"Ghost, Sleep On My Chest!" V3 Chapter 5 - Fool's Showdown
Muck flowed from the shattered tank on the floor, clogged up, and pooled until it fell again. Orphen stood silently over the stream of water flowing toward the exit that Hirietta had opened. He just stared at the 'ghost' — Sammy — and carefully pondered.
(According to Phonogolos, there are four creatures in all...)
Perhaps a little surprised at his utter lack of response, Hirietta raised her voice a bit.
"Phonogolos has created numerous creatures. Animals and... some based on inanimate objects, but his ultimate goal, Orphen, was to transform human beings."
"So... This guy was the one to take the sacrificial arrow, huh?"
Orphen asked slowly as he pushed Majic behind him. Sammy was shaking in front of him, his contours almost breaking down, then pulling themselves together again.
The sound of hard shoes across the wet floor told him that Hirietta was approaching them. She quickly pulled her dagger from its sheath as she stood alongside Orphen.
"Yes. His name is Sammy. He used to live in this mansion as Phonogolos' assistant. Now he's the last creature that Phonogolos created. The last... and the worst."
"Does he still have the ability to form coherent thoughts?"
Orphen asked quietly, pointing his right hand menacingly at Sammy. He could see the expression on Hirietta's face twitch. She paused... then shook her head.
"There's no way. There's no body left, never mind a brain. He's gone mad long ago, and if he sees a sorcerer, he'll just attack them. To think Phonogolos — He's coming!"
As soon as she screamed, Orphen grabbed Majic by the shoulder and leapt away toward the shattered tank. Hirietta jumped back the same way, to the other side of the room. Orphen shuddered as the black fog passed between them at tremendous speed, keeping watch all the while. The fog — Sammy, cut through the air of the basement like a gale itself, slamming into the entrance wall and scattering into four separate parts. There was an explosion — leaving countless cracks in the wall, like it had been hit by a giant hammer.
With a sigh, Orphen mumbled.
"It looks like I don't have time to listen to the rest of this story, but we'll revisit that issue later."
But he didn't have time to even mutter about such things. Fwoo... The fog, which was spreading outwards, slowly gathered once again in the center of the room, and as soon as it took human form, it was gone.
He rushed them again!
"I release, the Sword of Light!"
Orphen screamed into the center of the oncoming fog. A vortex of light scattered heat waves, scattering Sammy's fog. Sammy wandered lazily like a school of fish in the sea... until, for the third time, he gathered in the center of the room.
"M-master...!"
Majic's trembling voice rattled behind him. Orphen looked at Sammy, and groaned in annoyance.
"You..."
"How do you beat him? A ghost like that...?"
"He's not a ghost. He's a combat creature."
"So, how do you kill a creature like that?"
"You ask a fish."
Orphen pointed to the dead Phonogolos lying on the floor. He was being sarcastic, but Majic seemed to take it seriously. He sighed and walked slowly toward the corpse.
"Watch out!"
Orphen suddenly noticed, and shoved Majic from behind. The small boy stumbled a few steps before falling onto the filthy water-soaked floor. He jumped up with a start and turned around with a reproachful look on his face.
"What was that for, Master?"
But Majic seemed to have noticed the same thing as he was about to yell out. From the floor where he'd been standing just a moment before, Kenkrim appeared, his short arm outstretched as far as it could go, the hand full of knives reaching out.
"Ack..."
Majic's eerie groan echoed in the stale air of the basement. Orphen quickly drew his arm up and shouted.
"I carry, the sword of the devil!"
As he shouted, he felt a weight in his hand, as if he were actually holding a sword. Without taking a breath, he brought the invisible sword down on the floor where Kenkrim had appeared. The sword roared through the air and pierced the concrete floor by several centimeters — but there was no response. The fat 'hand' slowly sank into the cracked floor and disappeared.
Then—
"Uwaaah?!"
Majic's scream rang out again. He looked up to see several black whip-like objects emerging from the dust chute in the ceiling. The whips moved in a creepy tentacle-like motion, then suddenly zoomed off and exploded at Majic's feet, gaining momentum. Schlllack! — the sound of tearing flesh, followed by a spray of blackish blood that stained the torn away shreds. The hit wasn't on Majic, but on the corpse of Phonogolos that was lying at his feet. The body of the giant fish was cut in two, splattering cold blood.
"I release—"
Orphen aimed at the hole in the dust chute and raised his right hand, but before he could complete the spell, the whips seemed to notice his presence and changed direction. They were now targeting him...
(I'll never make it!)
Orphen's mind frantically raced.
It would've been faster for them to cut off his head, rather than wait for the magic to be activated — but—
Skree!
His head rang at a sharp metallic sound erupting right next to him. Hirietta caught the tip of the black whip with the back of her knife. Orphen shouted out, looking away from her face — which had a strained smile.
"I release, the Sword of Light!"
Pow!
A bright white flash of light slung across the basement and shattered a corner of the ceiling, including the hole above the tank. The earth and sand crumbled away along with some rubble, and at the same time — a figure, apparently caught in the dust chute, fell to the floor with a heavy thud. The figure — in pitch black armor — rose up, covered in sediment that had mixed with the water still on the floor.
Hirietta gripped her knife and warned him.
"... That's Axel. Be careful. He's dangerous."
"What are you saying, all of them are dangerous!"
Majic came rushing towards him, screaming in a high-pitched voice.
(Well, I guess so—)
Orphen looked at Sammy, who'd already taken human form in the middle of the room.
"There's a 'Hand' that can come out from anywhere, at any time and the 'Armor' that can throw its whips and steel wires around at insane speeds. Finally, we've got the ghost, who isn't affected by heat or shockwaves. If you wanted to defeat them, you'd need a squad of skilled sorcerers. What could you possibly expect me to do?"
"Kill him."
Hirietta responded immediately.
"... What?"
"Don't tell me you can't. After all, you're supposed to be the most skilled assassin on this continent, aren't you? The black magic sorcerer Childman's treasured child — Krylancelo of the Tower of Fang!"
"?"
Majic didn't understand a word of what she was saying — he looked between the two of them, staring in amazement. Orphen glared at her, gritting his teeth. Hirietta, her knife held to the creatures, was on her guard, bracing herself for a counter-argument. Only — Orphen didn't argue.
Instead, he decided to mumble one final petty comment.
"... When I'm up against humans, I guess."
"Sammy was human."
"What would I know about that."
Orphen mumbled in a low, venomous tone. He was sick to his stomach. Sammy, the man in question, stood behind the 'armor' and watched them, while Axel, the jet-black 'armor', was standing up from the sand and rubble, standing at attention with no visible expression. He had no idea where the 'hand' was at, but he could sense its presence from all directions. If they continued their fight, there was no doubt that they'd eventually be driven to exhaustion and killed.
(The best move is to run away, but...)
Orphen wiped the sweat from his forehead, mumbling under his breath.
"Azalie becoming a monster was more than enough on its own."
(... What?)
The two in the room with him, Hirietta and Majic, asked at the same time.
Orphen ignored them and stared right at Majic with a quiet — calm look in his eyes.
"... Hey. Is it true that Cleao's dead?"
"Oh..."
Majic was absolutely mortified as he placed his hand over his mouth, at a loss for words. Orphen figured he regretted what he had said. However, as he continued to stare in silence, he simply nodded with a strange shadow cast over his dirty face.
"Y-Yeah."
"I see..."
Orphen replied, then turned to Hirietta.
"We're getting out of here. In a closed room like this, we'll be cornered sooner or later. When I give the signal, jump into the exit. You first, then Majic."
"... I'll go with your plan, for now."
Hirietta stopped her cue, biting her bright red lip.
"But I think you're forgetting the most important thing. There are four creatures in total."
Orphen's eyes blinked at her words, and he turned his attention to the exit door, which had been left open.
There, a lanky, half-human, half-snake creature stood idly by, doing nothing — It was Kikuiem.
"Ugh..."
A long, thin moan creaked out of his throat — Kozen had regained consciousness. The headache was throbbing like a wave surging from the back of his skull. As he calmed down, he knew the pain wasn't just in his head, either. The wound on his left shoulder seemed to have stopped bleeding, but it left a dull ache.
"Motherfucker."
He spat, and sat up. He held his aching head and looked around. His vision was still hazy, but it was so dark that he wondered at first if he'd gone blind. However, after a few moments, his eyes slowly grew used to the darkness.
He was in a room that looked like some sort of storage shed, with the windows all nailed closed from the inside. However, if he glanced around, he could easily see that the room wasn't a shed. He was lying on the floor, but in the center of the room was a bed, or rather, a surgical bed, bolted firmly in place. There were no light fixtures on the ceiling, but there was a gas lamp hook, even if it was partially torn off. There was also a large hole in the ceiling through which a blue sky peeked in from the late afternoon.
The room was quite large, and he could tell from the vague hints that it was on the second floor. In the corner of the room, among what appeared to be junk, there was a cabinet and what looked like surgical equipment.
"An operating room, huh...?"
Kozen thought rather simply. He wondered if that meant this was some kind of hospital... He pulled his sword from the scabbard at his waist, then looked around more carefully. He'd been brought here by that mysterious 'ghost' — he was sure of it. He'd been carried by a gust of wind, like a small tornado that had been created by it. He must've been dropped into this room through the hole in the ceiling. This place had to be somewhere close to the village, because there was no way they could've traveled far like that.
"Wait a minute—"
Kozen had a flash of inspiration.
"Yes — Phonogolos. That's what it said. I've heard that the heretic Phonogolos has a compound around here. Perhaps this is it..."
As he started to walk away, he felt something squish under his foot — and looked down with a disgusted expression. It was a huge lump of dust. Thin white bones were sticking out from here and there in the mass that he'd stepped on. They appeared to be the bones of a cat, but there were also some strange bones mixed in here and there that he knew couldn't belong to a cat.
"They must've been corroded and turned to dust, but what the hell is this thing? Did cats have five limbs?"
There was no way it could be, but it didn't matter. Kozen looked up when he made that decision. He was concerned about the center bunk. Someone was lying there, slumped in a heap.
As he approached, he saw that it was the girl he'd just met in the village — or rather, had even been kicked by. She was lying there with her eyes closed and her hands clasped to her chest, not moving a muscle. Not even breathing.
(There don't seem to be any external injuries...?)
Kozen reached out and placed his fingers on the girl's neck. After a moment, he sighed.
"She's dead — No...? What?"
He couldn't tell. She certainly didn't have a pulse. Her body temperature was also quite cold, though higher than the room temperature.
Yet there was something strange. If there'd been a knife in the girl's chest, Kozen wouldn't have given it a second thought, but there was seemingly no cause of death at all. If she died of asphyxiation, there's no way she could've died with such a beautiful face. There were no signs of fractures around the spine. If she died of shock, it seemed strange that her eyes were closed. If she'd died of gas poisoning or frozen to death, her corpse should've been found in a state that matched those conditions, but there was no way she could've frozen to death on such a warm summer day, and if it'd been gas, he'd have died the same way. The only possibility would be death from disease, but it'd have to be something unnoticeable.
He didn't want to accept the fact that he'd been kicked so spectacularly by a dead girl.
"Well... Whatever."
With that one word, Kozen sheathed his sword and picked the girl up instead. It wasn't for any reason in particular. In the end, he was sure that he was only doing it because he couldn't figure out her cause of death, but even if she was now only a corpse, he knew he'd never sleep again if he left a girl he knew in some haunted house like this.
The girl was lighter than he expected, and cradling her in his arms, Kozen looked around, feeling a little overwhelmed. There was a door leading out of the room, but he wasn't sure if he could just walk through it. The scar on his right hand twitched under the girl's armpit, as if worried.
Then—
He suddenly noticed something strange. In the corner of the room, among the junk, there was a hole that he might've mistaken for a well were it not indoors. He approached it and took a peek inside.
Booooooooooom!
He heard an explosion and caught a glimpse of what looked like a flash of light.
"—Sorcery?"
As soon as he muttered the words,
"What are you saying, all of them are dangerous!"
He could faintly hear the voice of the sorcerer apprentice boy who'd been with the girl.
"Is there a battle going on... beneath this pit?"
Kozen muttered to himself.
"The depth of this hole suggests there's a basement. If that was sorcery, does that mean he's here...?"
Thump!
Kozen was suddenly pushed away, taking two or three steps back. What had pushed him out of the way was — the black fog!
At the same time, the fog spread around him. The originally dark room was now engulfed by swirling blackness. In confusion, Kozen clicked his tongue and dropped the girl's body. He couldn't bear to abandon her, but if he didn't run, he'd be the one to die.
"Damn it!"
He reached for the scabbard at his waist, but the sword was gone.
"What the—?"
As he screamed, the black mist suddenly split in two right before his eyes. From the center, he saw his own sword's white blade flash, lunging at his chest, the chest of its owner.
"... When you have to fight someone that you couldn't possibly compete against, no matter how much power you have — and you feel you must defeat them — what do you think you should do, Krylancelo?"
Slowly, from the depths of the shadows, spoke a quiet, emotionless voice — the voice of Childman, the strongest black-magic sorcerer on the continent...
Orphen, or rather Krylancelo at the time, simply replied that he didn't know. His master, in contrast, simply shrugged his shoulders.
"You cheat."
I remember now, Orphen clicked his tongue. A dozen crates were stacked behind him.
Sammy and the Armor were lined up side by side, staring at him — while the Snake barred the only way out, and with the invisible hand — that made up the four creatures, while he stood alone.
"I just remembered."
"What?"
Majic asked. He clung to Hirietta's waist like a lost child. The female assassin looked down at him with annoyance, but Majic didn't seem to notice.
Orphen smiled wryly and plucked the bandana from his forehead.
"Now that I've remembered... I'm not Orphen for a while."
He silently placed the bandana in the boys hands, ignoring his apprentice who raised a quizzical look at him. Next, he took off his jacket and handed that to him as well. Finally... he removed the pendant from around his neck.
The emblem of the one-legged dragon, entwined with a sword — proof of being a sorcerer from the Tower of Fang. He took it in his hand and looked at it intently. On the back of the dragon, with its wings outstretched, was carved the owner's name. His pendant had the named Krylancelo carved into it — a name that had become a strange legend among the sorcerers of the continent. Orphen looked at it with a grin and handed the silver pendant over to Majic.
"Master...?"
Majic asked, holding the things he'd been given. Orphen looked at Sammy.
"When I die, take that pendant with you to the Tower of Fang. It's the least they could do. At the Tower... Choose Forte Packingum to be your Childman Class as your master. If you mention my name, he won't be able to refuse you."
"M-Master!"
Majic shouted as a look of surprise came over his face. He continued, his eyes as wide as saucers.
"If you die, that's a bad omen..."
"Shut up. I'm not going to die."
He said, his eyes flashing with a hint of surprise.
"It's just a precaution. Think of it as an insurance policy."
Orphen turned to Hirietta.
"I'll take care of that snake. When he moves from the doorway, take Majic and run."
"... What are you going to do about him?"
Hirietta asked with sweat dripping down her cheeks, but Orphen didn't answer.
"If I told you, they'd know about it, too. I'll draw them away anyway."
"Are you going to fight them all be yourself?"
"Well, I guess so."
"Do you think you can hold your own without support?"
(...Cleao would've said the same thing.)
Orphen chuckled.
"Yeah."
He nodded so casually that it must've taken her by surprise. He saw the shock written clearly on Hirietta's face for a moment, and then Majic interrupted from beside her. He looked impatient, and spoke quickly.
"There's no way you can manage against a group like this!"
"It's going to happen."
Orphen beamed a quiet, expressionless smile.
"I'll stab them all, even if it means stabbing them in the back."
Stab, he said, but Majic evidently didn't get the nuance behind that word. He threw back a look of disapproval, but soon realized that it didn't matter.
"Why do you have to do that! These people have nothing to do with you, Master!"
"You said it yourself. Cleao was killed by these people."
"No...!"
Majic was startled.
"Wait, Master, are you saying you're going to take revenge?"
"They killed Cleao, and she will be avenged accordingly."
Saying this, Orphen ran out. He bolted in a straight line toward the back of the basement, toward Sammy. The Armor moved slowly and sluggishly as it saw him move.
"Orphen!"
"Master!"
Orphen ignored the calls of the two who were chasing after him.
"I'm here, Sammy!"
He shouted, thrusting his right hand toward the jet-black face of the Armor that loomed just in front of him.
"It's me, Phonogolos!"
He cast a spell with his statement, releasing his magical power. The photothermal wave fired at close range struck the Armor square in the face. The huge armored figure, which must've weighed 200 kilograms, was blown back several meters by the impact of the explosion, although it didn't seem particularly effective. A heavy thud echoed through the basement.
Orphen didn't stop, and ran straight into the room.
In front of him, Sammy's face visibly stiffened, and he screamed.
"Phonogolos — He's here! Kill him—!"
Grrrssssss!
A voice came from behind him, around the entrance of the room. The sound of the serpent tightening its throat — Just as I thought, Orphen muttered to himself.
(I knew it, all of these creatures are under Sammy's control!)
"I release, the Sword of Light!"
He fired the torrent of light with all of his might, piercing through the center of Sammy. With an explosion, Sammy's mist-formed body was thoroughly scattered.
At the same time, Orphen spun around. The Snake that'd been waiting at the entrance was now coming towards him with a slithering gait, but unusually fast. It slipped past Majic and Hirietta — The head, shaped like a rugby ball when viewed from the front, opened its jaws—
"Shyaa!"
With one short breath, a yellowish liquid spurted out from the center of its mouth. He jumped sideways to dodge it, but the liquid on the floor gave off a strange sound and smell, accompanied by white smoke. The concrete of the floor melted as it hissed.
(Venom!)
Orphen realized as he slipped beside the snake's body and circled around behind it. With a light touch, he placed his right hand on the serpent's scale-covered back.
"I see, the princess of chaos!"
A vortex of super-gravity surrounded the snake-man's body, crushing his long, thin frame to the floor without resistance. Even without pausing to look over at the Snake, which had collapsed like a sinking ship, Orphen was jumping, somehow anticipating the next attack — he looked down, seeing Kenkrim's fingertips, which had emerged from the floor, resentfully sink back down through the stone and disappear after having failed to catch their prey.
Orphen landed with a thud and turned to the creatures. Majic and Hirietta were no longer in the room. He could hear the sound of hurried footsteps echoing up the stairs.
Staring at the creatures, they showed no signs of damage, despite having been hit by one blow each. The Armor was standing up as if nothing had happened to it, and the Snake was looking over its shoulder, making a strange noise. Sammy, which had once dispersed, was also gathering in the same position at the center of the room. The Hand was nowhere to be seen.
Left alone in the room with the Combat Creatures, Orphen folded his arms. He confronted them as they were — and as he watched Sammy get back to his normal form, he spoke up.
"Don't get carried away. I'm serious now. Just to be clear..."
The corner of his eyes lifted up, and he continued.
"I'm furious."
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Fool's Gathering Fool's Trap Fool's Rumor Fool's Confession Fool's Showdown Fools Never Stop |