His speed was so great that it was difficult to even track him with my eyes.
Even so, following the faint chill of my Danger Sense, I succeeded in sliding my longsword between the man's swinging arm and my own body.
I took the blow of his flame-wreathed arm on the flat of my blade.
Immediately after—BOOM!!
"Gah—!?"
"Takeo-kun!?"
I heard Hinata-san’s voice, which sounded like a scream.
With the momentum of someone hit by a truck, my entire body was blown backward and slammed into the corridor wall.
The impact was tremendous. Still, it wasn't quite as bad as when the Headshot Yakuza had kicked me. I had managed to kill some of the momentum by jumping back of my own accord.
However, I had no time to recover.
"—Die, kid."
Before I knew it, the middle-aged man was gripping a spear made of flames in his long arm.
He thrust it mercilessly toward me while I was still pinned against the wall.
"—!!"
I didn't have a second to spare to nurse my pain. I reflexively activated Fighting Spirit and leaped, rolling away from the spot.
I narrowly evaded the strike of the Flame Spear and moved back frantically, turning my gaze back toward the man.
The spot where I had been a moment ago—the wall of the underground passage—began to glow red-hot and melt into a sludge where the tip of the Flame Spear had struck.
The heat was absurd. Just how many degrees was that thing!?
The only saving grace was that the man's movements were still amateurish.
His attack power was high enough that a single direct hit would likely mean instant death, but the movements themselves, though fast, were monotonous. His targets were obvious, and it wasn't impossible to dodge them even now.
The problem was—
"Hah!!"
The flame-wreathed humanoid pulled out the Flame Spear and turned back toward me.
He looked like a demon. Before he could close the distance again, I swung my sword quickly.
I unleashed a full-power Flying Blade imbued with Berserk and Mighty Blade.
I fired the strike without caring if the man died. In this situation, I couldn't afford to worry about the seal on my Pleasure Killer title.
Having just turned around, the man couldn't defend against the Flying Blade.
It was a clean hit. A diagonal slash traced a line from his right shoulder to his lower left side. CRACK!! A loud sound, like something exploding, echoed through the passage.
The man's body swayed slightly.
But what had shattered was my Flying Blade.
The slash failed to leave even a single scratch on the Flame Armor enveloping his body.
"Was that... your full-power attack?"
The man's voice regained its composure.
I couldn't help but grimace, muttering a curse. "Damn it."
To land a blow with even higher attack power, I had no choice but to activate the second stage of Blood Vengeance and deliver a direct hit imbued with Mighty Blade. That would raise my Strength and allow me to land a strike with an increased damage multiplier from Sword Aura or Magic Sword.
However, I truly didn't think that would be enough to pierce the defense of that Flame Armor.
It was checkmate. I had no way to damage him right now.
I could try to hang on until his MP ran out. If he felt he was at a disadvantage, the man would likely run away like he had before, but...
He didn't seem to be in any rush to end the fight out of concern for his MP consumption. In other words, I had to assume his MP wasn't going to run out anytime soon.
And I didn't think the man, who was livid after having his right arm severed, would ever let me escape...
I was really in trouble. I might actually die.
"Fuhahahaha!! What's the matter? Is that all you've got, kid!?"
"Guh—!?"
With a whoosh!!, flames erupted from his back as he closed in at high speed, thrusting his Flame Spear.
I desperately avoided it and started running, never letting my feet stop for a second.
Cold sweat drenched my body. I had no margin for error.
Showing my back and running away was out of the question. Pulling too much distance was also pointless. No, it was actually worse.
Being chased by someone with flame jets was a nightmare. That last strike had been terrifyingly close. I didn't think I could dodge that many more times. Moreover, if I moved too far away, he might switch to long-range or area-of-effect fire magic.
Therefore, I maintained a distance where the man didn't feel the need to travel. At a range where the Flame Spear could just barely reach me, I goaded him into repeating simple spear thrusts.
"Fuhaha, fuhahahahaha!! What's wrong, kid!? You're doing nothing but running!! Is that it, after all that preaching you did to me!? Aren't you ashamed!? Huh!?"
Every time the man swung his spear while laughing gleefully, the tip scraped the floor, walls, and ceiling, leaving glowing red lines in its wake. An advertising display on the wall was sliced in two, and the ceiling lights shattered, plunging us into darkness.
To avoid the man's attacks, I rolled across the ground again and again.
While rolling pathetically but desperately—deliberately avoiding the spots that had gone dark—I gradually moved through the passage in the opposite direction of Hinata-san.
I was frantically fleeing to survive. My breath was getting ragged. I knew this was only buying time.
Still, I ran. I ran. I ran.
But that couldn't last forever.
"There's no place left to run, kid!"
I was finally cornered at the end of the long corridor.
It wasn't a dead end—it was just a corner. There were still places to flee, but I allowed myself to be backed into it.
"D-Damn it...!"
"Hmm? It's useless!!"
As a last resort, I attempted to slip past the man. But he swung his Flame Spear and fired a Flame Mass, blocking my path.
The fire exploded, and the impact blew me into the corner of the passage, where I rolled across the ground. In the process, the hilt of the Holy Sword slipped from my right hand. The blade rolled away with a clatter.
I couldn't escape.
There was no more room to run.
Realizing that, in a fit of desperation, I threw the objects I was holding in my hand toward the man.
I screamed in terror.
"U-Uwaaaaaaaa!! Don't come any closer!! Stay back!! Stay baaaaaack!!"
Sizzle! The moment the objects I threw hit the man's Flame Armor, they evaporated instantly.
It was unexpected that they turned to vapor without even shattering. The man mocked me, seemingly feeling no pain at all.
"Fu-fuhaha, fuhahahahaha!! Ah, how pathetic!! How pathetic you are, kid!!"
"S-Stay back!! Don't come over here!!"
I kept throwing things at the laughing man anyway. I repeatedly threw whatever I had in my hands. Once those were gone, I pulled things out of my pockets, desperately throwing them in an attempt to keep him from getting even a centimeter closer.
However, all of it was meaningless.
The projectiles evaporated in an instant without dealing even a single point of damage.
"Useless, useless!! Something like that won't even hurt as much as a mosquito bite!!"
"Uwa, uwaaaaa!! Get away from meeeee!!"
"Kid, because of you, I missed the chance to kill several Explorers. Your crime for making me feel the fear of death is heavy. And for taking my right arm. The most you can do to atone is to die miserably while crying and screaming...!!"
"Uwaaaaaaaa!! Nyaaaaaaaaa!! Chowaaaaaaaa!!"
"Now, I'm going to kill you... wait, there's too many, way too many!! How long are you going to keep throwing!? Just what are those!?"
"Hoeaaaaaaaaaa!!"
I pulled from my pocket and threw! Pulled from the other pocket and threw! I kept throwing and throwing, alternating between my right and left hands.
I was throwing fastballs faster than a professional pitcher, over and over again.
However, it was only logical that my "balls" would run out. Eventually, I had thrown every last one I had.
I stood there, panting heavily, my shoulders heaving.
"...It seems... you're finally finished...?"
"..."
"What was that...? Were you just picking up stones...? No, well, whatever. More importantly, you can't do anything else now. Kid, this time I'm really going to kil—l you?"
"Sigh..."
Just as I thought.
I was convinced that I was a genius after all.
My Intelligence stat being 6 must surely be some kind of mistake. Rather, I was so smart that my genius had caused the Intelligence stat to overflow, resulting in a 6.
As proof of that.
"Impossible...!?"
The man's gaze shifted away from me.
Countless particles of light appeared as if welling up from the space around us, and they began to move and aggregate in a flowing stream.
What was born from that condensed light was—
"Gii?"
A single Normal Goblin had popped.
But that was enough.
It was even more successful than I had anticipated.
"Don't tell me... what you were throwing just now were Magic Stones!?"
By the time the man realized and turned his gaze back to me, it was already too late.
I hooked my foot under the hilt of the Holy Sword that was rolling by my feet and kicked it up, sending the sword into the air.
By the time I grabbed the spinning hilt with my right hand, I had already finished activating Berserk and Fighting Spirit.
Then, simultaneously with grabbing the sword, I activated my Water-attribute Magic Sword and Mighty Blade. Finally, I poured MP into the bracelets on both arms to reactivate the effects of Fleet-footed and Finesse. A translucent blue light quietly enveloped the blade, and—
"Goblin, I'm your opponent."
At the same moment I spoke, I activated Taunt, and all the preparations were complete.
―――――――――――――――― HP: 39 / 210 MP: 0 / 66 Strength: 374 (+264) Constitution: 320 (+220) Intelligence: 11 (+5) Spirit: 132 (+72) Agility: 355 (+254) Dexterity: 253 (+148) ――――――――――――――――
With the Goblin's aggro turned toward me, Goblin Genocider was activated.
Since my remaining HP had fallen below 20% after activating Mighty Blade, the second stage of Blood Vengeance was triggered.
In addition, I activated various other buff skills in parallel—and my stats became like this. (By the way, the fixed-value enhancement from the Bless buff had long since disappeared).
By the way, why were my stats no longer weakened?
The reason lay in the Magic Stones I had gathered while rolling across the floor.
Yes, they were the Magic Stones from the Armed Goblins that had appeared in Shinjuku Station and been exterminated by us Explorers.
Because it was an emergency where every second counted, no one had bothered to pick them up. Therefore, Magic Stones were rolling all over the station. I had simply gathered them while pathetically rolling on the floor to avoid the man's attacks, and then thrown them at him when I was cornered at the turn.
The Magic Stones that had evaporated due to the man's flames had dispersed the magical power they contained into the air.
The man had said it himself, hadn't he?
Things like, "Comrades on the surface are doing Magic Essence Dispersion Activity," or "Breaking Magic Stones dropped by the Floor 20 boss to make monsters pop."
And come to think of it, the reason I kept leaving Magic Stones in the Monster Rooms was precisely because it dispersed Magic Essence into the room.
In short.
The surface becoming like a dungeon and monsters popping was the result of the man and his associates dispersing Magic Essence.
If the weakening of stats and the cessation of Goblin repops were the result of the dispersed Magic Essence thinning over time, then it all made sense.
If that were the case, then by replenishing the thin Magic Essence in the atmosphere myself, the weakening of my stats should be mitigated...
I had taken a gamble on that theory, and it had worked out better than expected.
The weakening was completely lifted, and even a Goblin—albeit only one—had popped for me.
That said, the number of Magic Stones I "used" was only a few dozen. I didn't know how many Magic Stones the man and his associates had used to dungeonize the surface... but it seemed that Magic Essence dispersed quickly. In that case, I couldn't expect this state to last very long.
This was likely temporary. Maybe it would last for a minute. No, this was an open corridor. Perhaps the Magic Essence would disperse in just a few dozen seconds.
That was why I had to settle this instantly.
"Yo—you—!?"
"――――"
Using my rapidly increased stats to their fullest, I stepped into the man's range in a flash.
Ah, just as I thought. The man's physical abilities were higher than mine when I was weakened, but lower than mine when I was at full strength. He completely failed to track my movements.
"Goh—!!?"
First, one strike.
A diagonal slash with Magic Sword imbued with the Water attribute and Mighty Blade.
The Flame Armor was sliced open along the line of the slash, and the man's body was cut beneath it.
But the slash was shallow. A good amount of the damage had been absorbed by the armor.
"――――"
It was within expectations. Without stopping my movements for even a fraction of a second, I moved to the next action.
Raising the sword I had swung down, I imbued it with Mighty Blade again and swung down. There were still a few seconds left before the Magic Sword effect disappeared. That was enough. A reverse diagonal slash. This time, I sliced through the man's body even deeper than before.
"Gii!?"
An 'X' was carved into the Flame Armor, and the hole in the armor expanded due to the aftereffects of the slash.
Like flames being blown and scattered by the wind, the armor could no longer be maintained and vanished, peeling away from the man's body.
Thank goodness.
If the Flame Armor hadn't vanished, I really would have had no choice but to deliver a finishing blow to the man's life.
In the midst of the split-second exchange, I felt a slight sense of relief... and let go of the sword's hilt.
Taking one more step forward, I clenched my right fist tight.
"Oooooooooooh!! Go to sleep!!!"
Directly into the man's face, now exposed after the armor was blown away.
I delivered a full-power right hook on a trajectory that struck his chin from the side.
I felt a destructive sensation, as if something had shattered in the man's jaw. Having his head shaken by a massive force starting from his chin—the man’s eyes rolled back... and thud, he fell flat on his back.
"Haa... haa..."
While panting, I carefully checked his condition. The man was unconscious. He showed no signs of moving.
Without a doubt, I had won this time. And I had done it without taking his life.
When I looked at my status screen, I saw that I only had 2 HP remaining.
It was the price for getting close to the Flame Armor, even for a short time. Just like his Flame Sword, my HP was shaved down just by proximity.
It had been a much closer victory than I'd realized.
"Gugya!!"
"Ah, crap!?"
Suddenly, a goblin's voice came from behind.
I’d forgotten there was still a goblin left. I hurriedly turned around to see it clutching a club and running toward me—
"Gogya!?"
Immediately after, its head was smashed by a blow from behind.
"Takeo-kun, are you okay!?"
"Hinata-san."
The one who defeated the goblin was Hinata-san, clutching the Guardian's Holy Staff.
I knew she hadn't run away even though I told her to... but Hinata-san was something else. It seemed she had become strong enough to kill a Normal Goblin in one shot just by giving it a thwack with her staff.
She was quite a high level now, after all.
"You saved me."
"No. So... what about that man...?"
"He's alive. I managed to knock him out."
"I see, that's a relief...!!"
Hinata-san let out a long sigh of relief.
I didn't know what was happening with the rest of the Shinjuku Dungeon or the Association yet, but I could consider the commotion at Shinjuku Station to be over for now.
At the very least, our part in this was finished.
"Hinata-san, let's hand the man over to the Association."
"Yeah, let's."
We dragged the unconscious man and returned to the Association branch inside the station.
Fortunately, it seemed that the monster spawning had stopped inside the Association as well, and the monsters had stopped overflowing from the dungeon.
Relieved, Hinata-san and I watched the entire commotion come to a temporary end, though it left deep scars on modern society.
A few days later.
For some reason, Hinata-san had gained the Saint title.