“Such a despairingly long distance.”
“Ah… Really, I didn’t know one hundred metres could be so long.”
Zaryusu’s group thought about how to reach the enemy without injuries— or with minimal injuries.
“How about tunneling through the wetlands?”
“Even for the powers of a druid… that would be difficult. It would be great if we could use ‘Invisibility’.”
They could sneak close immediately using ‘Flight’ after casting ‘Invisibility’. But these were not among the spells a druid could learn.
“How about making a shield while we advance?”
“Making a shield will take too much time.”
“What about dismantling… a house?”
Zenberu smiled wryly as he knew the proposal he just said wouldn’t work. The enemy was attacking with fireball explosion, even if they could protect one side, the heat would still get in from the side. There was no time to craft a full body shield to protect against the heat.
“Oh right… there is another way.”
“What is it, Zaryusu?”
Crusch who was a little afraid asked. Did I make such a scary expression? Zaryusu thought. But it couldn’t be helped, he was so troubled that he wanted to curse out.
“No… I just… found a shield.”
Iguvua nodded with satisfaction at the current situation.
It was progressing smoothly. The two Blood Meat Hulks were still battling, but he was making good progress towards the village.
There were several foolish lizardmen who wanted to charge him, but they seemed to understand the futility of their action after witnessing the power of fireball. The five that spread out before the assault had the best record right now, but they only made it to fifty metres.
It was as though Iguvua was walking alone in the wilderness as he advanced silently. He might pity the lizardmen as weaklings, but he didn’t let his guard down.
It was a short distance to the target village. He planned to shoot fireball consecutively and raze the houses together with the lizardmen.
But the lizardmen would definitely try to stop him from reaching the village. It should be about time for someone to attack. Iguvua who was musing about this found himself proven right.
“… Oh, I see.”
Iguvua saw a hydra heading straight for him.
If that was the ace of the lizardmen, he will crush it with overwhelming strength and sap their will to fight. That would make the destruction of the village simpler.
To play it safe, Iguvua checked for other enemies in the surrounding and the sky. After confirming it was clear, Iguvua stopped and waited leisurely for the hydra to enter his attack range.
When the hydra got into the region that was hard to determine whether if it was within the attack range, it started charging. That’s right, it ran full speed towards Iguvua.
“Fools, you think you can cover this distance with your snail-like pace? Beasts will just be beasts.”
Iguvua laughed mockingly and shot the fireball he conjured at the hydra.
The fireball flew straight and scored a direct hit on the hydra. The eruption of flames engulfed the hydra.
Although the hydra staggered, it continued to advance. It carried on charging even though it was on fire. No, the flames dissipated instantly, that was just the imagination of Iguvua. The scene before Iguvua conveyed the exemplary determination of the hydra.
Iguvua frowned with displeasure. His pride was seriously wounded when the beast endured the attack.
Indeed, the hydra had damage resistance buff cast on it, but it wasn’t any of the high tier spells and could not negate all the damage.
… I remember hydras have the special ability of fast regeneration… But it shouldn’t work against fire attacks… No matter, it has high vitality since it is a monster. It is no surprise for it to tank one hit.
Iguvua consoled himself that way, but he could not appease his wrath. Iguvua was a special creature created by the Supreme Being, Ainz Ooal Gown. It is disrespectful for the enemy not to fall from his attack.
Iguvua casted an icy glare that was the opposite of his seething anger at the approaching hydra.
“… How unpleasant, die!”
He fired a fireball once more, engulfing the hydra in flames again. It even gave the illusion of charring flesh from such a distance. The wounds might not be fatal, but it would make it hesitate from advancing further.
But—
“— Why isn’t it stopping? Why is it still coming?”
Part 5
Rororo ran relentlessly. It might be huge, but it had a speed matching the lizardmen since it was traversing the wetlands. Ripples splashed everywhere with loud splattering sounds.
Its amber eyes turned white from the high temperature, two of its four heads had lost its strength.
Despite that, it ran.
Another ‘fireball’ struck Rororo squarely in the body. The heat inside the ‘fireball’ exploded in an instant, penetrating Rororo’s entire being. It felt a pain equivalent to being punched all over its body, its eyes were dry as the fiery air burned its lungs.
With burns all over its body, the feedback of pain that came nonstop from its body warned Rororo: it will die if it was hit again.
Even so— it ran.
Ran.
And ran.
It didn’t stop advancing nor stop its feet. The high temperature peeled the scales away, warping the skin underneath it and blood gushed out. Despite that, it still ran.
Unintelligent beasts would have definitely escaped, but Rororo didn’t.
Rororo was a type of monster called hydra.
There were all sorts of monsters, with those that surpass humans in intelligence, and those that were no different from animals. Rororo belonged to the latter.
For Rororo who was only as smart as a normal animal to continue advancing on the verge of death— towards Iguvua who was dealing such pain to it, it was incredible and hard to fathom.
In fact, even its enemy Iguvua was baffled, and suspected Rororo was being manipulated by magic.
But that was not so.
That’s right, that was not the answer.
Iguvua would probably never understand.
Rororo who only had the intelligence of a beast— it was running for the sake of family.
Rororo didn’t know its parents, though not because of hydras being the type of monster to abandon its offspring. Before it reached a certain age, it should have had lived with one of its parents to learn the way of survival through them. But why didn’t Rororo do so?
That was because Rororo was a deformed baby. Normal hydra would be born with eight heads, and that will increase as it grows older, up to the maximum of twelve heads.
But Rororo was born with just four heads, so its parents abandoned Rororo and left with its other siblings.
Although hydras become powerful creatures in their adulthood, it was only a matter of time before Rororo would have died in nature’s harsh environment without its parent’s protection during infancy.
If it wasn’t for the male lizardmen who happened to pass by and picked it up.
— And so, Rororo got a family that was its father, mother and close friend.
Rororo’s consciousness was about to fall apart from the pain when it thought about a question it had always pondered.
Why was its body so big? Why did it have so many heads?
It thought about this when it looked at its foster parent. And Rororo held a belief from old conclusion.