Ah, I stopped the brainrot without even realizing it.
Suddenly, embarrassment rushed to my face.
But! If I don't act like this, I'll never get the chance!
"So it's you again, Magus."
"Hahaha. Let's take it easy on each other, friend."
"Preposterous... Hmph!"
But the feeling lasted only a moment.
The embarrassment quickly faded, replaced by a tension that crept through my entire body.
Crack!
The light of [Six-Arm Thunder] shattered.
Well, Tiona had broken through it back when she was only Level 4, so this was only natural.
Still, I'd bought a little time, and that was enough.
In the meantime, the potion-fed stone thrower and Aspi had both managed to retreat safely.
However, contrary to the original plan, this had devolved into an awkward one-on-one instead of a pincer attack.
Judging by how easily he'd subdued Aspi, the enemy's estimated level had to be at least 5.
And this was my first time fighting a first-rate adventurer.
Was I in a pinch?
Ugh, my SAN is in a pinch!
"You really went to such lengths just to save trash like that."
"I save foolish men for foolish reasons. Pretty common, isn't it? Besides, I happen to like that sort of thing. Friends who are that straight-laced and stupid, I mean."
Because that kind of foolishness—that humanity—was something I could never possess.
No matter how many times I saw it, I was truly jealous.
"Nonsense."
Crack.
Good grief, why did his warm-up sounds have to be so threatening?
Anyone watching would think he was about to charge me this very second...!
"Die!"
"Whoa!"
The moment the thought crossed my mind, the bone-helmet bastard suddenly lunged at me.
For me, having only adjusted my expectations slightly beyond my experience fighting Level 4 Tiona, the speed was enough to make me jump.
So this was what Level 5 felt like.
It was shocking and dizzying, but...
"At this level!"
Bang! Bang!
I knew it was likely pointless, but I fired [Gandr] at him as a form of suppression.
But this brute.
After taking one hit, he must have decided it was tolerable, because he simply snorted and ignored it, charging straight in.
From the way he acted, it seemed he was resisting the curse in [Gandr] to the point of near uselessness.
"It won't even work as a distraction."
"Then how about this?"
"[Flame]."
The red cross that drank blood and killed!
Boom!
Crossing my hands, I launched a cross of fire.
But as expected, it dealt almost no damage.
Dammit, his body really was disgustingly tough.
Or maybe this guy had some kind of anti-magic skill in his status?
Tiona had been momentarily stopped by it, after all.
"Struggling, are you!"
Crash!
"Hah, tch."
His foot smashed the floor, sending fragments flying everywhere.
But I'd already reinforced my legs with mana, so I dodged safely. No damage.
For now, I decided to put some definite distance between us.
"Good grief, all I had was a few days of practice forced on me by my 'senpai'!"
Shk!
I pulled two sword hilts from my waist, pinching them between my fingers.
As I channeled mana into them, blades that hadn't been there a moment ago sprang out, long and sharp.
Yes, the famous [Black Keys] everyone knew.
To be precise, these were only replicas I'd made to look the part using materials from this world.
Still, I was confident their performance surpassed the originals by a fair margin.
They functioned properly as a [Key of Providence], and I'd also packed in a few extra buffs for [Ironclad Action].
In the first place, most of their use was basically as knockback tools.
As weapons, they were almost useless except against a few specific monsters.
I absolutely couldn't use them properly myself, but if it were my 'senpai,' I had a feeling he could probably blow away even that rumored [Princess of the True Ancestors] with these.
Whoosh! Thunk!
"Ghk! Cheap tricks!"
"What are you talking about? You're just a lowly footslogger with no charge skill."
Ah, yes. As expected, ranged attacks were the best for safely being a jerk.
Determined to burn through every Black Key I'd brought, I steadily kept widening the distance between us.
And while I was at it, I handled [that] too.
After that... what should I do now?
"Tch. Maybe I shouldn't have left it behind."
Damn it, I really needed a dependable frontliner.
No matter what I tried, I couldn't focus because I was too worried that that bastard might rush me at any second.
So, [Moon Spirit Slime], come on~! ... I wanted to say that, but I decided against it.
The other team still wasn't in good shape either.
For now, I thought it was the wise choice to buy distance and time.
And if that happened, who knew?
Maybe Ais would come back and settle everything.
"Annoying. Vioras!"
Koooooo!
"Oh dear."
Hey, you sneaky little leaf bastard!
You're bringing in teammates for a sacred one-on-one top-lane duel?
Dammit, where's our jungler?!
Jungler! Junglerrrrrrrrr!
The enemy jungler lives in top laneeeeeeeee!
The jungler gap is insaneeeeeeeee!
Boom! Boom!
"I'll cover you!"
At that moment, Aspi, who had mostly recovered, took out the explosives she had on hand and dealt with the cannibalized monsters rushing me.
The stone thrower helped from the side as well.
Hey, hey. I knew I could count on you, damn it!
"Tch, to think those half-dead things would dare!"
"If you can't secure the kill after getting them low, that's trolling."
"What nonsense are you spouting!"
Hmph, not telling.
I laughed and kept hurling Black Keys at him.
Hm? I'm out?
I thought I'd brought quite a lot.
"You bastard!"
Maybe the bone-helmet bastard noticed too, because he charged at me with everything he had.
Even though I'd been keeping my distance, his superior physical ability quickly closed the gap again.
But perhaps because this was the chance I'd finally managed to seize, I could see his field of vision narrowing.
Then I guess this was my lucky break.
Sshhk!
"Ghk!"
The decisive strike, packed with mana through both arms.
With that 'snake,' I bit into his neck and the back of his head almost simultaneously.
Unlike when I'd gone easy on Tiona, this time I'd truly poured in killing intent and ripped him apart.
Even so, his body was exceptionally hard, so I couldn't go very deep, but given the location, it was still a fatal wound.
Thanks to that, his head and my hand were quickly dyed red with blood.
"You, you little...!"
"Not done yet!"
This was the advantage I'd finally seized.
If I wasted even a moment catching my breath or trying to relax, he'd definitely catch up and counterattack.
The best move was to bring the bone-helmet bastard down right here.
Ideally, I'd have liked that gamble I'd set up earlier to succeed, but since there'd been no reaction so far, it looked like that had failed.
"I still haven't fixed the side effects, but...!"
I didn't want to use this if I could help it, thinking about the aftermath, but I had no choice!
Click, kiing!
I pressed several magic stone buttons attached to the outer surface of my right boot.
Then, only that boot began to emit a blindingly brilliant light.
The brightness was so absurd it was practically abnormal.
If you let your guard down, getting flashbanged was inevitable.
"Ghk, what is that light...!"
"[Activate]!"
The boot began rapidly devouring massive amounts of mana, not only from within me but from the surrounding environment.
Yellow sparks crackled violently all around, making the scene look extremely dangerous.
But with this, I believed I could definitely bring him down.
It was that powerful, and also that insanely dangerous of an item.
"[Speed is weight]."
Fwoosh!
"What?!"
In an instant.
Literally before anyone could blink, before he could react at all, my shining leg was raised above his head.
And I recited the promised line.
"Hey, have you ever been kicked by [the speed of light]?"
That was the end.
For the record, that whole line was the activation incantation for the Mystic Code.
KRAAANG!
"Guhk!"
The bastard's head was driven deep into the floor.
The impact didn't end there; it went on to smash the Dungeon floor outright.
Truly overwhelming destructive power.
It was the kind of force that made the other onlookers let out involuntary gasps of awe.
"No, wait, didn't you just say you didn't have any more of those...!"
"K, kuuuuh..."
"Ah."
Aspi, who had been about to protest that incredible power, couldn't finish her sentence.
Probably because she'd lost her words when she saw my pathetic state through the smoke and the shattered Dungeon debris.
"Ah, f... damn... it hurts...!"
In truth, I was in terrible shape.
Just from how I felt, I wanted to rip off the leg I'd used for the kick and throw it away.
Every muscle in my body ached so badly it felt like they were being torn apart in real time, and it felt as if all the bones in my lower body had turned to powder and were swirling around inside me.
My skin had burst from being unable to withstand the force of the kick, and my legs were twisted and bent all over the place like some kind of torture device. Just looking at them made it feel like new pain was being born.
It hurt that much.
On top of that, the glasses I'd been wearing had already shattered to pieces and flown off somewhere.
Those were actually pretty valuable, so that was a serious shame.
Honestly, even now, I still wondered why I'd made something like this and brought it here.
"I-I'm dying. I'm gonna die. No, just kill me already...! If possible, be, be gentle about ittt..."
"H-how are you still alive?"
"...Looks like it was a pretty severe side effect."
"W-well, otherwise there's no way something with that kind of power... ugh, could exist... right."
In the end, I barely managed to stand with Aspi and the stone thrower supporting me.
Ah, but it still hurt so, so much.
Please, please let the potion I gave the rear team still be available.
If not, I really felt like I might die on the way ba...
"Vio, ras!"
Thud!
"What is this?!"
"Mageus big brother!"
The two of them were startled and flustered by the sudden ambush.
And I was even more dumbfounded than they were.
I couldn't hold it in anymore and spat out several bowls' worth of blood.
"Kuek!"
Ah, damn it.
This is seriously bullshit.
Did he punch through my stomach this time?
What a perverted bastard; he really loves gut shots.
"Kh, ugh! You... you damn adventurers!"
We turned around.
There stood the man who had been wearing the bone helmet.
The helmet had long since been smashed to pieces, and the head beneath it was half-destroyed and completely crushed.
That wasn't all.
Lower down, his upper body was also completely wrecked in half.
And yet, that bastard was still alive.
He moved and got back up on both legs.
He was still breathing, even while gasping harshly and bleeding dark red all over the place.
Even more infuriatingly, for some reason I couldn't understand, he was regenerating and recovering from that state.
So this bastard really wasn't human, but a monster after all.
Did he think he was immortal or something?
"You... did well, Magus... bastard... I'll... praise you!"
"Damn it. And you, cough, have no shame either. To come back, spit, alive from that."
"Of course. It's truly a shame, but... this body, loved by 'her,' would never wither so easily from something of that level."
Then the monster grinned smugly.
When Aspi saw that face, she said with a deathly pale expression, "No way... the White-Haired Demon (Vendetta)? The real Oliverus Act?!"
"Impossible! How can a dead man be here?!"
With the stone thrower's added explanation, I couldn't hide my own shock either.
What? A dead man?
Wait, was this suddenly a living dead genre?
I hadn't heard anything about zombies appearing in the Dungeon yet.
"Were you... alive?"
"No, I was definitely dead. But from the abyss of death, I was reborn."
Oliverus boasted in response to Aspi's question.
Then, like some kind of fanatic lost in ecstasy, he spread his arms and shouted, "I was granted a second life! By none other than 'her'!"
At that cry, I thought, Hmm, so it's "her," huh.
Well, it was about time for some shadowy mastermind to start peeking out from behind the curtain.
By the way... before this turns into a dialogue scene for information delivery, give me my damn potion already, you idiots!