Slayers

Crimson Town.

I had never been there until now, although I’d heard of it before. Originally, the town was formed by connecting the countless small islands floating within a huge lake. Numerous ca.n.a.ls ran between them, and the main form of transportation were the tiny boats that went back and forth. All of the buildings in town were painted to a white color.

From this explanation, it was already clear that the place was pretty good as a tourist attraction, but... before, there always was a question I could not get my head around.

That being, why the town’s name was ‘Crimson’.

Now though...

“I see... so that’s the reason why it’s called Crimson.” As I glanced down at the town from a high mountain slope, the mystery clearly solved itself.

It was late afternoon, just when the sun was sinking behind a mountaintop. Bathed in orange-red sunlight, the water in the ca.n.a.ls glittered with scarlet, and all the buildings were dyed to a bright crimson color, like they were burning.

Indeed, the spectacular sight fit the t.i.tle of ‘Crimson Town’ really well.

“We can get to the city if we head down a bit... in that direction,” Aria said, stepping forth from the bushes behind me.

‘Let’s use the waterway after climbing up the mountain’ - that’s what she suggested. Aria told us that if we left the road, took a small detour and hiked a mountain which looked like it had no connection to Crimson whatsoever, we could avoid the king’s army and reach the catchment area, the source of the city’s water.

Since Crimson was built around a lake, it needed to have some kind of water supply, and a bigger one pa.s.sed by this very mountain. Aria said she stumbled across it while playing with her sister when she was young.

A fond memory with her sister used like this... Is that a good or bad omen, I wonder?

“Well then, shall we hustle on?” With those words, Dilarl shamelessly put his arm around Aria’s shoulder.

Yep, there he was. After all that terrified blah-blah, he eventually decided to follow us anyway.

Since he was commissioned by the guild, he could not back out now, but he couldn’t follow the road to the king’s army either. So he had no choice but to join us - or so he said, anyway. To me it looked more like he was just trying to hit on Aria.

“Er... well... Mr. Dilarl...” she mumbled.

“Hmm?... Heh, are you scared, Aria?”

“She’s trying to tell you to knock it off!!” The sole of my boot hit Dilarl in the face.

“Really... Don’t be like that, Aria,” I turned to her. “If you don’t tell him to get lost in earnest, this guy will never quit.”

“Ah... I see...” That was all she had to say to my kind advice.

“Ouch...” Dilarl moaned. “Was I that bad? It is fine that you’re being strict, but--”

“Yes, that’s one of my strong points,” I said flatly. Dilarl fell silent, giving me some unpleasant looks. “Anyway, Aria, guide us to that water source.”

“Okay.” She nodded in response, pushing aside some bushes in front of us.

After a bit of walking, we could hear the sound of running water.

“Here’s the place.” Aria came to a halt. We were already some distance away from where we last stopped.

Gourry glanced around with an awkward expression. “This looks like a waterfall.”

“Yes. It is a waterfall,” she replied with an entirely straight face.

Yeah... it really was. A large stream of water poured down the cliff with a loud noise. We were looking at the waterfall from a spur of rock at the midpoint between the top and the bottom; the part below us was roughly as high as a building’s second floor. They might as well have called this place a valley instead of just a river - the enormous body of cold water fell from the cliff in a foreboding manner.

“You... you’re not saying that we have to jump down from here, right?” Gourry asked, trembling.

Aria, however, waved her hand in front of her chest and said, “No, I wouldn’t. There are two or three waterfalls like this one later on, so if we try something like that, we will die.”

Right... I finally found out why the king’s army or Cairus’ gang didn’t bother with this route.

“But after we descend from here somehow,” she continued, “Crimson will be right in front of us.”

Ah, I get it. So we just have to descend from he--

Err...

“Wait a minute!” I marched up to Aria. “What do you mean by ‘somehow’?! Are you saying that you didn’t think of a way we can get down from this place?!”

“N-No, I meant that there are several ways to do that,” she stuttered. “We can travel on the surface of the water with Levitation, or descend down the mountain road which follows this valley... I don’t think the mountain road would be very comfortable... but it can’t be that terrible either since I managed to climb up here when I was young.”

“I’m sorry, but both ways are a no-go,” I shot down Aria’s suggestion.

“You think so...?”

“If we take either route, Cairus’ men would definitely detect us,” I explained. “If a Crimson resident like Aria knows this way, chances are good that Cairus, who’s been living there for a while too, would also know about it. Of course, this isn’t a place where dozens or hundreds of people could pa.s.s through, which means that even if the king’s army would be aware of it, they wouldn’t use it, so Cairus probably doesn’t keep a large force here... but we’re still better off thinking that he must have left at least one patrol, and we’ll probably find more as we get closer to the town. Going under the cover of darkness won’t help either, as the noises we make going through these bushes will be heard. Though getting discovered wouldn’t be the end of us, it could make our task a lot harder.”

“B... But how will we...? It‘s going to take a lot of time for us to find a different way down,” Aria said.

“Hmm...” With a sigh, I glanced down the waterfall. The stream fell into the deep blue water with a thunder-like sound. “Aria, how deep is this river?”

“Sorry? Ah... Well, if it weren’t for the waterfalls, it’s deep enough that we could travel on it by ship.”

“Okay. Then I decided what the plan will be,” I stated.

“What are you going to do?” Aria asked. I pointed at a more distant part of the river.

“We’ll go under the water.”

For a while, only the sound of the waterfall could be heard around us.

“Whaaaaaat?!” Gourry, Aria and Dilarl yelled at the same time.

“Hey, Lina! Do you mean we have to swim down from here?”

“That doesn’t make sense! I told you there is another waterfall!”

“It’s better to fight some enemies than to simply jump down from here like that!”

“SHUT UP!! Who said that we have to swim?!” I shouted, silencing the terrible racket. “When did I say anything like that? That would be crazy, obviously, we’d kick the bucket for sure! I thought we can use a rapid flight spell called Ray Wing, which creates a shield of wind around us. With that, we could breathe under the water, and because the river is very deep, if we sink low enough no one will be able to see us!”

Of course, it would be too much for a normal Ray Wing to carry the four of us, but if I boosted the magic’s power using the talismans I bought from a certain person, it wouldn’t be impossible.

“Oh right! I understand!”

“If that’s what you meant, then I have no complaints.” Both Aria and Dilarl nodded quickly to my suggestion.

“You don’t? But I still have a bad feeling about this...” Gourry still stuck to being the lone complainer, but I ignored him.

That said, though, just between you and me, this time his misgivings were justified.

“Well, if we are decided, then let’s leave right away. Bind yourselves to a lifeline and be careful not to drop your gear or weapon in the water,” I said, quickly readying myself as well.

It goes without saying that I had recovered the short sword that was turned into a lump of ice during the fight with Zonagain. It was not a great sword but it wasn’t a cheap one either. Not wanting to lose it in the water, I bound the sheath and the hilt with a rope, which I also knotted to my belt and fastened it.

I buckled the lifeline to my belt as well... and it seemed like the other three were ready too.

“Well then, shall we get going?” They inclined their heads in response. I nodded back, and began chanting a spell under my breath.

“Ray Wing!”

Surrounded by the barrier of wind, the four of us floated down through the stream of water.

“Liar! Ms. Lina, you crook!”

“Shut your mouth, Aria! You’re going to bite your tongue!”

The screams of Aria and Dilarl filled the wind barrier.

Well... I don’t blame them for screaming, honestly. I could describe our current situation as ‘drifting along in the water inside a bubble of air’, but saying that the journey was in any way comfortable, like being on a cruise ship or something, would be too much even for a lie.

Deep water or not, the bottom of the river was anything but flat; there were uneven rocks everywhere, and the riverbed twisted and turned erratically with its width changing all the time as well. Also, the current was very strong down there, its direction changing randomly without warning.

So, that was the environment we had to navigate through with Ray Wing.

Okay, ‘navigate’ is a bit strong of a word; to be frank, we were more or less swept away. I controlled the movement of the spell when we fell into a waterfall, but except that, we were moving almost completely with the river currents.

I really don’t want to describe how it feels to travel like this.

All in all, I understood why Aria and Dilarl were screaming in terror, but... I could not tolerate them calling me a ‘liar’ or ‘crook’. I never said anything like ‘it won’t be a b.u.mpy ride’ or ‘it will be safe’, after all.

In contrast to the two, Gourry was keeping his mouth firmly shut when I glanced at him over my shoulder. His expression spoke without words, though: “My life is always like this,” it said.

Anyway, since we were already in the middle of things, there was no other choice but to ask them to endure it until we arrived to Crimson.

We have pa.s.sed by three spots that looked like a waterfall - okay, maybe fell, not pa.s.sed. According to Aria’s description, we should have been near the city now. However, it wasn’t possible for me to have a look around just like that. To get a glimpse of what’s going on above the water, we would’ve needed to float to the surface with the wind barrier - but it was really easy for anyone to spot us like that, so if there were any enemies around, I’m sure we would’ve been discovered in a heartbeat.

So our only option was to look at our surroundings within the river. Maybe when we entered the town, the currents would slow down a bit and we could catch some signs of civilization at the river bank. As the sun had already completely set, the visibility was getting pretty bad, but the bright moonlight still let me see a bit of what was going on around us.

Speaking of which, I feel the currents became gentler a little while ago...

Directing the spell’s movement, my eyes darted left and right.

And next to us...

As I glanced to the right, the voice was caught in my throat.

“Ms. Lina?” Aria turned towards the same direction I was facing... and fell silent as well.

There was an eye there.

Outside the barrier of wind, there was an eye, roughly the size of an adult fist, staring at us. It was trailing our barrier, matching its speed. Honestly, it was more revolting than just odd; the eye’s owner could not be clearly seen, but I was able to glimpse a sizable shadow floating in the water.

“Uhm... I...” Aria turned towards me, her voice and expression stiff. “M-Maybe it’s a fish?

I don’t think so...

Instead of answering, I increased the spell’s speed without a word. The eye which was following us from our right dropped behind.

Then we heard something crack.

“Woaaah?!” The noise and Dilarl’s yell hit the air at the same time.

I glanced in his direction to see a number of wriggling green tentacles had broken through the wind barrier, feeling their way towards us.

“What?” Not hindered by the small bubble, Gourry quickly drew his sword and sliced the tentacles off.

Of course! The enemy’s men aren’t so careless to leave the numerous ca.n.a.ls in the city without surveillance!

“We’ve been found out! Let’s move up!” I shouted.

After this turn of events, staying in the water would have done us more harm than good now. I lifted the spell and floated towards the surface.

The moment I tried to go higher, however, we could feel a dull impact as something crashed into the surface of the wind barrier.

“Ms. Lina! Above!” Hearing Aria’s words, I looked up, and saw two strangely shaped shadows swimming in our direction, as if they were try to overturn the barrier. Although I could only see two black silhouettes before the surface of the water, they certainly weren’t fish.

The two shades closed in on us with a wavering motion. In the next instant, two fins, looking more like sharp blades actually, penetrated the barrier of wind and entered inside.

“Haa!” Gourry hurriedly struck at them with his blade. But, even though his swordfighting skills were top-notch, the small, confined s.p.a.ce where he could barely move limited their effectiveness: the fin he hit shrank back for a moment, as if it lost its nerve, but then pushed deeper inside once more.

“Aria! Use Freeze Arrow!” I commanded.

“Huh? But Freeze Arrow is...” She hesitated, not understanding what I meant.

Dilarl cast the spell instead. “Freeze Arrow!” His icy projectiles did not come into existence within the barrier, but outside of it; namely at the place where the two shadows stuck to our shield.

Of course, I couldn’t be sure that the Freeze Arrows would have an effect on the shades - but they could definitely freeze the water. As they emerged, they solidified everything around them, blocking out the pair of shadows! The fins which broke into the barrier retreated along with them.

Good! Thanks to that, the way up is clear!

I gave the Ray Wing spell some juice, and, slicing through the surface of the water, the barrier leaped forward into the night sky.

Countless stars covered the heavens. The drops of water flying through the air glittered in the moonlight. A flock of birds flew into the sky, and we could see the dark rows of the city buildings - we’ve arrived inside Crimson Town.

…Err... A flock of birds?

I turned my head back and did a double take. In the middle of the night these should have been owls or maybe bats - but those which flew through the Crimson sky were neither, even if their wings were similar to the latter.

Well, at least I wouldn’t call the human-sized, spear-wielding whatsits ‘bats’, similar wings or no.

Their form copied the shape of a human, but these things-I’d-rather-not-describe-in-detail were staring at us with faces without eyes, mouth or nose, with dozens of what looked to be lesser demons following after them.

Oh, d.a.m.n it! First the underwater troops, now we get to meet the flight squad?

I wouldn’t have been able to move freely in our current condition, so I directed the spell to land at a nearby road, and dispelled Ray Wing.

In the meantime, some shadows rushed out of the ca.n.a.l with a splashing noise. The scales covering their body glittered in the moonlight - they seemed like a combination of a lesser demon and a fish. Where their hands and feet should have been were the blade-like fins that broke our wind barrier earlier.

“Hooah!” The moment their emerged, Gourry broke into a run, gripping his sword!

“Wait, Gourry--” Before I could finish, both he and I fell to the ground with a thud.

I immediately sprang to my feet. “How could you forget that we’re bound together by the lifeline?!” I shouted.

“S-Sorry! Gourry stood up hurriedly, cut the rope with a swing of his blade and dashed forward once more. We also untied the rope around the sheath and our weapons and cut the lifeline as well.

Gourry’s sword sparkled in the moonlight, and sliced at the half-fish half-demon thing.

“Khyaaaaaak!” Not far from us, another one of them howled at the night sky - right before countless icy arrows materialized in front of it.

Not good!

“Gourry! Get back!” I shouted, whirled around, and broke into a run.

The new enemy total was a couple of these half-fishes, dozens of winged lesser demons and one of those human-like winged creatures. I was sure we could defeat them, but it would have taken us some time to bring them down - and during that time reinforcements were bound to arrive. We needed a minute to organize our forces first.

“H... Hey! Lina!” Gourry hastily followed after me; of course, Aria and Dilarl started to run as well.

Flapping of wings stirred the air. I could feel a murderous presence behind me, so I dashed into an alley while chanting a spell. As I looked up, between the buildings I could see some of the winged lesser demons floating in front of the night sky.

It looks like they can’t enter such a narrow alley because those wings would be in the way.

Still, we couldn’t relax; they will simply attack us with a spell from above!

“Khyaaaak!” The howls of the demons could be heard from the sky. At the same moment, I put my hand on the wall of the house next to me, and released my spell.

“Blast Wave!” With a sharp, crashing sound, a large hole was made into the wall. “Here!” I said and ran into the building through it, the others following behind.

“You blasted into someone’s hou--?!” Before Aria could finish yelling at me, a thunderous noise cut her short as a cloud of dust filled the alley. I knew the demons would launch a spell like that from above, which is why I ducked into the house.

While Aria looked concerned about it, I don’t think the house had any residents. I suspected as much because no light could be seen within from the outside: it was too early for people to go to sleep, but already too dark to see without lighting a fire. My suspicion proved right when we got in, as the interior was completely unfurnished, with no trace of a living soul.

I couldn’t tell if the owners escaped from town because of what was happening, or if no one ever lived here to begin with - but anyway, the real problem was what to do now that we were there.

Of course, once the enemy discovers where we are, they will attack us again.

Maybe they’ll try to overwhelm us through sheer numbers...

No... More like...

I started to chant a spell under my breath.

Mere moments later, the house was crushed by the demons’ magical onslaught.

We could hear something collapse.

“I was expecting this...” I murmured silently within the darkness, listening to the vibrations of something heavy nearby.

“What do you mean you were expecting this?”

“That they’d try to blew us all up along with the house,” I answered Aria’s question. It was difficult to hold a conversation in our current situation, though, so I whispered another spell chant. “Lighting.”

With a sparkle, the small magical light I created illuminated the place. It looked like all of us made it safely.

“Lina, couldn’t you have made it larger in here? It’s too narrow like this,” Gourry complained.

“There was no helping it, I didn’t have time for anything more. I can enlarge it a bit, but not by much. We’re in the middle of the earth, you know.”

After running into the empty house, I figured that they were going to level it along with us, so with Bephis Bring, a tunnel-digging spell, we escaped underground into a hole. If I put my mind to it, I can create a s.p.a.ce the size of a smaller room with this spell, but using it like that without any kind of support would make the cavity collapse.

Regardless, it sure felt odd talking in this insanely narrow tunnel, huddled up next to each other like some earthworms.

I cast another spell. “Bephis Bring.”

Heeding my commands, the soil around us receded... wait, let me think about this. Where does the earth dug up by the spell disappear to, anyway...?

At any rate, eventually the s.p.a.ce became big enough for four people to sit down in a circle.

“Still... things got pretty nasty back there...” It was none other than me who spoke first. “I knew that since this was their base, they’d focus their fighting power here... but I didn’t expect coming across all these demons in various forms...”

“Demons...? You mean those men with wings and the half-fish creatures were demons?”

I nodded to Dilarl, who was frowning with his brows furrowed.

“I don’t know what those human-shaped, winged creeps are... But to me the other ones with wings and the ones with the half-fish body look like transformed lesser demons, who were created a bit differently compared to their normal lesser demon buddies; you could call them close relatives. I mean, that half-fish thing summoned freeze arrows with a howl, just like the lesser demons do.”

Of course, this was just my theory, but what if the creatures were made using fish and birds as base, with the same method Zonagain used on rats?

Listening to my words, Dilarl stroked his chin with his thumb and muttered, “It... It looks like I ended up in a real h.e.l.lhole... Being ordered around by the king’s army suddenly doesn’t seem so bad as an option anymore.”

“I’m sorry... I got you involved in this...” Aria murmured in a sad tone - prompting Dilarl to back away from his prior words in a frenzy.

“Ah, no, no! Don’t mind what I said, Aria! I didn’t mean it like that! I just wanted to say that tough work like this isn’t meant for those who’re much too refined, like you and me."

“Huh...?”

“Just what do you mean by that, exactly?” Gourry and me questioned him from the sides.

“N-No, I didn’t mean that you guys are cra.s.s or something!”

This guy... is going to lose his life to his mouth.

“Anyway,” I added, “the question is what to do now. If those demons are going to swarm us again, I’d really feel like blowing up the whole town and get things over with...”

“No, Ms. Lina! You can’t do that! There are still people in here!”

“Y-Yes! Even if you want to bring the enemy down... please get your priorities straight, alright?” Aria and Dilarl protested after hearing my plans, their expression changing from stupified to outraged.

“You guys thought I was serious? It was just a silly joke!”

“Your eyes did not look like it.”

“Stop complaining for nothing, Gourry! Anyway, if our plan is to rush to the enemy’s main base and defeat Cairus before anything else, then our only problem is how to get there. Aria, do you know how can we get to Cairus from where we are now?”

“I think Cairus might be at the Sorcerer’s Guild...” she said. “The place we’re in now is the issue, I don’t know every single part of this town all that well... Maybe I could guess where we are if it was daytime...”

“In other words, you have no idea, right?”

“I’m sorry... I’m not of much help...” Aria shrunk back apologetically.

“Ah, don’t worry about it,” I replied. “So, it seems we have to figure out our location. We better get to it quickl--”

“But Lina, wouldn’t it be dangerous to go up right now?” Gourry interrupted me with his opinion when I was about to chant a spell. The way he can stumble upon such crucial issues never fails to amaze me ever since I met him.

“You have a point,” I answered. “Yes, their troops are probably patrolling around us as we speak. But if we waste too much time here, we might not get to the enemy base before it’s too late, not to mention that the way we are now is really not the proper situation for a time-out.”

The entrance of this cave got blocked when the demons blew up the house we ran into, so if we didn’t move quickly, we might have ran out of air. And even if that didn’t happen, what if the enemy is very thorough and wants to find our corpses among the debris, only to come upon the cave entrance? What would they do? If I’m on their side, I’d pour water into it without hesitation.

All in all, if we kept waiting here like this, our situation would’ve only gotten worse, not better.

I murmured an incantation.

“Bephis Bring!” I put my hand to the earth wall, and a long straight tunnel formed in the soil ahead with a soft sound. “So, how about we move forward in a single file while I dig the tunnel ahead?”

Everyone nodded in agreement.

Still...

“Bephis Bring!”

Even though you could call this simple work...

“Bephis Bring!”

I wouldn’t say it was easy. At least, it was quickly getting on my nerves.

“Again! Bephis Bring!” I kept casting the same spell over and over.

Then, after the who-knows-which time, water spilled from the soil of the tunnel. I illuminated the path ahead, and sure enough, it was completely drenched.

On a side note, the light in question was coming from the tip of my sword. Normally, it could not be extinguished until the spell itself expired, but like this I could put the light out by sheathing my blade.

“There’s some water coming out...” I spoke up.

“Yes, like I said earlier, there used to be a lake here,” Aria replied. “Also, there’s a ca.n.a.l somewhere nearby, so... Oh, I forgot to mention that. It could be very bad if we hit the ca.n.a.l by accident, so it might be better if we go deeper than this.”

“Okay, got it.” I cast another Bephis Bring to deepen our tunnel, and we crawled through the wet ground.

“But... I... I can’t take this. It’s horrible,” Dilarl could be heard complaining from the back. “My clothes are soaked and... I just feel so very filthy.”

“Stop whining, Dilarl. Both Aria and me are doing this without a word,” I growled.

“You’re right, but... is there no easier method except this?” he insisted.

“If you’ll take care of all our pursuers when we’re detected, going back to the surface is fine by me.”

“But that’s impossi--! All right, all right! I’ll stop complaining and keep moving, okay?”

“My thoughts exactly.” With that, I started casting the spell for the umpteenth time; I lost count by that point.

“By the way, Lina...” Gourry spoke to me as I chanted the incantation. “Something has been bugging me since a little while ago... Hey, are you listening?”

Of course I was listening. I just couldn’t reply since I was in the middle of releasing my spell.

“It feels like the texture of the earth became different...” he continued.

Oh, give me a break.

“Bephis Bring.” After lengthening the tunnel with my spell, I crouched down and muttered, “It’s no wonder it feels like that since, you know, the earth looks almost like mud right now.”

“No, that’s not what I meant. This feeling is--”

“Then what do you mea--” No sooner than those words left my mouth, my right hand sank deep into the ground with a wet sound.

Huh?

At that moment, an overwhelming current of water blasted forth abruptly, and swept us away.

“Urgh... Unngh.....” After letting out a groan, I blinked two or three times. As I opened my eyes, fluorescent moss filled my field of vision.

I pushed myself up while checking my body for injuries; fortunately, it looked like I made it in one piece. Gourry was out cold beside me, though.

When I looked around, I could see water stretching out endlessly in the distance. Inside the lake, there were several islands each the size of a small house; Gourry and I were also lying on one of them. Aria and Dilarl were swept to another island not far from us. The ceiling of the cave was covered by the same fluorescent moss.

“An underground lake...?” It wasn’t me but Aria who said that in a murmur, as she came to and sat up on their own small island.

It sure looked like it. A great underground lake unfolded before our eyes right below Crimson Town. Obviously, I had no idea that a place like this existed here.

“Hey... What’s going on?” I glanced at Dilarl as he sat up.

“It could be that... there was a stream of water running below the lake which was also connected to it. And when our tunnel nearly hit it...”

“...The tunnel floor collapsed,” he finished my line of thought.

“Right. Hey, Gourry, how long do you plan on just lying there?”

“Ungh... Uhh...” As I shook him, he let out a groan, his body moving slightly...

…then he abruptly jumped to his feet, looked around, and finally chose to glare at me.

“This is what I’ve been trying to tell you just now,” he told me. “It felt like we were walking on really thin ice.”

“Ah... I see...” I scratched the top of my head with an embarra.s.sed look.

“This... This is the first time I’ve been here. I never would have thought that there’d be a lake under the town...” Aria murmured in a blank tone, looking around after we managed to gather in one spot using Levitation.

The light from the fluorescent moss was not very bright, and there were several natural stone pillars which connected the ceiling with the lake floor blocking the view, so we couldn’t see all that far. Still, the fact that we could not see the lake sh.o.r.e might have meant that...

Could this underground lake be bigger than Crimson Town?

I could completely understand Aria’s astonishment at the fact that there was something like this under her hometown, but... the real problem right now was...

“So you mean you have no idea how we can go back to the surface from here, right?”

“I’m sorry... I didn’t know anything about this...” Aria mumbled.

“I already told you that you don’t need to apologize. It looks like no one got seriously hurt, anyway,” I interjected. “We surely couldn’t have been swept too far from where we were previously... But regardless, we have only one option; it seems we have to dig our way up little by lit--”

There was a rustling noise. A presence appeared behind me, still far away.

I instinctively turned around, but all my eyes could see was the calm surface of the lake.

“What’s wrong?” I did not answer Aria’s question, but started chanting a spell instead. There was no way that presence was just my imagination. Confirming my suspicion, Gourry, who had both the intelligence and the instincts of an animal, pulled out his sword and quietly focused his gaze on the lake surface. And then...

My eyes caught shadows moving under the water; not just one or two, but a whole lot of them!

Are these the same creatures we encountered earlier?

A moment later, like I suspected, the same kind of fish demons from before broke through the lake’s surface. The fluorescent moss’ dim light shined on their scales..

“Freeze Brid!” Timing my attack to the instant when demons rose from the water, the cold energy froze part of the surface. Some of the demons slipped on the ice while one of them got stuck with half of its body frozen.
“Haaa!” Gourry dashed towards the demons, not bothered by the slippery ice at all!

These creatures weren’t the kind to stand still while being attacked though.

“Khyaaaak!” The cries of the demons echoed through the underground cave as dozens of Freeze Arrows appeared in front of them.

Wait! Aren’t those--?!

Cutting through the air with a hiss, the arrows flew right at us!

Gourry continued to run without slowing down one bit, and parried a couple of the projectiles - they scattered in the air, turning into countless bubbles that twinkled in the light from above.

“Water?” Dilarl spoke up from behind.

He was right. The arrows made by the demons weren’t from frozen, but from liquid water.

That didn’t mean we could take them lightly though. One such arrow pa.s.sed by me with a sharp noise, cutting a hole into my cloak. The projectiles were made of high-pressure, high-speed water, which gave them enormous destructive power.

“Aria! Dilarl! Freeze more of the lake with a couple of spells so we can move around more!” I shouted to them without turning back, and started chanting my own incantation.

“O... Okay!”

“Understood!”

By that time, Gourry already took down two of the demons, and was now facing a third.

Suddenly, he halted his movement, and made a wide leap to the right - just before several water arrows shot up from where he had been standing, sent by another enemy who tried attacking him from below the ice.

I couldn’t see the attacker, not to mention make out how many of them were below us - for now, we had to concentrate on blasting those we could get a glimpse of.

“Dynast Breath!”

One shot of my spell aimed at a shadow beneath the water - one less demon to worry about!

I turned my eyes on Gourry, who seemed to be doing a great job getting rid of all the enemies that came out of the water.

Great! Let’s fall back to the small island for now, so we can force more demons out of the lake!

Just when I was about to tell this to Gourry, however...

“Gaah!”

“Aria!” Two yells came from behind my back, accompanied by the sound of a loud burst of water. When I turned back, all I could see was Dilarl standing there with a blank look on his face next to a fragment of ice floating upon the surface.

Aria was nowhere to be found.

Don’t tell me she’s--

“Aria fell into the water!” Dilarl shouted with desperation in his voice. “Can... Can’t you do something?!”

If there were no enemies below, I could use Ray Wing, find Aria and save her, but... even if I do find her now, to get her out of there I’d have to pull her within the wind barrier and float back to the surface while holding her tightly. I don’t think our opponents would watch us motionlessly while all of that happened.

Also, would they ignore someone who just fell into the water alone?

Maybe she is already--

“Where’s Aria?!” Gourry questioned us as he returned to where we were. Neither I nor Dilarl could bring ourselves to answer. The demons did halt their attack temporarily just now, but--

The sound of splashing water came from our right. We quickly looked in that direction - and saw a man we’ve never met before standing on an island a bit farther away.

If you asked me to describe him, well, I could find no better likeness than that of a bluish-green drowned corpse.

Of course, he was no simple corpse or zombie. There were large scales at the end of his swollen toes, and his long-nailed fingers were webbed, a thin film-like substance running between them. Maybe those tentacles of sorts that broke into our wind barrier at the ca.n.a.l when we entered Crimson Town were actually his limbs.

All in all, to be honest, the guy looked pretty revolting - so much so, actually, that I had the urge to unleash all kinds of attack spells into his face just by looking at him. There was one thing, however, that kept me from doing that:

He held Aria within his arms.

“She is alive... for now...” the thing spoke in a kind of a wet voice, like someone talking with his mouth full.

“Ugh...” As if to prove his point, Aria opened her eyes, her body moving a bit. “Huh? What happened...? Noooo!” Realizing the situation she was in, she twisted and turned desperately, but the arm held her firm. Meanwhile, the other hand moved to cover her mouth to keep her from casting a spell.

“So... It looks like you managed to find out where we are,” I addressed the guy.

“You will regret it if you underestimate me, the Great Narof,” he boasted. “As you have attacked us using the waterway above, we did not think you would try reaching Mr. Cairus through here. But still, you wouldn’t cross the whole town to get there... so the only remaining route was this.”

Huh?

“Hmm... you said your name was Narof, right?” I replied. “You might seem to lead these underwater guards of Crimson, but you still look like a total idiot.”

“Whaat?” Narof yelled, sounding every bit as clueless as I described him.

“If it’s as you say and this is ‘the only remaining route’,” I gestured at our surroundings, “that means there exists a way for us to reach the guild from here! How nice of you to let us know!”

“What? Then... then you didn’t know what place this is?”

“No, we didn’t! We were simply washed up here by accident!”

“I don’t think we can talk about that like we’re proud of it or something...”

I completely ignored Gourry’s quip, hope you don’t mind.

Narof’s expression didn’t change at all after hearing my words - well, if he was able to change the look on his face to begin with. “I see... But if I get rid of you here, it will be over regardless... I warn you now, don’t resist. If you fight back, who knows what will happen to this woman?”

Taking this threat as a signal, around ten of these fish demons came to the surface, surrounding our island. We could’ve dealt with this many easily enough; the real problem was that Aria was being held hostage.

In a situation like this, the one thing I can count on... is my superb silver tongue!

“Pfft... Don’t make me laugh!” I snapped. “How could we believe that you’d release Aria if we don’t fight back?”

“The Great Narof will give you his word,” he answered fluently. “I only wish to be able to get rid of you; although I will lose this girl, she cannot harm Mr. Cairus by herself...”

Raising my voice, I yelled back at him, “Stop kidding! Who would believe the word of someone like you who cowardly takes hostages? You might say it’s not a problem for you if you let Aria go, but it wouldn’t be a problem for you to kill her afterwards either! Not to mention that a man with tentacles and a bluish-green face isn--” In mid-word, I took a half step to the side.

“Freeze Arrow!” The arrow of cold summoned by Dilarl flew forward and created a bridge of ice between the small island and Narof .

Gourry ran at full speed through the bridge!

“What the--?!” Narof managed a cry just before a wide swing from Gourry’s blade cut down his height by a head.

While I was having the conversation with him, I heard Gourry and Dilarl speaking about something in a hushed tone, and then Dilarl starting to chant a spell. So I diverted Narof’s attention by raising my voice, and stepped aside a bit when I figured Dilarl was finished with his incantation.

Narof’s body fell back without another sound; Gourry tore Aria from his arms before she sank into the water.

“Khyaaaaaak!” Hearing the splash, the demons around us began to howl all at once.

Are they attacking because they lost their commander?

I was prepared for this though! Jumping next to Dilarl, I touched the ground with my hand and released the spell into it which I’ve been chanting, right when the demons launched their water arrows.

“Bephis Bring!” With a rumble, the ground under my feet caved in, and Dilarl and me fell a short distance into the seash.e.l.l-shaped crater I created. We ducked to the ground, and the countless water arrows pa.s.sed over us in vain.

All right. Now it’s up to us to nail this fight.

I cast another spell while sticking my head out from the edge of the crater. “Blast Ash!”

Boom! One less fish demon, one more pile of ash.

The fight progressed pretty well for us.

The three of us chanted spells from the cover of the crater, standing up briefly to shoot and then ducking down again. If any reckless demon tried to rush in, Gourry’s sword cut it down in a single strike. Doing nothing but repeating this tactic, we steadily lessened the number of enemies.

In a bit more detail, the surface of the lake around our island was covered completely in ice thanks to our spells. We couldn’t be targeted from afar either since the crater was below ground level, so if the demons wanted to attack us, they needed to get to us by wading through the ice first. All we had to do is wait for one of them to give it a try, and use that moment to blast it. There was no danger of defeat as long as we didn’t let our guard down. If Narof had been alive, the enemy might have tried some kind of tactic, but without him the demons just kept attacking us blindly over and over again.

And a little later...

“It’s been pretty quiet,” Aria said after we had defeated an uncountable number of foes. “It looks like this was it.”

“Yeah, it seems so,” I replied, sticking my head out at the edge of the crater and looking around. There weren’t any demons to be seen anywhere. “No one’s there.”

“Is it finally over?” Dilarl mumbled with a sigh as he rose.

“Don’t let your guard down. While we can’t see any of them, they could still be hiding somewhere,” I warned him while standing up as well and looking around again.

No sign of any demons still. I think it’s okay to a.s.sume that we’ve dealt with all the attackers.

Well then...

“Believe it or not, according to that blue-green monster, there is a way to get to the guild from here somehow,” I told the others while turning back to them. “How about we find it and infiltrate the place?”

“Just like that? But Lina, finding our way here is...” Gourry trailed off as he glanced around, not sounding very enthusiastic.

Right, this underground lake is huge. We don’t know what the ‘way’ looks like, so finding it won’t be easy.

Not easy with mundane methods, that is.

“And also... won’t we just run into more enemies?”

“Sure, Dilarl, would you rather reach the guild by digging back to the surface and fighting all the demons coming from the sky?”

“Absolutely not... Such violent methods are no hobby of mine...”

“Is that so? Then leave it to me, I have a plan. Aria, Dilarl, you can cast a wind barrier or Levitation, right?”

“Yes,” she answered.

“Of course I can cast such easy spells,” he boasted.

“All right,” I said. “Then I’ll get the four of us into the air with Levitation, and you two create a double barrier of wind around us.”

“Why do we have to complicate things? Levitation should be enough,” Dilarl complained.

“You’ll find out why later. Let’s get to it.” I began to chant the spell and held hands with Gourry and Aria. Dilarl took Aria’s hand, and... “Levitation!”

Thanks to the boosted version of Levitation we floated up from the ground. Aria and Dilarl cast the same spell one after the other, summoning the double wind barrier around us.

Good. With that, we’re ready.

I directed the spell away from the island.

Even if I wanted to be optimistic, I couldn’t say that our surroundings were very helpful in finding secret pa.s.sages. The fluorescent moss did not cover the whole cave, and the parts which were unlit looked pretty much like gaping holes. This in itself made it nearly impossible to find the path when we didn’t even know what it looked like. However...

“Say... Like your friend mentioned, isn’t it something of a fool’s errand to look for the pa.s.sage like this?” Before long, Dilarl started mumbling.

“It’s okay, don’t be worried. Just don’t let your constant grizzling break your concentration on the barrier,” I shot back.

“I know, I know... but is this really okay?” He kept going. “Won’t we simply wander around aimlessly, and find that it was just a waste of time?”

“No, we won’t.”

In that moment, an impact shook the shield of wind with a short, dull sound.

“Lina! Behind us!”

Hearing Gourry’s warning, I commanded the spell to move back. There was another small island nearby with a natural pillar as well. But under that island...

The same sound of impact, again. Now it was clear: a couple of water arrows shot through the air and smashed into the barrier.

Is it there?

I tried forcing my eyes to penetrate the darkness, and could make out a couple of shadows moving around the lake.

“Hey, you! What are we going to do now?” Dilarl shouted.

“Ms. Lina, this is reckless!” Aria protested.

“Stop wailing and concentrate on the barrier!”

We were getting closer the small island I steered us toward, and the forms of our enemies gradually faded in from the black backdrop.

Some fish demons... and... what’s that?

Among the incoming water arrows, one crimson arrow appeared as well. A sense of foreboding washed through me; I tried changing course, but the arrow was already upon us.

With a sharp, high-pitched sound, the crimson light penetrated both barriers without much effort.

d.a.m.n it...!

Metal clashed with magic energy; Gourry swatted the arrow away with his blade before it could’ve reached me. “Lina! Drop me off here!”

“D... Drop you off?!”

“Yes!”

“A... Alright. Dilarl, Aria! On my signal, dismiss the wind barrier, and launch Freeze and Flare Arrows at the enemy! Got it?”

“But... but...” she stuttered.

“Hey! Will that be alright? ”

“Yes!” I cut their protests short. “Gourry! Are you ready?”

“Yeah! Whenever!”

I glanced in the direction of the enemy; the water arrows let out by the demons kept crashing against the barrier, and the crimson light appeared behind them again as well.

“Now!”

The barrier was gone. The crimson light was launched towards us.

I dropped Gourry off to the side of the pillar; as he jumped off, the reactionary force pushed us back and away from him, and the crimson arrow flew by between us.

Gourry whirled through the air, and planted his sword into the vertical stone surface; as he descended, the blade cut through the rock, slowing his fall. He was near the midst of the enemy under the pillar now; they could not neglect him even if they wanted to.

“Freeze Arrow!” That was the moment when Aria and Dilarl finished their incantations. As the demons on the island were preoccupied with the fact that Gourry appeared above them, they were caught within the icy rainfall. The spell could not do them any harm of course, but it was enough to take their attention away from him.

“Aria, Levitation! Dilarl, wind barrier once more!” I ordered.

“Eh?”

“Okay!” Dilarl didn’t hesitate, although Aria paused for a moment before beginning her chant in a frenzy.

Meanwhile, the demons were still in a state of confusion, but one of them faced the approaching Gourry and howled loudly - water arrows materialized immediately around it.

Not good!

The demon unleashed its arrows on him-- but suddenly, the direction of Gourry’s fall changed, letting him easily avoid them all.

Right! He changed his course by adjusting the angle of his sword stuck in the pillar!

He can be shockingly smart sometimes - although I suspect he was just following his intuition.

Anyway, Gourry made it to the center of our enemies, if only barely, while on our end...

“Windy Shield!”

“Levitation!”

...the two spells were finished!

“Whatever happens, keep your concentration, alright?” With that, I released my own Levitation magic and started chanting another incantation.

On the ground, the fight between the demons and Gourry was already underway. With his expertise, I expected him to take down a couple of them by now - but for whatever reason, he seemed to be having a hard time with merely one.

What the--? If we don’t help him quickly--

“Fireball!” I released my modified spell. Originally, this incantation created a ball of light in the palm of the caster which exploded when it hit something, spreading flames, but now I managed to summon it outside the wind barrier, a little bit behind us.

That’s it! Go!

“Break!” I flicked my finger, and--

Booooom!!

Crimson flames burst forth outside the shield!

“Gwaaaaaaah!”

“Aaaaaaaaaaah!”

The screams of Dilarl and Aria filled my ears as the pressure of the explosion hurled the barrier towards the battlefield below with breakneck speed!

It crashed into the lake right next to the island, spraying water everywhere.

Right, that got the demons’ attention.

Dilarl released the shield of wind, and at the same time--

“Blast Ash!” I was chanting this one as we fell; the spell turned the almost all the demons to ash.

“Aria, dismiss Levitation!” I commanded.

“Ah... yes!” She quickly released the spell, and we splashed into the knee-deep water. I thought the last remaining demon would attack us now, but it actually began to flee. I slowly walked onto the small island, Aria and Dilarl following behind.

Gourry seemed to be eyeing someone who wasn’t a fish demon.

A huge, billowing ma.s.s of white skin - that’s what it looked like at first. Shaped like a human-sized, half-deflated balloon, its skin was so pale that I could almost see through it - okay, that might be an overstatement, but it was at least as white as the face of a gravely ill person. At around the height of an average human’s chest, we could see a blond young man’s face. It was handsome like a statue; like a relief that was carved into a very-very inappropriate place.

As if to prove to us that it was no statue, the face opened its mouth. “Nice to meet you. My name is Aireus.” His voice was certainly that of a human. “I’m vaguely aware of what’s going on here, although Narof proving so weak was unexpected. He was quite strong, but... it probably would have been better if he didn’t resort to taking a hostage, or hadn’t tried pursuing a fair fight.” He spoke plainly, as if we were having an idle chat. “Still, it was such a pity. So I think I’ll provide him with a seat and let him play a more active part now.”

“What do you mean... by that?” Dilarl asked incredulously.

“What I am saying is this...” Aireus smiled widely.

The ma.s.s of skin beside his head seemed to protrude.

“Uugh!” Aria unwittingly gagged at the abhorrent scene.

Next to Aireus’ head... the head of Narof, the same one we cut off, appeared to take form.