Midnight.
A full moon hung in the sky, shedding bright light over the grassland.
The wind was not particularly strong — truly an ideal environment for a night raid.
Bathing in the pouring moonlight, Rei called out to Zai and the others.
"The Dragonias seem to have gone to sleep, so it's about time we make our move. If I use magic from here, there's a high chance they'll come our way. That would cause all sorts of problems."
At Rei's words, Zai and the others wore expressions of bitter frustration.
It wasn't that they felt frustrated toward Rei — rather, it was proof of their frustration at their own lack of strength, which had forced him to say such things.
...In truth, there was hardly anyone who could fight a Dragonias head-on in a one-on-one battle.
Even among those chosen from the settlement's strongest, Zai and Dratt were only barely able to hold their own.
And even then, "able to fight" didn't necessarily mean they could win.
With the inherent difference in physical abilities between the species — and comparing the Dragonias, who were ruled by hunger and would kill and devour their opponent regardless of whatever damage they sustained, to the Centaurs, who had their own mental fragilities — fighting head-on inevitably put the Centaurs at a disadvantage.
Considering those circumstances, they had no choice but to obey Rei's words. That was the honest truth.
Rei could sense the Centaurs' feelings as well.
The Centaurs were a proud race to begin with.
Having Rei defeat an enemy they could do nothing about on their own naturally left them with feelings about their own inadequacy.
...Even so, when it came to choosing between their pride and the settlement's safety, Zai and Dratt's positions left them no option but to choose the latter.
They knew that. They had come this far fully understanding everything... but whether they had no feelings about Rei's words at all — of course they did.
Then again, in the current situation, saying anything would be meaningless.
If they had trained more, grown stronger, and reached the point where they could defeat Dragonias on their own, then it would be a different story.
"Understood. So we wait at a distance and attack the Dragonias that survive your magic, right?"
Suppressing the emotions within him, Zai asked Rei.
Rei nodded while stroking Set.
"That's right. But... honestly, at that scale, even if the flames deal damage, there will likely be some we can't finish off. I'd want you to prioritize those."
"Got it. Leave that to us."
Rei's words implicitly meant that they couldn't defeat the red-scaled Dragonias that would withstand his magic, so they should only target Dragonias that had taken near-fatal damage. Zai nodded obediently.
He understood that at their current level of strength, being told such things was only natural.
...Though Dratt and a few others wore frustrated expressions.
"Alright, then we'll begin operations. ...I'm sure there's no need to worry, but don't do anything reckless like rushing at the enemy in a bid for glory, alright?"
He said it as a precaution.
The Centaurs knew the strength of the Dragonias better than Rei did, so he didn't think there was much need to worry.
Even so, he gave the warning just in case.
"We know. More importantly, hurry up."
Prompted by Zai, Rei called out to Set, who had been lying down, and climbed onto his back.
Rather than flying, Set ran along the ground, moving away from where Zai and the others were... and eventually, after about five minutes at Set's pace, he stopped.
"Alright, Set. What I'm about to create is the Fire Whirlwind I've used a few times before."
"Gruu!"
Set rumbled as if to say he understood.
Stroking Set, Rei considered whether he should create the Fire Whirlwind here.
A Fire Whirlwind suddenly appearing inside their stronghold would certainly surprise the Dragonias.
But it was currently the middle of the night, and most of them should be asleep.
...There was a question of whether they could even sleep while dominated by hunger, but from what he could see from a distance, most of the Dragonias were unmistakably sleeping.
(Tens of thousands... huh. I haven't confirmed it precisely, but that's probably about how many there are.)
Dragonias, each one possessing enough combat power that it took a large number of Centaurs to stand against it — tens of thousands of them.
If this fighting force went all out, Rei felt it wouldn't be strange if not just this grassland but this entire world was devoured. Yet in reality, nothing of that scale had happened.
There seemed to be various reasons and circumstances behind that, but regardless, what Rei had to do remained the same.
(Right. Since there are few elements that will confuse the enemy, it's probably better to create the Fire Whirlwind here and move it from there. I can't control it exactly as I want, but the Centaurs should be able to flee without issue... I'll believe that.)
Having made that decision, he took Death Scythe out of his Misty Ring and looked at Set once more.
"Let's go."
"Gruu."
After confirming Set's rumble, Rei chanted his incantation.
O flames, manifest your searing, scorching power as a vortex.
Flames compressed alongside that incantation.
He hurled those flames toward a spot some distance away.
Swirling Roaring Fire.
They landed about a hundred meters ahead, and a Flame Tornado was born.
"Gururururu!"
Beside Rei, Set used his Tornado skill with a cry, generating a tornado of wind.
The tornado was created at the same location as the Flame Tornado.
"Wind Hand."
With Death Scythe in hand, Rei next activated Wind Hand.
The moment the two tornadoes — the wind tornado and the Flame Tornado — merged, he extended a wind tentacle.
The Flame Tornado and the wind tornado.
The Flame Tornado created by Rei's magic had greater power.
Greater, yes — but countering that discrepancy was Wind Hand, Rei's skill.
The Wind Hand extending from Death Scythe fused the two together... and through Rei's mana, the merged wind-and-fire tornado — the Fire Whirlwind — grew explosively.
A Fire Whirlwind that slashed through everything with wind blades and incinerated all with flame.
"Whoa..."
The moment the Fire Whirlwind was born, a fierce blast of heat struck Rei and Set.
The Fire Whirlwind then began to move... right toward the Dragonias stronghold, exactly as Rei intended.
"Phew. ...Now then, how will they react? No, before that, there's something I need to do. Set, we're going up into the sky."
"Gruu."
Set had probably anticipated what Rei would say.
He quickly crouched, signaling Rei to get on.
Carrying Rei on his back, Set ran up into the sky with a few strides.
And... from above, the light of the Fire Whirlwind clearly illuminated the Dragonias stronghold.
Since the Dragonias were fundamentally dominated by hunger, they couldn't build houses or huts.
They had simply been lying on the ground sleeping, so even by the Fire Whirlwind's light, they were clearly visible.
Of course, the fact that a moon floated in a cloudless sky also helped, as did Rei and Set having Night Vision.
(They haven't noticed? ...Is it because they act on instinct? No, if they lived on instinct, they should be moving immediately.)
If they moved on instinct, Rei thought they would start moving the moment they sensed a threat to their lives, but the Dragonias' movements were sluggish.
Even so, he could see a few that had noticed the Fire Whirlwind's movement beginning to stir.
Regardless, the sluggish movements were undeniably fortunate for Rei.
Perhaps the Dragonias, with their lizard-like lower bodies and upper bodies resembling Lizardmen, simply couldn't move quickly upon waking — but for Rei, it was nothing but good fortune.
While all this was happening, the Fire Whirlwind engulfed the Dragonias.
First a few, then over a dozen... eventually dozens.
It swallowed Dragonias one after another, burning them to ash.
"And while I'm at it, this too."
Approaching the Fire Whirlwind, Rei began tossing out barrels he retrieved from his Misty Ring one after another.
Inside the barrels were items Rei had purchased cheaply from weapon shops and blacksmiths over time.
Inside were daggers and longswords with broken tips, along with various other blades.
Weapons abandoned by customers who no longer needed them, failed creations by blacksmiths... blade fragments collected for various reasons.
Those blade fragments were swallowed by the Fire Whirlwind.
They became sharp blades within the vortex, slicing through the Dragonias' bodies.
Or else, metal melted by the Fire Whirlwind's heat went flying and scorched the bodies of nearby Dragonias.
Even as this happened, the Fire Whirlwind gradually increased the damage it inflicted.
As if erased by an eraser, nothing remained in the path it had passed through.
"Yeah, even the Dragonias with red scales are taking quite a bit of damage after all."
The red-scaled Dragonias were indeed not burned by the Fire Whirlwind's flames.
But just because they were unharmed by the fire didn't mean they emerged unscathed from everything else.
Their bodies were sliced apart by the blade fragments Rei had thrown, or they were swallowed by the Fire Whirlwind and violently collided with their companions' bodies, breaking bones from the impact... though not as much as the flames, they were still taking significant damage one after another.
However, given the sheer number of Dragonias, while they were unquestionably taking heavy damage, it still wasn't enough to completely annihilate them as a whole.
"Set, pull away from the Fire Whirlwind a bit. I want to create a few more."
"Gruu?"
Is that okay? Set rumbled.
Rei nodded, indicating not to worry about it.
If the enemy to defeat were humans, it wasn't certain that multiple Fire Whirlwinds would be necessary... but there still shouldn't have been much need to worry.
But this time was different.
For one thing, the Dragonias themselves possessed strength that couldn't even be compared to ordinary humans.
He was currently killing them at a considerable rate, but even among those who had taken damage that would kill any normal human, there were still Dragonias surviving. ...Naturally, they had taken considerable damage.
But the ones remaining were only the red-scaled Dragonias that could withstand the fire — all the others had died from the flames.
However... what would happen if the red-scaled Dragonias that were barely surviving now were caught in the Fire Whirlwind again?
That was obvious without needing to think about it.
"...I'm a bit tired, as expected."
Releasing a breath, Rei gazed down at the ground from Set's back.
The number of Fire Whirlwinds currently rampaging down there... was ten.
A full ten tornadoes clad in flame, laden with metal fragments, were surging back and forth everywhere.
Touch them and die.
Approach them and die from the heat.
Such Fire Whirlwinds existed in massive numbers, swirling about.
On top of that, for reasons unknown even to Rei who had created them, when the Fire Whirlwinds collided with each other, they didn't fuse — instead, they repelled each other.
Like spinning tops bouncing off one another.
The Dragonias had already shaken off their just-woken state and were in a panic.
Naturally. With ten Fire Whirlwinds, there was nowhere they could escape to.
"Maybe it's because they're ruled by hunger, but for some reason they show no signs of fleeing beyond a certain range. ...Is it really hunger?"
Ten Fire Whirlwinds.
That would be a threat of sheer despair for the Dragonias.
But even so, there were no walls around them, and they weren't being confined.
Thinking about it normally, the Dragonias on the outer edges of the area where the Fire Whirlwinds were rampaging could have escaped from there.
And yet, while they scrambled about within that range, not a single Dragonias tried to head beyond it.
What exactly was going on, and why?
He was curious, but right now, annihilating the Dragonias took priority over that curiosity.
"Might as well. Let's make it a bit livelier."
With Death Scythe in hand, Rei began chanting his incantation.
O flames, using my magic power as your source, become arrows that burn all to ash, and rain down ceaselessly, endlessly, like rain, like a storm.
Along with that incantation, numerous arrows made of fire — so many it would be tedious to count — materialized around Rei.
Their number: approximately five hundred.
Anyone who saw them would feel nothing but despair.
With those Flame Arrows floating around him... Rei activated the magic.
Shower of Flame Arrows!
With those words, five hundred Flame Arrows rained down upon the ground like a storm.