Chapter 25

Mini forest guardians born from the fruits scattered everywhere.

They’re called Mini Guardians.

In reality, they’re a head taller than your average adult man.

Phase 2 of the Guardians.

This is the revival pattern of the Guardians.

If we can’t defeat all the guardians born from the fruits within the given time,

the guardian will revert to Phase 1.

This can essentially be viewed as a failure to conquer the guardians.

It’s highly unlikely that a party that has already exhausted its energy in Phase 1 can defeat the guardians again.

So, we must definitely stop the Phase 2 revival pattern.

“Everyone, listen up.”

I pointed to the fallen fruits one by one.

“The guardians born from the fruits grow stronger the more we take them down. So we should prioritize taking out the ones on the outside first and then hit the ones in the center together last.”

With the urgency of the situation, I just made the key points clear.

Everyone nodded in understanding.

“Poara, focus on healing for now. There will come a moment when we need to unleash our firepower once more. The same goes for you, Saint.”

“Yes!”

“Understood.”

The remaining guardians are to be handled by me, Seron, and Aisha.

“Sweet potato, how do you know how to fight an Apostle you’ve never seen before?”

Seron, gripping his axe, asked me this.

Is that really the question at a time like this?

“I studied.”

In times like this, you just have to be shameless.

“…I went to the academy too, but I still don’t know anything!”

“Well, that means you studied less.”

I sped off before Seron could get irritated.

Since the battle had dragged on quite a bit, gray zones had become rampant.

Each step felt like a massive drain on my stamina, so I had to be as cautious as possible when moving.

The reason I told everyone to handle the outside first was also because of the gray zones.

If we started from the inside and the guardians tried to retreat inside, it would be a hassle.

Fortunately, everyone seemed to understand without needing further explanation.

In the distance, Aisha and Seron began to ambush the guardians.

Needless to say, Aisha was impressive, and despite his complaints, Seron had exceptional skills.

Confirming that the two were facing off against a guardian, I lifted my head.

Then I saw a guardian with vines extending from its body, flailing about.

It had sturdy four legs and two arms, and vines all wrapped around its body.

The vines were poisonous, and if they touched you, your skin would melt away.

But,

Swish!

Slash!

That didn’t apply to me with my steel skin.

I sliced through the incoming vine with the edge of my hand and grabbed my shield.

Thud!

At that moment, a rock projectile shot from the vine and struck my shield.

This was the guardian’s basic pattern.

They attack with poisonous vines, then follow up with rock projectiles.

The guardian was acting just as I remembered.

That means we can proceed with our existing strategy.

I took a breath, moving my body to loosen any tension in my muscles to avoid mistakes.

This would be my first real battle.

I was going to face countless Apostles to prevent a bad ending.

This battle was just the first step in fighting those Apostles.

‘To be honest,’

I’m scared too.

I’m charging straight at a monster that’s a head taller than me.

The pressure I felt was vastly different from the mock battles.

In mock battles, there were professors and teaching assistants to save my life.

But right now, this is reality.

No one is here to save me.

In this place, you have to take care of your own life.

That’s Magung.

Because of that, I mustn’t show fear.

If I get scared, my muscles will tense up, my vision will narrow, and my mind will spiral into panic.

Be bolder. Be more certain.

Think of every strategy to take down the Apostle and claim victory.

Once again, I sliced the approaching vine with the edge of my hand.

The shield I drew in deflected the rock projectile.

Suddenly, I was just about 2 meters away from the guardian.

The guardian, realizing it had closed the distance between us, stopped swinging its vines.

Instead, it started swinging its muscular arms that looked reminiscent of a gorilla.

Its arms bore massive blades like axes.

If we collided, I’d take severe damage.

As my body rushed forward, I quickly lowered it.

It felt like all the training Aisha and I did paid off.

With my leg trained to extend deftly, the guardian’s arm zipped past above my lowered head.

I dodged the first close-range attack.

However, I didn’t let my guard down.

‘Once more.’

Boom!

I heard something explode from the tip of the guardian’s arm.

It was the sound of a heat fruit exploding that was attached to the end of its arm.

With the explosion of the heat fruit, the guardian’s arm swung back toward me with a vengeance.

It was this rapid succession pattern of attacking even after dodging the first strike.

A colossal arm flew toward me, bigger than my own head.

I smashed into the ground as I continued my forward stance.

Wham!

The guardian’s arm swung low, aiming for my lowered body.

I jumped to avoid it and stomped on the shoulder of the guardian right in front of me.

Then I tightened my grip on the edge of my hand.

The guardian’s head stared blankly at me.

It realized its mistake but it was too late.

Crunch!

My hand, filled with strength, slammed into the guardian’s head.

My hand pierced through the guardian’s thick exoskeleton and dug inside.

A nasty foreign sensation rushed over me from the inside.

I twisted my hand further to wreak havoc inside the guardian’s head and pulled it out.

My hand was drenched in purple blood and brain fluid.

There was no time to feel disgusted.

I landed on the ground, not in the gray zone, but on solid ground as the guardian’s body crumbled.

Phew.

A short sigh escaped my lips.

Thankful for Bickamon’s body.

If it weren’t for Bickamon’s agile body, I wouldn’t have been able to execute my thoughts so smoothly.

Of course, I had prepared backup plans for any missteps.

That’s why I could move without fear.

Always be prepared.

‘Now there’s just one left.’

There are still plenty of guardians left.

There’s no time to stop.

We continue on.

* * *

Thanks to my efforts, Aisha’s and Seron’s, the number of fruit guardians was rapidly decreasing.

But once we passed half, the pace started to slow down significantly.

As mentioned earlier, the guardians grow stronger as the numbers decrease.

So, once we lost half, it took more time to deal with the now twice as strong guardians.

Their patterns began to diversify.

The last guardian we faced would handle all these patterns.

It was good to experience them all during the battle.

“Hah, heh, aren’t you guys tired yet?!”

Seron shouted at Aisha and me as he took down one guardian with his exploding axe.

If he had the energy to shout, I wish he’d put more effort into the fight.

Aisha and I charged forward, looking nonchalant to take down the next guardian.

“Compared to our daily stamina training,”

“This is easy.”

Aisha started the banter, and I chimed in.

I became strong thanks to the endless hellish training with Aisha.

She was the one constructing the training course.

“Hmm, should we call ourselves the Greatsword Iron Man and the Edge Iron Man?”

Saint SirMiel, who was watching us from a distance, smiled kindly.

At this rate, I might really end up with those names.

“Hanon, the roots are moving again!”

Just then, Poara pointed at the roots moving atop the dark clouds.

Just as Poara said, the roots began to move again.

This was a notification that the revival pattern was in progress.

‘It’s tighter than I thought.’

I was spending way more time dodging gray zones while trying to take down guardians than I anticipated.

This is real life, unlike in the game.

The need to mind the ground and the guardians took too much of my focus.

‘Maybe I should’ve saved some firepower for Poara.’

It was better to let a casualty happen in Phase 1 than to risk losing someone in Phase 2, but.

The revival phase was more bothersome than I’d thought.

“Seron, there’s no time to rest! Get up and take down at least one more!”

“Ugh, I know!”

Seron groaned but still got up and ran toward the guardian.

“Senpai.”

Meanwhile, Aisha came up beside me.

“At this rate, we’re going to be late.”

“…Yeah, it feels like we might be late.”

Aisha nodded.

“Senpai, isn’t the main reason we are late in capturing the Apostles because of the gray zones?”

She was right.

Taking down the guardians wasn’t that difficult.

But focusing on the gray zones beneath us ate up way too much time.

“Just once.”

Aisha tightened her grip on the great sword.

“I can make it so you don’t have to worry about the gray zones. What do you think? Can you handle it while I do?”

My eyes slowly widened.

I caught on to what Aisha was planning.

“Leave it to me.”

I distanced myself from Aisha and charged toward Poara.

In the meantime, Aisha lowered her stance, holding her great sword.

Just then, I grabbed a guardian that Seron had taken down.

“Hey, hey, what are you doing?”

“Poara! Can you attach a low-level wind spirit to me?”

“Yes, yes, I can do that!”

I shouted to Poara without answering Seron.

Suddenly, Poara hurriedly summoned the low-level wind spirit and stuck it to my back.

A small butterfly-like spirit flapped its wings.

I threw Seron between Poara and Saint SirMiel.

“Saint, a great wind is coming soon.”

I looked back at Aisha, who had lowered her stance.

“Can you do it without getting swept up?”

“Of course.”

Saint SirMiel prepared the defensive blessing along with her prayer.

Meanwhile, Aisha started spinning in her seated position.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh-

The speed of her rotation started to become absurdly fast, and soon the wind began to rush in around Aisha.

All the wind was being drawn toward Aisha.

The violent wind caused even the guardians to lift off the ground and get dragged along.

“…Is she one of us?”

Seron wore a shocked expression as he watched the guardians getting swept up by the wind Aisha stirred up.

Clearly, Aisha was operating on a level above mere humans.

But that made me feel the most secure in this moment.

Saint SirMiel showered us with defensive blessings.

Thanks to that, we didn’t get swept away by the wind.

“Poara, be ready!”

I sprinted towards Aisha, who was surrounding herself with defensive magic.

Here it comes.

As the violent wind burst forth around Aisha,

the massive great sword she wielded lifted above her head before slamming straight down.

Thud!

Then a storm crashed onto the ground.

Ka-boom!

In an instant, a tempest arose from the ground.

Everything on the surface lifted into the air.

Without a moment to prepare, the guardians got tangled up with each other and were swept away by Aisha’s wind.

As soon as I saw this, I thrust out my hand and cried out to Poara.

“Launch me!”

With my shout, Poara sent me flying with the wind spirit.

My body soared into the air.

But if I charged in blindly, I’d just get rammed by steel projectiles.

At this moment, I needed to become a cannon that could blow away all the guardians.

So, I pulled out my trump card I’d been saving.

On my skin,

magical symbols began to appear and glow brightly.

Magic Seal

This was a technique I learned from Sharine.

Normally, magic seals are inscribed on tools, not on a person’s skin.

But my skin? It’s tougher than most armor.

That’s why I inscribed the magic seal directly onto my skin.

If I used the bandage of the veil to hide the marks of the magic seal, no one would know it existed until it was triggered.

My body began to heat up as flames ignited.

This was my ultimate move, saved for a day like today.

The magic seal I inscribed was an explosive magic spell.

It was a spell that Sharine directly assisted me in inscribing.

‘I’m a human bomb.’

As I reached the gathered guardians, my body was engulfed in light.

The late struggle of the guardians was in vain.

‘Enjoy it.’

BOOOOOOOM!

It was an unprecedented explosion on the first floor of the gray forest.