of them pitifully across the ground. The knights’ formation was utterly broken. Those who’d withstood the force or had sacrificed their shields to block the threads gulped at the disastrous spectacle.

What the hell is this? they all thought to themselves. Hadn’t the chains of the Holy Gaze shackled the Great White Spider? The shock from the sudden attack, the feeling of being captivated by her beauty... All those emotions were now dominated by an entirely new sensation—utter fear.

“Hrk?!”

Gerbera stomped a leg through one of the knights tumbling on the ground, then swayed her upper body.

“I’ll admit it. As I am now, I’m definitely weaker.”

Her words were undoubtedly the truth. In her normal state, all those captured by her threads would’ve been crushed in a shower of blood. Her debilitation was the very reason she couldn’t do that now.

“But what of it?” she asked the knights.

Her body was heavy. She couldn’t breathe properly. Her movements were so slow they were yawn-inducing, and her luster was gone. That vexing Holy Gaze still wormed its way through Gerbera’s body. But even after being cursed, she’d declared to her lord that she could still fight. She would never lie to him.

“You’re far too conceited if you think that’s enough to take my head, whelps.”

Her white hair dangled over her face, and her eyes, red like frozen blood, glared through the opening.

“Eep...”

The knights were forced to remember, whether they liked it or not. Before them was the Great White Spider written about in legends, the strongest monster in the Depths of the Woodlands.

“You bastards have laid your hands on something you should never have touched. Suffer in regret as you perish with that thought in mind.”

It was impossible to bind the Great White Spider with such measly shackles. Gerbera trampled those on the ground with her eight legs, then leaped into the air.

“Shyaaah!”

Her legs smashed against shields, gouged through armor, repelled swords, and sent men flying. She was facing nearly a hundred knights of the Holy Order; even she would be overwhelmed by the sheer number of skilled combatants in a head-on battle. Nevertheless, despite the Holy Gaze’s curse, she easily held her ground against them.

There were two reasons for this. The first was Gerbera’s combat mastery. She’d lived for a long time in the Depths and had a great deal of experience. Even with her stamina, strength, and agility sapped, she could hold off the actual deterioration of her combat potential to a certain extent. What’s more, Gerbera specialized in independent battle, so she wasn’t very good at protecting others, but this time her job was to go on a rampage. It was here she could display her true value.

“F-Fuck! Surround her! Surround her!”

The second reason Gerbera could hold her ground was the terrain. Using the trees, Gerbera swooped down on the knights from every angle imaginable. Whenever they tried to use their numbers to their advantage, she would mess them up with her mobility. The debilitation magic they specialized in would be fine in an open field, but they couldn’t target someone they could barely see between the trees. Gerbera made sure of it.

This was the Woodlands, the Great White Spider’s home turf. She knew how to fight here better than anyone else in the world, and she threw herself into this battle. She wasn’t the only one to do so either.

“Gaaah?!”

With the knights’ attention completely fixed on Gerbera, grade 3 wind magic swept over a section of their formation. Blood splattered into the air as a girl with flaxen hair dropped down among them. She looked lovely, but also sinister.

“Partial mimicry—Devil Arm Mode.”

Her arm transformed—quite literally—into something out of a nightmare. Using the brute strength of a bear, the sharp mantis blades growing from each of her fingers cut clean through several knights, bones and all. Those who escaped fatal wounds were afflicted with the poison coating her blades, and they turned pale and fell to their knees.

Even with their attention focused on Gerbera, ten or so knights dying in an instant was a bit of a shock. But that only stood to reason. With Gerbera in a weakened state, this girl was the strongest among all of Majima Takahiro’s servants.

“N-No way!”

The knights knew of her. Her name was Lily. Among all the pawns available to Majima Takahiro, she was part of his core party. And here she was with Gerbera in the forest. In other words...

“It can’t be... The monster tamer sent both of his strongest defenders out here?!”

The knights’ eyes widened in shock.

“I-Impossible! What could Majima Takahiro possibly be thinking?!”

Their hysteria was understandable. The main force was supposed to be the one coming under attack by his strongest servants, yet, of all things, it was the detached force who found themselves suffering the deadliest blow. They’d made light of the situation, so they couldn’t handle this new development. They’d never expected this encounter, and now they were forced to battle in very disadvantageous terrain.

That said, this was only what the situation looked like in hindsight. This spot was somewhat far away from the village. Majima Takahiro was insane to send his strongest fighters, who had to help strengthen the village defenses, wandering around all the way out here instead. They’d probably been on patrol, but the region around the village was pretty vast. Actually, bumping into the detached force had to be a coincidence, and if Travis hadn’t put this force together to begin with, it would’ve been an utter waste of resources. With the village defenses weakened to such an extent, wouldn’t the main force break through and end things on their own?

Yes. Even though they’d successfully found the detached force, it didn’t change the situation much. With the strongest fighters away, the village would be forced into a hard-fought defensive battle. That was what the knights here were thinking, at least. Naturally, separated from the main force like this, they had no way of knowing that Rose had gone all out and forced them into a temporary retreat.

“Why would he do this?!”

The knights had no way of knowing. Majima Takahiro had made a poor choice by sending his two strongest pawns out here, but by some unfortunate coincidence, they’d found the detached force and engaged them in battle in disadvantageous terrain. Furthermore, Rose had unexpectedly stopped the main force, which was supposed to be drawing Lily and Gerbera out.

If this was all a coincidence, then certainty didn’t exist in the world. That was why Lily felt this was foul play. Not that she would hold back because of that.

“K-Kill them! Kill them, dammit!”

The knights screamed in desperation. After several more casualties, they finally managed to take up a formation. They immediately split into a vanguard and rear guard, preparing themselves to intercept an attacker.

However, twenty of them were dead, and ten more were out of commission due to severe wounds or poison. That was about a third of the detached force down.

“Th-This wasn’t the plan!”

“I bet it wasn’t.”

Lily could understand their fear. This wasn’t their plan. How could it be?

Her beloved master was the first to realize the knights’ plan. He’d found it strange when Travis retreated the other day. The knight had backed off so easily. Back then, Travis had had fifty knights with him, but that hadn’t been enough to kill Majima’s group. Just as Gerbera had said, she and Lily could’ve taken them on.

If his other servants hiding in the forest—especially Lobivia—were to have joined the battle, Travis would’ve found himself in a pretty dire situation. Lily’s master hadn’t given that order because everyone else was hiding elsewhere, but Travis had had no way of knowing at the time.

Consequently, Travis’s overly calm behavior was suspicious, and only one reason came to mind: they seriously believed in their superiority. That was the big miscalculation Takahiro had mentioned to Helena.

Looking at it now, it wasn’t all that strange. Travis clearly had information on Majima Takahiro, but it was incomplete. For example, he had no way of knowing about Lobivia, who’d only joined their ranks recently. In fact, Travis had spoken like he hadn’t expected Majima Takahiro to show up in the village at all. With that, they could conjecture that his information was outdated.

Travis couldn’t predict that Takahiro was currently keeping Lobivia in reserve while having Lily and Gerbera boldly attack. Also, Travis didn’t know that Lily had nearly reached the level of the legendary Great White Spider. What’s more, they hadn’t expected Gerbera to still be able to put up a fight.

“Gaaah?!”

Another scream. Another knight fell to the spear in Lily’s normal hand. The experienced knights in the rear guard weren’t going to let this opening pass, and they fired grade 2 wind magic in the form of bullets. However, the projectiles vanished into the maw of jagged teeth on the Devil Arm’s palm.

“How unfortunate,” Lily said with a smile. “What’ll you do? At this rate, you’ll be annihilated, you know?”

She looked like a lovely girl, but this must’ve been a nightmarish scene for them.

“A-Aaah! The girl to the front! Aim at her!” one of them screamed. “Seal her agility! Charge in as one!” Despite being driven by fear, the commanding knight gave precise orders.

At this rate, things would only get worse. Their forces were being shaved away little by little. Lily’s Devil Arm was particularly fiendish.

She had brute strength that not even the knights reinforced by their allies’ mana could match. Her claws were razor sharp, and failing to fend them off meant getting bisected. On the other hand, blocking them left deep gouges in their shields, and if she hit their armor, the claws would reach their skin and send poison into their systems.

It was hard enough to surround someone in a forest battle, and they had Gerbera getting in the way too. Like Lily said, they’d be done for at this rate. So what were they to do? The reason they were so one-sidedly on the defense was because they had two opponents. If they only had one, they could put up a fight. That was the commanding officer’s decision.

Unlike Gerbera, who was hopping from tree to tree, Lily had to stay grounded. It seemed she could devour magic attacks with the sinister mouth on her palm, but that wouldn’t work on debilitation and reinforcement magic—in theory, at least.

“Wh-Why?! Debilitation isn’t wor— Krgh?!”

A black spear bored through the screaming knight’s throat. Debilitation magic struck Lily, but it didn’t slow her down at all. For some reason, she undid her Devil Arm and started fighting with her spear, but her movements were keen and nimble.

Even if they couldn’t match the brutality of Travis’s Holy Gaze, which could pierce its target’s magic resistance, an accumulation of debilitation magic could yield a comparable effect. As for why it wasn’t working...

“I get it! Compatibility!”

One of the knights realized what was going on. Magic didn’t always exhibit its effects. If there were a hundred different types of monsters, then no magic existed that would work on all of them. For example, holy magic was effective against undead monsters, but it did pretty much nothing to any other monsters. Debilitation magic that focused on weakening one’s physical abilities also didn’t have much of an effect on certain inorganic monsters.

“Use something else! Different magic!”

Depending on the circumstances, some monsters could repel pretty much all forms of debilitation magic. Fortunately for them, Lily was a slime, so this didn’t apply to her. Therefore, the knights figured some other magic would work.

“They really adapt fast...”

Lily figured they would immediately realize the problem of compatibility. She didn’t panic, though. The knights weren’t wrong, but they weren’t quite right either. They should’ve given it more thought.

What had poor compatibility with what? Physical debilitation magic wasn’t compatible with Lily? That wasn’t technically right. The knights of the Holy Order specialized in group tactics. Well-organized and coordinated group tactics—this was what wouldn’t work against her. This they hadn’t realized.

“Eat this!”

They unleashed fire-based debilitation magic as one. It was the same type as the water-based debilitation magic Leah had used in the battle against the ruby bear during the azure hares’ suppression.

Fire injured most living beings. The magic only had enough force behind it to be a nuisance when compared to regular offensive magic, but it was different when more people used it. Countless flames twirled around the girl who was dancing in battle against the vanguard.

“Huh...?”

Just then, one of the knights at the front saw something strange—ears. Animal ears were pushing out of the girl’s head through her flaxen hair. They were round, resembling a bear’s ears. They were actually rather cute. The man figured he was going insane from the intensity of the battle, but the hallucination didn’t go away.

“Thank you,” the girl mouthed to him.

“Eeek?!”

The girl’s lovely smile sent a chill down his spine, but he had no time to react. In the next instant, the earth burst into flames, with Lily at the center of the explosion.

“Aaargh?!”

When discussing the compatibility of debilitation magic, one had to consider something far more terrifying than its lack of effectiveness—the possibility of strengthening one’s target instead. For example, what would happen if one cast fire-based debilitation on a monster that manipulated fire? The flames were liable to grow stronger, and the enemy could turn them around on the attacker. That was exactly what was going on now.

“No, no, no. You can’t use fire magic against a ruby bear.”

Flames rose from all over Lily’s body. She was using the inherent ability of the ruby bear, the most troublesome monster native to western Aker, capable of burning all those around it. Having reproduced its ability with mimicry, Lily was powered up with all her enemies’ might put together.

Just as Lily said, the knights should never have resorted to fire magic. But that didn’t mean other magic would’ve worked either. Wind for wind, water for water, earth for earth; Lily could reproduce the powers of monsters to deal with all of them.

So long as there wasn’t a type that worked on any and all monsters, debilitation magic wouldn’t work on Lily at all thanks to her ability to mimic the nature of many different monsters. Lily’s very existence was a massive roadblock for the Fourth Company’s group tactics. About the only thing that would work on her was their trump card, Travis’s Holy Gaze, but he’d chosen to use that on someone else.

Bathed in fire as if they’d poured gasoline onto an open flame, the knights screamed and ran in every direction. There was no way they could fight like this. Every time Lily’s black spear plunged through the air, another burning knight fell to the ground. Gerbera also went proactively on the offensive.

By the time the fire calmed down, only forty of the hundred knights remained, and pretty much all of them were suffering from burns. With them reduced to such a state, Lily’s Devil Arm mowed them down, and Gerbera’s legs pierced them. Their formation was broken, their numbers were down, and their morale was in tatters.

Regardless, Lily and Gerbera didn’t hold back. They’d been entrusted with annihilating the detached force as quickly as possible, after all. Rose, who was protecting the village’s entrance, knew that she couldn’t annihilate the enemy on her own. Instead, she could hold them back for a short while until Lily and Gerbera finished with the detached force and came back.

For that plan to succeed, they had to finish their work using the limited amount of time Rose had bought them, so Lily and Gerbera fought with everything they had. It had been like walking a tightrope, but it was going well so far.

To an unknowing bystander, this must have looked like a boon of terrific luck. The truth, however, was different.

“This really is foul play,” Lily said, smiling wryly as she thought of her beloved. “Right, Master?”