The Giant Cicada, a full twenty meters in length, had its torso bisected clean in two. The upper half was blown away by Set's strike, while the lower half collapsed onto the ground.
Seeing that, Rei finally deactivated the Flame Emperor's Crimson Armor. Set likewise killed the recoil from its Power Crush by landing on the ground, then came running toward Rei.
"Gruuu!"
Set pressed its face against Rei, purring happily. Rei stroked its head with the hand not holding Death Scythe.
"You pulled us through."
At those words of praise, Set purred even louder, plainly showing its joy.
A few minutes passed like that. Then, before he knew it, the Light Sphere came descending slowly toward Rei and his group.
Its flickering was slow—so slow it almost looked as though it was hesitating to approach Rei.
Tilting his head at the Light Sphere's behavior, Rei wondered why it wouldn't come closer.
But... that was only natural.
The Light Sphere was, at its core, the will of the World Tree—and the World Tree was, needless to say, a tree.
And trees naturally feared fire.
Being called the World Tree, the World Tree—the entity that could be called the Light Sphere's true body—possessed strong fire resistance against an ordinary bonfire, or even the flames unleashed by a mage.
Even for such a Light Sphere, the Flame Emperor's Crimson Armor that Rei had worn just moments ago was on an entirely different level.
An enormous quantity of magic power had been transformed into fire magic by Rei's aptitude, condensed to the point of becoming visible.
As if it were the very incarnation of fire.
Even for a tree called the World Tree, no matter how strong its fire resistance, there were limits.
Rei's Flame Emperor's Crimson Armor had far exceeded those limits.
That was why the Light Sphere wanted to approach Rei but couldn't help hesitating.
If he could communicate with the Light Sphere, Rei might have understood the circumstances. Unfortunately, he had no such ability.
He could only hold the vague impression that the Light Sphere simply wouldn't come near him.
"Hey, what's wrong? Did something happen?"
When Rei called out, the Light Sphere slowly drew closer... and then, as if its earlier behavior had been a lie, it flickered violently.
At the same time, sensing something moving behind him, Rei leapt away from that spot almost reflexively.
Along with Rei, Set sprang sideways on all four legs.
Once clear of the area, Rei turned his gaze toward the presence and was stunned to see the Giant Cicada's upper body there. His eyes went wide.
"What—!?"
Its upper body had been severed, and on top of that, it had taken Set's Power Crush and been blown flying from the point of severance.
And yet, for some reason, the Giant Cicada moved on its upper body alone and lunged at Rei.
Still, that attack appeared to have been its truly final burst of strength. The Giant Cicada's upper body collapsed onto the ground and did not so much as twitch.
"...Is it really dead this time?"
Having been lunged at by the upper body alone once already, Rei kept Death Scythe at the ready and stayed on guard.
After several seconds, then ten-odd seconds, then tens of seconds passed with no movement from the Giant Cicada, he finally lowered his stance.
"Gruuru?"
Are you okay? —that was what Set seemed to ask with its purr. Rei nodded to signal he was fine and gently patted it.
Beside Rei, the Light Sphere—which until moments ago had been hesitating over whether to approach him—had drawn as close as it had been before the battle with the Giant Cicada began.
Rei glanced at the Light Sphere but said nothing further. Instead, he picked up a stone lying nearby.
To confirm whether the Giant Cicada was alive or dead, he threw the stone lightly... yet at a speed that would undoubtedly hurt if it connected.
The stone struck home, and a deeply unpleasant sound—the sound of stone sinking into flesh—rang out across the area.
Even after being struck by a stone at a speed that produced such a sound, the Giant Cicada's upper body did not move even slightly.
Well, the impact of the stone had jostled it somewhat, but it was clear that this movement was not the Giant Cicada's own will.
"It really does seem to be dead. ...I'm going to go take a look. Set, cover me just in case."
"Guruuru."
When Rei told Set that and stepped forward with Death Scythe at the ready, the Light Sphere moved into his path and flickered.
As if asking, What about me? Rei thought for a moment, then spoke.
"You stay on standby near Set. If that Giant Cicada was a monster that grew by feeding on your magic power and tree sap, it would be the worst possible matchup for you."
At Rei's explanation, the Light Sphere flickered a few times, then obediently headed toward Set's side.
It understood that Rei was worried about its safety and had told it to stay near Set.
Rei glanced at the Light Sphere by Set, then once again approached the Giant Cicada.
Closing the distance with the Giant Cicada—more precisely, with the Giant Cicada's upper body—while staying ready to respond instantly if anything happened. Still seeing no movement from the creature, he next prodded at it several times with Death Scythe's pommel.
Still no reaction whatsoever. He poked a little harder... and eventually understood that it was truly dead.
"I never imagined it would still be alive even after being cut clean in half. I remember seeing on TV or somewhere that insects don't have a sense of pain... is that why? No, but I've fought insect-type monsters before, and there were some that clearly felt pain."
Tilting his head, he set about examining the Giant Cicada's corpse once more.
The first thing Rei took interest in was, naturally, the Giant Cicada's magic stone.
But at a total length of twenty meters... even bisected at the torso and reduced to half, there was no way he could extract the magic stone from a ten-meter torso right away.
Well, strictly speaking, if he entered the body through the severed surface, he could probably retrieve the magic stone. But that would mean drenching his entire body in the Giant Cicada's fluids, and Rei wanted to avoid that situation if at all possible.
Alternatively, he could consider slicing the upper body open with Death Scythe... but that would undoubtedly take time.
In the end, Rei set the magic stone aside for later and shifted his interest to the legs.
Some had been severed by a Death Scythe strike infused with the Flame Emperor's Crimson Armor, but the Giant Cicada's legs originally numbered ten in total, left and right combined.
Since the body had been bisected, nearly half of the legs were on the lower half. Even so, the upper body still had legs attached.
"These legs... they made a metallic sound when they caught Death Scythe's blade, didn't they."
Recalling the battle at the World Tree, Rei fixed his gaze steadily on the tips of the Giant Cicada's legs.
The tips were not so much sharp blades as needle-like points, and in the center of each, there was something like a hole.
What crossed Rei's mind upon seeing that was the image of the creature clinging to the World Tree's trunk, draining sap and magic power from it.
In other words, the Giant Cicada's legs served as weapons while simultaneously fulfilling the role of a mouth.
"For all that, it does have a proper mouth on its face, though."
He touched the tip of a leg. What came back was a hard, rigid sensation... much like metal.
It had deflected a strike from Rei's Death Scythe, so it undoubtedly possessed considerable hardness.
Which meant it was also excellent material for crafting weapons.
Still, the hole in the center is a problem... If it were just a sharp needle-like shape, it could probably be used as a weapon as-is.
As Rei pondered this while touching one of the Giant Cicada's legs, he suddenly sensed the presence of someone approaching.
When he turned his gaze in that direction, there were three Dark Elves.
Seeing them, Rei recalled that while he was fighting the Giant Cicada in the sky, several people had been heading toward the clearing created by the Light Sphere—by the World Tree.
They were there, come to think of it...
Given that it had been a fiercely hectic battle, Rei had completely forgotten about the matter. He spoke to the three Dark Elves approaching nervously.
"What's up?"
His voice carried a somewhat light, casual tone, which seemed to ease their tension. One of them hurriedly opened her mouth.
"This isn't the time for 'what's up'! What in the world is this clearing! Ugh, geez. I don't know what method you used, but destroying the forest like this..."
The Dark Elf Woman, apparently the leader of the trio, approached as she said that.
"Besides, that huge thing—isn't that the monster that was flying freely through the forest sky just now! It looked like it was fighting your griffon, Rei-san... but something like that suddenly plummeting to the ground, of course we'd come to check on the situation!"
At their leader's words, the other two Dark Elf Guards nodded in agreement.
"If you pull something like destroying the forest... in the worst case, it could lead to a fight with everyone at the settlement, you know!?"
Noticing that her words carried a tone of genuine concern for him, Rei was slightly surprised.
I guess I am appreciated, after all.
Rei found it unexpected, but he had treated the World Tree at the Dark Elf settlement and successfully found and rescued the four missing children.
To the Dark Elves, Rei was a benefactor.
They absolutely did not want to commit the ungrateful act of fighting such a benefactor—and above all, they didn't think they could win.
To the Dark Elf Woman, who was wondering how to explain this to the people of the settlement, Rei spoke in a reassuring manner.
"It's fine. The forest wasn't destroyed."
"Huh? What are you talking about? It's clearly a clearing right here, isn't it? You can't just gloss that over..."
The Dark Elf Woman told him that with a hint of exasperation, and the other two Dark Elf Guards nodded as well.
However... toward those three, Rei's gaze was directed at the trees beyond the clearing.
The Dark Elves followed Rei's gaze, then turned their eyes back to Rei with expressions that said they had no idea what he was trying to do.
Thinking about it normally, I wouldn't be convinced either if someone told me the forest—and only a part of it—had moved. ...How did they really do it? The roots should have been firmly in the ground...
It was an utterly absurd event no matter how he looked at it. But the fact that Rei hadn't realized his and Set's very existence could be called unreasonable without being out of place was very much like him.
"If you absolutely can't believe what I'm saying... well, why don't you try going outside the forest once. If you do, I think you'll see that the forest itself has grown larger by the amount of this clearing."
For a moment, Rei wondered whether, given the forest's shape had been distorted, the Protective Barrier covering the settlement would be fine—and what was happening to the Labyrinth Barrier. But in a land where magic and the like existed, and given that the one who had done this was the World Tree...
He reached the conclusion that worrying about such things was a waste of effort.
"The forest... grew larger by the amount of this clearing?"
Even for Dark Elves who lived alongside the World Tree, the words that came out of Rei's mouth were unexpected and something they could hardly believe.
But the reason they still wanted to believe was that Rei had the proven track record of fully restoring the World Tree, even if temporarily, and above all, the Giant Cicada's corpse spread out before their eyes lent powerful persuasion.
A person with this much power wouldn't tell a lie that could be exposed with a simple investigation.
"Right now, the settlement is more important than the forest, isn't it? When you headed toward this clearing, the battle with the monsters was still ongoing, right? Are you sure you don't need to go back?"
"! R-right. We got so caught up in the sight... but first, it's fine to think there's no danger in this clearing, right?"
"Since I didn't create it, I can't guarantee absolute safety, but I can only say it's probably fine."
Saying that, Rei touched the Giant Cicada's upper and lower halves and stored them in the Misty Ring, then called Set and mounted its back.
"Ah, wait! What are we supposed to do—?"
If possible, she wanted them to take her group along too. The Dark Elf Woman conveyed that without words, and Rei shook his head atop Set's back.
"Sorry, but that's impossible. Set can only carry me or... at most a child, even if it tries its hardest. You clearly weigh more than a child, don't you?"
Though not as much as Marina, the Dark Elf Woman had a fairly sizable chest.
She was also taller than Rei, and there was no way her weight could be called comparable to a child's.
"So sorry, but you'll have to make your way back on your own. But... I think I can probably do something about the monsters, so don't worry."
"Eh?"
Just as when he had spoken about the clearing, the Dark Elf Woman wore an expression that said she had no idea what he was talking about. Paying that no mind, Rei lightly tapped Set on the neck.
As always, Set sensed Rei's intent and, with a few running steps, bounded up into the sky.
The ground receded in the blink of an eye... and in a matter of minutes, they arrived at the settlement.
"Set, do it."
"Guruu."
Letting out a small purr... and then circling the area around the settlement, Set cried out high, higher.
It was not King's Intimidation. It was purely to show—to declare to the other monsters—that Set, a griffon, was here.
"Gruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun!"
Set's cry reached every monster in the vicinity of the settlement, and upon understanding that a griffon was near them, they fled at full speed in an instant.