Chapter 33

Chapter 33 \n<h1>Chapter 33</h1>

 

Its appearance was just too unexpected and sudden.

It made its way through many demons and appeared before the two of us.

I felt unpleasant the moment I laid my eyes on it. It had black armor that moved and a pair of red eyes that could be seen from the opening of their helmet.

What was this… This sensation was as if I was forced to feel malice towards it— No, I had to remain calm. It could attack at any time now.

“Everyone, don’t move okay?”

Kazuki gave those instructions to the soldiers behind us. While suppressing my own emotions of conflict due to the enemy’s hostility, someone let out a shout,

“Uooooooooooooooo!!”

!? Kazuki-kun!

“Wait! Kazuki-kun!”

“Let me go! I have to take this guy down right now!! If we don’t kill them, we’ll be killed!”

“Calm down!”

I grabbed Kazuki by the shoulder to hold him back. Including Kazuki, the other soldiers also seemed to be directing hateful glares at the enemy before us.

Luckily, I was able to raise my voice to the soldiers behind us. I was surprised I gave instructions like a commanding officer.

“All of you, stop right now!”

But no matter how I raised my voice, the soldiers from the other units didn’t stop.

The Kingdom’s soldiers surrounded the Black Knight but the other demon soldiers didn’t move at all. I felt uneasy because of how composed the enemy was.

I couldn’t move.

There was a sense of discomfort as I couldn’t understand where this hatred towards the Black Knight was coming from.

“……”

“Die!”

One of the soldiers came up to the Black Knight and gave a heavy vertical slash with their sword.

The soldier intended to take down the enemy with this one attack and it hit the Black Knight’s armor.

It was an attack that you would normally die from but the armor wiggled and the Black Knight simply just stood there.

“……”

“Daaaaah!!”

Another soldier thrusted their spear at the enemy at the same time as the first soldier that was attacking.

“……”

“This is the end for you!!”

And to finish it off, the entire spear unit had also charged in and thrusted their spears at the enemy. They were charging at the enemy extremely fast and I could imagine the amount of power this charge held.

The person leading the charge, their skill was the real thing. Even if their mental state was being affected by hatred right now, he was someone that couldn’t be looked down upon.

Similar to a heavy tank charging in, the two pronged spear was aimed at the Black Knight’s abdomen.

Another Captain had also thrusted their great sword at the Black Knight and was glaring at them.

“I don’t know what kind of magic a bastard like you has but… I’ll just defeat you before you can use it—“

“Hmm.”

For the first time, the Black Knight let out their voice.

It was a neutral voice devoid of life that didn’t indicate their gender and just hearing it caused me discomfort.

“This is meaningless, if you think you can kill me with just this level of an attack… Aah, so boring… To think that the Third Commander would be overwhelmed by these guys… They kept talking about how strong the other side was but maybe they were just exaggerating it?”

“Wh..at?”

“How long are you going to stay there? You’re in my way.”

After the Black Knight said that, the black armor’s chest area started to change shape and began its attack.

“…..!?”

“Captain!!”

The Captain stepped back, escaping from the attack.

The Black Knight was still surrounded; the Captain was able to recover on his feet thanks to his comrades. The Captain then unsheathed his sword and gave an order,

“Don’t let your guards down!! The enemy is still standing!! Enclose the enemy and take them down!!”

“““Yes!”””

“Senpai! I’m going to assist them!”

“Ah, hey Kazuki-kun! …Kuh, it can’t be helped! All of you come too!”

Signaling with my hand, Kazuki-kun and I along with the soldiers behind us started running towards the Black Knight.

……Good grief, you openly expressed your opinion back in our world too. That’s good and all but… You’re a little too reckless! Courage and recklessness were two different things, Kazuki-kun!

The soldiers were just slightly behind Kazuki-kun as they pursued him.

But in a sense, this was a chance. The enemy should have suffered a grave wound. Unless the enemy had healing magic or was immortal, this was an opportunity.

“Ah, ah, they’re really getting carried away. What a pain, but—“

The Black Knight removed the great sword and spear from their body. As if they had no interest in the surrounding attack from the soldiers, they snapped their fingers and said,

“Just die, [Inversion].”

Suddenly, the Captain and three of his troops stopped moving and had blood flowing down from their heads. They then fell onto the ground without warning, as if they were puppets that had their strings cut.

Why…..? There wasn’t anything that indicated an attack.

There weren’t any traces of magic.

In just one instant, 4 elite soldiers had been submerged in a pool of blood.

“Inukami-senpai…… Just what was that…?”

“I don’t know, but we shouldn’t approach carelessly……”

Seeing the terrifying scene before us, Kazuki-kun stopped moving and asked me.

I don’t know, but it was possible that the Black Knight had unsheathed their sword so fast that our eyes couldn’t see the attack. Maybe they possessed Wind magic and used blades of wind to attack… It was also possible they were using some kind of Illusion magic… But no matter which one the Black Knight had, even an idiot would know not to carelessly approach them.

But if we retreated now, the other soldiers would end up just like the Captain.

“Ah, this is boring. I thought I would have trouble with some slightly stronger humans. But humans are still just humans after all… Boring, boring, boring.”

“It would seem like the both of us are going to have to fight him…”

“Yes..”

“Haah? You’re going to do it? I don’t really mind, I’m really bored anyways… I’ll kill you immediately.”

The opponent was eager to fight.

It was favorable for us to an extent since he would be targeting us rather than the other soldiers.

Without taking my eyes off the Black Knight, I called out to the soldiers behind me,

“Can you guys take care of the other demons around here? You don’t have to defeat them, you guys can just stall them. Try and hold out until Kazuki-kun and I defeat this guy.”

“Leave it to us, Hero-sama. We will definitely not lose our lives.”

“How reliable…”

With this, we didn’t have to worry about being attacked in the back.

Drawing my sword, I stood in line next to Kazuki-kun.

In comparison, the Black Knight was just standing upright. Was it because they were confident or did they already set up something in advance—

“I’ll open with the first attack!”

“We don’t know what they can do… Try to avoid getting hit! Also you guys should retreat towards where the other demons are when Kazuki-kun fires his magic!!”

““Yes!””

Wielding his sword in his left hand, Kazuki-kun approached the Black Knight.

If my Lightning magic were to be considered an AOE-type, Kazuki-kun’s Light magic would be the single-target type. His Light magic could fire a highly concentrated beam from the palm of his hand with tremendous penetration power.

“No matter how fast they are, they can’t dodge something that moves at the speed of light!”

Kazuki-kun aimed a beam of light at the Black Knight which hit their shoulder. Because of the Light magic’s penetration power, a hole had been made on their shoulder along with smoke coming out from it.

“Hmm, ….Interesting. You two are with those small fries huh, pleased to meet you.”

It seemed like it didn’t have any particular effect on them. The weakness for demons was supposed to be light… Just what kind of magic did they possess?

The wound that the Captain inflicted on the Black Knight had disappeared as well.

“Kazuki-kun…”

“It’s no good, light isn’t effective on them.”

“Kufufu, aah, light, light, light, it’s something that we hate the most. Aah that’s right, since you fired at me, I have to return the favor… [Inversion].”

It was the same words that were said to defeat the Captain.

[Inversion]? Just what do those words mean—

“Gu, ahh… Aaaaaaaaaaah.”

Suddenly a cry of anguish was raised and Kazuki-kun was kneeling on one knee as he holding down his left shoulder.

“Kazuki-kun, what’s wrong!?”

“My shoulder… My shoulder feels like it’s burning…”

“Your… Shoulder?”

Looking closer, blood was oozing out through an opening on his shoulder.

Just what did they do!? Did something fly towards Kazuki-kun’s armor!? No, I didn’t feel anything fly past here. This was—

“The attack came from the inside……?”

“Senpai…. I’m fine.”

Using his own magic to heal himself, Kazuki-kun stood up.

Recovery magic like this was only a temporary measure as it didn’t fully heal the wound.

If time passed, it was possible for it to completely heal but—

“Fuh!!”

I used my sword to block the mass of black that tried to strike at Kazuki-kun’s stomach. The lump of black mass was an extension of the Black Knight’s hand… By changing its shape, it was possible to use it as an attack. Along with their mysterious way of attacking, it was a troublesome opponent.

“……How unfortunate.”

“What’s unfortunate?”

“Kufufu, I wonder.”

They were troublesome on top of being ominous.

It felt like we were fighting a monster not from this world.