78 – 78. Are We Taking This Away?

Light and darkness share a few interesting similarities. One of them being that both are obscured by something stronger or deeper than themselves.

After that, Rica followed like a shadow.

Gripping the shadow that made all senses disappear and felt ominous just at the sight of it like a dagger.

The eerie abyss, like roots crawling over the body, enveloped Rica in the form of a shadow.

Radiating an unsettling aura, the two confronted the immobilized girls, Roxer and Beng, pointing their swords at them.

“Ha!”

In response, Roxer let out a sigh filled with various emotions.

He was worried that Rica, who had a strong tsundere vibe and even planted a fist-sized potato on his side, might stab Rica, who now had a blade against her.

Every time he saw Jane, the protagonist of the original work, who had a naturally hostile relationship with him, he wondered what would happen if she bullied him…

Now, he had let go of that worry and exchanged some trust, but then this happened.

“This insane game… We barely put together the best party members, and they just swallow them up like that?”

The only thing to blame for the unexpected situation was the insane difficulty spike.

“Jane?? W-why are you suddenly like this?”

“Rica? Don’t joke around…! It’s not fun, that kind of joke….”

Unable to believe the sudden possession of Rica and Jane, Camilla and Erin hesitated and took a step back.

Attempting to speak to them, clearly emanating hostility as if denying reality, but they were blocked by the tanker, Ciel, who stated that the two were seemingly under the control of a strange tree.

As they hesitated and prepared for battle, Roxer, with his unique gaze, stared intently at the tree and the possessed girls.

“… No matter how it seems to have come from the outside or whatever, it’s ultimately made up of vermilion and crimson threads, and blue lines with a metallic quality.”

The possessed girls by the tree were no different.

Their form and complexity were not of this world.

It was understandable since they had roamed the outer world and, for some reason, had fallen into the myths of the past.

Having inherited a trace of that lineage, they manifested as Misteltein, the Slayer of Gods.

The tree was nothing but a facade, transcending imagination.

It seemed flawless, so much so that it appeared to be filled to the brim, even in its minutiae.

In the tiny gaps were strange structures never seen before.

Even with layers upon layers of blue threads visible, the future was not in sight.

“This is driving me crazy. Damn it, whether it’s the tree or whatever, they all ganged up and managed to snatch Rica and Jane away….”

Facing the worst situation, Roxer, well aware of how strong the girls were as they faced the 6th Awakening while aligning with them, knew better than anyone.

Occasionally, he would break into a cold sweat at the thought of what would happen if the girls changed their minds and attacked.

Surely, facing a mentally unstable monster like Misteltein’s original form in a state of possession, even in an abnormal state, Roxer was clearly showing hostility.

“… Sigh….”

Roxer’s sigh, no, admiration, was faintly mixed with delight.

Sensing the imminent crisis, his skyrocketing heartbeat brought an exhilaration like never before.

His lips, like his skyrocketing heart rate, rose as if stained with madness.

Seeing the chilling smile that made the hairs on his skin stand on end, Ciel swallowed hard.

“I’m a bit scared in this situation too. Could it be that Roxer is even more so than me!?”

Thinking he was a Majohist like herself… No, thinking he enjoyed being a Majohist more than her, she assumed he had turned from an ally to an enemy.

Whether true or not, Roxer’s power condensed and the black response embedded in his heart was activated with a frenzied heartbeat.

Roxer’s gold and enemy territories gradually darkened.

The darkened pupils targeted Rica and Jane, who were in combat stance, their gazes consumed.

Roxer, looking at them and Mistein’s progeny in search of a way to restore the two to their original state.

“Hey!! Rica!! Jane!! I know everything you are hearing from inside!!!”

As he saw the shadows fiercely resisting the light, which seemed to originate from Rica and Jane, he shouted.

“If I lose control against you two, I might lose my life…!!!”

Simultaneously, a fiery blaze engulfed his black energy on the white blade he held.

By infusing energy into the blade completely, becoming one with it, his body prepared to act as a sword.

Like a madly sprinting engine, his heartbeat fluctuated, and his vision sharpened, allowing him to see things that were originally unseen.

The blue threads of time flowing like waves, as if visible.

The crimson and magenta spider threads felt sharp, changing shapes like breaking waves.

An unknown entity, and the main person who could be considered the strongest against that entity, engulfed by pure helplessness.

The fusion of his heartbeat addiction and the madness in his battle resulted in his power forcibly breaking through to a 5th-stage awakening.

However.

“Ugh!? My heart… is throbbing…!”

The intense pain rushed to his heart as his heartbeat surged too high.

Yet, the smile on his lips grew even more intense with madness.

A sensation like playing a game on the most difficult time attack mode.

The price was his life, and the reward, no one knew.

An irrational and unbearable situation, driving himself further into madness with pain as a catalyst, he shouted.

“If you don’t want to die, come out on your own!! Rica!! Jane!!”

As the words ended, Jane’s area, glowing with white light, covered the space menacingly, while Rica’s shadow engulfed the entire area.

Approaching at a speed that surpassed cognition, like a flickering light going on and off.

Mistein’s progeny, sensing Roxer’s mysterious power, judged it dangerous to delay time and thus went all out from the start.

Thanks to this, Roxer’s vision and mind seemed to be engulfed in white and burning black.

The three standing behind Roxer couldn’t even react.

Or more precisely, they were deploying defensive spells, like Siel’s all-encompassing defense, while enduring the enemy’s powerful attacks with their entire bodies.

But this was not intentional, and Camilla and Erin’s own defensive magic also activated in response.

However, the attack approaching faster than the activation speed.

Therefore, Roxer’s heartbeat accelerated even more. It would have been impossible for an ordinary human.

Thanks to the fusion of his power manipulating time and space residing in his heart, the condensed black fusion furnace.

‘Overclocking the heart…!’

With overclocking already applied to his body, he could overclock a specific part, his heart, once more.

Now, the blue threads, the crimson and magenta spider threads flowing over, appeared faintly blurry.

If his heart pushed too hard, everything might end just like that.

But if he couldn’t block the attacks of the two women engulfed before him, everything would end as is.

His painstakingly grown body would be blown away, and the painstakingly collected party might vanish in a blink.

Above all, now that his heartbeat had started vibrating, it felt like transcending something, like ascending to a different realm… something beyond the pleasure and thrill brought by the heartbeat addiction.

Roxer controlled each movement of his body with his power.

In a fleeting moment of a flashing light.

Jane’s longsword clashed with Roxer’s sword, the sound of colliding metallic sharpness barely reaching as Lika swung a dagger from behind Roxer.

Even though Roxer’s every move had been anticipated within Jane’s domain.

His muscles, joints infused with his strength, tore through Jane’s white flash-like domain with each movement.

Dodging Lika’s fierce strike from above by spinning his body.

It was a parry.

The endless exchange between the two, like a downpour of countless strikes, continued relentlessly.

Storming through, ripping apart their midst like lightning piercing fiercely.

To onlookers, it seemed like a continuous flash of light.

But within it, amidst the gradual perfecting of the parry, the grim sword strikes on Roxer’s body continued incessantly.

Though Lika and Jane had learned to forcibly align their parries in their overwhelmed state.

They were unaware that continuing like this might lead to Roxer’s death from minimal but excessive bleeding.

Being consumed by a sudden transcendental being, consciousness faded faintly.

“Darn it!!! Stop!!! Please stop!!!”

To prevent what should never arise from within, Lika’s overwhelmed body resisted internally to the point of movement becoming erratic.

“No…!!! If we continue like this, Roxer will…!!!”

Jane, too, fiercely resisted, momentarily stiffening her overwhelmed body.

Roxer, noticing this, grasped his blade in a fleeting moment before blood could flow.

At that moment, Roxer’s reaction was triggered by the “Hand of the Demon” he had confiscated from the evangelist of the cultists who attacked the tower of the double helix in his inventory…

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