SLKD – Volume 3 Chapter 5Previous Chapter | Project Page | Next Chapter
The Shield of the Water G.o.d, the Gleeful Dirge, the Sacred Fire that is Filled with One’s Soul
“Silent…Water?” With a great deal of effort, I called out to Silent Water, who was standing right in front of me. The pain that I felt all over my body told me that this wasn’t a hallucination.
“Master!” Silent Water nervously knelt down beside me, then when she saw Reidy, who was in my arms, she asked, “Master, who is she?”
“Sh…she is… Reidy…” My chest was hurting a lot, so were my shoulders; did I break some bones?
“Is that right? A lightning type spirit, eh… Master, you don’t have to worry, just leave everything to me…” As she told me this, Silent Water’s took on a dark expression… Very scary… This was the second time I saw Silent Water with this kind of expression…
“How dare you… how dare you injure my master?” Silent Water turned around; her beautiful voice had changed to a lower octave and had taken on a threatening tone.
“A water spirit? If I remember right… Didn’t you live somewhere near Golubzi?”
“Oh? So, you know me? However, I do ask that you refrain from saying that we have any sort of relations. Towards anyone who dares to injure my master, I will definitely not forgive…”
After hearing what Silent Water said, the demon’s face had a look like he was intrigued, “Won’t forgive me, hmmm… I recall you being that spirit hunter, Genuoduolasu’s prey? You standing here is proof that that arrogant guy bit it… You really are impressive…”
At this moment, a black magic circle materialized in front of the demon…
That guy could do magic? I didn’t realize that this whole time… I thought he was a close-quarter combat type of demon…
“That’s right, it was I who injured that no good, weak master of yours. But… you should wait till after you have tried my Stones of Evil before deciding whether you will forgive me or not.” As soon as the demon finished talking, I could see some black stones shooting out at a rapid speed from inside the magic circle… We are done for… This was what I thought in that instant.
“Plunk, plunk, plunk…” (The sound of stones falling into water.)
“What?! You caught all of them?”
In front of Silent Water was a thick wall of water. Those black stones were floating inside the wall after being caught.
“When facing off against the Shield of the Water G.o.d’s impenetrable defense, do you think these pathetic attacks of yours count for anything?” As Silent Water began explaining this, she reached out her right hand with her palm facing the demon… then… one… two… three… many bluish white magic circles appeared, “Oh water that is the source of life, please grant me strength. Through your alternate form, I shall obliterate all things that oppose my master.”
When Silent Water chanted her spell, the bluish white magic circles emitted a pale light. Inside the magic circles, countless icicles formed and caused the air around it to condense into a frosty mist. Then, they all shot towards the earth type demon…
“Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam…” The icicles went straight for the demon and hit him, then a large amount of rock dust came out… and completely blocked the view demon.
Wow!!! Silent Water is so cool! This must be what awesomeness feels like… but, why did Silent Water come here?
‘She used teleportation magic to get here since she is your contracted spirit… After spirits form contracts with humans, most live in the masters’ magical worlds, awaiting the masters’ summon. However, humanoid spirits aren’t the same as the rest of the spirits, they have the option to live a normal life like humans do… Like just now, when you felt as though you were on the brink of death, she felt your spiritual tremor and knew that you were in danger. This caused her to use teleportation magic to transport herself to your side.’
‘So, that was what happened… Freed, my back hurts a lot, my bone wouldn’t have been shattered, would it?’
‘You’re fine. Right when you were about to get knocked over by that earth type demon, we adjusted the dragon power within your body, and focused it on your back, reducing the damage that you took from that hit by ninety percent.’
‘The damage that I had taken was already reduced by ninety percent? Is that for real? I only felt ten percent of what that demon had dealt me? This… just how strong is this demon?’
‘Humph… it is just that you are too weak… Relax, you just need to wait a little while and you should be fine. Right now, the dragon power is being turned into curative power to heal you.’
‘Dragon power even has this kind of use? No wonder a moment ago, I felt like I was about to drop dead because of the pain, and now, I just feel that it is really painful, so that was what is happening…’
“Hey! Hurry up and let go, you foolish human! What do you think you are doing, staring at me like that?”
When I came to, Reidy had already stood back up. She looked dumbfounded as she stared at her own two hands. Her face had this expression like she couldn’t believe what had just happened. She muttered to herself, “My magical power… even… got restored? Just now… that feeling… so it really is…” Then, Reidy looked at me suspiciously, “You… just who are you?”
“I am just a… normal… Koff…” I coughed up some more blood before I could finish my sentence. Freed wouldn’t be lying to me, would he? ‘Just now that blood has already been somewhat coagulated.’
“Hey… human, are you alright?” “Master…” Reidy and Silent Water asked at the same time.
“I am alright… no big…”
“Wh…who told you to take it upon yourself to shield me… you brought it on yourself…” Reidy put her hands on her hips and turned her face away from me, looking at me like I was the one asking for it.
“Hey you! What is the meaning of this? Master got hurt because he was protecting you!” Silent Water was angry.
“So what? I didn’t ask him to help me – if that isn’t him… bringing it on himself… then… what is?” Reidy kind of faltered as she answered Silent Water.
“You try saying that again? If Master didn’t save you, you would have…”
“Don’t worry about it, Silent Water… Hmmm? Watch out! That demon isn’t dead…”
When the white fog dissipated, I could see that the demon called “Derecho” was still standing there. The arms that he used to shield his head as well as his body were impaled with numerous icicles…
“I didn’t think…your attack could be this powerful… No wonder that arrogant guy died. But… regrettably, you have b.u.mped into me…” The demon was wheezing and gasping as he said this. His voice had a hint of anger in it. It looked like Silent Water had upset him.
The stones in the nearby area floated up in the air, and flew towards “Derecho”; then, those icicles that were pinned on his body earlier were all pushed out by the rocks he was absorbing, which made him even more brawny. “You are very powerful, that’s why you have what it takes to enjoy my Gleeful Dirge. Now, let’s see whose techniques are stronger, the blocking ability of your Shield of the Water G.o.d, or the piercing attack of my Gleeful Dirge.”
Right at this moment, a gigantic magic circle appeared above our heads…
“Enjoy! Savor the time you have left to try to enjoy whatever happiness you can have while lamenting your imminent demise.”
The magic circle radiated a black light, then I could see a bunch of sharp stones fall out from the circle overhead, at a slow speed.
Silent Water mobilized two layers of the Shield of Water G.o.d, shielding us overhead. Meanwhile, the sharp stones just continued their descent to us. They didn’t speed up, nor slow down. They just fell towards us at a constant pace. Then, they pierced through the first layer of the shield; they didn’t show any signs of slowing down…
“How could this be?” Silent Water began to panic when she saw that her first layer of water shield had been completely penetrated.
“How’s that? It’s quite formidable, isn’t it? Actually, I deliberately slowed them down, so that I could enjoy that fantastic expression on your face.” “Derecho” let out a hideous roar of laughter.
‘Freed, the situation is horrible, do you have any idea… any idea that can…’
‘Let me think… disintegrate? Quick… quickly now and tell the lightning spirit to discharge her electricity onto the shield.’
“Reidy, quickly, strike at the shield with your lightning bolt.”
“Don’t order me around, you human.” Reidy regained her composure from the shock earlier, then lifted both of her hands up at the shield and shouted, “Thunder Cut!”
An enormous bolt of lightning struck Silent Water’s water shield. Steam rushed out and the area was rapidly covered by a layer of mist…
“Ridiculous! How could my Gleeful Dirge be…” The misty steam then quickly dispersed and dissipated into the sky. Above us, Silent Water’s water shield was gone, those sharp stones were gone – there was nothing left except for the starry night sky.
‘Freed… That was incredible! Just exactly what had happened?’
‘Honestly speaking, that magic of his was very powerful and those stones could pierce through any defensive mechanism, even a dragon’s scale is no exception… But, those stones contain magical power; so in the water shield, under the condition where electricity can electrolyze the water, the electrolysis process generated a great deal of energy and significantly elevated the temperature – this disturbed the magical elements within the stones and broke the magic that held them together.’
When Reidy saw that all the sharp stones had disintegrated, the concerned expression she had before faded, “Even though I don’t know what happened, I am sure your death is upon you now, Guntheru.”
So, his name is actually Guntheru…
“Hahahaha… Even though you broke down my Gleeful Dirge attack… with your puny attacks that neither hurt nor itch me, what harm could you possibly do?” When Guntheru saw that we countered his advanced magic, he was only mildly surprised and quickly recovered his composure.
He lifted his hand, that was as big and strong as a tree trunk, and with his fist, he hit the ground. The dust and soil from the ground rose up like a shock wave and came at us…
“Shield of the Water G.o.d!”
Silent Water used her Shield of the Water G.o.d, but the blast from that shock wave was too powerful. Even though it didn’t break through Silent Water’s shield, the force knocked the shield into Silent Water and Reidy… “Bam…” They were sent flying and crashed into a tree… then fell back down hard… It looked really painful…
d.a.m.n it!!!
‘Kid, do you want to use that?’
‘Yes!’
‘Have you really thought this through? You have used up quite a bit of your dragon power already. So, to compensate for this, this time around, we will need to burn up more of your soul.’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
So what if it would burn up my soul? If I had to watch Silent Water and Reidy get hurt, then I’d rather die. Even if it wasn’t for that reason, if I couldn’t kill this demon, we would all die anyway.
“Guntheru!” I stood up.
Even though my body still hurt a bit, it was basically all healed up.
“Oh? Human kid, what do you think you are doing? Just now that attack, did it hit you so hard that you are coming back for more?”
“You are very powerful.”
“Yes, I am very powerful. But your spirit isn’t bad either. I really don’t understand why such a powerful spirit like her would form a contract with a weak human like yourself.”
“Do you want to know the reason why?”
‘Freed.’
‘Understood.’
My right hand began to light up with that long forgotten white flame.
“Sa…sacred…Fire? That’s impossible…”
“Guntheru, tremble before me…”
“Stones of Evil!”
Guntheru began his magic and those black stones came at me like a fierce rainstorm. But, to me, this was a rainstorm happening in slow motion.
Left, right, left, down, left, left, right…
I was like a gust of wind and easily dodged all of Guntheru’s Stones of Evil. Then, in one punch, with my soul fueled Sacred Fire, I hit him squarely on his body.
“Yeowch! Oh! Ahhh…”
The Sacred Fire quickly spread throughout Guntheru’s entire body. He screamed for about 2 seconds or so before he was vaporized and vanished into thin air. I couldn’t help but be amazed by his power… it even took the Sacred Fire that long before it could purify him…
‘That demon actually was about to evolve into a special cla.s.s demon, so, he was much more powerful than the other demons you have encountered before… Meh… All in all, you did alright, kid.’
‘Ho… thanks for the… compli…’ All of a sudden, a wave of extreme fatigue hit me.
“Thunk.” Before I fell onto the ground, everything in front of my eyes turned pitch black.
————————————
“Kid, you were really cutting it close this time; you almost bit it.”
“Yo… Freed.”
“What’s the matter? Knowing that you almost got yourself killed makes you happy?”
“No… It is just that I proved that I had the ability to protect Silent Water…”
“Humph – really… the resolve to protect her or die trying…”
“My soul, is it almost all used up by now?”
“Yeah, you’ve only got that little bit left. I am telling you, kid, even if you have a death wish, you didn’t have to do a double whammy, you lit the Sacred Fire and went into wind state at the same time.”
“But, if I didn’t go into wind state, wouldn’t I be stopped by Guntheru’s Stones of something or another back there?”
“Mmm… you’ve got a point.”
“Erm… I… Later on, if I were to release the Sacred Fire again, I will die, right?”
“More or less. It depends on how far in the future you plan to use it again. If you release the Sacred Fire in the near future, you will die for sure. If you can wait till the dragon power has fully fixed your soul up, then you won’t die.”
“Wait a minute, did you just say that dragon power can fix up my soul?”
“Yeah.”
“Why didn’t you say something about this before?”
“Because you didn’t have any dragon power before… Your body only began to generate dragon power after we were able to interact with you in your conscious mind.”
“Really? Then, if you were to fix up my soul, how long would it take approximately?”
“About a month. After all, it isn’t that easy to convert dragon power into power of the soul.”
“So that’s how it is…”
“Um, kid, you have been asleep for a while – get up now, someone is getting worried…”
…
Ack… My head hurts; this… what’s this on my face that is all wet? Is it raining? But… how could rain be this warm…
After I struggled to open my eyes, in front of me, I saw Silent Water’s tear stained face.
“Master…” Silent Water quickly wrapped her arms around my neck and held onto me tightly, her warm tears fell onto my neck.
“Si… Silent Water…” I gently and steadily patted Silent Water on her head…
“Look, you water spirit, like I said before, this human wouldn’t die that easily…”
I took a look at Reidy, who was half kneeling, half sitting in front of me. Her eyes were a bit red. From the looks of it, she must have blamed herself for what happened, thinking that it was because of her that I got hurt, right?
“Silent Water… I am alright now. You’d better watch out, if you keep on crying like this, I might just leave you here.”
“Master’s a meanie…” Silent Water stopped crying, let go of me and wiped the tears off her face.
I sat up and noticed that at the moment, I was situated in the same cave that we were in earlier … and the sky was already bright.
“I… how long had I been out?”
“Two days…”
“Wait… two days?”
Then, in the Human World, wouldn’t this be Sunday morning already? I haven’t even found Nora Gra.s.s yet, and Nagisa’s father is still waiting for me. I have to hurry up and get back.