Chapter 6: Holy Knight
At night, Shu goes to the graveyard to hunt undead monsters as usual. He had started thinking about finding a more efficient hunting ground, now that his magic practice was taking shape.
During the day, he had gathered some information while hiding in the ground and listening to people's conversations. Apparently, graveyards also buried dead magic-wielders from battles, and he could obtain information about where they died. From there, he could predict the strength of the monsters in the area and use it as a reference for his destination.
(Well, that's after it's completed anyway.)
Shu starts looking for prey to gather magical power. He hopes to encounter a middle-class or even higher class monster, but he doesn't expect to find one as they are rare.
After hunting a few undead monsters, he suddenly felt a strange sensation.
(Did something just pass through?)
He felt something like a wave of magic energy pass by at high speed. It wasn't a sensation he could dismiss as just his imagination, so he looked around.
But there was nothing there.
(What was that?)
Then he felt the strange sensation again.
He felt magic energy the moment he tilted his head. There was no doubt that something was being done to him.
Thinking this, Shu became alert and began paying attention to magic detection. He relied on the stars and moonlight to see far away and looked for anything suspicious.
Then he quickly found it.
(Is that a lantern light? Humans at this time? Why?)
No one wants to come to the graveyard at night when monsters appear, except for occasional magic-wielding hunters. And Shu knew that the hunters had come here yesterday and would not come two days in a row.
So Shu felt suspicious.
(Should I run just in case?)
The lantern light approached him.
Shu started moving away from it.
But then he felt the strange sensation for the third time. At the same time, the lantern light began to move towards him. Shu began to realize the true nature of the strange sensation.
(Could it be magic or magic-wielding that can detect me? If so, it's clumsy.)
I don't know how far they can sense, but they won't be able to escape like this.
I also thought about using a large-scale magic circle as a bluff, but I excluded it from my thoughts because it's not a hand I can play more than once.
Judging from the number of lanterns, there are six of them.
In terms of numbers, the odds are against me.
And the opponents are not monsters but wise humans.
(...Can I intercept them with that?)
If I'm lucky, I can win in an instant.
If I'm unlucky, I'll be defeated instead.
It's a delicate situation.
However, I don't think I can escape from six humans who are faster than nightmares and spirits. Based on my estimate, the six humans are approaching at a speed like a car. In the end, it's just a difference between being caught up quickly or slowly.
Shu decided to prepare himself and wait.
(Well, I don't just plan to wait for free. Should I prepare?)
My ideal is to use a surprise magic attack to capture them all at once.
The next best thing is to kill four or more of them.
(They're here.)
Six humans surrounded Shu, who was floating in the air. Each of them had something like a lantern hanging from their waist. To be honest, it's a light made of magical elements, not a lantern, but Shu didn't have the knowledge to distinguish them, so he ignored it.
Anyway, one of the people surrounding Shu took out a spear from nowhere and prepared himself.
"Is this it?"
"Yes, Captain Zeku. This evil spirit, Lice, is the strongest monster in the graveyard. There's no mistake in my detection."
"The unique individual found in the dark forest was a high-level spirit, High Ghost. Did it evolve?"
Evil spirit Lice and nightmare spirit Phantom have the same appearance, so the humans seem to have mistaken them. However, that was not important to Shu.
He immediately deployed the magic he had prepared and launched a surprise attack.
(Activate, "Air-cutting Divider Line.")
The magic circle expanded rapidly with Shu at the center. The six humans were also included in the range, and only the man named Zeku was able to react quickly.
He reflexively strengthened his body and jumped back.
However, it was just a bad feeling, and his action was the correct one.
"Ah!"
"Gahaha..."
"Ugh...aahhh!"
"Go...huff."
"Wha...haah..."
The five people left behind in the magic circle were instantly split in half, both top and bottom.
This magic, the "Divide Line of the Sky-Slashing Domain," was an application of disassembly magic. The main mechanism was to expand the magical domain with the thickness of one atom and decompose the molecular bonds to cut the target.
The important thing here is to activate magic inside the body of a living being.
To tell the truth, when a magical effect is activated inside a living being that possesses magic power, the effect is canceled out by the magic power possessed by the target, which disturbs it.
So the magic "Life Drain" was combined.
Only the part with the thickness of one atom that was expanded as a dividing area was sucked up with "Life Drain." If the magic power is at the level of one atom, it can be sucked up in an instant. At that moment, the disassembly magic is activated, and the "Divide Line of the Sky-Slashing Domain" is completed.
The disadvantages are that it can only be activated for an instant and that it consumes a lot of magical power.
(I couldn't take out just one person. Did they notice?)
There is no problem with the magical power that was consumed. By defeating the five humans, magical power was absorbed and the amount surpassed what they had before. It seems that the human possessed a considerable amount of magical power.
That was lucky.
(They probably saw through the "Divide Line of the Sky-Slashing Domain.")
Another weakness of this magic is that it can be seen through magical power detection. Since it consumes a lot of magical power just before activation, it can be avoided reflexively.
Furthermore, it does not work on opponents who possess magical power that is too strong for even the magic in the area with the thickness of one atom to be absorbed by "Soul Siphon."
(There is only one person left to escape...but it doesn't seem possible.)
I thought of escaping since the goal had been achieved, but a man named Zec seemed to have no intention of letting them go. Although he was briefly stunned when his companions were instantly killed, he quickly recovered and had a furious expression.
"You...damn you!"
(This guy has more magical power than me right now.)
Zec raises his spear with a roar of anger.
Then it glows white and splits into countless pieces, floating up in large numbers. If it were to rain down like that, it would be quite dangerous.
"I, the holy knight Zec Ballat, will surely take revenge on my fellow brethren! Be prepared, evil spirit Reis!"
Fortunately, he had an abundance of magical power.
Shu drew an acceleration magic circle and manipulated vectors. This was also a complete surprise attack, so it would only work once. To ensure success, he didn't just rely on reflexes, but also changed the direction.
If he made the value of the momentum negative, he could reflect it.
However, changing the direction of the vector requires a mathematical element called rotation. He incorporated a three-dimensional rotation matrix and created a magic circle that changed only the direction of the vector without changing its magnitude. It was also advanced magic for Shu.
(Just in time!)
Several split spears passed through the magic circle deployed like a shield and pierced Shu's body. They were supposed to be physically invalid, but these spears were manifested by Zek's magic equipment. Unfortunately, they were not pure physical attacks but magic-equipped attacks.
The main ability of this weapon-type magic equipment was to split and manipulate spears, and if a Phantom nightmare spirit were hit by its strafing, it would be finished. Even after receiving a few hits, Shu had large holes in his body.
(Acceleration magic circle, activate!)
Fortunately, he didn't feel any pain because he was a spirit.
The magic circle was activated a little late, and the split spears raining down from above were repelled. Then, they changed direction and rushed towards Zek.
"What the...? Wha...!"
That was the last voice he raised, and then he was instantly reduced to mincemeat, and Zek died.
Once again, Shu accumulated a large amount of magical power.
He had stolen a considerable amount of magical power from Zek, who was an A-ranked magic user and even a Holy Knight. The five people earlier were B-ranked magic users, so even if they were combined, they were only equivalent to Zek.
In other words, the magical power obtained this time was equivalent to that of two A-ranked magic users.
The injured spirit was repaired in an instant, and Shu evolved. He underwent a significant evolution from a middle-mid to a high-greater level, and his appearance also changed significantly.
The current Shu was not only a translucent spirit body but could also materialize.
(Phew... I was a little surprised by the sudden influx of magical power, but thanks to that, I evolved.)
The race Shu had reached was Elemental Spirit.
It was a rare and rare monster even among spirit types. At the high-greater class, it would generally require a B-ranked magic user to barely defeat them. However, it did not apply to Shu, who used wisdom to perform magic.
Even though it was a surprise attack, he had still defeated an A-ranked magic user.
However, if Zek had a different type of magical armor that wasn't weapon-based, or if he was the type to fight simply by swinging instead of shooting a spear, the result would have been different.
This time the compatibility was good.
(Is it Saint Knight Zek? This will cause a commotion tomorrow. Let's move up the schedule and escape quickly. We might be sent a stronger guy next time. We only won today by chance.)
Even Shu felt nervous.
Although he didn't have a body to feel nervous, he felt a sudden relief in his tense mind.
(Let's go to the next destination. Wasn't it the Elderah Forest? Let's be quiet for a while.)
Although he felt like he wanted to experience a physical body after a long time, it was convenient to move in spirit form.
Shu floated and headed south to the Elderah Forest.
***
The next day, Saint Knight Zek and his unit were found dead. In particular, Saint Knight Zek was so crushed that his original form couldn't be seen, and those who inspected the bodies frowned.
The other five knights who were his subordinates were also strange corpses.
Their bodies had been cut so cleanly with an extremely sharp blade that they were bisected. It was quite difficult to cut a human body so cleanly, so the bodies were judged to be abnormal.
"May the souls of Saint Knight Zek Barat and his subordinates return to your presence."
The bishop of the demon-worshipping cult offered a prayer and sent the souls of the fallen knights to the god of magical armor, El Magia. Of course, it is unclear whether such a god really exists, but at least he believed in its existence.
And the bishop shed tears and whispered as he prayed to God.
"Oh, God. Why did you take him away?"
However, God did not respond.
But that was all he could say.
For the bishop, Saint Knight Zek was also a friend.
"I should have placed more importance on the Prophecy of the Holy Grinia. If I had dispatched not only him but also more knights, it might have been different..."
He hated the demons.
He hated the demon from the prophecy that killed Zek.
The bishop felt a surge of black emotion. However, the object of his hatred was the demon. It was not an entity that should be given mercy, so that black emotion did not contradict his doctrine.
"Call for reinforcements and search the cemetery. We will definitely get revenge. Zek."
Without knowing that Shu, who was already the culprit, was gone, the bishop made his decision.